Bestiary

In the beginning, when the Earth was being created, it was a wild place overrun with flora. Not until the man-god Oggun brought tools to the people could that wilderness be tamed enough for humans to live and prosper. As a hunter named Tobe Ode, he cut paths through wilderness and created a place for his people to live. With Oggun’s tools, those people could craft homes, towns, roads, and clothing, domesticate their animals, and survive the lash of elements. Weapons, however, are tools as well, so Oggun is some­ times associated with the atrocities of war. During his human life, it is said, he slew his disrespectful subjects, and ultimately himself, with his own sword. To offset the awful legacy of weapons, Oggun also developed surgery and surgical tools with which to heal the bite of his creations. Now he can remove things from the body like tumors, cysts, and blood clots, and has become a very skillful, caring doctor. Thus, Oggun is like a knife: In one person’s hands, he can kill, but in the hands of another, his power can be used to heal.

Anyone who’s good with their hands — such as barbers, carpenters, hairdressers, tailors, and jewelry makers — is said to be blessed with the powers of Oggun. A devotee with Oggun’s powers may create any tool necessary for whatever challenge she has in front of her, from potent weapons to the specific key needed to unlock a door. Oggun’s true gift is utility, and his worshippers are inventive folk indeed. Thanks to his affinity for paths through impediment, he’s regarded as a patron of drivers, some of whom wear iron amulets in his name in order to ward off traffic accidents. Like his tools, Oggun is honest even to a fault. In some courts, his worshippers can swear upon his name and kiss a piece of iron as a sign of truthfulness.

A mortal who wishes to invoke Oggun must use a cast-iron cauldron with tools inside of it. Since Oggun is such a hardworking man, he has a large appetite and will eat almost anything offered to him; that said, he’s very partial to watermelon, smoked fish, plantains, pomegranates, grapes, rum, roosters, and goats. An invocation to Oggun needs to have an animal sacrifice, and no ceremony can go forward without first asking him to bless the knife. Once appeased, Oggun clears a mage’s path by using his

collection of tools to create a road — symbolic or literal — upon which the mortal can travel to her desired destination.

A large man with strong arms, Oggun wears the colors green and black. He carries tools like the hammer, anvil, machete, hoe, shovel, pike, rake, and pickax. Like the hunter-king he once was, Oggun dwells in the forests, and can often be found hunting or fishing with his friends Erinle, Eleggua, and Oshosi.

Much like his tools, Oggun often seems hard, strict, and cold. He is not, however, a violent or frightening god by nature — just someone who’s firm in his stance. A tireless worker, Oggun crafts tools endlessly at his forge, and enjoys finding new materials he can use and problems he can solve with his inventions.