Shona and Ndebele History And Traditions

Zambezia : New British Possession in Central South Africa

2011-10-27T14:21:00.000-07:00

Author: E. A. Maund

Source: Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society and Monthly Record of Geography,

New Monthly Series, Vol. 12, No. 11 (Nov., 1890), pp. 649-655

Published by: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of

British Geographers)

PROCEEDINGS OF 1ST ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY AND MONTHLY RECORD OF GEOGRAPHY.

A VIGOROUS spirit of commercial enterprise is now busily opening up that rich territory of Zambezia so long traversed by our explorers and ivory hunters, and which only so lately was declared "within the sphere of British influence." The British South Africa Company, empowered by royal charter, will in the immediate future find occupation, homes, and probably riches for thousands of our overteeming population, who are ever eager to colonise, when, as in the present instance, so promising a land is brought within their reach.

Five years ago Sir Charles Warren's expedition opened up the grazing farms of Bechuanaland as a new field for emigration. This has since glown into a thriving crown colony with two fast growing towns, Vryburg and Mafeking, and a railway in construction to traverse it. Matabeleland was then a terra incognita, difficult and dangerous to approach. Ignorance created these illusions, which a more intimate acquaintance has now happily dispelled. The telegraph is fast connecting us with nearly a thousand of our countrymen, gone in to prospect and settle in this once far-off Matabeleland. They are now about Mount Wedsa, at the head of the Sabi river, a locality for years much coveted by trek Boers, as the rich valleys there afford splendid farming opportunities.* There is now an organised post and coach communica-

* Read at the Geographical Section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, Leeds Meeting, on Sept. 5th last.

* Since the reading of this paper, the above mentioned expeditionary force has arrived at Mount Hampden, lat. 17° 35', long. 31° 22', without let or hindrance from the Matabele. The occupation of Mashonaland is therefore an accomplished fact. Mount Hampden is, we are informed, to be the headquarters of the Company for administrative purposes. The natives have heartily welcomed the white man; and reports from the experts show that the auriferous nature of the country has not been overrated; indeed the richness of the country traversed by this pioneering expedition, both in gold and farm lands, caused many of its members to wish to settle long before reaching the objective point, Mount Hampden, and many prospecting parties from the Transvaal and Cape Colony, are now fast trekking for this New Eldorado.-E. A. M.

tion with Kimberley; and Gu-Bulawayo, the king's chief kraal, is actually within thirty days of London.

I wish to draw the attention to this territory of Zambezia, so quickly being developed, of those who have few opportunities of reading the Royal Geographical Society's reports, and who rarely see our instructive, but too quickly pigeon-holed blue-books.

Of course, many of those forming the Mashonaland pioneering party are fresh to African travelling experiences, and consequently may form and give adverse opinions on the country. It is, however, a splendidly equipped expedition, responsible positions being held by good men, capable of sound judgment men, too, who have been, seen, and think it good enough to go again. For years past, unfortunately, there harre been those who, vhen they got down country, from what used to be the "interior," loved to pose as heroes by accounts of the dangers and difficulties they had gone through, and it was this foolish way of mountainising molehills which retarded many frozn going to see for themselves.

Matabele Land, which lies between 16° and 229 S. lat. and 27° and 33°E . long., is the most promising country for colonisation in South Africa, lying high, generally healthy, rich in minerals and soil, and sparsely populated. The people are not half so black as they are painted (I mean in character). Notwithstanding all their malicious reports to the contrary, the king and people have kept to their promises of friendship to the English, given, when their headmen came to England last year, to see if we were more respectable than the Boers made us out to be.

Lobengula has allowed the construction of a road on to Mount Hampden,a t the sources of the Mazoe river, which, passing the Lundi river at 20½° S. lat., goes on via Mount Wedsa to open up MashonaLand; he even sent his Indunas to greet the expedition now passing through his territory. Of course savages are proverbially fickle, but the chartered company are now in a position, should it ever be to protect their necessary, working parties from the much overrated Matabele hordes.

The country domillated by the Matabele (I cannot say governed) is as big as Germany, and very thinly populated; While the actual territory occupied by them is very small, and would comparea about as does Bavariato the German Empire. They rule from this centre much as the Roman military colonies did in barbarian however, Europe, without, the same civilising influence. Their kraals occupy the plateau forming the watershed between the Zambezi and risers, the Crocodile which varies between four and five thousand feet above sea-level. It is unnecessary to dwell here upon the Matabele nation, whose history has been one of bloodshed since their exodus from Zululand, and who still live under a military despotism of the worst kind. The terror of their assegais reaches beyond the Zambezi, while witchcraft claims many a victim along their own kraals. No better illustration can be given of these horrors than the sinister name of Lobengula's head kraal, Gu-Bulawayo, which means, " The place of killing."

We have now gone among them not as judges, but to change all this killing and slavery by civilising influences; for we should not ourselves forget that, though it may be three-hundred years since we burned bishops and tortured for religion, yet it is actually as late as the eighteenth century that we burned a witch in Perthshire.

It is with reference to the country where the Matabele chief kraals are situated that I would now speak, as during visits in 1885 and 1888, as well as during several lnonths' stay with the king this and last year,I have had the chance of mapping and prospecting this distriet. It will also give some idea of what England is now busily opening up. Witchcraft so terrorises the people that many were the amusing stratagems I had to have recourse to in obtaining angles from the hill-tops. Their confidenee in me, after bringing their Indunas safe home again from their wondrous voyage, was often rudely shaken. " Maundi must be a bit of a tagati (witch) when his sextant brought down the sun," and they were very doubtful whether shooting a kraal with a prismatle compass might not keep the rain off the cornfields in its vicinity. The rains, however, were particularly heavy this year; in the neighbourhood of Bulawayo no less than 40 inches of rain were measured during the months of November, Deeember, January, and February. Like all tropieal rains they are not eontinuous, but eome on in terrifieally heavy thunderstorms, with hot sunshine between. For several weeks before the rains actually fall the clouds bank up and threaten. Then is the king busy with his witch-doctors, making fell potions to eharm the clouds to break. One sees him anxiously gazing at every heavy cloud, for the people come in from all parts to beg rain from him, " their rainmaker," for their parched grounds. And many is the laugh I have had with him on the subject when, after a heavy rain, the people come to "bonga" (praise) him. Great then is his good humour, but he is far too shrewd to be a believer in his own powers in the rain-making line.

The months of September and October, before the rains, are the hottest in the year. All vegetation appears to be burnt up, and the country has a dreary aspect. Cattle grow thin, and the vast herds are sent off low down the rivers to find grass and water. In September I have registered a maximum in the shade ranging between 105° and 111° F.; but the atmosphere is so dry that one does not feel it; 85° near the sea coast, with the air saturated with moisture, being comparatively much hotter. The evenings and tnornings are delightful, and at an elevation of 4000 feet the heat is not enervating, in fact we used to play lawn tennis through it, much to the antlsement of the natives. During the winter months, May, June, and July, it is often very cold at night in these highlands. Even on the Macloutsie river, at elevations under 3000 feet, I have known 15° of frost at night, with the thermometer ranging over 80° in the day, as measured by instruments registered at Kew.Mealies put in soak for the horses over-night have been frozen nearly solid in the morning. Notwithstanding this great variation in temperature, this season is particularly healthy. Trek oxen suffer from the dryness of the grass and cold; so do the poor unclothed natives, who do not thaw out until the sun has well aired the day. The climate is, however, well adapted to the Anglo-Saxon, who can work all the year round in it. There are Englishmen who have lived up there for the last 15 or 20 years. And what is more essential for good colonisation, white children thrive well, some of the missionaries and traders having reared large families. Of course, low down the river banks, during the rainy season, one expects to find fever,as in every new country, but houses built a few hundred feet above the river avoid any such danger.

The Matabele corn-land principally lies in the district embraced by the map accompanying this paper, and when the clouds begin to bank they begin to pick, for as yet the king sets his face against ploughs. Sowing goes on in October and November, and after the first rains it is marvelous the rapidity with which the grass and corn grow. The russet brown country changes suddenly to an emerald green, and the grassland, which is good and abundant, and forests are ablaze with flowers of every hue. Those so soon to have farms up there will assuredly choose this season when wishing to effect a land sale. Harvesting goes on in May and June, and much of the corn is soon turned into Kaffir beer, the national drink, while a good deal is traded for coloured cotton and beads. Kaffir corn was traded last year for five-shillings' worth of goods per sack, but mealies were more difficult to buy. There is a great future in the corn as also in the cattle trade for this country. As I have mentioned, during the winter, or dry season, the cattle are sent off the plateau down the rivers, as higher up the water only remains in pools,the rains being so heavy that they run off quickly into deep channels; but by judicious storage of this rain supply vast tracts might be irrigated, while springs are numerous and only want opening up. In the Gu-Bulawayo district the soil is very deep and rich. Anything and everything seems to grow and flourish. At Shiloh, where Mr Thomas, a missionary, nonv dead, led on water from a spring, and made a large garden, I reaped and thrashed out several sacks of excellent English wheat. I planted potatoes too, which gave a very good crop. Cabbages, carrots, onions, marrows, beans, peas, cucumber,tomatoes, and lettuce also throve well. In fact, all Europeans vegetables, as well as sweet potatoes and mealies, grew very quickly in this irrigated ground. The rivers are generally in beds too deep to run the water off except at great expense; but windmill pumps, nuriyas, and dams could be utilised. With the aid of water, almost any fruit seems to flourish. From the same garden, we enjoyed a large crops of oranges,lemons,figs, grapes, bananas (or rather plantains), peaches, apricots, pomegranates, mulberries,and Cape gooseberries. The date-palms and apple-trees, though growing well, were too young to bear. The orange and lemon trees grow luxuriantly and fruit well. So too do the figs. There were beautiful groves of them in this missionary's garden. The vines grown over high trellised alleys also bore a great deal of lescious fruit. The white ant is the gardeners enemy, but luckily he seems to prefer the sandy soil to the rich loams. Many will be the splendid market gardens by and by to supply the mining centres. The Matabele women are the labourers. One sees during the picking season long rows of girls often with a queen among them, keeping time with their mattocks to a not unmelodious chant. Great quantities of excellent tobacco are grown by the Mashonas and Makalakas, that grown at Inyoka, of which the king receives a yearly tribute, being considered the best. It is principally converted into snuff. The rice grown in Mashona Land is excellent, and cost last year about eighteen shillings' worth of goods par sack. The grass, corn, rice, tobacco, and gardening capabilities of this country are sufficient allurements for farming colonists, while undoubtedly it would produce coffee and sugar. Cotton and india rubber we know it produces in the north, as the Mashonas weave blankets of the former, and make candles of the latter. Indigo grows as a weed, and is used by the Mashonas for dyeing their homemade blankets.

Farmers have to combat lung sickness among cattle and that terrible scourge horse-sickness. Inoculation and quarantine laws will stamp out the former The natives now inoculate for lung-sickness, a treatment which is very successful, but they do not understand closing infected districts. For horse-sickness a specific has still to be found. It comes on yearly after the rains. In good years one per cent perhaps will die, whereas in a bad season like the last one a high percentage succumb. I lost eleven horses out of thirteen in a week. A " salted horse," or one which has gone through the sickness and therefore is supposed to be proof against it, will cost you 50l.o r 60l., whereas a very serviceable horse can be bought for 10l. down country.

Matabele Land is well wooded, though the timber is not large. The mopani, a hard-wood capable of withstanding white ants, is useful for buildng and firewood, while its bark tans excellent leather. Until coal is found nearer than the Zambezi valley there is a good and sufficient supply fbr miIling purposes.

It is to the mineral riches, however, that we must look for the quick development of this country. The gold in MashonaLand will, I believe create a " rush" only to be paralleled in the derelopment of California and the Western States of America. In the accompanying map no less than twenty reefs will be seerl marked, which, as far as the suspicious natives would allow, I prospected. In some of these we found free gold, and colour in the water courses below them. Old workings,too, were visible, which shows that at one time this quartz was worth working, even with crude appliances. There is a banket formation similar to that in the Transsaal in this district. While north of the Ramaquoban river the Charter Prospectors found a large body of reef which returned as much as 2 oz. of gold to the ton. These riches running among and even through the Matabele kraals must for the present lie undeveloped. The rich gold reefs in MashonaLand have been written and talked about for the last twenty years, and below Mount Hampden alluvial deposits are known to exist. This poor man's gold-field the Company has now sent experts to develop. It is from this Mazoe and Hanyani district that the natives bring gold-dust in quills for sale to the white men, notwithstanding the known penalty of death they risk in the traffic. But all this we will hope is now changed. The natives know that the white man will have the gold where it is known to exist, and they have wisely made the best of the situation by putting themselves in the hands of a strong company countenanced by the Great White Queen, who will befriend and not dispossess them.

From numbers of natives who yearly go from here to find work in Johannesburg and Kimberley, the people generally have learned that it is better to have the benefits arising from these mines nearer their own homes. Hence the mass of the working population are in favour of the white man crushing their quartz, and thus saving them 800 miles tramp southwards.

The Makalakas and Mashonas, the original inhabitants of the country, though physically much inferior to their masters, the Matabeles, are clever and willing workers. They fashion the hematite iron, in which mineral the country is particularly rich, into a variety of objects, principally, however, at present into assegais. The copper, too, in the country was formerly smelted by them, as is evidenced by old copper workings I have seen.

Where once the Matabele learn the benefits and freedom to accrue from the white man's rule they will soon, I believe, work as well as the Zulus in Natal. If, however, they will not change the assegais for the pick and the plough, then gradually they will disappear beyond the Zambezi before the inevitable march of civilisation; and from among the downtrodden Mashonas and Makalakas we shall find plenty of labour for both mines and fields.

It is strange that this country, so long reputed to be rich in gold and other minerals, of which Baines wrote twenty years ago as being the Land of Ophir,should until now have baffled our colonising instincts. The work, however, has now begun under the most favourable auspices. The administration of Zambezia is already organised,law and order will reign wherever the Chartered Company penetrate. The revolvers bowie knife, and spirit saloon will there have no place. Gold laws are framed, and the ivory-giver, the elephant, will now be preserved instead of exterminated. Raiding and slavery must cease; and Christianity will spread where hitherto the missionary's labours have been well nigh fruitless.

We English colonise native territories to make them pay. We know that "a strong executive means order," and that stirring up native strife only necessitates costly expeditions. Slavery it is our ambition to abolish. So, too, we suppress the liquor traffic as breeding infinite troubles. Bechuana Land is a happy example of what can be done in this line. Khama's people are rapidly becoming civilised, and afford a good market for our goods. The greed for gold will always overcome climatic difficulties.

Matabele and Mashona Lands 1891

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Here is another interesting article on the Shona and Ndebele of Zimbabwe life in early 19th century.

Author(s): E. A. MaundSource: Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society and Monthly Record of Geography,New Monthly Series, Vol. 13, No. 1 (Jan., 1891), pp. 1-21Published by: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute ofBritish Geographers)

PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY AND MONTHLY EECOED OF GEOGRAPHY. On Matabele and Mashona Lands. By E. A. Maund. (Read at the Evening Meeting, November 24th, 1890.) Map, p. 64. Afrioa, with its many fascinations, bas monopolised much of the world's attention in 1890. Enterprise has been stimulated into fresh activity. Pioneers as intrepid as those of the sixteenth century have proved the commercial value of the " interior," which has been little better than a dream for the past three centuries. European Powers have carved up the sunny continent and painted its map with their own colours. A library of information has been compiled, and yet I would still draw your overtaxed attention to a region so long fabled as the seat of an ancient splendour and magnificence: the site from which " They fetched gold four hundred talents to King Solomon," which Milton " thought Ophir," where Moorish tradition supposed Sheba's queen ruled in luxury. The secret of this intensely interesting country, with its numerous pre-historic remains, now bids fair soon to be unlocked. Archaeologists are to have a rare treat in solving the oft-disputed problem as to the origin of these extensive ruins. Though stone-lore may prove this ancient and mythical civilisation to have been Phoenician, yet we know that the mediaeval Monomotapa or Benamatapa, the modern Matabele and Mashona Lands, was an empire rich in gold when Henry VIII. ascended our throne; whose " Great Lord" ruled many kings from his capital Zimbaoch (probably the ruined Zimbabye). Experts may now soon piece up a history by excavation, but at best it will be to show us a sad decadence from an ancient civilisation to a modern savagedom. This glorious country of Zambezia?so long speculated on, now speculated in, so oft traversed by our explorers and hunters, the scene of heart-breaking labours by our missionaries?is now being sys- tematically opened up, not by armed intervention, but by the vigorous epirit of commercial enterprise. With the last decade of this century will begin a new history of civiiisation in this famous forgotten land. The British South Africa Company, empowered by Royal charter, will there find employment, homes and riches for thousands of our over-teeming population, and the place of ruins will again become the support of a mighty empire.

Only five years ago Sir Charles Warren's expedition opened up Bechuana-land as a new field for emigration. This has rapidly grown into a thriving Crown colony, supporting an increasing English and Dutch population, and raising large herds of cattle; thus proving how absolutely unreliable previous reports about this country had been.

It has now two fast-growing towns, Vryburg and Mafeking, and a railway quickly constructing, already complete to Vryburg, which will be the trunk line from Capetown to the northern goldfields, having connections eastward, via Malmani and Johannesburg, with Delagoa Bay and Natal, and westward, via Shoshong, with the rich cattle country of Ngami-land, and passing on via the Victoria Falls to the Barotse, who now ask for our protection.

The telegraph has now passed through and beyond Bechuana-land, linking us with many of our adventurous countrymen already settled in the country dominated by the Matabele, so long deemed dangerous of approach.

Those of us who have been into that desirable country have always looked upon Bechuana-land as only a stepping-stone to the fairer land beyond; and we must remember that it is no further from our present base than was Kimberley from Capetown when the first diamond was found. This unknown " interior " was long erroneously thought to be fever-stricken and uncolonisable, a delusion which better acquaintance has dispelled, and the discovery of vast gold deposits will sooner or later develop a " rush " that will make light of distance, and that no climatic difficulty will deter. The cost of transport for this new northern gold- field, by the southern trunk line with its narrow gauge, would enor- mously reduce the profits. We are soon, however, to tap our new colony from the east coast. Beira, at the mouth of the Pungwe river, the route to which has already been prospected, is scarcely more than 250 miles from the mines, 70 miles of which can be done by water. The rest will not take long to connect up by railway. It is needless to demonstrate the advantages of this route over that to Capetown, which is at least 1800 miles. In America, the railway went first, and the development of the country quickly followed. Let us take a leaf from their book.

The principal physical feature noticeable in Bechuana-land and extending to tbe high veldt plateau of the Matopo range, is a series of vast sand-belts running east and west, varying in breadth from a few thousand yards to 50 miles, and in elevation, the crest above the trough, from a few feet to several hundred. These belts carry good grass and bush with camel-thorn trees, the bush being invariably thickest on the crest, but necessarily lack a surface water-supply. This marked feature extends, with a few accidental variations caused by the outcropping of granite, limestone, and basaltic hills, probably from Namaqua-land and Damara-land on the west to theBasuto Transvaal and Mashona Mountains on the east, and beyond the Zambezi northwards.

The cause of these mysterious sand-belts suggest a problem in physical geography which must be left to geology to decide. They must have been raised in their present wave-like formation either by the aid of water or by a constant and powerful wind. The theory that this part of Africa was an elevated basin, which has gradually drained Zambeziward, is the most acceptable, as in the greatest depression about Lake Ngami and along the fertile valley of the Chobe there is still abundance of water. The continual washing backward and forward of the water has disintegrated the old red sandstone upper crust, and left the red sand in this formation like, on a small scale, the sand-ridges left on our sea-shore by the receding tide; while the kopjes of granite, which all have one form, stand out like rocks at low water.

These kopjes are rocky hills, with the summits apparently denuded, leaving a flat table-top with short cliff-like edge, the debris having fallen in slopes at an angle of 45 degrees, as though crumbled off as the tide fell. Beneath the sand formation is generally to be found a lime? stone sedimentary crust, which in the Kalahari undoubtedly preserves the water underneath from evaporation. Thus at a fountain near Yryburg, between Motito and Takoon, 20 feet beneath the surface there is a running stream 57 feet deep, doing no good to the soil, simply because it wants man, aided by science, to prevent its thus running to waste. The sandstone conglomerates at Kanje and Molopololi, and the banket formation in Matabele-land, were possibly formed by infiltration during this water age. The results of its energetic action is seen in the Matopo range, where you find hills formed of a single block of granite, looking in the distance like our Downs, but on closer inspection this gentle slope is rounded off and polished by the action of the sand- laden water. Detrition has made it as smooth as the shingle-pebbles on our shores. These hills are a favourite haunt of baboons, as immediately they are disturbed they seam per over the steepest and roundest hills, where you cannot follow them. There is apparently no glacial actions, but moulins I have frequently found of all sizes in the smooth surface, often with the rounded boulder in situ. Indeed, for a long time, until I found them large and the boulder there, I had taken them for old Mashona mills, either for crushing corn or quartz, and subsequently I found these people do utilise the smaller for the former purpose. Geologists now by a closer examination will doubtless come across fossils in the limestone crust and sand, which will decide the question as to there having been a large lake since dried up, or one gradually run off, owing to a breach having been made through the

outer rim by some convulsion where the Zambezi now flows out. This lake theory was a favourite speculation of Livingstone.

With regard to the vegetation being thickest on the crest of the belts, I can only suggest that whatever moisture falls, quickly finds its way to the valleys ; consequently the grass grows more luxuriantly there. The grass in these valleys, after good rains, is often 4 to 6 feet high, and, as the natives yearly burn the grass when it is driest, it naturaliy follows that the fire is fiercer in the bottoms than over the crest, where grass is sparse from lack of moisture. Bush and trees perish in the dells, but live through the ordeal above, and often ulti- mately become so thick as to be impenetrable.

It is on the high veldt among the Mashona hills that the rich reefs lie, once so well worth working in pre-historic times, as is evidenced by the old workings to be found all over the country; while the rich watered valleys, from whose streams the natives now wash their quills- full of gold, are capable of raising crops. and feeding cattle for the support of a large European population.

Before going into details I would draw your attention to the map of Matabele-land and Mashona-land. It practically lies between the parallels of 16? and 22? S. lat. and the meridians of 27? to 33? E. long., and is certainly the most promising country for colonisation in South Africa. Compared with the country south of it, Matabele-land is like Canaan after the wilderness. Lying high, generally healthy, and very rich in minerals?gold, copper, and iron having been extensively worked by the ancients with their rude appliances. Its numerous rivers are either run? ning, or have plenty of water in them. The soil is rich and admirably adapted for corn; cattle thrive, and there is an abundance of grass and wood. White children can be reared in the country, which is a sine qua non if it is to be successfully colonised by white men; and, above all, it is sparsely populated.

The country dominated by the Matabele is nearly as large as Germany, while the territory actually occupied by them is very small, and would compare about as Bavaria does to the German Empire. Their kraals occupy the plateau forming the water-parting between the Zam? bezi and the Crocodile rivers. They are a Zulu military organisation, occupying a rich country which they have depopulated, and live under a despotism of the worst kind. The population may be estimated at about 150,000, and has, from the incorporation of conquered elements, become a mixed people of Zulus, Bechuanas, Mashonas, and Makalakas. Their fighting strength is probably not over 14,000 to 15,000 men.

It is unnecessary here to dwell upon the history of the Matabele nation, which has been one of bloodshed since their exodus from Zulu-land under 'Mzilikazi about 1822; it was sixteen years later that they occupied Matabele-land. The terror of their assegais reaches beyond the Zambezi, while witchcraft claims many a victim amongst their kraals. Of their government little can be said, except that everything centres in the King. The secret of his power is on Louis XIV.'s principle, " L'etat, c'est moi." Everything is reported to him, from the death of a calf to the defeat of an impi. Their laws principally relate to witchcraft. One, however, relating to marriage, I am informed, many a married man in England would envy, namely, that mothers-in-law may not enter their son-in-law's house, and, should they meet in the street, they must avert their gaze.

The Matabele, however, have very much improved of late years, and I attribute it to their greater intercourse with white men, through their seeking work at the diamond and gold mines. There has been less raiding, though this will never cease until their organization is destroyed.

King Lo Bengula is by no means so black as he is painted (I mean in character). I must differ from those who say he is " deadly cruel." We must not judge him by our standard. He has to rule a turbulent people, who do not know the value of life. He is shrewd, possesses a wonderful memory, and has sufficient intuitive knowledge to despise many of the superstitions, of which, as rain-maker, he is the chief exponent. Speaking one day to me of killing, he said, " You see, you white men have prisons, and can lock a man up safely. I have not. What am I to do ? When a man would not listen to orders, I used to have his ears cut off as being useless; but whatever their punishment, they frequently repeated the offence. Now I warn them?and then a knobkerried man never repeats his offence." This, for a savage, was fairly logical. It may appear to us cruel; but remember how short a time it is since we hanged for sheep-stealing, and certainly the savage execution with the knobkerrie is not so revolting, and is less painful, than a civilised execution refined with electricity. A blow on the back of the head, and all is over. Lo Bengula is very hospitable to white men, and likes them always about him. He is, in my opinion, much more adapted to a farmer's life?being very fond of his cattle?than to ruling the crew he does. As a young man, he was a keen sportsman, but is now too grossly fat to get on a horse. Though his head kraal has the sinister name of " Gubulawayo," or the " place of killing," yet all that sort of thing has much toned down, and one sees little of such horrors. Lo Bengula is far too refined to ornament the approach to his kraal with human heads, as chiefs do further removed from civilisation. Notwithstanding all the malicious reports to the contrary, the king and people have kept to their promises of friendship to the English, and acted up to their engagements.

I first made Lo Bengula's acquaintance in 1885, when I was sent by Sir Charles Warren with Lieut. Haynes to advise him to keep on friendly terms with Khama, our ally, the chief of the Bechuana. In the next few years, after the craze in South Africa on the discovery of gold at the Randt, poor Lo Bengula was overwhelmed with concession- seekers. When I revisited him at Gubulawayo in 1888 in a private capacity, he sent for me one morning, and after confiding to me his fears of the Boers and Portuguese, and the doubts his people entertained of the power of England after the defeat at Majuba, asked me if I would take a letter from him and accompany two of his head men to England, to see if the White Queen still lived. These envoys, he said, would be " his eyes, ears, and mouth." Though I hesitated at first, I accepted the mission, and next day we started down country?Mr. Colenbrander (the interpreter), two naked old coloured men, that is the envoys, and myself. We gradually dressed the ambassadors on the road. I took them through the Transvaal, partly that they should be able afterwards to compare Boer power with our own, and partly owing to scarcity of water on the other route. By the time we arrived at Capetown, the two envoys apparently became devoted to clothes and delighted with civiiisation. What struck them most at Cape Town was the houses, reared story above story, and the juvenile wax figures in a clothier's window, which they refused to look at, and could not be induced to believe were other than dead children on show before buriaL On the passage to England they were never either sea-sick or home-sick, and enjoyed the voyage in what they called the floating kraal immensely. Soon after landing, through the kind efforts of Lady Frederick Cavendish and Lord Lothian, we went down to Windsor, and they saw the White Queen, who thoroughly won their hearts by her gracious reception. After a month spent in England, during which time they had ample opportunities of seeing England's greatness (for the authorities did all they could to impress them) we returned to the Cape.

On landing, one of these old men (their ages were 65 and 70, or older) showed signs of failing, and I feared I should not get him back to his home. However, in July last year, we arrived safely with the letters and presents in Matabele-land, being received on the frontier with mystic witchcraft rites to impress the nation. For months afterwards long palavers went on, and these old fellows gave the most minute descriptions of all they had seen, and very clever were many of their illustrations. Thus, describing the sea to the Indunas, they said it was like the blue vault of heaven at noon, and the floating kraal was as the sun in the centre ; the water was mostly thus calmly blue, the kraal being pushed through it by its steamer (engine) from behind. The sapient remark of Lo Bengula was, " How could such a vast iron kraal be sustained by tbe water, unless it had supports from the bottom, by which it was pushed along ? Truly these ' Makeeweh ' (white men) are the sons of the sea." Sometimes, the old men added, the sea was " full," i.e., like their boisterous rivers in the rainy season ; then, the floors and roofs of the kraal rocked till the white men danced. This rough sea was soon after passing the Portuguese gate (Lisbon), and refers to a gale in the Bay of Biscay ; but they could not understand how the Queen allowed the Portuguese to have a gate on her water leading to Capetown. London they described as the place all white men must come from; people, people everywhere, all in a hurry, serious of face, and always busy like the white ants. There was not room for every one above ground in this great kraal, for they could see men and horses moving in a stage below, just as they live in houses built one above the other (this referring to Holborn Viaduct). The fire-carriages, too (train), like those between Kimberley and Capetown, have to burrow in the earth under the streets for fear of being stopped by the crowd. The sham fight at Aldershot they described very minutely, and, in my hearing, old Babiaan, turning round to about thirty Indunas, said," Never talk of fighting the white man again. Aough ! They rise up line after line, always firing. Their little boys, the sons of head men, all learn to figbt like men (referring to Eton boys). Their generals corrected all faults; they won't pass a man who is out of time as they dance by in line coming from the fight (the march past)." Many a laugh we had over curious but always intelli? gent descriptions of their recollections. Above all, the interview at Windsor most impressed them, and the sight of Cetewayo's assegais in the corridors of arms there.

