StapleCentral African Republic
Gozo
Cassava flour cooked into a stiff paste, the daily starch of the Central African Republic. Rolled in the palm and dipped in whatever sauce there is.
Serves 6 · 30 minutes
Bofi
Farmers and forest people of the Lobaye in the south-western Central African Republic, whose villages sit alongside BaAka camps in one of the most studied hunter-gatherer and farmer relationships in Africa, and whose forest is now a diamond and logging frontier.
Identity
Population: Estimated 20,000 to 40,000
Location: Lobaye and Mambéré-Kadéï prefectures of the south-western Central African Republic, around Boda and Ngotto
Language: Bofi; the BaAka of the area speak a closely related variety, Bofi as spoken by foragers
Language family: Niger-Congo → Adamawa-Ubangi → Ubangian (Gbaya group)
Traditional governance: Village and lineage authority; Central African prefectural administration; the village-forager patron relationships operating alongside.
Clans, Sections & Sub-groups (3)
Most African peoples are federations of named sub-groups (clans, sections, chiefdoms or sub-tribes), each with its own dialect, territory and traditions.
Bofi of Boda
The northern farming communities.
Bofi of Ngotto
Communities on the forest edge near the Ngotto reserve.
Bofi BaAka
Forest-dwelling communities speaking a Bofi variety, distinct from the Aka of the Sangha.
Culture
Clothing: Contemporary dress; barkcloth historically, made and painted by BaAka neighbours; ceremonial regalia at funerals.
Food: Cassava and plantain, forest game obtained through and with BaAka partners, river fish, palm oil, caterpillars in season, honey, and palm wine.
Ceremonies: Funerals with drumming and dance; ancestral offerings; hunting rites; the polyphonic singing and dance shared with BaAka neighbours.
Marriage customs: Patrilineal with bridewealth in goods; marriage between village Bofi and BaAka occurs and is asymmetrical, usually of BaAka women into village households.
Initiation rites: Boys' circumcision with instruction; the practical passage is into the hunting and farming economy.
Food & Recipes
Every dish the Atlas publishes for Central African Republic, at national rather than community level — 10 in all: the staple a household eats daily, the dish the country names as its own, street food, what is cooked for a wedding or Eid, regional specialities and a drink. Quantities and method are given for every one, so these are recipes rather than descriptions, and each has a photograph from Wikimedia Commons. The Food page carries the whole continent, searchable by country and by ingredient.
StapleCentral African Republic
Boule de Manioc
also Gozo ball, Cassava fufu
Cassava flour worked into a smooth dense ball, the Central African staple, torn off and used to lift sauce. Made in every household daily.
Serves 6 · 30 minutes
National dishCentral African Republic
Kanda ti Nyma
Meatballs of beef and ground squash seeds cooked in a tomato and groundnut sauce, wrapped in leaves in the traditional version. A dish of the Ubangi river country.
Serves 6 · 1 hour 30 minutes
National dishCentral African Republic
Sauce Arachide
also Groundnut sauce, Kanda ti nyma
Groundnut paste cooked with meat, tomato and chilli into a thick red-brown sauce, the dish that turns up at every Central African table.
Serves 6 · 1 hour 30 minutes
Street foodCentral African Republic
Makara
Fried dough balls sold at markets and roadsides with sweet tea, eaten at breakfast or bought by the handful for a journey.
Serves Makes 20 · 2 hours 15 minutes
Street foodCentral African Republic
Kanya
also Peanut brittle bar, Kanyah
Roasted peanuts pounded with sugar and a little rice flour and pressed into bars, sold at markets and bus stops across the Central African Republic.
Serves Makes about 20 bars · 40 minutes
Festival & feastCentral African Republic
Poulet à la Moambé
Chicken cooked in palm nut pulp with chilli and garlic, made for guests and celebrations across the Congo basin. Orange, rich and served over cassava.
Serves 6 · 1 hour 30 minutes
Regional specialityCentral African Republic
Koko
Forest vine leaves shredded very fine and cooked with palm oil, smoked fish and groundnut. The same plant as Cameroonian eru, gathered from the same forest.
Serves 6 · 1 hour
Regional specialityCentral African Republic
Poisson Fumé aux Feuilles
also Smoked fish with greens
Smoked river fish cooked with cassava or gnetum leaves and palm oil, the standard meal along the Ubangi and its tributaries.
