Nsibidi ideographic script
Escritura ideográfica nsibidi
- Date
- anterior a 1904 (origen incierto) · confidence low
- Place
- Ikom, Cross River, Nigeria
- Credited to
- Ejagham, Efik and Igbo peoples (Ekpe society)
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
A set of ideograms used on textiles, tattoos, walls and gestures for messages and records, some of them secret to the Ekpe society. It is an indigenous graphic system of West Africa.
Documented by T. D. Maxwell (1904) and J. K. Macgregor (1909). Similar signs on Calabar pottery (5th-15th centuries) suggest an ancient origin, but the connection is unproven.
What it led to
- confidential communication among secret societies
- derived graphic systems in Cuba (Abakuá anaforuana)
- modern reclamation as an African script