They told us they could see that all the kings and queens at Madame Tussaud's were those whom our present Queen had conquered, because last, and downstairs, came Cetewayo?and was not his assegai at the end of the corridor ? This idea we did not think it necessary to correct.

Much more could I tell you of their sayings, but the great result of their visit is what we should appreciate. I have no hesitation in saying that the recent peaceable occupation of Mashona-land by our party of pioneers is the direct outcome of the clever way in which these two old men told their tale, and the King disseminated it among his people.

The Queen did more good for the Empire by that kindly interview at Windsor, than could have been done by thousands of her soldiers. Had the same policy been followed in Zulu-land, how much trouble, how many brave lives, and what vast expenditure, might have been saved ! For the Zulu is our natural ally in South Africa-he admires us for our athletic tastes, manliness, and pluck.

Before I left Matabele-land this year, Lo Bengula had sanctioned the construction of a road by the Chartered Company to Mount Hampden, at the sources of the Mazoe, and had permitted two parties of prospec- tors to work between Bulawayo and Tati, thereby showing his faith in the power of the English, and his determination to act up to his engagements with them.

Let me now state why this country isso well adapted to colonisation. Unfortunately the few Europeans who have lived in what used to be the far " interior," have given us but meagre ideas of its capabilities; and some few, on coming down country, have loved to pose as heroes by accounts of the dangers and difficulties they have gone through. This has undoubtedly retarded the development of what we now know to be so profitable a land, capable of relieving our congested home population, and yielding us the much-needed increase of gold to push forward our commercial enterprises.

The country about to be opened up, for colonisation is, as you see, an extensive plateau, on the water-parting between the Zambezi and the Crocodile rivers. There are no great mountain peaks. To the east the slope of the land is abrupt and the country broken, many of the hills isolated and very conspicuous, while to the north-west it falls in gentle undulations. The plateau is furrowed by many considerable rivers, and their numerous tributaries. The climate in these highlands, which vary from 3000 to 5000 feet above sea-level, is far more healthy than the now well-colonised seaboard of South Africa. The seasons are well marked, and the rainfall good. For eight months, from April to November, the air is particularly dry and salubrious, and compares well with the Free State. During, and just after the rains one must be careful, as in all tropical climates. But with proper precautions dwellings placed high and above exhalations from the marshes left by the subsiding rivers, and above all a judicious abstinence from alcoholic drinks, the new mining and farming communities will be as healthy as are the missionaries who have lived so long there with their families.

Here let me pay a tribute to these silent workers, whose genial hospitality and kindly attention in case of sickness is bestowed on travellers throughout Africa. In Matabele-land as elsewhere they have been the pioneers of civilisation. A heartbreaking up-hill work has theirs been for the past thirty years among the truculent Matabele, and though their converts are few, their example is beneficial to whites and blacks alike. They have built comfortable brick houses, laid on water from brooks and springs, and irrigated gardens which show the capabilities of the soil. The King, it is true, is the only one at present who dares copy them; he has a large commodious brick house put up by their builder, he has too an irrigated garden after their pattern. Now, let us hope, their harvest will come, for with the advent of a white population the old order of things will quickly change in Matabele-land. The example of their health will also be an incentive to our countrymen to house themselves as quickly as possible, or we shall have direful stories of fever, simply resulting from a lack of those com- forts to which they have been used, and which up here will be a necessity.

During the last rainy season in the months of November, December, January and February, the rainfall in the neighbourhood of Buluwayo amounted to upwards of forty inches. Like all tropical rains they are not continuous, but come in terrifically heavy thunderstorms with hot sunshine between. At this time the King is very busy with his witch- doctors, rain-making; often painted with medicine charms in bands like a tiger, or making a dreadful concoction called by the traders " hell broth," to please his credulous people, who come to beg rain for their gardens.

The months of September and October, before the rains, are the hottest in the year. All vegetation appears dried up, and the grass lands are burned off by the natives. Cattle grow thin, and are sent off low down the rivers to find grass and water. The natives have, of course, no knowledge of how to store their generous rainfall. In September I have registered a maximum in the shade ranging between 105? and 111? F., but the atmosphere is so dry that it is more easily supported than 85? near the sea coast, where the air is saturated with moisture. The evenings and mornings are delightful, and on this high ground the heat is never enervating. During the winter months, May, June, and July, it is very cold at night in these highlands. Even on the Macloutsie river, at an elevation of 2500 feet, I have registered 15? of frost at night, with the thermometer ranging up to 80? in the day (observed with instruments registered at Kew). Mealies?that is, Indian corn?put in soak for the horses over night, have been frozen hard in the morning.

Notwithstanding this great variation in temperature, the dry season is particularly healthy. What, however, braces the white man withers up the unclothed native. Trek oxen suffer too from this cold, and the dryness of the grass. By these remarks I wish to convey the fact that with ordinary care this country is admirably adapted to colonisation by us Anglo-Saxons. Englishmen have lived up there for the last twenty-five years, and, what is more essential, traders and missionaries have reared large families. There is not the necessity for sending them home as with Indian children. Neither need men, as on the west coast, return home periodically, in order to recruit. Here they may make a permanent home.

The soil all along the rich valleys is very fertile, and large crops of mealies and Kaffir corn, pumpkins, sweet potatoes, tobacco, and even potatoes and tomatoes are grown by the natives, the two latter by the Makalakas. Sowing goes on in October and November, and after the first rains it is marvellous to note the rapidity with which the grass and corn grow. The country changes its russet-burnt garb as if by magic to one of emerald green, and grass land and forest are ablaze with flowers. Harvest time is in May and June, and much of the corn is soon turned into Kaffir beer?the national drink. There is a great future in the corn, as also in the cattle trade, for this country. Kaffir corn was traded last year for 5s. worth of goods per sack. As before stated, the rains are so heavy that they run off quickly into the lower reaches of the rivers, and in beds too deep to lead off the water, except at great expense; but by judicious storage of this rain supply, vast tracts might be irrigated. Springs are numerous, and only want opening up.

As an illustration of what can be done with this deep alluvial soil, I will instance a garden at Shiloh where Mr. Thomas, a missionary, now dead, led on the water from a spring. From it last year I reaped and threshed several sacks of English wheat, and got a very good crop of potatoes. Cabbages, carrots, onions, marrows, beans, peas, cucumbers, tomatoes, and lettuce also throve well. In fact, all English vegetables, as well as sweet potatoes and mealies, grew very quickly in this irrigated ground. Almost any fruit seems to flourish. From the same garden we enjoyed large crops of oranges, lemons, figs, bananas (or rather plantains), peaches, apricots, pomegranates, mulberries, and Cape goose- berries. The date palm and apple trees, though growing well, were too young to bear. The orange, lemon, and fig trees grow luxuriantly, and fruit well. There were beautiful groves of them in this missionary's garden. The vines, grown over trellised alleys, bore a great many and very heavy bunches of luscious grapes. The white ant is the gardener's enemy, but, luckily, he seems to prefer the sandy soils to the rich loams.

Great quantities of excellent tobacco are grown by the Mashonas and Makalakas, that coming as tribute from Inyoka being considered the best. It is principally converted into snuff. I bring for exhibition some which I brought home last year, together with Mashona pipes. The outside glaze is nicotine squeezed out in preparing the cones. It is very strong, but, faute de mieux, is not bad smoking; we, however, used to wash it in two waters and carefully dry it before smoking Lo Bengula smokes huge pipes of it all day long. The rice grown in Mashona? land is excellent, and cost last year about ISs. worth of goods per sack, while in Mashona-land it is now less than 12s. a bag, i. e. 230 lbs. We used to buy it from the natives in small bags like this, made out of bark; unfortunately, weevils have got into this sample. Cotton and indiarubber we know grow in the north, for the Mashonas weave blankets of the former and make candles of the latter. Indigo grows as a weed, and is used by the natives for dyeing purposes. The grass, corn, rice, tobacco, and gardening capabilities of this country are sufficient allurements for farming colonists, while undoubtedly it would produce cotton, sugar, and coffee.

Three scourges farmers have to combat: lung-sickness among cattle, horse-sickness, and the tsetse fly. The first is successfully treated by inoculation. Natives of course do not understand closing infected districts; but under the white man's laws this disease will undoubtedly be stamped out. For horse-sickness a specific has still to be found, and in the presence of the loss to South Africa arising from it, it would assuredly pay to enlist the services of European scientists. The tsetse fly, whose bite is so deadly to domestic cattle, will disappear with the game. The Transvaal, since the game has been so shot out, is now nearly free from this pest. The Mashonas dry and pound the fly, and give it to their dogs, a fly a day, as a safeguard against the effects of it.

Matabele-land is well wooded, though the timber is not large except along the rivers. The mopani, of which there are vast forests, is a hard wood, capable of withstanding white ants, and is useful for building and firewood, wbile its bark tans excellent leather. I have brought for the inspection of the meeting the skin of a koodoo and pieces of buffalo hide, tanned with it by a native. It is an excellent leather for veldt schoens, as the Boers'understandings are called. Until coal is found nearer than the Zambezi valley, there is a good and sufficient wood supply.

It is to the mineral riches, however, that we must look for the quick development of this country. The gold in Mashonaland, will, I believe, create a rush, only to be paralleled in the development of California and the western states of America. During the seven months I remained with the King after the return of his Indunas, I mapped, and as far as possible prospected, the immediate neighbourhood of his chief kraals. In some of the numerous reefs we found free gold, and old workings were frequently visible. There is, too, in this district a banket formation similar to that in the Transvaal; while north of the Bamaquoban river the Charter prospectors found a body of reef running as much as two ounces to the ton. It is not in this district, however, the Company has begun work ; but it is the Mazoe and Hanyani fields which are being carefully explored by a well-organized pioneering expedition. These northern gold-fields have been talked about for twenty years. From these rivers it is that the natives bring gold-dust in quills for sale to the white men. Mount Hampden tberefore was made the first objective point of the Company. The King sanctioned the making of a road, which is [now open to traffic; while from Fort Salisbury, six miles south of that mountain, the administration of Zambezia has begun, and a township is springing up. The journey thither, under the able command of Col. Pennefather and Sir John Willoughby, gives us some new geographical facts, which I am able to communicate to you to-night. It is far more satisfactory to be able to fill in a map with known physical features than simply to paint it with a proprietary colour.

Passing out of Khama's country, the British South Africa Company's expedition found a fair agricultural country, rising only 500 feet in the 150 miles between the Tuli and Lundi. The former river is 400 yards wide at the drift. Half a dozen new rivers, whose euphonious names I need not trouble you with, are reported as running south-east to the Crocodile. At first the road led through a bush and mopani feldt, while the latter 90 miles consists of grazing flats interspersed with granite and sandstone kopjes. It is sparsely populated by Makalakas and jjanyai who are tributary to LoBengula.

After the Lundi, the elevation gets sharper and the country more difficult; there is a rise of 1500 feet in less than 65 miles to the top of the Providential Pass, the only apparent pass (and that 8 miles long) leading from the low to the high veldt. At the Inkwe (? Tokwe) the height above sea-level is 2700 feet. This is a rapid river with water 50 yards wide and 3 feet deep, even in the dry season. The formation here changes from granite to slate, and the gold indications are very good. We are now among the ancient workings of Benamatapa, Monomotapa, or Quitave. Twelve miles east in the mountains are the grand ruins of its ancient capital, Zimbabye, or Zimbaoe. The many and vast remains of ancient buildings all point, from their propinquity to old workings, to an extensive gold industry, when the means of extraction were crude as compared with modern appliances. The country gra? dually rises into an undulating plateau ranging from 4500 to 5100 feet above sea-level, with park-like scenery, the eastern edge breaking away into rocky gorges, supply ing many tributaries to the Sabi. The water? parting between this river and the Zambezi's tributaries is often very narrow, 100 yards would sometimes only separate the streams running to the two basins. There are apparently no inhabitants on this plateau south of the Hanyani, so cruelly have Matabele assegais done their work.

The bush is thick and the land boggy at the head waters of these rivers, but beyond the Umfuli there are plains from which Mount Hampden rises, stretching away to the head waters of the Mazoe. The neighbourhood of Fort Salisbury is well wooded, and the petty tribal chiefs welcomed the English force, as promising them security. Prospectors are reporting favourably from all directions, and find old workings wherever they go.

There will be no lack of labour, for numbers of natives, who yearly go south to work will gladly save themselves the 800 miles' tramp, and work in the mines nearer home. The Makalakas and Mashonas, the earlier inhabitants of the country, though physically much inferior to their masters, the Matabele, are clever and willing workers. They fashion the iron, in which mineral the country is particularly rich, into a variety of objects, axes, knives, hoes, beads-principally, however, at present into assegais. When once the Matabele learn the benefits and freedom to accrue from the white man's rule, they will soon, I believe, work as well as their kinsmen, the Zulus of Natal. If, however, they will not change the assegai for the pick and the plough, then gradually they will disappear beyond the Zambezi before the inevitable march of civiiisation, and from the down-trodden Mashonas and Makalakas we shall find plenty of labour for both mines and fields.

It is strange that this country, so long fabled as the land of Opbir, and of which Baines and Mauch gave such accurate reports more than twenty years ago, should so long have baffled our colonising instincts.

With regard to these extensive ruins-not only at Zimbabwe, but all over the country- which have so long puzzled the curious from their inaccessibility, the mystery surrounding their origin is now soon to be cleared up by competent archaeologists, who are going out to investigate them. There can be little doubt that they were built for the smelting, and possibly the protection and storage of gold, copper, and other metals; but by whom ? I hear one competent authority say they are probably, from the style of building, Phoenician, another that they are Persian. Some Portuguese manuscripts and maps attribute them to the Moors, and they are certainly similar in style to old Moorish work in the northern hemisphere. There is, however, a Spanish manuscript account of a voyage to Malabar and the coast of Africa by Barbosa, cousin of Magellan, composed by himself in 1514 (translated and published by the Hakluyt Sooiety) in which he says:?" On entering this country of Sofala there is the country of Benamatapa, which is very large and peopled by Gentiles whom the Moors call Cafers. These are brown men. . . ? They carry swords in scabbards of wood bound with gold or other metals. They are men of war, and some of them are merchants. Leaving Sofala for the interior of the country, fourteen days' journey from it, there is a large town of the Gentiles which is called Zimbaoch, in which the King of Benamatapa frequently dwells, and from there to the city of Benamatapa there are six days'journey, and the road goes from Sofala inland towards the Cape of Good Hope. And in the said Benamatapa, which is a very large town, the King is used to make his longest residence; and it is thence the merchants bring to Sofala the gold which they sell to the Moors, without weighing it, for coloured stuffs and beads of Cambay, which are much used and valued amongst them, and the people of the city of Benamatapa say this gold comes from farther off towards the Cape of Good Hope."

This old evidence conclusively proves that the Portuguese had nothing to do with the erection of these buildings. It shows too that the Moors had not then occupied the country. Why should not these brown Gentiles, with their partial civilisation and splendour, have been a decayed remnant of some old Phoenician State ? Let the experts tell us. As I have said, these ruins are always found near gold workings. The buildings are all similar, though some are more substantial than others. I have carefully examined those at Tati and on the Impakwe river. They are built in the same way, of granite hewn into small blocks, somewhat bigger than a brick, and put together without mortar. In the base of both of these there is the same herring-bone course as at Zimbabye, though nearer the base of the wall. On remov- ing the rubbish inside we came upon what were evidently three large circular roasting floors, some five feet in diameter, formed of a kind of hard burnt fireclay, and slightly concave. There were also remains of slag about. The remains on the Impakwe are similar in construction, and are within fifty yards of the river. It was evidently an octagonal

Zimbabwe Ruins

tower. On the ground was a similar roasting floor, and there is much slag about, though I failed to find any quartz. The place was evidently divided up by party-walls. Mr. George Phillips, who was with Mauch when he discovered Zimbabwe told me this morning, that when he examined this ruin at Impakwe more than twenty years ago, the walls were then much higher; but it is a regular outspanning place, and is getting destroyed. On searching it then, he found beneath the debris a fire-clay pipe, about 18 inches long, with a thin bar of much oxidised copper in it.

Zimbabwe was discovered by Mauch in 1871. The ruins then were about 30 feet high, and the walls from 10 feet thick at the base to 7 feet on the summit. There were, too, stone beams projecting 10 feet from the wall, which were ornamented with a pattern of lozenge-shaped figures, separated by horizontal zigzag lines. You have recently read accounts of their great extent, and in the photographic slide I now show you see the walls with the herring-bone course near the summit. The ruins on the Lundi river may be those of Benamatapa, spoken of by Barbosa.

The description of these ruins given by Mauch, and now confirmed by the Charter's pioneers, agrees in many particulars with those given to the English public in Shakespeare's day. Purchas, in his ' Pilgrimage/ printed in London 1614, describing Benamotapa, says:?

"But to returne (and who will not returne) to the mines: There are other mines in the provinces of Boro and Quitieni, in which and in the Rivers is found Gold not so pure. The people are carelesse and negligent to get, and the Moores which traded with them, were faine to give wares in trust, with promise by such a time to pay them in Gold, and the people would not guile in their word " Other mines are in Toroa, wherein are those buildings which Barrius attributeth to some forren Prince, and I, for the reasons before alledged, to Salomon. It is a square fortresse of stone; the stones of marueilous greatnesse, without anie signe of morter or other matter to ioyne them. The wall fiue and twentie spannes thicke, the height not holding proportion. Over the gate are letters, which the learned Moores could neyther reade nor know what letters they were. There are other buildings besides of like fashion. The people call them, the Court, for an Officer keepes it for the Benomotapa, and hath charge of some of his women that are there kept. They esteeme them beyond humane power to build, and, therefore, account them the workes of Deuils; and the Moores which saw them said the Portugais Castles were no way to bee compared to them. They are fiue hundred and tenne miles from Sofala, Westward, in one-and-twentie degrees of Southerly Latitude, in all which space is not found one building Ancient or later; the people are rude, and build cottages of Timber."

Heylin, in his ' Cosmography,' published in 1656, gives a similar description, adding, they were "perhaps the work of some of the ^Ethiopian or Abassine Emperours when their power and Empire was at the highest." While Purchas suggests the "hieroglyphics" were "the old Hebrew Letters, which the Phoenicians of olde, and Samaritans to this day observe."

Millar, in his 'System of Geography,' published in 1782, also gives a graphic account of the ruins, and speaks of the characters written over the gate. These, let us hope, our archeologists will soon be able to unearth and decipher, for they would probably be tbe key to a long lost history. For three hundred years, then, we have had very accurate descriptions of these ruins. And so far from the Portuguese having had anything to do with them, we are distinctly told " the Portugals Castles were no way to bee compared to them."

It is also evident that these buildings were connected with the mining of a people whose history we have lost. It is beside the question whether they were the famed mines of King Solomon, or whether the Queen of Sheba reigned here over a mighty and industrious population. Suffice it for us, that we, with our engines and batteries, are about to make this rich country again disgorge the gold which has so long lain hidden around these pre-historic remains. The work has now begun under the most favourable auspices. The administration of Zambezia is already organised. The gold laws just promulgated give the most liberal terms. Confidence will reign wherever the Chartered Company penetrates. The horrors brought about by liquor saloons among a lawless community will there have no place. Baiding and slavery will cease when once we find paid occupation for the native. Chris? tianity will spread, and peace with prosperity will reign over a region where the most inhuman cruelties have been perpetrated for years.* *

Note on the Map -I would call attention to the great difference in longitude shown on the route from the Macloukie river, an affluent of the Limpopo, to Fort Salisbury to the north. According to Selous, the position of Mount Hampden is about 31? 18' E., but according to the route map of the expedition of the British South African Co. (which is made the basis of our map), Fort Salisbury is 31? 2', and being 8? miles to the S.E. of Mount Hampden, would make the latter about 30? 58J', or about 20' to the west of Selous' position. A curious confirmation of the above westerly alteration is given by Mr. Erskine in his journey to Umzila's, 1871-72 (E.G.S. 'Journal,' vol. xiv.), in dis- cussing the position of Zimbabye (the hill with the celebrated ruins). He says, on p. 45;?" Mr. Mauch's researches place these ruins within 42 miles of my calculated position when at Umzila's kraal, which was determined by several celestial observations by the stars and sun, to be in lat. 20? 23' S. and long. 32? 30' E. by dead reckoning ; about 25 miles to the east of the Sabi river. I neither heard anything of the ruins after repeated inquiries, nor of Mr. Mauch himself. I am therefore surprised to read in his account that he supposed himself only six days' walk from Sofala; whereas the natives informed me that I was at least eight days' walk distant from Sofala, Mr. Mauch being still to the westward of my position by his own account, i.e. west of the Sabi." On p. 46, Mr. Erskine continues:?" It is my opinion that Zimbabye is placed by Mr. Mauch at least 30 or 40 miles too far to the east; and that instead of being 164 miles from Sofala, it is distant about 200 nautical miles, as stated by the old geographers." Now the officers of the expedition place Zimbabye in 31? 6' E., while on Mr. Erskine's map it is given as 31? 40', a difference of 34 minutes, which is fairly approximate to the above-mentioned opinion of Mr. Erskine, viz. 30 or 40miles too far to the east;" and though none of these positions are strictly accurate, yet Mr. Erskine's remarks strikingly confirm the observations of the expedition. Neither Mr. Mauch nor Mr. Selous took any observations for longitude, I believe-[William Shawe, compiler of the map.]

Before the paper,

The Peesident said: In introducing to you Mr. Maund, the reader of the paper to which we are about to listen, I may mention that he was on the staff of Sir Charles Warren in 1885, and by Sir Charles Warren he was sent, with Lieut. Haynes, e.e., to the kraal of Lobengula for the purpose of conferring with that chief and getting him to respect the British protectorate over the chief Khama. In that object he entirely succeeded and obtained eventually great and deserved influence over the mind of Lobengula. From South Africa Mr. Maund transferred himself to North Africa, and there remained for two years. He returned from North Africa and went again into Lobengula's country. By that time, partly in consequence of the reports of Mr. Maund and his colleague, which were published in a Blue-book, there had been a rush of gold-seekers to Lobengula's country, and when Mr. Maund returned he found Lobengula not a little troubled by the many persons who wanted to get concessions out of him. Lobengula then had the happy idea of proposing to Mr. Maund that he should take charge of two of his principal chiefs, take them to England, and present them to the Queen. After some hesitation Mr. Maund accepted this proposal, took the chiefs to England, and did present them to the Queen. They returned and spread in their own country good reports of all that they had seen, and one result of Mr. Maund's efforts, and of those of his companion, has been that Lobengula has thus far been acting not only with the most perfect good faith, but in the most friendly manner towards the British.

After the paper,

Mr. Theodobe Bent : I am afraid I cannot give you very much information on the small data I have to go upon, because the photographs we have seen to-night do not give us very many architectural features. At the same time, I am sure I can join with everybody in feeling excessively grateful toMr. Maund for introducing to us a new feature in African exploration, i.e. that the archasologist has something to do with the South of Africa; and the photographs we have seen are extremely interestiDg, and if only we can find out the origin of these ruins, I am sure we shall contribute a great addition to arehseological lore. In the first place Mr. Maund has spoken of them as possibly Phoenician. Now of course it is a great temptation to talk of Phoenician ruins when there is anything like gold to be found in connection with them, but from my own personai experience of Phoenician ruins, I cannot say that they bear the slightest resemblance whatsoever. In the first place the earliest Phoenicians always built with large stones, and I have seen in the Persian Gulf mounds of blocks of stone of enormous size; passing on into the Mediterranean basin we there get in the earlier Phoenician remains stones of exceeding magnitude and similar masonry; but the Phcenicians, as they progressed in the arts of civiiisa? tion, invariably adopted the art of the people with whom they carried on their trade: Greek influence, Egyptian influence, Assyrian influence, and Roman influence so exercised themselves upon Phcenician art, that in the end their art was almost indis- tinguishable from that of the races with which they carried on trade. They were like ourselves, imitative, fond of trade, carried on commerce, but do not seem to have had the power of originating any artistic devices. Of course it is a speculation, but if it is the Land of Ophir it would be very nice indeed. I like speculations myself immensely, but I think it is the best thing to look upon them with caution. Nine speculations out of ten are wrong, but for the sake of the tenth it is best always to have speculations, and now that Mr. Maund has suggested one or two, I will bring forward my own speculation with regard to these ruins in Mashonaland. He alluded to the fact that somebody said they were Persian. I believe I am the originator of that idea. In the neighbourhood of Zanzibar, some little time ago, Sir John Kirk found some very interesting ruins, which on comparison turned out to be distinctly of Persian origin. In these buildings he found tiles and fragments of pottery, which correspond exactly with the tiles and pottery which are found in the rains of Eai and other Persian towns of the Sassanian dynasty in the neighbourhood of Teheran. Of course it is very curious, at any rate, to track the Persians to Africa at all. It seems a very long way to go for your origin, but if you have them in Africa, there is no reason why you should not bring them into Mashonaland ; but now before doing this it is necessary to turn to the pages of Persian history. The Sassanian dynasty came to its greatest zenith at the time of Kosroes II., usually called the Conqueror. This man carried his armies all through the then known world. He brought terror into the hearts of the Koman emperors in Byzantium. He turned, as we have it distinctly stated, the Eomans out of Arabia and Africa. Furthermore he collected an enormous amount of wealth. His empire was quite the largest the Persians ever had, therefore I think it is not going too far to say that the ruins in Africa, at Zanzibar and the neighbourhood, were probably of the time of the dynasty to which Kosroes II. belonged, and that Kosroes II. was the founder of a Persian empire in Africa.

We will now pass on to consider the photographs that Mr. Maund has placed before us this evening. Architecturally the only point that we could easily dis? tinguish was that geometrical pattern, the course of zigzag round the fort; I have examined one or two other photographs, and these also have geometrical patterns in courses, and of two of these I have photographs of my own, which gives you the exact parallel to those at Eai, near Teheran, in the old ruins which were built in the Sassanian dynasty; hence we seem now rather to have got a clue. This is my theory, and I can only give it for what it is worth, but it really does seem to me that we can reduce ourselves to very narrow limits. Almost immediately after the death of Kosroes II. the Persian empire split up. Before the Sassanian dynasty the Persian empire attempted nothing in the way of exploration in Africa; it was entireiy occupied with its own affairs, so that if they are at all Persian, it must be of that dynasty. But of course this theory is open to doubt, and I am perfectly certain that nothing definite will ever be found out about these forts until they are thoroughly dug out and investigated, when perhaps some inscription will be found that will prove that both Mr. Maund and I are quite wrong.

Mr. G. Phillips : I have lived in the country for the last six and twenty years and outlived all the Englishmen who went with me into that district. I consider the paper that Mr. Maund has read this evening perfectly true and accurate; the only thing that I am afraid of is the salubrity of the low part between the Manyami and Umfuli rivers. Next February and March will determine whether Englishmen can live there. Never an Engiishman has lived there yet. A few natives entered in 1868, and are still there, and a few in March 1870, the year Lobengula was made king of the Matabele, and are still thereabouts; but since then people have been careful to come out in November and go in again in April and May. When I was at the ruins in October 1871 I heard there were two white men close to the ruins of Zimbabye in a destitute condition. One of them was Mauch, with an American named Adam Kinders. Mauch told me they had found some ruins like those I had seen. I asked an old man at the ruins when they were built, and he replied they were built when the stones were soft, or so long ago that no one knew anything at all about it. From there to the westward there is a line of these ruins. A few miles distant is another tremendous ruin, with three gateways and walls, I suppose 30 feet thick at the base, and outside are great heaps of ashes, and a few potsherds. One ironwood tree, that wonld take hundreds of years to grow, had risen through the wall and split it. The most perfect ruin of all, however, is north-west of Tati; it is a little larger than this hall; the walls are 12 to 15 feet thick, and it is entered by a^passage so arranged as to be commanded by arches from the interior, and it only adrnits of the passage of one at a time. I came here just to speak, as Mr. Maund had particularly asked me to do so to-night,

The President: We have listened to a very interesting and valuable paper, and I am afraid that as Mr. Maund is still suffering a good deal from the results of his exploration, he has come here at no inconsiderable inconvenience to himself. I shall then, I am sure, take you all with me, if in your name I return to him our snost sincere thanks.

