INTRODUCTORY
The main objects of this work are to place on record the results of investigations made among the native tribes in British East Africa, particularly among the Kikuyu and Kamba people, and to endeavour, from a study of their ceremonial with regard to sacrifice and taboo, to obtain a better insight into the principles which underlie the outward forms and ceremonies of their ritual.
It has long been customary, partly through narrow-minded prejudice and partly through ignorance, to class as Pagans all native tribes which have not yet embraced one of the great positive religions, such as Christianity or Mohammedanism. But the time has now come when such negative definitions, if seriously applied, will have to be abandoned. It must be admitted that all savages have a natural religion which is a survival of, and is analogous to, a stage of belief which existed among the ancestors of the civilised peoples of the present day. The admission is inevitable, however distasteful to those who are dogmatic in their religious beliefs and loath to admit that religious thought and the conception of a deity have passed through an evolutionary process and, furthermore, a process which has not ceased. For, after all, the development of mental and moral ideas is a part of the evolution of the living being as much as the development of limbs, cranial shape, or body markings. No positive system of religion descended from heaven as a completely new concept of the deity and with an absolutely novel code. Such a system could never have survived. Any new religious teacher could not fail to be, to a great extent, a [[20]]creature of his environment and of the age in which he was born. He must necessarily graft his scheme on to what went before. As Robertson Smith so truly says, “a new scheme of faith can only find a hearing by appealing to religious instincts and susceptibilities that already exist in the audience.”
In East Africa, various tribes remain in a stage of belief very similar to that which prevailed in Arabia and Assyria from about 1500 B.C. and onward, and which continued till a dogmatic uniformity was forced on the bulk of the people by the teachings of Mahomed about A.D. 650.
Asiatic beliefs were introduced to Abyssinia by the Sabæans or Himyaritic invaders a few centuries before the Christian era, but it is doubtful whether they spread to any extent. For ancient religious influences on Central Africa, we must look more to the channel afforded by the Nile valley which had become a route of exploration as far back as the time of the Pharaohs. Although, however, we know that Egyptian influence was spasmodically exercised for a long distance up the Nile valley, little evidence of any spiritual effect has as yet come to light. This is natural, for the ancient expeditions were at long intervals and were not missionary enterprises, but were in search of material gain.
The only case of permanent settlement which appears to be beyond doubt is the invasion into Uganda, Unyoro, and Ankole, of a light coloured race, now known as the Ba-Hima or Ba-Huma. Some consider that these people came from the Abyssinian highlands; Sir Harry Johnston, on the other hand, believes them to be descendants of ancient Egyptian settlers; according to Dr Seligman they are probably descendants of what he terms Proto-Egyptians—the latter description being a more concrete definition based upon careful researches in the Nile valley, the result of which was not available when Sir H. H. Johnston made his suggestion.
But whatever the origin of the Ba-Hima, there [[21]]appears to be no trace of this infusion of northern blood anywhere east of the Rift Valley, except, possibly, among the Masai who are believed to have migrated south-east from the valley of the Upper Nile. The Nandi, the Lako and Savei of Elgon, the Lumbwa and Elgeyo also came from the north-west, but did not cross the Rift.
The Kikuyu absorbed some Masai blood from time to time, and also intermixed to some extent with the aboriginal Oggiek, but they are mainly Bantu in blood and constitution. The Kamba people, whose ancestors flowed into their present habitat from the south and south-west, are believed to be pure Bantu.
We have, therefore, no evidence as to where the ancestors of the Kikuyu or Kamba lived about two thousand years ago, and, further, whether they were affected by Semitic culture in remote times.
It is, moreover, highly improbable that the ancient Semitic beliefs should have originated in East Africa. We must, therefore, decide whether such similarity as we find to-day is merely a case of parallel and unconnected development, or the result of an ancient invasion of a Semitic race or possibly of a race which had adopted Semitic beliefs. In the present state of knowledge it will be safer to assume that this similarity is due to parallel development, many examples of which may be found in other parts of the world.
It is, however, necessary to make it clear that if there should have been any Semitic influence it cannot have been derived from the Arab settlements on the East Coast of Africa, founded during the last few hundred years. Their political hold of the country never extended much beyond the tidal waters, and their only social influence was the slight one exercised at intermittent intervals by a slave raiding or ivory trading expedition. No ancient trace of Mohammedanism can be found among the people under consideration, and their present stage of culture is pre-Islamic in point of time. [[22]]
The religious beliefs of the tribes of Kikuyu and Ukamba generally consist of a rudimentary conception of a high god, corresponding more or less to the old Hebrew concept of Jahveh. To the bulk of the peasantry this idea is naturally very vague and practically subconscious. But the elders of what may be termed the “high place” are believed to have a clear conception of it, and their deity is apparently of the kind which can be influenced and appeased by material attentions. The belief in ancestral spirits—ngoma or aiimu—is the predominating spiritual factor in the minds of the great majority of the people. These are ever present, and the relations between men and spirits are in accordance with the actual patriarchal state of society. The spirits must not be ignored, for are they not of the blood kin? If neglected, they will be angry and punish their children. But naturally no rancour is felt when such punishments are inflicted. There is a total absence of religious intolerance about this cult; failure to worship or failure to contribute to a sacrifice brings its own retribution, and the spirits are swift in detecting a delinquent.
These spirits are not necessarily evil, but there is little doubt that the character of the spirit is believed to reflect to some extent the character of the person from whom it came, and the power of the spirit is intimately connected with the position of the person in the tribe. This explains to some extent why an ordinary person is cast out at death, whereas an elder, qualified to take part in sacrificial ceremonies, receives burial. The burial is probably pleasing to the spirit, and the spirit of an elder possesses more power than that of an uninitiated common person. All spirits, however, appear to be relentless and malignant when neglected, and remain so until they are appeased. At times they are said to assist their clients, and, through a suitable medium, to warn the people of an impending raid.
In old Semitic records the evil spirits or jinn loom very large; they are usually referred to as devils in the [[23]]Old Testament. They have no continuous or fixed personal relations with mankind, but have their own particular haunts in desert places, caves, and so forth. They are, so to speak, outlaws; they appear to man either in human or animal form, and if one is killed, a solid carcase is believed to remain. Among the ancient Semites, the belief became very elaborate and survives to this day in out-of-the-way places. These unwholesome creatures were even classified more or less definitely as jinni, ghouls, mared, lilith, sedim, and so forth.
Among our African tribes this cult, however, has fortunately not developed to any great extent. It may, of course, have been forgotten, or it may have disappeared, but there are still a few traces of it left. A Kamba story, for instance, tells of two girls who took shelter in a cave during a storm. A centipede came in while they were there and the girls threw it outside. But the centipede was an evil spirit and revenged itself by closing up the entrance to the cave, so that the girls were starved to death. This story might have come straight from Central Arabia and be that of a jinni, the sedim of the Talmud, who were supposed to assume any form they wished. The deity or the ancestral spirit is appeased by means of sacrifice or libations, carried out either privately or communally according to the circumstances. A considerable amount of detailed information concerning these has been collected, which it may be interesting to compare with similar practices described in the Old Testament and other ancient literature.
The aiimu ya Kitombo referred to in “Ethnology of the A-Kamba” (p. 89), and the unnatural creature said to be seen at Manyani (p. 87, op. cit.), should also very probably be placed in this class.
The widespread prevalence of “taboo” among these tribes is very surprising, as it is a subject which is rarely mentioned and certainly never openly discussed. It has, nevertheless, reached a pitch of considerable [[24]]elaboration. The reason for many of the prohibitions is obvious, but that of others is extremely obscure.
The tribes under review have a very definite idea of prayer. Their appeals to the deity take place regularly at the sacred place, either on the occasion of sacrifice or when pouring out libations to the spirits. Examples of these are given later. This form of supplication is probably much more common than we are inclined to think. But it is no easy matter to induce people to give a definite enumeration of minor rites which they perform constantly and as a matter of course. The A-Kamba, for instance, when on a journey, and when leaving a spot where they have camped, throw a firebrand on their path and pray that the party should reach its destination in safety and proceed together in amity. This is done by the head of the party, the next man throwing a few leaves on the firebrand and stepping on it. It is a pretty custom, although a European of the present day might consider it a somewhat strenuous method of expressing gratitude! But when people are constantly travelling through parts of a country infested with lions, and when their only protection from wild animals is a small camp fire, one can perhaps understand that they should think it advisable to keep on the right side of the deity.
At Kikuyu, a man was once seized with a sudden fit. When he recovered consciousness, he was given a little water. Before drinking it, he promptly poured a few drops in front of him, then on his right side, then on his left. This was meant as a kind of silent prayer of thanksgiving for recovery. He stated that it was his muungu who had attacked him thus.
Charms are also very common. Many of them are in the nature of sympathetic magic, whilst others are merely a form of perpetual prayer, or rather, of materialised prayers. A German missionary, named Brutzer, gives a good example, and describes the charms worn by a Kamba friend; one was worn round his neck to [[25]]protect him against witchcraft in general; on his wrist was a bracelet containing a charm which would warn him should there be poison in any beer which might be offered to him; if his hand shook on raising the gourd to his lips, it would be a sign of poison. From his elbow two pieces of wood were suspended to protect him from snake bites. And hanging from his waist was a chain to ensure riches.
There are also charms against infection; these are carried by a man when visiting a sick friend. There are charms worn when going to war, charms worn when love-making, to ensure the return of affection. The charms usually consist of powdered wood, roots and herbs. The advice of a medicine man is sought and he recommends a certain plant or tree. Grain is taken to the plant or tree indicated, and six times a single grain is thrown at the tree, the remainder of the grain being thrown the seventh time only. This possibly signifies a sacrifice to the spirit of the tree. The plant is then dug up, or a piece of wood cut off the root of the tree and dried and powdered. Sometimes a firebrand and water are taken to the tree; in this case, the water is placed on the ground, and the supplicant, closing his eyes, walks six times round the tree, then stands under it, facing east, and prays, with eyes still closed: “Tree, I have a favour to ask—I have a sick child or wife or brother”—as the case may be—“and know not the origin of his sickness, as he has no trouble with anyone. I come to ask a favour. I come to you, O Tree, to treat him for it that he may be cured.”
According to some of the missionaries, the natives believe that the fate of each individual from birth to death is decided beforehand; they believe, in fact, in predestination. I myself have discovered no trace of this. A native will sometimes say of a bad character, “Oh, he was born a bad lot,” but this seems to me too vague a statement to serve as the basis of a theory. Conscience does not loom very large as a rule. The [[26]]Reverend Hoffman, who lived for many years in Kitui, however, quotes a saying which undoubtedly shows that the natives have some faint notion of the meaning of it: “Aka nwa Engai” or “God will find him.” Thus do the Kamba refer to an evil-doer.
The Kamba account of creation is very vague. The first man is said to have been produced by the high god Engai out of an ant-hill by the sea, and from him all men are descended. He is referred to as imuuma ndi (he who came out of the earth).
According to the Reverend Hoffman, there is a saying that “the bird was created on the fifth day, and the imundu mwei on the sixth day.” No further explanation of this curious saying is given. The ordinary meaning of mundu mwei is “man of power or wisdom,” and it is used of the medicine man. But in the saying above quoted, it probably refers to mankind generically as opposed to other animals.
Generally speaking, the tribes under consideration attribute the existence of the world and of its inhabitants to creation by Engai. Very little abstract spirituality is to be found in their religion. Almost everything is concrete, and, according to their point of view, strictly logical. The same is probably true of all religions appertaining to human beings on a similar plane of culture.
This aspect of religion is a great snare to the European student. Being the product of a far more complex environment and having been brought up under the influence of religions of a higher type, he finds it extremely difficult to avoid either reading more into a ceremony than actually exists, or, on the other hand, he is apt to overlook some apparently trivial point which may be of deep significance to the worshipper. [[27]]
CHAPTER I
SPIRIT BELIEFS
Ancestral Spirits.—The belief in the vitality of the ancestral spirits is very strong among both the Kikuyu and the Kamba peoples; the former call them Ngoma and the latter Aiimu (singular Imu). The A-Kamba declare that the life breath ngo becomes the Imu. Curiously enough, the disembodied spirit was called Edimmu by the ancient Assyrians (according to R. C. Thompson in “Semitic Magic”), and they also believed that the soul could return to earth and that ghosts were responsible for many body ills.
Under ordinary circumstances, when a person died and was duly buried his soul entered the underworld, “the house of darkness, the seat of the god Irkalla, the house from which none come forth again.” This would seem to correspond to the Sheol of the Hebrews.
The Assyrian word Edimmu (the root of which is immu) is practically identical with the Kamba word for the same conception, but there is no evidence to show that the identity is anything but accidental.
The belief in the ancestral spirit is merely a form of the belief in a soul, with the difference that the present-day religions of the civilised world would not admit that the spirits of the departed could interfere with the life of man. We still find traces of this belief in Europe in the Feast of All Souls, and in curious ceremonies which take place in some countries on St John’s Eve. [[28]]
The Yezidis of Mesopotamia believe that the spirits of the good inhabit the air, whilst the Kikuyu believe that the ancestral spirits live underground, and the Kamba that they inhabit certain sacred fig trees. This latter belief would seem to be particularly widespread. It is prevalent all over India, and examples of it are to be found at most places along the east coast of Africa.
The Kikuyu will tell you that there is only one ngoma or spirit for each person, and that women as well as men possess it. Cattle are said to have no ngoma, but sometimes they may become possessed with that of human beings, and an evil spirit will now and again enter their body in the hope of destroying the poor beast. An animal so possessed is easily recognised by its peculiar behaviour; it goes about shaking its head, and tears stream from its eyes. This spirit may be of the same nature as the evil demons of Semitic mythology. The Kikuyu declare that it can be driven out by getting the possessed animal to sniff the smoke of a fire made of the dry fruit of the tree known as Kigelia musa. They believe that the high god Engai can control the actions of the ngoma, and they sometimes go to a sacred fig tree, mugumu, and beseech Engai to protect the people from evil spirits.
It is said that the ngoma of a murdered man flies straight back to his father’s village and, as a rule, hovers around it; but, should the murderer run away and hide, the ngoma of his victim will often pursue and haunt him or else influence events in such a way that the guilty one will be discovered and handed over to the authorities, who will deal with him according to tribal law.
I endeavoured to find out from the elders whether the spirit or soul was supposed to be present in the body during life. But they declared that all they knew was that ngere, the life breath, was present during life, and between this and the soul they seemed to make no [[29]]difference. They believe, however, that it is dangerous to wake a man suddenly, as his ngere is away, and, in this semi-conscious condition, he is very apt to strike you if he should happen to have a weapon at hand.
They have quite a clear conception of the ngoma or spirit of the departed, the character of which is said to be similar to that of the person during his or her lifetime.
Unlike the people of Kavirondo, they have no fear of treading on a man’s shadow.
There are no particular customs connected with suicide, although suicide is certainly not unknown among them. When people hang or stab or drown themselves they are supposed to have been possessed by a malevolent spirit.
The general attitude of the people towards the ancestral spirits has been described in the introductory chapter, and many concrete examples will be found in the accounts of the various ceremonies given later. The influence of these spirit beliefs among the Kamba people has been very clearly set forth by the Hon. C. Dundas in his paper on Kitui, R.A.I.J., Vol. xliii, 1913, page 534 et seq.
A quotation from an Assyrian tablet some three thousand years old, which R. C. Thompson refers to in his “Semitic Magic,” shows how slowly man changes:
“The Gods which seize (upon man)
Have come forth from the grave.
The evil wind gusts
Have come forth from the grave
To demand the payment of rites and pouring of libations.
They have come forth from the grave,
Have come like a whirlwind.”
The author goes on to say: “Now if the attentions of its friends on earth should cease and the soul should find nothing to eat and drink, then it was driven by force of hunger to come back to earth to demand its due.” This psalm-like utterance might equally well [[30]]have been made by a Kikuyu or a Kamba of the present day.
The intense desire of Africans for offspring is probably due to the fact that children are expected to sacrifice to the spirits of their dead parents, and the ghost of one who has left no posterity is therefore in a piteous plight. The spirits generally manifest themselves through certain women who, falling into a trance, give utterance to the message with which they are charged (“Ethnology of the A-Kamba,” p. 86). This reminds one of Saul going to Endor to visit a woman with a familiar spirit (Sam. xxviii. 7).
Spirits are also said to manifest themselves and give messages to men in dreams.
The Kitui people say that sometimes when a snake, crawling outside a hut, is attacked, it will suddenly vanish, and they then know that it was the imu of a deceased person which had either assumed the form of a snake or entered the body of a snake. A few days afterwards, a woman will become possessed and fall into a state of semi-trance, and the imu will speak through her mouth and say: “I came into the village the other day, and So-and-so wanted to strike me.” Whereupon the people think it just as well to sacrifice a goat to sooth the feelings of the injured spirit.
The Kamba people, unlike the Kikuyu, do not believe that spirits enter into kimbu or caterpillars.
When a hyæna comes and howls near a village, it is looked upon as an evil omen and as a token of death, and the beast is generally driven away and killed, if possible. They very probably believe that an evil demon has assumed the shape of a hyæna. In the Assyrian tablets mention is made of a spirit called Alu which slinks through the streets at night like a pariah dog and harms people.
There is a curious custom in Ukamba which throws some light on the spiritual beliefs of the people. If a young unmarried man is killed away from his village, his imu or spirit will return there and speak to the people [[31]]through the medium of an old woman in a dance (see p. 86, author’s work on the A-Kamba), and say, “I am So-and-so speaking, and I want a wife.” The youth’s father will then make arrangements to buy a girl from another village and bring her to his, and she will be mentioned as the wife of the deceased, speaking of him by name. She will presently be married to a brother of the deceased, but she must continue to live in the village where the deceased had his home.
If at any time the corporeal husband beats or ill-treats her, and she in consequence runs away to her father, the imu of the deceased will come and pester the people of the village and they will have bad luck; it will probably ask, through the usual medium, why his wife has been ill-treated and driven away. The head of the family will then take steps to induce the girl to return for fear of the wrath of the spirit of his deceased son.
To those who wish to obtain full insight into the sociology of these people, it is of the utmost importance to have a clear understanding of the native’s point of view, and to bear in mind that the ancestral spirits are a very real and vital thing to him and have a very deep influence upon his life.
The leaders of psychical research allege that the survival of human personality after death has been scientifically proved, and that, under favourable circumstances, communications from the dead have been received. If this be so, might it not be said that races on a lower plane of culture are possibly more sensitive to such influences and that their belief in the activity of the ancestral spirits is therefore not wholly unreasonable? The evidence for this, however, is at present quite insufficient to satisfy most, although we think that the question is one which deserves further consideration.
Tree Spirits.—When clearing a forest to make a cultivated field, the Kikuyu people generally leave a large and conspicuous tree in the clearing. Such a [[32]]tree is called murema kiriti and is believed to collect the spirits from all other trees which have been cut down in the vicinity. We have here an interesting example of animism, the spirits so collected being most emphatically declared to be tree, and not human spirits. Now if this tree shows signs of decay and is liable to be blown down, they decide to fell it. Before taking this step, however, they sacrifice a red ram at the foot of the tree, the ram being, as usual, killed by suffocation. The tree is then cut down, and when this is done, the elders take branches from two sacred bushes, mukenya and muthakwa, and plant them on each side of the stump of the fallen tree; two elders cut the mukenya, and two the muthakwa. The elders then say “Nitukuria muti tutemeti,” which means “We pray for this tree we have cut down,” and pour the melted tail-fat of the ram over the stump, smearing the tatha or stomach contents of the animal over the trunk of the fallen tree. The wood from such a tree can only be used by a senior elder, by a very old woman, or for the making of beehives. If young people were to use this particular fuel, they would become ill or die; old people are supposed to be ordinarily immune against the operation of most curses or thahu. It is believed that when a tree is cut down the spirits leave it and settle in another big tree, and, if the above ceremonial is observed, they are not angry and do not vent their spite upon the people, or, as they say, no thahu falls upon them. If such a tree blows down, the spirits are supposed to avenge themselves on the elders, who are held responsible for not having taken the necessary precautions, and they are very apt to die.
There is great similarity between this and the lore concerning the spirit of the oak, mentioned by Professor Frazer. And, from a different point of view, it may also be considered as an example of the slaying of the divine king, expressed in terms of trees: fear that harm may befall the spirit or spirits of the tree, and the consequent ceremonial killing of the tree and [[33]]arranging for the comfortable and formal migration of the spirits to another tree, or to a new dwelling place.
The A-Kamba of Kibwezi have a similar belief: before cutting down a big solitary tree in a clearing, an elder and a very old woman must pour beer and corn at its foot. The man pours out the beer, and the woman the corn. The tree is then felled, and, taking a branch from it, they place it against another tree some little distance away, and declare that the spirit of the fallen tree will then go quietly into its new abode.
In Ukamba of Ulu, Mr Osborne states that his people told him that to fell an ithembo tree would, of course, be considered absolute sacrilege, and according to tradition it was the felling of an ithembo tree on the Iveti Hills by an official of the I.B.E.A. Co. which gave rise to the attacks by the A-Kamba on the Government Station at Machakos in about 1892.
Large trees, however, which are not ithembo trees appear to have a certain sanctity, and when, for reasons of utility or safety, the felling of such trees becomes necessary the following ceremony is practised:
The trunk of the tree to be felled is plastered with the sap of the waithu shrub as a ng͠nondu.
A small branch of the tree is broken off and placed against some smaller tree in the vicinity.
Some earth at the foot of the tree is also taken and placed at the foot of the smaller tree.
The elders then assemble with some beer at the tree to be cut down, and a little of the beer is poured out at the foot of the doomed tree, accompanied by some such prayer as—“We give this beer as a gift to the Engai, if one lives here, and ask him to go to another tree.”
The rest of the beer is then drunk by the assembled elders.
The larger parts of the tree are taken by the elders of ithembo to manufacture into honey barrels, whilst [[34]]the rest is carried off as firewood by the women entitled to sacrifice at the ithembo.
Non-observance of this ceremony is supposed to bring death on the man who cuts the tree down, and on all who make use of the timber.
Miscellaneous Spirit Worship.—There are some traces of the belief in river spirits. For instance, at places where there are waterfalls like on the Chania and Thika, the elders, in passing, will spit into the river or throw a little grass into it.
There is a sacred rock near Thembigwa, close to a stream called Kichii—a tributary of the Ruaraka—where the natives pluck tufts of grass as they pass by and throw them on the rock.
If a tree has blown down and fallen across the path, grass is again placed on the fallen trunk. Sometimes, too, stones are laid on a fallen tree. When people come upon the skull of a dead elephant in the bush, they also place grass on it.
The origin of all these customs appears to be lost.
Certain plants are believed to be maleficent, and are possibly thought to be connected with bad spirits. There is a creeper called mwinyuria, which is said to possess sap like blood; the story is told how one day, near Kirawa, three men named Nbota, Kigondu, and Kacheru, cut one of these plants which was growing near a sacred fig tree, and died the same day. When cut, the released end is alleged to spring out like the lash of a whip. This creeper is rare in Kikuyu, but is said to be common in the Kibwezi bush.
The Scapegoat.—The Kikuyu have a ceremony which appears to be an undoubted example of a belief which may be grouped with the Semitic doctrine of the scapegoat.
If a serious epidemic visits a village, the elders take a ram, a he-goat or a ewe lamb which has not yet borne, mwati, and slaughter it at the village. They cut pieces of meat from the carcase and impale them on wooden skewers, ndara or njibe. The men and [[35]]women of the village then each take a piece, walk away some distance from the village and throw it into the bush. They firmly believe that the disease will be carried away with the pieces of meat.
The remaining meat is roasted at a fire and eaten by the villagers; the bones are collected at the place where the meat was roasted and are broken up and the marrow extracted and eaten. Beer is prepared, and next morning at dawn, some is poured on the bones and the hyænas come and carry off the fragments.
When they pour the libation of beer on the place of the fire, they pray as follows: “Twa oria ichua twa oria murimu utika choke muchi”—which means, “We put out the fire at the place where we roasted the meat, we put out the sickness so that it cannot return again to our village.”
Everyone must be awakened before the beer is poured out. The beer is put into an ox-horn and into a piece of gourd, ndayi, the former being held in the right hand and the latter in the left. The beer in the right hand is poured out first to appease the male ngoma, that in the left to appease the female ngoma.
From the ceremony taking place at the village it is clear that the people believe that the ancestral spirits alone require to be propitiated.
The Scapegoat Idea in Kitui.—If a village is afflicted by a serious sickness, the headman will call in a medicine man who concocts some medicine by grinding up the roots of the following plants: muthumba, kiongoa (an aloe), mulema, nthata, kivumbu, and mutaa. A small boy and girl are then chosen from among the inhabitants, the villagers all congregate together, and the small boy leads a goat twice round the group, followed by the little girl and led by the medicine man; the party then passes through the centre of the group of people. The medicine man next makes an incision in the right ear of the goat, and the blood from this is allowed to drip into a half gourd containing the above-mentioned magical [[36]]concoction, mixed with water. The villagers then form up into a procession and, led by the medicine man, run for some distance into the bush towards the setting sun, no one being allowed to look backwards. The medicine man then stops and throws the mixture of medicine and blood in front of him, and the people return. This ceremony is performed in the early afternoon, after two p.m. That night, the village head must cohabit with his wife. This point is considered a matter of such importance that the elder has to take the kithito oath that it has been done.
A Kikuyu Oracle.—There lives in South Kikuyu-land an elder named Kichura or Thiga wa Wairumbi wa Kaumo of the Kachiko clan and the Njenga generation or rika, who is credited with the extraordinary power of being the recipient of messages from the Supreme Being, and in consequence possesses the gift of prophecy. He was interviewed and cross-examined by the writer, and stated that at intervals, about twice a year, during the night, he falls into a deeper sleep than usual, a trance in fact, and that while in this condition he is taken out of his bed and statements are made to him by a voice, but he cannot see who gives him the message. The trance always occurs at night, and he is generally taken outside his house while in this cataleptic condition, but says that he never remembers being able to distinguish the huts or any familiar objects in the village. The interior of the hut appears to him to be lighted up, and the message comes with a booming sound which he understands.
He stated that one day when visiting an elder named Kibutu, he was seized during the night and taken bodily through the thatch of the roof, and was found on the top of the hut next morning. On another occasion a young man of the warrior class, mwanake, belonging to his village, was sleeping alongside him in his hut when he was temporarily carried off, and the young man’s hair all came off as if it had been shaved, and in the morning it was found lying in a heap on [[37]]the floor by the bed, the owner having no idea how this had occurred.
