How the Tortoise Got Its Shell

In this origin tale, the great chief Mauri, identified in the source as God, decided to hold a splendid yam festival. He sent messengers to invite all his chiefs and people to the gathering, which was to be held on Fida, which is Friday.

On the morning of the feast he sent some of his servants to the nearby towns and villages to buy goats, sheep, and cows. Mr Klo, the tortoise, was sent to buy palm wine. In those days Klo was tall and handsome, and he was told to go to the palm groves of Koklovi, the chicken.

Klo was a very strong traveller at that time, and although the groves were many miles from Mauri’s palace, he got there quickly. Koklovi was eating his breakfast when he arrived. After they had greeted each other politely, Koklovi asked why Klo had come.

“His Majesty Mauri, ruler of the world, sent me to buy palm wine for him,” said Klo.

“Ruler of the world or not,” Koklovi replied, “nobody can buy my wine with money. If you want it, you must fight for it. If you win, you can have all of it, and the palm-trees too.”

Klo was pleased with this answer, because he was a powerful fighter. But Koklovi was every bit as strong, and they fought for several hours before Klo finally beat him. When he had won, he tied Koklovi up securely before leaving him.

Then Klo took his great pot and filled it with wine. There was more wine than the pot could hold, so, foolishly, Klo drank all the rest himself. Then he piled the palm-trees on his back and started back to the palace carrying the pot of wine.

All that wine made him feel so drowsy and tired that he could not walk quickly under his load. On top of that, a terrible rain began to pour down, making the ground slippery and even harder to cross.

By the time Klo reached his master’s palace, the gates were shut and locked. It had grown so late that Mauri assumed everyone was already inside. The great hall was crowded with people singing and dancing, and the music was so loud that no one heard Klo knocking at the gate. So he had to stay outside with his huge load of wine and palm-trees.

The rain went on for nearly two months, and it was so fierce that everyone stayed inside the palace until it stopped. By that time Klo had died beneath the weight of his load, which he had not been able to get off his back. There he lay in front of the gate, with the pile of palm-trees on top of him.

When the rain finally ended and the gates were opened, the people were astonished to see a great mound outside the gate where nothing had been before. They fetched spades and began shovelling it away.

At the very bottom of the pile they found Klo. His clay pot and the dust had caked together into a hard covering on his back.

They carried him into the palace, and with the help of many wonderful medicines he was brought back to life. But he has never been able to stand up straight since. He has been a creeping creature ever after, with a great shell on his back.

About this tale

“How the Tortoise Got Its Shell” is story XX in Barker and Sinclair’s West African Folk-Tales (1917). The book itself glosses its local names in brackets: Mauri is God, Fida is Friday, Klo is the tortoise, and Koklovi is the chicken.

It is one of the “just-so” tales that Barker says make up most of the non-Anansi stories: explanations for why a creature looks or behaves as it does. Here the cause is a mix of greed, bad weather and a party too loud to hear the knocking at the gate.

Read the original: West African Folk-Tales by Barker and Sinclair (Project Gutenberg)

Best for ages 9–12 with an adult — includes drinking, fighting, death beneath a heavy load and a magical revival.

Reading the story closely

Klo’s drinking slows him, but other decisions also shape the disaster: Koklovi demands a fight, the load cannot be removed, and the palace closes without checking that every messenger has returned. The loud celebration and unheard knocking place abundance beside exclusion.

Trace the delays on Klo’s journey and mark which ones he controls. Then compare the pot before and after the storm: a container carried for someone else becomes a permanent covering on his body. This imaginative transformation explains the shell within the tale, not the biology of tortoises, and the revival is magical rather than a medical claim.

Talk about it

• What job did Mauri give to Klo?
• What mistake did Klo make after winning the wine?
• How did the pot and the dust turn into a shell?

Related stories

• The Hunter and the Tortoise — a tortoise with a magic song
• Elephant and Tortoise — a southern African tortoise who outlasts an elephant
• King Chameleon and the Animals — another Gold Coast tale explaining an animal’s way of life