Africa's Sinister Vampire Tradition

Photo: Steve Weaver

The African vampire tradition is thought to be one of the oldest; perhaps consequently it is the known the least because the lore of the African people was shared primarily through the oral tradition. Totally different from the Victorian vampire, the African vampire is less centered on sexual repression, and more a supernatural explanation for crop failures and inexplicable diseases at the time. African vampires range from demonic predators such as Asasabonsam and the Adze that physically extract blood from their victims to the ghostly Obayifo that absorbed blood through psychic means. The closest thing to the human-transformed vampire in the African tradition is the witch that used a myriad of means to steal the blood from its enemies and children to keep itself young. Minions of the witch also tended to be either undead or vampiric and attacked the enemies of their master.

In the deep forests of south Ghana the Ashanti hunters speak of a winged, demonic, virile, mannish creature with iron teeth lurking in the trees, the Asasabonsam. A predator to the hunters prowling in the area, the Asasabonsam would snatch men into the trees with their hook shaped feet and suck their blood. The creature may also hang by its hooked feet and snatch you away with its arms. As a species Asasabonsam were both female and male, and the sex and race of those they attacked was also nonspecific.

Photo: James Clayton

A few sightings of the Asasabonsam declare the creature to have a wingspan of up to twenty feet, giving modern researchers a reason to believe that the Asasabonsam was actually an extremely large bat, a rare species that was indigenous to the area. Whether the creature was actually a man-eater or the scapegoat for missing hunters is of course unknown. A photograph was thought to be taken of the creature, but it is now lost and thus remains a mystery to this day.

Also a product of Ashanti lore, the Obayifo (nicknamed “Bayi”) was known to various other tribes’ mythology. The Dahomeans knew it as the Asiman. But despite its different names, the common story holds up. The Obayifo was a witch masquerading amongst the living, much like an average vampire. Yet unlike the average vampire, becoming an Obayifo was a ritual process, and was not a trait passed on genetically. Therefore the process of identifying an Obayifo was very difficult. At night the Obayifo would leave its body, travelling as a ball of light much like the will-o-wisp, and would psychically drain the blood from its victims when hungry. Its favorite victims was small children; otherwise the Obayifo didn't discriminate between the blood or life force of its victims. If thirsty the Obayifo would drain the life from fruits and vegetables. The Obayifo is known to devour entire fields of crop. A creature consumed with envy for others, it is considered an evil being whose only adversary is the Okomfo, a holy priest believed to be the voice of the town’s gods.

In Nigeria among the Yako were witches similar to the Obayifo which were also believed to assume a corporeal form and leave an ulcer as a mark of their sucking. They could also assume the shape of an incubus or succubus and suffocate someone in their sleep. Such a vampire is believed to be the basis of the Loogaroo, Asema, and the Sukuyan found in the Caribbean (Haiti, Surinam, and Trinidad, respectfully).

Photo: whiteafrican

Although not considered vampires, many witches in Africa practiced vampirism in various methods. While working in the delta of the Niger River, Arthur Glyn Leonard heard tale of witches secretly leaving the village at night and working with demons to bring death upon their enemies. The ritual slowly sapped the blood of the victim until death. Signs of the ritual were unbeknownst to the villagers, but the pain to the victim was very real. Leonard hypothesized that the procedure was a highly adept poisoning technique, much like that of the sorcerers of medieval Europe. Also in Nigeria was an excruciating ritual called the “sucking out of the heart.” At night a witch would sit upon the roof of the victim and extract blood straight from the heart of the victim. P. Amaury Talbot linked this vampire ritual to tuberculosis. In West Africa amongst the Ga people, witches gathered around a pot called the baisea that was believed to contain the souls of these vampires' victims. Anyone looking in the pot except the witches would see water, but the Ga witches saw the life force they withdrew through psychic means. The afflicted did not hesitate to pursue the witches responsible. Strict trials were ordered to identify the witch that was causing harm, and the person found guilty would be harshly executed (such trials are similar to the witch and vampire trials held in Europe).

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Witches were executed warily. One tribe believed that pulling the tongue of the witch and pinning it to the chin with a thorn prevented any final curses the witch would make. As punishment, witches were often impaled by a stake and then their heads severed, either burning the body or leaving it for predators to eat. The tribes were even suspicious of buried bodies. If there was a hole found where a person was buried, the deceased was believed to have escaped in the form of a small animal such as a rodent. Traces of blood and abnormal bloating would also be considered a sign of the undead. Only by totally destroying the body was the evil spirit believed to have been destroyed.

Photo: Axel Rouvin

Witches also had the ability to summon insidious and vampiric creatures to do their bidding. The Isithfuntela are the corpses of a witch’s servant reanimated to do the bidding of the witch. A nail was driven through the head of the creature so as to puncture the brain and its tongue was cut out rendering it fit for an undead zombie. The Isithfuntela then started a cult following for it by hypnotizing its victims and then driving a nail in their head as well.

A lightning elemental bird the size of a man, the Impundulu was a creature tales of which originated in South Africa. The Zulus and Xhosa believe that the Impundulu is hatched from an egg formed in the earth where lightning strikes. The Impundulu often served a witch or at least favored a certain witch, and it attacked its enemies with a lust for blood. Also summoning lightning bolts, the large black and white bird is known as an extremely cruel predator. It even preyed upon women by assuming the figure of an attractive male.