Formation d'États et formation d'une ethnie : le cas des Anyi-Ndenye

Abstract

C.-H. Perrot — State Formation and Formation of an Ethnie Group: The Case of the Ndenye Anyi. As far as 1887 today's Ndenye community was populated by a congeries of refugees of Nzema, Denkyera and Akan origin organised into small independent States. Yet from 1896 on Ndenye is considered, both by colonial authorities and by its own people, as a single polity and ethnie group. The ethnie consciousness is expressed in the traditions of origin which present as the kingdom's founder Ano Asema, the Anyi king of Aowin, without taking into account the actual hetero-geneity which obtained formerly. The eventual prominence of the Ndenye Anyi is bound to the accumulation of gold and dependents over two centuries. The political organisation was mainly borrowed from the Akan, but with 'son's stools' created for chiefs' sons (not sister's sons) who became heads of new patrilineage. Hence the diminishing importance of kin relationships (no real clan structure) which are superseded by political bonds on a territorial and residential basis. Group consciousness is expressed through royal rites with the participation of ail lineages without any discrimination based upon the date of their incorporation.