KIKUYU.
TYPICAL MUTHURI YA UKURU.
(Elder of the grade of priest)
He does not sleep in an ordinary hut with his wife, but in a thengira or bachelor hut with another elder. When he is seized with one of his trances the other elder will wake up and find he has gone, but does not see him go or return.
The day following one of his seizures he collects the elders and delivers his message. He states that after one of these seizures he is very exhausted, and for three days cannot rise from his bed. His father and paternal grandfather had this gift or power. His father told him that his paternal grandmother had three breasts, two on her bosom and one on her back, but he did not say whether he considered that this had any connection with the other phenomena.
He stated that he believed the gift came from God and not from the ngoma or ancestral spirits, and that if he did not deliver to the people the messages he received he would be stricken with sickness. He says that he was invested with this power when he was a stripling, soon after he had been circumcised. One morning he woke up with his two hands tightly clasped, and he passed blood instead of urine for nine days. A big medicine man named Wangnendu was then called in, a goat was killed, and the medicine man tied rukwaru bracelets of the skin on to the patient’s wrists. The hæmaturia then stopped, and his hands relaxed, and he was able to open them, and it was found that he had fifteen mbugu in each hand. These are white stones such as are used in a medicine man’s divination gourd. The medicine man then brought a small medicine gourd and placed the mbugu therein.
Kichura still has the gourd with the thirty mbugu, and relates how on one occasion his hut was burnt down and his gourd was destroyed in the fire, but that the mbugu were found quite uninjured in the ashes. He was asked whether he considered that his powers were intimately connected with these stones; he declared [[38]]that he did not believe he could lose them, but if by some mischance, however, they should be lost God would give him some more, and that even if they were lost he would receive oracles as before.
He gave examples of the kind of messages he received. On one occasion, some time before the advent of Europeans, he was told that the Masai would be severely stricken with small-pox, and that subsequently many would settle among the Kikuyu, and shortly afterwards it happened accordingly. On another occasion he was told that a white race would enter the country and that they and the Kikuyu would live side by side in this country, and now it has come to pass.
He was seized before the great famine of 1900 and foretold its arrival. Later, he was told to inform the Kikuyu to sacrifice a white sheep, a red sheep, and a black male goat at the mugumu, sacred fig trees, and that the chief Kinanjui was to sacrifice a mori, white heifer, at the head waters of the Mbagathi River. These orders were obeyed, and the famine and small-pox were lifted from the land.
Early in the present season he was told that the maize and other grains would be lost by drought, and that the food now being planted (April, 1911) would come to a good harvest. He was also told that during the present year the young people would suffer greatly from dysentery, and that they were to sacrifice sheep at the sacred fig trees, and that the women and children were to put bracelets from the skins of the sacrificed sheep on their wrists. Many have done so, and those who have obeyed will escape the visitation. After this he says that small-pox will come from the west of the country, and attack people from Karuri’s (east slopes of Nandarua Mountain) to Limoru. The disease will gradually work its course eastward and decrease in intensity. When he delivers one of his oracular utterances the athuri ya kiama, elders of the council, bring him a sheep and a gourd of beer. He kills the former [[39]]and eats it, and the beer is returned to the elders to drink.
He says that sometimes when rain does not come he is accused of stopping it, but that such accusations are due to ignorance, as he is merely the unconscious and involuntary agent for utterances from a Supreme Power, and that all he can do in such cases is to take a sheep to a sacred fig tree, sacrifice it there, and pray for rain, just like any other elder who is qualified to do so.
In Ukamba, many years ago, a famous medicine man, Kathengi by name, is said to have prophesied the coming of the white men and their domination of the country. [[40]]
CHAPTER II
SACRIFICE
Although this rite has often been referred to and described in a somewhat desultory way by various writers, it seems to have received very little serious attention. The subject is, however, one which undoubtedly contains many features of great interest and is certainly deserving of special examination and study. There is little doubt that if we can only fully understand the relations of a people to their gods we have advanced a long way towards a realisation of their moral and intellectual development.
It is first proposed to examine the Kikuyu ceremonial.
Among this tribe sacrifice is of two kinds:
(1) The sacrifice at the sacred fig tree, or mugumu, which is always intended as an act of communion with a deity or high god called Engai.
This sacrifice may be either a communal rite, or it may be a personal matter for the head of a village.
(2) The other sacrifice is carried out in a village and is intended as an offering to the spirits of the ancestors who are supposed to live underground. This may be either a communal or an individual act.
Dotted about Kikuyu are numbers of great wild fig trees (Ficus capensis), many of which are used from generation to generation as sacred shrines or places of sacrifice, called mugumu or muti wa Engai.
Certain big medicine men like Njau wa Kabocha have special trees; it appears that the original choice [[41]]of a tree as a sacred place devolved on certain notable medicine men, and if a sacred tree happens to fall owing to age, the elders assemble there and sacrifice a ram and a male goat; they eat one half and leave the other half of each carcase at the tree and pour the fat over the stump of the fallen tree to appease the deity.
It is then the duty of the local magician and the elders of ukuru to choose another tree. They sacrifice at the new tree, and if their prayers are answered they know that it is acceptable to Engai, but, if after several trials no result is obtained, they dedicate another to the service of Engai.
The idea of sacrilege is very marked. If, for instance, an impious person cuts a portion of a sacred tree, dire results are believed to ensue, and the elders make the offender pay a ram and a male goat. These are sacrificed at the tree, and the elders apply a strip of the skin to the place where the incision was made in the tree and anoint it with fat and the tatha or stomach contents. The breast of the ram is cut off and hung in the tree, and the remainder of the carcase and the whole of the carcase of the goat, eaten by the elders.
No beast or bird can be killed or shot in a sacred tree. The sacred tree and its environs is often called Kithangaona cha inja, which means the “sacred place of the ceremonies.” On the occasion of a sacrifice the elders of ukuru send word to the elders of Athamaki or Athuri ya mburi nne or elders of four goats and any senior to that grade, saying tuthieni mutini—“Let us go to the tree.” No elder whose father is alive can attend. No elder must go to the tree in a state of anger; no one must display anger with a wife, child, or even a stranger the day before he attends at the tree.
Elders of both of the circumcision guilds go together to the sacred tree and also elders of all clans.
If two elders, or their people, have a blood feud they are not allowed to attend or take part in a sacrifice [[42]]at the sacred tree until the feud is at an end; if they do, they are supposed to die.
A person who is alien to the tribe, but who has been formally admitted to it, may attend a sacrifice.
Oaths or ordeals are not administered at the sacred tree.
Strict celibacy must be observed the night before they go to sacrifice and the night after. The night before, they sleep in their usual huts, but the night after, they sleep in the thengira or goat hut. The morning following the sacrifice they go and bathe in a river and then resume their ordinary life.
A departure from this rule of celibacy by anyone present will entirely spoil the efficacy of the sacrifice, and, if an offender is discovered, he will have to pay a fine of two goats, and the elders will spit on him ceremonially and sacrifice afresh on the following day.
Arms must not be taken to the sacred tree. The elders wear their usual garments.
The following things are collected on the day before the sacrifice at the village of the elder who provides the sacrificial ram, and that night they stay at his village:
- 2 gourds of honey beer.
- 2 gourds of sugar cane beer.
- 1 cooking pot.
- 1 half gourd.
- 1 small knife for skinning the sacrifice and making the incision to bleed it.
The sacrifice is always a ram, and it is called ngorima. One year it will be black, but if that particular year the seasons are not propitious they consider that the deity is displeased and therefore change the colour, choosing either a red or a white one.
In former times a he-goat was said to be sacrificed before going to war. The ram must have the clan mark on its ears, and must also have had its tail cut. [[43]]
The provision of the sacrificial animals is settled by the elders, who pick the donors by rotation. At a specially important sacrificial ceremony, however, an important medicine man is called in and decides who shall provide the ram.
The proper time for a communal sacrifice is about two p.m., but private sacrifices take place at nine a.m.
It is said that the later time is usual for a communal sacrifice because it takes some time for elders who live far away to reach the place.
When the assembly arrives at the tree, one of the elders lifts up the ram into a standing position on its hind legs, facing the tree. This is called Kurugamia ngorima mugumuini—“To stand the ram before the tree.” The idea is probably to show the sacrificial animal ceremonially to the deity.
Only senior elders are allowed to go to the actual foot of the tree, and the elders of the four goat grade collect the wood for the ichua fire.
A gourd of honey and one of sugar cane beer are then poured into the ground at the base of the tree and the elders call out: “Twa kuthaitha Engai twa kuhoia mburi twa kuhoia indo chiothi”—“We pray to God, we sacrifice a goat, we offer all things.”
It is curious that they use the word mburi, which really signifies a goat, whilst the Kikuyu use the word mburi in a collective sense, which, in this way, often refers to sheep as well as goats.
The sheep is then suffocated by clasping its muzzle. As soon as it is insensible, but before it is actually dead, its throat is pierced by the sacrificial knife and the blood is collected in the half gourd called kinga, mentioned above. The blood is then poured out at the foot of the sacred tree, cf. [Exodus xxix. 10]: “And thou shalt slay the ram and thou shalt take his blood and sprinkle it round about upon the altar.” The animal can be strangled by any elder present, and it does not appear to be the duty of any particular person to pierce the animal’s throat. It is said that [[44]]the animal is strangled so that its life breath should not escape. A sheep killed for food is also strangled, but an animal which has its throat cut can also be eaten.
Should an ox be killed, it is stabbed at the back of the neck, but an ox is said never to be offered as a sacrifice.
The right half of the carcase is then skinned, that portion being cut away and removed, and the left half wrapped in the skin and placed at the foot of the tree and left there. This is believed to be eaten by a hyæna or wild cat which is moved to do so by the deity.
A fire is then lit at a little distance from the tree and the pieces of meat from it are stuck on skewers, roasted and eaten by the elders. In olden times this fire was always supposed to be kindled from new fire made by friction, but nowadays a firebrand is often brought from a village, or better still from a fire in a garden.
The place at which this sacrificial fire is kindled is called ichua. The meat is laid on the branches of certain sacred trees, viz:
- 1. Muthakwa.
- 2. Nahoroa.
- 3. Muthigio.
- 4. Mugumu.
- 5. Mararia.
which are collectively termed mathinjiro. The skewers used for roasting the meat are called ndara, and must be of muthakwa and muthigio wood. The branches and the skewers have to be burnt in the sacred fire on the same day as that on which the meat is cooked. The burning of these is said to be in the nature of a prayer to Engai, and it is specifically stated that this is not done for fear of anyone using these branches and skewers as fuel as everyone would dread touching them.
When the meat is cooked, it is eaten by the elders, who each drink a horn of beer. The fat of the ram is [[45]]boiled down in the cooking pot provided for the purpose, and one of the elders climbs into the sacred tree, and pours the liquid fat on to the main stem of the tree. The breast of the ram is often cut out and also hung up in the tree. Cf. [Exodus xxix. 26]: “And thou shalt take the breast of the ram and wave it for a wave offering before the Lord.” The bones of the portion of the sacrificial ram eaten by the elders are each broken into two parts and placed at the foot of the tree, the marrow not being extracted. Not a single piece of the meat may be taken back to the villages. The elders then retire some little distance away and chant as follows: “Tathai Engai mwangi utue mbura”—“We Mwangi elders pray God to give us rain.”
If, of course, the sacrifice is for another object the prayer is varied. After the prayer no man must look back at the tree. Each man returns to his village. Next morning the principal wife of each elder goes to the tree and deposits at its foot offerings of uncooked bananas and various kinds of grain.
If, however, they notice that the sacrificial meat is untouched they do not deposit their offerings, but retire to some distance and call out to their husbands, telling them that Engai has refused the sacrifice. The elders assemble and send the women back with their offerings. They then select another elder and direct him to provide a fresh ram, which is sacrificed as before. They pray to Engai and beg him not to refuse their sacrifice a second time, as they have brought a fatter sheep. Their exhortation is: “Tiga Engai kutumbia”—“Beg God not to refuse.”
The women come again on the following morning, and, if the meat is eaten, they leave their offerings and return to their villages, chanting a pæan of joy as they go. The chant is called Ngemi, and is a form of what is usually known as “ululuing.”
They sacrifice at the sacred trees to invoke rain, and they also sacrifice to check the progress of an epidemic, when they say: “Kurinda murimo utikaoki [[46]]muji”—“To stop the sickness that it may not come to the village.”
They sacrifice and pray for relief from famine: “Kuoya mugumuini ng͠naragu ithire”—“To pray at the mugumu tree that the hunger may finish.”
Here again a ram is sacrificed, but before the animal is killed an important magician pours medicine into its mouth, and also squirts beer from his own mouth into that of the ram.
Unlike other tribes, they neither shave their heads nor deposit offerings of hair at the sacred tree. It is said that sometimes lights are seen at night in a sacred tree, and the following day they hasten to sacrifice there. Every season, when the maize is just coming up, the elders summon the important medicine men to go with them to the sacred tree to sacrifice. One of the magicians pours medicine into the mouth of the sacrificial ram before it is killed, and also pours it on the fire on which the meat is roasted. The bones of the animal are then burnt in the fire. These are supposed to be burnt so that the smoke may ascend into the sacred tree and be pleasing to the deity. “It is a burnt offering to the Lord: it is sweet savour an offering made by fire unto the Lord” ([Exodus xxix. 18]).
The blood is caught in a half gourd, njeli or kinga, and then placed in an ox horn; one half is poured at the foot of the sacred tree, the other half being mixed with tiny pieces of intestinal fat and placed in the large intestine of the sacrificial ram. This is roasted over the fire and eaten by the senior elders of ukuru. The mixture is called ndundiru.
Near the time of the harvest, when the crops are ripe, but before they are cut, the elders take a ram to the sacred place and slaughter it. They pour the blood at the foot of the tree and pray: “Engai twaoka kukui enyama tutikarware enda twa getha iriu wega”—“O God we have to bring meat so that we may not get ill, for we have good crops and are glad.”
The elders then eat the meat. After the feast, [[47]]they take the tatha or stomach contents of the sacrificial ram and sprinkle it over the ripe crops, and also sprinkle some over the mukumbi or big wicker bottles in the grain huts and over the big gourds in which grain is stored. It is believed that if the elders failed to do this, the people would suffer greatly from diarrhœa. The last two rites are evidently rudimentary forms of the ancient Semitic ritual of the offering of the firstfruits, or cereal oblation. The sprinkling of the crops and of the grain receptacles with tatha indicate either a conservation of the crop for human consumption, or a purification of it from all influences which might be harmful to the consumers. The latter is probably more in accordance with their line of thought.
On the particular day when sacrifices for rain are offered, no one may touch the earth with iron; not even a spear or sword may be rested on the ground, as the sacrifice would then be useless.
The Kamba have a somewhat similar belief, and think that to till the soil with iron drives away the rain.
Among the Kikuyu, however, the ground on such days must not be struck by anything, and an elder may not even strike his mithege staff into the ground in the usual way.
Sacrifices for good crops are also made at the mugumu trees by medicine men. On the same day, a mwanake (a young man of warrior age) patrols the whole district (ridge) with a torch, which he finally throws on the ground. No one may then come from another ridge or leave the ridge to go to another.
Sanctuary.—The ancient idea of a sanctuary at a holy place is known to the Kikuyu. If a murderer, or a person who has committed a serious crime, runs to a sacred place and touches the tree, he is safe from vengeance. The criminal cannot, of course, stay indefinitely at the tree or he would starve, but the elders come and take him away, and his life is safe. He cannot, however, re-enter a village, and his clans-men [[48]]have to go to the tree and sacrifice a ram, which they are supposed to offer in exchange for him. He is smeared with the tatha, and a line of white earth, ira, is drawn from his forehead to the tip of his nose by a senior elder, of ukuru. After which he is tahikia, or ceremonially purified, and can return to his family. All the meat of the sacrifice is eaten by the elders, and none is left at the tree. Some of the tatha, however, is sprinkled at the foot with the object of purifying the spot where the criminal stood. In a case of this sort the criminal does not pay blood money himself, but his blood relatives have to pay for him. If in war an enemy were pursued and took sanctuary at a sacred place, he could not be attacked whilst he was there, but would probably be seized and killed at some distance from the sacred place.
If, again, a man should kill a tribesman, he can run to the house of his victim’s father and, by confessing his crime, obtain sanctuary there. The father will then kill a ram and place a strip of skin on the right wrist of the homicide, who must have his hand shaved and be ceremonially purified by a medicine man—tahikia, as it is termed. He will henceforth become as the son of the deceased’s father.
Private Sacrifice to the Deity.—The head of a village usually has a private sacred tree at which he sacrifices to the deity for good fortune or for assistance in times of trouble.
The ceremony described by Routledge—“A Prehistoric People,” pages 232–734—is a private sacrifice to the deity.
As we have said before, women are not allowed to attend a sacrifice to the deity at one of the regular sacred trees. But at a private sacrifice for good fortune, carried out at a sacred tree belonging to a particular village, the village elders attend with their wives and children, their cattle, sheep and goats.
The sacrificial ram is killed, and the whole family, as well as flocks and herds, are smeared with fat. [[49]]The party then returns home, uttering the usual African cry of joy, sometimes called “ululuing” which the Kikuyu term ngemi.
The women and children are not actually allowed to come near the tree, but must remain some little distance away. The people belonging to the Masai circumcision guild use muzigio, mutumaiyu (Olea chrysophylla), or mugumu trees for their private sacrifices. They would probably begin with a mutumaiyu or muzigio tree, and if the luck was not good they would change to a mugumu. Those belonging to the Kikuyu guild use either mugumu or muthakwa trees.
In a private sacrifice, the skin of the sacrificial ram is taken back to the village and presented to the head wife of the elder, but this is never done at a public communal sacrifice.
The night before the sacrifice, the elders of the village sleep in their own huts, but must observe celibacy. The night after, they sleep in the goat hut or thengira.
For two days before and after a sacrifice, no stranger is allowed to sleep in a village; nothing is sent out of the village to sell, and nothing is allowed to be carried away. If a stranger comes, he can be fed, but he must eat the food there and not take it away. At both a public and private sacrifice the eyes of a ram must be very carefully removed from the carcase, for it is considered an extremely bad omen if an eye should burst during extraction, and a fresh sacrificial ram then has to be provided.
Two days after a private sacrifice, ceremonial beer drinking takes place at the village, the men drinking together in the goat hut, or thengira, and the women in the hut of the principal wife; this is called a kithangaona ya muchi. During the ceremony they pray to the deity: “Twa thuitha Engai utue endo chiothi chiana na mburi na ngombe”—“We pray thee, O God, that you will give us all things, children, goats, and cattle.” [[50]]
On the morning of the day following a private sacrifice the wives go to the sacred tree and deposit offerings of grain, bananas, and other things.
Sacrifice to Ancestral Spirits.—In addition to the sacrifice at the sacred trees to the deity Engai, the Kikuyu sacrifice to the ngoma, or ancestral spirits. These rites, however, never take place at the sacred trees, but in a village, close to the village shrine.
The animal sacrificed is a ram. It is killed in the same way as those sacrificed to the deity, the carcase being laid upon branches from certain sacred trees, viz:
- Mukuyu—Ficus sp:
- Mutumaiyu—Olea chrysophylla.
- Muthakwa—Vernonia sp:
- Mutare.
- Mugumu—Ficus capensis.
The branches are called mathinjiro.
Four skewers, ndara, are cut from each of the above species, and the pieces of meat which are eaten are impaled upon the skewers and roasted at a fire specially kindled for the purpose, called ichua and muzigia. Mutumaiyu or makuri wood must be used.
The branches on which the meat has rested, as well as the skewers, must be burnt the same day in the fire on which the meat was cooked. Early next morning, before sunrise, beer is poured on the spot.
The ichua fire was formerly kindled on the spot from new fire made by friction, but nowadays it is supposed to be brought from a village.
These sacrifices generally take place at about nine a.m.
An elder usually sacrifices a ram every three months or so at the grave of his father. He pours blood, fat, and beer upon it and leaves the skin there.
If the father died away from home, on a journey, the son proceeds some distance along the road by which the father left and sacrifices a ram by the roadside. [[51]]The son and his wives eat the meat of the sacrifice, but a wife married after the father’s death, as well as the man’s children, are not allowed to touch it.
The sacrifice must take place before sunrise. This would seem to be a very common feature in many ancient sacrifices, and some authorities consider that it may be in some way connected with the worship of Venus, the morning star. It is, of course, a difficult question to settle, but I would venture to suggest that it is more likely to have some connection with the idea that ancestral spirits are more active at night, and therefore more appreciative of attention, and that they lapse into inaction with the sunrise.
There appears to be no particular day in the month for the celebration of these sacrifices.
If, on the occasion of a sacrifice at the sacred tree, the elders chance to see a snake, they say that it is a ngoma, or ancestral spirit, which has taken the form of a snake, and endeavour to pour a little of the blood from the sacrificial ram on its head, back, and tail.
If the owner of the village should meet a large caterpillar, called thatu, near the gate, he pours a little fat and milk in its path; if it turns back, all is well. If, on the other hand, it should walk round the spot where the fat, and so forth, was poured, and still come on towards the village, the people know that it is a spirit which has assumed the form of a caterpillar, and a ram is sacrificed in the village. If one of these caterpillars is found in a food hut, a ram is again sacrificed for the same reason.
Should anyone set fire to the grass or scrub on the spot where the dead are thrown out, spirits of the departed are supposed to be heard calling out. When this happens, the person who lit the fire gives a ram, which must be killed on the spot, and the elders of ukuru sprinkle the tatha all round to appease the ngoma.
Sometimes a spirit will come and call in a peculiar [[52]]way outside a village at night. The people believe that it is hungry, and next day sacrifice a ram.
The elders, when they eat, always throw a little food to the spirits before commencing their meal, and at a beer-drinking always pour a little beer on the ground to propitiate the spirits so that they may not harm them. Women, too, when they are cooking porridge or gruel, invariably throw some on the ground for the spirits.
Description of a Sacrifice at a Sacred Fig Tree in Kikuyu. (Witnessed by the Author.)—The elders first took some sugar cane and poured a little on each side and in front of the tree, praying at the same time. The sacrificial ram was then strangled, held up before the tree, and its throat pierced. The blood was collected in a cow’s horn and a little poured out on each side of the tree and allowed to trickle down the trunk. At this stage of the proceedings another prayer was uttered.
A strip of skin and fat running from the throat of the carcase down to its belly, and including the genitals, was then cut off and hung up on a small branch projecting from the tree. The elders now prayed again. After this the ram was dismembered and the feast took place.
If the head of a village notices the appearance of disease among his flocks and herds, or among his people, he sacrifices at his own sacred tree. But he first of all consults a mundu mugo, or medicine man, to find out whether the affliction comes from the high god or is due to the offended ngoma, or ancestral spirits. The medicine man throws his stones, and if, after sorting them into little heaps, the balance left is eight, he knows the trouble comes from the high god; if, on the other hand, the balance is seven, the trouble is attributed to the ngoma or ancestral spirits.
For a man, the heap consists of five stones, and for a woman three. [[53]]
The sacrificial ram is obtained from a neighbour.
If a bad storm comes and damages the crops, or if there is too much rain or a drought, a large assembly of elders is convened. They meet and sacrifice at the communal place of sacrifice, called the big mugumu.
Sacrifice among A-Kamba.—We will now examine the ceremonial connected with sacrifice among the A-Kamba, and principally among those of Kitui. These people have two kinds of sacred places, or mathembo (singular, ithembo).
(1) Sacred places for the whole country, or rather for each big division of the country, at which they pray and sacrifice to Engai or Mulungu for rain, and in the event of a pestilence among human beings and cattle.
(2) Sacred places for a group of two or three villages, where they pray to the aiimu, or ancestral spirits, on the occasion of sickness among people or cattle.
The holy places are almost always at a tree. For the first-mentioned a fig tree of the species known as mumo is chosen. For the village shrine, on the other hand, the tree may be either a mumo, fig tree, another variety of wild fig called mumbo, or a mutundu tree.
The mode of procedure of a sacrifice for rain at an ithembo of the first kind may be taken as an example, and the following description was given by a couple of leading elders:
On the day settled for the ceremony, the elders of ithembo assemble early in the morning, and at about nine a.m. proceed slowly to the sacred place, taking with them an nthengi, or male goat, usually black in colour, as well as milk, snuff, and a small quantity of every kind of produce which is grown.
The following were specified: mbaazi (cajanus), mawele (millet), mtama (sorghum), bananas, wimbi (penicillaria), sugar cane, beans, sweet potatoes, cassava, and pumpkins; also some sugar cane beer (honey beer is not allowed), red trade beads and [[54]]cowries, the leaves of a sweet smelling plant called mutaa, butter and gruel.
The men lead the goat and carry the milk, gruel, snuff, and beer, each one putting a little butter in the milk, whilst the other items are carried to the tree by the old women.
The women are not allowed to approach the tree, but dance together some distance away; as mentioned above, the ceremony commences at about nine a.m., and goes on till about two p.m., when the actual sacrifice takes place. The proceedings are not hurried, as some of the elders have to travel long distances before reaching the spot.
Six senior elders and six old women are selected, and all proceed to the tree; they can wear their loin cloths, but their blankets are taken off and left some distance away. The men go first and taste a little of the milk, gruel, and beer, which they spit out at the foot of the tree, and then give way to the old women who go through the same ceremony. The men again return to the tree and pour the balance of the milk and so forth at its foot. Each elder now puts some of the snuff in the palm of his hands, takes a little, and deposits the remainder. The women again come up and pour the foodstuffs at the foot of the sacred tree, the butter being smeared on it.
When the offerings are deposited, the officiating elders—one can almost call them priests—pray as follows: “Mulungu chao ya nekeu twenda nbua na aka machisi na ngombe kisia na mbui kisia engai tupiengea muimu andu ma kakwe”—“Mulungu, this is food. We desire rain and wives and cattle and goats to bear, and we pray God that our people may not die of sickness.”
