https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2862-0653
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ABSTRACT
The encounters between Acholi and Europeans, beginning in 1904 with the settlement of the Church Missionary Society in Acholiland, had a profound impact on the people. Scholars have long examined the impact of these encounters on various aspects of life. But a study of their impact on mortuary practices in the region has largely been neglected. Recently, scholars have shined a spotlight on death and dying as a result of the armed conflict that engulfed Acholiland from the late 1980s. Drawing on previously untapped primary sources, interviews, and works of Acholi intellectuals, this article complements this new trend, by focusing on death and mortuary practices between the 1900s and the 1980s. Specifically, it recreates these practices and demonstrates change and continuity; and it concludes with a history of the cemetery in Acholiland.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Lloyd, Uganda to Khartoum, 198.
2 Ibid.
3 The Comboni Missionary House Library, Gulu, Uganda (hereafter: CMHLG)/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908; Okumu, “The Funeral Rites,” 175.
4 Meinert et al., “Cement, Graves and Pillar”; Meinert and Whyte, “Creating the New Times: Reburials”; Seebach, “The Dead Are Not Dead”; Victor, Letha and Porter, “Dirty things.”
5 p’Bitek, Horn of My Love; see also Odoki, Death Ritual.
6 See, for example, the edited collection in the Journal of African History by Rebekah Lee and Megan Vaughan, “Death and Dying in the History of Africa since 1800.”
7 Atkinson, The Roots, 270.
8 See, for example, Behrend, Alice Lakwena, 14; Amone and Muura, “British Colonialism.” However, Finnström disagrees with this argument, see Living with Bad Surroundings, 54.
9 On Alur see Southall, Alur Society; on Lugbara see Middleton’s Lugbara Religion.
10 Atkinson, The Roots, 267.
11 Ibid., 268.
12 CMHLG/117/Christian in Acholiland. Here, the Catholic church claimed to have converted 50 percent of the Acholi while the Anglican claimed to have Christianized 30 percent.
13 Kitching, “The Commencement of Work,” 827.
14 Kitching, An Outline Grammar, 1907.
15 Ibid., 76.
16 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908; see also Kitching, On the Backwaters, 253.
17 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
18 Greene, Sacred Sites, 61–82.
19 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908; see also p’Bitek, Horn of My Love, 24.
20 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
21 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
22 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908; see also Odoki, Death Ritual, 37–38
23 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
24 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies.
25 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
26 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies.
27 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies.
28 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies.
29 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
30 p’Bitek, Horn of My Love, 22.
31 P. Okech, personal communication, February 17, 2015.
32 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
33 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies.
34 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
35 Okumu, “The Funeral Rites,” 174.
36 p’Bitek, Horn of My Love, 22.
37 Ibid.
38 Girling, The Acholi, 159.
39 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
40 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies.
41 CMHLG/007: A. B. Fisher, 1913–1914.
42 Opoka, “Funeral Rite,” 170.
43 Peter Loum, personal communication, February 8, 2015.
44 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
45 p’Bitek, Horn of My Love, 21.
46 Ibid.
47 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
48 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
49 See, for example, Curley, Elders, 67–78.
50 p’Bitek, Religion of the central Luo, 92–3.
51 Ibid., 151–3.
52 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
53 CMHLG/007: A. B. Fisher, 1913–1914.
54 p’Bitek, Horn of My Love, 22.
55 Lloyd, Uganda to Khartoum, 198.
56 Odoki, Death Ritual, 41.
57 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908; p’Bitek, Horn of My Love, 22.
58 Lloyd, Uganda to Khartoum, 198.
59 Kitching, On the Backwaters, 254.
60 Lloyd, Uganda to Khartoum, 198.
61 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
62 p’Bitek, Horn of My Love, 22; Opoka, “Funeral Rite,” 170.
63 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
64 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
65 Okumu, “The Funeral Rites,” 175–6.
66 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies; see also Opoka, “Funeral Rite,” 170.
67 Okumu, “The Funeral Rites,” 175.
68 Ibid.,176; see also Opoka, “Funeral Rite,” 170.
69 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies.
70 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies; see also Okumu, “The Funeral Rites,” 176.
71 Harlacher et al., Traditional ways of coping, 65–69.
72 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
73 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
74 CMHLG/002: A. B. Lloyd in Patiko, 1904–1908.
75 p’Bitek, Horn of My Love, 22
76 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
77 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies.
78 Parker, “The Cultural Politics of Death,” 212.
79 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
80 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908; see also Kitching, An Outline Grammar, 50; Ocitti, Oteka Okello Mwoka Lengomoi, 33.
