Akan: palace

Akan: minor deities (singular: obosom)

Asante unit of weight for gold dust; one sixteenth of a ounce; see peredwan

Akan: festival day; see akwasidae

Asante dance

Akan: greeting to a person at work

Akan: reply to the greeting adwúma óo! (literally “work is good”)

coloured glass beads of uncertain origin, greatly valued in parts of West Africa

Brazil: percussion instrument, consisting of two hollow iron cones, beaten with an iron rod

Akan: greeting on entering a house (“is anybody there?”); see àmêê

group of closely related languages including Asante, Fanti and Akuapem Twi

Akan: subject; used here as pawn; see donko below

Akan (borrowed?): alcoholic beverage (usually distilled from palm wine)

Akan: male slaves (singular: okra) favoured by their master and destined to accompany and serve him in the next world

Asante festival celebrated  every sixth Sunday in which the Asantehene offers food and drink to the ancestral stools.

ruler of Oyo

Hausa blacksmith who settled at Yendi around 1730

Akan: reply to àgòo; (“come in!”)

Akan: precisely; indeed

Akan: is that so? really?

Spider-man; trickster hero of Asante folklore

Akan: folklore; stories concerning Ananse

see Palmares

West African kingdom and empire with its capital at Kumase; its people; its language. The founding states of the Asante confederation were: Kumase, Asumegya, Kumawu, Mampon, Offinso, Nsuta, Kokofu and Bekwae

Asante war-cry: “Asante porcupine: kill a thousand; a thousand will come.”

Akan: queen-mother of Asante; leading female royal (but note: not necessarily the mother of the Asantehene)

Akan: king of Asante

Akan: assembly of the Asante nation

Akan:  female spirit of the earth (Thursday born)

Akan: Horn call of Koranten Péte. Literally “it has been said, it has been said, it has been done”

Akan states, tributary to Asante and often in a state of rebellion

town on the Pra river at the southern border of the Asante heartland

Askia Muhammad;  ruler of the Songhai Empire c.1493-1528

Akan: royal talking drum of Asante

Akan: lady

Yoruba: traditional priest

Port.: baize

facial incision

tree of the African savanna (Adansonia digitata)

Akan: heavy cotton smock worn by men in northern Ghana; war-dress

drum

Bekpokpam name for Dagomba

a people of north-eastern Ghana, also known as Konkomba

Bekpokpam spirits of the bush

diarrhoea

Brazil: slave recently arrived from Africa and as yet unbaptized

deity of the people of Edina

Akan: come

Akan: king of Breman

a people living to the north-west of the Asante heartland

slaves from Cabinda in West Africa

Port.: West African chief or elder

Brazil: half African, half Tupi

Brazil: cheap rum distilled from sugar waste or molasses

Brazil: curtained sedan chair

Brazil: mansion, home of the senhor de engenho

tropical tree

Brazil: musical instrument; similar to xaque-xaque but with a swelling at one end only

nocturnal African mammal of the family Viverridae. Also called civet cat

musky perfume extracted from anal scent glands of the civet cat

supervisory board of the Dutch Reformed Church in Amsterdam

type of bead

Indian Ocean shell formerly used as a currency in West Africa

Brazil: creole; African slave born in Brazil

country of the Dagomba

a people of northern Ghana (and their language)

tree of the African savanna

Akan state conquered by Asante

head cloth

slave from Asante's northern hinterland (plural nnonkofoo)

(entry in Christaller, Rev. J. G, Dictionary of the Asante and Fante Language called Tshi (Twi), Second Edition, Basel, 1933 and see Languages

West African coastal town; site of Elmina Castle

slave-trading castle built by the Portuguese at Edina in 1482-86

Brazil: sugar mill, or plantation

Upper Plantation

Middle Plantation

elevate to the stool, i.e. install as king (amongst the Akans)

Brazil: Aragão's slave shop.

West African Akan people; their states; their language

Brazil: general manager

tool made from the tail of an elephant or a cow, used to keep flies off the head of an important person

Akan: talking drum

Akan: West African food made by pounding yam or plantain

Brazilian tree (ficus doliaria martius) used by West African slaves for worship as a substitute for the iroko (odum) and nsanda.

King of Palmares

Brazil: cheap rum distilled from sugar waste or molasses.

