Detail, Egúngún Masquerade costume, Nigeria, late 20th century WA508366

"I had watched them [the masqueraders] before over the wall of the backyard, seated on Joseph's shoulders. I knew that the egúngún were spirits of the dead. They spoke in guttural voices and were to be feared even more than kidnappers. And yet I had noticed that many of them were also playful and would joke with children. I had very nearly been startled off Joseph's shoulders once when one of them passed directly beneath the wall, looked up and waved, calling out in the familiar throaty manner, "Nle o, omo Tisa Agba" (Greeting, son of the Senior Teacher)."

(Wole Soyinka, autobiography Ake: The Years of Childhood 1981)