Mr. Maund thanked the meeting for listening so patiently to his paper, and the proceedings terminated.

Ndebele Raids Effect on Shona Power

2011-08-06T16:15:00.000-07:00

Ndebele Raiders and Shona Power

Author: D. N. Beach

Source: The Journal of African History, Vol. 15, No. 4 (1974), pp. 633-651

Published by: Cambridge University Press

FROM the twelfth to the nineteenth centuries the southern Zambezian plateau was dominated by the Shona-speaking peoples. Although the Portuguese influenced chiefs in the north during the seventeenth century, they did not destroy the basic Shona economic, social and political structure of the country. But the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries saw the permanent loss of Shona territory in the south-west and south-east to the Tswana and Tsonga-Hlengwe, as well asthe invasions of the mfecane period, when Nguni- and Sotho-speaking peoples crossed the plateau. The middle of the century saw two Nguni speaking dynasties established, the Ndebele under Mzilikazi in the southwest and the Gaza under Soshangane in the eastern highlands. Finally, in the 1890s, the whole country was claimed by the Portuguese and the British, the latter making a large-scale settlement under the control of Cecil Rhodes's British South Africa Company.

The precise extent and nature of Gaza influence upon the Shona has not been given much attention by historians, largely because the Gaza state moved bodily to the south-east in 1889. Although the Ndebele have been examined more closely, several factors have affected both the available evidence on the Ndebele relations with the Shona and the viewpoints of historians. Firstly, most European observers of Shona-Ndebele contacts were influenced by the fact that they approached the subject both literally and figuratively from the angle of the Ndebele state itself, which added to the preconceptions they already possessed.' Secondly, exaggerated estimates of the number, scope and brutality of Ndebele raids on the Shona were later used to justify the conquest of the Ndebele by the British South Africa Company in 1893.² Thirdly, Rhodes's claims to the Shona country were based upon an exaggeration of the extent of Ndebele power.³Fourthly, most accounts of Ndebele history after 1840 have tended to interpret the Ndebele in terms of their Nguni ancestry, ignoring the fact that the Ndebele state was a successor to the Shona-speaking Changamire Rozvi state, which influenced it in many ways. This article aims to place the impact of the Ndebele upon the Shona in perspective by relating the foundation of the Ndebele state to the Rozvi state it succeeded, and by showing how the balance of power between the Ndebele and the independent Shona changed during the nineteenth century.

The basic population of the area occupied by the Ndebele in the 1840s spoke the Kalanga dialect of Shona and was descended from the people of the Leopards Kopje culture, who occupied the area from about 1000.4 In the fifteenth century, people of the Zimbabwe culture moved west into the Kalanga country, and some time after 1450 the Torwa dynasty ruled over a state that was a successor to Zimbabwe, based on Khami. Some time between 1644 and 1683 the Torwa dynasty was succeeded by that of the Changamire Rozvi, whose main centres were the stone buildings of Danangombe (Dhlodhlo) and Manyanga (Tabazikamnambo).5 But although the Khami culture was a continuation of that of Zimbabwe,6 the Kalanga remained the basic population, and by the nineteenth century the Rozvi of the Changamire dynasty were speaking a variant of Kalanga.7 The dry environment of the southwestern plateau favoured cattle breeding, and from the earliest days of Kalanga settlement the economy of the area was strongly committed to the build-up of herds. In addition, until the early nineteenth century the goldfields of the area were in production on a reduced scale and the Torwa and Changamire dynasties exported gold and ivory to the Portuguese centres on the Zambezi and the coast in return for cloth and beads, as well as other articles.8

When, in the early nineteenth century, the migrations of Mpanga, Ngwana Maseko, Zwangendaba and Nyamazana, set off by the mfecane, struck the Changamire state, it was poorly prepared to stand the shock. Droughts, wars with the Karanga advancing from the north-east, Tswana raids, strife between the royal dynasty and the Mwari cult and civil wars within the dynasty had seriously affected the strength of a state that had earlier been one of the foremost military powers of southern Africa.9 By the early part of the nineteenth century the most important Rozvi families were grouped in a ring around the Changamire capitals of Danangombe and Manyanga east of the Bembesi river. West of the Bembesi, the Khami area was under a Kalanga sub-ruler, Ndumba.'0 The most serious split within the Changamire dynasty was between the houses of Miutinhima, a son of the Changamire Gumboremvura, and of Chirisamhuru, who was Changamire in the early 1830s.11 The Mutinhima faction occupied the Mulungwane hills and influenced a wide area east of the upper Lundi. Other Rozvi sub-rulers of the main dynasty were Lukuluba of the Ghoko hills, Rozani of the Vungu river, Swabasvi of the Somabula forest, and a ruler praise-named Dlembeu on the Mpopoti range.12 Nevertheless, weakened as it was, the Changamire state withstood the attacks of Mpanga, Ngwana Maseko and Zwangendaba, who were driven off, although they did a great deal of damage, taking grain and cattle. Even the death of Changamire Chirisamhuru at the hands of Nyamazana's group did not destroy the Changamire state.13 It seems likely that no Mambo was installed immediately after Chirisamhuru's death, but at some point well before 1852 his son Tohwechipi succeeded him, and as he received the support of the Mutinhima house he can fairly be said to have been the next Mambo.14

Ndebele State and its Tributaries

The Ndebele invasion differed from those of the Ngoni in several ways. Firstly, Mzilikazi's people made no attempt to attack the central part of the Changamire state, but settled in the western province of Ndumba, westof the Bembesi river. Secondly, they consolidated their power by exploiting the splits between the Rozvi, and by entering into an economic relationship with them. The main body of Ndebele under Gundwane arrived from the Umzingwani valley in I838-9.15 Ndumba's dynasty vanished from the scene relatively early,16 and the main resistance in the immediate area was led by Mutinhima from the Mulungwane hills. Mutinhima, nicknamed mafuta, was at first successful in his defence, and may not have been pushed out of the hills until after Mzilikazi arrived.17 The Ndebele succession crisis undoubtedly delayed the impact of the Ndebele upon the Shona, but even so it seems to have been surprisingly mild. There are reports of some raids made upon the local people in the first year,18 but tradition from the Kalanga pointed out that although 'they killed a lot of people . . . none of my family were killed. We did not regard the Matabele as bad people. The only thing they fought over was grain.... There was no trouble when the Matabele came'. This was contrasted with the rapacity of the Ngoni during previous invasions.19 On the Manzamnyama river the local Kalanga fled briefly and then returned as tributaries of the new overlords. 20 In short, west of the Bembesi the place of the Ndumba dynasty was simply taken by Mzilikazi and his followers, who settled down among the Kalanga as the Rozvi had done before them. It was thus logical that the Ndebele should not remain on hostile terms with the local Shona because they needed supplies of grain, which would not be forthcoming if raiding was continued for a long time. In I854 Moffat noted the Ndebele prosperity in grain, and in 1858 he confirmed that the Shona were continuing to live inside the Ndebele-settled area in their own villages.21

The Ndebele had thus become rivals of the Rozvi as rulers of the Kalanga and other Shona peoples, and in the period when the Changamire dynasty was weakened by the death of Chirisamhuru, Mzilikazi actually took his place as overlord of certain Rozvi families of the main dynasty. These, including Swabasvi, Lukuluba and Rozani, may have been motivated by internal political jealousies among the Rozvi such as their exclusion from the centre of power and the succession, but they also had an economic motive. The Ngoni invasions had resulted in the loss of a great number of the prized Rozvi cattle, so that there was a considerable shortage.22 The Ndebele, on the other hand, had plenty of cattle but desperately needed more people. The result was that an exchange took place, in which Mzilikazi distributed cattle to the Rozvi mentioned above in return for young people, who were incorporated into the Ndebele state and society.23 This state of affairs extended over the eastern half of the Changamire state and even as far as Tsunga, the land between the upper Umniati river and the Mwanesi range. There, the Nyandoro dynasty had acted as intermediaries between the main Rozvi dynasty and the peoples north-east of them.24 At some time before the great campaigns in that direction in the 1850s and 1860s Ndebele cattle were distributed there as well. 25

It was not likely that this situation would endure for long without serious trouble. Firstly, there was the problem of the main Rozvi dynasty, which had withdrawn into the hills that fringed the Changamire state to the east.26 It was hardly likely to accept the loss of its position without making some attempt to regain it. Secondly, the economic exchange created by the Ndebele was, in the long run, extremely disadvantageous to the Rozvi and other Shona who took part in it. The Ndebele appear to have retained ultimate ownership of the cattle that they distributed, although the milk and limited slaughter rights would presumably have been accorded to the herders, but the young people who were levied by the Ndebele were not allowed to return to their own societies. Moffat noted in 1854 that 'there is nothing they deplore so much as their children being taken from them just at a time when they become useful to their parents', 27 and this practice, taken to excess, could ruin a Shona society. Later the Ndebele did not need to recruit so many from their tributaries, and so caused less damage and created less resentment. But the combination of a serious grievance and the existing organization of the Rozvi state led to the first serious Shona resistance to Ndebele rule.

It is important to stress that the Ndebele did not believe in total war any more than the Shona believed in total peace. During the warfare between the Chirumanzu dynasty and the Ndebele in the 1850s Moffat was able to note that between the fighting in 1854-5 and the surrender of Chirumanzu in I857 there had been no further fighting.28 In August 1866, the Ndebele attempted to trade with Mashayamombe's people, despite their attack on the latter earlier in the year.29 As for the Shona, even the Njanja, whose exploitation of the Wedza ironfield and wide-ranging hoeselling network was one of the great economic success stories of the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and who depended for their sales on good relations with the surrounding peoples, did not hesitate to rob 'Portuguese' zungu traders passing through their territory, even though this hardly endeared them to the peoples who expected to receive the trade goods that the zungu were importing.30

Even when Ndebele raids were major ones, directed against specific targets on the orders of the king, there was a tendency for other people in the area to suffer as well. This was because the Ndebele, whose famed military discipline existed far more in the minds of European writers than it ever did in reality, were prone to scatter across a wide area in search of cattle and women. This emerges clearly from all detailed accounts from

Europeans living among the Shona. Thus, quite unlike Montagu Kerr's fictitious stereotype of a surprise attack on a surrounded village, Mauch, in 1872, gives a picture of a series of raids which continued over a period of about three weeks over a very wide front, from the western Duma on the Mtilikwe-Pokoteke confluence to the upper Pokoteke, an area of some forty miles. The Shona, who had at least three days' warning, suffered various losses but were rarely taken completely by surprise.31 The same picture emerges from accounts of the 1892 raids on the country from Chivi to Gutu and from those of I893 on Zimuto.32 Ndebele raiders also tended to follow up their targets if they fled, as when they pursued people from the Chaminuka medium's base near the Umfuli to the northern Shawasha country beyond the Umwindsi in I883.33 Even Ndebele on a peaceful mission, such as the delivery of a message, would sometimes cover

If the main stimulus behind the great Ndebele campaigns of the 1850s and 1860s was the political threat of the Rozvi dynasty, the economic stimulus of the Shona trade system was also extremely important. Indeed, it appears to have provoked the first important expansion of Ndebele power. In inheriting the Changamire state, the Ndebele had inherited its basic economic framework, which, in spite of a regional emphasis on cattle, was also aligned to the traditional exchange of gold and ivory for cloth and beads. Thus, even during the fighting of 1854-5, the trade system linking the Ndebele with the Zambezi and the coast through the north-eastern Shona country continued to function. Nevertheless, by the 1850s it had become clear to Mzilikazi that the Shona were difficult to dislodge from their mountain strongholds.35 At this point neither side had guns in quantity, although the Shona had been importing a certain number of guns for a very long time.36 The Ndebele had learned from their experiences south of the Limpopo that guns were useful, and in the 1850s and 1860s they did their best to acquire them.37 The basic Kalanga population of the Changamire state had been accustomed to import cloth, and their needs also had to be supplied. Although supplies of both guns and cloth were available through the variously friendly, neutral or hostile Shona dominions to the east, it was obviously desirable for the Ndebele to control the trade routes to a greater extent.

The first expansion of the Ndebele was to the north-west, however. One reason for this was probably that the Ndebele state was too weak in the 1840s to attempt the more hazardous-because more heavily populated and thus better defended-route to the north-east. The badly-watered sand country to the north-west was almost uninhabited and thus offered no resistance to raiders who could easily cross it to strike at the Shona under Hwange, Pashu and Saba on the Deka, Gwai and Zambezi rivers. These people were not only vulnerable but also offered access to one of the trade routes to the sea. This route was along the Zambezi through the Tonga country to Zumbo, Tete, Sena and the sea, and was economically viable in spite of the distance involved because nearly all the distance could be covered by some sort of water transport. Water transport, as Selous noted, made goods from these Portuguese ports much more competitive than those hauled by wagon from the South African ports,38 and in the 1860s 'Portuguese' traders were operating near the Victoria Falls.39 By the early I850s the Ndebele appear to have established their authority over the Zambezian polities,40 especially after the death of the Hwange in 1853,41 although intermittent raids on the area occurred for various reasons as long as the Ndebele state survived.

A Rozvi tradition from the Insiza area suggests that Mzilikazi extended his policy of co-operation with the Rozvi to the point of requesting Chirisamhuru's son Tohwechipi to return from his exile in the direction of the eastern Highlands and settle down in his own country, and that it actually worked for a few years before Tohwechipi broke away.42 It seems certain that the Ndebele tried to get the Mutinhima house to join them, but that they refused. The 1850s saw a rapid revival of the Rozvi power, and as mentioned above they seem to have sunk their differences sufficiently for the Mutinhima group to recognize the paramountcy of Tohwechipi. Even the Swabasvi house broke away from the Ndebele and joined the Mambo's Rozvi.43 But it does not seem that there was a single Rozvi command over the rest of the Shona. Even some of the Rozvi under Lukuluba and Rozani remained under the Ndebele,44 and accounts of the period are full of stories of quarrels and warfare between the Rozvi and rulers such as Hwata, Gutu and the people of the upper Sabi valley.45 Other Shona rulers did attack the Ndebele at the same time as the Rozvi, but it appears to have been on their own initiative.

If the Ndebele exactions of young people provided the basic motive for the Shona resistance to Ndebele rule in the early 1850s, and the revival of the Changamire dynasty gave an example to be followed, the resistance

took a thoroughly traditional form. Shona raiders penetrated deep into the country of the Ndebele, stealing cattle and-according to the Ndebele committing atrocities on women. The most prominent of the raiders were

the Mambo Tohwechipi, his relative Mutinhima, and Chizema the son of the Govera ruler Chirumanzu on the Shashe.46 But these raids provoked an Ndebele response that proved too strong for the Shona. Battles were

fought in the mountains to the east of the Ndebele state: at the Mipopoti range against the Rozvi ruler 'Dlembeu Kupengobuta',47 at Umgulugulu (Guruguru) mountain,48 and against the Mhari ruler Zingwe, who was killed for refusing to supply young people as tribute.49 Tohwechipi was forced to retreat through Chivi past Nyaningwe hill in the direction of Zimbabwe,50 and it may be near there that he won the defensive battle of Chikato. By employing zvitunya-strong people51-who came from the Zambezi to trade and who possessed guns, he was able to defeat the Ndebele some time before 1852, winning himself the name of Chibambamu in the process.52 The fighting continued into 1854, and then there was a lull. But by 1857 the situation had resolved itself in Mzilikazi's favour. The Chirumanzu dynasty surrendered early in 1857,53 and from then until 1889 became a strong ally of the Ndebele.54 Indeed, Chizema, who had been so prominent in raids on the Ndebele, was aided by them in his unsuccessful attempt to win a new land for himself in southern Buhera in the years that followed.55

As for the Rozvi, they suffered from the lack of unity among the Shona peoples. In July 1857 it was noted that 'the rulers holding these lands [goldfields in the central Shona country] were tributary to the emperor Changamire, but today, by a betrayal, the "Uata Mezircase" has taken possession of them from the said Changamire, who lives as a refugee in Njanja, land of the ruler Gambiza, in the district of the Hera, on the edges of his vast domains.' This 'Uata' could have been Mzilikazi, but 'Uata' was also the Portuguese rendering of 'Hwata'. Hwata was the ruler of a comparatively small Hera polity at the head of the Mazoe valley, but if his territory was small his economic influence was considerable. He controlled the goldfields in the northern Shawasha country to the east of him,56 and the locality of the old Portuguese feira of Dambarare.57 This strategic position-probably of importance far back into early Shona history enabled Hwata to dominate much of the trade of the central Shona country, buying ivory and reselling it to the 'Portuguese' traders,58 whose houses were to be found in the upper Mazoe valley.59 Hwata guarded this economic advantage jealously, and when the people near the old feira of Maramuca60-probably the Devera group that owned the Shurushuru goldfield61-attempted to re-open it to 'Portuguese' trade in c. 1830-50, he attacked both them and the 'Portuguese'. He lost the battle but won the war, for the feira was not re-opened.62 Mzilikazi devoted as much effort to the defeat of Hwata as he did to Tohwechipi, and the continued subjection of Hwata to Ndebele rule until I889 suggests that Mzilikazi was fully aware of the economic importance of Hwata's area and intended to profit by it.

There seems to have been a period of peace from 1854 to 1860, but from the latter date to 1873 the Ndebele made what was probably their greatest concerted effort to dominate the Shona. They raided over a wide front from Chivi in the east to Mangwende in the north-east and Hwata in the north, and in the northern areas in particular the relatively few raids mentioned in traditions most probably occurred during this period. Even so, it does not seem likely that the Ndebele were numerous enough to affect all these areas at once, and in one year, I863, when the main strength of the kingdom was turned against the Ngwato to the south-west, the only noted effort to the north-west was a raid by associates of the Ndebele on the Deka river area,63 while another force raided Hwata's associate, Chiweshe, in the upper Mazoe valley.64

The Ndebele effort of 1860 was confined to a small raid to the north-east and another to the south-east. After this, it is possible to make some estimate of the sequence of events in each area affected by the surge of Ndebele activity. In the east, the peoples of Chivi,65 Bere, Zimuto, and the Njanja were attacked in 1861. Bere's Mhari bore the brunt of the attack,66 and were severely weakened in consequence,67 while Chivi's Mhari appear to have succumbed to the power of the newly-imported guns68 and became tributary to the Ndebele. A combination of ambition on the part of Chivi Matsweru's son, Makonese, and the Ndebele expansion led to the deaths of both Chivi and Bere at about this time.69

The attack on the Njanja mentioned above brought the Ndebele back into contact with the Changamire Rozvi, who had arrived in the Hera country-dominated by the two Hera rulers Mutekedza and Nyashanu and

the rapidly-expanding Njanja confederacy under Gambiza-by 1857.70 The Rozvi, led by the Mambo Tohwechipi Chibambamu and his cousins of the Mutinhima house, occupied hills on the frontier between Nyashanu and Gambiza such as Bedza and the Mavangwe range.71 It is stated that the Ndebele made three major attacks in order to rid themselves of the menace of the remnant of Rozvi imperial power, until in 1866 a prolonged siege forced Tohwechipi to surrender.72 He was brought to Mzilikazi but later allowed to leave. Tradition is emphatic that he left Mavangwe and went to Gutu, where he died,73 but in view of the fact that in 1873 Mtikana Mafu led a major force against the Rozvi in Gutu it seems possible that even the defeat of 1866 did not crush Rozvi resistance to the Ndebele.74 In view of the tendency of Ndebele raiders to spread across country it seems likely that most of the damage suffered by the Njanja and the Hera of Mutekedza and Nyashanu occurred at this time. Certainly by 1870 the Ndebele had raided Mutekedza, since they had mutilated his sub-ruler Nyoka.75 This may also be the period of Chizema's attempt to conquer southern Buhera from Nerutanga, which was repulsed by that ruler and the Njanja in spite of his Ndebele backing. The Njanja recall having aided Gutu after this, which may coincide with the I873 raid there.76 The Nhowe of Mangwende remembered in I898 that 'it was in following up the Abarosis that the Matabele first came to know our country, with the result that they commenced killing and raiding through the different districts'.77 The Rozvi were not the only ones responsible, however, because the Ndebele tendency to follow up their enemies applied to Nyandoro of Tsunga as well. Nyandoro had been herding cattle for the Ndebele, but at about this time the murder of an Ndebele nduna led to hostilities,78 and the Ndebele attacked Tsunga, which was flat and nearly indefensible. This was thus one of the very few areas occupied by the Shona that was depopulated by Ndebele action, as the Nyandoro people left en masse in the general direction of their seventeenth-century home in Fungwe. They moved to the nearby Nyoka river, and after a year or two raids pushed them further north-east to the Chirume. A few years later more raids drove them to the Matswitswi caves in Samuriwo's land, from which they fled after Nyandoro's death and further raids as refugees to Mangwende.79 Like the Rozvi, they brought the attention of the Ndebele to those peoples who lived nearby, so that Samuriwo, Chihota, Svosve and Mangwende all suffered.80 But, as the Mangwende people pointed out in 1898, 'The first time they entered the country very few of Mangwende's tribe were killed, and very few were taken prisoners, but they took away with them large numbers of cattle and goats.... The Matabeli never came back into this district again but every year they were raiding the districts on the Sabi river.'80 This marked the farthest point of Ndebele raiding to the north-east.

The pursuit of the Rozvi Mambo and his associate Nyandoro led the Ndebele straight to the north-east up the watershed of the whole country, over open, grassy plains. These were of little significance to their economy except as sources of cattle to replenish their herds, after the lungsickness of 1861 had so reduced them that the kingdom actually contracted in size at this time.82 The route to the north, however, not only led to the trade routes of the heart of the old Mutapa state, but was also of considerable economic importance in itself, running as it did through some of the biggest goldfields still being worked in the early part of the century83 and

across river valleys running west from the watershed, that were full of elephants.84 The great Ndebele efforts of 1860-8 in this area hit the inhabitants very hard. The Ngezi dynasty of Rimuka partly broke up,85 and the Mashayamombe and Chivero people of the Umfuli valley also suffered, so that at one point their rulers were forced to flee to the north.86 However, Mashayamombe at least appears to have returned to his land by 1866, in time to be raided once more. Mzilikazi's attempt to trade for ivory later that year suggests economic motives.87 Economic motives almost certainly also lay behind the very determined efforts made to subject the Hwata trading centre. For four years from 1860-1 the Ndebele attacked, even sending Lotshe to raid Hwata's associate and neighbour Chiweshe at a time when the greatest need for men lay on the Ngwato front to the south-west in 1863. Finally Hwata surrendered in 1864, and was captured to be returned to his home as a tributary ruler.88 However, Hwata, like the Mambo Tohwechipi, appears to have attempted to break away from this relationship, because a major campaign was required in 1868 to subject him again. Even in 1870 his allegiance to the Ndebele was thought to be superficial,89 but he remained at least nominally tributary until 1889.90

After these major campaigns the Ndebele succeeded in making a number of Shona political units tributary to them. This relationship involved the payment of articles of partly symbolic value, such as skins, feathers, hoes, tobacco or spears, or the provision of services, such as labour for hutbuilding.91 Nevertheless, such tribute represented a considerable diversion of valuable man-hours among a people living in a largely subsistence economy. Consequently there was a tendency to break away from Ndebele domination that ran counter to the strong attraction of Ndebele society to many Shona. It was noticeable that in many of the tributary lands farthest from the main Ndebele state the tributary relationship took the form of an alliance between a Shona faction, that relied upon Ndebele support against its rivals within the dynasty, and the Ndebele, who themselves could rely upon this faction. This seems to have been the case with Hwata, Mutekedza and Chirumanzu. The main body of Ndebele tributaries was bounded by a line that ran from the KweKwe river east to Chirumanzu, south to Chivi and then south across the lowveld to Matibi. This boundary varied from year to year, depending upon the political situation in the border areas. Hwange, the Shangwe of the Mafungabusi plateau, Nemakonde, Hwata and Mutekedza were all outlying tributaries, separated from the main body by almost uninhabited land or independent Shona lands.92

The wars of the 1850s established the dominance of the Ndebele in the vicinity of the old Changamire state. The campaigns of the 1860s wiped out the last power of the Rozvi and gave the Ndebele strong economic advantages in the north. In spite of the dissensions of the succession crisis of 1868-72, in terms of relations between the Shona and the Ndebele the latter were, by I873, at the zenith of their power. It is thus ironic, in view of the myths of Ndebele supremacy, to note that their first serious defeat, and the first sign of a change in the balance of power that was to lead in the end to the revolt of many of the Shona tributaries, occurred only six years later, in I879. Ironic, but not surprising. The Shona after all were descendants of the creators of the most impressive Iron Age material culture in southern Africa, the Zimbabwe-Khami culture. They worked what was left of considerable goldfields, and had access to many elephants. Their political institutions and territories were small only by comparison with the few super-states of southern, central and east Africa. By comparison with most polities of that area many Shona rulers held quite big territories. Most of them owned superb defensive sites. Moreover, developments to the south were beginning to aid the Shona. The opening of the Kimberley diamond fields in 1867, the increased availability of guns as Europeans adopted rifles, the expansionist ambitions of Britain and the Afrikaners-and Portuguese counter-moves-all tended to aid the Shona in the short run, though not in the long. Under the circumstances it is surprising that the Ndebele accomplished as much as they did. The sale of gold and ivory and the labour opportunities of Kimberley and the Rand made it possible for the Shona, who in the 1860s had been fatally short of guns by comparison with the Ndebele,93 to re-arm. Guns, which entered the Shona country in the hands of 'Portuguese' traders, Venda mercenaries and gun-runners from the Ndebele kingdom, as well as through Shona long-distance traders and migrant labourers, made the hill strongholds of the Shona almost impregnable even against gun-using Ndebele and Europeans, as the 1896-7 risings were to show.94

In 1879 the missionary Cockin wrote that 'latterly some of the kraals attacked have shewn fight and being many days away and the towns denser, the Amandebele are becoming afraid to go there so much. Cattle and sheep and slaves (are) not coming in so freely now from these distant raids . . .'95 and it is probable that he was referring in particular to the war with Chivi. In the 1860s Chivi was evidently tributary to the Ndebele, but in the reign of Mazorodze, who ruled from 1870 at the latest, the Mhari began to acquire guns from the Venda and to build up a considerable herd of cattle, guarded by a group of men. This represented a threat to Ndebele power in the area, and in October 1879 a major force under Lotshe and Manyewu attacked the Mhari capital of Nyaningwe. Although the Ndebele force consisted of the Mbizo ibuto and probably outnumbered the defenders of Nyaningwe, they were repulsed with the loss of twenty men, their only success being the capture of the Chivi himself on an outlying hill. The loss of twenty men was not significant in itself, but the defeat was, and even the execution of Chivi did not hide the fact that although the Ndebele could operate over the open ground, they could not take the hill-strongholds of the Mhari, who were henceforth independent.96

The year 1880 saw the defeat of the Gaza by Gutu in the similar battle of Rasa mountain,97 and the beginning of a rift between the Ndebele and their ally the Chaminuka medium of the upper Umfuli. Up to then, Lobengula had paid the medium tribute in return for religious services,98 and in that year they combined to raid the Shona north of the Hunyani. But at the same time the Chaminuka medium claimed that he, and not Lobengula, had the power to grant hunting-rights to Europeans in the area, and his son Jugu 'had said that his father would now show Lobengula that the country beyond the Umniati river belonged to him, Chameluga' and that if necessary he could drive away the Europeans by his magic. It is therefore not surprising to find that in 1883 Lobengula had the Chaminuka medium killed. His men raided as far as the Shawasha country of Chinamhora, 99 whose people had taken Chaminuka's cattle,100 which in all probability had been taken from them in 1880.

