“La Prise de la Pierre Sacrée”, or “Epe Ekpe”, is the annual festival in Glidji whereby the colour of a sacred stone tells the fortune of the coming year. The stone is retrieved from a sacred forest by a high priest who interprets its colour. White represents abundance, black is destruction and famine, red is for war, blue is abundance. This was my first experience watching performers enter a deep trance and it was an explosion of gesticulation, singing, drumming, and of course the spell-binding trance where dancers fling their heads back, eyes roll to the back of their heads, movements become wilder and more animated to the crescendo of drums…
Historical Guin festival. It is undoubtedly one of the most important ceremonies in West Africa. Epé-Ekpé is the occasion to take the sacred stone, the Kpessosso and marks the beginning of the year of the Guin ethnic group. It is usually celebrated in September in Glidji Kpodji. The Epé-Ekpé calendar is set at the Nma Dumo (corn seed) ceremony, which takes place on the first new moon in June. After this ceremony, the high priest is instructed by the religious authorities to announce to traditional priests (hunon) and followers the beginning of the forbidden period, Sedodo.
Sedodo (prohibition decree) is a Lenten period of about three months. From that day on, no one has the right to make noise at night, to mourn the dead or to play the drum. No one can break these laws or risk attracting revenge and anger from the gods. Anyone who violates these laws will regularly mourn at the time of the annual ceremony and will be deprived of a funeral.
The Kpessosso, taken from the sacred stone, always falls on a Thursday is the highlight of the ceremony. All the initiates and devotees of the deities gather around Gbatsome. This ceremony takes place in three stages:
Tchesi Dodo (preparation of sacred water). Before starting the Tchesi Dodo ritual, the Tchesi is prepared with sea water, a bottle of gin, a bottle of sodabi and special herbs. Once the preparation is finished, the hunons and some insiders place their hands over the bowl and soak them three times successively in the liquid before spraying those around them. The bowl is then placed in front of the crowd. It is at this moment that the Tchesi’s blessing rite begins. The high priest then begins several invocations and prayers. When these are finished, he heads for the sacred enclosure and returns with bottles of alcohol containing the strength of voodoo and that he entrusts to the hunon. New prayers are said at the end, then he pours the various drinks into the bowl and goes to each convent to make sacrifices. This is when the ritual libation ceremonies begin.
People gather in front of the convents for purification and receive a few drops of water on their heads before washing their faces. During this ritual, many followers fall into a violent trance. After making the libations, each group heads to the sacred place where the sanctuaries of the three great voodoo shrines stand to which they offer offerings.
Le Motata (track clearing). The path leading to the sacred forest where the sacred stone will be “discovered” is swept only once a year, during this ceremony. Only religious leaders enter the forest, while the crowd waits at the edge in an increasingly excited state.
The Kpessosso (taking the sacred stone). After a while, hunons and vodusi come out of the sacred forest. A young vodusi wears the sacred stone that symbolizes the New Year and represents the goddess mama Koley. The delirious crowd waits in the square in front of the convent of Avu du Pu, in the centre of which stands a column of white stone surrounded by a bamboo fence. The procession then goes around the convent of Mama Koley and returns to the entrance of the path. The vodusi perform ritual dances before lifting the stone with their arms. This is the highlight of this ceremony which marks the beginning of the year for the Guen-Mina
