ABSTRACT

African taboos refer to the moral principles among the African people that served as proscriptions, spelling out how African traditional societies ought to or ought not to relate with the persons and things in their environment. These taboos provide and preserve balance and harmony within the community, and in the community’s relationship with nature. They are respected by members of African communities because of the spiritual background that they possess, given that they are either promulgated by a deity or the ancestors. Within the context of African environmental ethics, taboos fit into several facets. Even though it can be studied as a major source of African environmental ethics, it belongs to a special place in the study of the indigenous modalities for environmental preservation. This piece, therefore, studies African taboos as guardians of the environment with the view of outlining its role in the preservation of the environment, especially in precolonial African societies. For the purpose of this study, the hermeneutic method of inquiry was employed. The paper discovered that African taboos occupied a central place in the effort of traditional African societies towards the preservation of the environment.