In 1882 Selous noted that Ndebele had reached the Mukwadzi river west of the Umvukwe range,100 and in 1887 there was a major raid on the Umvukwe area,102 probably the one led by Gwasagwasa against the Shona ruler Chipuriro, far to the north.103 This may have represented a revival of the policy of the 1860s of gaining control of the trade routes to the Zambezi, for beyond Chipuriro lay the prazos of Matakenya, Jose de Araujo Lobo, who had earlier been in contact with the Ndebele, buying their ivory. In 1888 a major raid struck at the Mashayamombe and Rwizi people of the Umfuli valley.104 The reason for this is not known. The attack on Rwizi may have been to prevent a renewal of the Chaminuka cult, while the fact that a very large number of people were removed from Mashayamombe's may mean that this was the raid, recalled in tradition, that resulted from a civil war among Mashayamombe's people in which one side called in the Ndebele.105 But it may also have resulted from the fact that the Shona were undeniably growing stronger. Isolated Ndebele were liable to be killed if they were discovered. In 1887 a whole party of Ndebele was killed, and indeed the 1888 raid 'suffered so severely that Lobengula was very angry and another one was sent out in another direction.' Montagu Kerr, with his preconceived ideas, was amazed to hear the Shona at the head of the Mazoe valley in 1884 coolly discussing their chances of success, with some hope of victory, but it seems that in the 1880s the Shona were indeed beginning to turn the tide of Ndebele power.106

This trend was greatly advanced by the Portuguese, who, seeking to counter British expansion by limiting the power of the Ndebele upon which Rhodes's claims were based, sent two expeditions into the Shona country in 1889. Nominally led by Vitor Cordon and Paiva de Andrada, but actually relying upon the forces of such prazo-holders as 'Kuvheya', Manoel Antonio de Sousa, and 'Chimbango', Vicente Jose Ribeiro, they reached Nemakonde and Mangwende respectively, and made treaties with Shona rulers in a wide belt across the country from the Mafungabusi plateau to the upper Sabi. Portuguese flags were distributed in acts of vassalage that were not taken seriously by the Shona, and large numbers of guns were handed over by the Portuguese.107 The effect of the treaties was to give nearly every Shona polity north of the Umniati river a considerable increase in the size of its armoury. The 'Portuguese' zungu expedition to the whole Charumbira-Mapanzure-Bere group of peoples in 1872 had only had forty-eight guns for sale,108 but the 1889 expeditions gave this many to a single ruler. Even the small polities received ten guns, and powder and ammunition were supplied as well.109 This was a huge increase in Shona fighting strength, and from both oral traditions and some of Cordon's treaties110 there is no doubt that the whole tenor of this major political development was anti-Ndebele. The implications of this in Shona history proper cannot be discussed here, but the effect on the balance of power between the Ndebele and the Shona was immense. Hwata, Nemakonde, Mutekedza and some of the Shangwe all abandoned their allegiance to Lobengula and accepted the Portuguese guns and flags which were to be found as far south as the Njanja country and beyond.111 No major raiding forces of Ndebele ever entered the central Shona country again. There are strong suggestions that the revolt against Ndebele power even extended as far south as Gutu, where from 1889 the rulers no longer had the Gaza state to balance against the Ndebele, and to Chirumanzu, where the death of Bangure allowed his brother Chatikobo, aided by some Rozvi, to lead the people into their first revolt since 1857.112 But the arrival of the British in 1890 altered the situation.

Although there can be no doubt that Lobengula was thoroughly opposed to the arrival of Rhodes's men on his eastern frontier, he remained functionally neutral to the extent that he did not attack the Pioneer column, and once the British had driven away the Portuguese and captured the formidable Sousa, he took advantage of the British presence to regain control over Nemakonde and Chirumanzu, although Hwata and Mutekedza remained lost to him. Even so, this was only possible with the co-operation of Shona interest groups. In a coup d'etat in 189I, Chinyama, son of Bangure, drove out his uncle Chatikobo and became the new Chirumanzu with Ndebele aid.113 At the end of the year an Ndebele force visited the Nemakonde area and, after consultation with the most important spirit medium, killed Nemakonde Hodza and four others in an action that has all the marks of a coup d'etat by an internal group.114 During 1892 a similar split in the Gutu dynasty and an appeal for Ndebele help by Makuvaza led to a joint Chirumanzu-Ndebele force installing him as ruler;115 at this time a small party of Ndebele even reached the highlands across the Sabi, perhaps the furthest point ever attained in that direction, in this last rather feeble demonstration of Ndebele power.116

It is beyond the scope of this paper to discuss the events and negotiations that led to the war in 1893 that broke the Ndebele state, except insofar as they concern the Shona. The lowveld area had been subjected to raiding for years, partly at least by unofficial raiding parties, causing Matibi to move away from his northern lands into the remote lowveld in the late 1880s.117 But the decisive area was around Chivi and Zimuto. Chivi was raided in late 1891, to the delight of Rhodes, who was trying to prove Lobengula's dominance of the area,118 but in July and August 1892 a major raid on the recalcitrant Chivi and Zimuto led to an appeal by Chivi to Rhodes's deputy Jameson.119 This in turn led to a demand that Ndebele raiders stay away from the town of Victoria and the main road,120 a demand that was fully complied with, as far as the Ndebele ruler was concerned, until the crucial raid of July 1893.121 Even this raid came about partly as a result of Shona actions. Early in June 1893 a joint party of raiders from Bere and the Makamure house of Zimuto stole cattle from Mpakame, a Shona tributary of the Ndebele at Guruguru hill. Mpakame complained to his overlord the Ndebele-ized Rozvi Lukuluba at the Ghoko range. Lukuluba raided Bere in retaliation, but on being turned back by Company police, reported in turn to his superior, Mgandane of Nxa.122 This led directly to the famous raid in July on Bere and Zimuto near Victoria, to the fight of 18 July and to Rhodes's decision to overthrow the Ndebele kingdom.

Even before the British columns set out, however, Shona raiders were moving in to take Ndebele cattle.123 As the Victoria column began to move towards its rendezvous in the north with the Salisbury column, it was joined by large forces of Shona. Zimuto sent 120, Madziviri 50, and Gutu abandoned the Ndebele who had put him in power the previous year and sent eighty men. As the force approached Chirumanzu its ruler Chinyama followed Gutu's example and offered 300 men.l24 A few days later Chivi's men marched through Victoria to catch up with the advancing columns.125 These Shona, acting in concert for the first time in their particular histories, fought at the Shangani battle with some success, considering that they were left outside the defensive laagers.126 Meanwhile in the south, Matibi, whose relations with the Ndebele had been deteriorating to the point of outright war as he was repeatedly raided, experienced a further raid in late 1893 and retaliated in force, together with the police. They penetrated deep into Godhlwayo.127 These Anglo-Shona alliances of 1893 had a profound effect on the subsequent history of the southern Shona, especially in 1896. As the Ndebele state fell, Shona raiders from all over the southern Shona country and from as far as the upper Sabi valley began to move towards the Ndebele herds, and the end of Ndebele power in the summer of 1893-4, saw Shona raiders striking deep into the Ndebele kingdom, as they had done in the early 1850s.128

SUMMARY

For a variety of reasons the extent, number and severity of Ndebele raids upon the Shona-speaking peoples have been greatly exaggerated in the past. Moreover most studies of the Ndebele have failed to take into account the fact that the Ndebele conquered an already well-established Shona state with an economy linked with the Indian Ocean trade. This article seeks to show that the bulk of Ndebele raiding before 1873 was a response to both the political and military threat of the Changamire Rozvi dynasty and to the economic needs of the state that had been taken over. Even so, Ndebele raids were limited in extent and duration, and the two decades after 1873 saw a steady revival of Shona strength. In spite of Ndebele raids aimed at preventing this process, the independent Shona strengthened themselves by re-arming and 'alliances', and were able to take part in the eventual overthrow of the Ndebele kingdom.

This article is a condensed version of a paper presented at the History Workshop,

Gaborone, September 1973.

Notes

Sources with biases, conscious or unconscious, include: The Matabele Journals of Robert Moffat, 1829-I860, ed. J. P. R. Wallis (London, 1945); The Matabele Mission ...of John and Emily Moffat, I858-I878, ed. J. P. R. Wallis (London, I945); W. Montagu Kerr, The Far Interior (London, I887); Gold and the Gospel in Mashonaland 1888, eds. C. E. Fripp and V. W. Hiller (London, 1949); The Northern Goldfields Diaries of Thomas Baines, ed. J. P. R. Wallis (London, 1946); J. Mackenzie, Ten Years North of the Orange River (Edinburgh, I871); F. Coillard, On the Threshold of Central Africa (London, I897) A. A. Anderson, Twenty-five Years in a Waggon (London, I888); The Southern African Diaries of Thomas Leask I865-I870, ed. J. P. R. Wallis (London, 1954).
'I hope they do raid the Barotses', wrote the Company's secretary in I892. 'All these raids and deaths and murders ought to be entered into a book, so that we may always be able to prove justification and their being a cruel damnable race.' Hist. MSS CO 4/I/I F. Rutherfoord Harris to J. W. Colenbrander, 9 Feb. I892. Unless otherwise stated all reference codes relate to the National Archives of Rhodesia, Salisbury.
T. O. Ranger, 'The rewriting of African History during the Scramble: the Matabele dominance in Mashonaland', Afr. Soc. Res. iv (I967); D. N. Beach, 'The Adendorff Trek in Shona History', S.A.H.J. III (197I).
T. N. Huffman, The Leopards Kopje Tradition (in press).
This interpretation, which differs radically from that generally made previously, was made independently by Dr Mudenge (S. I. Mudenge, 'The Rozvi Empire and the Feira of Zumbo', unpubl. Ph.D. thesis (London, 1972), 35-43, 54-70) and myself (D. N. Beach, 'Historians and the Shona Empires, II, 3, The Changamire Problem', Univ. of Rhodesia, Hist. Dept., Henderson Seminar Paper, 20, 1972), but to Dr Mudenge belongs the credit for convincingly identifying the Khami culture in its earlier phase with the Torwa dynasty.
T. N. Huffman, 'The Rise and Fall of Zimbabwe', J. Afr. Hist. XIII, 3 (I972), 356-7.
G. Fortune, 'A Rozvi text with translation and notes', NADA, 33 (1956).
Mudenge, 'The Rozvi Empire', 52, 70, 159-60; N. Sutherland-Harris, 'Trade and the Rozvi Mambo', in J. R. Gray and D. Birmingham, eds., Precolonial African Trade (London, 1970).
F.W.T. . Posselt, Mambo and his Court (Salisbury, 1923), 2; N. 3/33/8, J. W. Posselt, N. C. Charter to Acting C. N. C. Salisbury, c. I Jan. 1904; Mudenge, 'The Rozvi Empire', 187-91. Dr Mudenge's use of Portuguese documents to date Rozvi reigns in the late eighteenth century is one of the most important breakthroughs in the study of Rozvi history. His explanation of the origins of the Jiri-Gumunyu dispute is another, and his argument has influenced my use of the evidence cited below.
K. R. Robinson, Khami Ruins (Cambridge, 1959), Appendix 6, Tradition 2. This is a reflection of a tradition recorded in one of a set of very valuable traditions collected in 1898-1906 (NB 6/i/i, N 3/33/8 and A 3/I8/I8): A 3/18/28 C. T. Stuart, N. C. Gwelo to C. N. C. Bulawayo, 16 Feb. 1906. This is not the Ndumba after whom the Ndumba hills at the Bubi source are named, A 3/18/28 R. Lanning. N. C. Inyati to C. N. C. Bulawayo, 21 Apr. 1906.
The main traditions of Rozvi politics are found in J. W. Posselt in N. 3/33/8; F. W.T. Posselt, Mambo; M. V. J. Rukara, in Hist. MSS Msc. RU 4/I/I; A. Marwodzi, 'The Barozwi', NADA, 2 (1924); E. M. Lloyd and S. Muhlanga, 'Mbava', NADA, 3 (I925) and 'Mbava and the others', NADA, 4 (1926); Fortune, 'A Rozvi text'; K. R. Robinson, 'A History of the Bikita District', NADA, 34 (1957); S. Rhodesia Ministry of Internal Affairs Delineation Reports, Bikita and Buhera, I964-5. The simplest and most convincing explanation of the dispute is that the modern Jiri group are descended from Mutinhima, son of Gumboremvura, and that the Gumunyu group are descended from Chirisamhuru. The co-operation of the Mutinhima house with the main house in the 1850s is described below. The death of Mambo Tohwechipi Chibambamu in c. 1873 after his defeat in i866 led to the political eclipse of his house and the rise of Mutinhima's. The earliest known reference to Tohwechipi's son or brother Chikore makes it clear that he was not regarded as Mambo-although the reference must be regarded with caution on this point because it comes from a traditionally pro-Mutinhima area (A 3/I8/28, F. G. Elliott, N. C. Selukwe to C. N. C. Bulawayo, I9 May I906). By I890 the people near Zimbabwe stated that 'Tihina' (Mutinhima) was ruling the Bikita Rozvi (Argief van die N. G. Kerk, Cape Town, Report of S. P. Helm, I89I). In I896 the Gumunyu-descended Chiduku group joined the ritual-position holder Mavudzi and the Mbava group in the installation of a Mutinhima-house member, Chikohore Chingombe, as Rozvi Mambo in the Mavangwe hills, Buhera (N i/i/8, N. C. Ndanga to C. N. C. Salisbury, 2 Mar. I897). Subsequently the Mutinhima house dominated the Buhera and Bikita Rozvi until the revival of the Chirisamhuru-Gumunyu house in Bikita in the I950s.
F. W. T. Posselt, Mambo, 6; Sr Mary Aquina, O.P., 'The tribes in Chilimanzi Reserve and their relation to the Rozvi', NADA, IX, 2 (1965), 4I; Fortune, 'A Rozvi text', 72; A 3/18/28 T. M. Thomas, Acting N. C. Insiza to C. N. C. Bulawayo, 16 May 1906; MIA Delineation Report, Que Que, I963; Stuart in A 3/1i8/28; NB 6/i/i S. N. G. Jackson, N. C. Belingwe to C. N. C. Bulawayo, 31 Mar. 1898.
G. J. Liesegang, 'Nguni migrations between Delagoa Bay and the Zambezi, I821-I839', Afr. Hist. Studies, III, 2 (1970); W. A. Elliott, 'The Ma-Shuna' in D. Carnegie, Among the Matabele (London, I894), II3; F. G. Elliott in A 3/I8/28; S. N. G. Jackson in NB 6/i/i; Hist. MSS WE 3/2/4; Hist. MSS Wi 8/i/i Nkani I passim.
Robert Moffat, J7ournals, I, 369; F. G. Elliott A 2.I8/28. In this case the Mutinhima faction admitted their subordination to Chirisamhuru's house.
Hist. MSS Wi 8/I/2 Ntabeni I-2.
Stuart in A 3/I8/28.
Hist. MSS Wi 8/i/i Ngungu 2; T. M. Thomas, Eleven Years in Central South Africa (London, i873), I65; S. N. G. Jackson in NB 6/i/i; 'Mziki' (pseudonym of A. A. Campbell), 'Mlimo (Pietermaritzburg, I926), 85. This latter account, which existed in draft form in I905 and in final form in I9II, has been described as a fabrication. But the presence of information about Lukuluba and Chizema in particular, and about the affairs of the eastern Ndebele in general, suggests that it is indeed a body of genuine tradition collected in Insiza I897-I905 and added to a fictional romantic story.
Hist. MSS Wi 8/I/2 Ntabeni 4.
Hist. MSS Wi 8/i/iI Nkani I-2.
G. A. Taylor, 'The Matabele Headring', NADA, 3 (1925), 4I.
Robert Moffat, Yournals, I, 2I4-I5, 224, 265; II, I58.
F. G. Elliott in A 3/I8/28.
F. W. T. Posselt, Mambo, 6; Stuart in A 3/I8/28; Lloyd and Muhlanga, 'Mbava and others', 92.
N 3/33/8 E. Morris, N. C. Marandellas to Acting C. N. C. Salisbury, I Jan. 1904.
W. Edwards, 'The Wanoe', NADA, 4 (I926), I8. Edwards gives Nyandoro's Fungwe origins correctly (Morris, in N 3/33/8), but omits the period in which he ruled Tsunga under the Rozvi.
Robert Moffat, Journals, I, 233, 240, 369. Moffat originally used the term 'Shona' to mean, principally, 'Rozvi', and 'Bamakalaka' to mean 'Kalanga'.
Ibid., I, 319.
Ibid., II, 59.
Leask, Diaries, 81, 88.
The Journal of Carl Matuch I869-I872, ed. E. E. Burke (Salisbury, 1969), 222.
Ibid., 209-214.
E.g. A i/o/i, H. Paulet to L. S. Jameson, 28 July I892.
F. C. Selous, Travel and Adventure in South East Africa (London, I893), II6.
Baines, Diaries, I, I63.
Robert Moffat, Journals, I, 224, 234, 241, 250, 36I; II ,79-80, 104.
Mudenge, 'The Rozvi Empire', 117-I8. Zumbo sent two guns every three years.
Robert Moffat, Yournals, I, 234; II, 79, 104; John Moffat, Matabele Mission, I 52, i6 i.
Selous, Adventure, 474.
Baines, Diaries, II, 469.
Robert Moffat, Yournals, I 243.
E. C. Tabler, The Far Interior (Cape Town, 1955), 212.
T. M. Thomas in A 3/i8/28.
F. G. Elliott and Stuart in A 3/i8/28; F. W. T. Posselt, Mambo, 6.
Stuart and T. M. Thomas in A 3/i8/28; M\IA Delineation Reports, Que Que and Gatooma, 1963-5.
D. J. van der Merwe, 'Some history of the Vakaranga in the Gutu Reserve', NADA, I4 (1936-7), 73. The episode described immediately preceded the Jiri Rozvi move to Bikita in the late nineteenth century; Marwodzi, 'The Barozwi', go. By 'this country of the Batonga' he meant the upper Sabi valley; for Hwata, see below.
Robert Moffat, Journals, 1, 233, 24I, 250, 368-9; Campbell, 'Mlimo, 103.
S. N. G. Jackson in NB 6/i/i.
Leask, Diaries, 114.
NB 6/i/i W. T. T. Driver, N. C. Selukwe to C. N. C. Bulawayo, 3I Mar. I898; I am indebted to Mr R. G. Mwanza for his tradition confirming and explaining Zingwe's death.
S. A. Dornan, 'Rhodesian Ruins and Native Tradition', S.A.J. Science, xii, 2 (I9I6), 508.
I am indebted to Mr A. Samasuwo for his translation of this Rozvi dialect word.
Rukara in Hist. MSS Misc/RU 4/I/I; MIA Delineation Report, Bikita, I964; Robert Moffat, Journals, I, 369; J. Chapman, Travels in the Interior of South Africa 1849-1863 (Cape Town, i868), I, 63. I am indebted to Mr J. D. Cobbing for this latter reference.
Robert Moffat, Journals, II, 59.
D. N. Beach, 'The Rising in South-western Mashonaland, 1896-7', unpubl. Ph.D. thesis (London, I971), 205.
Univ. of Rhodesia, Hist. Dept., Text 78 Bha; MIA Delineation Report, Buhera, 1965.
Izidoro Correia Pereira, 'Mappa das minas conhecidas na distrito de Senna', 31 July I857, in Memoria e Documentos acerca dos Direitos de Portugal aos territorios de Machona e Nyassa I890 (Lisbon, I890), 296. 'Mezircase' could be a variant of the Hwata praisename mufakose.
P. S. Garlake, 'Excavations at the Seventeenth-century Portuguese site of Dambarare, Rhodesia', Proc. Trans. Rhod. Scientific Assn. LIV, I (I969).
Mauch, Journal, 220; P(ublic) R(ecord) O(ffice), London, CO 417(I4) South Africa 1887, II, Mandy to Jones, 8 Feb. I887, 46. I am indebted to Dr N. M. B. Bhebe for this reference, and for having drawn my attention to the importance of Hwata's trade system.
Hist. MSS 6/z/1 29 Dec. I890.
P. S. Garlake, 'Seventeenth-century Portuguese earthworks in Rhodesia', S.A. Archael. Bull. xxi, 84 (I966).
Pereira, 'Mappa das minas', 296.
Baines, Journals, II, 472-5.
Chapman, Travels ii, 161.
Campbell, 'Mlimo, 139.
John Moffat, Matabele Mission, 136-7, 152; T. M. Thomas, Eleven Years, 3I4. I am indebted to Mr J. D. White for his help on this point.
Campbell, 'Mlimo, 137.
Mauch, Journal, 176-8.
John Moffat, Matabele Mission, 152.
Beach, 'Adendorff', 38-9; Driver in NB 6/i/i.
Pereira, 'Mappa das minas', 296.
MIA Delineation Report, Bikita, I964; Fortune, 'A Rozvi text', 73.
Leask, Diaries, IO2; T. M. Thomas, Eleven Years, 339-40.
MIA Delineation Report, Bikita, I964.
Driver in NB 6/i/i; C. G. Oates, Matabeleland and the Victoria Falls (London, 1881), 59; Campbell, 'Mlimo, I5I; Hist. MSS Wi 8/i/2 Ntabeni 53.
Baines, Diaries, II, 413.
See 57.
N 3/33/8, W. Edwards, N. C. Mrewa to Acting C. N. C. Salisbury, ii Dec. I903, encl. 'A Short History of Mangwendi's People, I3 Apr. I898'.
Edwards, 'Wanoe', i8.
Morris, in N 3/33/8.
Morris and Edwards in N 3/33/8.
Edwards in N 3/33/8.
Leask, 74, 221.
Pereira, 'Mappa das minas', 296.
Large-scale ivory shooting by European hunters in these valleys began in 1865 (Tabler, Far Interior, 27I), and by I884 African gunmen had decimated the game there (Kerr, The Far Interior, I, 44).
N 3/33/8 S. N. G. Jackson, N. C. Hartley to Acting C. N. C. Salisbury, c. 1 Jan. 1904; PRO, FO I79/279 No. 57, 'Memorandum on the Rights of Portugal in the territories to the south of the Zambezi, communicated by M. de Freitas,' I2 July 1890; Baines, Diaries, 1I, 498.
S. N. G. Jackson in N 3/33/8.
Leask, Diaries, 86.
Baines, Diaries, II, 498. T. M. Thomas (Eleven Years, 325) incorrectly made the date 1863, but Baines was closer to the event in time and place, as well as being backed up by John Moffat.
Baines, Diaries, I, XXXVII, 55, 498; Selous, Adventure, 47, 295.
Mandy, in PRO, CO 417(14) South Africa I887, II.
On tribute, see Beach, 'Rising', 126, and N. M. B. Bhebe, 'Christian Missions in Matabeleland, 1859-1923', unpubl. Ph.D. thesis (London, 1972).
Beach, 'Rising', 124-35.
John Moffat, Matabele Mission, 152; Leask, Diaries, 69, I90.
Beach, 'Rising', 143-9.
Hist. MSS LO 6/I/4, J. Cockin to Mullen, May I879.
Beach, 'Adendorff', 39-40; the I877 date for the war given in my earlier articles has been revised by Hist. MSS TH 2/I/I, for which reference I am indebted to Mr J. D. Cobbing.
N 9/I/6, Statistical Report for year ending 31 Mar. 1900, Gutu.
Beach, 'Rising', 155-7.
Selous, Adventure, 113-I6, 465-6.
J. Chidziva, 'History of the vaShawasha', NADA, ix, i (I964), 29.
Selous, Adventure, 50-3.
Fripp and Hiller, Gold and the Gospel, 32, 34.
Driver in NB 6/i/i; Hist. MSS, Wi 8/i/2, Ntabeni 53-5. Gwasagwasa also visited Chipuriro in I892 (A i/9/i, Lendy to Jameson, i Apr. I893), probably to investigate the removal of Chipuriro by the Portuguese (L. Decle, Three Years in Savage Africa [London, I898], 2I7).
Fripp and Hiller, Gold and the Gospel, 27-30, 51, 69; Decle, Three Years, 141.
D. N. Beach, 'Kaguvi and Fort Mhondoro', Rhodesiana, 27 (1972), 38 n.
Fripp and Hiller, Gold and the Gospel, 27-8, 3I, 65, 67; Kerr, Far Interior, i, 64, 151.
Memoria e Documentos, 27-8, 268-76, 333; Boletim Oficial... de Mofambique, 51, 2I Dec. I889, 725; B.O.M. I2, Mar. I890, I52; B.O.M. 20, 17 May I890, Caetano de Carvalho Montez, 'Documentos para a historia de Mozambique', Mojambique, documentatio trimestral, 25, I94I, 86, 98-iii; J. C. Paiva de Andrada to Minister of Marine, 18 Aug. I889, Arquivo do Ministerio dos Negocios Estrangeiros, Lisbon, Soberania de Portugal na Zambezia, Caixa 2, I889; J. C. Paiva de Andrada to Francisco Costa, 15 and 27 Dec. I889, Arquivo Hist6rico Ultramarino, Lisbon, Mo4ambique, 2a. Repartiio, 6a. Caixa I889; Freitas, op. cit.; Beach, 'Rising', I74-97.
Mauch, Journal, 213.
CT i/i16, C. Lendy to A. R. Colquhoun, 18 Dec. 1890.
Memoria e Documentos, 27i-6; University of Rhodesia, Hist. Dept. Texts 53-4, 6o-i Hty.
CT I/I2/8, A. R. Colquhoun to F. Rutherfoord Harris, io Dec. I890; CT I/5/2, R. G. Nicholson to F. Rutherfoord Harris, 7 Nov. I890.
LO 5/2/3, Lt.-Col. Pennefather to F. Rutherfoord Harris, 4 Sept. 1890; URHD Text 26 Czi; N 9/4/I3, N. C. Chilimanzi to C. N. C., I Nov. 1902.
URHD Text 26 Czi; Hist. MSS WI 5/I/I, 7 Apr. I897.
A 2/8/I, L. S. Jameson to Acting Secy. BSAC Cape Town, 2 Dec. I89I.
DV 5/I/I, Chaplin to L. S. Jameson, 25 Mar. I892; CT I/I5/2, L. S. Jameson to Acting Secy. BSAC Cape Town, I5 July I892; A I/9/I, telegraphic conversation A. 19 Aug.-Sept. I892; NB I/I/9, A. N. C. Gutu to C. N. C., 9 Sept. 1900.
Houghton Library, Harvard, Diary of W. L. Thompson, 29-3I Aug. I892. I am indebted to Dr J. K. Rennie for this reference.
Hist. MSS BE 2/I/I, Diary of Tshakoma mission, 1st quarter, 1887.
Beach, 'Adendorff', 40, 43.
LO 5/2/2I, F. R. Harris to London Board of BSAC, 27 July I892.
A 2/1/4, H. M. Hole to J. W. Colenbrander, 5 Sept. I892.
Beach, 'Rising', 230-5.
E. G. Howman and J. H. Stanley Adam, 'The hand of glory', NADA, 6 (1928), 33-4; Campbell, 'Mlimo, -I; CT 1/14/I, C. Lendy to L. S. Jameson, 18 June 1893.
Hist. MSS CO 4/I/I, B. Dawson to J. W. Colenbrander, 24 Sept. I893.
Hist. MSS MO 14/2/I, 8 and io Oct. I893; Hist. MSS WE 3/2/3; Hist. MSS WI 9/2/4, 16 Oct. 1893.
CT 1/14/2, F. R. Harris to H. Loch, 28 Oct. I893.
W. A. Wills and L. T. Collingridge, The Downfall of Lobengula (London, 1894), 107.
DV i/i/i, Hay and Crowne to F. R. Harris, 7 Mar. I894; DV 7/2/2, trial of H. D. Hay, 14 Dec. I893; L 2/3/8, Vigers to Duncan, 7 Dec. 1893.
N I/1/3, N. C. Hartley to C. N. C., I9 Feb. and I5 July I895; N I/I/2, N. C. Charter to C. N. C., 30 Jan. and I9 Feb. I895; N I/I/I2, N. C. Victoria to C. N. C., 2 and 16 Oct. I894; A IS/I/I, N. C. Victoria's report to 10 Dec. I894.

Languages of Southern Rhodesia in 1917

2011-08-06T13:35:00.000-07:00

THE LANGUAGE OF SOUTHERN RHODESIA

By ALICE WERNER, Lecturer in Swahili and Bantu Languages

Abstract of a public lecture given by Miss Werner at the School on February 21st, 1917.

THOUGH the development of the mining industry consequent on European occupation has brought natives of several different tribes into Southern Rhodesia, there appears to be virtually but one indigenous language in this territory. The Zulu spoken by the Matebele and the Sesuto of Sebituane's people, who settled on the Zambezi about the middle of last century, are comparatively recent intrusions.

