gba ǹje

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Same spelling, different tones

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• ògbanje(= nwa ōgbanje) (from -gba nje make several trips to and from a place; literally maker of several trips or recurrent visitor) 'repeater'; child believed to belong to a band in the world of spirits to which he/she returns in infancy; from there he goes back to his mother's womb to be born again, only to die and return to the spirit world again in infancy. Ògbanje is born several times, dying each time and returning to the world of spirits. A mother who experiences frequent child mortality is believed to be visited by a member or members of the ògbanje group. The new-born baby is regarded as the one who died last; and the child's death is to be expected any time, unless a native doctor specialist in ògbanje spirits is provided and performs successfully certain rituals which include the ògbanje object known as iyi ògbanje or iyi ùwà, on which the ògbanje swore to return to the spirit world. The place where the object is hidden is known only to the doctor and the ògbanje. (But an ògbanje can decide to stay and live to old age without the native doctor's rituals and/or propitiation to the other members of his particular ògbanje band.) Sometimes a part of the dead ògbanje's body, e.g. a finger or an ear, is amputated, and as proof that it was the same child who returns next time it is believed that such amputated parts are missing on the new baby's body. The amputation of parts of the body is done in the belief that the ògbanje would feel the pain and/or shame and on the next return to the world would remember it and refuse to die again. An ògbanje who stays is given excessive petting and care to the disadvantage of the other children. The parents who have suffered greatly at the hands of the ògbanje and become improverished do everything possible in order to prevent a recurrence of the bitter experience. The ògbanje behaves in his own peculiar way. Sometimes his character and physical features may bear no resemblance to those of any member of the family. The surviving ògbanje sometimes exploits this difference and the special treatment of his parents ruthlessly and selfishly by, for instance, demanding that a particular kind of clothes must be bought for him, otherwise the parents run the risk of losing him. Certain proper names are often though not invariably given to surviving ògbanjes. The names are believed to help in preventing the ògbanje from returning to the world of spirits. The names include Nònyelụm stay with me; Nwoōsu the son of òsu (but this does not make such a child an òsu. It is meant to bring shame on the ògbanje as explained above).