81 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
82 CMHLG/312: A. L. Kitching, 1904–1908.
83 CMHLG/102: Acholi Death Ceremonies.
84 Ocitti, Oteka Okello Mwoka Lengomoi, 33.
85 p’Bitek, Horn of My Love, 24.
86 CMHLG/01: Article from Acholi Magazine (author’s translation).
87 This view is consistent with the practice of the Acholi’s southerly neighbors, the Langi, among whom ‘the widow herself decides which man of her husband’s clan she will marry, in consultation with senior members of the lineage,’ see Curley, Elders,77.
88 Ocitti, Oteka Okello Mwoka Lengomoi, 33.
89 Just like among the Langi that Curley studied, among the Acholi a ‘goat must be sacrificed or the woman will be afflicted with illness and misfortune by the shade of her former husband’ (1973: 78).
90 CMHLG/01: Article from Acholi Magazine (author’s translation).
91 Ibid.
92 CMHLG/007: A. B. Fisher, 1913–1914.
93 CMHLG/109: Reopening of the CMS Mission, 1913–1917.
94 Greene, Sacred Sites, 71.
95 The Uganda National Archives, Entebbe, Uganda (hereafter: UNA)/SMP/0121: Burial Sites in Gulu District, 16 November 1911.
96 UNA/SMP/0412: Meetings with Acholi Chiefs in Gulu District, 6 March 1914.
97 CMHLG/007: A. B. Fisher, 1913–1914.
98 The Makerere University Archives, Kampala, Uganda (hereafter MUA)/AR/CMS/98/2: Minutes of the Upper Nile Mission, Gulu.
99 CMHLG/1: Minutes of Church Meetings, 1929–1935.
100 Ibid.
101 Ibid.
102 CMHLG/1: Minutes of Church Meetings, 1935–1937.
103 CMHLG/1: Minutes of Church Meetings, 1935–1937.
104 Okumu, “The Funeral Rites,”177.
105 Okumu, “The Funeral Rites,”177.
106 CMHLG/17/Minutes of the Church Meeting, 1950.
107 CMHLG/17/Minutes of the Church Meeting, 1955.
108 Okumu, “The Funeral Rites,” 178–9.
109 CMHLG/17/Minutes of the Church Meeting, 1952.
110 Okumu, “The Funeral Rites,” 177.
111 CMHLG/17/Minutes of the Church Meeting, 1952.
112 CMHLG/18/Minutes of the Church Meeting, 1953.
113 Okech, Tekwaro, 31.
114 Ocitti, The Urban Geography of Gulu.
115 MUA/AR/CMS/98/2: Minutes of the Upper Nile Mission, Gulu.
116 UNA/SMP/1127: Gulu District Cemetery, 24 August 1925.
117 MUA/AR/CMS/107/4: Correspondence of the Standing Committee of Upper Nile Mission, 1947–1950.
118 MUA/AR/CMS/107/4: Correspondence of the Standing Committee of Upper Nile Mission, 1947–1950.
119 CMHLG/17/Minutes of the Church Meeting, 1950.
120 CMHLG/022/Copies of Lobo Mewa.
121 CMHLG/023/Acholi Magazine Articles.
122 CMHLG/023/Acholi Magazine Articles.
123 CMHLG/023/Acholi Magazine Articles.
124 Samuel Arweny, personal communication, February 17, 2015; John Otto, personal communication, February 15, 2015.
125 CMHLG/023/Acholi Magazine articles.
126 Gulu District Archives, Gulu, Uganda (hereafter: GDA)/Box 532: Gulu Cemetery, 16 November 1968.
127 GDA Box 532: Gulu Cemetery, 16 November 1968.
128 CMHLG/022/Copies of Lobo Mewa.
129 Samuel Arweny, personal communication, February 17, 2015; John Otto, personal communication, February 15, 2015.
130 The task of relocation was finally completed in 2018, see James “Muslims Relocate Graves from Gulu Town.”
131 Samuel Arweny, personal communication, February 17, 2015; John Otto, personal communication, February 15, 2015.
132 See, for example, See Hepner, Steadman, and Hanebrink, “Sowing the Dead: Massacre and the Missing in Northern Uganda”; Meinert et al., “Cement, Graves and Pillar”; Meinert and Whyte, “Creating the New Times: Reburials”; Seebach, “The Dead Are Not Dead”; Jahn and Wilhelm-Solomon, “Bones in the Wrong Soil”.
133 Jahn and Wilhelm-Solomon, “Bones in the Wrong Soil,” 182.
134 See, for example, Meinert et al., “Cement, Graves and Pillar”; Meinert and Whyte, “Creating the New Times: Reburials”; Hepner et al., “Sowing the Dead: Massacres and the Missing in Northern Uganda”; Jahn and Wilhelm-Solomon, “Bones in the Wrong Soil”.