THE KEDE: A RIVERAIN STATE IN NORTHERN NIGERIA 183
arisen. Their occurrence or avoidance is clearly bound up with the interpretation put on Kede political autonomy—a point which we will discuss under a separate heading,
VL The Claim to Autonomy
Let me say, first, that the administration of Kede country presents an exact analogy to the administration of Nupe kingdom. Emissaries from the capital, delegates recruited from the ruling house, are in charge of the administrative districts of the Emirate as they are of the district of Kede country. This analogy reflects the analogous political evolution in both countries: the rise to power of a small group over a large country with heterogeneous population. The only exception from this rule of administering the districts of the Emirate through royal delegates is Kede country itself, which remained under its own chief, who acted as the representative of the Etsu Nupe. Even for this exception there is a parallel to be found in Kede organization: the emissary system did not apply to the area of the upper-stream Kede. Their whole area was regarded as one sub-district of Kede country and was placed in charge, not of an emissary from Muregi, but of one of their own chiefs, the village chief of Bele, their southernmost settlement. The explanation for this privileged position of the two groups, the Kede Tifin under Kede and the Kede under Nupe, is most probably the same—namely, that their rulers would have found it difficult to control themselves effectively the territory of these subject communities: the Kede the country of the upper-stream group, which was not easy to reach with their big canoes (note that they made the chief in the place farthest down-stream the 'deputy' for the whole group), and the Nupe kings the whole river area.
To the down-stream Kede their autonomous position in Nupe Emirate is a sacred trust, dating back to their first chief who received, with the chieftainship of Kede, the 'Rule over the Water' from the mythical Tsoede. The Kede chiefs still style themselves Etsu nya nuwa ('King of the Water'), and, as their history shows, have always taken this title very literally. It meant to them more than merely the formal concession of assigning to a Kede chief duties normally discharged by a royal delegate, and they have in the past frequently attempted to acquire a larger