Your guess may be as good as mine. I’ve always thought that the people of Gomoa had no peculiar reason for naming their towns and villages, simply put, a copycat behaviour of a sort!

However, an intercourse with Nana Amoh Mensah, the Oman baatan of Gomoa Gyaaman proved otherwise. With wrinkles drawn on his forehead like a map, he screamed at me when I asked him why the people of Gomoa had similar names of towns and villages in the country and even beyond. 

The 60-year-old said, with one of his fingers pointed at me, “We have no duplicate of any town or city, be it within or outside the country”. 

Where were those towns when we started naming ours? Our towns are indigenous, and their names are very symbolic. 

All these arguments are just to ridicule our rich culture, but they have no bases and lack factual evidence which cannot stand the test of time,” he argued.

Fear then took hold of me because I realised I had shaken the bile of the old man. In an attempt to escape his anger, I decided to vanish into thin air but he held firmly to my right wrist. 

He then told me to sit down for him to walk me through the rich culture of the people of Gomoa. Before he began,he demanded a bottle of schnapp from me to offer libation to the gods of the land, but I could only offer some money in lieu of the schnapp.

Realising that I had gained enough confidence to punch the old man with questions, I sat comfortably.   

Even though I wasn’t in a television studio directing a presenter or an anchor on what to do, I raised my hand to signal the old man to tell me the history behind some of the towns and villages in Gomoa. 

History 

As early as 1942, Nana Amoh Mensah said Gomoa Lome was founded by Nana Kum. Due to lack of water at Gomoa Gyaaman, he (Nana Kum) decided to move and settle at the place where he could get enough water. He finally chanced upon a water body and decided to live nearby. He subsequently invited his loved ones to join him in his newly found place of abode.

The town, therefore, earned the name, “se edome bra,” to wit, ‘join me if you love me’. The name, was, therefore, translated as “Dome” . However, recent developments have brought a twist to the name and it has been corrupted into ‘Lome,’ just like the capital of Togo. I beamed and nodded my head like a lizard on a tree. “You’re happy heh?” he asked. But i wouldn’t talk for a while.

Gomoa Dahomey shared boundaries with Gomoa Kyebi, Sraha and Mankessim in the 17th century, according to the Oman baatan of Gomoa Gyaaman. This time, I noticed the old man was happy. With a lot of questions running through my mind, I decided to stay cool for a while in order not to arouse his anger again. He said that when the current settlers came, they saw a big tree which proved difficult to uproot.  With unity, tenacity of purpose and one vision, they managed to uproot the tree with their bare hands and settled there. It was then called ‘Da-ho-mey’ (a fantse expression), which literally means “let us rest and settle here.”  

Just when my lecturer, as I called him since the start of the conversation, was about rounding up, a man in his mid-forties bumped into us. He was introduced to me by my ‘lecturer’ as Mr Aspect Kobina Donkoh (an elder of Gomoa Gyaaman). 

Mr Donkoh took the baton from my ‘lecturer’ quickly and started the narration with much more vigour.  

Gomoa Gyaaman

According to the Gomoa Gyaaman elder, that small town is almost 200 years old. He said six forests and villages were put together to become one village at the time. These villages were led by six elders: Nana Kum, Nana Amo Mensah, Nana Bondam Entsie, Nana Otabil, Nana Akuaku and Nana Kwaafo. These friends agreed to come together to form a town with one chief in order to be protected against their enemies.

However, when they came to their permanent place of settlement, they were expected to pay 64 pounds to the owner of the land. Unfortunately, they couldn’t pay the amount after they had settled. Realising that the pressure being mounted on them by the owner of the land was unbearable, Nana Kum told his colleagues to leave everything for him to handle. Subsequently, his friends started calling him, “Nana Gyaamam,” to wit “Nana leave it for to me”. Hence, the name Gomoa Gyaaman, which is the corrupt form of “Gyaamam.” This means the small farming community’s name is entirely different from that of Germany in Europe. With excitement written all over my face, I shouted and applauded my newly-found tutor.

Gomoa Ngyeresi

Regarding Gomoa Ngyeresi (England or Great Britain), Mr Donkoh said the first person who came to settle on the land was a Ga, from Chorkor, a suburb of Accra, in the early 17th Century, who could only express himself in English. As a result, those who came to settle there with him began calling him Nana “Ngyeresi” meaning one who comes from England and could only speak English, hence the name Gomoa Ngyeresi. 

Gomoa Nkoransa

Gomoa Nkoransa, he added, was carved out of three cottages with Asamanfom as the ‘head’ town. These three cottages were later joined to form one village and was named ‘Nkoransa’ (the merger of three cottages or villages). It is an entirely different town from Nkoranza in the Brong-Ahafo Region. 

What about Gomoa Kumasi?, I quickly enquired. I don’t have much knowledge about it, he replied with a smiling face.

Gomoa Kumasi 

Gomoa Kumasi is also another controversial name given to a small town by the people of Gomoa. Nana Esabotwey II, ‘Mankrado’ of Gomoa Kumasi, agrees that even though it is a duplicate of the Garden City (Kumasi, capital of the Ashanti Region), the name is symbolic. History has it that four friends agreed to join four cottages, namely; Kwaaman, Abowinmu, Entumbir and Abodo to form the current Gomoa Kumasi in 1886. The four friends usually met under a Kum tree to play draft in order not to be attacked by any enemy. As a result, they agreed to call the village “Kum ase,” to wit, “Under the Kum tree.” The small town has since been called Gomoa Kumasi. 

Gomoa Ajumako

After the people of Gomoa left their traditional home, Gomoa Maim, they decided to settle at a place called Gomoa Ajumako. Due to wars in the olden days, Gomoa Ajumako was discovered as the war zone for the Gomoa people to fight their enemies. The village was, therefore, called “Ajumako” which means a war zone.  

Gomoa Brofoyedur

According to Nana Esuon Abonyi Kwata II, the chief of Gomoa Brofoyedur (English is heavy), that small town was discovered as a result of the huge rocks that were found in the area by the first settlers. He said the inhabitants could not clear the rocks and hills when they attempted to construct a road. Some white men decided to offer a helping hand. In the end, they successfully cleared the rocks and hills and constructed a road in between. Excited as they were, the populace started praising the whitemen as being mighty, which is interpreted in Fantse as “Aborofo ye dur” (the whites are mighty). It, therefore, earned the name, Gomoa Brofoyedur.  

Gomoa Obuasi

Incidentally, the only town I discovered without a distinct history was Gomoa Obuasi. It is believed that the small town, with its numerous recreational facilities, was carved out of Gomoa Gyaaman, and named directly after Obuasi in the Ashanti Region, the harbour of gold in Ghana. 

It is clear that in spite of the rich culture and symbolic names of most of the Gomoa towns, there are similar ones in Ghana and beyond.