KNOWLEDGE of astronomy is necessary, for the effective use of some medicinal plants, because the phases of the Moon and the Suns apparent position in the sky determine the availability and intensity of light on Earths surface.This, in its turn, affects the chemistry of plantsand hence the potency of herbal concoctions made from them. The curative properties of medicinal flora are, after all, derived from chemical compounds in their roots, stems, leaves and fruits.Many of these compounds are heat, light and/or pressure sensitive. Thus the chemistry of medicinal plants can change in response to variations in moonlight and sunlight, as well as temperature and atmospheric pressure.During a visit to Adamawa State, about eight or nine years ago, for example, a lecturer from the Federal University of Science and Technology, Yola, carried me up into the Bagale Hills. He identified a plant whose leaves have to be harvested at a certain time of the night, or else the remedy wont work.He also showed me an intriguing pattern, carved on the surface of a rock. The design is apparently a crude calendar, which the herbalist etched in stone, to keep track of the Moons movementand, perhaps, that of other celestial bodies.Knowledge is power. Those who possess useful information will monopolise it, if they can. Our ancestors were no different. Traditional African technicians and proto-scientists, such as iron smelters, herbalists, astrologers and engineers, shrouded their trades in mysticism, ritual and taboo.The idea was to create and sustain an aura of supernaturalism that would instill fear into any potential interloper or infringera busy-body who might discover that the incantations, libations and, sacrifices concealed chemistry, physics, astronomy and engineering which a mere mortal could learn!Ritual, in particular, is a way of remembering. It is both a communication and an information storage system. In the absence of books and computers, the procedure for laying out stone circles, smelting iron or treating small pox were recalled through ritual, which also underscored the importance of the event.What missionaries and evangelists are doing among the Koma, thereforeand what they have done elsewhere in Nigeriais equivalent to putting a sludge hammer to your computers hard drive or setting fire to the university library.Nowhere is this more pathetically apparent, than in Cross River State. It is probable that the creators of the ancient Stone Circles, which I have been studying, had knowledge of mathematics, engineering, metrology and astronomy. But most of the evidence, handed down as pagan relics, has been destroyed.The heathen practices and institutions of the Koma are cultural hard drives, so to speak. Their customs, traditions, rituals and relics are alfresco libraries, in which knowledge and insight have been accumulating, possibly for many thousands of years.But the ongoing conversion of the Koma to Christianity, and other changes in their lifestyle, threatens to destroy this enormously important database.My belief is that the Federal, State and Local Governments should act expeditiously to stop all evangelical activity among the Koma and insulate them from other modernising influences.The most effective means of achieving this, it seems, would be to declare Koma territory a Strategic Research Reserve and limit access to credible Nigerian scientists, social scientists and scholars.
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