The sacrifice of the goat comes next, but before this is done, they take the roots of two trees called mriti and muthumba, grind them together, mix them with water, and make the animal drink the mixture with a view to sanctifying it. This done, they lead the goat [[55]]up to the tree, stand it on its hind legs before the tree, or, as they say, “show” it; its throat is then pierced and the blood allowed to flow over the offerings previously enumerated. The carcase is skinned and an incision made from the throat to the stomach. The upper portion of the skull with the horns is cut off and buried at the foot of the tree. The leg bones, however, must not be broken, but carefully disarticulated at the knee-joints and elbows. Small pieces of meat are cut from every part of the carcase and from every internal organ and deposited at the foot of the tree. The meat is then divided, the left shoulder and part of the back is given to the officiating old women, whilst the elders take the rest. (Cf. [Exodus xii. 46]: “The bones of the meat of the passover feast must not be broken.”)
Each party, male and female, lights a separate fire and eats, the selected officiating elders eating with their fellows. The fire must be made of the wood of a mumo tree, not that of the sacred tree, but of another of the same species. The six men and six women each impale a fragment of the meat on a skewer of mumo wood, roast and eat it. This is a ceremonial meal, and when it is over the remainder of the meat is divided up, and any kind of firewood can be used for cooking it.
The actual sacrifice of the goat is called kutonya ng͠nondu, to pierce the sacrifice. The mere word sacrifice, however, hardly expresses it, for the word ng͠nondu really implies purification, or perhaps expiation, the underlying idea being that the goat is an expiatory gift offered with the object of relieving the country from the effects of the deity’s displeasure and of the consequent drought.
No work is done on the day following the sacrifice, and no cultivation is undertaken, neither any house building. A man may stroll over and see a friend close by, but he is not allowed to go on a real journey.
The night before the sacrifice the elders must [[56]]observe celibacy, as well as on the six following days, the day on which the sacred meat was eaten counting as the first.
No elder can participate in this ceremony if he has the stain of death on him; that is to say, if his wife or child has died, and the purification ceremonies connected with the event have not been completed; or again if he, or one of his men, has killed someone and the ceremonies for removing the bloodstain are not over. Any fighting or quarrelling or fighting among the people would also be likely to destroy the efficacy of the ceremony.
If a man breaks a stick from the sacred tree the elders at once fine him, and a bull or goat is sacrificed. The wound in the tree is anointed with butter, and milk is poured at its foot. Lights are sometimes seen at night in mathembo, but people very rarely go out to them while it is dark; those who have tried it declare that stones were thrown at them from the tree, and that these stones strike fire when they hit the ground. If a person be thus attacked, it is a sure sign that he is fitted for a medicine man.
Another account of the procedure was obtained from elders in a different part of the Ukamba country, and as this varies a little and contains a few additional details, it is considered advisable to describe it.
The day before the sacrifice, the women of the neighbourhood gather together and go to the sugar cane plantations, every woman bringing back two or three sticks of cane and taking them to the thomi, or village meeting place, of one of the elders, where they are crushed to make beer. In the evening, the elders of ithembo take the beer and place it near the sacred tree. They light a fire there with a firebrand from the village, and the gourds of beer are put near it; a little beer is also poured at the foot of the tree and they pray to the imu of the person to whom the tree is dedicated, and then return home. It is believed that the object of this ritual is to attract the attention of [[57]]the guardian spirit of the shrine, and to propitiate it and to ensure, as it were, its attendance on the morrow as the intermediary between the people and Engai.
In the morning, the elders of ithembo and certain very old women proceed to the ithembo. The elders bring the sacrificial beast and first suffocate it; they then quickly skin its throat, and the oldest of the elders stabs it in the neck with a knife, collecting the blood in a half gourd (nzeli). The skinning is then completed, and small pieces of meat are cut from the tongue, ribs, and the left flank. One kidney, one testicle, and a piece of the liver, heart, and every internal organ are also taken, all these fragments being placed in a half gourd. They then take a half gourd of beer, and the gourds containing the meat and the blood, and empty them at the foot of the tree. The old women now approach and deposit samples of every kind of field produce—beans, maize, and so forth—and milk. Some of the food is cooked and some is raw.
When the men deposit their offerings they pray as follows: “Engai twaevoya mbua kuamba eyima sionthi Engai”—“We pray to God that rain may bless all our country.”
The women merely say “Twaevoya mbua”—“We pray for rain.”
The sacrificial meat is then cooked and eaten. The first to partake of it are the four senior elders.
The fire for cooking the meat is lit a little away from the tree, and the fuel must consist of dry sticks picked up in the sacred grove. The fire having been lit, a small staging is built over it, and the pieces of meat are placed thereon to roast. The place of the fire is called ivuvio; the wood used for the framework is muthakwa; the sticks composing it are mbatwa, and the whole framework when completed is called ndala.
When removing the marrow the bones of the sacrificial animal must not be broken.
After the feast the bones are collected and placed [[58]]on the fire and covered with the stomach contents (tatha or muyo), and the smoke which rises to heaven is said to be pleasing to Engai.
A private sacrifice is called kithangaona by the Kamba people, its object being to purify a village from sickness. The ceremony is also termed kuvindukia muimu—“to cleanse the place from the spirit” (ku-indukia—to cleanse) and may possibly have an implied meaning to the effect that the spirit must be appeased.
Sometimes a woman who goes into a cataleptic condition, which is known as being seized by aiimu, will say that to obtain rain a beast of a particular colour must be sacrificed. A black goat is said to be preferable as a supplication for rain, the colour probably being symbolical of the rain clouds.
Sheep and goats, both male and female, are sacrificed, and also bulls and bullocks, but never a cow.
A black bullock is thought to be the most acceptable and a white sheep comes next, whilst many of the Kamba people consider a red animal bad for the purpose of sacrifice.
Sacred Places (Mathembo) in Ukamba.—Dotted about the country, near most of the older villages, there are sacred trees, representing private shrines, called mathembo. The sacrifice which takes place here is similar to that described above, but the proceedings do not take so long, as the assembly is smaller. There is no particular day of the month for such a ceremony, but it should not be performed in the months called Nyanya and Kenda (the month Nyanya in 1912 commenced on June 14th). Ikumi is suitable for a sacrificial ceremony, as it is then considered possible to prepare the fields for planting, in expectation of the rain which will fall as a result of the ceremony.
Four pieces of the stalk of the castor oil bush are planted at the foot of the sacred tree. If on a certain day a man brews beer, he visits the tree in the evening and pours a little of the beer into each of the castor [[59]]oil stems, and prays to the aiimu, saying, “I have made some beer, and this is your share; do not come into the village and bother us.” The castor oil stalks are meant to imitate gourds of beer. It is customary to deposit at the tree a piece of the fruit of Kigelia pinnata, or K. Musa (called miatini and used in producing fermentation in beer), and the leaf of a mumo tree. They then say, “This is your nzeli to drink the beer from,” the nzeli being a half gourd used as a drinking cup, and the mumo leaf in this case representing a nzeli. As these things decay, they are periodically renewed.
The people of a village utter a prayer when they see the new moon, begging that they may go safely through the month. This bears a close resemblance to the European habit of turning one’s money and bowing nine times to the new moon. At the village ithembo beer is poured out, generally on the advice of a medicine man, when someone is ill in the village.
The sacrifice at the village ithembo usually takes place about ten a.m., the people returning at noon. On their arrival at the village, a mixture of tatha and water is sprinkled upon the cattle, and upon the water pots of the village. This is called kikaela muyo and is done for the benefit of those villagers who are not qualified to go to the sacred place.
The women qualified to attend a ceremony at an ithembo are those who are past the age of child-bearing and have a husband who is a mutumia ya ithembo (an elder of the ithembo). A childless old woman may also be allowed to go.
It often happens that during a ceremony at an ithembo a woman is seized, or possessed, and passes into a condition of semi-trance in which she will prophecy either that the rains are coming or that they will fail, or, in former days, that a Masai raid was imminent. An explanation of this was carefully sought, and, upon investigation, I was told that the message came from the imu or spirit of the person of [[60]]olden times to whom the ithembo was dedicated and to whom it was supposed to belong, but quite clearly, that this spirit was only an intermediary, the message really coming from the high god Engai or Mulungu.
A little house is always built at the foot of the sacred tree on the east side, with the door facing the rising sun, and two days before the time settled upon for commencing planting a pot of water and one of food, as well as butter and milk, are placed in it. On the day following the deposit of this offering, no work is done. These offerings are said to be for Engai; the pot of water is a reminder that rain is required, and the food represents the crops.
Sacrifices for Rain.—Kikuyu—If the elders go to the sacred fig tree for rain they sacrifice the usual ram, preferably a black one. If, on the other hand, they pray for rain to cease, the sacrificial ram is preferably a white one, although a red one may be used. After the sacrifice, the intestines are taken and tied round the stem high up in the tree. The melted tail fat is then poured at the foot of the tree and a strip of the meat and fat are hung on a branch.
Ukamba.—Among the Kamba a black goat should be sacrificed for rain; a red one, however, is occasionally used. But whatever the colour of the animal sacrificed, it is very important that it should be entirely of one colour, and not spotted or parti-coloured. A parti-coloured animal would probably be considered as having some blemish. (Cf. [Deut. xviii. 1]: “Thou shalt not sacrifice unto the Lord thy God any bullock or sheep wherein is blemish or evil-favouredness”; also [Numbers xix. 2]: “Speak unto the children of Israel that they bring thee a red heifer without spot.”)
The Kitui A-Kamba also have another curious ceremony which they perform when their crops are in danger of being spoilt for lack of rain. They snare a couple of hyrax (Procavia sp.) and carry them round the fields containing the standing crops; one is then [[61]]released, the other is killed. The heart, contents of the stomach, and intestines of the victim are then taken and placed on a fire which is lit among the crops. The smoke of the sacrifice is said to be pleasing to the deity (Engai). Cf. [Exodus xxix]: “And burn them … for a sweet savour before the Lord.” The carcase is not eaten.
The use of a hyrax for sacrificial purposes is rather curious, and may well be a relic of an old Semitic belief in which the hyrax was thought to have possessed originally the human shape. It was said that he who eats of its flesh will never see father and mother again.
The A-Kamba, however, appear to have lost sight of any connection of this sort, and it is therefore impossible to say whether it really existed; the choice of this curious animal may be merely a coincidence.
General Remarks on Sacred Places and Sacrifices.—The way in which a particular tree is chosen as a sacred place was explained to me unhesitatingly in the following manner: In a particular locality, long ago, there would be a woman, noted as a prophetess or seer, whose prophecies always came true, and at her death she would be buried in her village. After a time, a woman of that village became possessed by the imu, or spirit, of the deceased, and, in a state of exaltation, would speak in the name of the prophetess, saying: “I cannot stay here, I am called by Engai, and I go to live at a certain tree” (which would be specified). The tree thus designated then acquired sanctity. Four elders and four old women would then be selected; taking some earth from her grave, and one (a blood relation of the deceased) taking a goat, they would all proceed to the tree. The earth was deposited at its foot, the goat led thrice round the tree and then sacrificed. The delegates then prayed: “We have brought you to the tree you desire,” and a small hut was built on the spot. This hut is renewed from time to time, usually before a great ceremony takes place at the tree. [[62]]
The elders who build the hut must have their heads shaved next morning, but must shave one another, as no one else is allowed to do it. They then hide their hair. (Note.—Hiding away of hair after it is cut or shaved is a common custom among Africans; the idea is supposed to be that an evil-disposed person might use the hair as a medium for bewitching the owner.)
An interesting and thoughtful paper on the A-Kamba of Kitui, by Hon. C. Dundas, appeared in the Journal R.A.I., 1913, and on page 534 et seq. the writer discusses the religious beliefs of these people. He has come to the conclusion that they have no conception of a high god, and that the terms Engai and Mulungu are merely collective words denoting the plurality of the spiritual world. The present writer, however, is unable to accept this opinion, for while it is recognised that great confusion of thought may exist on the subject among the bulk of the people, there is little doubt that the elders of ithembo, or tribal shrines, are quite clear on the matter. Great care was taken to record only such information on the question as was furnished by this grade of Kamba society. And as the elders of ithembo correspond, in a measure, to the priestly castes of more highly developed communities, their opinion has a certain value, and we therefore feel justified in saying that the Kamba religion contains the concept of a high god. We would also contend that the information herein recorded contains internal evidence of this, and every effort has been made not to read more into the information than it actually contains. The fact that the writer was known to have been duly recognised as an elder among the neighbouring tribes, the Kikuyu, undoubtedly induced the elders to discuss these questions with considerable freedom in his presence. The words used to designate what may be conveniently termed the high god are Engai, Mulungu, and sometimes Chua (or the sun). [[63]]
It is sometimes said that Engai lives in the high mountains, Kenya for instance, and this would appear to differentiate the great spirit from one which has its origin in an ordinary human form. They insist also that there is only one Engai. They say that if the aiimu, or ancestral spirits, want to kill someone, Engai or Mulungu can stop them, their explanation being that although the aiimu can afflict a living person, they cannot kill him unless Mulungu concurs.
There is a saying when anyone dies, “Nundu wa chua,” which means “the order of the sun,” the obvious inference of which is that death comes from the high god.
They are emphatic in stating that Engai, and not the aiimu, brings the rain. It is said that a woman will sometimes bear a child having a mark on its body similar in position to that of a wound which caused the death of a brother-in-law or some near relative in the village. The deceased is supposed to have been seen by Engai, and it is he who puts a similar mark on the new-born child. I am not sure, however, that the term Engai is not somewhat loosely used in this case, as the imu of the deceased might well be held responsible for such an occurrence.
Other confirmatory evidence of the presence of the concept of a high god will be found in the account of various ceremonies.
There is no doubt about the definition of the concept of the imu, and it can be translated as the spirit of the deceased person.
The Kitui elders stated that the sacrificial fire for cooking the meat at the ithembo must always be made by friction, so as to avoid any such impurity or uncleanness being brought from a house as might occur were burning embers from a household kitchen taken to the tree.
No one who is under a thabu or tabu can take part in a ceremony at an ithembo, nor must the muma or kithito oath be taken on such an occasion. Inquiries [[64]]were made as to whether, in olden times, any of the spoils of war were sacrificed at an ithembo, but this was said not to have been the case.
When, as sometimes happens, a shooting star appears to fall in an ithembo, it is supposed to be a sign that Engai has descended to the ithembo and demands food. Various kinds of food are then taken there as offerings. It is, however, not usual to sacrifice an animal. The shooting star falling on an ithembo may be compared with the story of Jehovah appearing to Moses in a burning bush, which seemed to burn and yet not be consumed. It is here to be noted that it is Engai who demands food, not the aiimu.
Sacrifice apparently is only performed when the people desire to invoke help.
One elder only from each clan, mbai, can participate in a ceremony at the ithembo on any particular occasion, and, further, no elder whose father is alive can go to the tree.
If in war an enemy took sanctuary at an ithembo he was allowed to stay there unmolested, and was safe; at night he escaped. If, again, he caught hold of an elder of ithembo, he was equally safe; the elder would take him to his village and send one of his sons to convey him safely out of the country. It is considered that this fact emphasises the priestly position of the elders of ithembo, who must, at all cost, avoid the stain of death.
If a snake is seen at a sacred place it is customary to pour milk, butter, and gruel over it; it is supposed to be njoka ya aiimu (snake of the aiimu).
Arms must not be taken to an ithembo, small knives to skin the sacrificial animals only being allowed.
No bird or beast can be killed at a sacred tree in the grove which generally surrounds it.
Should a sacred tree, of the old communal mathembo kind, fall down, the people will still worship on the site.
KIKUYU MUTHURI OR ELDER.
(Prognathous type)
If a village which possesses one of the small [[65]]mathembo is moved, the assistance of a medicine woman is sought for the selection of another one near the new site for the village. The elders take her to the old tree and leave her there all night in solitary vigil; in the morning she is fetched and taken to the new tree.
When the elders return from sacrificing at a sacred tree, each takes a small piece of the skin of the sacrificial animal and ties it on the thorn fence near his hut. It is believed, however, that this would not be allowed in the case of a great communal gathering to pray for rain, such as previously described.
The sacrificial animal is provided by the elders of ithembo in rotation.
It is said that before going to war a black goat was sacrificed at the ithembo, and success was prayed for.
Upon returning from a successful raiding expedition, they went to the organiser of the party, the muthiani, killed the biggest ox, and prayed to Engai as a thanksgiving ceremony. This did not take place at the ithembo, as, in all probability, they dared not go to the ithembo with any suspicion of bloodstain upon them.
The Kamba belief that the spirits like to haunt certain sacred fig trees is very widespread, and there is one factor connected with it which is common to the whole area in which the belief is found, and that is that sacrilegious trespassers in a sacred grove are assailed by showers of missiles. Such incidents are often alleged to occur in India, and, apart from native superstition, the writer has even heard of two examples in East Africa, where European colonists, who had no knowledge of these beliefs but had built in the vicinity of sacred fig trees, asserted that they were periodically disturbed at night by stones thrown on the roofs of their houses. In Phil Robinson’s well-known book, “In my Indian Garden” (page 208), it is stated that in Burmah to this day the Government pays a fee, called [[66]]murung, to the headmen of certain tracts for appeasing the manes of their ancestors lodged in old sal trees.
Robertson Smith also quotes an old authority to the effect that fig, carob, and sycamore trees are haunted by devils.
The belief in ghosts is widespread in Kitui, and people who allege that they occasionally see the ghosts of human beings are not uncommon. They do not appear to be terrified about it, but state that they call out to the apparition to verify its immaterial character, and if no reply is received they know that it belongs to the aiimu. If, however, a ghost is seen, it is necessary for the observer to kill a ram and smear his face with some of the purifying tatha, together with some of the ram’s fat.
We thus see that when a shrine is established, tradition and the continual use of it for worship sanctifies it and maintains its position in the popular mind. As the authority previously quoted points out: “Holy places are older than temples, and older than the beginnings of settled life.”
It is also interesting to note how the old Canaanite high places were associated with a tree or grove of trees. This is considered by some authorities as an indication of an ancient cult of tree worship. There is little evidence of the survival of such a cult among the people under consideration, but an account has been given of a ceremony which has to be performed when a large solitary tree in a clearing is cut down, and certain rites have to be performed to transfer either the spirit of the tree to a new abode or perhaps human spirits resident in the tree.
There is, however, little doubt that the ancient altars erected under trees were a later development of worship which originally took place at the tree without any altar. It is said that our English maypole is a degraded survival of the worship under trees. Generally speaking, in ancient Arabia the gifts of the worshippers were presented to the deity by being laid [[67]]on sacred ground, often at the foot of a sacred tree, or they were hung on it, and when libations of sacrificial blood or other things were offered, they were poured either there or over a sacred stone. All this might have been written of our African peoples of to-day, and one cannot, therefore, be accused of special pleading in inviting attention to the similarity of practice.
It is supposed that the ceremonial dedication of the foundation of a sacred building is a direct survival of the rites which took place in ancient times when a new “holy place” was formerly recognised and adopted.
The ancient flavour will be detected in the following extract from the account of the proceedings which took place a few years ago upon the occasion of the laying of the foundation stone of a Jewish synagogue, in British East Africa, the sacrificial nature of the rites being very noticeable:
“Corn, wine, and oil were presented to His Excellency by three prominent Freemasons. His Excellency strewed the corn on the stone, and the bearer of the corn said:
“ ‘There shall be a handful of corn in the earth upon the top of the mountains, the fruit thereof shall make Lebanon, and they of the city shall flourish like grass of the earth.’
“His Excellency poured the wine on the stone, and the bearer of the wine said:
“ ‘And for a drink offering thou shalt offer him a third part of a bin of wine, for a sweet savour unto the Lord.’
“His Excellency poured oil on the stone, the bearer of the oil said:
“ ‘And thou shalt make it an oil of holy ointment, an ointment compound after the art of apothecary, it shall be an holy anointing oil. And thou shalt anoint the tabernacle of the congregation therewith and the Ark of the testimony.’
“Benediction—‘May the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, shower down his choicest blessings upon this Synagogue about to be erected for His Honour, and may He grant a full supply of the Corn of Nourishment, the Wine of Refreshment, and the Oil of Joy.’ ”
Making of Fire (Kamba of Kibwezi).—The fire [[68]]required for sacrificial purposes was formerly always made anew by friction, as fire so produced could carry no evil with it, whereas if firebrands were brought from a hut some thabu or curse which rested on the family owning the hut might inadvertently be brought with it, and the wood might in fact be infected.
Nowadays, however, it is curious to note that a sacrificial fire is lighted with matches; for they consider that these, being of foreign origin, can bring no infection derived from Kamba spirit influence. This gives some insight into the ratiocination of the native mind.
Fire was formerly made, and is still made, on occasion, by hunters and others who rapidly rotate a piece of hard stick, held vertically between the hands, in a cup-shaped cavity cut in a piece of soft wood which is held between the toes, the friction generating enough heat to produce sparks which light some tinder. The vertical stick is called the male, and the other piece the female, the reasons for which nomenclature are obvious.
It is curious to note that a woman is not allowed to make fire by friction, the reason given for this being that a man has to squat to make fire, and that if a woman does the same, it is unseemly, as she thereby exposes her nakedness. It is believed, however, that there is more in it than this, and that only a male is really supposed to manipulate the masculine portion of the fire-making apparatus. [[69]]
CHAPTER III
SACRED STONES OR VILLAGE SHRINES IN KIKUYU
When the Kikuyu people found a new village, the elder of the family collects three stones, two being brought from the bed of a river to the north of the village, the direction from which the tribe migrated, and one from a river to the south of the village. The river in the north is generally the Thika, and the river in the south is generally the Mbagathi. The stones must not be collected from a river from which the villagers take water for their domestic use, and it must also be a river with a perennial flow.
These stones usually weigh from thirty to forty pounds, and are used as a village shrine. Having obtained the stones, the people take a black ram, sew up its left eye, and bury it in the middle of the village. This is done with the idea that if anyone comes to bring bad magic to the people of the village, he will, like the ram, lose the sight of one eye. The three stones are then planted round the spot where the ram is buried. Four people carry out this ceremony: the head of the village, another elder of the same clan, and the two senior wives of the village head. They break branches from the mutumaiyu, mukenya, and muthakwa trees and plant them round the spot. If they take root, it is considered a very good omen; if the branches die, however, they are replaced periodically by fresh ones.
Whenever a sacrifice is made in the village, in connection with any ceremony, the ram is killed near this spot and blood and fat are poured into the ground [[70]]between the stones. Meat for the spirits is always put out in two heaps, one for the male and one for the female spirits. It is believed that if the stones are obtained from strong flowing rivers, they will help to protect the village from nocturnal thieves. Moreover, the stones from the rivers to the north of the village will stop the entrance of bad ngoma or spirits coming from that direction, and similarly, the stones from the south will form a protection against the evil spirits from that direction.
The stones are not supposed to possess a spirit, but if a stone is stolen it is looked upon as a terrible crime. The thief is said to have, by its possession, the power to inflict a serious curse upon the village, whenever it was stolen. When the stone is missed, the head of the village collects the kiama, or council of elders, and presents them with a fee of a ram and a bullock, which are killed. They tell the owner to wait three days, and if by then the stone is not returned, they bring him the kithathi on which to curse the thief. In all probability, the stone is secretly returned by night; if not, the owner curses the thief on the kithathi, and some time afterwards it will be found that two or three people have died mysteriously in a certain village and the stone is brought back. The owner of the stone will then kill a sheep, and place strips of the skin, rukwaru, upon the right wrist of all the men, and upon the left ankle of all the women in the thief’s village. After this, they all go to a river and are purified on the bank of it by a mundu mugo, or medicine man. They then bathe in the river and are marked on their foreheads by a vertical mark made with ira, or white earth, and return home. The owner of the stones now presents a ram or male goat to the elders of kiama, to show that the trouble is over. It is said that no theft of this kind has occurred in recent years.
The sacred stones are called Kithangona ya muchi, which may be interpreted as “village shrine” or altar. The Swahili equivalent is Mathbah ya Kafara ya [[71]]miji; mathbah is evidently the same as the Arabic masseba. It is believed to be associated particularly with the ngoma, or ancestral spirits, and has no connection with the deity. They may perhaps believe that the stones form a resting-place for the beneficent ngoma of their ancestors, or that they indicate a spot where the villagers can render service to the spirits. The former interpretation is the more likely; why, otherwise, should there be such trouble when one is stolen? These stones must never be used as seats.
The same idea occurs in Bantu Kavirondo, where these stones are to be found in each village. Mumia pointed out such a shrine, decked round with white feathers, where a fowl was periodically killed and the blood poured between the stones. The stones were said to have come from the north of the Nzoia River, from a place whence the Wanga clan were supposed to have migrated.
Some years ago, one of these stones was stolen by a complainant who alleged that he could not get a hearing in a case regarding the debt of a cow. The whole country-side was upset at the loss; the suit was immediately heard and disposed of, and eventually the stone was returned. The incident clearly showed what importance was attached to these apparently insignificant objects.
If a Kikuyu village is moved, the stones are moved to the new village, a fresh ram being buried in the new spot. Before the stones are removed, the head of the village and his senior wife pour out honey-beer and sugar-cane beer on the space between the stones, which can then be removed with impunity. When a brew of honey-beer is made a little of the honey is poured out between the stones, and when the beer is fermented, a libation is also poured there.
The writer recently witnessed the celebration of the morning prayer at a village shrine. The principal wife brought sugar-cane beer and poured some into a [[72]]cow horn and some into a small U shaped gourd. The elder, who was head of the village, then poured the beer, first from the horn on to the trees growing between the stones, and then from the gourd. He now uttered a prayer with great solemnity, and called upon the spirits to grant good fortune to the village and also to the visitor. He prayed for wealth in live stock, abundance of children, safety in journeying, and so forth. As the prayer proceeded another elder responded solemnly. The beer from the horn was a libation to the male spirits; that from the gourd to the female spirits. The horn had a knob carved on the end, the origin of which might be phallic. [[73]]
CHAPTER IV.
THE FIRSTFRUITS OF THE HARVEST, ALSO PLANTING CEREMONIAL
It is interesting to compare all this with the Mosaic ritual laid down in [Exodus xxiii. 19]: “The first of the firstfruits of thy land thou shalt bring into the house of the Lord thy God.” This is the Levitical minha or tribute.