This language is sometimes called "Mashona", "Chino" , "Chiswina", apd "Chizwina" (sw and zw appear to be attempts at the peculiar labial sibilant also found in Ronga and the other Delagoa Bay dialects); but none of these names are to be recommended, The people called "Mashona" or "Maswina" strongly object to these appellations, which seem to be opprobrious terms applied to them by their Matebele conquerors. Moreover,

the name Chiswina seems to be confined to the Salisbury District, while elsewhere there are countless local designations: Chimanyika (Umtali), Chiungwe (Rusapi), Chikaranga (Victoria), Chirozwi, etc. (Chi- is the prefix indicating "language ", corresponding to Se- in "Sesuto ", Lu- in " Luganda", etc.)

The most satisfactory name would seem to be " Karanga". Mrs. C. S. Louw (Manual of the Chikaranga Language, Bulawayo, 1915), says: "In the district of Victoria "-in the south-east, on the head-waters of the Sabi-" the natives call it Chikaranga ". But there seems reason to follow Father Torrend in taking this name to include all the sub-tribes. The Bechwana, when they came in contact with these people in the north-west, called them " Makalaka" (= Makalanga or Makaranga), and the fact that the Great Zimbabwe, which was the King's Kraal, or chief tribal centre, lies in the Victoria district seems to indicate that their headquarters were formerly here. It was the Paramount Chief of the Makaranga who was vaguely known to sixteenth century geographers as the " Emperor of Monomotapa"

Karanga is so nearly akin to Nyanja (which covers a large area north of the Zambezi) that the differences may be set down as merely dialectical. It includes Chindau (spoken in Gazaland, just east of the Portuguese border), of which Mr. Daniel Jones has made a careful phonetic study.1 Its affinities appear to be rather with the languages north of the Zambezi than with the more southern ones; it has not, like Zulu, adopted the suffixed locative, or the Hottentot clicks, and the "laterals" (usually written, in Zulu and Sesuto, hl, dhl, ti, tlh) occur, if at all, only to a limited extent. But this point cannot be determined without a full examination of the language by an exact phonetician. The three books before me, that of the Rev. H. Buck (Penhalonga), of Father Biehler, S.J. (Chishawasha, Salisbury District), and Mrs. Louw (Victoria) not only deal with different parts of the country but use different systems of orthography, so that it is impossible to gather from them what variations of sound are due to dialectical divergence, or, in some cases, exactly what sounds are intended. Mrs. Louw's book is by far the most satisfactory from a phonetic point of view.

East of the area covered by Karanga comes the Delagoa Bay group of languages included by M. Junod under the name Thonga (so written to mark the aspirated t and also to distinguish them from the Tonga ( = Chopi) of Inhambane, the Tonga ( = Toka) of the Middle Zambezi, and the Tonga of West Nyasa). They are more nearly allied to Zulu than is any other language, except the Xosa of Cape Colony; but they also have links with Karanga (notably the labial sibilant already mentioned) and with the languages beyond them to the north.

One interesting point about Karanga, which deserves further investigation, is the occurrence of words identical or cognate with Swahili forms, which seem to be absent from intervening languages. Thus we have sona= "sew" (Swahili shona, but Nyanja tsoka, soca, Yao tota); tswimbo, "stick"; dikiti, " melon"; ganda, " skin," "husk," etc.; and others. This is not the place to attempt giving a, complete list, still less to draw any inferences

from this phenomenon.

A different interest attaches to a few stray Arabic words. Ndarama, "gold," "money," is evidently (as pointed out long ago by Meinhof) from dirham, and must have spread in both directions from the Arab settlements on the Lower Zambezi, as it is also found in Nyanja. (Here it means either with the addition of "white", "silver ", with the addition of " red ", "gold ", or simply "money ". Curiously enough, it is not used in Swahili.)

Mari, "money," " property"= (arabic symbol used) , is also found in Zulu as i-mali and in Swahili as mali. It may be a question whether the Zulus borrowed it from the Makaranga or vice versa; it might have reached the former through the medium of the coast tribes, though M. Junod says the Thonga have taken it from Zulu. An interesting point in the latter language is the occurrence of the forms isi-kati, "time, "um-kati, "point of time." The Swahili wa-kati is so evidently derived from "(arabic symbols used)', the initial (arabic symbol) being treated as a prefix, that one is tempted to think of the Zulu words as having the same origin (prefixes being variable); but it might be possible to establish a connexion with the Bantu root KATI, "middle," "interval," or "space between ". It seems to be accepted that, in primitive languages, conceptions of space precede conceptions of time.

Notes

1. The Pronunciation and Orthography of the Chindau Language. University of

London Press, 1911.

Matabele Toys collected in 1917

2011-08-05T05:36:00.000-07:00

Below are some Matabele toys collected in 1917 from the land of the Ndebele in the then Rhodesia by Matthew Park. They were on exhibition at Glasgow Art Gallery in Scotland, UK

Matabele Toys, Zimbabwe, (rhino; woman; giraffe; leopard).

Ndebele Amabutho or Ndebele Military Structure

2011-08-04T15:13:00.000-07:00

The Evolution of Ndebele Amabutho

Author: Julian Cobbing

Source: The Journal of African History, Vol. 15, No. 4 (1974), pp. 607-631

Published by: Cambridge University Press

IT has become a well-established cliche to say that the Zulu state and its Nguni off-shoots, such as the Ndebele of Mzilikazi and his son, Lobengula, were 'military states', and that at the root of their social and political organizations lay the 'regimental system'. It comes therefore as a surprise to discover that rarely, if at all, has the 'regimental system' of an Nguni state been examined in detail. Barnes, for example, in his study of the Fort Jameson Ngoni, describes 'regiments' as military age-sets which are peripheral to the main political structure of the Ngoni state. As with the Ndebele, regimental age-sets cut across the 'segmentary' structure of Ngoni society; yet one is not told what happened to the 'regiments' when they grew collectively older, nor whether they made any lasting impact upon the political and residential structure of the state.2 Similarly in Zulu historiography there is no adequate manual of how the Zulu 'regimental system' worked. Judging from many existing accounts, indeed, Zulu society was unworkable.3

The same is true for the Rhodesian Ndebele who crossed the Drakensberg into the country north of the Vaal River in about 1822 and passed on northwards into modern Matabeleland (western Rhodesia) between 1837 and 184I. The student fresh to the subject of the Ndebele finds himself informed that the Ndebele state in the Matopos region was highly centralized and consisted of a royal capital surrounded by a relatively small

number of 'regimental' towns, each with a population of at least one thousand people and often much more.4 They were 'colossal strongholds' with a purely military raison d'etre.5 Each was 'commanded' by a chief(induna) who was 'appointed' by the king and who was an 'official' rather than the representative of an important local lineage.6 'Regiments' were grouped into four 'divisions', each with its superior commander.7 At this and every other point in the state hierarchy, the political function was overlaid by the military one, so that state and army were inseparable. The kingdom expanded via the creation of new regiments formed every so often to absorb a new generation of youths, to which were added captives taken in the annual raids upon adjacent Shona tribes. Settlement was thus everywhere uniform, the whole one 'warlike aggregation [rather] than a cultural unit'.8 Early descriptions, especially, were invariably accompanied by generalizations about the sanguinary nature of the state and of its militaristic objectives.9

This picture at first seems plausible. But one soon discovers that it departs in essentials from the historical evidence available. For example, the majority of Ndebele settlements in the pre-colonial era were smallscale, probably averaging from about fifty to two hundred people. Villages were collected together into clusters10 and the outlying political unit of the state was not the 'regimental' town, but the partially decentralized chieftaincy or isigaba (lit: sub-division), which contained several villages. One family supplied a succession of chiefs within an isigaba according to strict laws of patrilineality, which even the king was rarely able to disturb.11 The emergence of the isigaba was inseparably linked with the formation of 'regiments'. It is hoped that the following account illustrates the simplicity of this development whilst accommodating the main historical facts.

Ndebele Settlement 19th Century

The Evolution of the Typical Ibutho

Ndebele settlements not only moved physically from time to time, but were simultaneously in a state of evolution. This can best be understood by comparing the concepts of the umusi (pl. imisi: kraal, village) with that of the ibutho (pl. amabutho: 'regiment'). An umusi was a residential unit containing families of men, women and children, and was essentially concerned with non-military activities, whereas an ibutho was a concept with a specifically military and masculine sense. Generically, the term ibutho meant men gathered together for martial functions; but it was used to designate three different, though related ideas. In the first place it was a theoretical concept defining men from a given group of imisi, who, if called out for military duty, would be called out together. This reflected a relationship between men from imisi which usually had a common origin or geographical location, or both. An ibutho was, secondly, an actual squad of men assembled from the adult male inhabitants of imisi, to which they returned when the specific operation was completed. The Ndebele army was thus essentially temporary and melted away after combat. Thirdly, an ibutho was young men (amajaha) grouped together (ababebuthwa) in separate and temporary settlements of varying sizes for both offensive and defensive fighting purposes. Only in this last sense did ibutho approximate

to the British idea of regiment, but the differences in concept are so enormous as to make the translation misleading. The thing to note, however, is that imisi-the normal residential units of the Ndebele kingdom- were not purely military formations as in the third sense of the word ibutho. An umusi only had a military function in so far as its menfolk were potential soldiers. But in this respect the Ndebele did not differ from their neighbours such as the Shona and the Tswana.

Hughes and Omer-Cooper have already suggested that an ibutho in the third sense could transform itself over a number of years into an umusi, or, more probably, a cluster of imisi.12 In doing so the character of the settlement underwent a metamorphosis, and its purely military function evanesced. The military potential of the kingdom would come to reside in newly-created amabutho, into which the children of existing imisi might be drafted. This process explains, firstly, the perpetuation of settlements over several generations (age-set units disappear); and, secondly, the internal settlement proliferation of the state. Only in the most general sense was it a form of segmentation.13 It is better described as a process of unplanned internal self-regeneration, at once both politically and militarily expedient, which reversed any tendency towards in-breeding of close kin: a tendency already emphasized by the ban on marriage between people of the same isibongo (praise-name). The process, finally, led to the social advancement of brave warriors (abaqawe) and the permanent elevation of new aristocratic families.14

This process of settlement evolution is pivotal to an understanding of the structure of the Ndebele state, and so warrants a more detailed analysis. The Ndebele youth was brought up to be cattle-herder, hunter and soldier functions which were obviously linked. Depending on his promise, but usually at about the age of ten, the Ndebele child would begin to help in the herding of his father's cattle. He would follow the cattle into the winter veldt, mix with his elders and learn the rigours of life.15 At puberty, an initiation ceremony, the tomba, was performed: a medicine called izembe was burnt, blown into the boy's mouth through a reed, and official adulthood was reached.16 The youth would not however make the next transition, that of entry into an ibutho, until he had had full sexual experience, for otherwise the protective medicines (intelezi) of the izanusi(doctors) would not work.17

The raising of amabutho in the Ndebele state was an irregular occurrence, depending firstly on the particular political or fighting requirements of the moment, and secondly on the availability of sufficient numbers of adult males. The examples which follow are taken from the raising of Imbizo, Insuga and Umcijo. Imbizo was raised during the civil war crisis between i870 and I872, the first two years of Lobengula's reign, and only two years after Mzilikazi had raised Inqobo. The raising of Insuga which followed in c. I883, a gap of about twelve years, was more clearly connected with the availability of recruits, but was also probably linked with the wars against the Tawana of I883-5. And the drafting of Umcijo and another ibutho, the Ihlati, in I890 followed by only approximately two years the raising of Isiziba. This outburst of ibutho-raising was almost solely the result of the European invasion of Mashonaland.

Ntabeni Khumalo, giving us our first example, was born at Dukadeni in the western Malungwane and in I87I was put into Imbizo.18 The recruits trained at the Nkantor Mountain in the central Matopos for two years before establishing a settlement on the Koce River.

We first went by ourselves and built the kraal, and then our mothers came. We cooked our own food whilst we built the kraal, and when our mothers came they cooked for us. Our sisters also came. Our fathers stayed behind. Some younger women stayed behind to look after our fathers.19

And a contemporary observer, Thomas Baines, wrote in August 1871,

giving a different emphasis:

The king is forming a new regiment called La Besa or 'the called'. They are lads of 10 to 18 years of age . . . all removed from their mammas and other softening influences, that they may grow up as hardy and daring as possible. He sent them out twice to hunt.20

Ginyalitshe Hlabangana told a similar story of being drafted into Insuga in the mid-1880s.21 Ginyalitshe was born at Amangubeni (Inqobo), which was near Inyati, and for many years he herded cattle there for his father, Sigozwana. After Sigozwana's death he went to stay at the umusi zamathanga (private village) of his grandfather, Dlamlomo, which was not far from Inqobo. One day Lobengula's messenger came to Inqobo, and the induna sent round the imisi under his control and collected a group of youths amongst whom was Ginyalitshe. They went to Bulawayo, were, with others, collectively named Insuga ('those who depart in the day') and sent to the upper Nata River. 'Today', Lobengula informed them, underlining their rise to independence and maturity, 'you leave your fathers and you have your own kraal'. They stayed in the west of the kingdom for about six years before being transferred to the upper Gwelo in 1890.

Ndansi Khumalo, lastly, tells of being drafted into Umcijo.22

We spent about a month singing and dancing near the King's kraal; he used to give us lots of food and we were well looked after. We brought our own outfit, our skins and shields. Our parents provided our spears.

During their stay at Bulawayo the recruits bathed in a specially treated pool in the Umgusa River to counteract any evil which might level itself against them. They were then sent to the Shangani River to guard the king's cattle. Each pair of amajaha (unmarried soldiers) built cattle shelters and looked after from five to ten head, having the use of the milk. They learnt to fight, and were posted to the Gwelo River in March i892.23

A newly-formed ibutho, consisting of young soldiers-to-be under the leadership of a mature warrior, would be 'butha'd' in a particular isigaba (induna's area), sometimes moving from isigaba to isigaba for particular purposes. Dr Smith noted that 'they then only take their war-dresses and implements. The karosses they leave behind them saying that the people of the kraal whither they go must find them in karosses'.24 They had an internal law-and-order function; and the local induna could call upon the amajaha to make themselves useful around the king's villages, cutting poles and grass for huts or being utilized for building and repair works.25 Moving around continually, the amajaha would erect temporary grass 'loobas' or shelters at night, with special lodging for any attendant women.26 An ibutho would usually divide into a number of encampments or groups termed isigatshana, each training and hunting under a separate leader.27 As time went by, a young ibutho would be mixed with maturer forces for raiding experience. After a few years it would become an elite group of soldiers, who enshrined in themselves the major military potential of the state.

Although it was not uncommon for men who were already married to be drafted into an ibutho,28 the decisive stage in its evolution into a number of settled imisi occurred when the amajaha were officially encouraged to marry, between five and ten years after formation. During this period the ibutho remained closely connected with the imisi which had supplied its recruits, irrespective of where it was posted. Ginyalitshe even emphasized: 'I continued to live at Dlamlomo's kraal after I became a member of the Insuga regiment. The king did not separate the young men from their homes'; and, 'it did not mean that we could not go back and live with our fathers if we wanted to. It was not a prohibition.'29 Ginyalitshe seems here to be referring to periodical visits home, which most frequently took place during the summer months, the time of planting and of the rains. Thomas Morgan Thomas mentions on one occasion how 'the impiso [Imbizo] are scattered here and there visiting among their friends',30 a form of regular 'home-leave' called umusi wamaxhegu.31 During these constant contacts, a young man would perhaps take a sister, or even one of his father's wives, back to the ibutho. Love-making between the amajaha and the attendant females was a normal and condoned practice, and if pregnancies resulted, marriages were arranged. The rate of marriage would accelerate when the warriors were in their late twenties or early thirties, at this stage with the specific approval of the king.

Although Maund wrote in i885 that Lobengula 'has just permitted a military kraal to marry, because several hundred girls in it were reported to be in an interesting condition',32 it need not be thought that some huge marriage ceremony or a large number of simultaneous marriages took place.33 Marriages occurred over an extended period of time; and each was a matter for the families of the couple concerned. A man would leave his ibutho and return to his father's umusi for the ceremonies (bavulelwe). Ntabeni Khumalo at Imbizo recalled how 'when my wife came to me I paid lobolo: three beasts, two cows and an ox, to her father. We killed an ox for the occasion'.34 The bride would come with her attendants to her future father-in-law's umusi in a procession called the umtimba, after which dancing and feasting lasted several days. Shortly after his marriage Ntabeni returned to Imbizo and his wife remained at his father's umusi of Dukada. Later it is probable that his wife moved to Imbizo; and here they would settle as a family where the children would grow up. Women might even go to an ibutho in search of marriage. The induna Geletu remembered how a girl called Nhlombi had left his umusi to go and marry a man in Imbizo, the girl's relations moving with her.35 On another occasion the daughter of Jozana of Mbambanjeni ran away to her sweetheart, Simila, at Imbizo, after she had first been betrothed against her will to Labalala of Nxa.36

Although a percentage of wives would remain at the imisi of their fathers-in-law, the presence of favourite wives and their children would make the main centre of the ibutho static, and it would gradually transform itself into a main umusi with a number of smaller linked imisi. At an interim stage of development the settlement would still have some of the characteristics of an ibutho. The transition towards a greater demilitarization could be slowed, for example, by the drafting of new recruits, and even by the military training of the children of the first warriors. The first generation of children to grow up in the Imbizo imisi were collectively nick-named Litshelentaba ('stones off a mountain'); and by the early 1890s Imbizo-Litshelentaba, strengthened by new drafts from other imisi, was itself an ibutho. The children of later recruits were known as Imbizo-Nembe ('porridge for children'), but they were still too young for military service at the time of the collapse of the Ndebele state in the mid-1890s.37 Nevertheless, in spite of this generation of new military talent, Imbizweni became more static. Some of the older men returned to their original imisi, whilst others who had acquired cattle in warfare or otherwise distinguished themselves, established their imisi zamathanga in the vicinity of the main umusi.38 The original ibutho had become a new isigaba or chieftaincy.

How long it took for a full transition of loyalties to the new imisi to be made is difficult to judge. Imbizo for example was not sufficiently detached from its root imisi to be able to perpetuate itself into the period of the European conquest. After the burning down of the Imbizo main kraal in 1894 its people preferred to return home, and Imbizo became merely the umusi of its chief, Mjaan Khumalo.39 Amabutho formed later, such as Insuga, Isiziba and Ihlati, also disappeared in the period after I894. But Induba and Mhlahlanhlela (formed in the early i86os) and Inqobo (late i86os) did perpetuate themselves into the twentieth century as groupings with which Ndebele identify themselves today, even if far removed from the nineteenth-century sites. Examples of fully matured imisi which exist as concepts providing group identity today are: Ndinana (descendants living in the Lundi Tribal Trustland under chief Jobe Matshazi, of the main nineteenth-century line); Intunta (descendants either living near the old site of Intunta at Bushtick in the Essexvale district, or along the Lundi River in the Belingwe Tribal Trustland under chief Ngungumbane Mkwananzi of the main nineteenth-century line); and Nqama (descendants living under the traditional line of Mathema chiefs in Wenlock Tribal Trustland). All these, and others such as Ujinga, Matshetshe and Godhlwayo, are imisi which had become established by the I85os and sometimes before the migration of Mzilikazi northwards across the Limpopo in the late I830s. A minimum period for the establishment of group-identity into the era after the conquest is thus c. twenty-five years of independent existence before I893, although under less violent circumstances it would probably have been less.

How then did pre-existing imisi survive intact over several generations in the face of the periodic creation of new amabutho? Why did settlements not mature, age and die? The answer is that the perpetuation of settlements was ensured since only a percentage of young men in a given age group would go to form a new ibutho and many less fortunate youngsters would remain behind.40 Some would not be given the chance to enter, especially if there was a lengthy time-lag between two drafts. There were also exemptions, one informant for example mentioning that an only son would not be 'butha'd'. Other informants emphasized the permanent return of men from the ibutho to their fathers' villages, and their replacement by young men in a fresh draft. This exit from an ibutho occurred especially with men who had a political function to play in the imisi of origin, such as sons of chiefs. Thus Hliso Mkwananzi of Intunta was drafted into Induba in the i86os, but by the i88os he was back at Intunta, having assumed the chieftaincy in succession to his father, Mahubohubo.41 Also, according to Nqagwana Khumalo: 'When an old man died his eldest son would be withdrawn from his regiment so that he could look after his father's village and property.'42 Yet the reverse move could take place. When parents of a 'butha'd' son grew old, they could ask their induna to be allowed to move their home to where the son was living.43 But irrespective of whether an eldest son remained in his 'ibutho-umusi' or returned to his father's umusi following his father's death, he would inherit his father's property such as cattle.44 In this way the rise and maturation of amabutho did not break across the hereditary aspects of family life, and the functioning of existing settlements was only partially disrupted. If major imisi disappeared, it was not usually a result of a failure to regenerate, but because of deliberate dispersal for political reasons, as with Gibixegu in c. I84I-2 and Zwangendaba in I870.45

Since it is possible to date the sequence of creation of amabutho approximately, it is also possible to estimate the age or generation of informants or their ancestors if one knows the ibutho into which they were drafted. Mapunda Msiza, for example, was drafted into Iliba probably in the early I840s. His son, Sonjobo, was born at Iliba, but subsequently in the I870s was put into Imbizo; and Sonjobo's sons, Mpuqa, Matete and Mguqu, were born at Imbizo in the 1880s.46 Another example is that of Sikwebu Ncube, who was born at Iliba and drafted into Induba in the i86os. His daughter, Magoli, was born at Induba, and in the I870S went to marry Mukontshwana Tjili, a young Sotho who had gone into Mbuyaswe in about I869.41

In general, someone born into Iliba (formed probably in the I840s), is older than someone born into Inqobo or Imbizo (I867-77I).48 One can detect the relative age of brothers in the same way. For example, Bozongwana Khumalo's (presumably) eldest son, Gabeni, went into Imbizo, whilst his three younger sons, Mukenke, Mqhewa and Ntabeni went into Insuga.49 Finally, men of older-established imisi such as Godhlwayo would, over the generations, be present in virtually all newly-created amabutho.50 Theoretically, then, settlements evolved, and at any given moment in the last three-quarters of the nineteenth century settlements of different composition and 'stage' existed side by side. This assumption is largely derived from informants who, whilst themselves not able to explain the evolution, were nevertheless agreed that there was a generic difference between imisi (established since time immemorial) and amabutho (time of establishment remembered, if only vaguely). Tito Matshazi and Ntolwana Dhlodhlo, two particularly knowledgeable female informants, drew up the following lists51:

I. Imisi 2. Amabutho Approx. dateof formation

Godhlwayo Mahlokohloko 1849-50

Ndinana Induba 1862-4

Mzinyatini Mhlahlanhlela 1863

Matshetshe Inqobo 1867-9

Nqama (etc.) Imbizo 1871

(all in existence by Insuga 1883-4

the early I840s) Isiziba 1887-8

Umcijo 1890

Ihlati 1890

Finally, with the help especially of Mpuqa Msiza and Zimu Moyo, the following diagrammatical representation of settlement evolution was established in the sand of several villages52:

Diagrammatical Presentation of Ndebele settlement evolution

The Historiography of the 'Division' or 'Province'

Besides imisi and amabutho, several key writers on the Ndebele have described the 'division' or 'province'. There is, however, no Ndebele word for such a concept, and modern informants deny that they existed.53 Because of this conflict, a re-examination of the historiography of the European idea of the 'division-province' is necessary. The relevance to the argument will become clear in the next section.

The first hint of something higher than the induna in the Ndebele political hierarchy came from Andrew Smith, who divided Mzilikazi's chiefs into two grades: the numzan (umnumzana) and the tuna (induna), the former, according to Smith, being the senior. Smith went on to isolate certain 'big' chiefs (Kalipi, Gwabalanda, Mpondo and Mncumbata) who, he implied, held authority over large portions of Mzilikazi's territory.54 The missionary, Thomas, was more explicit:

The king divided the land into several provinces, these again were divided into smaller districts, and the districts into towns. Over each province, a very loyal subject was appointed to represent the sovereign.... This officer was called the induna enkulu (great under chief), and was next in rank to the king.55

Most writers have cited Thomas to show firstly, that the province existed as a formal administrative sub-division of the kingdom, and secondly that there was a hierarchy of appointment with an induna enkulu being an official senior in rank to an induna, the former ruling the 'province', and the latter the 'district'. But both Smith's and Thomas's terms were applied inexactly. Smith's umnumzana was simply the head of an umusi, even though it was a title of respect. If anything, the umnumzana was inferior to the induna, although one man could be both.56 Similarly the induna enkulu was just an important chief. This carried implications of power and prestige, but not of officially appointed rank.

In 1885 Maund (who had read Thomas) added a military meaning to both province, which became 'division', and induna enkulu, who became primarily a military figure. It is a military framework from which Ndebele historiography has never escaped.57 'The country', wrote Maund, 'is divided into four divisions [Amabuto, Amagapa, Imhlope and Likanda], which really constitute the four great territorial divisions of the army'. Each division embraced a number of kraals, some of which were regimental headquarters headed by 'indunas, or officers of regiment in the field'. The system was not only purely military but highly centralized, as a glance at Maund's illustrative diagram shows:

Ndebele Hierarchy

And to underline the organizational interlocking of army and state, Maund added:

When an impi goes out it is in two divisions under two Indunas acting under a selected general. They march in columns. One from each territorial division and another consisting of the king's men, i.e. Embezu [Imbizo] and his own town [Bulawayo].

Apart from the general meaninglessness of the diagram, and the improbability of such a precise army organization, the important things to note are that Maund was a soldier who at this point had known the Ndebele for a fortnight, who came from the England of the generation of the Cardwell army reforms, and believed that militarily the Ndebele were 'similar to the Zulus', whose own degree of militarization was being vastly exaggerated during the Zulu war of I879. There is in fact no evidence to support Maund's theories as to Ndebele military divisions. Yet his analysis of the Ndebele became gospel, and has done more to influence Ndebele studies than any other piece of writing. For example, in 1898 the Matabeleland

Administrator, Captain Lawley, informed the assembled Ndebele izinduna about Maund rather than about themselves. 'As you know', he said, 'in the days of Lobengula there were five divisions which were each governed by five [sic] chiefs'.58 By 1919 Posselt had 'confirmed' the idea of the province as a division. Each head of division was now a 'divisional commander', and each division was divided into 'regiments' just like the British army.59

The army analogy developed alarmingly after the Second World War. In a celebrated article the archaeologist Roger Summers elaborated on Maund's diagram, which now looked like this60:

Ndebele Hierarchy

Maund's influence is plain, although the degree of militarization has increased. The king is now commander-in-chief; there is a commander at 'H.Q. Kraal' (presumably Bulawayo); and now there is a 'Great Council' (the isikulu) to advise the king. In the context it can only be a military council. Otherwise Summers's diagram is as unworkable and as detached from any evidence as is Maund's. In their publication, The Warriors, in 1970, Summers and Pagden threw all reservations aside and described the Ndebele kingdom in purely military terms. It consisted of regimental components of an army inseparable from the state.62

The anthropologist Hughes, although a collaborator of Summers, was more cautious. He renounced the term 'division' in favour of 'province' again; and whilst believing that the provinces were territorial entities with clearly demarcated boundaries, recognized that 'in one sense provinces were primarily divisions of the people not of territory'.63 And, the first writer to hint that provinces were not administrative sub-divisions of the state, but rather evolutionary antecedents of the later nineteenth-century imisi, Hughes noted that 'the four provinces formed administrative segments of the nation, and . . . the regiments formed by Lobengula comprised another segment of the same order of segmentation'.64 Nevertheless, the imisi were for Hughes still essentially military units; and although he thought that because of the administrative aspects of their function 'there might seem to be a good case for adopting some English term other than "regiment" to describe them [amabutho]', he did not do so on the ground that 'it would create unnecessary confusion to adopt another translation of this Ndebele word [ibutho] here'.65 And so the influence of the nineteenthcentury commentators still holds the field.

