Oron Museum

The Ekpu are carved wooden figures made by the Oron people to represent lineage ancestors, standing figures with elongated bodies, beards and often a staff or horn, kept in family shrines and honoured with offerings, with the oldest surviving examples dated by some accounts to the eighteenth century. A museum was established at Oron in 1959 to house a collection of them, and it held over six hundred figures, the largest assembly of the tradition anywhere. A large part of the collection was lost or damaged during the fighting of the late 1960s, and further losses have occurred since; the museum has been rebuilt and holds what remains. The setting is the estuary town of Oron, reached by road or by boat from Calabar.

What you actually see

• The Ekpu figures - the carved ancestral sculptures of the Oron.
• Carving detail - the elongated forms, beards and staffs.
• The museum galleries - the surviving collection and its displays.
• The estuary town - Oron on the Cross River water.

When to go

November to March in the dry season for the roads and the boat crossing from Calabar. Weekday mornings are most reliable for opening. Hours have been irregular at times.

Honest expectations

A large part of the original collection was lost and what remains is a fraction of what the museum once held. The building and displays are dated. Opening hours are unreliable. Oron is off the usual routes.

Nearby

Calabar lies northeast across the estuary; Ibeno beach is west.