Akech was a ruler in
East Africa
East Africa, Eastern Africa, or East of Africa, is the eastern subregion of the African continent. In the United Nations Statistics Division scheme of geographic regions, 10-11-(16*) territories make up Eastern Africa:
Due to the historical ...
who flourished from 1760 until 1787.
Akech was the second wife of Rwoth
Nyabongo, ruler of the chiefdom of
Paroketu. The royal line of succession had up until this point been
patrilineal, and in due course Nyabongo would have been succeeded by Jobi, the eldest son of Akura, his
senior wife
Great Wife, otherwise appearing in West Africa as Senior Wife, is an honorific applied to contemporary royal and aristocratic consorts in states throughout modern Africa (e.g., Mantfombi Dlamini of eSwatini, who once served as the chief consort of ...
. Akech, however, enjoyed a position in religious leadership, which augmented her royal standing, and she used this to consolidate her own power; consequently, by 1760 she had risen to get political prominence not only as the wife of the chief and as a ritual leader, but as mother of the successor to the throne. Her son
Roketu later came to power; his people then came to be known as the Pa-Akech, or "people of Akech", recognizing the fact that she had founded a ruling dynasty.
Little else is recorded of Akech, save that she was a member of a clan of the
Bunyoro.
[R. A. Sargent]
Found in the Fog of the Male Myth: Analysing Female Political Roles in Pre-Colonial Africa
/ref>
References
18th-century women monarchs
Queens regnant in Africa
18th-century monarchs in Africa
Bunyoro
East Africa
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