The original Amabutho and the development of settlement under Mzilikazi

This persistent historiographical 'militarization' of the structure of Ndebele society has obscured the true origin and structure of the 'province'. Present-day informants deny the existence of military or administrative divisions larger than the isigaba, or single chieftaincy, and register incomprehension when the English ideas of 'division', as used by Maund, or of 'province', as used by Thomas, are explained to them. Yet they are well-acquainted with the concepts of Amakanda, Amhlope, Amnyama (for Maund's Amabuto) and Igapha.66 A man from Nxa will, for example, use Nxa and Amakanda interchangeably, even though Amakanda refers hazily to a general area rather than to a specific point on the map. Another man will identify Nyamandhlovu with Igapha in the same way. What is the separation of the umusi Nxa from the larger but less precise concept of Amakanda? The answer is, as Ntabeni Khumalo pointed out to a surprised Windram (he had been looking for military divisions), that:

There were no groupings of the regiments under main divisions.... All the later regiments came from the original regiments, the Amhlope, Amakanda, the Amnyama and Igapha.... Although they had their own regiments, the later people used to regard themselves as the descendants of one or other of the older regiments. 67

The slender historical evidence that exists confirms that the 'divisions' were indeed early amabutho which later 'spawned' fresh amabutho, and in the process themselves disappeared. The initial close links between amabutho spawned in this way were increased by their future geographical proximity in the Matopos region. By the mid-nineteenth century however, the original proto-amabutho were becoming memories, and there had been a fusing of the various descent groups. The attempt to place all the later amabutho into neat lists according to 'division' is a reflection of the historian's mania for tidiness, and of the influence of Maund.68

Literature and tradition combine to produce the following chronology. Mzilikazi left Tshaka's country in the early 1825 with a small body of men divided into two major groups, Amakanda and Amhlope.69 By the late I820s Amakanda had sub-divided into smaller groups, among which were Nxa and Ndinana, and Amhlope had given rise for example to Isizinda, Magolosa and Dibinhlangu. These became the nuclei for the assimilation of Sotho peoples as the Ndebele passed through what is now the Transvaal. By the I830S other break-offs, new accretions or family groupings had emerged, among which were Insinda, Insinga, Nzwananzi

and Dhlodhlo, identifying themselves with Amakanda; and others such as Mfakuceba and Ntembusa associated with Amhlope.0

The third of the proto-amabutho was Amnyama (the black-haired ones, i.e. young men), who were regarded as the 'sons' of Amakanda-Amhlope.7 Mzilikazi was reputed to have formed Amnyama just before his quarrel with Tshaka; and we know of leaders of later Amnyama-identified imisi, such as Mahubohubo of Intunta and Dambisamahubo of Godhlwayo, who earned for themselves reputations as abaqawe in the stormy period of Mzilikazi's break-away.72 In the early I83os Amnyama gave rise probably first to Mzinyati, and a little later to Eyengo, Dukada, Matshetshe, Godhlwayo, Nkenenkene and Isiphezi.73 Several of the Amnyama and Amakanda settlements broke away from Mzilikazi after the Boer attack on Egabeni towards the end of I837, and, led by Gundwane Ndiweni and Majijili Gwebu, migrated across the Limpopo to the Malungwane Hills

APPROXIMATE CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE OF THE MAJOR NDEBELE AMABUTHO

Chronology of major Ndebele Amabutho

in what is now Rhodesia. Amnyama-connected imisi settled to the west of the Malungwane range along the valleys of the Ncema and upper Umzingwani, and Amakanda further to the east along the upper Insiza. Gundwane established a new capital at Gibixegu on the Umzingwani; but this was destroyed by Mzilikazi when he arrived from the Zambezi in c. 1841.

The fourth proto-ibutho was Igapha, the name coming from Mzilikazi's I835-7 capital of Egabeni, and its recruits from the Amakanda-Amhlope- Amnyama group already in existence.75 Igapha and several imi.si connected with Amhlope, such as Isizinda and Magolosa, followed Mzilikazi to the upper Nata and Gwaai valleys, after a migration taking them through Ngwato country to the lower Chobe and south again.76 North of the Matopos Igapha disintegrated into the off-shoot settlements of Amagogo, Nqama and Nyamandhlovu,77 groupings which probably bore the brunt of the fighting against Gundwane's Amakanda-Amnyama in the civil war of c. I842. Amhlope imisi tended to site themselves immediately to the north of the Matopos, whereas imisi descended from Igapha subsequently came to function as a defensive cordon reaching from the northern Matopos through the upper Gwaai, Khami and Umgusa Rivers to the Bembesi and Shangani in an umbrella-handle shaped crescent. Later the term Igapha (or Amagapha) referred to the collective idea of men from Igapha-descended imisi. It developed south-western and north-eastern facets, so that Ndebele spoke of the imisi of 'Igapha towards the Matopos' as Likamagqegenya or Linkgcweli, and of the imisi of 'Igapha towards Que Que' as Lamasandhla. Lamasandhla was in particular used to describe the artificial extension of Ndebele settlement to the Gwelo and Ingwenya Rivers at the time of the European occupation.78

Settlement now evolved in the Matopos region along the lines already suggested, but without precise reference to the proto-amabutho. Zwangendaba, Mbambanjeni, Ujinga, Iliba, Ilanga, Babamba and Hlambabaloi probably emerged in the I840s along the upper Umgusa and upper Bembesi valleys. In about I849-50 Mzilikazi established another ibutho on the watershed between the Bembesi and Umgusa called Mahlokohloko. This was both royal capital and the major ibutho of the 1850s, much as Igapha had been during the mid-i83os. By the end of the 1850s, however, Mzilikazi had moved again, this time about twenty miles to the north-east, where Inyati was formed on the Inkwegwesi.79 Induba was formed at some time during the early i86os, and Mhlahlanhlela-successor to Inyati as royal capital-in I863, possibly as a result of the Ndebele-Ngwato war of that year. Either in the 1850S or early 1860s Intemba was drafted under the leadership of Xukutwayo Mlotshwa, and sent to the extreme northeast of the kingdom between Inyati and the Mambo Hills.80

Lobengula's Amabutho

Lobengula raised, or began to raise, about a dozen new amabutho, concerning which there is happily a little more evidence. Inqobo ('the blanket') was raised at about the time of Mzilikazi's death in i868,81 and during the early part of I87I was moved to the Inkwegwesi River near Emhlangeni, replacing the more mature amabutho of Inyati and Intemba as the kingdom's most northerly outpost.82 Inqobo became a number of imisi under the leadership of Mazwi Gumede and Mtini Mpoko Ndhlovu. In I89I or early I892 a contingent from Inqobo was positioned on the Gwelo River to help defend the Ndebele kingdom from anticipated European incursions. Mazwi assumed authority over Rozvi groups on the watershed between the Gwelo and Lundi Rivers such as Lozani and Gambiza, both of whom went to him for land.83 Generally, Inqobo usurped

the position of Mbambanjeni, which, during the time of Mncumbata Khumalo, had for a time been sited along the upper Gwelo. In 1866 Mbambanjeni had moved south-west to the headwaters of the Shangani, but in 1892, nfow under Mncumbata's son, Mhlabi, was destroyed for political reasons.84

By far the most prestigious of Lobengula's amabutho was Imbizo, something of whose social evolution we have already examined. Its formation in I87I was a result of Lobengula's fears of an invasion by those Ndebele supporting 'Nkulumane' and Mangwane, his rivals for the kingship.85 Its first leader, according to Mahlangu, was Habimane Mthimkulu, but later Lobengula's second-cousin Mjaan Khumalo assumed control.86 In about June I87I Imbizo was probably involved in an attack upon a force of Macheng's Ngwato near the Tati River; and later that year participated in raids against the Karanga of Zimundu and Sibanda in the present Fort Victoria region. The cattle captured during these raids were given to Imbizo, which soon afterwards moved to the Koce River for better grazing, and perhaps to stand between Bulawayo, the new royal capital, and the still disaffected north-east.87

A whole generation of scions of important families was drafted into Imbizo during the first years of its formation.88 Imbizo took part in most of the major campaigns of the I870s, including the prolonged siege of Chivi's stronghold in October i879.89 It had the reputation of being particularly fearsome, and came in the end to challenge even Lobengula's authority. In about I874 men from Imbizo were attacked by a band from Godhlwayo in the storm created by the execution of the Godhlwayo chief, Mtikana Mafu.90 A decade later, in July I885, there was a symbolic battle of the generations between Imbizo and Mhlahlanhlela over the ownership of a captive (ifuyiweyo), in which about twenty men were killed or wounded.91 In October I890 J. S. Moffat wrote: 'the induna of Imbizo [Mjaan] is in trouble with his men, they want to get rid of him, he does not suit them.'92 Mjaan supported Lobengula's militarily unaggressive policy towards the British South Africa Company, whose forces had occupied Mashonaland without the king's permission. His men however

were more extreme, and made the lives of local whites a misery in an endeavour to bring about a military collision.93

Lobengula's next major ibutho was Insuga, which was formed in about 1883 during the time of the Tawana wars under the leadership of Manondwaan Tshabalala, and which had close connexions with the Inqobo- Ujinga complex of villages along the Inkwegwesi valley. Predictably, men of younger average age went into Insuga than had gone into Imbizo, and these included Nyamanda, Lobengula's second son and heir. One of Insuga's abalisa (headmen) was Sepalo Ndiweni; and the leader of one of its izigatshana, of which there were at least three, was Siatcha, the son of Matilingwane.4 In May I890 Insuga was transferred from the Nata River to the upper Gwelo as a result of the crisis caused by the entry of the pioneer column into Mashonaland.95 In I89I or I892 a body of men was detached from the main ibutho forming a sub-ibutho called Insizwa which had a separate umusi.96 Like Imbizo, Insuga was impatient to anticipate what was regarded as the inevitable attack from the Europeans in Mashonaland. Men from Insuga sang treasonable songs at the nxwala of 1892,97 and later that year they quarrelled over cattle with the Nxa people (upper Shangani), producing tensions which, White suggests, helped lead to their precipitate actions at Fort Victoria in July i893.98 Although many of warriors had married by I893, most of the families stayed behind in their home imisi in the troubled period preceding the war of I893. Having no roots, Insuga therefore disintegrated in the period after I894, and Manondwaan led a somewhat lone fight in the Gwelo region in the Rising of 1896. 99

Isiziba ('still waters in a river') was formed in about 1887,100 and its sub-chiefs were Nhlapo, and an unmarried son of Qaqa Ndiweni, leader of the Kwesincinyane isigatshana of Mhlahlanhlela.101 In I890 it was moved east to the Shangani River, after which it came under the overall command of the Insuga chief, Manondwaan Tshabalala. Isiziba participated in the raid on Nemakonde in September I89I, the July I892 raid on Chivi and the Shangani battle of October I893, following which it dissolved.102

Ihlati ('a forest of short bush'), referred to by Mahlangu as an isigatshana of Mhlahlanhlela, was raised during the crisis of May-June i89o, an event to which Colenbrander was probably alluding when he wrote:

'Lobengula is raising a new regiment consisting of two hundred to three hundred young men just returned from the diamond fields armed with Martini- Henry rifles which they have earned there.'103 Initially Ihlati appears to have trained under Somfulu Fuyane in the Nyamandhlovu area; but later it was mixed with Insuga and sent to the Ingwenya River under Matshe, the eldest son of Gambo Sithole.104 Matshe's brother, and Gambo's eventual successor, Dlomo, was in Ihlati, as also was Nyamanda's younger brother, Tshakalisa, who was about seventeen years old in i892.105 At about the same time, Umcijo ('a sharp end' as of a spear) was being raised in the Emhlangeni vicinity under Mlumbi.106 In March I892 Lobengula moved Umcijo to the Gwelo River, about twenty miles to the north-west of Ihlati, where it formed the extreme left-wing of the Ndebele defensive cordon.107

There are, lastly, occasional references to other of Lobengula's amabutho, though whether they were ever military settlements proper, or were simply villages of mainly non-Ndebele assimilants, is uncertain. One was

Amazibalongwe, also known as Edutjwa, which contained Kalanga and was led by Manyeu Ndiweni of Mhlahlanhlela. It was positioned somewhere on the Nata River, and, according to Posselt, took part in the attack on the Tawana in 1885.108 Others were Ngwangwa under Ngogode Thebe; Nkanyezi, on the Umgusa River not far from Imbizo, under Rubane Ngwenya (whom Posselt described as 'a Bechuana nobleman, who had tendered his allegiance to the king, and was thus rewarded with the royal confidence'); and Makupekupe, a predominantly Rozvi group in the eastern Malungwane which the king was reputed to have been organizing just before the war of i893.109 There was also a personal bodyguard of the king known as the Imbovane, 'the king's black ants', as Vaughan-Williams called them. These 'slave youngsters slept outside the king's stockade with the dogs' and attended the king wherever he travelled.110

Some conclusions

The critical reader might conclude from the foregoing: there are some interesting new facts here, and perhaps it is true that Maund overstated his case regarding the military structure of the Ndebele state. But the Ndebele state did evolve from military origins; the underlying structure of the state was still therefore military, and existing accounts have only to be modified in detail. There are several reasons, however, for going further than this. In the first place, it is clear from the above analysis that even if the word 'regiment' is retained as a translation for ibutho, only a very small proportion of Ndebele settlements at any given time were 'mobilized' amabutho. Even though men from the reproductive imisi continued to be called out to fight from time to time, the 'army', that is the fighting amabutho, was an organ (if that is not an over-exact term) within the state and subordinate to it. To continue to describe the Ndebele state as an army would be tantamount to replacing the word state in its various contexts by the word army. At almost every point in the Ndebele state structure a word redolent of military meaning has been misleadingly applied to what were essentially political phenomena. The umusi was a settlement concerned with the whole gamut of human activity rather than with military affairs alone; the chief was a political, judicial and even spiritual leader, rather than a military 'officer', a hereditary 'baron' as opposed to a royally appointed 'official'; the isikulu was an informal and ever-changing group of friends, relatives and advisers of the king with a political role, rather than a military 'council'; the 'division' was not something akin to a Prussian canton but a social grouping antecedent to later nineteenth-century settlement; the king was not simply a commander-in chief (Lobengula never led an army into battle) but an administrator and a ruler in the full sense of the words.

Secondly, a correct appreciation of amabutho evolution provides an understanding of how the state operated at other levels. For example, the manner in which political interests emerged away from the centre of the state can only be explained by reference to the evolution of amabutho. The majority of the great Ndebele families, such as the Sitholes of Amagogo, the Masukus of Matshetshe, the Matshazis of Ndinana or the Mafus of Godhlwayo, owed their rise to their identification with the creation and maturation of an ibutho. The process set up centrifugal tensions which, along with splits within the royal family, were at the root of the major crises the state faced in its short career (such as the civil wars of I841-2 and 1868-72). All Ndebele owed allegiance to the king; but their most proximate allegiance came to be to the chiefly family which held a stranglehold over power in the isigaba. Rivalries at high levels of the state were paralleled by similar struggles for power and position within the isigaba. The isigaba was the state writ small, a mini-state almost. As an ibutho matured, divided into imisi, occupied a definable geographical area for a generation or so, and experienced a succession of chiefs from the same family, it emerged as a rival power centre to the larger state. Paradoxically, the initial process of ibutho formation, partly a defence against the danger of state tensions (cf. the raising of Imbizo), led eventually to their magnification. Over-powerful chiefs such as Mtikana Mafu of Godhlwayo or Gambo Sithole of Amagogo were either killed or exiled.1"' Sooner or later one of them would have reacted as Mzilikazi did to Tshaka by seceding.

In the third place, the evolved ibutho was the nucleus around which the state grew. It was reproductive and therefore expanded in population, even though some of its male offspring went into new amabutho, and many of its young females married into other izigaba. The mature warrior (iqawe) with several wives, a village of his own (umusi zamathanga), and many children, occupied a central position in Ndebele society. His family grew

with the addition of captives (abafuyiweyo) taken in war, distributed to him by the king or by the chief and distributed by him amongst his wives. In an analogous way a brave man could become wealthy in cattle. His status within the isigaba increased if he married the daughter or other female relative of the chief. If he caught the king's eye he might be given the command of an ibutho (as Mhlumbi was in I890) and raise himself to chiefly rank. Only at certain points along this tortuous path was a man a purely military figure: his means may have been the exploitation of his martial abilities,112 but his aims were control of people, cattle and territory, the major standards by which others judged him.

Many of these processes are either incompatible with or unaccounted for by the caricature of the Ndebele state as a conglomeration of uniformly structured 'regimental' towns. The descriptions of authors like E. A. Maund, F. W. T. Posselt and R. Summers are not so much unworkable (which is true) but invalid because looking at only a part, they generalized for the whole. The lessons are threefold. The historical analysis of the major Nguni states has for far too long been derived from tendentious or incomplete nineteenth-century accounts; the anthropological study of the nineteenth-century Nguni is all too frequently vitiated by poor use of what anyway is inadequate historical source material; lastly, it is possible that a fresh historical examination of other Nguni states, more particularly that of the Zulu, will lead eventually to substantial revisions in how we

view their organizations and dynamic logic.

SUMMARY

The assumptions that Ndebele settlement was purely militarily orientated and that it was composed of a hierarchy of 'regiments' and 'divisions' or 'provinces' are false. The parallels between the Ndebele ibutho and the English regiment are so tenuous that the translation is best dispensed with. On the other hand, an Ndebele ibutho was, at least in one sense, a military organization which evolved over a number of years into a cluster of imisi (villages). These imisi were residential, essentially non-military, and composed by far the largest proportion of Ndebele settlement. The 'division' did not exist. Amhlope, Amakanda, Amnyama and Igapha were collective group concepts comprising imisi descended from four original or proto-amabutho created in the period before the migration of the Ndebele to the Matopos region. The sequence of creation of amabutho in the post-1850 period can roughly be determined, outbursts of ibutho formation usually coinciding with crises in the history of the kingdom. Amabutho created after the late 1860s such as Imbizo and Insuga disintegrated after the European conquest during the 1890s, whereas older, established imisi survive as concepts of allegiance to this day. A knowledge of how the Ndebele ibutho evolved is essential for a more complete understanding of the dynamics of Ndebele society at other levels, for example the way the chieftaincies (izigaba) and the great local lineages emerged, as well as the social and political context within which individuals sought to realize their ambitions. The unexpected way in which a closer look at the ibutho reveals much of the early literature on the Ndebele to be at best incomplete, at worst, caricature, but either way misleading, suggests that other nineteenth-century Nguni states may benefit from renewed historical examination.

