Nsukka

The northern part of the eastern uplands is an area of early and possibly independent settlement whose focus lay at or near Nsukka, and certain villages in the north-east say their ancestors came from one or another Nsukka community.

The dialects spoken in the east of this area are reported to be nearer to Owerri Igbo than to the speech of the Nri-Awka or Onitsha groups, and Nsukka is one of the three places in that connection.

Afigbo reports that the town's principal cult, Ezoguda, was traced to an ancestor held to be a son of the priest-chief at Nshi (Nri), and that Nsukka's first Eze — the only real one it is said to have had — was the man who brought the iron staff of that cult from Nri. The annual sacrifice, held in January, received the dried livers of game killed by the people of Eha Alumona during the year, part of which was sent back towards Nri.

Afigbo cautions that these deities do not exist at Nri, and reads the traditions as claims by particular families to the offices of priest and chief rather than as records of migration.