Robertson Smith’s “Religion of the Semites,” p. 241, states: “Among the Hebrews, as among other agricultural peoples, the offering of firstfruits was connected with the idea that it is not lawful or safe to eat of the new fruit until the god has received his due. The offering makes the whole crop lawful food, but it does not render it holy food; nothing is consecrated except the small portion offered at the altar, and of the remaining store clean persons and unclean can eat alike during the year. This, therefore, is quite a different thing from the consecration of animal sacrifices, for in the latter case the whole flesh is holy, and only those who are clean can eat of it” (Cf. [Lev. xxiii. 10–21]).
Professor Robertson Smith also points out that in Hosea’s time the firstfruits of corn were offered at the shrines of the Baalim, who had become recognised as the giver of rain and the author of all fertility. This principle, it will be seen, agrees as closely as possible with the ideas of the tribes under review.
In Kikuyu, the people do not appear to take the firstfruits to the sacred tree formally before reaping the crop, but on the occasion of each harvest the women will take offerings of the various cereal foods—maize, [[74]]millet, and so forth (also beans, sugar cane, etc.)—to the sacred place. They are not allowed to go right up to the tree, but pour their gifts on the ground near by. All such food must be uncooked. This being done, they return, and the elders kill either a young ewe which has not yet borne a lamb, or a ram, at a little distance from the tree, and a rukwaru, or strip of skin, is placed on the left wrist of each of the women. The elders then eat the meat; none is actually taken to the tree or left there. It is a kind of harvest thanksgiving ceremony.
Firstfruits in Ukamba.—It is customary to eat a certain quantity of the maize cobs or the bean crop before they ripen. But before this can be done a little of each kind is reaped and laid at the ithembo by an elder and an old woman, and a goat is sacrificed. The tatha, or stomach contents of the goat, are mixed with the green food in a cooking pot and boiled. A portion of this is then distributed to each village, after which the green crops can be safely eaten.
Next comes the proper harvest, but before reaping can commence the owners again consult the medicine man whose advice was previously sought at sowing time. They take him a present of every kind of grain, and so forth, reaped at the previous harvest, and he gives his advice as to a propitious day for the ceremony. The elders then gather the firstfruits of the harvest and assemble at the village meeting-place (thomi) of one of the senior elders and sacrifice a goat. Then, as above, they cook samples of the various products in a big pot together with the tatha of the goat. When the food is ready, the women from the villages round come and receive some of it, which is placed on leaves.
It is said that were this ceremony to be omitted, the people would be afflicted with diarrhœa, and would presumably become the victims of thabu. But when it is concluded, they may reap and eat of the crop without fear or hindrance. [[75]]
Curiously enough, this ceremony is not considered necessary for the mbaazi crop (Cajanus indicus or pigeon pea). The people give no explanation of this, but it may be that the pigeon pea was introduced from Kikuyu or elsewhere, after the belief had developed, and was therefore excluded.
A housewife having gathered into her granary (ikumba) all her crops, must not cohabit with her husband the night on which she has completed her harvest.
A present of a little of the new grain has to be made to the medicine man who advised the people where to plant.
If a woman has had assistance from her neighbours in the harvest-field she makes a feast of all kinds of food; no men are present, as they have nothing to do with it. There is no dancing on such an occasion.
The next thing is the threshing of the grain, and before the mawele grain, and according to some the mbaazi pea, can be threshed, permission must be sought from a medicine man who specialises in agricultural magic. In Kibwezi district no one has any leave to thresh mawele until the elders have sacrificed at the ithembo. It is said that if anyone breaks this prohibition the particular area will miss the mvua ya ua, or the second portion, of the next big rains. These are the showers which bring the grain into head and fill out the seed, and thus they will miss their crops. The first half of the rains grow the stem and leaves, and the second half bring the plant to fruition.
Again, if a woman has the assistance of her neighbours she will make a feast for them at the completion of the threshing.
Planting of Crops and Harvest.—In Ukamba, before the sowing of the grain is commenced a medicine man is usually consulted with regard to the proper season and the prospect of good rains.
When these preliminaries are settled, the elders of ithembo and the old women are summoned to the [[76]]ithembo. The men bring a goat and the women bring milk and offerings of grain contributed by the villages of the neighbourhood.
The goat is sacrificed at the sacred tree; some of the blood and the beer are poured out as libations, an offering of the cereals is made, prayers for good crops are offered, and the meat and food is then eaten and the beer is drunk by the worshippers.
They then go away and commence to plant with a light heart. After planting, however, a woman must not cohabit with her husband until the grain has sprouted and appeared above ground. Should, however, ceremonial cohabitation become necessary in connection with some other religious observance, the woman must first go and dig up a seed of each species of food product which has been planted and bring it back to the village.
If any man plants before the proper sacrifice has taken place, the elders will fine him a goat, which has to be sacrificed at the ithembo as an atonement. Further, the grain which has been sown has, as far as it is possible, to be dug up, collected and returned to the village. If it is left in the ground, it is supposed not to mature, and also Engai might be angry with the community at large.
The people of Ulu (Ukamba) again, often perform another fertility ceremony to ensure good crops. They take the dung of the hyrax, which is called kinyoi ngilla in Kikamba, and mix it with the powdered root of the mulinditi tree and a weed called waithu. This medicine is then mixed with some of the seed which they propose to plant and burnt together with some of the dry weeds collected from the field. The fire is made in such a position that the smoke drifts across the field. The ashes of this fire are then mixed with the seed about to be sown. In Kitui, however, it is said that a live hyrax is carried round the field by a procession of villagers, the animal being then killed and its blood and entrails scattered over the field. [[77]]
CHAPTER V
CIRCUMCISION CEREMONIAL
One of the most important factors in the life history of all natives is the formal initiation to the tribe, of which the outward sign is usually the ceremony of circumcision. In Kikuyu these rites have attained some elaboration, and it is important to describe them in detail.
It will later be seen in [Chapter VII] how deeply the division of the Kikuyu tribe into the two guilds, Kikuyu and Masai,[1] affects their customs, and in the following description the rites of the two guilds are described separately.
Before a child reaches the age of circumcision, however, a ceremony called Ku-chiaruo ringi has to be gone through, which means “to be born again.” It must be undergone by young children before they are eligible for the next stage of initiation, viz., circumcision.
The occurrence of these two ceremonies, connected as they are, cannot fail to strike one as being, in a lower stage of civilisation, the genesis of the idea of the sacraments of baptism and confirmation. It is said in fact [[78]]that some of the missionaries do not hesitate to explain the two Christian doctrines mentioned by reference to the two pagan ones, and state that with the help of this key the natives at once grasp the idea of their doctrines.
But to return to the ceremony itself—the form varies with the guild of the parents. According to the fashion of the Masai guild, about eight days after the birth of the child, be it male or female, the father of the infant kills a male sheep and takes the meat to the house of the mother, who eats it with her neighbours if they belong to the Masai guild. At the conclusion of the feast, the mother is adorned with the skin from the left foreleg and shoulder of the sheep, the piece of skin being fastened from her left wrist to left shoulder; this she wears for four days, when it is taken off and thrown on to her bed, where it remains till it disappears. The mother and child have their heads shaved on the day this ceremony takes place; it has no connection with the naming of the child, which is done on the day of its birth.
The ceremony of Ku-chiaruo ringi, according to the fashion of the Kikuyu guild, is as follows in S. Kikuyu. The day after the birth a male sheep is killed and some of its fat is cooked in a pot and given to the mother and infant to drink. It was not specifically stated whether this had a direct connection with the rite referred to, but the description commenced with a mention of this. When the child reaches the age of from three to six years the father kills a male sheep, and three days later the novice is adorned with part of the skin and the skin of the big stomach. These skins are fastened on the right shoulder of a boy or on the left shoulder of a girl. The skin used for a boy has, however, the left shoulder and leg cut out of it, and that for a girl has the right shoulder and leg cut away. The child wears these for three days, and on the fourth day the father cohabits with the mother of the child. [[79]]
There is, however, one important point, and that is that before the child is decorated with the sheep skin it must go and lie alongside its mother on her bed and cry out like a newly born infant. Only after this ceremony has been performed is the child eligible for circumcision.
A few days after circumcision the child returns to sleep on a bed in its mother’s hut, but the father has to kill a sheep before he can return, and the child must drink some of the blood, the father also having to cohabit with the mother upon the occasion.
Owing to similarity of name it is possible that the ceremony of Ku-chiaruo ringi might be confused with Ku-chiaruo kungi, which is of widely different significance. This latter is an adoption ceremony, and is said to be similar to a Swahili rite called ndugu Kuchanjiana. If a person has no brothers or parents he will probably try to obtain the protection of some wealthy man and his family. If such a man agrees to adopt him he takes a male sheep and slaughters it, and the suppliant takes another one. The elders are assembled and slaughter these sheep, strips of the skin (rukwaru) being taken from the right foot and from the chest of each sheep and tied round each person’s hand, while each is decorated with strips of skin from the sheep of the other party. The poor man is then considered as the son of the wealthy one, and when the occasion arises the latter pays out live stock to buy a wife for his adopted son.
The Kamba people, at any rate the Kitui section, have nothing corresponding to the Ku-chiaruo ringi rite of the Kikuyu, but when the child is about six months old it is moved from its mother’s bed and thenceforward sleeps on a little bed by itself. If the husband cohabits with his wife during this period the child has to be placed on the mother’s back.
Circumcision.—As previously mentioned, the A-Kikuyu are circumcised according to two systems, some according to one and some according to the other. [[80]]
- (1) Ku-ruithia ukabi, i.e., Masai fashion.
- (2) Ku-ruithia u Kikuyu or Gikuyu, i.e., Kikuyu fashion.
The actual surgical operation is the same, but according to the Masai system the boys stay and sleep in the hut for four days after the operation, and then go out, shoot birds, and wear the skins of the birds on the head and neck. When the new moon appears their heads are shaved, and each one then goes to his home. The head of the village cannot sleep in the hut where the circumcised youths are staying until they are well.
According to the Kikuyu system the youths remain in the hut for eight days; on the day of the operation a sheep is killed, and on the ninth day the father of the children takes them away to their homes. The head of the village sleeps in the hut where the youths stay after the operation has taken place.
KIKUYU CIRCUMCISION FEAST.
SUGAR CANES OVER VILLAGE GATE.
EATING CEREMONIAL FOOD.
Those circumcised according to Kikuyu fashion hold the feast called Mambura the day before the operation; the writer recently witnessed one of these gatherings, and so is able to describe it with some accuracy. It was held at a village between the Mathari and Thigiri streams, and was on the twelfth day of the moon, so there does not appear to be any particular significance as to date. Several thousand people of both sexes had collected to dance and take part in the festivities; the warriors were dressed in their war paint and had their bodies smeared with red or grey paint, and in some cases were picked out with star-like patterns. The women were all in their best, and freely smeared with red ochre and oil; a large collection of elders was there, and the chief was present, as he explained, in order to keep order and prevent the young warriors from quarrelling. Over the gate of the village two long pieces of sugar cane were fastened, and all who entered the village were supposed to pass underneath. The entrance of the village was also guarded by a bag of medicines belonging to a mundu mugo; these were supposed to prevent [[81]]anyone coming into the village to bewitch the candidates. In the morning the elders of kiama slaughtered a big male goat, nthengi, by strangulation, and each male candidate for circumcision had a strip of the skin fastened round his right wrist, the same strip being also carried over the back of his hand and his second finger passed through a slit in it. The male candidates were nude with the exception of a string of beads or so, and a necklace made of a creeper called ngurwa; the girls were nude as far as clothes went, but were enveloped in strings of beads from their necks to below their waists. Much dancing took place till a little after two p.m., when there was a ceremonial meal. The candidates came into the village in Indian file, the girls leading the way. They were received in front of the hut, where they were to reside temporarily after the operation, by a few elders who had for some time been preparing a number of strips of a vegetable creeper, and smearing them with a black oily mixture. Each girl first came up and had a piece of the creeper fastened round her left ankle. The creeper is called ruruera, and each piece is smeared with medicine made from the umu and wang͠nondu plants mixed with castor oil. One of the elders then took a handful of porridge made of wimbi and mtama meal (eleusine grain and sorghum), and placed some on a bundle of twigs of the mararia bush and offered it to each candidate; the candidate bit a little piece and then spat it out on the ground, the balance was then placed in her hand and she ate it. The porridge was placed on a flat stone used for grinding corn. The boys then came along one by one, and the ceremony was repeated in the same manner, but the strip of creeper was fastened on the right ankle of each boy. It was stated that the object of this portion of the ceremony was to lessen the pain suffered by the candidates during the actual operation.
In another part of the village a man was completing five stools of white wood, roughly hewn out of the solid, which were intended as special seats for the [[82]]elders and old women who had to perform the ceremony.
Immediately after the ceremonial meal was finished a great rush occurred, and the candidates, followed by the crowd, galloped off to a mugumu, fig tree, about three hundred yards away; as they approached it, the boys threw clubs and sticks up into the tree, and then commenced to climb into the branches, hacking savagely the whole time at the leaves and twigs; each youth had a light club with the head sharpened to a blunt cutting edge, and by dint of vigorous hacking gradually broke off small branches which fell down among the crowd below, and were immediately seized by the people, some of whom at once began to strip off the bark.
The bark was supposed to be used to bind round the heads of the candidates. The people then danced round the tree, and this ended the proceedings. The leaves of the fig tree are collected and strewn in the hut where the candidates sleep after the operation. They are said to be for the purpose of catching the blood, and possibly to prevent the hut being defiled by the blood soaking into the earthen floor. They would never throw sticks into, or gather leaves from, a sacred mugumu tree.
The actual operation was not seen, as it took place at dawn the following morning; it is performed in the open near the village. The bulk of the prepuce is not cut off at all, but forms an excrescence below the glans, a small piece of skin only being cut off; it is thrown away, and not buried.
At the similar operation in Ukamba the prepuce is left on the leaves on which the youth is seated during the operation and thrown away with them.
The neophyte is placed on a bed of leaves for the operation, as it is very bad for the blood to fall on the earth. If anyone touches the blood it is considered unlucky and he must cohabit with his wife, and the mother of the child with her husband, and no harm will ensue. [[83]]
Mambura Festivities Preceding Circumcision According to Masai Fashion.—The festival which precedes circumcision according to the Masai fashion was also witnessed. It was originally to have been held at full moon, but bad weather caused its postponement till the twenty-fifth day of the moon, which seemed to be equally propitious.
In the morning a sheep was killed and eaten by the elders, and at about noon the candidates had assembled. The people of the village and the candidates passed their time in dancing until the preparations were completed. The male candidates were smeared from head to foot with ashes, and were nude with the exception of a belt of iron chain (munyoro), a bead necklet (kinyata), an iron dancing bell (kigamba) on the right leg near the knee; some wore a ring of the ngurwa vine round their necks. The girls were decorated from neck to waist with a load of beads as in the Kikuyu form of the ceremony.
The first proceeding was the decoration of each of the male candidates with a bracelet made of climbing euphorbiaceous plant called mwimba iguru.
The elders of kiama and the wives of the owner of the village, who was one of the elders, sat round in a circle in the middle of the village with a quantity of tendrils of the plant on a wicker tray, kitaruru, in the centre; a small gourd of white diatomaceous earth, ira, was produced, and each person licked a little and then smeared a small portion of the white earth on his throat and navel; this was to purify himself for the ceremony. A horn cup of honey-beer was then produced, each one taking a sip, and then all simultaneously blowing it out of their mouths in spray on to the plant; it was said that the object of this was to purify or dedicate the plant to the use to which it was to be applied. The male candidates then came up one by one and a bracelet of the creeper was fastened on the right wrist of each.
After a little more dancing the male candidates were seated in a row on ox-hides spread out on the ground; [[84]]a woman, the sister of the owner of the village, came along and poured first a little milk and then a little honey-beer on the head of the one on the left of the line; she smeared it over the scalp and shaved a place on the right side of his head and passed on to the next. The shaving was merely ceremonial, as the candidates had all been shaved on the head before coming to the ceremony—the native razor, ruenji, being used. The milk was in a gourd and the beer in a cow horn. The male candidates then got up, and the same performance was gone through with the girls.
Shortly after this two great branches from the mutamaiyu tree were brought to the gate of the village and held upright, one on each side of the entrance; the elders said that in the ceremonies according to Masai fashion the mutamaiyu had the same significance as the mugumu tree had in the Kikuyu ceremonial. The candidates came through the village dancing and singing all the time up to near the mutamaiyu branches, and stopped a few yards away from them, still dancing and singing. The song did not appear to have any great significance, being to the effect that from time immemorial they always had the mutamaiyu at these festivals, and now it had come they could proceed to circumcise the candidates according to old custom.
They then all returned to the village, and the candidates were arranged in the order in which they could be circumcised on the morrow. The owner of the village divested himself of his blanket and donned an oily kaross made of goatskin from which all the hair had been scraped; his hands were carefully wiped and some ira (the white earth previously mentioned) was poured into the palm of his hand from a small gourd. He then commenced at the left of the line and anointed each candidate on different parts of the body with smears of the white earth; he was assisted by his principal wife and two sisters and another elder.
The boys were first touched on the tongue, and a line was then drawn down the forehead to the point of [[85]]the nose; a spot was placed on the throat, the navel, the palm of each hand, and finally between the big toe and first toe.
The procedure with the girls was slightly different, the tongue being smeared first, and a horizontal line then drawn across the forehead. The palms of the hands and the navel were next smeared, and finally a band was drawn round each ankle.
After the candidates had thus been anointed, the elders took mouthfuls of honey-beer out of a horn and blew it in spray over each candidate’s head and shoulders. This part of the proceedings was a ceremony intended to purify the candidates from any thahu which might be on them, and to protect them from any thahu which they might possibly get from an onlooker. The spectators “ululued” loudly during this operation.
It was then about two p.m., and nothing further of importance took place; the crowd, which had been gradually growing, however, danced on till sundown.
At nightfall each candidate was said to receive a dose of the crushed seeds of a plant called ngaita, which acted as an aperient, and in the morning before the operation each one had to bathe in water in which an axe head had been placed to make it cold; it was, however, stated that if there were a large number, some would not bother about this, but would bathe in the nearest stream.
The operation took place at dawn on the following morning, and was not witnessed. No firewood but that from the mutamaiyu tree is allowed to be used in the hut where the candidates live after the operation.
This custom of circumcision according to the two different systems applies to both sexes. Both classes dance with the oval wooden shields called ndomi before circumcision, and travel through the district painted in zig-zag stripes with white clay.
A man circumcised according to Masai fashion can marry a girl circumcised according to Kikuyu fashion [[86]]and vice versâ; but a medicine man and the elders have to perform a ceremony to change the girl from Kikuyu to Masai before the marriage can take place. The ceremony is said to be as follows: a male sheep is killed, and the small intestines are extracted. The medicine man and the girl take hold of them, and the elders then cut the intestines with three pieces of wood sharpened to a knife edge and made of mathakwa, mukeo, and mukenya bushes. A piece of intestine is cut with each knife. The girl is then anointed with the fat of the sheep by another woman and smeared over with tatha (the stomach contents) mixed with water.
In the case of a marriage between a couple belonging to different guilds the man never changes; it is always the woman who relinquishes the system in which she was brought up. A man can, however, at his own wish and for reasons of his own, change his guild; that is to say a man brought up Masai fashion can change over to the Kikuyu side. It is a much simpler matter for him than for a woman; a male sheep is killed by the elders, and a medicine man then comes and puts him through the ordinary purification ceremony.
A man usually belongs to the guild of his father; that is to say, he is circumcised according to the system of his father and grandfather before him. The mark of a person circumcised Masai fashion is as follows: a copper ring is placed in the lower lobe of each ear, and a piece of stick with an ostrich feather on it is bound on each side of the head; a band of sanseviera fibre, ndivai,[2] is bound round the forehead, and on this band bird skins are fastened.
These ornaments are worn for eight days only; bows and arrows are also carried and sandals are worn. After eight days they put off the ornaments and give up the bows and arrows, leaving them in the village where they were circumcised. They then have their heads shaved at the village and return home.
CLIMBING THE “MUGUMO” FIG TREE TO GATHER LEAVES.
Those circumcised Kikuyu fashion go through [[87]]none of this, but for two days wear a strip of banana fibre, maigoia, in the lobe of each ear. During five days after recovery they also wear in their ears a round plug of mununga wood whitened on the top with ira and a necklace of the leaves of the mutathi plant. This is probably a protective magic to preserve them from evil influence during their convalescence.
The marks just enumerated only apply to the male sex. With regard to girls, further inquiry has elicited the following facts: a girl whose father belongs to the Masai guild wears rings of copper called ndogonyi on each ankle. A girl whose father belongs to the Kikuyu guild wears an anklet of iron with little rattles, called nyara runga, attached to it.
If a girl who is Masai marries a man who is Kikuyu the ndogonyi are taken off at marriage. If a girl who is Kikuyu marries a man who is Masai she does not, however, discard the nyara runga.
The elaborate ceremonial of old days in connection with circumcision is now rapidly dying out in Southern Kikuyu.
Inquiries were made as to whether the bull-roarer, which is well known in Kikuyu as kiburuti, was used in these ceremonies, but curiously enough it appears to survive only as a child’s toy, whereas in many of the neighbouring tribes it and its first cousin, the friction drum, are regularly used in initiation ceremonial.
Among the Kikuyu, two men circumcised at the same ceremony cannot go into each other’s huts or even touch one another and neither may their children by their first wives. The prohibition may be removed by an exchange of goats, or beer, which both families consume together in a hut. This prohibition does not extend to children of younger wives or to grandchildren. It does not appear to be connected in any way with thabu, but a penalty of a goat or two is paid for breach of the custom.
Generations of the A-Kikuyu.—The description of [[88]]the circumcision may be concluded by an enumeration of the circumcision ages of the Kikuyu as far back as they can be traced.
In the December number of Man, 1908, the late Hon. K. Dundas gives a list of the Rika or circumcision ages of the A-Kikuyu which probably goes back about one hundred years or so, but this enumeration did not go sufficiently into detail, and certain important points were missed, so it has now been revised.
Four well-known elders, named Katonyo wa Munene, Karanja wa Hiti, Ithonga wa Kaithuma, and Mukuria wa Mucheru, were consulted, and the following lists are probably as reliable as can be expected, dependent as they unavoidably are on the memory of old men. The first list was given me by the first two, the second list by the second two. There are slight variations, but these are almost inevitable under the circumstances.
Morika, or Muhurika, singular—Rika, plural, is the circumcision age or generation, and corresponds more or less to the poror among the Masai. The Rika called Manjiri, Mamba, Manduti, and Chuma were not recognised by either of the elders, who both commenced their count with Chiira, which is obviously the same as Shiera of Dundas’s paper, and possibly the farther north one goes among the Kikuyu tribe the farther back do their legends go.
The following is the list beginning at the most remote point:
Version I
| 1. | Chiira. | ||||
| 2. | Mathathi. | ||||
| 3. | Endemi. | ||||
| 4. | Iregi |  | These three, it is said, are often grouped as Iregi. | ||
| 5. | Kiarie | ||||
| 6. | Kamao[[89]] | ||||
| 7. | Kinuthia |  | The fathers of the oldest men alive in the country belonged to these ages, and arecalled Maina. | ||
| 8. | Karanja | ||||
| 9. | Njuguna | ||||
| 10. | Kinyanjui | ||||
| 11. | Kathuru | ||||
| 12. | Ngnanga | ||||
| 13. | Njerogi, means the orphans, Chief Katonyo is of this morika. | ||||
| 14. | Wainaina, means those who shivered during the circumcision ceremony. | ||||
| 15. | Mungai, means swelled faces. | ||||
| 16. | Kitao, refers to their eating colocasia roots after they were circumcised. | ||||
| 17. | Ngua ya nina, those who wore their mothers’ clothes. | ||||
| 18. | Mbugwa or Kuchu, because the circumcision wounds did not heal. | ||||
| 19. | Mwiruri, name of a song they sang at the ceremony that year. | ||||
| 20. | Mwitungu, means small-pox. | ||||
| 21. | Kiambuthi, called Mwangi, those of the dancing place. | ||||
| 22. | Kirira or Ngugi, because fire was on Kenya at the time of the circumcision ceremony. | ||||
| 23. | Mangorio, named after a sweet-smelling tree used to decorate the youths after circumcision. | ||||
| 24. | Rohangha, named after a girl who had decorated her ears before marriage. | ||||
| 25. | Wanyoiki, because they came one by one to the place of circumcision. | ||||
| 26. | Boro, the big stomach of a sheep. | ||||
| 27. | Imburu, the poor people (there was a famine at the time). | ||||
| 28. | Ngoraya. | ||||
| 29. | Kiniti, from a song.[[90]] | ||||
| 30. | Ingigi, season of the locusts (Katonyo’s son, Thuku, belongs to this generation). | ||||
| 31. | Mutongu |  | Called Mwangi. |  | Time of the small-pox, probably about 1895. When circumcised they went to dig potatoesin the fields. |
| 32. | Kenjeko | ||||
| 33. | Kamande |  | Called Mwiringhu. This is a name given by the youths themselves to this age. They will probably berenamed later by the elders when the generation is complete. |  | Time of the caterpillar plague. |
| 34. | Wanyaregi | The wanderers. | |||
| 35. | Kanyuto | The man-eating leopards; there were several about in that year. | |||
| 36. | Thegeni | The year of the cutting of the iron wire. | |||
| 37. | Kariangara | They ate gruel made of immature maize (Thuku’s son belongs to this year). | |||
| 38. | Njege | The porcupines. | |||
| 39. | Makio | Named after a liquid magic medicine which was sold in Kikuyu during the year. Thosecircumcised in 1910 belong to this morika, it will finish early in 1911. | |||
Version II
| 1. | Chiira. | 15. | Ngnanga. | 29. | Mwitongu. | ||||||||
| 2. | Mathathi. | 16. | Njerogi. | 30. | Mwiruri. | ||||||||
| 3. | Endemi. | 17. | Ubu. | 31. | Uchu. | ||||||||
| 4. | Iregi. | 18. | Wainaina | | These are often grouped as Wainaina. | 32. | Kiambuthi. | ||||||
| 5. | Mukuria. | 19. | Kangnethi | 33. | Ngugi or Kirira. | ||||||||
| 6. | Kicharu. | 20. | Kitao | 34. | Mangorio. | ||||||||
| 7. | Kamao. | 21. | Mungai | | Often grouped as Mungai. | 35. | Rohangha. | ||||||
| 8. | Kiarie.[[91]] | 22. | Injehia | 36. | Wanyoike. | ||||||||
| 9. | Kimemia. | 23. | Mairanga | 37. | Kinyiti. | ||||||||
| 10. | Kimani. | 24. | Marire. | 38. | Imboru. | ||||||||
| 11. | Karanja. | 25. | Wangigi. | 39. | Ingigi. | ||||||||
| 12. | Kinuthia. | 26. | Ngua ya nina. | 40. | Mutungu. | ||||||||
| 13. | Njuguna. | 27. | Wakirutu. | 41. | Kenjeko. | ||||||||
| 14. | Kinyanjui or Kathuru. | 28. | Mougwa or Kitindiko. | 42. | Kamande. | ||||||||
This brings us up to the last few years, and the elders said they had no interest in them.