Notes

The following is based partly upon documents of the British South Africa Company (BSAC), and a number of Historical Manuscripts contained in the National Archives of Rhodesia, Salisbury. A particularly rich source for the Ndebele is material relating to the Chief Native Commissioner for Matabeleland, I897-19I4, the most important files of which are numbered NBi (In Letters), NB3 (Correspondence) and NB6 (Reports). Other file series of use are those designated CT (Correspondence of the Kimberley and later Cape Town offices of the BSAC), and LO (Correspondence of the London Board of the BSAC). Most of the material used represents oral traditions collected by Company officials and their correspondents for a variety of immediate purposes. Historical Manuscript references are distinguished in the footnotes by the prefix Hist. MSS. The most valuable single source is filed under the code Hist. MSS W18, and contains the reminiscences of R. Foster Windram, in fact a series of traditions collected from Ndebele between I937 and I94I. I have supplemented this material considerably by fieldwork carried out in the Belingwe, Lundi, Godhlwayo, Matopos, Ntabazinduna, Khumalo and Nkai Tribal Trustlands (TTLs) of western Rhodesia. I am particularly indebted to my research assistants E. M. Mhlanga, J. B. Dube and S. H. Khumalo, to M. Mahlangu for translating the work Umthwakazi by P. S. Mahlangu from Sindebele into English, to my interpreters C. Mkwananzi and M. Senda, to A. R. Simmens for drawing the map, and to the Research Board and the Department of History of the University of Rhodesia for helping to finance this field-work.
J. A. Barnes, Politics in a Changing Society: A Political History of the Fort Jameson Ngoni (London, 1954), 36-41.
For example, E. J. Krige, The Social System of the Zulus (Pietermaritzburg, I936), 261-5; M. Gluckman, 'The Kingdom of the Zulu of South Africa', in M. Fortes and E. E. Evans-Pritchard, African Political Systems (London, I940), 3I-2.
A. J. B. Hughes and J. van Velsen, 'The Ndebele', in The Shona and Ndebele of Southern Rhodesia, Ethnographic Survey of Africa, Southern Africa, Part iv (London,1955), 68.
P. Becker, Path of Blood: The Rise and Conquests of Mzilikazi, Founder of the Ndebele (London, Panther Books, 1972 reprint), 78.
J. D. Omer-Cooper, The Zulu Aftermath: A Nineteenth Century Revolution in Bantu Africa (London, I966), 135.
R. Summers and C. W. Pagden, The Warriors (Cape Town, 1970), 41-2.
E. C. Tabler, The Far Interior: Chronicles of Pioneering in The Matabele and Mashona Countries, 1847-79 (Cape Town, I955), 13.
F. C. Selous, Travel and Adventure in South-East Africa (London, I893), 8I, for example.
The villages were not in any way physically linked but separated by tracts of countryside. The habit of referring to Ndebele settlements as 'towns' may have reflected the familiarity of most Ndebele travellers with Ngwato settlements which were much larger. The map on p. 609 is misleading because it shows only a small percentage of Ndebele villages. The majority were those of private individuals (imisi zamathanga) which are now extremely difficult to locate. The main conclusion from this is that the settlement "revolution' which was meant to have taken place in 1894-5 never occurred.
For a detailed discussion of the major Ndebele chiefly families see my Ph.D. thesis on the Ndebele under the Khumalos, now in preparation.
Hughes and Van Velsen, 'The Ndebele', 67; Omer-Cooper, Zulu Aftermath, 148-9.
A. J. B. Hughes, Kin, Caste and Nation Among the Rhodesian Ndebele, Rhodes-Livingstone Papers No. 25 (Manchester, I956), 5. The terms 'segment' and 'segmentation' are of little practical use in describing Ndebele settlement or society.
It is not true, as W. F. Lye claims in 'The Ndebele Kingdom South of the Limpopo', Journal of African History, x, i (I969), 99, that 'this regimental organization of the male population broke down any clan or local affiliations'. Indeed, the amabutho and the imisi which evolved from them became local affiliations; and the hereditary families which established themselves in power parallel to the evolution of settlement provided clan affiliations. Thus the Mafus of Godhlwayo or the Mkwananzis of Intunta were families with a tremendous local and personal following, as Mzilikazi found to his cost, for example, in the civil war of c. 1841-2, when both Godhlwayo and Intunta opposed him.
P. R. Kirby (ed.), The Diary of Dr Andrew Smith, I834-6, 2 vols. (Cape Town, 1939-40), I, 293-
G. G. B. Woods, 'Extracts from Customs and History; Amandebele', Native Affairs Department Annual (henceforth NADA), Ix (1931), 18.
D. G. Lewis, 'Lobengula's Regiments: Recruiting and Lobolo', NADA, xxxiii (1956), 5.
Hist. MSS WI8/I/2, Reminiscences of R. Foster Windram, Statement of Ntabeni Khumalo, 4 Feb. 1940.
19 Ibid. Some informants say that it was the grandmothers who did the menial tasks for the amajaha; others that at the beginning of an ibutho's life there were no women at all.
J. P. R. Wallis (ed.), The Northern Goldfields Diaries of Thomas Baines, 3 vols. (London, I946), in, 658.
Hist. MSS WI8/i/i, Reminiscences of R. Foster Windram, Statement of Ginyalitshe Hlabangana, 6 April I940.
J. W. Posselt and M. Perham, 'The Story of Ndansi Khumalo of The Matabele Tribe', in M. Perham (ed.), Ten Africans (London, I936), 66-7.
For other accounts of ibutho-raising see Wallis, Baines Diaries, I, 261; J. Mackenzie, Ten Years North of the Orange River (Edinburgh, I871), 327; and T. M. Thomas, Eleven Years in Central South Africa (London, I873), 183
Kirby, Smith Diary, II, 246.
Interview with Nyamabani Khumalo, Shabani, 6 Dec. 1973.
J. P. R. Wallis (ed.), The Matabele Journals of Robert Moffat, I829-60, 2 vols. (London, 1945), I, 28I.
Interview with Mabhena by E. M. Mhlanga, Avoca, Godhlwayo TTL, 24 Aug. 1972.
For example, Mukontshwana Tjili had married at Ndinana before being drafted into Mbuyaswe, where he married a second wife; interview with Tjavu Tjili, Godhlwayo TTL, 24 Jan. 1974.
Hist. MSS W18/i/i, Statement of Ginyalitshe Hlabangana, 6 April I940.
Hist. MSS TH2/i/i, T. M. Thomas Journal, I874-83, entry for 25 April I877.
Interview with Mkhwezeli Bozongwana by J. B. Dube, Ntabazinduna TTL, 24 June 1972.
C 4643, 'Further Correspondence Respecting the Affairs of The Transvaal and Adjacent Territories', Feb. i886, Enclosure 8 in No. 34, Matabeleland, by Lieut. Maund, B.F.F., 115.
As implied in Summers and Pagden, Warriors, 148.
Hist. MSS W18/i/2, Statement of Ntabeni Khumalo, 4 Feb. 1940. Lye, 'Ndebele Kingdom', 99, is incorrect when he writes: 'the wives were either a gift of the king or were paid for with royal cattle'. A man's choice of wife was his own. Lobola was never paid with the king's cattle (izinkomo enkosi), but, at least for the first marriage, usually out of the private cattle (izinkomo zamathanga) of the father.
NBI/I/2, Lanning to C. N. C., ii Dec. I897.
NB3/i/6, Campbell to Jackson, 20 May I909.
Maund, C 4643, iI6; interview with Mpuqa Msiza, Lundi TTL, 4 Dec. 1973. Summers and Pagden, Warriors, 47, refer to a 'junior company' of Imbizo called Encinyane. The view of H. Child, The amaNdebele (Salisbury, I968), 20, that 'regiments did not expand within themselves, losses in war being made up from recruitment' is thus incorrect.
Mjaan Khumalo, chief of Imbizo, had at least two imisi zamathanga where he kept some of his wives; interview with Nqagwana Khumalo by J. B. Dube, Ntabazinduna TTL, 5 June 1972.
NB6/i/i, C. N. C. Annual Report for year ending 31 Mar. I898, and Annual Report, Bulawayo, same year. Imbizo's dispersal may have been largely a result of the excessive attention it received from the Europeans, as well as its position on the main Bulawayo- Inyati wagon road. Other settlements probably broke up in the migrations prior to I840.
Hughes, Kin, Caste and Nation, 13.
Interview with Chief Ngungumbane Mkwananzi, Ngungumbane, Belingwe TTL, 5 Dec. 1973.
Interview with Nqagwana Khumalo by J. B. Dube, 5 June 1972.
Interview with Makwakwa Ngwenya by J. B. Dube, Nkai TTL, IO-I5 Nov. 1972.
Interview with Sihlangu Tshabalala by J. B. Dube, Bulawayo, 16-24 Sept. 1972.
Haynes was clearly referring to Zwangendaba when he claimed in I885, 'old regiments die out or are broken up and distributed among others'; see C 4643, Enclosure 9 in No. 34, 'Report on Matabililand', by Lieut. C. E. Haynes, I20-x.
Interview with Mpuqa Msiza, 4 Dec. 1973.
Interview with Tjavu Tjili, 24 Jan. 1974.
This is only a rough guide since settlements such as Iliba and Induba did not break up but continued to reproduce until the end of the kingdom. Thus Manqikila, the eldest son and heir of Mehlomakulu, head of the Dhlodhlo family, was drafted into Inqobo some time after i869 and was still attached to Inqobo in I893, where and in which year his son, Ndabayenduku, was born.
Interview with Mkhwezeli Bozongwana by J. B. Dube, 24 June 1972.
On the other hand, informants often say that recruits to an ibutho were taken from a particular group of imisi. For example, Insuga had special links with the imisi of Inqobo and Ujinga in the Inkwegwesi valley. The identification of post-I840s imisi in the Matopos area with one or other of four original or proto-amabutho (discussed below) also suggests the linkage of an ibutho with a specific hinterland. Nevertheless, it seems that the amabutho of Lobengula's reign contained men from most parts of the kingdom.
Interview with Ntolwane Dhlodhlo and Tito Matshazi, Lundi TTL, 4 Dec. 1973. This is in no way a complete list of Ndebele settlement.
Interviews with Mpuqa Msiza, 3 Dec. I973; and with Zimu Moyo, Ngungumbane, Belingwe TTL, 5 Dec. 1973. Informants often arrived at this process only after much thought, and that such an evolution took place had seldom occurred to them.
Hughes, Kin, Caste and Nation, II, uses the word ixhiba for 'province', but ixhiba simply means a hut (for unmarried boys or girls) or a group of warriors.
Kirby, Smith Diary, II, 76, 79.
Thomas, Eleven Years, 224-5.
The exact status of both the umnumzana and the induna in nineteenth-century Ndebele society awaits clarification. Amongst the Zulu umnumzana means 'villageheadman', whereas Barnes, Politics, 9, describes him as a 'regional governor' of the Fort Jameson Ngoni. Barnes seems, however, to be referring to no more than the head of a lineage. Amongst the Ndebele the umnumzana was, roughly, a 'headman', and is today, according to Pelling, the equivalent of 'Mr'; see Wallis, Baines Diaries, I, 79; and J. N. Pelling, A Practical Ndebele Dictionary (Bulawayo, I966), 52.
For Maund's interpretation, see C 4643, Enclosure 8 in No. 34, Matabeleland, 113-i6.
L05/6/8, Lawley's speech at the Meeting of Headmen and Indunas at Bulawayo, 5 Jan. 1897.
F. W. T. Posselt, 'The Rise of the Amandebele', Proceedings of the Rhodesian Science Association, xviii (I919-20); this is reprinted with minor changes in F. W. T. Posselt, Fact and Fiction (Bulawayo, 1I935), 1161-93.
R. Summers, 'The Military Doctrine of the Matabele', NADA, xxxii (I955), 7-15.
Summers, 'Military Doctrine', 8, admits that there is no Ndebele word for 'divisional commander'; he suggests induna yomuzi, which means, however, induna of a village.
The military bias of Summers and Pagden is especially implicit in Appendix 2, 'Estimates of Regimental Strength at various times in 1893', Warriors, 148-51. Isikulu, for example, means 'important men,' and was never a formal council.
A. J. B. Hughes, 'The Restructuring of Ndebele Society under European Control', unpublished Ph.D. typescript, no date (copy held by the National Free Library, Bulawayo), 132; Hughes, Kin, Caste and Nation, ii, 69.
Hughes, 'Restructuring', 134. See also footnote I3.
Hughes, Kin, Caste and Nation, 15-I6. It is rather the use of the word regiment which has created unnecessary confusion in Ndebele studies.
They are usually referred to as amabutho.
Hist. MSS W18/i/2, Statement on the Organization of the Matabele Nation by Ntabeni Khumalo.
See especially P. S. Mahlangu, Umthwakazi (Cape Town, I957), 23-7. For Maund's lists see C 4643, 115-I6.
Hist. MSS W18/i/i, Statement of Mvumi, ii Nov. I937. Lye, 'Ndebele Kingdom', 9I, refers to Amhlope as Mzilikazi's older married regiment.
'Mziki' (A. A. Campbell), 'Mlimo. The Rise and Fall of the Matabele (Pietermaritzburg, I926), 53, 59, 67; A. T. Bryant, Olden Times in Zululand and Natal (London, I929), 426, 438-9; Mahlangu, Umthwakazi, 23-7.
Hist. MSS WI8/i/i, Second Statement of Ginyalitshe, 6 April 1940.
Interview with Ngungumbane Mkwananzi, 5 Dec. 1973; interview with Mabhena by E. M. Mhlanga, 24 Aug. I972; Hist. MSS WI8/i/i, Statement of Ginyalitshe, 23 Nov. I937.
'Mziki', 'Mlimo, 59; Hist. MSS WI8/i/i, Statement of Mvumi, ii Nov. I937, who said: 'when Amnyama became very few they were put with Inzimazana [Mzinyati]'. Mzinyati, led by the Gwebu and Khumalo families, was always regarded as the most important of the Amnyama-descended imisi. Godhlwayo was formed at Mkwahla in the 1830s, some say as an offshoot of Mzinyati.
'Mziki', 'Mlimo, ch. I2. Gundwane's Amakanda-Amnyama group made Mzilikazi's son Nkulumane king. It is likely that this was at first regarded as a permanent solution, and symbolic of the emergence of a new but small Nguni state north of the Limpopo.
Hist. MSS WI8/i/i, Second Statement of Ginyalitshe.
'Mziki', 'Mlimo, ch. ii.
Hist. MSS WI8/i/i, Second Statement of Ginyalitshe; Mahlangu, Umthwakazi, 25.
Interview with Zimu Moyo, 5 Dec. 1973. A glance at the map is enough to dispose of the idea of four large administrative divisions. The umbrella-handle is made by drawing a line connecting the imisi of Nqama, Amagogo, Nyamandlovu, Ujinga and Umcijo, all of which identified themselves with Igapha. Note that Nqama is separated from Amagogo by Amhlope-connected imisi such as Isizinda. Que Que is a modern town just to the north of the map.
For Zwangendaba, Mncwazi and Ujinga see H. M. G. Jackson, 'Boer Invasion of Rhodesia', NADA, ii (1924), 58-60; Mhlagazanhlansi (N. Jones), My Friend Khumalo (Bulawayo, I944), ii. For Mahlokohloko and Inyati see Wallis, Moffat Journals, I, 229; II, 71-2, 249.
For Induba see 'Mziki', 'Mlimo, IIo; for Mhlahlanhlela see J. P. R. Wallis (ed.), The Matabele Mission, a Selection from The Correspondence of John and Emily Moffat (London, 1945), 21 I; for Intemba see Wallis, Baines Diaries, ii, 535.
Summers and Pagden, Warriors, say that Inqobo was formed out of the Mbuyaswe ibutho which Mzilikazi formed at the close of his life. Thomas, Eleven Years, I83 (writing in about 1871), describes umbuyazwi as 'the preparatory course of the [in the context, any] ibuto', which may or may not support this.
London Missionary Society Archives (School of Oriental and African Studies), Matabeleland, Box i, Folder 3, Jacket B (henceforth LMS MLI/3/B), Sykes to Mullens, 2I June I878. The reasons for the change are unclear. Perhaps Intemba and Inyati had 'matured' and were no longer militarily effective; perhaps Lobengula was doubtful of their loyalty, or perhaps they were moved south to defend against the anticipated invasion by Mangwane, Lobengula's half-brother, who was supported by the Ngwato king, Macheng. The attack did not take place until January I872, however.
Rhodesian Government Delineation Report, Gwelo District, The Gambiza Chieftainship, 1963.
Thomas, Eleven Years, 190-2; CTi/8/4, Colenbrander to Harris, Telegram, 5 July 1892.
85 Interview wvith Sihlangu Tshabalala by J. B. Dube, 16-24 Nov. I972; Hist. MSS W18/i/i, Second Statement of Ginyalitshe, 6 April I940, who observed that Lobengula 'only wanted young men [for Imbizo] because they would have no knowledge of Nkulumane'. Nkulumane was almost certainly dead by 187I, but was being impersonated by a man called Kanda. The real threat to Lobengula was Mangwane.
Mahlangu, Umthwakazi, 6o.
LMS MLi/2/D, Thompson to Mullens, I4 Aug. i87I; Wallis, Baines Diaries, iIl, 657-8; 'Mziki', 'Mlimo, II9.
See, for example, NBi/i/i, Robinson to C. N. C., 6 Aug. I900; NBE7/I/I, Stuart to C. N. C., 8 June 1897; NBI/I/5, Statement of Tala Ndiweni, 19 Nov. I902; Hist. MSS MAi/2/2, Diary of Major Thomas Maxwell I889-9I, entry for 27 Dec. 1890.
Hist. MSS TH2/I/I, 'Thomas Diary', entry for October I879.
Mbizo (F. V. Johnstone), 'Mtikana ka Mafu', NADA, IV (I926), 54-5.
M. Gelfand (ed.), Gubulwayo and Beyond: Letters and Journals of the early Jesuit Missionaries to Zambesia, I879-87 (London, 1968), 463.
CTi/I3/IO, J. S. Moffat to Harris, 6 Oct. I890.
Hist. MSS MOI/I/5/6, J. S. Moffat Correspondence-Official and Political, Moffat to Loch, 24 May 1892. For Jameson's misrepresentation of Lobengula's permission for the pioneer column to enter Mashonaland, see J. Cobbing, 'Lobengula, Jameson and the Occupation of Mashonaland', to be published in Rhodesian History, IV (0974).
Hist. MSS WI8/i/i, Joint Statement of Mvutu and Posela; and Statement of Siatcha, zo Nov. 1937; J. A. Pitout, 'Lobengula's Flight and the Shangani Battle', NADA, XL (i963), 7I; C 8547, 'Report by Sir Richard Martin on the Native Administration of the British South Africa Company', I897, 32-3, Carnegie to Martin, no date. The distinction between the umlisa and the umnumzana has not yet been cleared up.
CTi/I3/4, Doyle to Harris, 25 July I890.
Hist. MSS W18/i/z, Statement of Ntabeni Khumalo.
D. N. Beach, 'The Rising in South-Western Mashonaland, I896-7', unpublished Ph.D. thesis, London University (1971), 221.
J. White, 'History of Shabani' (forthcoming), draft chapter: 'The Ndebele Influence'.
L05/6/7, W. I. S. Driver to C. N. C., 2o Dec. I896.
It was present in the Bulawayo area by I889; see MOI/3/I1/, J. S. Moffat Diary I887-92, entry for 10 Dec. 1889.
Hist. MSS W18/i/i, Statement of Mvumi; Mahlangu, Umthwakazi, 23.
Beach, 'Rising', 2z2; Hist. MSS WIi/i/i, G. T. Wilkerson, 'The Matabele Nation', 19; Summers and Pagden, Warriors, I15.
Hist. MSS C04/3/I, J. W. Colenbrander Diary, June-July I890, entry for 8 June I890.
F. Gambo, 'The Royal House of the "Gambos"', NADA, XXXIX (I962), 49; Rhodesian Government Delineation Report, Nyamandhlovu District, The Matapula Chieftainship, I965.
C. L. Norris Newman, Matabeleland and How We Got It (London, I895), I6i.
Hist. MSS W18/i/z, Statement of Ntabeni Khumalo; Perham, Ten Africans, 67-8.
For this defensive cordon see CTi/i3/3, Colenbrander to Curry, I June I892. A major link in it was Amaveni, a Rozvi settlement which Ndansi Khumalo referred to as 'baboons; we called them this because they were a mixed lot, not pure Matabele'. Amaveni was in the upper Gwelo region at least by the mid-i88os; see Perham, Ten Africans, 68; CTi/6/8, Selous to Selous Exploration Syndicate, z and IZ Oct. I889.
Posselt, Fact and Fiction, 76; Hist. MSS WIi/i/i, Wilkerson, 'Matabele Nation', I9. Other Kalanga settlements under Ndebele control on the highveld to the west of Bulawayo were Usaba, Zinyama, Mpande and Lulwane (see map). Although 'governed' by Ndebele izinduna, they do not seem ever to have been amabutho in the formal sense.
Hist. MSS WI8/i/z, Statement of Ntabeni Khumalo; Posselt, Fact and Fiction, 76; WIi /i /i, Wilkerson, 'Matabele Nation', 19.
Interview with Nqagwana Khumalo by J. B. Dube, 5 June I972; Mhlagazanhlansi, My Friend Khumalo, z3; H. Vaughan-Williams, A Visit to Lobengula in I889 (Pietermaritzburg, I94I), 103; Hist. MSS FRz/z/i, The Reminiscences of Ivon Fry, 1938, 92. According to Nqagwana the Imbovane lived in a part of Bulawayo called Engoqeni.
The careers of Mtikana and Gambo, as well as other chiefs, are discussed in my forthcoming Ph.D. thesis.
Men could exploit other talents such as those of the isanusi ('doctor') or umkhanda (blacksmith), or even a personal hold over the king.

History of The Ndebele

2011-07-14T15:20:00.000-07:00

The Ndebele Kingdom South of the Limpopo River
Author(s): William F. Lye
Source: The Journal of African History, Vol. 10, No. 1 (1969), pp. 87-104

MUCH has been written about the Ndebele kingdom north of the Limpopo River, whereas the Transvaal period has been strangely neglected.2 While few literate observers were involved with the Ndebele at that early time, the period has relevance to the development of a distinctive Ndebele polity. This study depends on accounts written by those few travellers who visited Mzilikazi prior to his expulsion from South Africa by the Boers in 1837. These include the Rev. Robert Moffat of Kuruman, Dr Andrew Smith who explored the area in 1835, and missionaries of the Wesleyan, Paris Evangelical and American Board societies. Their evidence is supplemented by the traditional history of the Ndebele, especially that preserved by Malida ka Mabuya.3

Here an attempt is made to reconstruct the major events relating to the establishment of the Ndebele on the South African high veld to 1837, and to analyse the nature of the society which Mzilikazi organized up to that time.

NDEBELE MIGRATIONS TO 1837

Mzilikazi belonged to the Northern Kumalo, a small chiefdom of the Northern Nguni. His branch originated in the segmentation of the Kumalo in the generation of his father, Mashobana. Mashobana lived near other Kumalo chiefdoms, between the esiKwebezi, a tributary of the Black Mfolozi, and the Mkuze. This was when Zwide and Dingeswayo were contending for mastery. A neighbouring Kumalo chief, Donda, a vassal of Dingeswayo, aided Shaka to escape a trap by Zwide, when Zwide attacked and killed Dingeswayo in I818. Therefore, Zwide killed Donda, and also killed Mashobana, his son-in-law. Zwide then placed Mzilikazi, his grandson, over the Kumalo, subject to himself.4

Mzilikazi must have been an effective leader. He inherited the chieftainship legitimately and also by appointment from Zwide. He was then between eighteen and twenty-two years old.5 Mzilikazi's appearance was often described. Robert Moffat called him short, as did Andrew Smith; Jean- Paul Pellissier, a French missionary, thought him average; Captain W.

Cornwallis Harris regarded him as being tall, each probably reflecting their own bias more than the appearance of the chief. He had a round forehead and a pleasant smile, a gentle countenance and a soft, effeminate voice. He tended to corpulence and had the scars of war. He appeared shrewd and observant, cheerful, even-tempered, dignified, reserved, wily, suspicious, avaricious, robust and virile to various of those who met him.6

Mzilikazi ruled his people as a vassal of Zwide only briefly. By i822 he had become a regimental commander under Shaka. He must have joined Shaka voluntarily, for Shaka did not eliminate the Kumalo chiefdom. Mzilikazi retained command of his own people within Shaka's army and remained at his home kraal. By the end of 1823 Mzilikazi had rebelled and fled from Zululand to the interior high veld with those he could save about 300 young warriors and women.7

He fought his way north along the inner slopes of the Drakensberg until he reached the Olifants River, where he settled temporarily at ekuPumeleni, 'The Place of Rest'.8 From there he attacked the local inhabitants in order to replenish his forces and his herds.9

In addition, Mzilikazi sent his impi long distances to attack the Kholokwe among the southern Sotho, and Sepeka, a Nguni chief located near them. Sepeka joined with Mzilikazi. Mzilikazi may have also raided west at thistime, attacking Sebetwane and Moletsane, two of the marauders of the Difaqane.10

While at the Olifants, only one reversal was recorded. Shortly after his arrival, Mzilikazi apparently attacked the Pedi, who lived between the Olifants and the Steelpoort Rivers. From their flat-topped mountains they drove off the Ndebele and mocked the retreating impi, saying, 'It sleeps, it is tired, the evil beast; it roars no more'." In addition to recruiting men locally, Mzilikazi received reinforcements from Nguni refugees who fled from the coast.l2 Having built his band of refugee Kumalo into a military unit containing many other Nguni and Sotho recruits, in 1825 his strength was tested. Nqaba, another Nguni chief, had, like himself, fled from Shaka. Mzilikazi drove Nqaba eastward, where he joined other Nguni refugees and built his own kingdom in Malawi.13

In 1825 Mzilikazi left ekuPumeleni. Drought parched the land that year despite the intercession of rain-makers.14 Mzilikazi sent exploration parties to the south-west to fertile land with plentiful springs in the Magaliesberg hills. This land, along the Apies and Crocodile Rivers, Moffat described as the richest in all South Africa. It was dotted with ruined Kwena villages which had fallen to the hordes of the Difaqane.15

Other problems may have caused Mzilikazi to move. Perhaps he was searching for fresh recruits for his army. Probably the coming of Nqaba reminded him of his nearness to Shaka. According to one source, slaveraiding from the north threatened him.16

Accordingly, Mzilikazi destroyed his village and moved to the lands of the Kwena, where he established his people. Here Mzilikazi built two military kraals on the Apies: enDinaneni and enKungwini, and enHlahlandlela, at the confluence with the Crocodile.17

Once established, the Ndebele raided in every direction. Five regimentscrossed the Limpopo after cattle of the Shona people.18 In 1827 the Ndebele returned to the Steelpoort, where they avenged themselves against the Pedi. These Pedi were sent to construct a palisade around Mzilikazi's royal residence. No tools were provided, according to the tradition, and no food was given them. As one group dropped from exhaustion, more Pedi were impressed. They were called Hole by the Ndebele, which became the Ndebele equivalent for 'slave'.19 Other Ndebele armies subjugated the

Fig 1 Ndebele Migrations 1822-37

Phuthing living north of the Vaal and other Sotho communities to the south, east and west. They drove Moletsane's Taung south of the Vaal. But, though Mzilikazi raided beyond the Vaal and the Limpopo Rivers, he never controlled those areas.20

In his raids Mzilikazi had a consistent policy beyond a mere desire for cattle or a lust for fighting. Jan Viljoen, an elephant hunter who came to know him well, quoted Mzilikazi as saying that the wholesale massacres were 'an act of policy', and added, 'I was like a blind man, feeling my way with a stick. We had heard tales of great impi that suddenly popped up from underground, or swept down on you from high mountains, and we had a dread of the Korana, mounted and armed with rifles. I had to keep open veld around me.'21

Mzilikazi faced three major opponents during his residence along the Apies River: the Griqua leaders, Jan Bloem and Berend Berends, and Dingane.

In 1828, just before the first white men reached Mzilikazi, Jan Bloem assembled a large commando consisting of Korana, Bergenaar, Taung and Rolong. They intended to destroy the Ndebele and, incidentally, to make off with their cattle. They sacked several posts and rounded up about 3,000 head of cattle, because Mzilikazi's regiments were fighting the Ngwaketse at the time. Rather than face the Ndebele army, the raiders proceeded homeward with the cattle. Three days later the commando split up. The Taung and Rolong took their cattle and proceeded south. Bloem and his Korana and Bergenaar remained behind, allowing an impi of Mzilikazi to surround them at dawn and recapture their cattle as well as some guns and other property of the Korana. Most of the raiders escaped, thanks to their horses.22

Mzilikazi gained the offensive thereafter and kept patrols guarding his southern approaches.23

The next major opponent of Mzilikazi was Berend Berends. He had visited the kraal of Mzilikazi with the Rev. James Archbell, which made him aware of Mzilikazi's wealth. Soon afterwards he tried to recruit a crusading force which would destroy Mzilikazi. The settled Griqua under Andries Waterboer refused, but others joined Berends from as far away as Philippolis. They found Mzilikazi's kraals guarded only by old men, for the main regiments were away again fighting the Shona. The invaders captured large herds from several cattle posts, but three nights later they fell to the same fate as Bloem. The Hlope, Mzilikazi's older married regiment, killed most of the raiders; only a few returned to Berends.24 Mzilikazi then determined to end the raiding by Griqua and Korana. He sent three regiments towards the Vaal. Before reaching the enemies'
homes, the impi found a band of Griqua hunters on the river. They killed several and captured three children. They also captured many guns, horses and wagons.25

Meanwhile, Dingane had consolidated his power after killing Shaka, and then sought a field of conquest for his restless army. He sent his entire force in search of the Ndebele in August 1832. Again, Mzilikazi's armies,as restless as the Zulu, were away in the north. Worse, the commander of Mzilikazi's Exna regiment deserted him and guided the approaching Zulu army. The two military kraals on the upper Apies were destroyed and their defenders annihilated. Mzilikazi appears to have tried to defend himself with the few troops remaining, but Dingane defeated him. The Zulu destroyed his unfinished capital, emHlahlandlela, and freed the Pedi. Mzilikazi soon moved farther west. Malida suggests that Mzilikazi built a semi-permanent encampment in the Mlulu mountains.26

When these three attacks occurred, the Ndebele warriors were on raiding expeditions. At the time of Bloem's commando, Mzilikazi had sent his troops to the west to drive the Ngwaketse to the Kalahari.27 During the year of Berend's commando, the Ndebele had crossed the Vaal to attack the Southern Sotho on both sides of the Caledon. They were successful against the Hoja and the Taung, but Sekonyela, the Tlokwa chief, repulsed them and sent a warning to Moshweshwe. Moshweshwe, too, repulsed the Ndebele by rolling rocks down the passes of Thaba Bosiu. As the Ndebele retired northward, Moshweshwe sent oxen to the soldiers, saying, 'Moshweshwe salutes you. Supposing that hunger had brought you to this country, he sends you these cattle that you may eat them on your way home.'28 They returned home and then went immediately north.

During this formative period Mzilikazi had gained control of the richest lands on the high veld between the Limpopo and the Vaal. He dominated the local Sotho peoples and recruited soldiers and workers from among them. He also continued to receive Nguni recruits.

Shortly after the Bloem incident Mzilikazi welcomed to his kraal his first white visitors. He sought out the traders Robert Schoon and William McLuckie, who were with the Hurutshe at Mosega. Mzilikazi treated them well and obtained from them, in addition to the usual beads, knowledgeabout guns, which until then he had known only in the reports of his warriors. But he knew well the results of white contacts with the Zulu, even remembering the names of the white traders at Port Natal.

Mzilikazi probably recognized the potential value of white contacts, but he was obviously deeply concerned with what he knew of the activities of traders in Natal. He treated the traders favourably, but sought through them to obtain a missionary, and sent with them his representative, Mncombate, to examine the missionary station at Kuruman.

Schoon and McLuckie contacted James Archbell, the Wesleyan missionary at Plaatberg on the Vaal, and Robert Moffat at Kuruman. Both agreed to visit the monarch. Through the reports of the traders and missionaries, it is clear that the primary motive of Mzilikazi was to obtain weapons and to win support from the white men against his enemies.29 Thereafter, Mzilikazi attempted consistently to obtain missionaries to reside at his kraal, possibly to mediate in his relations with other white men. He solicited the Wesleyans, Moffat, and the French Protestants to this end.30

Mzilikazi remained insecure along the Apies, and soon determined to move westward. The Griqua and Zulu threats aroused him to greater fury, and he reduced the remaining Tswana chiefdoms in the west. In 1832 he was reported as having followed up his defeat by Dingane with four campaigns against the Ngwaketse, the Kgatla, the Kwena, and the Rolong of Tawana at Khunwana. A participant stated that Mzilikazi justified the raid by the fact that the Rolong had murdered two Ndebele messengers collecting tribute at Khunwana, and because Tawana had joined Berends's raid against the Ndebele.31

After Dingane attacked him, Mzilikazi fled westward. In doing so he drove away the Hurutshe, his tributary, by the end of 1832 and settled in towns at Mosega and eGabeni along the Marico River.32

Once Mzilikazi was established on the Marico, he desolated the veld surrounding him as he had done in the east. Among the Tswana communities which he subjugated were the Rapulana Rolong of Matlaba. They submitted to Mzilikazi until I835, and then fled south to Thaba Nchu, where other Rolong had settled.33 Mzilikazi again fought the Hurutshe, then living on the Hartz River.34

Despite these precautions, Mzilikazi failed to achieve the security hesought. Annoyances continued from the Griqua and Korana as well as from thieving bands of homeless Tswana secluded in remote corners of his land, but all these were of little consequence until Jan Bloem rose again.35

In May 1834 Bloem organized another commando with his usual combination of mounted Griqua and Korana and Tswana footmen. Bloem attacked Mosega, and with his guns succeeded in capturing cattle. Again he allowed the Ndebele to trap him, and this time his horse was speared from under him and he had to escape on a spare mount. Though victorious, Mzilikazi realized that the victory was not indicative of his real strength against concerted opposition.36

Soon after, Mzilikazi received several visitors: traders and hunters, Moffat, and Dr Andrew Smith, who went to explore and to open relations for the Colonial government, and three American missionaries who, in 1836, went to teach the Ndebele at Mosega. The Ndebele received the white men well. Anybody who came from Kuruman, singly, and with prior approval, was welcomed.37 Only one instance marred this relationship. Andrew Geddes Bain, a trader, was driven from the area, but only because his Griqua guides stole Ndebele cattle.37

Lastly came the Voortrekkers. They differed from other white men in that they came in large numbers, they did not notify the king, and they acted as if they meant to stay.

On 15 August 1836 the military kraal nearest Mosega, Matsenyateng, became alerted to the arrival of the first trekkers. A vanguard had made temporary camps along the south bank of the Vaal, while their leaders travelled north and east arranging for a settlement. Boers crossed the river and camped on land which Mzilikazi claimed. Impi went out against them,
but first attacked a hunting party of Stephanus Erasmus, who had entered the area separately. The Ndebele wiped out their encampment and captured some San prisoners and five wagons.

The patrol went on to attack the encampment of Voortrekkers led by Sarel Cilliers and Andries Potgieter. Five or six hundred Ndebele rushed the Boer laager. For six hours the warriors attacked, and the trekkers, being forewarned, resisted. But another party, the Liebenbergs, had not been warned, and Kalipi's men completely destroyed them.39

On 19 October Kalipi's regiment crossed the Vaal to a hill, later called 'the Hill of the Fight'. There, Cilliers and Potgieter and a party of thirty-five trekkers and their families had arranged their wagons in a circle.

When the Ndebele approached, the Boers attempted to parley, but soon retreated to their laager. In a dramatic battle the trekkers drove off the Ndebele. The Boers estimated that they killed 430 warriors of a force of 6,000. The Ndebele, however, retreated with the flocks and herds of the Boers, numbering 100 horses, 4,600 head of cattle, and over 50,000 sheep
and goats.40

Thereafter, the farmers retreated to Thaba Nchu, where they reorganized under Andries Potgieter and Gerrit Maritz. They led a commando to the Ndebele kraals on 17 January I837. Kalipi's warriors were away from Matsenyateng. Though the attackers consisted of only 107 Boers, 40 Griqua and 60 Rolong, they attacked Mosega before dawn and captured the cattle and killed the inhabitants who showed themselves, even gunning down the women who had retreated into the house of the missionaries. The Boers attacked about fifteen kraals and retook 6,000 head of cattle and the captured wagons. The Ndebele lost perhaps 400 warriors. The American missionaries retreated with the Boers, assuming that the commando had destroyed their work.41

In June I837 the Zulu returned to the high veld. Mzilikazi sent a regiment to oppose them, but the Zulu slew them and captured several herds of cattle. Then Mzilikazi sent three regiments to track the retiring Zulu. Many Zulu were killed, but the survivors retreated, bearing away much of the booty. The Zulu called this raid a total defeat for the Ndebele. In fact, Mzilikazi saved many of his cattle, but the loss of men then and in the previous fight with the Boers seriously weakened the Ndebele.42

Because of this, Mzilikazi decided to move still farther from his enemies. While he was moving, another Boer commando under Potgieter and Piet Uys attacked him in November I837. At the same time Griqua were plundering cattle from other Ndebele kraals. The Boers found Mosega deserted, but they found the Ndebele at eGabeni, to the north. In a rout which lasted nine days, the Boers captured many cattle and seized the land which the Ndebele left strewn with 3,000 corpses.43 As he left, Mzilikazi allowed many of the subject peoples to remain behind.44 Despite that, the majority of those who followed him were Sotho people. Between 10,000 and 20,000 people followed him beyond the Limpopo. To the present day, ethnographers estimate that the Sotho element in the Ndebele polity exceeds the Nguni.45

The Ndebele Political and Military System

By 1835 Mzilikazi had built his kingdom to its largest extent south of the Limpopo. He had also established a viable social system which united the diverse elements in his following. Here will be attempted a description of that system as it operated on the high veld.

Mzilikazi's territory reached its maximum extent in 1832, when he moved to the Marico River. There he established his main centres at Mosega and eGabeni. Mzilikazi clearly regarded the Vaal River as his southern boundary and kept patrols on guard in that area. Much of the land in the south was denuded of any settlements.46 To the east he had disrupted the Kwena, Phuthing, Pedi and Transvaal Ndebele communities, but he never occupied the land, because he wanted space between him and the Zulu. His most easterly kraals were on the Crocodile and Apies Rivers in I829. By 1835 he had retreated twenty-five miles west of the Crocodile.47 The Limpopo served as a natural boundary and Mzilikazi tended to build his 'great places' in that direction. Though he raided to the north against the Shona, Mzilikazi never settled there before I837.

In the west, Mzilikazi continually expanded his state. In 1829 Moffat found the first Ndebele kraals five days east of Mosega. In 1835 they were near the Molopo River, and Andrew Smith reported that the Ndebele called that river their western boundary.48

The territory under Mzilikazi's influence extended 200 miles east to west and nearly as far north to south, but the area he utilized was much smaller.

