Brav Gede

First of the dead, memory of the departed

Brav Gede holds a singular place among the lwa of the dead in Haitian Vodou. Tradition holds that the first person buried in a cemetery becomes its guardian, and Brav is the name given to this role as much as to the spirit who fills it. He is therefore not a lwa who came from Africa but a figure born of Haitian soil itself, which sets him apart from the great spirits of the Rada rite. Like all the Gede, he appears in black and purple, he jokes, he drinks clairin steeped with hot peppers and he practises an obscenity that makes the gathering laugh. This laughter is not irreverence: in Vodou, mockery is the right way to approach death, because it puts death in its place and refuses to let it alone decide what is serious. Brav is invoked at funerals and during the festival of the dead, in November, when the Gede take over the cemeteries and the streets.