Serves 6 · 1 hour 15 minutes
Drink & sweetCentral African Republic
Ngbako
Maize or cassava beer fermented in villages and drunk from a shared vessel at gatherings and funerals. Cloudy, sour and drunk young.
Serves Makes about 5 litres · 3 days
Stories & Oral Literature
Two Peoples, One LanguageLinguistic and social history
The Bofi villagers and the BaAka foragers of the Lobaye speak varieties of the same Ubangian language, which is unusual: elsewhere in the region the forest peoples speak a language borrowed from a different farming neighbour. The Bofi BaAka are therefore linguistically distinct from the Aka of the Sangha to the south, who speak a variety of Ngando. The situation has made the Lobaye a natural laboratory for studying how forager and farmer communities differentiate when language does not separate them.
The Childhood StudiesAnthropological research
Barry Hewlett and colleagues have studied Bofi and BaAka childrearing since the 1970s in what is among the most detailed cross-cultural comparisons of infant care anywhere: BaAka infants are held almost continuously, nursed on demand and cared for by many adults; Bofi farming households show a pattern closer to the global norm. The comparison has been central to arguments in developmental psychology about what human infant care looked like before agriculture.
Diamonds in the LobayeContemporary conflict
The south-west's alluvial diamond fields have drawn artisanal miners for decades, and after 2013 armed groups fought for control of them; Boda saw severe communal violence between Muslim and Christian populations in 2014, with the town divided and thousands displaced into enclaves. The Kimberley Process suspended Central African diamond exports in 2013 and has partially readmitted them since. The Bofi live in a forest that is simultaneously a subsistence base, a logging concession and a mining frontier.
Proverbs
“The child that is always carried does not learn to cry for long.”
A BaAka observation the studies later measured.
“The forest feeds those who ask it properly.”
On hunting rites and on restraint.
“The stone that is dug leaves a hole that fills with water and quarrels.”
On artisanal mining.
Mythology & Spiritual Beliefs
Creation: A creator god of the Ubangian tradition; the forest as a power addressed before hunting; ancestral spirits at lineage sites.
Beliefs: Hunting rites and forest observance; ancestral offerings; BaAka healing and divination specialists consulted by village households; Catholic and Protestant Christianity present, with Islam among the trading population.
Ancestors: The dead are buried near the village and addressed at lineage sites; inherited exchange partnerships with BaAka families carry ancestral weight.
Gods, Goddesses & Spirits
The creator
The remote high god
The forest
Addressed as a power before hunting, in forms shared with BaAka neighbours
Ancestral spirits
Addressed at lineage sites for health and hunting
Architecture
Traditional settlements: Villages of rectangular mud-and-pole houses along forest roads, with BaAka camps of dome leaf huts alongside or a short walk into the forest.
Building techniques: Pole and mud walling with leaf and thatch roofing; barkcloth beating and painting; net and crossbow making; drum making.
Village layout: Houses in a line along the road with gardens behind and BaAka camps at the village edge; the forest immediately beyond the plots.
Artifacts
Painted barkcloth
Textile
Beaten and painted bark of the Lobaye, made by BaAka and traded through village households.
Hunting nets and crossbows
Craft
Forest hunting equipment used in the collective net drives.
Ngotto forest reserve
Natural heritage
Protected forest in the Lobaye, under logging and mining pressure.
Water drumming
Intangible heritage
The percussive water-slapping music of the Lobaye's rivers, performed by BaAka women and girls.
Historical Timeline
Pre-1800
Ubangian-speaking farmers settle the Lobaye alongside BaAka forest communities.
1890s–1930s
French concession companies impose rubber and ivory quotas; the Lobaye is severely disrupted.
1970s–present
Hewlett and colleagues document Bofi and BaAka childrearing in detail.
2013–2014
Central African conflict reaches the south-west; Boda is divided by communal violence; diamond exports are suspended.
2015–present
Partial readmission to the Kimberley Process; logging and mining pressure on the Lobaye forest continues.
Sources & Further Reading
Open sources
- Kimberley Process — Central African RepublicKimberley Process
Premium & scholarly sources
- Hewlett, Hunter-Gatherer Childhoods and Bofi studiesJSTOR
- Ethnologue: BofiSIL International