The name given to the morika generally has some topical allusion to an event which occurred during the year and about the time of the circumcision ceremonies; these allusions are naturally forgotten in course of time, and the derivations in many cases now appear senseless.
One morika extends over two years, or four Kikuyu seasons, called Kimera.
The terms Maina and Mwangi as names for the rika of the last fifty years seem to be fixed as far as one can gather, e.g.:—
- The Chief Katonyo’s father was Maina.
- Katonyo himself is Mwangi.
- Katonyo’s children are Maina. [[92]]
- Katonyo’s grandchildren when circumcised become Mwangi.
- His great-grandchildren when circumcised become Maina.
So apparently every person when circumcised takes the name of the morika of his grandfather.
The word morika is used indifferently as applying to the larger group as well as to the group of a particular year. Any young men, however, who have been circumcised of recent years, and are still under the class Mwiringhu, would not be called Mwangi until the group of years was complete.
The time of the completion of a group of years is decided by the elders, but what determined the commencement of a new group was not ascertained.
These rika names only apply to males.
A leading Kikuyu elder named Lorigi was independently questioned on these matters by Mr C. Dundas, and his view was as follows: The Azamaki of to-day are practically all Mwangi, and Lorigi himself, who is among the most senior Azamaki, belongs to Mwangi. Kamiri, and a few others, are Maina, like the Mwangi he attends the councils. The sons of Maina are Mwangi and the sons of Mwangi are Maina, so that a man always belongs to the same division as his grandfather: thus Lorigi’s father was a Maina and his son also belongs to Maina, but Lorigi himself belongs to Mwangi as his grandson does. It thus comes about that there are two generations of Mwangi and Maina living at the same time, and the younger generation of either is distinguished by the temporary name of Mwirungu (plural Irungi). When these become elders they will be called Mwangi or Maina, as the case may be, without the addition of Irungu.
The Itwika Ceremony.—As explained in the last section, the Kikuyu have rika or circumcision ages, and a long list was given; these rika fall into groups and so many form a greater rika, named either Mwangi or [[93]]Maina, which follow one another alternately. It was not clear at the time what determined a group of rika being lumped together as Maina or Mwangi; it now appears, however, that this is connected with a periodic ceremony called the itwika, which takes place every fifteen years or so. These correspond to a great extent to the eunoto of the Masai, and are of tremendous importance to the Kikuyu; the elders, in fact, state that they originated in Kikuyu, and were copied by the Masai during the period when the Kapotei and Dogilani Masai were very friendly with the S. Kikuyu and the Purko Masai with the N. Kikuyu; in the present state of our knowledge it is, however, impossible to say whether there is any foundation for this.[3] Probably the best test would be to inquire if the Bari people who live in or near the country from which the Masai are believed to be derived, possess this kind of social organisation. The itwika has been described by Mr. Routledge as a secret society connected with snake worship, but as far as can be discovered in S. Kikuyu there is no foundation for this idea, elders, however, do not care to discuss its ceremonial unless one is very well known to them; they are not supposed to discuss it with any person of younger grade than themselves, and the ceremonies may be considered, in fact, as a final initiation at which only fully qualified elders are allowed to attend.
The last great itwika ceremony was at the end of the big famine of 1898–9, and was held about the time that the Government founded Fort Hall.[4] The gatherings were formerly held on the area between the Thika and Chania rivers, just above the junction of these two rivers, and the name Thika is derived from its connection with the itwika. The last itwika was held [[94]]near Kalaki’s, in the district known as Tingnanga in Mimi wa Ruchu’s country; it is said that on account of the decimation of the people by famine and small-pox it was decided not to hold it at the old place. The next itwika will take place when the grandchildren of people of the same rika as the chief Kinanjui have all been circumcised, and the decision of the date rests with the athuri ya ukuu of the Maina generation, this being the senior generation to-day. This apparently corresponds to the ngaje of the Masai (vide Hollis’s “Masai”).
An account of the last ceremony was obtained from one who was present, and the first step is said to be the building of a huge long hut to accommodate those who participate in the festival. This is divided into two main divisions, one for elders of the Maina generation and one for those of the Mwangi generation, and in addition, a small room for the athuri ya ukuu, who may be considered as the officiating priests of the festival. These thuri ya ukuu are always eight in number, and at the last itwika their names were, Muthaka, Ngombwa Tutua, Kimwaki, Kathungu, Kithenji wa Njuki, Rimui wa Kanjuku, Ngegenya and Mbura wa Katuku, and the whole programme rested in their hands.
The principal elder of each village is supposed to attend, and often the next in importance as well; the gathering, therefore, consists of several thousand souls, and the proceedings continue for three months or more. Each elder brings sheep and goats, bullocks, gourds of honey-beer, and gourds of sugar-cane beer, and relays of food are brought to the camp during the ceremonies by women, but no women are allowed within the confines of the camp. A number of men are also selected to collect firewood, but do not come inside the camp. The only persons allowed inside the camp, except the elders, are eight spearmen, who are told off to attend on the eight athuri ya ukuu.
It does not appear possible to obtain a detailed account of the proceedings, but it is said that every [[95]]day the eight athuri ya ukuu instruct their juniors in the customs of the tribe and so forth, the elders also hold “ngomas” or dances.
One man is chosen as an official trumpeter to the proceedings, and he collects the elders for the various rites by blowing a horn of the rare bongo antelope (ndongoro). The horn is called choro, and no one else is allowed to blow it; this is considered a very honourable office, and the trumpeter is paid nine rams and nine female kids for his services.
In former days towards the end of the festival the elders in charge of an itwika sent two envoys to a certain place on a stream called Kikira, in Kenya province, which was said to be the habitat of a mysterious reptile called the ndamathia. It was described as being more like a crocodile than like a snake. This beast was given beer to drink, and when it was drunk hairs were plucked from its tail. A hairy tail is not characteristic of reptiles, but all are agreed that the hairs were obtained. The envoys then returned, and the hair was plaited together with some strands of fibre of the wild date palm (Phœnix reclinata), and then placed on the top of the itwika hut. At the conclusion of the festival the people went in procession to a sacred fig tree (mugumu) in the vicinity, and stuffed the hair into a crevice in the tree and left it there. They then took the milk of a cow which had only borne one calf, the milk of a ewe which had only borne one lamb, and the milk of a goat which had only borne one kid, and poured them as a libation at the foot of the fig tree; a dance round the fig tree then ensued. This was the concluding ceremony of the itwika. Each person attending was finally adorned on the wrist with a rukwaru or strip of skin from a male goat, and the itwika house was broken up and they returned home.
At the last itwika held in South Kikuyu the elders did not send for the hair of the ndamathia, but the concluding ceremony was carried out with a big black ox, which was tied by its fore and hind legs and laid [[96]]between two poles; all the people then came along, one after the other, and stamped on the ox, which eventually died. The ox was not eaten but was left lying there, and they then poured libations of milk and fat at the foot of the sacred mugumu tree and danced round it, praying to God (Engai). After this they shaved their heads, were adorned with the rukwaru from a male goat, and returned home. Upon reaching their villages each elder killed a ram and placed a rukwaru cut from its skin on every person in his village; these were worn for one day only, the villagers then ceremonially bathed and threw them away.
These ceremonies are said to be very pleasing to God (Engai). No one is ever allowed to cultivate on the area which has been used for an itwika ceremony, and no one must ever cut the mugumu (fig tree) with an axe or knife. [[97]]
[1] Members of the Kikuyu tribe from birth to old age pass through various grades of initiation, but the ceremonial observed is of two classes, one of which is referred to by the natives as the Kikuyu system, and the other the Masai system. The Kikuyu system is probably the older, whilst the so-called Masai system is probably contact metamorphism due to the proximity of the Masai and the partial intermingling which has occurred from time to time. Curiously enough, the Masai system bears very little resemblance to the Masai customs of the present day, so presumably it has been modified to fit in with the psychology of the Kikuyu who adopted it. [↑]
[2] Ol-divai is the Masai word for the wild Sanseviera. [↑]
[3] Vide article on Masai and their traditions, by A. C. Hollis—London Quarterly Review, July, 1907, p. 104—“Now the Masai themselves say they learnt this peculiar ceremony (viz.: their method of circumcision) from the Kikuyu.” [↑]
[4] Mr Routledge mentions a later one which took place near Karuri’s about 1904, but according to the S. Kikuyu natives it was only a local ceremony. [↑]
CHAPTER VI
DEATH AND BURIAL CEREMONIAL
Kikuyu.—Among most peoples, irrespective of their stage of culture, definite ceremonials have to be observed upon the occasion of a death, and before the heirs can succeed to the property. In Kikuyu land these are somewhat complex, and like many other observances in that country, their form greatly depends on the circumcision guild to which the person belongs. This is the excuse for introducing the subject, as it is submitted that this factor has apparently escaped the notice of previous investigators, and to understand fully the life-history of a Kikuyu native it must be clearly realised how, from his early years to his death, he is bound down by the ritual of the guild to which he belongs. The nearest analogy one can find to illustrate this is the case of one child who is baptised a Protestant and another a Roman Catholic; the main principles of these religions are the same, and among the Kikuyu the guild to which a man belongs does not affect his beliefs as to the ngoma, or spirits, and their influence upon mortals, but the ritual of his religion varies throughout his life according to the guild to which he belongs.
The ceremonial observed upon a death is called ku-hukura—the Swahili synonym, sadaka, has practically the same meaning.
The death and funeral ceremonies of an elder circumcised Kikuyu fashion will be first described. On the day of the death the children or heirs take two rams and present them to the elders to pay for the [[98]]digging of the grave; every elder who has circumcised children is buried, married women who have borne five or six children are also buried. The grass is dug with a mubiru or mukuruwi stick, the sons of the deceased doing the actual digging, but the elders decide the site and supervise the work; if a son refuses to assist in digging his father’s grave it disqualifies him from receiving a share of the estate. The grave-diggers receive a big male goat (nthenge), or, if the family is rich, a bullock, the bullock being slaughtered and the corpse buried in the hide. The corpse of a male is buried on its right side with its knees doubled up and with the right hand under the head. The site of the grave is near the gate of the village, and the face of the corpse is placed looking towards its hut. A woman is always buried lying on her left side.
On the third day after the interment, the elders assemble at the village to kill a ram to cleanse the village from the stain of death, and the sons eat the breast of this animal and next day shave their heads. The same day the elders bring with them one of their number who is very poor, and of the same clan as the deceased, and he has to sleep in the hut of the senior widow of the deceased and have connection with her; he generally lives on in the village and is looked upon as a stepfather to the children.
There is then a pause of six days, and on the seventh day the elders return, a supply of beer is made ready for them, and a big male goat is killed and eaten by all present. This is called nthenge ya noro, which means the “goat of the whetstone,” referring to the whetstone used in sharpening the razors with which the heads are ceremonially shaved at the conclusion of the ceremonies. During the first four days after the death, the married men in the village must have connection with their wives; during the succeeding four days, however, they must observe strict continence.
After the nthenge ya noro has been killed the property is divided. [[99]]
If the deceased belongs to the Masai circumcision guild the ceremonies are as follows:
When a death occurs the elders decide whether the person is to be buried or not. Only elders above what is known as the “three goat” grade are buried; these are called athuri ya mburi tatu, which means that they have reached the grade, the entrance fee to which is three goats; the next grade is athuri ya mburi nne or the “four goat” grade. No elder is a fully qualified member of council till he reaches that rank. Generally speaking, it works out that only those elders who have grown-up children are buried. In the case of a person not entitled to burial, it is the duty of the elders to decide the place in the bush where the corpse shall be deposited.
Assuming that the deceased is entitled to burial, the local athuri ya ukuu (highest grade of elders) are summoned, and the corpse is taken out of the hut by the sons and laid on the hide on which the person slept during life. A ram (ndorume) is then slaughtered, the fat being cooked in an earthenware pot and some poured on the corpse, the children of the deceased also being smeared with the fat. The ornaments of the deceased are then removed under the supervision of the elders and divided up among the immediate family; the eldest son has the first choice, then the senior wife, and each child gets something. An ox of a uniform colour, preferably all white or all black, is now slaughtered and the hide is set aside. The elder sons dig the grave, the site having first been chosen by the elders; it is usually situated inside the village near the goat hut or bachelor quarters, thengira. The corpse is then interred lying on the sleeping hide used during life; if a male, it is laid on its right side, knees doubled up and right hand under the head; if a female, it is laid on its left side in the same position. The corpse is then covered with the raw ox hide with the hair side upwards and the grave is filled in. Nothing is buried with the body, but after the grave is filled in, the elders [[100]]pour honey and cooked fat on the grave, and say, “We give you this to drink.”
A little later in the day a male goat, nthenge, is slaughtered, the meat being roasted on a fire near the gate of the village, and a little of the fat is placed on every fire in the village; the smell of this is believed to be very pleasing to the ngoma, or spirits, and any thahu or curse that may be impending is drawn away. This act is also said to lustrate the sons who have performed the burial.
A month, or perhaps more, is allowed to elapse, and the division of the estate takes place. The children or heirs then take four rams, and the women of the village shed all their ornaments and sleep together in the same hut, which is also shared by the four sheep. In the morning the elders arrive and the sheep are killed, the fat is cooked and then put away to cool, while the meat is eaten by the assembled people, providing they belong to the Masai guild. The head must be cooked and eaten away from the village; the skin is taken by someone else, and the viscera by yet another person.
On the following day the heads of all the inhabitants of the village are shaved and they are anointed with the fat of the sheep. During the ceremony the people present wear their skin garments inside out, and these are anointed with the cooked latex of the mugumu fig tree; after their bodies have been anointed with the fat they can once more turn their skin robes right side outwards, and the women resume their ornaments.
The property of the deceased is then divided up by the elders; the principle followed is that each son takes the property which had its dwelling-place in his mother’s hut, the goats and sheep, for instance, and which lodge, so many in the hut of each wife. With regard to which cattle, each son gets those which have been milked by his mother. Strict continency must be observed by all in the village until these proceedings are finished, and at their close the inhabitants and all [[101]]the property of the deceased are ceremonially purified by a medicine man.
Among the Kikuyu a woman’s skin cloak is laid outside on the ground when she dies and no one will touch it; a Dorobo husband, however, wears his wife’s cloak after her death; hence one may at times see a man wearing a woman’s cloak. The fear of corpses is intense with the Kikuyu, but it appears to be much less so with the Dorobo. They will, for instance, live in the house of the deceased, and do not seem to mind handling the corpse, a man’s sons, in fact, anointing his corpse after death.
Burial (Ukamba of Kitui).—Among these people the head of a village is buried if his wife, wives, or any sons are alive. If they are all dead the body is thrown out.
A man of importance and of high social grade is nearly always buried and is interred at the side of his cattle kraal.
The head wife of an elder is buried.
Beer and blood are periodically poured out by the side of a grave of a deceased medicine man, but not by that of other elders. It is essential that this libation should be made just before sunrise, and as this is in accordance with the practice in several other places, the custom is probably a very old one.
In the case of deceased elders, a libation of beer and blood is poured out inside the hut of the deceased when liquor is brewed or when a goat is killed.
If a childless wife, who is the first wife, dies, she is buried inside the village. In the case of a second or third wife, the body is thrown out, but curiously enough it must not be taken through the gate; a special opening is made in the village fence for the purpose, the opening being afterwards closed up again. Presumably this is to prevent her spirit from finding its way back into the village.
There is a curious custom among the Kamba of Ulu, in the event of a member of the family being away [[102]]when a death occurs in a village. An elder measures the corpse, cuts a stick of the same length and places it alongside the house of the deceased; this procedure is believed to protect the absent one from evil. Upon his return, a goat is killed and he is smeared with the contents of the stomach, muyo in Ki-Kamba, the tatha of Kikuyu, and some is deposited at the door of the hut, and he must tread in it before entering the hut; this ceremonially purifies him. The stick is then taken up by a mutumia ya makwa, one of the elders who understands the ritual connected with the removal of thabu or makwa, and is thrown out into the bush where the corpse of the deceased was deposited.
In Kitui if a man is on a journey and a death occurs in the village during his absence, his wives may not cut their hair till he returns and has performed the ceremonies necessary upon the occasion of a death. [[103]]
CHAPTER VII
THE CURSE AND ITS MANIFESTATIONS
(a) Thahu and its Connection with Circumcision Rites, etc.
Thahu, sometimes called nzahu, is the word used for a condition into which a person is believed to fall if he or she accidentally becomes the victim of certain circumstances or intentionally performs certain acts which carry with them a kind of ill luck or curse. A person who is thahu becomes emaciated and ill or breaks out into eruptions or boils, and if the thahu is not removed, will probably die. In many cases this undoubtedly happens by auto-suggestion, as it never occurs to the Kikuyu mind to be sceptical on a matter of this kind.
It is said that the thahu condition is caused by the ngoma, or spirits of departed ancestors, but the process does not seem to have been analysed any further.
We are now in a position to realise the attitude of the Kikuyu mind towards thahu, and it is considered that the term curse, in its mediaeval sense, expresses it. Everyone will remember in the Ingoldsby Legends the pitiable condition of the Jackdaw of Rheims after he had been cursed by the Cardinal for stealing his ring; now this would appeal to a Kikuyu, and he would at once say the jackdaw was thahu. In one of the cases of thahu, quoted hereafter, it is possible for a person to lay a curse maliciously on a whole village by breaking a cooking pot, and in another instance, a father can lay a curse on his son for disobedience. We thus have parallel instances from both higher and lower civilisation; in the first, the Cardinal curses the jackdaw with the help of the supernatural powers with which he [[104]]is invested by virtue of his sacred position, and in the lower culture it is apparently held that any person can inflict a curse by invoking the supernatural powers of the ngoma, or spirits, of the dead ancestors.[1]
The position has, indeed, changed but little. It would appear probable that as the priests gained power, they arrogated to themselves the monopoly of laying a curse upon their flock; but the freedom with which people use the conventional formula of curses to this day is evidence, however, that the power to inflict a curse was formerly at the disposal of all. It is nevertheless important to realise that when curses were believed to be effective, and in the case of malicious ones, punishable by native law, people were more careful about the custom than Europeans are to-day, when all belief in the power of a curse has died away.
Some people use the term ceremonial uncleanness to express the meaning of thahu, but, as far as my inquiries go, the phrase inadequately explains the Kikuyu ideas on this question. Acts which cause a person to become thahu are also often found to be enumerated under the heading of “prohibitions” and “tabus.”
The similarity between thahu and tabu is somewhat striking and worth considering. Tabu appears usually to be applied to some act or object by a man who often acts in the dual capacity of ruler and magician. There is, as far as can be discovered, no record of a Kikuyu thahu having been imposed by any known personage, but these beliefs must have originated somewhere, and it may be that they were originally imposed one by one by great medicine men in former times, and have thus become incorporated in what may be termed the tribal religion.
The removal of the curse is effected by a process of lustration which, in the more serious cases, has to be done by the mundu mugo, or medicine man, and in [[105]]others by the members of the native council, or kiama; the latter is an interesting case of the overlapping of judicial functions and those of a sacerdotal character.
The lustration ceremony is almost always accompanied by the slaughter of a sheep and anointment with the contents of the stomach, the white diatomaceous earth called ira being used in some cases. The purification is called tahika.
In a few cases smoke is used as a purifying agent and seems to be considered effective in some more trivial ones.
The reality of this aspect of Kikuyu life and thought may easily be under-estimated, but it is important that all who wish to gain a deep insight into native affairs should understand it and give the phenomenon its true value. To give the question a practical application, it may safely be said that no Kikuyu native who becomes thahu during the course of his employment by a white master, will rest until he has been freed of his curse or ill luck, and he will probably desert with wages due to him in order to get rid of it; he cannot afford to wait, the risk is too great.
There is another curious side to the question; a Kikuyu, when he is circumcised, undergoes this rite either according to the old Kikuyu custom or according to Masai custom; the physical operation and result are the same, but the ceremonial varies, and for some unfathomed reason, a man who is circumcised Masai fashion can do certain things or encounter certain circumstances with impunity which would, if he had been circumcised Kikuyu fashion, render him thahu. This is a very curious fact, and the Kikuyu themselves do not seem to be able to give any reason for it. The matter should, however, be made the subject of further research, as my information is derived from the southern branch of the tribe, and many customs which are dropping into disuse in that area, and thus losing their inner meaning, are found to be very much better known in Kenya Province or Mwaitumi, as they call it. [[106]]
List of Thahu.—I will now proceed to give a list of thahu which I have collected with the assistance of the Kikuyu chief Kinanjui and his kiama, or council, of athuri, or elders; the question of the two classes of circumcision will be discussed later.
(1) If a small child dies and the mother carries the body away into the bush, the woman is thahu, and if the husband cohabits with her before she is purified, he becomes thahu and the woman is cleansed. The man carries the thahu away with him, and, what is worse, may transmit it to his other wives. If the man becomes thahu in this way it is much more serious for him than the woman, and a mundu mugo, or medicine man, has to be called in: the woman has to be purified by three elders, athuri ya kiama, and an elder woman, mwirui. For instance, if a man has two wives and the younger had become thahu, the senior wife would shave the head of the woman who was to be purified; a sheep is killed, and she is smeared with tatha, or the contents of the stomach.
This thahu only falls on those who have been circumcised according to Kikuyu fashion: if the man has been circumcised according to Masai custom he does not become thahu.
(2) If a woman who has assisted at a birth cohabits with a man before the end of the umbilical cord of the newly born child has shrivelled up and come away, and before she has bathed herself ceremonially, the infant, although not her own, will become thahu. To remove the curse from the child the principal elder of the village kills a sheep and smears the woman with tatha, the contents of the animal’s stomach, and thus cleanses her.
This applies to those circumcised either according to Kikuyu or Masai fashion.
(3) If a man touches or carries a corpse, he becomes thahu until he is cleansed. The lustration is performed by members of the local council of elders, athuri ya kiama, and the final purification by a mundu mugo, or [[107]]medicine man. If he cohabits with a woman before he is cleansed she also becomes thahu.
(4) Stepping over a corpse inflicts a thahu of a very serious nature, and the person contracts a sickness called mangu (possibly leprosy). He is said to break out into an eruption, and the fingers come off and the nose rots away. To remove this thahu, both the elders, athuri ya kiama, and the mundu mugo are called in; the latter procures the bone of an elephant, and this is placed on the ground, the athuri forming a circle round it, and the patient then steps over the bone; the mundu mugo afterwards purifies the man in the usual way.[2]
This thahu applies to both sections of the tribe, viz., those circumcised Kikuyu fashion and those circumcised Masai fashion.
(5) During a marriage ceremony five goats have to be presented to the athuri ya kiama and are killed for a feast. After they are slaughtered the eyes of the carcases have to be removed, and if, during this process, an eye becomes cut or broken, the bride becomes thahu, and unless something is done will not bear children; the father of the girl has to present a sheep to the athuri, and the girl is purified by them—this not being a matter which necessitates a medicine man. This applies to both sections of the tribe.
(6) On the occasion of a birth, the young men of the village kill a sheep for a feast called mambura; if the man who slaughters it cuts his finger and his blood drips on to the meat, he is thahu until he is purified by the athuri ya kiama.
This again applies to both sections of the tribe.
(7) If a man, the head of the village, attends the circumcision of a child at the hut of one of his wives, he is thahu until the children who were circumcised in the hut are cured; a mundu mugo then comes and [[108]]purifies him and the woman in whose hut the children were circumcised.
This applies only to the men circumcised Kikuyu fashion, for in that section it is the custom for the village head to sleep in the hut where the circumcision has taken place, and he becomes thahu, whereas it is the custom for a village head who was circumcised Masai fashion to sleep in another hut until the ceremonies are quite over, thus escaping the thahu.
(8) If one man kills another, and comes to sleep at a village and eats with the family in a certain hut, the people with whom he has eaten become thahu, and the skin on which he has slept is thahu and may infect anyone sleeping on it. This is a case for a mundu mugo, who is called in to purify the hut and its occupants.
If, however, the owner of the hut and his family have been circumcised Masai fashion they do not become thahu.
(9) If an important elder dies he is buried by his sons and they are thahu until purified by the athuri ya kiama. They are smeared with oil and their heads are shaved during the ceremony; this is not considered a very serious thahu. If they have been circumcised Masai fashion they can be purified forthwith, but if they belong to the other section it is necessary for them to isolate themselves until the new moon appears.
(10) When a child is born the father kills a sheep, of which a large part is given to the woman who has assisted at the confinement, and if, before he has pegged out the skin and divided the meat, he is summoned away from the village on urgent business (my informant gave an example, and said: “Suppose he was arrested and taken away as a prisoner”), the infant is thahu and the principal elder of the village has to kill a sheep, take a strip of skin from the forefoot of this animal, and fasten it as a bracelet on the wrist of the infant to remove the ill luck.
This applies to both sections of the tribe. [[109]]
(11) If children are being circumcised at a village, and the owner of the hut where the ceremony has taken place goes away to sleep at another village before he is cleansed, and, say, on the way, meets a crowd of people, the children who were circumcised will all be thahu. This is a case for a mundu mugo.
This only applies to those circumcised Masai fashion as, by Kikuyu fashion, the man does not sleep at another village.
(12) If two men who were circumcised at the same ceremony fight and blood is spilt, they are both thahu until a mundu mugo comes and removes it. He kills the usual sheep and the athuri or elders put a strip of the skin of the sheep on the wrist of each of the two men. Persons who are circumcised at the same feast are called wakini. This holds good for both sections of the tribe.
(13) If one man circumcises his children according to Masai fashion and another according to Kikuyu fashion, and the former should eat meat killed by the latter, the former will be thahu and vice versâ.
(14) If a person belonging to the Mweithaga clan sleeps in the hut of a person belonging to another rika or clan, the people of that hut become thahu; this is a case for both medicine men and elders, and applies to both sections of the tribe.
