A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.

Overview

Spider has his wife peel and cook groundnuts with salt and oil, ostensibly so that he can take seed to his field. Instead he eats them in a cool place beside water, drinks and sleeps, then covers himself with mud to resemble a returning laborer. When his wife notices other people’s ripe fields and proposes harvesting their crop, he insists on going himself. The pretended farmer now steals real groundnuts from the Half-Man’s land to keep his earlier deception alive.

The cultivator notices the theft and constructs a female-shaped rubber trap. Spider addresses the figure as a woman, but its silence and adhesive surface entangle him: after one hand sticks, he adds the other, then kicks with each foot and finally strikes with his head. Every attempted attack increases his captivity. The farmer watches from concealment, then emerges with a heated tamarind switch treated with grease, beats the thief and releases him. His final warning threatens death if Spider returns to the field. The effigy itself neither speaks nor acts independently; its material, rather than a summoned spirit, holds the captive.

Tremearne’s discussion names the broader half-being category Barin Mutum or Bare-Bare and describes a body divided lengthwise, with one arm, one leg and one eye. The farm encounter is tale 15, despite the discussion’s printed cross-reference to 16. A separately summarized L.T.H. ii, 72 variant instead makes the captor female and releases Spider on condition that he keep her secret. After he breaks that promise she tries to kill him, but he escapes. The category also includes the volume’s lake giantess, whose massive appetite and separate encounter are retained in her own profile rather than transferred to the practical cultivator.

Longitudinal half-bodyOne arm, leg and eyeCultivated groundnut fieldSticky female effigy trapPunitive release
01

Origins & earliest records

Ba Gu(d)du supplies the selected narrated witness; A. J. N. Tremearne translated and edited it. His general collection context is not an exact performance date for this individual tale.

02

Records & interpretation

Complete primary episode independently read: Tale 15, The Deceitful Spider, the Half-Man, and the Rubber-Girl, pp. 212–214; category discussion The Half-Man, pp. 123–124.

Selected bibliography

Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.

  1. 01

    Hausa Superstitions and Customs, second edition

    Ba Gu(d)du, narrator; A. J. N. Tremearne, collector and translator · 1913

    Tale 15, The Deceitful Spider, the Half-Man, and the Rubber-Girl, pp. 212–214; category discussion The Half-Man, pp. 123–124.

Family & connections

A source-supported family tree or inspiration record has not yet been compiled for this profile. Related reading below indicates a connection in subject matter, not a proven lineage or creative influence.

References

Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.

  1. Collected primary narrative and explicitly separated edition variantsTremearne 1913 — Barin Mutum of the Groundnut FarmResearch access: 2026-10-05

Image credits

A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.

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