Part 1

KAFFIR FOLK-LORE:

A Selection from the Traditional Tales

CURRENT AMONG THE PEOPLE LIVING ON THE EASTERN BORDER OF THE CAPE COLONY

WITH COPIOUS EXPLANATORY NOTES.

BY GEO. Mc CALL THEAL, AUTHOR OF “A HISTORY OF THE COLONIES AND STATES OF SOUTH AFRICA.”

SECOND EDITION.

LONDON: SWAN SONNENSCHEIN, Le BAS & LOWREY, PATERNOSTER SQUARE. 1886.

PREFACE.

Of late years a great deal of interest has been taken in the folklore of uncivilized tribes by those who have made it their business to study mankind. It has been found that a knowledge of the traditionary tales of a people is a key to their ideas and a standard of their powers of thought. These stories display their imaginative faculties; they are guides to the nature of the religious belief, of the form of government, of the marriage customs, in short, of much that relates to both the inner and the outer life of those by whom they are told.

These tales also show the relationship between tribes and peoples of different countries and even of different languages. They are evidences that the same ideas are common to every branch of the human family at the same stage of progress. On this account, it is now generally recognised that in order to obtain correct information concerning an uncivilized race, a knowledge of their folklore is necessary. Without this a survey is no more complete than, for instance, a description of the English people would be if no notice of English literature were taken.

It is with a view of letting the people we have chosen to call Kaffirs describe themselves in their own words, that these stories have been collected and printed. They form only a small portion of the folklore that is extant among them, but it is believed that they have been so selected as to leave no distinguishing feature unrepresented.

Though these traditionary tales are very generally known, there are of course some persons who can relate them much better than others. The best narrators are almost invariably ancient dames, and the time chosen for story telling is always the evening. This is perhaps not so much on account of the evening being the most convenient time, as because such tales as these have most effect when told to an assemblage gathered round a fire circle, when night has spread her mantle over the earth, and when the belief in the supernatural is stronger than it is by day. Hence it may easily happen that persons may mix much with Kaffirs without even suspecting that they have in their possession a rich fund of legendary lore.

There is a peculiarity in many of these stories which makes them capable of almost indefinite expansion. They are so constructed that parts of one can be made to fit into parts of another, so as to form a new tale. In this respect they are like the blocks of wood in the form of cubes with which European children amuse themselves. Combined in one way they present the picture of a lion, another combination shows a map of Europe, another still, a view of St Paul’s, and so on. So with many of these tales. They are made up of fragments which are capable of a variety of combinations.

It will surprise no one to learn that these tales are already undergoing great changes among a very large section of the natives on the border. Tens of thousands of Kaffirs have adopted the religion of the Europeans, and the facility with which such changes can be made as were alluded to in the last paragraph has encouraged them to introduce ideas borrowed from their teachers. Thus with them Satan—of whom they had no conception before the advent of Europeans—is now the prompter to evil, and morals are drawn that never could have entered their heads in days of old. Their tales are thus a counterpart of the narrators, in possessing an adaptability to growth and a power of conformation to altered circumstances.

It is necessary to say a few words concerning the care that has been taken to give absolutely not a single sentence in any of these tales that has not come from native sources. Most of them have been obtained from at least ten or twelve individuals residing in different parts of the country, and they have all undergone a thorough revision by a circle of natives. They were not only told by natives, but were copied down by natives. The notes only are my own. I have directed the work of others, but have myself done nothing more than was necessary to explain the text. For this I can claim to be qualified by an intimate knowledge of the Kaffir people, gained through intercourse with them during a period of twenty years, and while filling positions among them varying from a mission teacher to a border magistrate.

Most of the tales collected in this book have already appeared in various South African papers and magazines, some as far back as 1874. They were arranged for publication in a volume which was to have been issued from the press of the Lovedale Missionary Institution, and the first sheet was already printed, when the disturbances of 1877 took place. I was then called away to perform work of a very different kind, and the publication was necessarily suspended. The book is now issued, in the hope that it may be found useful, as throwing light upon the mode of life of a people who differ from ourselves in many respects besides degree of civilization.

Geo. M. Theal.

Jan. 1882.

CONTENTS.