(15) If a man throws some earth at his wife, both become thahu; this is a case for a medicine man, and both have to be purified. This only applies to those circumcised Kikuyu fashion.
(16) If food is eaten from a cracked pot the persons eating it become thahu and a mundu mugo has to be called in. This affects both sections of the tribe.
(17) The wives of smiths are usually decorated with armlets made of twisted strips of iron called mithiori. If a man enters the hut of a smith, and cohabits with a woman so decorated, he becomes thahu. A sheep has to be killed and a supply of honey beer provided; a strip of skin from the sheep is placed on the wrist of the [[110]]man, the woman, and any children she may have; this bracelet is placed on the left wrist of females, and the right wrist of a male. The purification ceremony is performed by another smith.
This thahu affects both sections of the tribe.
(18) Persons eating food in a smithy become thahu; the smith himself can purify one from this curse.
It affects both sections.
(19) If a bead worn on a warrior’s neck or waist falls into food, the persons who partake of the food become thahu; if such a bead falls into the grain store and becomes inadvertently cooked with the food the result is the same. This only affects persons circumcised Kikuyu fashion.
(20) If a Kikuyu has had his crops protected by magical processes performed by a medicine man (to protect in this way is called ku-roga), and someone takes food from a garden so protected, he becomes thahu, and this form of thahu can only be removed by the medicine man who has roga-ed the plantation.
This applies to both sections of the tribe.
(21) If a man has connection with a woman from behind, they are both thahu. This is a very serious thahu and both the athuri ya kiama and a mundu mugo are necessary to remove it, neither the man nor the woman being allowed to eat any of the sacrificial sheep.
This applies to both sections.
(22) If a man beats his wife and draws blood, the woman is thahu, and the man cannot sleep in her hut until she is freed from it; the elders are called in and kill a sheep. The two persons concerned are not allowed to eat any of the meat, and the skin is reserved as a fee for a mundu mugo who is called in to perform the formal lustration.
This affects both sections of the tribe.
(23) If a woman is carrying a baby on her back, and it slips out of the leather garment and falls to the ground, it is thahu; the child must not be lifted from [[111]]the place where it fell until a sheep has been killed on that spot, and this is a case for both the elders of kiama and a medicine man. Both sections of the tribe are affected by this.
(24) If an elder or a woman when coming out of the hut slips and falls down on the ground, he or she is thahu, and lies there until a few elders of kiama come and slaughter a sheep near by, and some blood and tatha (contents of the stomach of the sheep) are rubbed on the spot where the person fell. The elders then say, “So-and-so is dead, let us bury him,” and they plant a sprig of the bushes called mukuria and muthakwa on the site of the mishap. This applies to both sections.
(25) If a man marries a woman and she steals anything from a member of her father’s clan, she is thahu, and milk will flow from her breasts without any natural cause, and any child she bears before the thahu is removed will be thahu. This is a matter for the athuri, or elders of kiama; a sheep is placed on the woman’s shoulders, and its throat is pinched until it micturates on the woman’s body, the sheep then being killed, and the contents of the gall bladder, mixed with urine from its bladder, poured over the leather garment of the woman, and her navel touched with a little of the mixture. The milk that was unnaturally flowing from her breasts will then dry up, and by this sign they will know that the thahu is removed.
This applies to both sections of the tribe.
(26) If a man’s son commits adultery with one of his father’s wives, and the father is still alive, the father becomes thahu and not the culprit, the reason given being that the father takes the thahu because he begot the son. The erring woman does not return to her husband, she is not thahu, and can still bring food to her husband, but he does not cohabit with her, and her hut is broken down. The son who has transgressed in this way has to make peace with his father by a formal present of a big male goat, nthengi. This thahu can [[112]]be removed by the athuri ya kiama; it is a very serious matter, and if the thahu is not quickly removed from the father, he will die.
It applies equally to both sections of the tribe.
(27) If a person touches menstrual blood, he or she is thahu; or if a man cohabits with a woman in this condition he is thahu. The person who is contaminated will first take some cow dung and then red ochreous earth (thiriga) and plaster it on the part of the body touched by the blood; ochre is said to be used because it is the same colour as the blood; the woman from whom the contamination came is also thahu. The mundu mugo has to be called in to purify the persons.
This applies to both sections.
(28) If one woman is circumcised Masai fashion and another Kikuyu fashion, and the child of the latter is suckled by the other woman, the child becomes thahu: this is a case for a mundu mugo.
This applies to those circumcised Kikuyu fashion.
(29) If a hyæna comes into a hut at night, kills a goat and the owner kills the hyæna in the hut, the hut will be abandoned, and the whole village has to be purified by the kiama.
This applies to both sections of the tribe.
(30) If a hyæna defæcates inside a village, the village and its inhabitants are thahu, and this is a case for the kiama to arrange; the usual sheep is killed and must be eaten by the people of the village. If a person belonging to another village eats any of the meat, a hyæna will come and defile the village where he lives.
This applies to both sections.
(31) If a woman is carrying a gourd on her back and it falls and breaks, she is thahu. This is a matter for the elders of kiama to arrange.
(32) If a goat should come up to where people are sitting, and try to suckle a woman’s breast, the woman is thahu, and the goat has to be taken away and slaughtered at the village of the woman’s father, [[113]]the elders of kiama being called in to purify the woman.
KIKUYU CIRCUMCISION FEAST.
MALE CANDIDATES.
FEMALE CANDIDATES.
This applies to both sections.
(33) If a woman is milking a cow and the calf climbs up on her shoulders while she is so occupied, the calf is not allowed to suckle the cow again and is forthwith slaughtered; this is a case for the elders. The people of the village must not eat any of the meat, half being taken by the woman to her father and the other half eaten by the elders.
This applies to both sections.
(34) When a woman has recently been confined and the discharges are still unfinished, it has sometimes happened that a cow has come along and licked the stool upon which she has been sitting. In such a case she must immediately tell her husband; if not, he will become thahu and die, and all the other people in the village will become thahu in a lesser degree and get ill. The cow has to be killed without delay by the elders and eaten by them; no person of the village must eat of the meat unless he has been circumcised Masai fashion. Three elders in Kikuyu are said to have died from this thahu within recent years.
It only applies to those who have been circumcised Kikuyu fashion.
(35) If a cow is out grazing and its tail becomes twisted round a tree, it is thahu, and must be slaughtered there and then; it is killed by the owner, and the elders receive the saddle and the young warriors the neck.
This only applies to cattle owned by persons circumcised Kikuyu fashion.
(36) There is a white bird called nyangi (the bird nyangi is in Swahili called furakombe); if one is seen to settle on a cow, and the cow is not killed, the owner of the cow will be thahu and die. The cow must be killed there and then and the meat divided up, the elders receiving the saddle, and the neighbouring warriors the neck, whilst no person belonging to the [[114]]village must eat of the meat. The herd of cattle also need to be purified, and the owner of the village, assisted by the elders, must take a female sheep which has not borne a lamb, and a male goat; these are slaughtered, and the intestines and bones of the animals (termed ichua) are placed on a fire, which is lit to the windward of the cattle kraal, and the smoke passing through the kraal and among the cattle will purify the herd. Should the bird be killed among the cattle, the whole herd would die.
This applies to both sections.
(37) If a cow’s horn comes off in a person’s hand the animal is thahu and is slaughtered, and the meat is eaten by all. This applies to both sections.
(38) If a bull or bullock leaves the herd when out grazing and comes home alone, and stands outside the village digging at the refuse heap (kiaraini) with its horns, it is known to be thahu, and is forthwith killed by the owner. This applies to both sections.
(39) If a goat is giving birth to a kid, and the head appears first and the body is not born quickly, it is said to be thahu, and is slaughtered by the owner. No woman must touch the meat of such an animal or she would become thahu; men only can eat it. Moreover, if a goat which is in kid should die, no woman must touch it or eat the meat, the idea probably being that her fertility might become contaminated. This applies to both sections.
(40) If a woman bears twins the first time she has children, the twins are thahu, and an old woman of the village, generally the midwife, stuffs grass in their mouths until they are suffocated and throws them out into the bush. If, however, a woman first bears a single child and then has twins they are not thrown out.
If a cow or a goat bears twins the first time, the same practice is observed, and a necklace of cowries is placed round the neck of the mother. This practice is observed by both sections. Some kill both mother and young, and a medicine man is called, who leads a [[115]]sheep round the village and then sacrifices it to remove the curse.
(41) If the side pole of a bedstead breaks, the person lying on it is thahu, and a sheep must be sacrificed; this is a matter for the kiama to arrange, and a bracelet called rukwaru, cut from the skin of the sheep, must be placed on the wrist of the person, or he or she is liable to die. This applies to both sections.
(42) A malicious person will sometimes, out of spite or in a fit of rage, take up a cooking pot, dash it down to the ground and break it, saying the words urokwo uwe, “Die like this.” This is a very serious matter and renders all the people of the village thahu; it is necessary for the people of the village to pay as much as seven sheep to remove the thahu. This is naturally considered a crime according to native law, and the offender is punished by the elders of kiama, who inflict a fine of seven goats. This applies to both sections.
(43) If a son seriously disobeys his father, he can be rendered thahu by his father rubbing ashes on his buttocks, and cursing him, saying, “May you be eaten by my anus.” The son will have to take a sheep and then a male goat and a jar of honey and crave his father’s forgiveness. The father slaughters the animal, and rubs his navel and his buttocks with the meat, and the curse is removed. This applies to both sections.
(44) If the head of a village has a quarrel with another man, wounds him with a simé or sword, and blood is spilt in the village, the village becomes thahu, unless the offender takes his adversary and leads him round the outskirts of the village, letting the blood drip on the ground as they go; the elders will then have to be called in, a sheep is killed, and they purify the village. This applies to both sections.
(45) If an idiot or maliciously-minded person picks up a skull, walks round a village with it and leaves it on the “thomi,” or “place of conference,” the village is thahu, and is in very serious danger. The elders are first called in, and they take a sheep and drag it round [[116]]the confines of the village by the same route as that taken by the person with the skull; the animal is killed and pieces of the intestines are dragged round the village. The meat of the sheep is only eaten by very old men. Six other sheep then have to be killed by the elders, and finally the medicine man has to purify each person in the village.
(46) If a wild animal is killed among a flock or herd of animals out grazing the beasts are thahu; they can be purified by the owner and the kiama; a sheep is killed and the bones and intestines are placed on a fire lit to windward of the infected flock or herd, and the smoke cleanses them and removes the curse. Vide Tylor’s “Primitive Culture,” Vol. ii, pp. 430–434, “Fire serves for purification in cases too trifling to require sacrifice.” This applies to both sections.
(47) If domestic animals are attacked and stung by bees they are thahu; a sheep is killed and the bones and intestines are placed on a fire lit to windward of the herd and the smoke removes the curse. This applies to both sections.
(48) If a son curses his father seriously he becomes thahu; he has to bring a sheep, which is eaten by his father and mother, the fat is melted and all three are smeared with it; the son then has to peg out the skin of the sheep in front of his mother’s hut. This applies to both sections.
(49) If a person strikes anyone who is herding cattle, etc., and draws blood, the flock or herd is thahu; the offender must pay a sheep, which is killed by the elders, and a strip of skin (rukwaru) is placed on the wrist of the offender; no young person is allowed near during the ceremony. This applies to both sections.
(50) If the droppings of a kite or crow fall on a person he is thahu; he must shave his head and bathe at a river, and the elders kill a sheep and fasten a strip of the skin on his wrist. The skin of the sheep must not be pegged out to dry in the village where the person lives. This applies to both sections. [[117]]
(51) If a woman sleeps with her leather garment inside out it is unlucky, but she is not thahu, the procedure being for her to spit on the garment and turn it the right way. This applies to both sections, but is considered much more unlucky for a woman circumcised Masai fashion.
(52) When a man dies, the eldest son gives one bull or a big male goat (according to his means) to the athuri ya kiama for a feast, and the elders then teach him his duties (kirira). The next step is to give the elders a male sheep (ku-hukuria), which must not be eaten by the children, the object of this being to cleanse the village of the deceased. Now if a son has not made these gifts nor gone through the necessary ceremonies marking his succession, he cannot participate in the sacrificial feast which has to take place at the sacred fig tree after the death of an elder (called ku-hoya Engai). The principal wife of the deceased can attend the sacrifice, but not the other wives and their children. And should they do so they will become thahu and it is a case for a medicine man to arrange. The women and children from the neighbouring villages can go.
If a sacrifice is made at a sacred fig tree to invoke rain only, athuri ya kiama can attend and eat it. No woman must go near. These rules apply to both sections.
(53) If children are being circumcised at a village according to Kikuyu fashion and the head of the village goes on a journey before eight days have elapsed or, according to Masai fashion, before four days have passed, he and those of his children who have been operated on become thahu; this is a case for the medicine man to arrange.
(54) If a child has been circumcised and, on the first occasion after the ceremony on which he leaves his village, the goats and sheep come back from grazing and enter the village before he returns, he is thahu. He cannot return to his village until it is removed and [[118]]must sleep at a neighbouring village where some of the other boys, who went through the ceremony with him, reside. To remove the thahu, his father has to kill a sheep and place a strip of skin (rukwaru) from the animal on his wrist.
(55) If a father picks up one of his children and places it on his back or shoulders, the father becomes thahu and the child will die, the result being the same whatever the sex of the child; if he carries the child in front of him there is no evil result. This is a case for a medicine man to arrange, and it applies to both sections of the tribe.
(56) If a person should be bitten by a hyæna or a dog he or she is thahu and a medicine man has to be called in; he kills a sheep and places a bracelet, or rukwaru, of the skin on the wrist of the patient. This applies to both sections.
(57) If a dog dies in a village it is a very serious matter; the head of the village and his people are thahu, and the elders are called in. The village head provides a sheep which is slaughtered, and the stomach contents (tatha) are sprinkled round the village, which is then ceremonially swept by the elders; the medicine man is then called in to purify all the people of what is called the mugiro of the dog. (Note.—The mugiro means the pollution produced by the blood of the dog having fallen on the ground of the village or the death of the dog in the village.) This only applies to the Kikuyu section of the tribe.
(58) The children and grandchildren of brothers and sisters cannot intermarry. Breach of this rule is considered to be a very grave sin, and all children born of such marriages surely die; the thahu on them cannot be purged by any ceremonial. The parents are not affected. It sometimes happens, however, that a young man unwittingly marries a cousin; for instance, if a part of the family moves away to another locality a man might become acquainted with a girl and marry her before he discovered the relationship. In such a case [[119]]the thahu is removable; the elders take a sheep and place it on the woman’s shoulders; it is then killed, the intestines are taken out, and the elders solemnly sever them with a sharp splinter of wood from the mukeo bush, and announce that they are cutting the clan “kutinyarurira,” which means that they are severing the bond of blood relationship existing between the pair. A medicine man then comes and purifies the couple. This only applies to the Kikuyu section of the tribe.
(59) If a parent goes on a journey and, during his absence, one of his or her sons cohabits with one of his father’s wives, the parents are thahu, and upon his return will be seized with illness. This is a case for the medicine man, who has to be called in to perform a lustration ceremony to purify them; the offending son is not affected. Sprigs of the mahoroa, muchatha, and mitei bushes are bound up together and dipped in water, and the water is sprinkled over the couple, a little being also sprinkled at the gate of the village. This only applies to those circumcised Kikuyu fashion. It is curious to note that practically the same custom is observed by the A-Kamba.
(60) If a Kikuyu native kills a man belonging to another tribe he is not thahu; if he kills a man of his own tribe, but of a different rika, or clan, to his own, he is not thahu; if, however, he kills a man belonging to his own rika, or clan, he is thahu, and it is a very serious matter. It can be arranged by the elders in the following manner:
Two trunks of the plantain or banana tree (called miramba in Kikuyu) are placed on the ground parallel to each other, and an elder sits on each; one of them is then lifted up by another elder, and the offender has to seat himself on the tree trunk exactly in the same place; the other elder is then removed and the elder brother of the deceased or brother next in age to him is put in his place.
The mothers of the offender and deceased then bring [[120]]to the place food made of every kind of field produce grown by the tribe, as well as meat; the usual sheep is killed by the elders and a little of the tatha, or stomach contents, is sprinkled over the food which was provided by the mothers of the two parties.
The two elders who first sat on the plantain trunks then solemnly eat a little of this food, and also administer some to the offender and the brother of the deceased. Two gourds containing gruel made of meal are then taken, and the elders put a little of the tatha in each, and one gourd is sent to the village of the offender and one to that of the deceased. The remaining food is divided among the assembly.
The following day the elders proceed to the local sacred fig tree (mugumu), and kill a sheep. They deposit some of the fat, the chest bone, the intestines and the more important bones at the foot of the tree, and eat the rest of the carcase. They say that the ngoma, or spirit of the deceased, will visit the tree that night in the shape of a wild cat and eat the meat, and that this offering will prevent the ngoma of the deceased from coming back to his village and troubling the occupants.
A medicine man then has to come and purify the murderer and the brother of the deceased.
This ceremony is not considered legal, and cannot be performed till the blood money has been paid.
The above case is a good example of the two stages of the removal of a more serious thahu; in the first place, the spirits of the deceased ancestors, including that of the murdered man, have to be appeased, and the personal defilement due to the spilling of blood, which falls on both the murderer and the family of the murdered man, has then to be removed by a separate ceremony performed by the medicine man. It is interesting to note that only the medicine man can remove this latter.
The above thahu applies to both sections of the tribe. In giving these details, my informants explained [[121]]that according to Kikuyu native law, the blood money for a man was a hundred sheep and goats, and nine sheep and goats in addition for the elders. If, however, a man could not raise a hundred goats it was the custom for him to give three daughters in payment, plus the nine goats for the elders.
The Kikuyu were formerly only allowed to eat the following wild animals and birds before being circumcised: partridges (ngware), pigeon (ndutwa), and hyrax (mi-kami). Many will not eat wild game throughout their lives, and people follow the custom they have been brought up to observe; those that eat it probably had Asi or Dorobo ancestors. A person who eats wild game does not become thahu. This same view is held by both sections. The repugnance to eating this kind of food probably had its origin in totemism, but all traces of this belief seem to be lost in S. Kikuyu.
(61) If a tree falls on a hut it is considered extremely unlucky; the hut, however, will not be abandoned, but it is necessary for the head of the village to kill a ram which is led round the village before being killed. If this were not done, the owner of the village, or at any rate the woman who lived in the hut, would become the victim of a thahu or curse. The owner of the village, however, may not enter the hut until the sacrifice has been made to appease the ngoma or ancestral spirits who inflict the thahu. This applies to both sections of the tribe, viz., those circumcised Kikuyu fashion and those Masai fashion.
(62) If a jackal (mbwei) comes into a village and calls at night when the inhabitants are asleep, the people say that a spirit is calling for meat, and it is considered very unlucky. Next morning the owner of the village will take a male goat (nthenge), lead it round the village, and kill it at about the spot where the jackal called out. Pieces are cut from the loin, lungs, heart, and each of the limbs, and piled up into two little heaps as offerings to the ngoma, who are believed to have [[122]]called out through the medium of the jackal. The sex of the ngoma is not known, and therefore to be on the safe side two little heaps are laid out, one for any male spirits and one for any female spirits. No bone must be broken in any meat offered to the spirits.
Next morning the elders go to the place where the two offerings of meat were deposited and pour out a libation of beer on each. They then address the ngoma as follows: “O ye spirits, take this meat and beer and give us goats and cattle and children, and do not bring thahu to this village.” The people of both circumcision guilds follow this procedure.
(63) If a certain snake, called nyamuyathi by the Kikuyu, enters a hut, it is necessary to pour some milk or fat on the floor for the reptile to drink; it may drink and leave, or it may not. If it does, well and good; if not, the owner of the village has to kill a sheep, cook some of its fat, and pour it out in the hut, saying at the same time: “We offer you some fat to drink, we beg of you to leave us.” It is believed that a ngoma, or spirit, has come in the guise of a snake, and on no account must such a snake be killed. After the sacrifice of the sheep has been made the snake will always go, but it disappears mysteriously and no one sees it leave. If the snake remained in the hut, the wife who owned the hut, and her children, would be thahu.
(64) If a stranger comes to a village and dies in a hut there, the hut is completely abandoned if the owner belongs to the Kikuyu guild; a large hole is made in the side of the hut by taking out several of the wall slabs or planks (mihirigo); the corpse is left inside and the hyænas come and carry it off. The hut is then left to fall into ruin, and no articles, such as cooking pots, beer, jars, etc., are removed from it. The men who break the hole in the wall are even considered unclean, as much as if they had handled the corpse, and after performing the duty they go straight off into the bush and stay there until they have bathed and been anointed with tatha (the stomach contents of a sheep); [[123]]finally a very old woman comes and shaves their heads; they are then ceremonially clean and can return to their families. A medicine man (mundu mugo) has, however, to come and purify the whole village in the usual way.
If the owner of the village belongs to the Masai guild the consequences are not so serious. The family leave the hut temporarily until the corpse has been carried off by the hyænas; they then kill a goat or sheep near the door of the hut, take a little of the fat from the stomach of the animal, and place a small portion on the cooking fire of each hut. This removes the thahu due to the death of the stranger and all is well.
(65) If a new hut is built in the village and the wife enters it and finds herself menstruating on the day she lights the first fire in it, the hut has to be broken down and demolished the very next day. The woman must on no account sleep a second night in it; a thahu is on both the woman and the hut. A medicine man has to be called in to purify ceremonially the woman and her children, a new hut is built and the medicine man ceremonially sweeps it out with a broom made of the twigs of the mukenya, mahoroa, and michatha bushes; he then collects the sweepings and throws them outside the village. This custom applies to both sections of the tribe.
This custom also has another phase which is as follows: If on the day a hut is built, the wife, who is the owner of the hut, is away from the village and finds herself menstruating, she cannot even return to the village, but has to seek shelter with neighbours for three days. On the fourth day she returns, bringing with her a gourd of water. When she reaches the thomi, or meeting-place outside the village, she pours some of the water into a half gourd and washes herself. She can then enter both village and hut without further ceremony. This applies to both sections of the tribe.
(66) When a new hut is built, the first fire to be lit [[124]]in it must be brought from a fire out in a shamba, or field, not from another hut. If fire cannot be obtained from a shamba it is first obtained from another village; with this a fire is lit in a shamba and burning sticks are taken from that fire. The Kikuyu state that they are afraid to get fire direct from another village in case they bring some unknown thahu along with it or with the firewood; they consider it a great risk, particularly for the children, who might get thin and ill in consequence.
Two or three days after the first fire has been lit a male sheep has to be slaughtered by the owner of the village. The meat is cooked in the hut, and the blood is poured out on the village thomi, then beer is brewed and a libation of it is poured out inside the hut near the door and on the thomi or village green. The above applies to those circumcised Kikuyu fashion. Those circumcised Masai fashion make the first fire in a new hut by friction with a firestick, and the wood for the first fire must come from two of the trees sacred to this branch, viz., mutamaiyu and mutarakwa (juniper).
(67) Anyone can impose a thahu upon the owner of a hut by plucking out a handful of thatch from over the door and throwing it on the ground. The thahu apparently affects the wife who lives in the hut, and she is apt to be attacked by a wasting disease. To remove the evil effects, a number of elders and a mundu mugo, or medicine man, are called in; they kill a ram or young ewe, which has not yet borne, near the door of the hut, and sprinkle the tatha inside the hut and at the door. They then take a rough brush made of twigs of the marario and mahoroa bushes and sweep up the tatha. This proceeding purifies the hut. They also sprinkle some of the tatha on the thatch over the door and put some muthakwa and mukenia sprigs in the place where the piece of thatch was taken.
Only the elders and the medicine man eat the meat of the sacrifice; none of the inhabitants of the village must touch it, and even the brothers of the owner of [[125]]the hut may not eat any. If the hut is not thus purified, it must be forthwith destroyed.
Should the thatch be pulled out unintentionally by a drunken man, he will only have to pay a goat for the purification ceremony. If, on the other hand, it is done with evil intent, the kiama, or council of elders, will fine the offender five goats. The writer is indebted to Mr Beech for bringing this example to his notice.
If a man goes to sleep at a strange village, and if the owner belongs to the same rika as himself, he is told to sleep in the hut of one of the wives of the owner. If this woman has lost a child and has not performed the usual purification ceremonies after a death, the man will return home with a thahu and will pass it on to the wife in whose hut he sleeps on his return home.
It is necessary for the hut to be purified as in the previous case, and then the man and his wife have also to be purified.
Again, if a wife goes and sleeps abroad and cohabits with a man who has assisted in the burial of a corpse or touched a corpse and not yet been purified, she will, on returning home, bring a thahu to her husband, and the same ceremony of lustration has to be undergone.
(68) The last of the Kikuyu thahu which will be quoted is one of some importance, as it may be, in primitive culture, the germ of one of the beliefs which affects the life of civilised peoples: this is the ill luck which is attached to the seventh day.
A herdsman will not herd his flocks for more than six days, and on the seventh must be relieved by another man.
If a man has been on a journey and absent for six days he must not return home on the seventh day, and must observe continence on the seventh day; rather than return to his village on that day he will go and sleep at the house of a neighbour a short distance away. If this law is broken, serious illness is certain to supervene and a medicine man (mundu mugo) has to be called in to remove the curse. Both sections of the [[126]]tribe are subject to it, and both male and female are affected. Moreover, the live stock of the offender will become sick.
This belief makes it easy for the missionaries to explain to the Kikuyu the meaning of the Christian observance of the Sabbath.
An important point in connection with thahu in Kikuyu which previously escaped notice is that an owner of a village, if he belongs to the Kikuyu circumcision guild, cannot enter or sleep in a hut which has been ceremonially purified until two days have elapsed, or for two months if he belongs to the Masai guild. This prohibition has a very practical effect, for in cases where the whole village has to be purified to rid it of some serious thahu the owner of the village would naturally be homeless for either two days or two months, as the case may be. To obviate this difficulty the purification ceremony is carried out in two instalments: one half of the village is done first, and a little later the medicine man returns and performs the lustration ceremony on the other half; the people are not thus greatly inconvenienced.
A variant of the word thahu in Kikuyu, which is often used by the old men, is nzahu.
It appears upon inquiry that not every elder in Kikuyu has the power of removing thahu, but only such as have lost a wife who is a mother.
