Aziza
Aziza is the Urhobo spirit of the winds and the forest, addressed in folklore as 'king of the forest as well as of the earth'. It is conceived as a small, swift, one-legged being, often pictured smoking a pipe, that heralds the dawn and rules the fleeting threshold between night and day; its great speed makes it a guardian of the rare moments when the boundaries of ordinary consciousness may be crossed. Aziza protects the fields, crops and herds of the farming community and drives off their enemies, yet it is also the dangerous power hunters and herbalists meet at the edge of the bush to gain occult knowledge. Its approach is known by the whirlwind that throws the trees of the forest into wild, cracking motion. As a spirit of the wild belonging to the Erhan/Edjo orders, Aziza is reckoned among the intermediary divinities deriving from the creator Oghene.
Parentage
Domains
- wind storm
- forest wilderness
- threshold liminality
Powers
- to stir the whirlwind and set the forest trees gyrating
- to guard the fields, herds and forest and to grant hidden knowledge to hunters
Epithets
- Ovie r'egbo
Relations
- subordinate to: Oghene