PAGE Introductory Chapter regarding the Kaffirs 1 The Story of the Bird that made Milk 29 The Story of Five Heads 48 The Story of Tangalimlibo 56 The Story of a Girl who disregarded the Custom of Ntonjane 67 The Story of Simbukumbukwana 72 The Story of Sikulume 78 The Story of Hlakanyana 89 The Story of Demane and Demazana 118 The Story of the Runaway Children; or, the Wonderful Feather 122 The Story of Ironside and his Sister 127 The Story of the Cannibal’s Wonderful Bird 133 The Story of the Cannibal Mother and her Children 137 The Story of the Girl and the Mbulu 144 The Story of Mbulukazi 148 The Story of Long Snake 155 The Story of Kenkebe 158 The Story of the Wonderful Horns 169 The Story of the Glutton 172 The Story of the Great Chief of the Animals 176 The Story of the Hare 179 The Story of Lion and Little Jackal 186 Proverbs and Figurative Expressions 191 Notes 207

KAFFIR FOLK.

INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER REGARDING THE KAFFIRS.

In South Africa the word Kaffir is often used in a general way to signify any black native who is not the descendant of an imported slave, but on the eastern frontier of the Cape Colony the term is usually restricted to a member of the Amaxosa tribe. It is from individuals of this tribe that the following stories have been collected.

Europeans have designated these people Kaffirs ever since the discovery of the country, though they themselves cannot even pronounce the word, as the English sound of the letter r is wanting in their language. R in Kaffir words, as now written, represents the same guttural sound as g does in Dutch, or the Scotch sound of ch in loch; thus Rarabe is pronounced Khah-khah-bay. They have no word by which to signify the whole race, but each tribe has its own title, which is usually the name of its first great chief, with the plural prefix Ama or Aba.

A very large portion of South Africa is occupied by people of this race. All along the eastern coast, as far south as the Great Fish River, the country is thickly populated with Kaffir tribes. On the other side of the mountains, the Bechuanas, their near kindred, are found stretching almost across to the Atlantic shore, from the heart of the continent southward to the Orange River.

The country lying between the present colonies of the Cape and Natal was first explored by Europeans in the year 1688, and was then found to be occupied by four great tribes,—the Amampondomsi, the Amampondo, the Abatembu, and the Amaxosa,—who formed nations as distinct from each other as are the French and the Italians. Their language was the same, and their laws and customs varied very slightly; but in all that respected government they were absolutely independent of one another. It has since been ascertained that the tribes further northward do not differ materially from these.

The Amaxosa were the farthest to the southward in 1688, as they have been ever since. On the coast they had then reached the Keiskama River, and there is good reason to believe that inland their outposts extended westward as far as the site of the present village of Somerset East. They were thus in contact with Hottentot tribes along an extended line, and an amalgamation of the two races had probably already commenced. It is certain that during the latter half of the last century a great many Hottentots were incorporated with the Amaxosa.

The mode of incorporation was in most instances a selection of Hottentot females after the destruction of their clan in war; but in at least one case a Hottentot tribe became gradually a Kaffir clan by mixture of blood through adoption of Kaffir refugees. The people of this tribe, a pure Hottentot one in 1689 and then called the Gqunaqua, were found by a traveller a century later to resemble Kaffirs more than Hottentots in appearance, and, except a few families, they are now undistinguishable from other members of the Amaxosa. Their original language has been lost, but their old tribal title is yet retained in the Kaffir form Amagqunukwebe.

This large admixture of Hottentot blood has not affected the mode of government or the general customs of the Amaxosa, as is seen on comparing them with other tribes to the north; but it has affected their personal appearance and their language. Many words in use by the women, though appearing in a Kaffir form, can be traced to Hottentot roots. Owing to this, their traditional stories may have been modified to some, though not to any great, extent

In a condition independent of European control, each Kaffir tribe is presided over by a great chief, whose government is, however, but little felt beyond his own immediate clan, each petty division being under a ruler who is in reality nearly independent. The person of a chief is inviolable, and an indignity offered to one of them is considered a crime of the gravest nature. Such offshoots of the ruling house as are not of themselves chiefs are of aristocratic rank, and are exempt from obedience to the laws which govern the commonalty. With regard to the common people, the principle of the law is that they are the property of the rulers, and consequently an offence against any of their persons is atoned for by a fine to the chief. Murder and assaults are punished in this manner. Thus in theory the government is despotic, but in practice it has many checks. The first is the existence of a body of councillors about the person of each chief, whose advice he is compelled to listen to. A second is the custom that a man who can escape from a chief whose enmity he has incurred will be protected by any other with whom he takes refuge, so that an arbitrary or unpopular ruler is in constant danger of losing his followers.

