Who is Effia’s mother?

Maame, who will go on to give birth to Esi, is Effia’s real mother. She is enslaved and raped by Cobbe. When Maame gives birth to Effia, she leaves the black stone with Baaba, sets the compound on fire, and flees into the night. Although Cobbe forces Baaba to raise Effia as her own, she never forgets that Effia is not her daughter and is a sign of her husband’s infidelity.

What happens to Esi’s stone?

Esi tries desperately to protect her mother’s stone. After Fiifi beats her, she swallows the stone to smuggle it into the castle and later buries it in the dungeon so she can keep it secret and safe. When Governor James chooses to sell her, Esi frantically tries to dig up her stone, but the soldiers force her to leave before she can find it. She ends up leaving the stone behind in the dungeon.

Why does Ness leave Kojo?

Ness leaves Kojo with Ma Aku to give him the best chance of making it to freedom. The night before the Devil finds them, Ness has an instinctual feeling of his imminent arrival. She gives Kojo to Ma Aku because the Devil doesn’t know about Ma Aku and isn’t looking for her. Therefore, when the Devil only finds Ness and Sam, he believes the lie that Kojo, who is an infant, died on the road and doesn’t try to look for him.

Why does the firewoman haunt Akua’s dreams?

The firewoman is Maame, mother of Effia and Esi and the apex of the ruptured family line. According to traditional Asante and Fante beliefs, ancestors sometimes appear to their descendants with important messages. Maame is angry both about the loss of her children and the pain those on the Ghanaian side of the family have caused with their complicity in slavery. Symbolically, Maame’s haunting represents the intergenerational trauma passed through this broken family lineage on both sides. As Akua will later tell Yaw, the suffering caused by family trauma casts a shadow over subsequent generations.

What is the significance of Marjorie and Marcus going into the ocean together?

Marjorie and Marcus swimming together symbolizes the mending of the rift between the two sides of the family. This ocean is the point where the Ghanaian and American sides of the family were forever divided by slavery. By swimming together, Marjorie and Marcus turn the ocean from a place of rupture to a place of reunion. When Marjorie coaxes Marcus into the water, this moment evokes Akua bringing Marjorie to the ocean to remind her “how to come home,” because Ghana and the coast are the origin of her roots. Here, Marjorie shows Marcus how to return home to his ancestors.

Take a Study Break