So far, oral history in non-literate societies has been utilized as complementary material for chronological << objective >> history. But in fact an oral history, like a written history, is a discourse about the past. The author believes that oral history must be treated first of all as material to know how the people of the society in question conceive and express their past in relation to the present. In the recited Mosi (Burkina Faso) royal geneaology studied by the author, the past is represented through rich metaphors, especially those of animals, plants and natural phenomena. Past kings are represented by metaphorical expressions composed of common nouns and verbs. It is the oral traditions related to a particular king that give to such phrases the function of a proper noun to designate a particular king. Here the traces of the past can be recognized only through metaphors. But the employment of the discourse itself, in which new events must have been absorbed in the course of history, reveals traces of the restructuring of the discourse.
