Ile Maroia Laji

What it is

In the Matatu de Brotas district of Salvador, in Bahia, stands Ile Maroia Laji, a Candomblé temple counted among the oldest in the city. It began as a family shrine to Oxossi, the orisha the founding family held to be its ancestor in myth, and grew into a temple with a high priestess at its head. The house belongs to the Ketu branch of the religion. Its other name, Terreiro do Alaketu, remembers where the family came from. Brazil granted it national heritage status, with recognition by the Ministry of Culture in 2005.

Where it comes from

The house tells of a beginning in 1636, when a princess of Ketu, a Yoruba kingdom in what is now the Republic of Benin, is said to have reached Bahia. In its telling, twin sisters of the Aro clan, Otampe Ojaro and Gogorixá, were seized at the age of nine by a Dahomean army, sold to traders and shipped to Salvador, where they were freed on arrival. They spent nine years selling food and working as servants to pay for a passage home. Otampe Ojaro, a priestess of Oxumarê in Dahomey, married a kinsman named Alaji; their daughter was Akobi-Odé. The family farm in Matatu de Brotas held the shrine. Written history places Dahomean raids on Ketu in 1789, and the house counts seven leaders since its founding.

Who does it

Every leader named in the house's line is initiated to a particular orisha. Akobi-Odé, whose will of 1867 is the oldest paper kept at the temple, passed the office to a grandson, Babá Aboré, born José Gonçalo Régis and a priest of Oshala. His niece followed in the late 19th century: Dionísia Francisca Régis, of Xangô, who died in 1948. That year the house went to Olga Francisca Régis, 23 years old and of Oya-Iansan, who led for 57 years until her death in 2005. Next came Mother Jojó, born Jocelina Barbosa Bispo, whose orisha is Nanã Buruku.

Peoples and places

The founders were Yoruba from the kingdom of Ketu, of the Aro, or Ọja Aro, clan, and the temple stands in Bahia, where the family settled in Matatu de Brotas. In Brazilian records the family is entered under Portuguese names: Maria do Rosário Régis for the priestess, Porfírio Régis for her husband, Maria Francisca Régis for their daughter. The surname is glossed as 'regal', or 'from the kings'.

What people believe

The temple follows Candomblé of the Ketu kind, in which a person is initiated to one of the named orishas. Oxossi, held by the founding family to be its ancestor in myth, had the first shrine on the farm. Other orishas appear in the line of leaders: Oxumarê, called the serpent-rainbow; Oshala; Xangô; Oya-Iansan; and Nanã Buruku. Memory of Ketu, a Yoruba kingdom, is carried in the second name, Terreiro do Alaketu, and in the royal descent the foundation story claims.

How scholars and sceptics see it

Scholars have studied the house for decades. The anthropologist Vivaldo da Costa Lima examined the 1867 will, the oldest document preserved there, and wrote a study of the family of saint in Bahia's Jeje-Nagô houses. Renato Silveira has written on the founding of the terreiro of Alaketo, and E. G. Parrinder's work on Ketu supplies the history of that kingdom. Historians set the 1636 claim beside recorded Dahomean attacks on Ketu in 1789, and observe that seven leaders fit poorly with three and a half centuries.

Law and persecution

The temple is a protected Brazilian heritage site. The heritage record gives the designation the number 1481 and the year 2001, while recognition by the Ministry of Culture is dated to 2005, shortly before Mother Olga's death. The listing places the house among the country's recognised historic religious buildings.

Today

Under Mother Olga the temple gained notice in Brazil and abroad, and she became one of Candomblé's public figures, governing the house and its community for 57 years. The house is credited with promoting the religion and with loosening its old ties to Catholic forms of worship. Leadership passed to her daughter, Mother Jojó. The heritage listing, granted as Olga's life ended, fixed the temple's standing as a national monument.

Questions people ask about Ile Maroia Laji

Good reading and sources

• Ile Maroia Laji on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• Wikidata recordOpen data