Dedications

After their last meeting, when Reverend Father Antonio Aymemí delivered to the most excellent governor the original of this present work, God, our father, called to his servant to reward his forty-seven extremely fruitful apostolic years. The grateful homeland also honored its illustrious son by naming him director general of Morocco and colonies, a reward most fitting for his persistent and highly productive labor on behalf of the church and mother country.

Father Aymemí went to heaven on Sept. 29, 1941; from there, he keeps watch, always with much care, over the souls of his beloved Bubis.

On Jan. 21 of the current year, 1942, the most excellent Juan Fontán y Lobé was appointed by the august chief of state as Director General of Morocco and Colonies. From a position so elevated as deserved, and using more powerful connections, he will continue, untiring, the great work of cultivating the social, religious, and economic prosperity of that colony, Father Aymemí’s memory and affection carried innermost in his heart. He also will uphold with determination the efforts of his honored successor, the most excellent Mariano Alonso y Alonso, and those of the esteemed bishop, the Most Reverend Father Leoncio Fernández, who leads the phalanx of the Missionary Sons of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

To the most excellent Francisco Franco Bahamonde, chief of the state of Spain, restorer of the homeland’s traditions and of the colonial sentiment, we have the honor to dedicate a modest colonial work, produced after more than forty-five years of living among the original race of Fernando Po. If it sees the light of publication, it is owing to the generous encouragement of the esteemed colonist, the most excellent Juan Fontán y Lobé, governor general.

Nothing is more natural than to give to your excellency this sincere homage of our admiration and our recognition. For you, most excellent sir, by your merits as statesman and soldier, and by lending your profound attention to the progressive development of the colony, have shown a supreme interest to have reappear the Africanist orientations of that great queen who was called Isabel the Catholic.

He responds to our affection for your personage, to the homage of our loyalty to your high representation, and to your work. This simple homage is rendered with pleasure on behalf of the missions of Fernando Poo.

To know the psychology of a village, a tribe, or of any race, it is an indisputable point that one must interpenetrate well into their ways and customs, their predominant ideas, their feelings, their manners of conduct, both with regard to the individual and family, and in their relations with strangers.

Now, to gain a perfect understanding of all of this, it is essential, of course, to understand and speak their language in the most precise way possible, which is to say, mastering their phrasing, their idioms, etc.

Based on this most important truth, the Catholic Church earnestly recommends to its missionaries who evangelize in infidel countries that they tenaciously procure the learning of the language of those indigenous persons who have been put under their special care.

And, concentrating now on the island of Fernando Po, we have Reverend Father Pedro Sala, so appreciated by the Bubis of Batete, Musola, and Basakato because he understood them perfectly. The same could be said of he who was among the Bubis of Conception and Moka, the most virtuous Father Pablo Pardina, who translated for the Bubis of Biapa the catechism of B.P. Claret, which was printed on the Peninsula.

And what will I say of the author of this present work, The Bubis, by Reverend Father Antonio Aymemí, whose introduction I have the honor and pleasure to give to its readers.

God’s grace compelled him from the moment he arrived in these lands in the year 1894, and very soon he could understand the indigenous, and they he, and he could probe into their most intimate ways.

Fruit ripened in all of his studies, in all of his works, in all of his investigations, and in all of his repeated forays on this Fernandian island for a space of more than forty-five consecutive years. His dedication brought about his Bubi Grammar and Dictionary and, more in particular, this present work, The Bubis, in which he wonderfully explains, enumerates, and describes each and every one of their customs, from birth to death.

Many times I have heard asked by way of complaint: “Why doesn’t someone write an illustrated work in which the ancient customs of the Bubis are described, to have a record for posterity so they won’t be lost to oblivion?” Well, from now on, whenever that questions is asked it can be answered: “Take and read the work The Bubi by the worthy missionary Reverend Father Antonio Aymemí, and in that you will find all that you desire.”

