A systematic description of Dahomean religion, arranged as its practitioners arrange it, by pantheon. Mawu heads the account as parent of the gods and the source of their power, the one who holds the formulae for making people and things and who sent divination down so that human beings might learn to deflect the anger of the ruling deities. The Sky pantheon is treated first, then the Earth pantheon, each with its priests, its initiates and its ceremonies.

Alongside the great gods stands the cult of the deified ancestors, built on the clan founders known as Tohwiyo and reaching into food prohibitions and the rites for the royal dead. A later section takes up magic and the semi-divine beings of the forest who connect it to the gods — Minona, the goddess of twins, the children said to be born to die and return. Serpent worship is examined and the charge of a phallic cult set aside.