If a wife dies and leaves children, the husband calls in two athuri ya ukuu (these are the very senior elders), a muthuri ya kiama (elder of council), and an old woman past the age of child bearing.
They kill a lamb, mwati, or a ram, and the elders then take the tatha (stomach contents), pour them into a half gourd, njeli, dip a bundle of leaves in the tatha and sprinkle the hut. This ceremony is believed to remove from the father and his children the thahu left by the death. The half gourd is then placed at the bed head of the father. A medicine man finally comes and purifies the whole family. If his generation or age is [[127]]junior to that of the elders who come to perform the above ceremony he cannot participate in it, but has to sit apart.
After this the father is considered to be eligible to take part in ceremonial connected with the removal of thahu, but only if he is a qualified muthuri ya kiama ya imburi nne or mburi ithano; that is to say, if he has reached the grade to which the entrance fee is four goats or five goats.
Partial Immunity of Elders from Thahu.—The elders of the highest grade, ukuru, are as a rule proof against the incidence of thahu. They probably acquire a certain sanctity from their communion with the deity when they take part in the performance of sacrifices at the sacred trees and can thus be considered as a primitive priesthood. If, however, they assist in the burial of a corpse and cohabit with their wives within two months, they will be stricken with illness. If they participate in the native oath ringa thengi, they must be celibate for four months, and if they assist at the kithathi or githathi oath ceremony, they must remain so for five months, or nothing can save them. In all the above cases they must, like ordinary people, be purified by a medicine man before they can resume their marital relations.
Thabu in Ukamba.—In Ukamba thahu is called thabu or makwa, and the popular attitude towards it is very similar to that existing in Kikuyu, but it does not appear to be such an important factor in the lives of the people, and for some reason or other does not seem to have reached such a high development. It is looked upon with awe, and people generally dislike to discuss it. The bulk of the elders can therefore only give one or two examples of it. They declare that the only people who can give much information are the atumia ya makwa (elders of makwa) and atumia ya ukuu (elders of ukuu), and these important people undoubtedly endeavour to envelop the beliefs in mystery. [[128]]
The incidence of makwa or thabu does not appear to be nearly so frequent in Ukamba as it is in Kikuyu. The Kamba, in fact, sneer at the Kikuyu, and say they are full of makwa. Moreover, owing to the reticence of the Kamba on the subject, it is not easy to collect examples. Mr C. Dundas, who has assisted in this inquiry, had to pay a fee of a bullock for himself and a goat for his interpreter before he could get any information on the subject. These fees admitted him to the grade of mutumia ya ukuu. All inquiries, however, had to be conducted in a low tone, and no one was allowed to listen. The following are all that have been discovered up to date, but there is little doubt that others exist:
(1) On the death of a man the village is unclean and must be purified by the elders, and during the period of purification strict continence must be observed by all those resident in the village. If a man fails to observe this rule he will become afflicted with makwa; also the woman, providing she belongs to the village where the death has taken place. Moreover, if a daughter of the deceased who is living away from the village visits there within eleven days of the death of her father, she will become afflicted.
The curse is removed in the same way in either of the above cases. A brother of the deceased must first cohabit with his wife. He then brings a goat and the afflicted person brings some beer. One of the elders then collects twigs of the movu, mulale, and muteme bushes; these are pounded up with water, and the mixture is called ng͠nondu. Some of the ng͠nondu is poured down the goat’s throat, the idea probably being to purify the animal ceremonially. The patient then walks three times round the goat, and the animal is lifted up by the elders. Its throat is cut and the blood spurts over the patient’s head and body. A piece of stick is then placed under his left arm and another between the toes of his right foot; two elders take hold of each of these sticks and pull them away saying, “We [[129]]purify you.” The belief is possibly that by some magical process the defilement is passed into the sticks. Subsequently the brother of the deceased again cohabits with the same wife, and the patient is then cured.
(2) A man may not lie on his mother’s bed, or even take any articles from it, without becoming makwa. Upon the death of his father he inherits, and is then entitled to use, his father’s bed, which was, of course, also occupied by his mother, and it is therefore necessary that he should be protected from any evil which may come from this. So the elders make a mixture called ng͠nondu, and smear the soles of his feet with it; they also sprinkle the framework of the bed. They say that if this were not done the son would become makwa if he even put his foot on the bed. If a son becomes makwa through transgressing this law before his father’s death, he has to be purified as in the previous case. It is suspected that this prohibition was devised as a safeguard against incest, but if the theory is correct the natives seem to have forgotten the reason. A man, moreover, may not sit on his brother-in-law’s bed without incurring thabu.
Reference is invited to the author’s work on the “Ethnology of the A-Kamba” (Camb. Press), p. 65, discussing the danger to a girl if a stranger touches her menstrual blood; this is a clear case of makwa, which falls on the girl in consequence.
Some of the prohibitions mentioned on p. 102 op. cit. are also cases of makwa, and on p. 97 op. cit. there is an account of a man who was suffering from thabu or makwa. At the time, unfortunately, the importance of the phenomena had not been fully recognised.
(3) If a man dies and leaves young wives, the sons usually take them over; but, of course, a son must not marry his mother. A son cannot, however, succeed to one of his father’s wives until the elders have performed certain ceremonies. If he cohabits with her before these are carried out he will become makwa. [[130]]
To remove the curse in this case the ceremonial is as follows: a paternal uncle of the offender collects the elders and provides beer for them; the woman concerned brings a goat. The elders make some of the ng͠nondu mixture, which is handed to the patient, who pretends to pay it to the elders. The elders then bring a branch of a tree called muuti and tell him to pay it to his uncle. He does so by throwing it at his uncle, saying, “I pay you before the elders.” This looks as if the spirit of the deceased father were offended, and ceremonial payment had to be made to the brother of the deceased, who for the time being represents him.
A piece of wood about fifteen inches long, cut from a mukingezia tree, is then brought. This is first inserted into the vaginal passage of the woman, and the man’s penis is then touched with it twice or thrice. One of the elders afterwards carries the stick away and throws it across a river saying, “I throw this evil away.” In the evening the uncle cohabits with the woman. The makwa is thus believed to be removed, but the man can never have anything to do with that woman again. He can, however, marry another of his father’s wives after the elders have performed the necessary rites.
(4) After the death of a father none of the sons may take honey from the father’s hives until the paternal uncle has first done so. Any who break this law will become makwa. It can, however, be removed by the uncle, who brings a sheep, and he, the elders, and the mother of the patient lead the sheep three times round the patient; at the conclusion of the third turn the sheep is lifted up and its throat is cut, and the blood is allowed to spurt over the patient. The animal’s throat is cut by one of the elders, whose forearm is held by the uncle and the mother. After this ceremony the patient is believed to be cured, and he can take honey. It may be that this was devised to prevent a son rushing off into the woods after his [[131]]father’s death and annexing any honey he found, irrespective of whether such and such a hive would fall to his share when the elders decided as to the division of the estate.
(5) If a woman loses a young child by death it is necessary for her to have her breasts ceremonially purified by a qualified elder, or it is believed that any future children she may bear will die of makwa.
(6) If a man cohabits with a married woman in the woods while the cattle are out grazing, it brings makwa upon the cattle and they will die. The woman, however, is generally afraid of evil falling on the precious cattle, and confesses. The cattle are then taken out of their kraal, medicine is placed on the ground at the gate, and they are then driven back over the medicine, and this lifts the curse. The woman has also to be ceremonially purified by an elder.
(7) If a woman who has borne children is forced by a man a curse is said to fall on the children and they will die. The evil can, however, be averted if she is purified by an elder; the man has to pay a goat and the expenses of the purification ceremony.
(8) If a hyæna defæcates in a village during the night a makwa falls on the village, and the elders have to kill a goat and purify (tapisha) the village.
(9) Some medicine men have the power to place a makwa upon one of their wives who is a particular favourite. This is done by medicine, but the details are kept secret. If a man seduces the woman in question it is said that death will ensue unless he can by payment induce the medicine man to lift the curse.
(10) If a person goes to his mother’s native village and eats food there, and if by any chance a death has occurred in that village and the funeral ceremonies are not completed, he will be stricken with makwa. Even if a wife goes to pay a visit to her father’s village under the above circumstances the result is the same. This form of makwa can only be removed by a medicine man. [[132]]
The little known Thaka or Tharaka people in the Tana Valley south-east of Kenia also believe in makwa, and use the same word for it. A few examples have been collected by Mr C. Dundas, and are given below:
(1) If a village is ceremonially unclean for some reason or other, and a man cohabits therein with a person of the opposite sex before it is purified, they are both stricken with makwa.
(2) If a man belonging to a village has been absent on the occasion of a death and at the necessary subsequent purification of the village, he may not enter until a sheep has been killed and the contents smeared on the threshold of his mother’s hut. If this lustration ceremony is omitted he is stricken with makwa.
(3) After the death of the head of a family the sons may take the younger widows to wife, but not until the brother of the deceased has ceremonially cohabited with the principal wife of the deceased. If this rite is not observed before a son marries one of his father’s widows, he will become makwa.
Little is yet known of the procedure which has to be adopted to remove the makwa, but it is said that only medicine men can do so. An elder, seen recently, who was covered with small sores, and some of whose toes had dropped off, was stated to be suffering from makwa, due to infringement of the rule mentioned in example (1) above.
A new road was recently opened in Kikuyu country, and where it crossed the Ruiru River a bridge was built. At one end of the bridge an arch, made of bent sticks, was erected, and on this a small wicker-work arrangement was suspended. Over the bent sticks a strip of the skin of a sheep was entwined. This was called “rigi,” and was a miniature of the wicker door of a hut. The Ruiru River at this place is the boundary between two sections of the country, and the object of the model door was to prevent evil influences, or thahu, entering the neighbouring area by the bridge. The strip of [[133]]skin was taken from a sheep which had been sacrificed there.
There is a curious belief in Kikuyu with regard to the burning of a hut. If a hut is burned down, the owner must not lodge the goats from that hut in the house of a friend, the idea being that the hut caught fire as the result of some kind of thahu, and that the goats are probably infected with the thahu and may thus bring sickness to other people’s animals. There was, for instance, a case where a hut was destroyed by fire, along with several goats, but the people dare not eat the carcases, although the meat was apparently quite wholesome.
When a burnt hut is rebuilt, a goat is slaughtered to prevent the new hut from being destroyed by fire. The meat of the goat is eaten by the elders, and the skin is given to an elder who has had a hut burnt. But although he may use the skin he must not sell it.
Extinction of Fire in a Hut.—Though not definitely connected with the thahu beliefs, the ill luck which is associated with the extinction of fire in a hut is rather interesting to note.
If a man has several huts it is considered extremely unlucky if the fire goes out in all of them in a single night. He must at once summon the elders, who kill a male sheep and sprinkle some of the stomach contents or tatha on each fireplace. If his nearest neighbours live some little way off, he relights the fire by means of a fire stick, mwaki ku-thegetha, but if they live near by he begs some fire from them. When the sheep is killed they also fry the fat in a cooking pot and sprinkle some of it in the village and pray to Engai (God)—“We give thee fat to drink, and beg thee not to extinguish the fire again.”
When fire goes out in the hut of a medicine man it is not necessary for him to kill a sheep like ordinary people, but he feels the ill luck all the same. He dare not travel next day, and if anyone comes to him for [[134]]medicine or to be purified, he will not perform the ceremony until a whole day has elapsed.
The elders who were interrogated about this were quite clear that it was God who put out the fire and not the ngoma, or spirits.
Effects of Breaking a Tabu.—A curious case of the results of an infringement of tabu recently came to the notice of an officer in Western Ukamba. He was inspecting the hospital, and found there a Kamba porter stricken with illness; his face was much swollen and covered by a kind of congested rash, and his testicles were also swollen. On inquiry, he stated that his affection came on suddenly after eating some hartebeest meat, and that he belonged to the Aitangwa clan, in which this was a forbidden meat. The officer immediately sought out an intelligent Mu-Kamba, who knew nothing about the incident, and asked about the Aitangwa and their tabu, or makwa, and without hesitation he was told that hartebeest meat was forbidden, and described exactly the symptoms from which the porter was suffering as being the result of breaking the prohibition. It was said that the man would have to sacrifice a goat and go through a purification ceremony to get rid of the affliction. The final result was not heard.
These phenomena are very curious, and psychologists would no doubt attribute them to self-hypnotic suggestion. It must, however, be remembered that a man who breaks the clan tabu is probably, before breaking it, very sceptical as to the evil effects, and, being sceptical, would presumably be proof against the hypnotic auto-suggestion.
(b) Purification and Blessing
Ku-tahikia in Kikuyu.—Reference has been made to purification by the medicine man, which generally concludes the ceremonies connected with the removal of thahu. This ceremony is the same in all cases in [[135]]which it is considered necessary; it may vary a little according to the practice of a particular medicine man, but that is all.
The writer was recently present at one of these ceremonies, and the procedure was as follows: The medicine man first received a sheep; he then made a small incision between the hoofs of the right foreleg and rubbed a little medicine into the wound. The medicine consisted of a powder made from the mararia bush and mahunyuru, which is the epidermis and hair of a sheep. Probably the idea underlying this was a consecration of the animal for the purpose of the ceremony. The medicine man then brought a number of sprigs of various plants:
- Mahoroa,
- Murumbai,
- Uruti-Emilia?
- Mukandu,
- Muchatha-Emilia, sp.,
- Matei or Mitei,
- Ihurura, a creeping, vine-like plant.
He separated these into two bundles, and bound each at the base with the creeper ihurura; they resembled two hand brushes of green leaves.
The mother of the patient or person who was to be purified then fetched about a pint of water from the stream, carrying it in a couple of banana leaves laid over each other. A small depression was scooped in the ground, and the water, still in the banana leaves, was deposited therein. The medicine man and the patient squatted opposite each other. The former then put a variety of powders in the water. These were enumerated as follows:
- (1) Powder made from the stomach contents of the tree hyrax.
- (2) Ruthuku made from the muhokora root.
- (3) Umu, a reddish powder made from the root of a thorny plant. [[136]]
- (4) A powder made from the irura (papyrus) and the mahoroa plant.
He then produced the dried right black forefoot of a sheep, dipped it in the water, stirred up the contents, and placed the wetted foot in the mouth of the patient, who licked it vigorously and then expectorated the liquid on the ground. This was repeated some twenty or thirty times, the medicine man incessantly recounting all kinds of dangers and evils in a chanting voice with a general refrain, “May you be delivered from all these.” He then took one of the bundles of plants and dipped the lower end in the water. The patient licked it and expectorated, as above described, the medicine man chanting the whole time.
The same procedure was adopted with the second bundle of leaves.
The patient then stood up; the medicine man took one of the brushes, dipped it in the water, and sprinkled the patient’s head and wiped the front of his body with the wetted bundle of leaves. The patient now turned round and the back of his body was similarly treated.
The patient then knelt down and washed his face with the water and washed each foot and leg. This done, he wiped his face, feet, and legs, first with one bundle and then with the other. The patient then put his finger into the water and pierced the banana leaf basin, and the water soaked away into the earth. Thereupon the medicine man gathered up the banana leaves and his bundle of leaves and deposited them on the village manure heap, kiaraini.
There was still a final stage of the proceeding, viz., the anointing with white clay, ira. The patient still stood in front of the medicine man, who took from a small gourd some of the white earth, and smeared it down the line of the nose, on the upper lip, under the chin, on the right and left big toe, and on the palms of both hands. A little of the medicines called irura and [[137]]muhokora were then taken and a little placed in the palm of each hand of the patient, who crossed his hands and, holding them in this position, alternately licked each palm. The medicine man then licked a little of the above medicine, and the ceremony was finished.
The purification ceremony cannot be performed without payment; it is otherwise of no avail.
Ceremonial Blessing by a Medicine Man (Kikuyu).—This is believed to be efficacious, upon certain occasions, against evil and as a purification. The medicine man gives the supplicant a powder made from an aromatic root called muhokora. It is of a greyish brown colour; a little is poured into his hand and he eats it. The medicine man also eats some, with the object, perhaps, of showing the patient that nothing bad has been mixed with it.
The medicine man then takes a long narrow gourd with tiny holes on one side of it and shakes out, as from a pepper castor, a powder made of the roots of the muhokora and mchanja muka plants, and at the same time uttering a prayer. The patient receives the powder on his hands and rubs it on his head and down the middle of his forehead. The medicine man now takes a draught of beer and ceremonially spits a little on to each of his breasts, first, however, spitting a little on the ground as a libation to the ngoma, or ancestral spirits.
The general idea of the purification ceremony is of a dual character; its first object is to cast out the contamination of an evil influence and, this being done, to re-establish normal relations between the worshipper and his deity. It is believed that among African natives the idea of the evil influence is not very concrete, but among other peoples the evil influence assumes the shape of a demon, the nature of which may be identified by a magician and expelled by him by the use of appropriate formulæ. The one is a higher development of the other. In Math. xvii. 14, and [Mark ix. 14], for instance, we find the founder of the Christian [[138]]religion playing the part of the magician and casting out an evil spirit. The only parallel to this class of procedure among the African natives under investigation is the curious Engai possession of the Kamba and the ritual undertaken to cure persons possessed: the odd point about those ceremonies, however, is that although the afflicted person for whom the dances are convened may be cured, others will be seized during the proceedings, the affliction apparently becoming infectious.
Kithangaona cha muchi—The Purification Sacrifice for a Village (Kamba of Kitui).—If sickness becomes prevalent in a village, the headman will consult a medicine man, who may declare that the spirit (imu) of a person who died long ago is bothering the people and needs appeasing, and he will therefore order a fowl to be taken round the village ceremonially and killed. This is supposed to be very efficacious in restoring the good luck of the village, and is done as follows: the village head will walk round outside the village with some ashes in his right hand and a fowl in the left; on reaching a point opposite the gate of the village the fowl will be released and allowed to fly inside. It is then caught again and its throat is cut and the knife is afterwards buried in the cattle kraal. The children of the village eat the fowl. The village head then prays to the deity (Engai) to remove the sickness and keep it from the village, and afterwards prays to the imu, or spirit, of the deceased person who is supposed to have brought the sickness. It is stated that they first pray to Engai because the imu is believed to have gone to Engai.
The aiimu which afflict villages are said to be usually those of deceased medicine men who, when alive, were supposed to communicate with Engai in their dreams. They declare that they have seen someone glowing like a fire, giving such and such a message.
There is another kithangaona cha muchi, which [[139]]also deals with sickness in a village, but differs from the previous example in which a fowl is used. As with European physicians, the practice of medicine men varies for individual patients.
The magician, having decided that the sickness is due to the imu of a deceased person, will order the women of the village to grind some mawele or wimbi flour and cook it and make porridge.
The porridge is brought to the hut of the afflicted person and some butter is added; the people present dip their wooden spoons in the porridge and each one eats a little and then throws some on to the floor as an offering to the imu; the senior wife of the village head commences and the others follow suit.
The village head then brews some beer, drinks a little, and pours some out to the troublesome imu. Having done this he kills a he-goat, cuts a strip of meat from the breast, cooks it, and deposits it at the door of the hut. It is probably eaten by the village dogs or fowls, but this does not matter.
The people then pray to the spirit and say, “We have given you food, beer, and meat, we beseech you to allow the sick one to recover.”
Kithangaona cha mburi—The Purification Sacrifice of the Goat.—On some occasions the medicine man will advise that the ceremony of kithangaona cha mburi be performed. This is done as follows: The evening before the ceremony, the head of the village puts a stone in the hut fire and leaves it there all night; next morning he calls a small boy and girl, and the former, accompanied by the headman, leads a male goat round the outside of the village, followed by the girl. The goat must be all one colour and not spotted. When the party reaches the gate of the village the headman takes a half gourd of water and places it on the goat’s head between the horns. The red hot stone is brought out from the glowing embers in the hut, dropped into the bowl of water, causing the water to boil and give off steam. A hole is now dug at the door [[140]]of the hut of the village head, who holds the stone over the hole and prays as follows: “Engai muimu mivo nathika dikoni wao mivo nathika hivia nathika wao pamwe nabia hii,” which, freely translated, means: “Oh God, I do not wish to see the sickness enter my village, so now I bury this stone and bury the sickness with it.” The goat is not killed, but is allowed to go free. This is an unusual proceeding. It is a curious example of a combination of magic and primitive religion.
Kithangaona cha munda—Prayers for Crops (Kitui).—When a villager sees that his crops are suffering from drought, the ravages of insect pests, and so forth, he will go to a river bed and cut the branch of a tree called kindio which grows there. He will then take the egg of a fowl, dig a hole in the ground, among the crops, and place the egg in it, planting the branch of the kindio tree in the hole. He prays to the deity (Engai) beseeching him to make his crops grow like the kindio, a tree which never withers. The egg is said to be used because of its nourishing properties, and it is also believed that no bad influence can penetrate its shell. This is a very pretty example of homœopathic magic.
The Dedication of the Bull—Kithangaona cha nzau—Kitui A-Kamba.—It sometimes happens that when a man consults a magician about a contemplated marriage, or some other matter, the magician informs him that in his village a cow is in calf and that this cow will bear a bull calf which will be of a certain colour, red or black or spotted. He tells the owner that the calf must not be killed or sold in the ordinary way, as it will be the property of the ancestral spirits (nzau ya aiimu), or will be dedicated to them. If, however, it is necessary at any time to kill this beast, some beer must be brewed, and the meat must be divided among the owner’s wives. No portion with a bone in it must be given to a stranger, but all the bones should be collected and buried in the cattle kraal. The meat of [[141]]the beast must be cooked and offered to the aiimu, and some of the beer poured out to them. The bones of the carcase may be broken, if so desired.
A beast thus dedicated to the aiimu will never die of disease. If, for any special reason, the owner wishes to sell or kill such a bull, a substitute must be found for it, and an important ceremony has to be observed. The original animal and the substitute are tied and thrown on their sides; the two animals are then placed touching each other. Some hair is cut from the forehead, the chest, and the tail of the original beast and placed on the substitute, the animals being then released. The aiimu are addressed, and it is explained to them that owing to pressing reasons the original beast has to be killed or sold, as the case may be, but that a suitable substitute has been provided. Some beer is brewed, and a libation of it is poured out in the hut of the village head.
Old Testament Parallels.—It is considered that the principle of thahu or thabu existed among the Israelites, and the following references to Mosaic law may be reasonably quoted:
[Leviticus xix. 8]: “Therefore everyone that eateth it shall bear his iniquity because he hath profaned the hallowed thing of the Lord and that soul shall be cut off from among his people.”
This refers to the eating of a sacrifice of peace offerings on the third day; it may be eaten the day of the sacrifice and the following day, but if eaten at all on the third day, inflicts a thabu on the culprit.
[Leviticus xix. 22]: “And the priest shall make an atonement for him with the ram of his trespass offering … and the sin which he hath done shall be forgiven him.”
This can be taken as a case of a man who has committed a crime against tribal law, and takes a ram to the priest or one of the elders of the tribe, who [[142]]performs the ceremony of tahikia to cleanse him from his sin.
The elaborate ceremonial laid down in [Leviticus xiv]. dealing with the case of purification from the plague of leprosy might be the procedure adopted by a Kikuyu medicine man to-day: the use of special plants, the sacrifice of a ewe lamb of the first year. The latter is identical with the mwati of Kikuyu practice.
It is laid down in [verse 19] that: “The priest shall offer the sin offering and make atonement for him that is to be cleansed.” This certainly looks as if the plague were the result of evil-doing on the part of the patient, and of the nature of a thahu, and is quite in accordance with present-day beliefs in Kikuyu and Ukamba.
The comminatory chapters xxviii. in Deuteronomy are of considerable interest as a parallel to the cases quoted as existing to-day in Africa, e.g., [xxviii. 45]: “And all these curses shall come upon thee and shall pursue thee and overtake thee till thou be destroyed.”
General Remarks on Thahu and Thabu.—It will be well to review the results of this inquiry. It should be noted that in a number of cases, about one-third of those enumerated, the thahu is brought upon the offender or brought upon a third party, by the intentional act of the offender; in other cases the person, and sometimes the live stock, are the victims of circumstances over which there is no control.
The investigations throw a vivid light upon the complicated nature of the life history of a Mu-Kikuyu or Mu-Kamba, and it is evident that a native of one of these tribes cannot go through life without becoming thahu or thabu some time or other.
Mr C. Dundas, writing on this subject, says with regard to the Kikuyu people: “The fear of thahu is always present, a man may be subject to it without knowing the cause. When anyone goes on a journey [[143]]he cannot tell whether he may not have contracted thahu in strange houses and villages, and therefore when he returns he will kill a goat for purification before he enters his village. This was done on one occasion by a number of elders who had been on a journey with me, but as they were representatives of the western part of the district, the goat was killed on crossing the Kamiti River, which river they regarded as the boundary of their country.”
Unmarried men and girls are not subject to thahu. On one occasion a woman in hospital was said to be suffering from thahu caused by having touched the genitals of a strange man; the symptoms of thahu were in reality only a bed sore, but a medicine man was called in to cure her. A case, in which a man was sued for a goat for the purification of a woman whom he had raped, and who, in consequence, could not suckle her child until she was purified, was tried before a kiama. The idea seemed to be that the child would become thahu.
The thahu is, however, in nearly all cases removable by the elders and medicine men for payment, and it may therefore be urged that the belief has not much value as a moral restraint. This view cannot, however, be seriously maintained for the following reasons: Take the case of a person who commits an act which he knows will bring thahu; it must be clearly understood that he never questions the validity of the principle; he goes about with the burden of the misdeed on his conscience, and this worries him so much that he gradually gets thin and ill, and puts it down to the thahu. It therefore ends by his confessing to the elders and begging them to free him from the curse. It is in essence nothing more or less than the confession and absolution of the Christian Church. Then again we have to consider the publicity of kraal life, where very little goes on which is not known to the neighbours; polygamy also increases this, a man confides in one wife, she tells another wife and so it goes through [[144]]the village; if one person commits an act which inflicts thahu on himself or a neighbour, it will gradually leak out by some means or other, and public opinion will insist on measures being taken to remove it. No living person would ever dream of evading the wrath of the ngoma, or ancestral spirits. Occasions may, of course, arise when the commission of a prohibited act may involve a third party, and the person who committed it may preserve silence on the point, but the elders will in most cases be in possession of complete information as to the movements of every person in the neighbourhood, and, moreover, the demeanour of the conscience-stricken culprit will invite suspicion, so in practice it is but rarely that the offender is not detected.
