The Yoruba legend of fire and the rise of volcanoes

It is Yemú, the way of the goddess of the sea, Yemaya, which grants the calm sea. It is said that on this path she is Oduduwa in its female version.

In this avatar the true crown of Yemayá is born, Yemú is the warrior Orisha, who fights to fulfill the mandates of the Creator Olofin so that peace may reign on earth. It is she who gives life through the flow of its waters.

And she was the savior, who helped extinguish the fire that once reigned over the entire surface of the Earth, making it uninhabitable.

Pataki: Olofin, Yemú and fire

This Pataki tells that, at the beginning of the world, the Earth was a great incandescent mass and Olofin himself felt so much heat that he sent Yemú to fight to put out the fire with the flow of its waters.

Yemú agreed to carry out the order of the creator and called the powerful forces of the waters to fight. After long days of work, Yemu was exhausted, but she had succeeded and the fire had disappeared from the surface of the Earth.

Rise of rivers and seas

So much was the water that Yemú used to eliminate the fire, that the flows ran from the highest to the lowest places. So long was the path the sweet liquid traversed that when it reached its destination it turned salty.

Thus, the shorter flows became rivers and lakes and remained sweet, while the longer ones became seas and were full of salt.

Birth of the volcanoes

Oroíña, the fire, had been imprisoned in the center of the planet. Yemu had pushed him there so that he couldn't cause any more disasters and the Earth could come to life.

But the fire was not satisfied with its destiny and asked to see Olofin so that he could give it other places to spread.

Then the Creator reproached him for his previous attitude, and with his usual goodness and wisdom told him that he was paying for his guilt for wanting to obliterate his most beautiful creation.

"But so that nobody will forget you, every so often I will lend you the hill and for it you will let your voice be heard and you will show your descendants", I assure.

Thus arose the volcanoes and their dangerous lava that on several occasions have devastated multiple territories.

Therefore, when we least expect it, a volcano erupts and lava flows amidst an intense noise, which according to legend, is the voices of Oroíña, fire, and Aggayu Solá, their son, who enjoy while they devour the crops and take over the savannah.