This list is, I think, a very interesting one, and shows the primitive pastoral and agricultural habits of the Hova Malagasy before they were influenced by European civilisation. Previous to their knowledge of clocks and watches (which are still unknown to the majority of people away from the capital), the native houses thus served as a rude kind of dial. As, until recent times, these were always built with their length running north and south, and with the single door and window facing the west, the sunlight coming in after midday at the open door gave, by its gradual progress along the floor, a fairly accurate measure of time to people amongst whom time was not of very much account. In the forenoon, the position of the sun, nearly square with the eastern purlin of the roof, marked about nine o’clock; and as noon approached, its vertical position, about the ridge-pole, or at least its reaching the meridian, clearly showed twelve o’clock. Then, as the sunlight gradually passed westward and began to peer in at the door, at about one o’clock, it announced “the peeping-in of the day” (mitsìdika àndro); and then, as successive points on the floor were reached by the advancing rays, several of the hours of the afternoon were sufficiently clearly marked off: “the place of rice-pounding” (am-pitotòam-bàry), as the light fell on the rice mortar, further into the house; “the calf-fastening place” (am-pamatòran-jànak òmby), as the rays reached one of the three central posts supporting the ridge, and where the calf was fastened for the night; and then, “touching” (tàfapàka), when the declining sunshine reached the eastern wall, at about half-past four in the afternoon. Other words and notes of time, it will be seen, are derived from various natural phenomena. Some other words for the division of time used by the Malagasy may be here noted. Thus “a rice-cooking” (indray màhamàsa-bàry) is frequently used to denote about half-an-hour; while “the frying of a locust” (indray mitòna valàla) is a phrase employed to describe a moment.
Many words exist in the Malagasy language to denote different appearances of nature which are somewhat poetical and seem to show some imaginative power. Thus the light fleecy clouds in the upper regions of the atmosphere are called “sky gossamer” (faròran-dànitra); the sun is the “day’s-eye” (masoandro); the galaxy is the “dividing of the year” (èfi-taona); the rainbow is “God’s great knife” (àntsibèn’ Andrìamànitra); and a waterspout is the “tail of the sky” (ràmbon-dànitra).
We saw just now that in Imèrina the native houses, with the sun touching different parts of them, form a kind of primitive sun-dial; so it may be well here to say something about the structure and arrangement of a native house in this part of Madagascar.
THE HOVA HOUSE
A Hova house of the old style is always built with its length running north and south; it is an oblong, the length being about half as much again as the breadth, and the door and window always on the west side, so as to be sheltered from the prevailing south-east winds; for, as there is no glass, there would be much inconvenience in facing the windward side. There is frequently another window at the north end of the house, and often one also in the north gable. The material used always to be the hard red clay found all over the central provinces; and this is still largely used, although sun-dried bricks are supplanting the old style of building. This clay, after being mixed with water, is kneaded by being trampled over thoroughly, and is then laid in courses of about a foot to eighteen inches in height, and about the same in thickness. Each layer is allowed to become hard and firm before the next one is set, and it is well beaten on both sides as it dries. If properly laid and of good material, the cracks are not very large when the clay is dry, and are filled up; and it makes a very substantial and durable walling, quite as much, and more so, as the majority of cheap brick houses in England. The boundary walls of the compounds are also made of the same hard clay; and it is remarkable how many years such material will last without much damage, although exposed almost daily, for four or five months every year, to the heavy rains of the wet season. (I know walls which had been built for several years before I saw them first forty-three years ago, and yet they seem little altered since that time.)
The houses of the upper classes and richer people used to be built of timber framework, the walls being of thick upright planks, which are grooved at the edge, a tenon of the tough anìvona palm bark being inserted so as to hold them together. Two or three lengths of the same fibrous substance were also passed through each plank longitudinally at different heights from the ground, so as to bind them all firmly together round the house. The accompanying drawing will show more clearly than any verbal description the details of the structure of a Hova tràno-kòtona, as this style of wooden house is called (no such houses are built nowadays; and very few of them remain; the use of brick, sun-dried and burnt, has entirely superseded them). The roof in both clay and timber houses does not depend for its stability on the walls only, but is mainly supported by three tall posts, which are let into the ground for some depth and carry the ridge-piece. One of these posts is in the centre, and one is at each end, close to the walls inside the house. This is a wise provision, as the roofs are generally of high pitch, and in violent winds would need much more support than could be given by the walls. The gables were always thatched with the same materials as the roof, either of long grass or the hèrana sedge. At each gable the outer timbers cross the apex, and project upwards for about a foot or two, the extremities being notched, and often having a small wooden figure of a bird. In the houses of people of rank, the tàndro-tràno or “house-horns” were three or four feet long, while in some of the royal houses they projected ten or twelve feet, the length being apparently some indication of the rank of the owner. In some tribes these gable ornaments, which have become only conventional horns among the Hovas, are carved in exact resemblance of those adorning the head of a bullock.
A MALAGASY HOUSE.
Showing elevation, plan, internal arrangement, and month names.
See [page 96]