The chief in council makes the law and administers it, but from the courts of the petty chiefs there is an appeal to the head of the tribe. Only two kinds of punishment are known: fines and death. Lawsuits are of frequent occurrence, and many Kaffirs display great ability and remarkable powers of oratory in conducting them. The judges are guided in their proceedings by a recognised common law and by precedents, though some of them are exceedingly venal. They will sit, however, with exemplary patience, for days together, to hear all the details of a case, and, where bribery is impossible, their sentences are usually in accordance with strict justice.

The manner in which the Kaffirs became divided into independent tribes in ancient times is clearly shown by the law of succession to the chieftainship which is in force to the present day. The first wives of a chief are usually the daughters of some of his father’s principal retainers; but as he increases in power his alliance is courted by great families, and thus it generally happens that the last of his wives is the highest in rank. Probably she is the daughter of a neighbouring chief, for it is indispensable in her case that the blood of the ruling line should flow in her veins. She is termed the great wife, and her eldest son is the principal heir.

Another of his wives is invested at some period of his life, with the consent of his councillors and friends, with the title of wife of the right hand, and to her eldest son is allotted a portion of the tribe, with which he forms a new clan. The government of this is entrusted to him as soon as he is full grown, so that while his brother is still a child he has opportunities of increasing his power. If he is the abler ruler of the two, war between them follows almost to a certainty as soon as the great heir reaches manhood, and is invested with a separate command. Should peace be maintained, upon the death of his father the son of the right hand acknowledges his brother as superior in rank, but pays him no tribute, nor admits of his right to interfere in any manner with the internal government of the new clan.

Thus there was always a tendency to division and subdivision of the tribes, which was the great fault of the system. But while it operated against unity, it tended towards a rapid expansion of the people in a country where only a slight opposition could be made by the earlier inhabitants. The less powerful chief of the two would naturally desire to reside at a considerable distance from his competitor, and thus a new tract of country would be taken possession of. About six generations ago a practice was introduced of dividing each tribe into three sections, by the elevation of a third son to power, with the title of representative of the ancients. But it was not generally adopted until Gaika, about the beginning of the present century, gave it his countenance, since which time this custom has been almost universally followed by the Amaxosa, so that the number of petty chiefs and little clans is now very great.

The Kaffir of the coast region is a model of a well-formed man. In general he is large, without being corpulent, strong, muscular, erect in bearing, and with all his limbs in perfect symmetry. His skull is shaped like that of a European; but here the resemblance ends, for his colour is a deep brown, and his hair is short and woolly. His intellectual abilities are of no mean order, and his reasoning powers are quite equal to those of a white man. He is haughty in demeanour, and possesses a large amount of vanity. For anything approaching frivolity he has a supreme contempt. The men are handsomer than the women, which is owing to the difference in their mode of living.

Their language is rich in words, and is musical in expression, owing to the great number of vowels used. With very few exceptions the syllables end in vowels. In structure it differs greatly from the languages of Europeans. The inflections take place at the beginning, not at the end of words. Thus the plural of indoda, a man, is amadoda, men; of umfazi, a woman, is abafazi, women; of isikali, a weapon, is izikali, weapons. And so with every part of speech which is capable of being inflected. This difference is, however, a slight one, when compared with the changes which the other parts of speech undergo to make them harmonize in sound with the principal noun in the sentence. According as the noun commences with a particular syllable, so the first syllable of the adjective, the verb, the adverb, and even the preposition, must be altered to agree with it in sound. Only the root syllables of these parts of speech remain the same in all combinations.

Kaffir words are in most instances combined together to form sentences in such a way that they cannot be separated from each other as English words are. What appears in writing to be only one word, is often really three or four, but as in another combination these would change their positions, and as very frequently a single letter represents a word, it would create much greater confusion to separate them than to write them as one.

There is no difficulty whatever in expressing any ideas in the Kaffir language. The present infinitive of any verb can be transformed into an abstract noun. The numerals are as complete as is necessary for any calculation. Adjectives proper are not numerous, but their place is supplied by abstract nouns; as if we should say, a thing with goodness, instead of, a good thing. The adjective follows the noun, as abantwana bane, children four, izinto zine, things four.

The language of the Amaxosa contains three clicks, which are now represented in writing by the superfluous letters c, q, and x. These clicks are easily sounded separately by Europeans, the c by withdrawing the tongue sharply from the front teeth, the q by doing the same from the roof of the mouth, and the x by drawing the breath in a peculiar way between the tongue and the side teeth; but they generally prove an insurmountable difficulty to an adult who wishes to learn to speak the language. By such a person a syllable commencing with a click can only be sounded as a distinct word with a considerable interval of time between it and the one before it. European children, however, readily learn to speak it fluently.

