Bashorun Gaa
Yoruba · mortal · oyo empire · Recorded classification
Gaa is the constitutional crisis of eighteenth-century Oyo in one man. The Oyo Mesi's power to present the parrot's egg — after which the Alaafin had no option but to die — was meant as a check on a bad king; Gaa turned it into a method, and for twenty years the Alaafin was whoever he currently permitted. The empire did not recover the balance afterwards. His end at Akesan, with every citizen ordered to take a pound of his flesh, is told in Yoruba tradition as the standard example of what is owed to a tyrant, and 'ohun t'a se f'ọlọrun Gaa' entered the language from it. He was absent from this registry entirely, as were all four of the Alaafins he killed.
Domains
- tyranny
- statecraft
Relations
- enemy: AbiodunThe fifth Alaafin of his tenure, and the one who outlived him.Reference treatment of the conflict between Bashorun Gaa and Alaafin Abiodun, including Gaa's killing of Abiodun's daughter Agbonyin. (secondary)
- killed by: AbiodunTaken alive by Oyabi's soldiers and executed on Abiodun's order at the Akesan market.Reference treatment of Gaa's capture by the forces Abiodun raised and of his execution at Abiodun's order around 1774. (secondary)
- enemy: LabisiThe first of the four.Reference treatment of Labisi's forced suicide seventeen days into his reign at Gaha's hands, marking the beginning of the overthrow of the Alaafinate. (secondary)
- killer of: LabisiSeventeen days, and never crowned.Reference treatment of Gaha as responsible for the death of Labisi, forced to kill himself seventeen days into an uncrowned reign in July 1754. (secondary)
- enemy: AwonbiojuThe second of the four.Reference treatment of Awonbioju's compelled suicide under Gaha, the second of two between June and October 1754. (secondary)
- killer of: AwonbiojuA hundred and thirty days.Reference treatment of the two Alaafins forced to commit suicide by Gaha between June and October 1754, Awonbioju having spent 130 days on the throne. (secondary)
- enemy: AgboluajeThe third of the four. Gaa went at his friend rather than at him.Reference treatment of Gaha's declaration of war against Agboluaje's friend Elewi-odo. (secondary)
- killer of: AgboluajeBy his own hand, and counted to Gaa in the reference treatments along with the other three.Reference treatment of Gaha's war on Elewi-odo and of Agboluaje's taking poison and dying before his emissaries returned; and of Gaha as responsible for the deaths of four Alaafins. (secondary)
- enemy: MajeogbeThe fourth, and the only one who marked him: Majeogbe's poison left Gaa paralysed.Reference treatment of Majeogbe's fortifying himself with charms against Gaha and of his poisoning of him. (secondary)
- killer of: MajeogbeThe last of the four, and the exchange that crippled him.Reference treatment of Majeogbe as the last Alaafin Gaha killed, and of Majeogbe's death unable to withstand Gaa's sons. (secondary)
Sources
- Bashorun Gaa was named head of the Oyo Mesi in 1754 and forced four successive Alaafins to ritual suicide before Alaafin Abiodun raised the Onikoyi and the Are Ona Kakanfo Oyabi against him and had him executed at Akesan market around 1774.: Reference treatments of Gaha's tenure as Bashorun, the four forced suicides and his death under Abiodun. (secondary)