Guede Nibo

Gede Nibo^{[1][lower-alpha 1]} (Haitian Creole: Gede Nibo^[9]) is a lwa who is leader of the spirits of the dead in Haitian Vodou. Formerly human, Gede Nibo was a handsome young man who was killed violently. After death, he was adopted as a lwa by Baron Samedi and Maman Brigitte. He is envisioned as an effeminate, nasal dandy. Nibo wears a black riding coat or drag. When he inhabits humans they are inspired to lascivious sexuality of all kinds.^[9]

Gede Nibo
Venerated in	Haitian Vodou, Folk Catholicism
Attributes	Black coat, top hat, staff, cigar, rum, skull, obscenities
Patronage	Gravestones, cemeteries

Function and depiction

Gede Nibo is a rada lwa^[10] who is considered to be a great healer. He is seen carrying a bottle of white rum infused with medicinal herbs, and often carries a staff and smokes a cigar. Nibo is the special patron of those who die young, and as such is often conflated with the Catholic saint Gerard Majella, who is depicted with a skull. Nibo is the guardian of the graves of those who died prematurely, particularly those whose final resting place is unknown. He is a psychopomp, an intermediary between the living and the dead. He gives voice to the dead spirits that have not been reclaimed from (The Lower World) or in Vodou terms "below the waters", and his chwals ("horses", possessed devotees) can give voice to the dead spirits whose bodies have not been found.^[9]

Service

Purple is considered his sacred color, and usual offerings include black goats, black roosters, calabash, cigars, coconut, fried plantains, pistachios, smoked herrings, sweet sesame balls, and white rum spiced with African bird pepper.^[9]

Until recently, Haitian farmers would perform a praise song to Guede Nibo each November. It involved phallic thrusts and other erotic gestures and was named "Massissi", a Haitian term for a "homoerotically inclined male".^[9]

In popular culture

• The Disney villain character Dr. Facilier in the animated film The Princess and the Frog is loosely modeled on Guede Nibo.^{[citation needed]}
• Baron Samedi (as the head of the Guede family of loa) is mentioned in the second novel in Ian Fleming's James Bond series of stories Live and Let Die.

See also

• LGBT themes in African diasporic mythologies

Footnotes

Notes

1. alternative spellings and variations include Guédé Nibo,^[2] Guédé-Nibo,^[3][4] Guede-Nibo,^[5] Ghede Nibo,^[6] Gédé Nibo,^[7] Gédé Nibbo,^[7] Gédé Nibho,^[7] Guede Nibho,^[8] Guede Nibbho,^[8] Guede Ni-Bo,^[8] Ti Puce^[8]

References

1. Carty, Marcel, ed. (2010). Vodou The Next Stage. Xlibris Corporation LLC. p. 42. ISBN 9781450023191. Retrieved 16 April 2021.
2. Rigaud, Milo; Cross, Robert B., eds. (1985). Secrets of Voodoo. City Lights Publishers. p. 213. ISBN 9780872861718. Retrieved 15 April 2021.
3. Métraux, Alfred, ed. (21 October 2016). Voodoo in Haiti. Normanby Press. p. 117. ISBN 9781787201668. Retrieved 16 April 2021.
4. Crosley, Reginald, ed. (2000). The Vodou Quantum Leap Alternative Realities, Power, and Mysticism. Llewellyn Publications. p. 98. ISBN 9781567181739. Retrieved 16 April 2021.
5. "Caribbean Quarterly Volumes 30-31". Extra Mural Department of the University College of the West Indies. 1984. p. 34. Retrieved 16 April 2021.
6. Masquerade Queer Poetry in America to the End of World War II. Indiana University Press. 2004. p. 19. ISBN 9780253216342. Retrieved 16 April 2021.
7. Malbrough, Ray T., ed. (2003). Hoodoo Mysteries Folk Magic, Mysticism & Rituals. Llewellyn Publications. pp. 147, 149. ISBN 9780738703503. Retrieved 15 April 2021.
8. Cuhulain, Kerr, ed. (2010). "Lexicon of Occult Terminology". p. 36. Archived from the original on 15 April 2021. Retrieved 16 April 2021.
9. Randy Conner, David Hatfield Sparks & Mariya Sparks (eds), Cassell's Encyclopedia of Queer Myth, Symbol & Spirit, p. 963, London and New York: Cassell, 1997.
10. Carole Boyce Davies (ed.), Encyclopedia of the African Diaspora, ABC-CLIO, 2008, p. 963.