In some of the examples of thahu which are cited above, cases will be noted in which the hut is affected and has to be forthwith demolished if the curse is not removed; this feature appears to be worthy of note, and it may in some measure account for the low type of domestic architecture among these tribes. Obviously there is but little incentive to build large permanent structures if, owing to the incidence of a thahu, the owner may have to demolish them at any moment. The author’s attention was first called to this point by a learned French missionary who has studied the Kikuyu for many years.
It must not be assumed that every native is conversant with all the acts of omission or commission by which thahu or thabu may be incurred and there are doubtless variations in different areas, i.e., the thahu of Western Kenya are not identical in number and character with those of Kyambu district. All the tribesmen, however, know a certain number, and if anything untoward occurs to a man he will consider it advisable to consult an elder; the elder will cross-examine him and ask if he has done so-and-so, or omitted to do certain things. Eventually the applicant will admit having done something which results in a [[145]]thahu; the way is then clear, and appropriate treatment must be sought in the proper quarter. Ridiculous as most of these taboos appear, they probably have a general value in regulating conduct in communities where legal restraint is in an undeveloped state.
(c) The Dying Curse
This is a very interesting belief, which occurs in both Kikuyu and Ukamba. In Kikuyu it is called kirume, and in Ukamba kiume. The belief is also said to be found, under the name of ukuongo, among the Ja-Luo Kavirondo.
It is really a thahu, thabu, or makwa which can be suspended by a dying man over his descendants. The same idea, somewhat inverted, exists among the Swahili, who call it rathi, or the dying blessing. If a man does not receive his father’s blessing, he is believed to go through life attended by much misfortune.
The general idea is that a dying person can put a curse upon property belonging to him, or can lay a curse upon another person, but only upon a person belonging to his own family; thus, for example, the head of a village, when dying, can lay a curse on a certain plot of land owned by him and will that it shall not pass out of the family, and if a descendant sells it, his speedy death is said to follow. A case recently came to the author’s knowledge where an elder was offered a very tempting sum for a particular piece of land, and equivalent land elsewhere, but refused it because the property had come down to him with a kirume on it. This is a very interesting revelation, because when one comes to consider it, in all probability it is the genesis of a last will or testament. Furthermore, it is the rude beginning of our principle of “entail.” It shows, moreover, that these people have almost reached the stage of individual tenure in land, or at any rate, of tenure by the family, the head of the village being the trustee for the family, and it is his duty to see [[146]]that the gethaka rights are preserved intact. The gethaka is the portion of a ridge owned by a particular family, title being obtained by an ancestor by purchase from the original occupiers, the Dorobo hunting tribes.
If the head of the family feels that he is nearing his end he assembles his sons, and to the eldest he will probably say, “The goats belonging to such a hut shall be yours”; he will then call another son and say, “The goats of such and such a hut shall be yours, and if any of you break these wishes he shall surely die.” He will then mention a certain shamba (cultivated field) and say, “Such and such a shamba, shall not be sold, and if this wish is broken the one who sells it shall die.” This operates as an entail on the property which will be passed on from generation to generation; such is the strength of the belief. Upon inquiry, examples may be found all over the country.
Another case quoted was that of a man who had a ne’er-do-well son who was in the habit of pilfering the neighbouring villages; the custom is for those who have suffered to collect and seize the equivalent of their losses from his father. If this continues, the father, in the end, becomes so annoyed with his son’s misdeeds that he will put a kirume on him when on his death-bed. There is quite a mediaeval flavour about this action.
Sometimes, too, a man, when he is very old, entrusts a son with charge of his live stock, and the son may abuse the trust and let the flocks and herds melt away. Cases have been known where an old patriarch on his death-bed has put a kirume on his son to the effect that he shall neither grow rich nor have wives, but to the end of his life shall be condemned to perpetual poverty.
Again, a daughter may be a trouble to her father; she is, say, married to a husband who has paid the required dowry to her father; she runs away, repeatedly misbehaves herself, and so forth, and the father will then be subject to continual worry, owing to [[147]]the husband’s demands for the return of the dowry. The father may eventually become so weary of all this worry that he will put a kirume on her and condemn her to perpetual barrenness.
Another case quoted was that of two brothers, one rich and one poor; the poor man may be envious of his brother and hate him in consequence. One day they go to drink beer, and, excited by the liquor, the poorer one brutally attacks his brother and grievously injures him. When the injured man recovers consciousness he will call his brother and say, “You have always been jealous of my wealth, and now I shall probably die from treatment received at your hands, but when I am dead if you attempt to seize any of my property you shall only be able to look at it, for if you touch a single head of stock you will die, and if your son comes to take any of my beasts he will also die.”
If a dying man calls out to a man of his own clan, muhirika, or morika, and makes a request such as, “Give me water,” and the person refuses, the dying man can impose a kirume upon the one who refuses.
A man is, generally speaking, only able to lay a kirume upon a person belonging to his own muhirika, or clan, which really means that a kirume will only affect one with a common blood tie.
There are, however, two exceptions to this:
If a man of one clan marries a woman of another clan (as is the rule) he can, if necessity arises, place a kirume upon the family of his wife if they live in the village of his father-in-law, because they have, as the expression runs, “Eaten of his property,” referring to the live stock he has paid over to his father-in-law for his wife.
The converse can also happen, for if a man has married a woman and has not paid his father-in-law the full amount agreed upon, the father-in-law when he dies can impose a kirume upon his son-in-law, and such kirume may also extend to his daughter, the idea [[148]]probably being that the daughter has not sufficiently worried her husband to pay the balance due.
The power to impose a kirume is apparently not altogether confined to elders, for it is said that if an incorrigible child is driven away from home, becomes starved and dies in consequence, it can, before it dies, curse its parents and say, “You have treated me like this, and therefore you shall not have any more children.”
It is said that if a person hears that someone of his own clan is threatening to impose a kirume on him, he can take steps to prevent its infliction. The procedure was described as follows: If a person hears that, say, a brother intended to place a kirume on him, he at once takes a male goat or sheep to his village and kills it there; he offers some of the fat, some milk and beer to the dying man, who cannot refuse to forgive the suppliant, and who ceremonially spits into his hands and rubs a little saliva on his forehead, navel, and feet. The threatened person then departs in peace, free from any danger of a kirume from that person. This applies to both guilds.
One curious case of kirume which was described deserves notice. It is probably very rare, but it possibly carries evidence of the ancient origin of the belief and dates back to matriarchal times.
Suppose a dying mwanake, or member of the warrior age, lays a kirume upon his maternal grandfather, what course would he pursue to rid himself of the dangerous infliction? If he was unable to get the one who imposed it to spit on him as above described, he would have to seek a grandson by another daughter, take or send to him a male goat, some beer, the milk of a cow and seed of the various kinds of grain grown in the country, and beg him to come to his village. The grandson would then come accompanied by the elders; he would taste the meat, beer, milk, etc., and ceremonially spit them out on the grandfather, and this would relieve the old man of all danger from the [[149]]kirume imposed by his other grandson. There is a word kigao, which is intimately connected with kirume, and is often confused with it, but inquiry seems to show that kigao means the neglect of a dying father’s wish with regard to the disposal of property, and the result of kigao, is, therefore, kirume, cause and effect being often very closely allied in the mind of a native.
The fear of kirume seems to be much greater in the section of the tribe circumcised Kikuyu fashion, for a prominent elder of the Masai guild stated that when those circumcised Masai fashion succeed to their father’s property they are invested with the brass bracelet worn by elders on their right wrist, and upon their mother’s death they wear the iron bracelet worn by her. These are called kigao, and once an elder has been invested with them he is quite safe from the effect of any kirume from his parents. The younger sons receive pieces of the ear ornaments, ichui, which are made into finger rings and fulfil the same purposes as the bracelets. This probably accounts for the greater popularity of the Masai guild among the Kikuyu people. At the same time the elder admitted that it would be bad to squander the flocks and herds left by his father, and that if they became depleted he would probably sell a portion of the landed property to make the flocks and herds up to their original strength.
If a man hears that a near relative is very ill he makes a point of going to see him, and takes the precaution of getting him to spit ceremonially on his hand and rub his visitor on the navel.
If a man goes to see his sick father or mother he takes a piece of mutton fat, and the sick parent ceremonially spits on it and the visitor rubs the piece of fat covered with saliva on his navel.
A married woman can impose a kirume, but not on an unmarried woman. The following is an example of a case in which a married woman may invoke this curse: [[150]]
If a married woman has for a long time been systematically ill-treated by a brutal husband she can, when dying, put a kirume on her father for having forced her to marry such a bad man, and also upon her husband for his brutality.
The kirume is looked upon as the severest form of thahu or nzahu known; in most cases of thahu the subject rarely dies, because it is slow in its action and the patient has an opportunity of making reparation and seeking relief from the prescribed medicine man or elders, but in the case of a kirume the curse is very swift in its action, the patient rapidly sickens, breaks out into ulcers and often dies before he can arrange to take measures to arrest its onslaught; his live stock will also die mysteriously.
It is believed that the effective power of the kirume is derived from the spirit (ngoma) of the deceased person by whom it is imposed, assisted by the ngoma of the ancestors of the family.
It is said that there is no poison without its antidote, and the same applies to the kirume, but the antidote must be applied in good time and the only persons who can effect a cure are certain persons called athuri ya ukuu. The athuri ya ukuu compose a grade of elders above that of athuri ya mburi nne (elders of four goats—referring to the fee they pay for initiation to the grade). They are always old men and rich, and have to pay to their fellow elders of the grade a bullock and a male sheep or goat as initiation fees.
While the athuri ya mburi nne form the ordinary kiama, or council of elders, the athuri ya ukuu constitute a native court of appeal, but they do not admit appeals except in very important cases, when it is within their competence to revise a judgment and, if they consider fit, reduce the amount of compensation. It is also the duty of the athuri ya ukuu to instruct the heir in the customs of the tribe when he succeeds to the property after his father’s death.
The athuri ya ukuu do not treat ordinary [[151]]cases of thahu but have to be called in for cases of kirume.
The ceremonial connected with the removal of a kirume is as follows; it is called ku-tahikia kirume in Kikuyu, which means “to purify from the kirume.”
The athuri ya ukuu are summoned to the patient’s village, and the day before the ceremony the elders catch a mole-like rodent called huku (Tachyoryctes sp.), put it alive in a cooking pot with some sweet potatoes, and cork up the mouth of the pot. The huku must be caught near the patient’s village. Next morning the athuri ya ukuu arrive with a medicine man belonging to another clan and a male sheep is killed; the elders then take the huku out of the pot and make passes all over the patient’s body with the live animal and now take the huku and samples of various kinds of native food, beads, etc., and proceed to the place where the corpse of the person who imposed the kirume has been buried or thrown out. Another sheep is taken with this party and also a small cooking pot; upon reaching the spot referred to the second sheep is killed and some of its fat is cooked in the pot. They then dig a hole and pour the fat in it, also milk, honey, beer, etc.; they smear the huku with the tatha, or stomach contents of the sheep, and the medicine man ties a tiny piece of meat to the right and left foreleg of the animal with a string made of mugeri (hibiscus) fibre, then fastening it up in a rough net made of the roots of the ruriera plant, and cuts the face off the sacrificial sheep, leaving the eyes intact, and places them all in the hole saying, “Go back to your burrow and take with you the spirit of the person who left this curse.” The hole is then filled in. The medicine man eats the remainder of the meat and afterwards returns to the village and purifies it.
The huku is said to personify the person who imposed the kirume, and the eyes of the sheep are to watch the huku and see that it does not return to the village. The huku is chosen because it lives below [[152]]ground, and the ngoma of deceased persons are believed to live below ground.
After this ceremony the affected one is believed to recover; some say, however, that it only alleviates the effect of a kirume, but does not remove it completely. The elders stated that this would not affect a kirume placed on a piece of land forbidding its sale, and what may be called the kirume of entail could not be lifted.
The lustration from a kirume by the huku ceremony only applies to the Kikuyu guild.
Altogether this is a very pretty example of what Sir J. G. Frazer terms “homœopathic magic.”
If a young woman has been abused or vilified by the young men (anake) of her particular rika or generation, it is a serious matter for her, but nothing is done about it until the girl is about to be married. The father, however, then takes a ram and makes a feast for the anake of the same rika or circumcision generation as his daughter, and they assemble and ceremonially spit on the girl. She can then be safely married and bear children. In fact, as a precaution, this is generally done even if there is no record of a quarrel between the girl and the young men of her rika. A medicine man is called in, a ewe is slaughtered, and he ceremonially purifies the girl before her marriage.
Ukamba.—As was mentioned before, the doctrine of kirume or the dying curse is found among the Kamba people and is there called kiume.
Elders, atumia, and young married men, anthele, can impose a kiume among the A-Kamba but not among the warrior class, anake.
A man is able to place a kiume upon the people of a village to the effect that they shall not refuse food or good treatment to a particular person, the friend of the dying man; this friend may even belong to another tribe.
A person cannot impose a kiume on anyone outside his immediate family. A married woman can place a kiume on her father’s village if she has reason to do so. [[153]]
An eldest son can place a kiume on a particular thing in the village from which his mother came, a common case of this being when a man places a kiume on the people of his maternal grandfather’s village, contingent on the disposal of a beast which was paid by his father to his mother’s people as part of her marriage price. The reason of this is that an eldest son has a claim to a heifer, the progeny of the marriage price paid by his father to his maternal grandfather for his mother, and he can, when dying, will this beast to any particular person, and if anyone prevents this bequest being carried out he will die; the kiume generally falls on the head of the village. The formula used is: “If you do not carry out this wish you will not be able to eat meat, to drink water, to drink milk to eat maize, to eat millet, and so on—and you will surely die.”
As in Kikuyu, a dying elder in Ukamba can place a kiume on a cultivated field, forbidding its sale out of the family.
If a Mu-Kamba breaks a dying wish and incurs a kiume, he can generally be freed from the consequences if he goes to an elder of his father’s village or to a near relative of his father and takes a bullock; the beast is killed and the elders spit water and milk on his face—this saves him from the worse effects of the kiume, viz., death. The ceremony is called kuathimwa.
There is little doubt that much more remains to be learnt about the ritual of kiume in Ukamba, but these things are more difficult to work out in that district and the details have to be dragged out bit by bit. [[154]]
[1] Of course the analogy is not complete, for it does not apply to one who accidentally becomes the victim of certain circumstances. [↑]
[2] The act of stepping over a corpse is probably considered a serious insult to the ngoma. [↑]
CHAPTER VIII
SUPERSTITIONS REGARDING CHILDREN AND WOMEN
Regarding the Birth of Children, etc. (Kikuyu).—In former times, if a child was born feet first it was suffocated and thrown out.
If a child touches the ground at the time of its birth it is considered very unlucky. A ram, a mwati (young ewe) or an arika (young female goat) is killed, and a bracelet made of the skin is placed on the mother’s wrist. This is done for the sake of the child. The skin of the animal sacrificed is used for carrying the child on its mother’s back.
It is again very unlucky when an infant cuts its upper teeth first, but the child is not killed, and is merely sent to its maternal grandmother. This only refers to those belonging to the Kikuyu circumcision guild. The child is termed kingu. To avert the ill luck, a friend is asked to cohabit with the mother for a month, after which the husband returns to his wife.
The birth of twins is a great misfortune either in human beings or domestic animals, but only when it occurs the first time a woman or animal bears.
It is believed that the father will die if he cohabits again with the mother; a case was cited of a man who did so and was killed by a train a few days later.
Formerly twin infants were always suffocated, and in such cases were thrown into the bush by the old woman who assisted at the birth. This probably still occurs in the remoter parts of Kikuyu, but the elders stated that in the more civilised parts they are no longer killed but are given to a member of the clan of the father to rear. [[155]]
In order to free the mother from the curse, the husband hands her over to another man called a mundu rohiu, and when she has borne to him, her husband takes her back. A ram has to be killed and the woman adorned with a rukwaru before she is taken back.
This only refers to those belonging to the Kikuyu circumcision guild.
If a person, who is a twin, crosses a river, he or she must stoop down and fill the mouth with water and, facing downstream, spit it out into the river, saying, according to their sex: “May I not beget (or bear) twins as my father (or mother) did.”
Anyone seeing this ceremony might well mistake it for a propitiatory offering to a river spirit, and the error indeed has occurred. The root idea, however, is that the flowing water may carry away the kind of thahu which results in such an unlucky tendency as that of bearing twins. They can give no explanation as to why twins should be of such ill omen if they happen to be the first children of a married couple or of a domestic animal. They do not appear to believe, as in some countries, that twins have any influence over the weather. If a woman bears twins a second time, one of the children will be given to another man to bring up.
The Hon. C. Dundas made some inquiries on this point in Kyambu district, and he states that in S. Kikuyu the birth of twins is considered unlucky excepting in the case of a woman who has borne other children; the younger the woman the more unlucky the occurrence, and if the first birth is of twins, no medicine man can remove the evil, and the only course is to throw the twins into the bush or to give them to another man of a different tribe or clan. In Kenya Province it is said that twins are sold to other tribes, but in Kyambu district the elders held this to be a bad custom. The foster-father becomes sole owner of the twins and if they are girls receives dowry for them. In such case if the twins were the first birth of a woman, the father can accept no part of the dowry, but if they were second [[156]]or subsequent births, he receives the whole dowry from the foster-father and returns ten goats to him.
At Ngenda Mission, a twin was handed over to the missionary, and the father agreed to give them the customary ten goats out of the dowry when the child should be married. No reason for this belief is known, but the custom is rigorously followed to this day. No one can sleep in the hut in which twins were born until they are disposed of, and the mother must cohabit with a stranger who is then called mwendia wa rohio or mundu rohiu (man of the sword).[1]
A short time ago a case of triplets occurred. The mother had first borne one child, then twins, and finally triplets. In this case only one of the triplets was given away to a man of another clan, for, as the woman had borne several times before, the triplets were not considered unlucky, and the giving away of the one was said to be due solely to the mother’s inability to suckle all three.
On the birth of a child a sheep is killed and a strip of the skin is worn on the mother’s wrist, rukwaru, and her head is shaved; the fat of the sheep is prepared and given to the infant to eat, being put into its mouth with the finger. This must be done before the child is suckled, and the same ceremony, in respect to the mother, is performed by the foster-mother in cases where a twin or other child is handed over to a family of another clan.
In every case where a child is handed over to foster-parents it will belong to the clan of its foster-parents and not to that of its real parents, but if the child is a girl she can marry a man of the foster-father’s clan provided he does not live close to the foster-father, while marriage with a man of her real father’s clan is prohibited to her. [[157]]
There is an undoubted widespread belief that the only satisfactory way of dealing with twins is to suffocate them, as they are unlucky. It is believed that the practice of giving them away is a later adaptation to the custom followed when a woman dies in child-birth, the child, whether twin or not, being always, in this case, given away to a man of another clan.
Among the Kamba of Ulu, the same general idea as to the unluckiness of twins, if they are the first-born, prevails. The twins, however, are not killed or put away, but within a day or two of their birth the mother is returned by her husband to her father and the marriage price of the woman is paid back to him. If the husband cohabits with the mother of the twins after their birth it is believed that he or the children will die. It is therefore quite clear that the curse or ill luck is only immanent in the woman. Upon the birth of an ordinary child a string made of the bark of the ithaa tree is ceremonially tied round its neck, but this is not permitted in the case of twins. After the mother of twins has been returned to her father, she may be married to another husband without the latter incurring the same risks as the first husband, but the second husband must be of the grade of an elder of council. It is an interesting point, as a man, on reaching this grade, is not so subject to the incidence of a curse as a young man. It would therefore appear that the woman is still to some extent dangerous. The second husband becomes the adopted father of the twins and carries out the ithaa ceremony mentioned above; one of the twins must be named Mbatha, the name of the other one being of no significance. At the feast of the ithaa, he kills two rams or two male goats, one for each twin. It is said that twins are not killed at birth, as among the Kikuyu, because the woman’s second husband would, under native law, sue the father for the value of the children.
As the twins grow up, each child must be treated exactly alike; if one has a present, the other must [[158]]receive the same. A wife must be found for each at the same time, and the same marriage dowry must be paid for each. In the case of boys, when sufficient live stock has been paid over to the prospective father-in-law to induce them to part with their daughters, both brides must be brought to their husbands on the same day. If one of the twins is a boy and the other a girl, and the latter is being sought in marriage by a young man, it is the custom for the brother to take his sister to her lover’s village for a visit. They stay there two days and return home on the third day, the girl being given a goat by the young man.
The Kamba of Ulu do not believe that twins have any influence on the rain or the weather generally. In Kitui, as in Kikuyu, it is most unlucky for twins to be born if they are the first children of the marriage. In former times one was buried alive, but this cruel custom has apparently died out. It is, however, still believed that if they are girls and both live, the mother will die, and if the twins are boys and they survive, the father will die. It is supposed that the evil effect can be mitigated to some extent if, three days after their birth, the father cohabits with the mother; the parents also kill a goat and are smeared with the tatha, or stomach contents.
If a cow bears twin calves at first calving they are invariably both killed.
As in Kikuyu, it is lucky for a child to be born head first; it is unlucky to be born feet first, but the infant is not killed. There is, however, a curious belief that such a person must never step over anyone lying on the ground, and if he forgets this prohibition, he must at once step back over the recumbent person. The stepping back is called njokela, “to go back,” and is supposed to reverse the ill luck which would be transmitted.
In Kitui, if a cow bears a dead calf the children can eat it but not a woman, as it is believed that the next time she is pregnant she will have a still-born child. [[159]]Women are also not allowed to eat the meat of a beast which dies.
If a cow bears a deformed calf it is buried, for if it is allowed to live lung trouble is said to appear among the cattle.
There is no particular taboo on crippled children, but the people say that the infant is the reincarnation of a deceased person similarly afflicted whom they remember, and give it his or her name.
The Kamba of Kitui believe that the aiimu, or spirits of the deceased, sometimes pray to the deity (Engai) to give them another body, and if the request is granted, a spirit will enter a new-born child and commence another corporeal existence on earth. Their reason for believing this is that a pregnant woman will sometimes dream of a deceased person night after night; if she dreams of a certain man who is dead, and then bears a son, they know it is that particular man who has come back to earth, and the child will be given his name. This is part of the same belief as that of the spiritual husband, described in the author’s work on the A-Kamba, page 39.
As in the Ulu district and Kikuyu it is considered very unlucky for a child to be born feet first, and such a child will have ill luck through life. If it is a male child his wife, if he marries in late life, is sure to die, and if it is a girl, her husband will die. In the latter case, however, the evil can be averted if the prospective husband, before he commences to pay for his bride, sends her mother a present of an axe. If the woman bears a child which is born feet first, it is essential that the husband cohabit with her on the seventh day after the birth.
Should a child in Kitui cut its upper incisor teeth first it is considered a very bad sign. Such a child must not partake of the firstfruits of the fields, and it is said that, should it admire a growing crop, that crop will never reach maturity. This evil influence, however, can to a great extent be mitigated if, when the first of [[160]]the child’s milk teeth drops out, the father cohabits with the mother.
A child is taught that when one of his milk teeth comes out he is to throw it between his legs and say, “May Engai give me a new tooth to replace the one I have lost.”
The feeling against twin birth varies according to the locality. In the more remote parts it is very strong, but in parts of Ulu, the prejudice is dying out. The father, however, will usually sacrifice to prevent evil effects.
Taboos on Women.—When a pregnant woman is near delivery, all arms are taken out of the hut, and also any iron hoes. They are not brought back again until the mother’s head has been shaved at the purification ceremony after a birth. If these articles are left in a hut on such an occasion and someone, for instance, takes a hoe away and uses it, the child will, it is believed, be afflicted with a thabu. The food in the house at the time of birth can only be eaten by the mother and three old women who assist at the birth; any infringement of this rule is a great danger to the newly born. Even the father cannot eat in the hut for three or four months, but if a man is poor and has only one wife, he will sleep in the thengira, or goat hut, and if he has no thengira, he will sleep in the hut on a separate bed.
A pregnant woman must not sew with a needle, as it is said to be very dangerous for the new-born infant.
If at child-birth any blood falls on the floor of the hut, the old women who assist at the birth dig up the earth floor at that place and bury the soil in the bush at some little distance from the village, for if a goat licked that particular spot it would die.
If a man goes into his hut at a birth or after it has taken place, and accidentally treads in blood which may have dripped on the floor, the newly born child will become sick, but the evil can be averted by the cohabitation of the parents.
This fear of certain kinds of blood is very curious [[161]]and goes right back to ancient times. Among these people a woman during her menstrual period may not grind corn, but is allowed to cook sweet potatoes or whole maize. She may not, however, milk the cattle, nor may she cut potato tops as green fodder for the goats.
A woman must also not step over her husband when in this state or he will become ill, and to remove the thahu a ewe lamb must be killed and both husband and wife invested with bracelets made of the skin (rukwaru). A woman will tell her husband when she becomes ill, and bathe when she is no longer so. Her husband can then return to her.
A woman must not shave her hair while her husband is on a journey; if she does so she will be accused of bewitching him. She can, however, clip her hair a little in front. This prohibition is said to be connected with the customs by which a wife shaves her head on the death of her husband, and were she to do so while he is travelling, it might possibly bring him ill luck.
If a man goes away to hunt or to fight, and on his way back, when he nears his village, is taken ill and suffers from diarrhœa, he knows thereby that his wife has been unfaithful to him during his absence. He will thereupon call an elder and tell him to bring a ram and the roots of certain medicinal plants: kindio, ibalu, and mathengi. The throat of the ram is pierced and the blood collected in a half gourd (nzeli) and mixed with the crushed roots and the tatha, or stomach contents, of the ram. The suspected woman is called out and told to take hold of the right arm of the elder who is holding the nzeli containing the mixture. She then takes a handful of the decoction and throws it on the ground, and the husband rubs his foot in it. The remainder of the mixture is sprinkled all the way from there to the door of the hut, as well as on the bed. She is probably beaten by her husband, and her paramour is summoned before the council of elders and fined a bull or a ram. [[163]]
[1] The frequent occurrence of sexual rites may appear repugnant to Europeans, but students of the ancient world will readily admit that there is an intimate connection between these rites and the religious beliefs of people in a certain stage of culture. Many examples could be quoted. [↑]
PART II
MAGIC
[[165]]