In the middle of the twelfth century, several Bamileke groups, settled in small villages around what is actually Bana. Legend says that one of the village chiefs, Mfenge was accused of sorcery by the others. In order to exonerate himself, he cut off his mother's head and had the cadaver examined by specialists. The belief in sorcery, that it is transmitted through the "maternal womb", was not proven. Mfenge then demanded that mothers in others families be beheaded. His four sons went from house to house, sending wives and mothers to the palace, in order to be examined. The recalcitrants were decapited on the spot. Taken by panic, chiefs and nobles fled, and Mfenge became King of Bana.