Big Qua Tee · Plate XXII · Seat of the Ndidem · Pre-Order (Ships ASAP)

Big Qua, Akim Qua Town, is the seat of the Ndidem of the Quas. The plate draws the great compound at the center of the nation.

Navy shirt carries ivory and fern-green ink; white shirt carries navy. Full-front print.

History

Big Qua Town is the capital of the Ejagham Qua nation in Calabar and the seat of the Ndidem, the paramount ruler who presides over the fourteen Qua clans. From its great compound the Qua governed as their forest ancestors did — through Mgbe rank and council rather than the trading-house wealth of their Efik neighbours — while holding land rights across the city that stand to this day. When Calabar's history is told as an Efik story alone, Big Qua is the standing correction: a royal capital of an older claim, at the center of the same city.