Egbere

In Yoruba mythology, Egbere are a type of malevolent spirit or goblin believed to reside in the woods and active only at night.[1][2]

Oxford's A Dictionary of the Yoruba language defines Egbere as a Yoruba word for fairy or goblin.[3][4] According to William Taylor's 1898 account, written in a colonial and often condescending tone, Egbere inhabit graves. They emerge at midnight and return at dawn, similar to vampires. They delight in riding sheep, and also bring disease to sheep.[5]

Egbere are described as being short in stature[6] and are associated with a small mat. There is a belief that anyone who manages to take the mat of wealth from an Egbere will attain unimaginable riches.[7] They are said to constantly cry, though the sincerity of these tears is questionable.[8][9][10]

## References

1. ↑ Crowther, Samuel; Vidal, Owen Emeric (1852). A Vocabulary of the Yoruba Language. Seeleys. p. 80. https://archive.org/details/vocabularyofyoru00crow.
2. ↑ "The Afro-American griot speaks : Afro-American names : Muñoz, Sharon R., 1945-". 1995. http://catalog.hathitrust.org/api/volumes/oclc/34027148.html.
3. ↑ "A Dictionary of the Yoruba language". 2016-10-23. https://archive.org/details/dictionaryofyoru0000unse/page/n82/mode/1up.
4. ↑ A Dictionary of the Yoruba language. Ibadan: University Press. 1985. p. 71. OCLC 1335925672.
5. ↑ Taylor, William (1898). The Flaming Torch in Darkest Africa. Eaton & Mains. p. 237. https://books.google.com/books?id=8MoTAAAAIAAJ.
6. ↑ "American Anthropologist January-March 1948: Vol 50 Iss 1". 2016-10-23. https://archive.org/details/sim_american-anthropologist_january-march-1948_50_1.
7. ↑ Tume, Tosin Kooshima (2019). "Yoruba folkore and Ifa narratives in Tunde Kelani's Agogo Eewo (2002) as cultural archetypes for national re-orientation". Journal of African Films & Diaspora Studies 2 (1): 23–41. doi:10.31920/2516-2713/2019/2n1a2. https://journals.co.za/doi/abs/10.31920/2516-2713/2019/2n1a2. Retrieved 2025-04-27.
8. ↑ Dopamu, Ade. "The Yoruba Religious System". Africa Update 6.3 (1999): 2-17, p. 7.
9. ↑ Jimoh, Shaykh Luqman. "The Yoruba concept of spirit husband and the Islamic belief in intermarriage between jinn and man: A comparative discourse". International Conference on Humanities, Literature and Management (ICHLM'15), Jan. 9-10, 2015, Dubai (UAE). 2015, p. 1.
10. ↑ Fagunwa, D. O.; Soyinka, Wole (1982). Forest of a thousand daemons : a hunter's saga. New York: Random House. OCLC 1149232864.

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