Sogbo is the Fon deity of thunder, lightning and storms, another of Mawu-Lisa's children in Fon cosmology, ruling the sky and the violent weather that crosses it. Worshippers historically held that a person killed by lightning had been struck for wrongdoing, and Sogbo's priests performed rites over the body and the site of the strike before burial could proceed.
Facts
Function
Domain / Function Cult
Attributes and IconographySogbo, like the wider family of West African thunder deities, is associated with thunderstones, the polished stone axe heads found in the ground after a lightning strike and kept as relics of where he touched down. His priests historically retrieved these stones from the site of a strike as evidence of his passage. 1 Attributions
Mythic AssociationIn the Dahomean division of the world myth, Mawu is said to have granted Sogbo, also called Xevioso, dominion over the sky and its thunder when she apportioned the realms among her children, the same account used to explain why his brother Sakpata was left the earth below. 1 Iconography
SymbolSogbo is the Fon deity of thunder, lightning and storms, ruling the sky and the violent weather that crosses it. 1 Attestation
Era of Attestation Veneration TodayActively venerated in a living tradition 1 HistoricityNot a historical person: a divine or other-than-human being 1 Belief
TheologyHenotheistic: a supreme being above served lesser divinities 1 A child of the creator pair Mawu-Lisa in Fon cosmology, matching the henotheistic reading already carried by Mawu-Lisa, Gu and Loko. Correspondences & Relations
Connections
Belongs to Tradition
Source Dahomey: An Ancient West African KingdomMelville J. Herskovits
Related To
Sources
1. Dahomey: An Ancient West African Kingdom
2. Voodoo in Haiti
Alfred Metraux, Oxford University Press, 1959Sogbo, Fon/Dahomey origin, documented in Haitian VodouView the Source Reader Challenges (0)
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