If only it also would be read by the Bubis! In it they could see that which was of their ancestors and the huge changes that have happened since their time to the present-day. And, comparing the past with the present, they would be moved to a hymn of gratitude to the Catholic religion and Mother Spain who have covered their brothers with their flag of protection, elevating them to a higher level of culture and leading them from any poor practices that may remain from those ancient superstitions this book so simply and naturally relates.

Reverend Father Antonio Aymemí receives the tribute and most sincere admiration from his old companion, who arrived in the colony, as did he, in 1894.

That the indigenous people of Fernando Poo Island belong to the large Bantu family is fundamental knowledge for anyone hoping to become even moderately educated in African ethnography and ethnology.

In the opinion of celebrated Africanist Delafosse[1] and others, the original Bantu were from numerous villages situated south of an irregular demarcation line that divides Rodolfo Lake, ends in the mouth of the King River in the Atlantic, runs from here to the Cape of Good Hope, and only among them exist ethnic and linguistic ties.

The Bantu never formed vast states or huge empires in the manner of the strong Sudanese family. Not that the Bantus were in any way inferior to the other African races, from the social and political points of view, nor in them was there less passion for profit, ambition, power, and authority – traits that produced conquerors and founders of expanding empires. It is simply that their country is covered in large part by dense and impenetrable jungles and crossed by innumerable waterways. Annual floods present insurmountable obstacles and, therefore, make the area less favorable for military enterprises, political relations, and trade.

Bantu origin is much obscured, and at the present it is a little less than impossible to mark for certain their ancient region. Nonetheless, the majority of anthropologists who have thoroughly studied the subject agree that the Bantu cradle was an immense territory of lakes between the source of the Nile, Congo, and Ubangi rivers.

Africanists disagree in which era the dispersion of different Bantu groups took place. Some are of the opinion that it was around the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, each group taking a different direction, and it can be affirmed with enough probability that the Bubis were the first to abandon their country of origin. The proof of this is that their tongues correspond to the first formation of the Bantu language, according to the common belief of the Africanist philologists.[2]

[1] [Maurice Delafosse (1870-1926) French scholar, teacher, and author of numerous books on African languages, history, and culture, including “Negroes in Africa: History and Culture,” Washington: Associated Publishers, 1931. This paragraph and the next paraphrase that book. Trans.]

[2] [Modern thought on Bantu origin and expansion places the cradle of the Bantu languages in Nigeria’s Benue Valley. According to Jan Vansima, in Paths in the Rainforest (University of Wisconsin Press, 1990): “In that general area, the Bantu family split into two branches: eastern and western Bantu, a split dated by glottochronology to c. 3000 BC. Western Bantu evolved east of the Cross River in western Cameroon, both on the then-forested Bamileke Plateau and on the lowlands near the ocean.” Author John Reader, in his book Africa: A Biography of the Continent (Alfred A. Knopf, 1998), also puts Bantu dispersion from their cradle-land at around 5000 years ago. The Bubis still are believed to have been among the first Bantu to migrate, and probably first arrived on Bioko sometime between 2000 and 3000 BC. Vansima notes: “Among the early splits, some were caused by the isolation of small groups moving out of reach. That seems to be the case for the Bioko and the Myene-Tsogo group, who moved by sea. ... Archaeological evidence attests to the early phases of settlement on Bioko. The earliest sites lie on the northern coast. They reveal a Neolithic occupation without ceramics, which has not been dated. From the seventh century AD on, pottery appears.” A second wave of migration from the African coast to Bioko Island accounts for much-later settlements. Vansima writes: “Most traditions tell of a Great Migration comprising four waves of immigrants. ... (Evidence) suggests that the immigrants conquered the earlier Bubi settlers. Nevertheless, the archaeological and linguistic evidence makes it clear that, conquerors or not, the immigrants adopted the language and the material culture of the aboriginal population. ... The archaeological evidence in hand suggests that the Great Migration ended in the fourteenth century.” Trans.]

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