Bantu Folk Lore (Medical and General)

by Matthew L. Hewat

[[Contents]]

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER								PAGE.
I.	[Bantu Tribes]							1
II.	[Some observations of interest in the Folk Lore of the Kaffir]							9
III.	[Doctors]							25
IV.	[Native Practices]							52
V.	[Surgery]							85
VI.	[Midwifery and Children]							97

[[vii]]

[[Contents]]

BANTU FOLK LORE.

Medical and General.

INTRODUCTION.

Having been for some time located in the border districts of the Cape Colony, and there coming into frequent contact with the natives; I was struck with the fact that there was a large field for investigation, and record of the “Medical Folk Lore” of the Bantu tribes, which was becoming more and more difficult of attainment as time went on, owing to the fact that the true unsophisticated native was rapidly becoming a thing of the past; or if one may put it so, becoming contaminated by the advance of civilization. Under the pressure of Colonial rule, Magistrates and Missionaries, the native character and ways are changing. Breeks and petticoats are endowed with positive virtues. They are made steps in the ladder that tends upwards, and the old fashioned Kaffir is fast disappearing.

Red clay and blankets or skins give way to veneer and varnish; outward conformity to a kind of civilization knocks off some objectionable, and some quite unobjectionable ways, and leaves the inside man as superstitious and as ignorant as ever. [[viii]]