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A platform on Ecology, African History and Culture. Feed your minds with enthusiasm and willingness to learn as we time travel.

19/05/2026

Papel are an ethnic group established in Casamance (Senegal), Guinea Bissau and Guinea. Most Papel people today are Christians, usually Catholic, but some still adhere to traditional beliefs, Ancestor veneration amongst traditional spiritual practitioners is central to Papel culture.
Papel people live traditionally around the city of Bissau, in the Biombo Region. They are linguistically and culturally close to mankagnes and Manjack or Manjacas. They are traditionally farmers. So, they have one of the most suitable land for rice cultivation.



Photo of Nahés (Papel) by Serra. 1962



Einarsdóttir, Jónina (2024). Tired of Weeping: Mother Love, Child Death, and Poverty in Guinea–Bissau. University of Wisconsin Press.

13/04/2026

The Eyo masquerade essentially admits tall people, which is why it is described as Agogoro Eyo (literally meaning the tall Eyo masquerade). In the manner of a spirit (An Orisha) visiting the earth on a purpose, the Eyo masquerade speaks in a ventriloquial voice, suggestive of its otherworldliness; and when greeted, it replies: Mo yo fun e, mo yo fun ara mi, which in Yoruba means: I rejoice for you, and I rejoice for myself. This response connotes the masquerades as rejoicing with the person greeting it for the witnessing of the day, and its own joy at taking the hallowed responsibility of cleansing. During the festival, Sandals and foot wear, as well as Suku, a hairstyle that is popular among the Yorubas one that has the hair coverage at the middle, then shoot upward, before tipping downward are prohibited.
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The festival has also taken a more touristic dimension in recent times, which like the Osun Osogbo festival, attracts visitors from all across Nigeria, as well as Yoruba diaspora populations. In fact, it is widely believed that the play is one of the manifestation of the customary African revelry that serves as the forerunner of the modern carnival in Brazil and other parts of the New World, which may have been started by the enslaved Yoruba people transplanted in that part of the world due to the Atlantic slave trade.



Eyo Olokun



Traditional Festivals, Vol. 2 [M - Z]. ABC-CLIO. 2005. p. 346.

18/08/2025

According to a Y-Chromosome DNA study by Wood et al. (2005), around 73% of Gĩkũyũs belong to the common paternal haplogroup E1b1a. The remainder carry other clades: 19% E1b1b with E-M293 contributing 11%, 2% A, and 2% B.
In terms of maternal lineages, Gĩkũyũs closely cluster with other Eastern Bantu groups like the Sukuma. Most belong to various Africa-centered mtDNA macro-haplogroup L lineages such as L0f, L3x, L4g and L5 per Castri et al. (2009). According to Salas et al. (2002), other Gĩkũyũs largely carry the L1a clade, which is one of the African mtDNA Haplogroups.



de Filippo, C; Barbieri, C; Whitten, M; et al. (March 2011). “Mol Biol Evo”. Mol. Biol. Evol. 28 (3): 1255-69.

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