Jonkonnu is not dead (Pt 1)

On December 9, Christine Rhone posted the following on her Facebook page: “No matter how jolly Christmas tries to be, there is always a small part of me that is forever scarred by my likkle-girl Jamaican Jonkanoo nightmare. No hot chocolate and Christmas carols, nor sorrel and black cake can wipe away the memory of being chased barefoot down Duke Street in Falmouth, Trelawny, by the Horsehead man, while fife and drum blared loudly.”

Horse Head is one of the characters in the popular Jamaican masquerade of yesteryear, called Jonkonnu, also known as Jonkanoo and John Canoe. It was for decades a fixture in Grand Market/Christmas Eve festivities.

Accompanied by music from traditional instruments, such as the fife, the drum and the banjo, the masqueraders danced and jigged, in wild abandon. Over time, the themes of the costumes, which had strong European sensibilities, evolved to be more Afro-centric.

The changes continued in the last half of the 20th century, and characters such as ‘Horse Head’, ‘Belly Woman’, ‘Pitchy-Patchy’, ‘The Devil’, and some fictional ones, were added to the cast and changed the impact of their performance. These new additions, some looking very scary, were now driving fear into the hearts of some spectators, chasing them through the crowds.

The tradition evolved from the brutal system of slavery when freedom was only a dream. Yet, there were occasions when the enslaved were allowed time to let loose, and ‘celebrate’. Christian festivals, such as Easter and Christmas, New Year’s and ‘Saints’ days were the times when they were given breaks. But, of them all, Christmas was the time when they paraded in elaborate costumes.

The older enslaved people, dressed in European-style clothes, would visit the masters’ house and entertain them with their own music. In return, they would get food and drink. And as time went by, the parade was led by Jonkonnu, the most flamboyant of the masqueraders. He would wear extravagant costumes as he led a parade of dancers and singers. But who was Jonkonnu?

Ghanaian warrior chief

The research has revealed that “scholars identify West Africa as the source of Jonkanoo”. In Belisario: Sketches of Character by Jackie Ranston (2008), Jonkonnu is said to be a derivative of Jon Konny, a Ghanaian warrior chief. He fought Dutch colonisers for more than 20 years, defending his native Prince’s Town.

In an article called ‘The other Belisario – Another John Canoe’, published in the Jamaica Journal Vol 32 Nos. 1-2, August 2009, Petrine Archer writes: “Around 1720, Jon Konny was eventually captured by the Dutch and sent as a slave to Jamaica, where he became a folk legend and the subject of slave street performances that bear striking resemblance to rituals practised in Prince Town, even today.” Jon Konny’s flamboyance became the benchmark, and masquerade leaders had come to be called Jon Konny, and subsequently the parade itself.

The popularity and the frequency of the masquerades have been on a steady decline since Emancipation. They had started out as an outlet to relieve the tension, pain and suffering of an enslaved people, but slavery was now abolished. There was no longer an anticipated period of ‘freedom’ and feasting. After it was no longer serving the purpose of a relief from the drudgery of slavery, and with the Christianisation of the formerly enslaved, Jonkonnu began to lose its importance and significance.

Also, over the years new types of entertainment and festivities have superseded Jonkonnu, as it were. The digital age and home entertainment technologies have also put some nails into the proverbial coffin. Incidentally, some masqueraders would carry ‘coffins’ on their heads to signal that they had come to carry you away, to that place, your grave.

“I swear Pitchy-Patchy, and the Bride were egging him [Horsehead] on.That bastard chased me into the house and I had to take refuge under my grandparents’ bed. He looked at me that day and singled me out for my own personal horror story. What did he see in my six-year-old soul? What made me his target? … It was hours before they found me under the bed and I was still drenched in sweat. To this day fife and drum give me the chills,” was how Rhone ended the post. “It was the pregnant one (Belly Woman) that ruined me!!” Sophie Miller Carr replied.

Though Jonkonnu is no longer chasing people all over the place in parish capitals on Christmas Eve, sending them to hide under beds and the skirts of their mothers and grandmothers, the ‘terror’ that he had inflicted on some is still alive in their collective memory, perhaps to haunt them for the rest of their lives, even if that were not the intention. He is also immortalised in the sketches of Isaac Mendes Belisario. Jonkonnu is not dead.

editorial@gleanerjm.com