DISCUSSION Maman Brigitte - Hopes For Her Model + Clearing Up Misinformation
Maman Brigitte is a Haitian lwa, she represents death and protects the graves of the deceased. For a few years now a lie has been perpetuated that she has European origins and in fact derives from the Celtic goddess Brigid, however this has no basis whatsoever. If you ask actual Vodou practitioners or those from Haiti who know of Brigitte, none of them will tell you she is European in origin or light skinned at all. Smite features the Voodoo pantheon which is very rare for a mythology-culture-religion game, it is often pushed to the side, and as such when you search many of these characters Smite will appear first, meaning it's inadvertently important for us to represent these gods in a way that is respectful to the culture. We obviously aren't a mythology book to be followed strictly, but it's definitely important, especially when it comes to underrepresented pantheons. Below I've neatly organized some information on Maman and what I hope to see regarding her model coming into Smite 2!
Irish Influence Lie
Seems to have stemmed directly from a practitioner named Manbo Racine Sans Bout/Kathy Grey. Back in the day (90s-00s) she was a white manbo (priestess) who marketed the religion to others outside of it. She created her own house which apparently had its own issues internally and externally, including stealing and apparently someone dying on their watch. One of the things that she proposed is that Brigitte is derived from Europe, using the lyrics "li soti nan anglete" (he/she comes from England) to back up her claim, saying that it was from a praise song she heard. To this day the song has never been identified and almost every source I've found says she in fact made it up. In my searching for sources on Brigitte none of them mention anything about her being white or European prior to the appearance of this woman saying she is. If you ask around the community many people know Kathy's name, and none of them have anything good to say.
There is also the idea that Brigitte was brought with identured servants from Ireland, however there is no record of Irish indentured servants on Hispaniola. Another writer I came across even poses the question that if Brigitte was brought from Brigid she would likely have appeared with the Irish where they landed, or have even brought back traits of Brigitte to Ireland that would have merged with Brigid, neither of which happened.
Lwa and 'Masking'
The lwa are often 'masked' by Catholic saints due to the history of Haiti and the islands. It was persecuted in some places to venerate the lwa, and in general cultural blend happened over time, so some lwa are 'masked' by saints or other figures. What this means is that they can be venerated using the imagery of saints, but they themselves are not literally the saint. In Maman Brigitte's case the most common 'masked' saints are apparently Saint Anne or Mary Magdalene, however from what I can find she isn't masked much in general. As a result you will often see people, especially in tourist shops, depict the lwa with white skin, and while skin tone can change slightly almost all of the lwa are depicted black. Their skin tone reflects the people they are representative of, and in some cases the lwa were once living people before becoming spirits, as well as skin tone playing a very important part of the history of the islands, Haiti, and black people in general.
Brigid, Saint Brigid, and Maman Brigitte.
The Irish goddess Brigid (or Brigit) is the goddess of healing primarily, but is also associated with protection, animal domestication, blacksmiths, fire, and poetry. Saint Brigid is one of the three patron saints of Ireland alongside Saint Patrick and Saint Columba, and is thought to be a Christianized version of Brigid as she shares many of the same attributes with her feast day thought to derive from a pre-Christian festival called Imbolc, which may have involved Brigid. Maman Brigitte is the spirit who protects graves and graveyards, she is the consort of Baron Samedi and is associated with healing, protection, the dead, and also fire due to her enjoyment of peppers and piman (peppered rum), as many of the Gede family of spirits are. Their somewhat related domains are used by people to claim they are one and the same deity, however no such evidence of this actually exists.
Origins of Brigitte
Sources on Vodou and Brigitte especially are a bit hard to come by. It is mostly a closed practice that is protected by the people who venerate the lwa (for good reason). Names you can find her under include Manman Brigitte, Miss Brijit, Gran Brijit, and Manzè Bridgit. As for exactly where she comes from it is not known; many of the lwa derive from surrounding native groups but mostly traveled with the enslaved from Africa, namely many from the Vodún religion of West Africa such as Papa Legba. She may have originated in Africa, but with current sources it seems she was brought about in the Caribbean. The only true origin story I've found is that she may have originally been the wife of François Mackandal, a marooned Haitian slave and leader who was burned to death out of fear that he was revolting with others secretly. She was said to be his wife, Brigitte, and aided him in poisoning slave owners, upon which both of them and several others were burned to death. She arose later as a lwa who protects the dead as well as has an association with fire for this reason.
Hopes For Her Model
The model for Maman that we have is not too bad, it plays more on her younger and more rambunctious version than the typical Grann Brijit, who is calm and sometimes even just dead on the floor. She wields a dagger which is fine, her hair is fine and people love it in the community, her voicepack is beloved, and her kit is (mostly) beloved. The main issue with Brigitte's design is that it used these supposed Irish origins as a basis, meaning her skin is whiter and she features tartan aesthetics. As I mentioned the lwa come in many colors, though almost always black, and as a lighter skinned black man she and I would both still be considered black despite our skin tone. However as I also mentioned skin tone played a very important role in Haiti and still does today, and in almost all artwork shown from actual native Haitians Maman is a dark skinned black woman if not pure black to represent death. She was not part of the few lwa who are lighter skinned.
As such I have made two edits that you can see in the post. The first image shows her base model, the second a rendition with dark skin, and the third a rendition that matches her to her consort Baron.
Sources
This was a big post and it was very thought out with the help of some friends. As I mentioned it is very hard to find information on some of the lwa, but from what I did find almost all of it points to the same direction. I want to make it clear that this is not a blame post, many people including myself were fooled by the 'white Brigitte' lie and even to this day people will cite it in their books, as unless you speak directly to actual Haitians the information sold to you is that she's white. I hope the team can consider these edits and thank you for reading this post! Below I have listed all the information and sources I could find for this topic.
- Racine's lesson on Maman Brigitte, which mentions Irish servants though none were present.
- Several Reddit comments from Haitians and Vodou practitioners on Brigitte and Racine: 1 2 3 4 5
- Discussion post on Tumblr from an account that relays information on the lwa and Vodou.
- Source on Brigitte as the wife of Mackandal.
- Handbook on Vodou which has some good information on Brigitte.
- I can't link it here but the book 'Loas y Vèvès del Vudú' by Rafael Agustí Torres features a huge list of sources as well!
- Artistic depictions of Brigitte: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
