Sogba, in its fuller form Sokogba, is the thunder power of Nupe religion, its name analysed as 'the axe of Soko' (Nupe sòkó 'God' joined to ègbà 'axe'). The Nupe hold that Soko, the sky god, causes lightning to strike thieves, and the sogba cult wielded this punitive thunder while also being sought out by women as a cure for barrenness. S. F. Nadel compared the cult directly with the worship of the Yoruba thunder god Shango and recorded that the thunder cult reached the Nupe from their Gwari (Gbagyi) neighbours; recent scholarship has argued, conversely, that the very name of Shango may derive from the Nupe Sogba. Like the gunnu festival and the kuti shrine-objects, sogba exemplifies the characteristic Nupe pattern in which sacred power resides in a cult and its emblems rather than in a richly personified god.