ABSTRACT
West African spiritual beliefs were termed ‘fetishism’ by Victorian commentators. Comte had identified fetishism as the first stage of religious development; Lubbock dismissed it as ‘mere witchcraft’. ‘When the taint of slavery fused with sensational reports about cannibalism, witchcraft, and apparently shameless sexual customs, Victorian Africa emerged draped in that pall of darkness that the Victorians themselves accepted as reality’. The notion of cannibalism was intimately connected to ideas about secret societies, especially in Sierra Leone and what was to become southern Nigeria. Secret societies were viewed with suspicion by both the British and by Africans themselves. Paradoxically, although there was little concern for understanding African spiritual beliefs, the cultural practices that emanated from them provided people in Victorian Britain with a rich source of fascination. In the narratives of both H. G. Foote and Zelie Colvile there were no attempts to understand and relate to the local spiritual practices of indigenous peoples.