The women do not always use the same words as the men, owing to the custom called ukuhlonipa, which prohibits females from pronouncing the names of any of their husband’s male relatives in the ascending line, or any words whatever in which the principal syllables of such names occur. Owing to this custom, in many instances almost a distinct dialect has come into use. (This custom is referred to in a note to follow the Story of Tangalimlibo.)

Before the advent of the white man, the Kaffirs knew nothing of letters or of any signs by which ideas could be expressed. Their history is thus traditional, and cannot be considered authentic beyond four or five generations back. There are numerous old men in every clan who profess to be acquainted with the deeds of the past, but their accounts of these seldom correspond in details beyond a period of about a century and a half. The genealogy of the great chiefs even, as given by them, is not the same beyond the time of Sikomo, the eighth in order from the present one, while with regard to minor chiefs considerable confusion exists two or three generations later.

They know of no other periods in reckoning time than the day and the lunar month, and can describe events only as happening before or after some remarkable occurrence, such as the death of a chief. The different seasons of the year are indicated by the rise in the evening of particular constellations, to which, as well as to several of the prominent stars and planets, they have given expressive names.

Until European clothing was introduced, the dress of the Kaffirs was composed of skins of animals formed into a square mantle the size of a large blanket, which they wrapped about their persons. The skin of the leopard was reserved for chiefs and their principal councillors alone, but any other could be used by common people. Married women wore a short leather petticoat at all times; in warm weather men and children went quite naked. No covering was ordinarily worn on the head, though a fillet, intended for show, was commonly bound round it, and a fantastic head-dress was used by the women on certain festive occasions.

They are fond of decorating their persons with ornaments, such as shells, teeth of animals, and beads, used as necklaces, copper and ivory rings on their arms, etc. They protect their bodies from the effects of the sun by rubbing themselves all over with fat and red clay, which makes them look like polished bronze. Their clothing is greased and coloured in the same manner.

They live in villages, large or small according to circumstances. Their habitations consist of hemispherical huts formed of strong wickerwork frames thatched with reeds or grass; they are proof against rain or wind. The largest are about twenty-five feet in diameter, and seven or eight feet in height in the centre. They are entered by a low, narrow aperture, which is the only opening in the structure; their interior is smoky and dirty, and not seldom swarms with vermin. The villages are usually in situations which command a good view of the surrounding country.

The Kaffirs are warlike in disposition and brave in the field, though when fighting with Europeans they seldom venture upon a pitched battle, owing to their dread of firearms. Their weapons of offence are wooden clubs with heavy heads, and assagais or javelins. The assagai (a corruption of a Portuguese word derived from the Latin hasta) consists of a long, thin iron head, with both edges sharp, and terminating in a point, and is attached by thongs to a slender shaft or rod. Poising this first in his uplifted hand and imparting to it a quivering motion, the Kaffir hurls it forth with great force and accuracy of aim. The club is used at close quarters, and can also be thrown to a considerable distance. Boys are trained to the use of both these weapons from an early age. Before the introduction of firearms the Kaffir used a shield to defend his person. It was made of ox-hide stretched over a wooden frame, and varied in size and pattern among the clans.

The warriors are formed into companies under their respective chiefs, and are not divided into regiments of about the same number. A battle between Kaffirs consists of a series of individual encounters, in which the bravest combatants on each side challenge each other by name, and when one falls, another is called upon by the victor to take his place. The height of ambition is to be mentioned in one of the rude chants which the bards, whose principal employment is to sing the praises of the chief, compose on the occasions of festivals, and to hear one’s name received with applause. The brave wear on their heads the feathers of the blue crane, which are given to them by the chief as tokens of distinction, and which no one else is permitted to wear (except a single individual at a peculiar ceremony which will be referred to in a note upon the custom of ntonjane).

Horned cattle constitute their principal wealth, and form a medium of exchange throughout the country. Great care is taken of them, and particular skill is exhibited in their training. They are taught to obey signals, as, for instance, to run home upon a certain call or whistle being given. In former days every man of note had his racing oxen, and prided himself upon their good qualities as much as an English squire does upon his blood horses. Ox racing was then one of the institutions of Kaffirland, and was connected with all kinds of festivities.