When Ọlọrun And His Òrìṣàs Slept, Part 1
Alafin Agu of Guinea
Born: 1087
Reigned: 1097 - 1098
Luwoo Nri was born to minor nobility in Oyo. His father could trace his lineage back to Oba Nri-Alike, via the oba’s younger daughter Nwabugwu, but two hundred years later there was a vast difference between the Nris of Oyo and the Nris of Igbo-Ukwu. He learned from his father that there was his family and there was the family, and one must always serve the family.
To serve the family, Luwoo was sent to Igbo-Ukwo as an apprentice for Guinea’s notorious spymaster, Awo Nńche. There he must have attracted Funanya’s attention somehow, because the next record we have is him being betrothed to the young Ekwefi. As Ekwefi’s betrothed and later her husband, his amiable disposition complemented her fiery nature. He was supportive and kind, in many ways her biggest fan. And when Ekwefi was killed in a duel, nobody was more devastated than her husband.
With Ekwefi dead, Luwoo was suddenly father to the heir to the mighty Guinea empire. He had known that this was a possibility, of course, but he hardly imagined that it would happen so soon, that his bright, self-possessed, considerate five year old boy would be the heir for an elderly empress. The notion was in all honesty terrifying. Luwoo wanted nothing more than to protect Agu from the pressures of the world and the attention of dangerous people. He wanted Agu to have the quiet life that he had once expected for himself. Instead, Agu would be expected to meet the most dangerous men and women in the world and prove himself their master. Luwoo kept his fears to himself. He saw no reason to scare the boy with such talk.
As old Alafin Funanya began to fail, Luwoo’s fear only grew. Agu would make a good alafin, in time, but right now he was just so young…
Modern history divides the early empire of Guinea into two broad regions: a ‘Nigerian’ core, referring to the traditional lands of the Igbo, Yoruba, Edo, and Hausa, and the culture and religion there of; and an ‘Atlantic’ frontier, referring to the traditional Akon-worshipping territories of the west that were held more loosely by the Nri alafins. While the Nigerian lands were becoming rapidly developed and urbanizations in this period, the Atlantic provinces were still poor. The Orisan faith was not widely practiced. Many ajapadas and obas of the west considered themselves to be far from the center, but some few had been vassalized by force during Funanya’s western expansion a decade before. The region was a powder keg, ready for a match.
Enter Obiageli Nri, the nana of the Atlantic coastal province of Gola near the northern border. Obiageli’s mother had been granted lands in the newly acquired western coast, but over time that honor came to feel like exile. Obiageli inherited her mother’s sense of grievance, but she also had an easy charm and raw cunning that her mother had lacked. She could speak to the western nobles in terms they understood, and harness their resentments into something greater than themselves.
She would meet every complaint with another, every rumor with a more outrageous rumor. When the nobles were boiling with fury, she’d hold up a hand and say, we could do this differently. The people of the west could take this empire for ourselves, as the Igbo took it from the Soninke sixty years ago. Soon the alafin will die, and a boy will be sitting on the throne. When that day comes, we can make our move.
******
1097. Agu, Alafin of all Guinea, accepted the crown from High Shaman Nwokike. He stood proud, and said the ritual words with a bright, clear voice. Luwoo’s heart swelled. For the first time in a long time, he felt hope.
Obiageli never wanted to hurt the boy. When she met with her supporters, the young woman was adamant that Agu wasn’t the enemy. The westerners had the obas of Akon and Adiru with them, and a dozen other nobles including the boy’s own uncle Nwora. They had three times the men that the alafin could command. Obiageli would make Agu see reason, and handle things peacefully.
The confrontation quickly got out of hand, however. Nwora was nervously fingering his sword, which made Agu’s father pull his sword. Before Obiageli knew what was happening, there was a royal guard lying dead on the floor and Agu was pleading for everybody to just stop. They all might have killed each other, rebel and royalist alike, if Agu had not stood up and offered his abdication, right there.
The whole business left a bad taste in Obiageli’s mouth. It was messier than she wanted it to be. Perhaps that’s why she left the boy in charge of his Igboland holdings. Somebody else might have been more ruthless, but she didn’t have it in her. Still, she was now Alafin Obiageli, crowned in a hasty ceremony before marching back to Gola on the Atlantic Coast. There was satisfaction in claiming the throne for the westerners, and she regarded with great pleasure the notion of building a grand palace overlooking the bay and a powerful retinue of Gola and Kru warriors.
Once back at Gola, however, she found herself pressed by challengers at all sides. She might dream of a mighty retinue, but at the moment, the imperial throne was weak, disconnected from the wealthy Nigerian holdings and the traditional palace guard. Suddenly the eastern lords were getting rebellious, led by the recently conquered Oba of Kanem and some of the Hausa ajapadas. Meanwhile, the Bidaic lords at Guinea’s northern border began to raid, preparing for a larger incursion.
With her position deteriorating almost immediately, Alafin Obiageli regretted her decision to leave Igboland alone. Agu had the most experienced warriors in the empire, and he kept them at home while he sulked. Obiageli sent Nwora Nri to rally the other Igbo lords to divest the boy of his holdings, hoping against hope to force another nearly bloodless coup. But it all went wrong when the boy fought back. Thanks to this intervention, Obiageli had the Niger river delta aflame with civil war while she was fighting a rebellion in the far east and border incursions in the west.
It had all been so clear in her head. How had it gone so wrong?
Luwoo would never forget the day that the traitor Nwora Nri stormed the imperial palace. The rebels were plainly incensed at the notion that Agu had fought back. They took this fury out on the palace retainers, slaughtering guards, yes, but also servants and old men and children too young to understand what was happening. Obiageli had thought to say that Agu should be kept safe, but had said nothing about the commonfolk and Nwora was taking full advantage.
When the rebels came to lead Agu away as hostage, the boy stood with his shoulders straight and addressed his enemies with a soft but confident voice. Nwora, his sword stained with the blood of better men, announced if Agu was reasonable then nobody else need to get hurt. The gall of that man made Luwoo want to choke. With his son in chains, however, he could do nothing but hate.
******
Alafin Obiageli got the report back: Nwora had gotten the boy to renounce his throne to Igbo-Benue and his claim on the palace guard, but in the process had made so many enemies that it was scarcely worth it. Worse, everybody knew that he was acting on her orders, so his crimes were hers. She could hardly renounce him without appearing weak and confused, so instead she congratulated him for a job well done. It seemed better than admitting that she could not control him.
Agu was hardly going to take this latest assault lying down, however. What might he do when he came of age, with an unimpeachable claim on the throne? What might the Nigerian nobles do? The alafin began to fret about worst case scenarios, and had her spymaster chasing all sorts of conspiracies. Nwora was often by her side that Agu had to die, either out of bloodlust or the simple sense that his own head would be first on the chopping block. Obiageli resisted, unwilling to accept that she had become a murderer of children.
Early in 1101, however, the Guinean spymaster came back with a report. Agu was seeking to take a Malinese bride, and dropping hints about making a claim for the throne again. The young man was 14 now, and soon he would be able to launch a war for the throne with the swords of Mali at his back. Thanks to Nwora’s excesses, he would have no reason to show mercy to her or her supporters.
At the council meeting, Alafin Obiageli made eye contact with Nwora. Nwora nodded, and left the room. That was all it took.