(Akan: sika dwa) symbol of the unity of the Asante state

a people living to the north of Asante; their country; their language

African stringed instrument

state in northern Ghana

sorghum

slave newly arrived from Africa

dry wind which blows from the Sahara across West Africa accompanied by a dusty haze

people of the West African savanna; their country; their language

cloth manufactured in the Yoruba area of Nigeria

Muslim cleric

Brazil: fraternal organization within the Catholic church

Dagbon name for the Asante; also Dagbon musketeers

Hausa town in Nigeria

Hausa town in Nigeria

Ga: boiled maize-bread (=Akan: odokono)

Akan: multi-coloured cotton or silk cloth hand-woven in strips

Asante state and its capital

king of Kokofu

Akan: greeting giving notice of approach; knocking

reddish, fragrant, nutlike seed of tropical African evergreen plant

Konadu's town or village. Village named after Konadu.

slaves from the Kongo in West Africa

see Bekpokpam

Akan: expression of sympathy. Sorry.

Gonja capital

title of the Gonja king

character in Dagomba history

commander of the Royal Dagomba Archers

Brazil: slave who has been baptized and who understands Portuguese

Brazil: large lizard

Brazil: werewolf-like creature of folklore

vegetable washing sponge

Akan?: term of respect used in addressing an elder woman

Muslim teacher

Brazil: slave who was a fellow-traveller on a slave ship

Asante state and its capital

queen-mother of Mampon

king of Mampon

people of northern Ghana

people of the upper Niger river valley; their language

Fanti town where there was a large slave market

Brazil: heavy clay soil suitable for the cultivation of sugar

Brazil: tea-like beverage

Brazil: unit of currency = one thousand reals

Brazil: slave from the West African Gold Coast or Slave Coast

Brazil: Charitable Brotherhood of the Holy House of Mercy

Akan: let's go

Akan: mythical dwarfs reputed to live in the forest (sing. aboatia))

Akan: plural imperative of soré, get up.

People of Burkina Faso and northern Ghana

title of Dagomba king

Dagomba king

Dagomba king

Dagomba king

Brazil: Yoruba

Dagomba frontier town

Grandfather/grandmother; title of respect for an Akan chief or elder; plural: nananom, ancestors

people of northern Ghana

Ki-Kongo: West African tree, often sacred.

One of the founding states of Asante

Akan: West African tree, often sacred. (Yoruba: iroko)

Yam festival

Akan: queen-mother

Akan: king

Akan: royal prince; son of a king

Akan: priest

a gossip

Brazil: pottery

Akan: royal spokesman

Akan: god's tree; household shrine

Akan: God (Saturday born)

Akan: God, Spirit of the earth, ancestral spirits, fathers, mothers.

Akan: horse

Akan: priest

river in north-east Ghana

Akan: a board game.

traditional priest

a covered litter carried on poles on the shoulders of two or four men.
Ceremonial vehicle for an Akan king.

Os Palmares; Angola Janga; famous seventeenth century quilombo in Brazil

Asante unit of weight for gold dust; 36 ackies; two and a quarter ounces; see ackie

Akan: shift up, make room

alcoholic drink made from fermented corn

Dutch: preacher

Brazil: colony of escaped slaves

Brazil: sugar growing region in Bahia

Akan: so, thus

Brazil: sugar harvest season

Akan: stringed musical instrument

Akan: mythical ogre of the forest

Brazil: master of the sugar mill; owner of a sugar plantation

Akan: West African tree used for carving

Brazil: slave cabin, hovel

Yoruba deity: deified fourth king of Oyo

fat obtained from the seeds of the shea tree, used as food, for illumination, for cosmetic purposes and for making soap.

Fanti town famous for its slave market

symbol of office of a king in many states of northern Ghana

Akan symbol of royal office

River in Ghana; name of the spirit which lives in the river

Brazil: daily task; standard plot of sugar cane

Kongo deity

Guardian of the Land; Bekpokpam priest

semi-mythical ancestor of the Dagomba

Asante unit of weight for gold dust; one-sixth of an ackie

Commander-in-Chief of the Dagomba King's army

bloodsucking African flies which transmit sleeping sickness to livestock; particularly virulent in the forest zone

Akan: stick used to clean one's teeth; the tree from which it is cut

Akan: maternal uncle; term of respect for an older man

Brazil: hollow metal instrument shaped like a dumb bell, with pebbles in each swollen extremity

Dagomba king Sitobu

Dagomba capital

Dagbon: king of Yendi

Dagomba frontier town

Nigerian town where the Dagomba stayed during their migration to Ghana

Dagomba king

Hausa town

suburb of an Akan town inhabited by people from the north or Muslims

town in northern Ghana

commanding officer of the army of Palmares