The number of people who inhabited that territory was immensely greater than the Kumalo refugee band of 1823. The original group consisted of only 200 or 300 warriors with fewer women, children and elders.49 In I829 the first white visitors estimated the total population at 60,000- 80,000.50 By 1836 Andrew Smith and others estimated the size of the Nguni military force at 1,000-5,000 warriors plus additions of subject peoples. To account for the difference between the smallness of this estimate and the formidable display of strength the Ndebele gave, Smith explained that Mzilikazi amassed his entire force for such shows, leaving the rest of his territory unguarded except for his few older men.51

To reach any conclusions about the size of the Ndebele population, its growth pattern and composition must be understood. Mzilikazi began with a few Kumalo, but eight Nguni chiefs joined their people to his.52 If each of these were comparable in number to Mzilikazi's own following, then Smith's estimate of the Nguni army could have been attained.

Mzilikazi's recruitment methods involved Sotho youths as well as Nguni immigrants. Ndebele warfare intentionally destroyed elderly and infant Sotho, but young men were recruited to the regiments, in which they soon outnumbered the Nguni, and the young girls were taken as wives by the Ndebele.53

The greater part of Mzilikazi's population consisted of indigenous Sotho whom he never attempted to assimilate. Some, the Hole, became domestic and community menials. Others were assigned villages of their own, where they herded cattle, possibly under their traditional chiefs, but under the surveillance of an Ndebele regiment. Others appear to have retained considerable freedom in their domestic activities, but were subject to tribute assessments and had to convey information to Mzilikazi regarding enemies.54 Combining all these elements, Nguni and Sotho, military and subjugated, tributary and vassal, makes reasonable an estimate of 60,000-80,000 subjects.55

The despotic nature of the Ndebele kingdom was noted by all visitors. Obsequious praising of the king shocked each missionary who entered the royal kraals.56

'The king's word is law, and his commands must be promptly executed be they ever so capricious', observed the Americans, adding, 'yet the government is administered with a systematic uniformity, which we infer proceeds from established usages, of which we are yet ignorant.'57 These usages merit consideration.

Transcending and tempering the typical picture of despotic and capricious behaviour, Mzilikazi evinced a concern for effective government, stability, and a regard for tradition. He attempted to give his acts the appearanceof regularity and justice, according to a later observer, and this conforms with the practices he established early.58 He retained among the royal entourage officials whom he allowed freer access to his person.59 He preserved the traditional Inkwala, or First Fruits Ceremony of the Nguni, by which he united his people under him. He held this ceremony in February at eGabeni, the kraal which was administered by Kabalonta, his elderly friend at whose kraal in the home country he was born.60 During the ceremony he allowed his subjects to sing their grievances in terms which would normally be forbidden in his presence.61 Though, like Dingeswayo, he never circumcised youths before they entered the regiments, he reverted to the traditional practice of requiring the warriors to be circumcised prior to marriage.62

The top of the Ndebele hierarchy was the king. While 'his word is law, and he has only to lift his finger and his order is promptly carried into execution',6 he also relied on advisors. Under him were 'two degrees of rank above the commonality'. The higher, called Umnumzane, included both male relatives of the king and commoners. These men did not normally go on raids, and, according to Smith, had the leading influence in the land after the king.64

The second rank was the Zinduna (singular, Induna), with authority over the military regiments and the subjects of the districts. The Zinduna were commoners and probably had more power than the nobility. The Zinduna, in turn, had subordinate officers. Perhaps at this early stage there were already larger ' provincial' divisions, for three major Zinduna were identified by Smith in I835: Kalipi, who ruled Mosega and the south; Kabalonta, who ruled the land north of eGabeni; and Mncombate, who ruled in the east.65 Kabalonta ruled the capital; Mncombate made official visits to Kuruman and Cape Town.66 If the description of later times applies, these three would have been called Zinduna Nkulu.67 Other Zinduna controlled local military-administrative districts and under them were village headmen.68

Representing the king in the districts, Mzilikazi's wives resided at every major kraal, where they shared the rule of the Zinduna. The Zinduna consulted these wives on important matters and the wives reined the Zinduna's independence. The wives provided the king with continuous information, and their residences became his during his travels. This practice was already established by i829.69

The structure here described is similar to the system developing among the Zulu and the Swazi. Differing from Shaka on one point, Mzilikazi had recognized wives, and his heir was allowed to live conscious of his position.70 Unlike the Swazi, Mzilikazi never used the clan structure in the organization of his districts, though he retained it for social purposes.71

The military system was the core of Ndebele society. The Induna was a military officer as well as a civil administrator. Immediately under the Zinduna came the Mantoto (lit. 'men') who were older married soldiers; next came the Machacha, 'invincible soldiers', who could not marry until they had distinguished themselves in battle and who expected to conquer or die; lastly came the Matsetse, or youths, who generally tended cattle.72 Like Shaka, Mzilikazi controlled the rights of his soldiers to marry, and when the Machacha married, the wives were either a gift of the king or were paid for with royal cattle. This regimental organization of the male population broke down any clan or local affiliations.73

The membership of an Ndebele regiment included subject peoples. The treatment of Nguni refugees was indistinguishable from that of the Kumalo; the treatment of Sotho subjects in the regiments was theoretically equal, but discrimination was felt throughout Ndebele history.74 The Griqua, Willem, who was captured in a raid, rose to prominence as an Induna for a time.75 Some Sotho also rose to prominence, but this occurred only later.76

Being the ruler of a permanently mobilized society, Mzilikazi had to keep his regiments occupied. Cattle raiding was a safe practice, but often Mzilikazi faced such threats that more serious fighting was required. Early accounts imply that Mzilikazi expended unreasonable fury for sheer lust. However, he often faced attacks which caused him to turn on his neighbours in order to find a refuge for his people. In the latest example, when Mzilikazi moved to Mosega, he had additional justification, because both the Hurutshe and the Rolong killed his emissaries, and were collaborating with his Griqua enemies.77 Though he fought often and deserved criticism for his brutality, Mzilikazi's battles were explicable within this context. His destruction of entire chiefdoms coincides with those times when Mzilikazi had to find new lands for his people.

Mzilikazi arranged his regimental kraals so that his capital was in the centre and his principal soldiers were stationed within an easy march, identified by Smith as one hour's journey, in kraals surrounding the centre. These posts held the choice breeding cattle. Outside this ring were placed eight or ten posts in each direction from which enemies were expected: towards Kuruman, along the southern approach of the Griqua and Korana, towards the east from whence came the Zulu, and on the north. Each of these divisions had its kraals located within sight of each other. Between the military posts Sotho kraals were stationed to tend the inferior cattle, often under a Sotho chief. At puberty, Nguni boys were organized into their own kraals, with cattle to guard. Actually, such new kraals were located within sight of seasoned regiments for protection.78

This layout of kraals indicated Mzilikazi's concern for foreign involvements. He maintained a policy of keeping open veld around him, and required his tributary neighbours to supply information regarding his enemies.79

The Ndebele developed a stratified social system. The Kumalo and later Nguni recruits were known as Nzansi (Zansi), meaning 'those who come from downstream'. One Sotho chiefdom, the Ndiweni, was included in this class, which provided the ruling elite of the Ndebele from whom came all the Zinduna. All the Nguni refugees became assimilated into this class, remaining distinguishable only by the retention of clan names, which enabled the Ndebele to continue the custom of exogamous marriages.80

All other Sotho were called Hole, which implied serfdom. Some Hole became personal menials of individuals, others remained together in their villages under the supervision of the military regiments, and tended Mzilikazi's cattle.81 These may properly be called vassals, as they retained their own chiefs.

Later, when the Ndebele migrated north, they released the Hole from bondage, and they achieved higher status as Enhla, a middle rank, which, like the Nzansi, could take Hole from the Shona of the north.82 Perhapsthe Enhla included only the descendants of mixed marriages between Nguni and Sotho. The information regarding intermarriage is confusing. Malida suggests that warriors could take Sotho maidens as wives, but this probably described conditions before Mzilikazi incorporated vassal communities intact. Malida protests that such intermarriages weakened the military prowess of the Ndebele.83 This practice appears to have been forbidden later.84

EXTERNAL RELATIONS OF THE NDEBELE

Mzilikazi's settlement on the high veld involved him in relations with several peoples: Africans, Griqua and Korana, and white. Each will be considered here.

Among his enemies, the Zulu predominated. Shaka never attacked the Ndebele after they reached the high veld, but remained a threat. When Dingane succeeded Shaka, his domestic difficulties forced him to send his regiments far away. No attack was conclusive, but they made Mzilikazi's position precarious, and induced him to move west and north.

Other potential Nguni enemies of Mzilikazi were the Ndwandwe, Hlubi and Xhosa. Zwide and his Ndwandwe were eliminated by Shaka in I826, after which the survivors joined Mzilikazi.85 When the Hlubi broke under Matiwane's army on the high veld, the survivors fled to Mzilikazi in I825. Mzilikazi plotted the death of the Hlubi chief, but when the plot was discovered, the Hlubi fled and Mzilikazi sent an impi in pursuit. Thereafter, both the Hlubi and Ngwane left the high veld.86

The Xhosa became a threat as a result of the 'Kaffir War' with the colony in I835. When Smith visited Mzilikazi, the Ndebele were worried about a possible invasion from the Xhosa, should they be defeated by the colonists. Nothing came of this, though Xhosa warriors visited Mzilikazi at the time.87

With other Nguni, Mzilikazi had favourable relations. His spies kept him informed of the movements of the Zulu, and his agents drew dissident Nguni from Zululand to join his army.88

Mzilikazi either drove away, destroyed or incorporated the Sotho within his land. Among the Tswana, only the Thlaping escaped untouched by Ndebele raids. This may have been because of their remoteness from him, but more probably because missionaries resided among them. Mzilikazi never attacked a town where missionaries lived, but this was a period of

crisis in his own affairs.

Mzilikazi's reputation as a depredator relates to those periods of his migration to safer lands. During the three moves to ekuPumeleni, the Apies and Marico, he was forced to destroy existing communities. At other times he conformed to traditional cattle raids or defensive and retaliatory fighting. His impact on the Sotho must be seen as his reaction to a search
for security. At other times, his relationships with Sotho chiefs were comparatively restrained.

Coincidental with the rise of Mzilikazi, the Griqua spawned the rebel Bergenaar, and numerous independent leaders became free to plunder the Ndebele herds. With their guns and horses, the Bergenaar usually succeeded in their cattle raids, but they were of little consequence because of the smallness of their attacks. Only Berends and Bloem, the Korana chief, succeeded in organizing large-scale attacks, and each time they failed.

Andries Waterboer offered Mzilikazi hope for peace with the Griqua. Both Waterboer and the king proposed a meeting, but their plan was thwarted by the attack of the Boers. Such an agreement might have produced the basis for a lasting peace.89

White visitors came early to Ndebele lands. Traders and hunters made friends easily, because they offered goods which the king liked, and because they could supply him with guns and the knowledge of their use which would make him secure. Most of the traders respected Mzilikazi's special friendship with Moffat, and used it to obtain favours. Even after the battle at Vechtkop, Captain Sutton and Lieutenant Moultrie of the Cape Seventy- Fifth Regiment received a friendly reception from the chief. He assured them that the attack on the Boers was unplanned and resulted from their coming via the route of Griqua raiders. Had they chosen to come via Kuruman, Mzilikazi stated, and had they made prior arrangements, the Boers would have had safe transit.90

While hunters were admitted on suffrance, Mzilikazi actively sought missionaries. Schoon solicited Archbell and Moffat to visit the chief in 1829, and thereafter Moffat became a 'father figure' to the king.91 He visited Mzilikazi on several occasions, but he also made safe the visits of French missionaries and the establishment of the Americans at Mosega.

Mzilikazi not only permitted the Paris missionaries to settle with the Hurutshe at Mosega, he insisted that they visit him and establish a chainof stations which would link his capital on the Apies with Kuruman. His motives were recognized as a desire for instruction in the use of firearms, a continuous link with the Cape for trade and an escape route in the event of an attack.92 Thereafter, Dingane forced Mzilikazi to move west, where he drove off the Hurutshe, but he first induced the missionaries to leave. Moffat was convinced that the missionaries' fear was ungrounded, and that they might have saved the Hurutshe had they remained. So convinced was he of Mzilikazi's good faith that he encouraged the Americans to settle
with him in I835.93 Later, Moffat assisted a third mission to go to Mzilikazi after his flight beyond the Limpopo.94

Mzilikazi was the most distant chief with whom the Colonial Government treated. In 1835 Andrew Smith, acting for the governor, Sir Benjamin D'Urban, gave Mzilikazi a medal and a cloak as symbols of a treaty of friendship. Mzilikazi confirmed this by sending Mncombati to the Cape to make a formal agreement with the governor. This agreement, signed on 3 March 1836, bound Mzilikazi to be a friend of the Colony, to preserve order in his land, to abstain from war except in self-defence, to protect all white men who visited him, to defend any missionaries who might settle among his people and to refrain from interfering with other chiefdoms in his vicinity. The governor engaged to grant Mzilikazi periodic gifts and to arrange for a missionary to settle with him to forward the intentions of the agreement.95 The effects of this agreement cannot be assessed, because the Boers destroyed this extension of British influence by driving the Ndebele out of reach of the Colony.

SUMMARY

Starting with a small band of refugees, Mzilikazi built a personal military kingdom on the Zulu model at three successive locations in South Africa. His early successes might be attributed to the disturbances resulting from the Difaqane. Later, his strength was maintained by his ability to incorporate diverse peoples into his polity. The aggressive policy for which he is known was not maintained during those periods in which he felt secure, but rather when he was forced to migrate farther from his major enemy, the Zulu. Evidence supports the contention that his main aim was a search for security. His policies were successful against the threats from African enemies. Only with the coming of white men did they fail. The essential features of Mzilikazi's political system are described to show what he preserved of traditional Nguni practices, what he borrowedfrom Dingeswayo and Shaka, and what he modified to fit his particular circumstances.

The viability of Mzilikazi's developing polity is confirmed by his success in reconstructing his kingdom north of the Limpopo River. Without minimizing the traditional characterization of Mzilikazi as a warrior, a desolator and a tyrant, it is as a creative political administrator that his full stature can be appreciated.

Footnote

Explorations In Matabeleland In 1888

2011-07-13T13:40:00.000-07:00

We have received the following letter from Mr. Selous, giving some details of his latest journey through Matabele and Mashuna Land, and notes in explanation of the valuable map of the region which accompanied his letter and which we now publish :-

Zeerust, Marico, Transvaal, January 5th, 1888.

I have just returned from a hunting trip in the Mashona country with three English gentlemen Messrs. J. A. Jameson (brother of the Mr. Jameson who was out here in 1880), A. C. Fountaine, and F. Cooper. We have travelled over a large tract of country in search of game, and I have worked out a rough map of the whole country, based upon Mr. Baines's observations, which I have assumed to be correct, and including my previous journeys in Matabeleland. This map I now send you, hoping that it may be of use to the Society. I had a very good prismatic compass given me by Mr. Jameson, with which I took bearings wherever I could, but in some parts of the country it is impossible to do so, as there are no landmarks or hills of any kind. I have made the distance by my reckoning almost exactly the same as Mr. Baines between Lo Magondi's and Mount Wedza, and the error in the compass may account for the difference in the positions of places on his corrected map, and as I have found them by my compass bearings. I have taken the positions of Lo Magondi's town and Mount Wedza as they stand in Mr. Ravenstein's last map as my basis in that part of the country, and then filled up the country between; and as I have now travelled all that country by several different routes, I cannot think that I am very far wrong in the way I have marked down the courses of the various rivers.

We went again this year to the confluence of the Umfuli and Umnyati rivers, and came straight back from there by a native footpath to Lo- Magondi's town. When Mr, Jameson and I reached the same spot in 1880 we travelled all along the bank of the river over a very rough country, and I overestimated the distance. This year, coming back as we did in a straight line on a native footpath, I was better able to- estimate it, and have accordingly placed the junction further south, and more correctly I think than I did at first. With regard to Thaba In- simbi, there are two ranges of hills lying approximately as I have marked them. Mr. Baines, whose route lay to the west of the Machabe- range, and then round up the Umfuli, and Lundaza and onward to Umtigesa's, could only have seen the one range?the more easterly. Let me here say that I always find the country exactly as Mr. Baines marks it on his actual route, but directly one gets off his line mistakes appear. As for Herr Mauch's routes, I can make nothing of them. Either he never travelled on some of them, or the whole face of the country has ehanged since he was there. For example, on Mr. Ravenstein's last map you will see, near the head of the Bembeesan river, a place called Tabuka's, by Mr. Baines, and some distance to the south of it a place* called Muzigaguva, on one of Herr Mauch's routes. Now Madabuga (Tabuka) and Muzigaguva were two headmen of Mashuna villages, the said villages being close together, not half a mile apart. These people were destroyed by the Matabele in 1883. Indaima's kraal, another Mashuna headman, Herr Mauch has put on the wrong side of the water? shed. The town stands near the river Tukwe, a tributary of the Lumti, and not on the Bembeesan, where Herr Mauch has placed it; the site of the town is the same now as it was forty years ago. The source of the Sebakwe is about where I have placed it too, about half way between Sigaro and Umtigesa's. Father Law took an observation at Sigaro in 1880. We crossed the Sebakwe close to that place this year, and I rode up nearly to the source of the river on horseback?a long journey.

At Sinoia, near the river Angwa, there is a very wonderful place- It is an immense circular hole, about 100 feet or more in depth, and 20 yards or more in diameter, at the bottom of which there is a lake or pool of water extending for 60 yards or so in an immense cavern, in under the rock. The water in this pool is of a most wonderful colour, a deep cobalt blue, but very clear, as one can see pebbles at the bottom at a great depth. There is a slanting shaft or tunnel running at an angle of about 45, from a point about 100 yards from the top of the hole, which strikes the bottom of the hole just at the edge of the water. We are inclined to think that all these excavations are the result of old gold workings, and that a vein of quartz has been worked out down the tunnel, and that eventually a spring was tapped, and that the water forming the subterranean lake, has welled up from below. If the whole thing is artificial, and the work of man, a truly extraordinary amount of labour must have been expended in this place. The natives have now built a stockaded town round this old working, or whatever it is, and go down the tunnel to draw water at the bottom. We went and bathed in it, swimming up the cavern to the other end of the pool. The water was quite warm. The rock on each side of the tunnel is covered with innumerable scores, which look as if they had been done with some kind of iron instrument. The natives have no tradition about this most curious place, but they have no traditions of any kind, not even about the large lemon and citron groves the trees covered with fruit which one finds in this part of the country.

Mr. Fountaine and myself climbed to the top of the most easterly, and, I think, highest peak of Mount Wedza, and found by the aneroid that it is 1750 feet from the base to the summit. The whole mountain is a mass of very rich ironstone, and we could take no compass bearings at all, as the compass would not work. I took the heights by my large aneroid all over the country, but I will not answer for their correctness. As a starting-point I took Kerr's altitude at our camp [on the Hanyame], 4050 feet, to be correct *

You will find that I have marked on the map all the rivers running westwards from the Matabele country into the Gwai (or Guay) somewhat differently from what they,appear on the published maps. My authority is Mr. David Thomas, now dead, a son of the missionary Mr. E. M. Thomas. He made several hunting trips from his father's place, Shiloh, between Emhlangen and Gubuluwayo, to the Zambesi, and found the position and course of the rivers as I have marked them. When I came back from the Zambesi to Emhlangen early in 1878, I crossed the Rutopi (Utope) near its source, and thought that it probably ran into the Gwai, but from what David Thomas told me, I feel sure that it runs into the Sengwe.

I am now going to cross the Zambesi with my waggons at the junction of the Chobe and Zambesi, and intend to go up to the Barotse country, as I am tired of the region south of the Zambesi. I intend to spend a couple of years in the wilds, hunting and collecting, and shall then, I think, return to England.

Cape Town, January 21th, 1888.

I have had three copies made here of my map by the Surveyor- General, Mr. de Smidt one I have given to him, the second to the Governor, and the third I am sending to you, I myself keeping my original. I had another sheet which I wished to send you, with a second map made out according to my compass bearings, but somewhere between Klerksdorp and here it has got lost, having no doubt slipped out of the centre of the roll in the middle of which it was. If I have time when I get back to Klerksdorp, I will make out a second copy from my note- book and send you. The map I am now sending you is one of a country which is bound to be of great importance in the near future, for there is an alluvial gold-field of large extent and wronderful richness I speak with some authority, as it has this year been roughly tested with really extraordinary resultsbacked by a country of great fertility, and watered most plentifully. However, please understand that my map is only a sketch-map, and lays no claim whatever to scientific accuracy. I believe it will be found by any one visiting the country to be a fairly correct map in a rough way, but that is all.

Note by Mr. Turner.

Whilst engaged upon the accompanying map illustrating Mr. Selous's letter, it occurred to me that the following extract from a report by Lieut. E. A. Maund, published in Blue Book C. 4643, February 1886, with reference to the altered situations of Gubuluwayo and Inyati, which does not appear to have been referred to elsewhere (except in a new French gazetteer), might perhaps be appropriately introduced here, as explaining the discrepancies in the positions of these towns as shown in various recent maps of this region.

In describing the division of the Matabele country into four military territorial divisions, he states, on p. 115 :- "Each regiment on formation receives a kraal named after it. This is the only kind of Matabele town existing. These kraals are posted near water, and when they have destroyed the wood for miles round, or there is not sufficient water or pasture for the cattle, as they increase by pillage or breeding, then the kraal is burnt, and the regiment builds another in a fresh bit of country. A large kraal or town can occupy a place for about ten years. This will account for Inyati having removed from the place marked as such on the maps. Emhlangen is the name of the place [still retained for the station of the London Missionary Society], and the Inyati regimental kraal is now 50 miles to south-east of it, hence the name of the new site is for the time being Inyati; while Gubuluwayo is 18 miles north of the position it occupied four years ago."

This Blue Book includes several official reports, containing a considerable amount of geographical information and description of the tribes, with the capabilities of the soil, in the country to the west and north of the Transvaal, not otherwise available.

Notes

* Vide 'Proceedings R. GL S.,' 1881, pp. 169 and 352; 1883, p. 268; 1884, p. 284. Mr. James S. Jameson, who joined, as naturalist, Stanley's expedition for the reiief of Emin Pasha. No. V.May 1888.]

Some Matebele or Ndebele Customs

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Author: Lionel Decle

Charge de Mission Scientifique du Gouvernement Franqais.

Source: The Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol. 23 (1894), pp. 83-88

Marriages.

POLYGAMY is the rule amongst the Matabeles, and the King Lobengula has eighty-four wives. The marriage ceremonies and customs differ greatly from those observed by the other South African tribes. When the father of the girl has given his permission to the marriage, the intended husband kills an ox or a sheep, according to his means, and sends or takes part of it to the village of the young woman's father; coming outside the hut, where the latter lives, he screams out "Here is meat for your child." The young men of the town then come out and drive the herald anway, but he is soon brought back and every one feasts on the meat.

When the girl goes to her husband, most of the young girls of the village accompany her. Sometimes, when he is wealthy enough, her father gives her an ox or a cow to take with her, and when she comes to her husband's place she has to take some dung of the animal presenting it to the bridegroom, who washes his hands with it. The bride must also bring with her a kalabash filled with water and beads, and when she comes into her future husband's house she pours water over him and his people and puts the beads on her head; then, placing the kalabash in front of the bridegroom, she smashes it with her foot: this seals the marriage.

The girls who have accompanied her are supplied with places of rest; the bridegroom slaughters an animal, and a dance with beer drinking takes place that night and the following day. The day after the bridesmaids go and collect wood in the veldt in the morning, the husband gives them a goat to eat, and then they go home.

Contrary to the custom of most African races the husband does not here pay for his wife before marrying her, but when his wife bears a child it belongs to her father unless her husband pays to his father-in-law cattle varying in number according to his means. Sometimes-although this is seldom the case-a man will go and ask for a girl, giving then cattle to her father, but that does not dispense with the usual payment after the child is born.

When a woman is childless her husband has a right to claim her sister or her next nearest relation. No relations are allowed to marry unless very distant-but the relationship is only considered on the man's side; in fact the rule is against marrying anyone with the same " isibongo " (surname); for instance, a Kumalo cannot marry a Kumalo.

Another custom is most strictly observed: a man can never look at his mother-in-law or at his wife's aunt, neither can a woman look at her father-in-law. A man can also send one of his wives away if he does not like her, and she can then marry another man.

Before marriage women are allowed all freedom. When a man is dead his widows usually become his brother's wives although it is not compulsory on the women; and if they choose they can marry again, but in that case the new husband must pay his father-in-law if a child is born.

Burials.

As soon as a Matabele is dead his relations tie the corpse in a blanket or a skin in a sitting position. The relations cry and howl, and the people in the village come and join them. A grave is dug outside the village-there is no special place of burial-which is covered with stones and bushes.

After the funeral the near relations and whoever has come in contact writh the corpse must go out of the town and stay away for several days until they have been doctored and cleansed. Every town has separate huts outside for this purpose.

As a rule they get the dying person out of his house into a small hut to die there.

If a man of importance dies the people from all the surrounding villages come and cry for him: they cry and howl on arriving and on departing only

Footnote

1. This custom oinly takes place in the case of a young girl being married.

Initiation Rites Among the Matabele or Ndebele

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Author: Neville Jones

Source: Man, Vol. 21 (Oct., 1921), pp. 147-150

Published by: Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland

The practice of circumcision among the Matabele ceased to all intents and purposes many years ago, and I am doubtful whether the subject has ever been dealt with to any extent in the literature dealing with the Zulu race. It is still practised among the Amaxosa, though the Zulus themselves have discarded the custom. It is said that in Mzilikazi's days circumcision was commonly resorted to, and formed an integral part of the rite of initiation to manhood, and it is not improbable that the puiberty rite of the people, as formerly practised, and still practised in many places, is a remnant of a ritual that once had the rite of circumcision as its central point.

The puberty ceremony for boys is as follows:-The rite, which is called ugutomba, lasts for two days. When a boy is aware that he has reached a state of puberty, he must rise very early in the morning and wash himself. He then picks a rush or reed and ties it about his loins, and he also smears mud taken from the hole of a crab round his waist. He then returns home and stands at the gate of the cattle kraal. He must not sit down, but if excessive fatigue obliges him to do so, he can rest occasionally on one of the poles used for closing the cattle kraal at night. He speaks to no one, not even his father, but he is allowed to have with him a small boy as a companion, who can light a fire for him if he feels cold, but he must not light a fire himself. He wears no clothing and eats no food. If he has been a troublesome boy, all whom he has annoyed may work off old scores upon him. They may beat him, crying as they do so " ukulile " (" you are grown up "), and he may not retaliate, but must bear it all patiently. He may only leave his post when it is dark in order that he may sleep. On the second day he resumes his former position at the gate of the cattle kraal, and on the afternoon of that day, the doctor arrives. If by any chance the doctor is late in arriving, the boy must remain where he is until he does, or he may herd the cattle, but in doing so he must remember not to sit down except upon an ant-hill, nor must he go home, for he is for the time being ceremonially impure.

When the doctor has arrived, his assistant makes porridge of izimba (red Kafir-corn), and when it is cooked the doctor sprinkles in some medicine, a buffcoloured powder made from the roots of the umtjwamo, a common tree on the veldt. The boy then rapidly dips his fingers into the pot, and taking a small morsel, places it in his mouth and spits it into the fire. He then finishes the porridge or goes on eating until given permission to desist. The doctor then boils some milk, and taking another medicine, which he has previously burned to a fine powder, he mixes it with the milk in the pot. The boy plunges his fingers into the pot, and licking a few drops of milk from them, spits into the fire. He then jumps over the pot and drinks the milk from the opposite side with his two hands. The doctor then hands him some charms (intebe), which are both protective and strength-giving, and these are hung about his neck. His companion, who has been with him all the time, stands ready with the ibetju, or loin skin, which the boy takes and fastens round his waist. The boy is then considered to have become a man, and he takes a senior position among the other boys who have not attained to puberty. Having reached manhood he must no longer drink fresh milk, but only sour milk.

The puberty rites for girls, also called ugutomba, are considerably more complicated, and last four days. When a girl becomes aware that she has reached the age of puberty, she goes and confides in a friend, who informs the girl's relatives. The girl then returns to her home, and her mother's house is swept and garnished for the occasion. All the girl's girl friends are invited to be present. As theyarrive they enter the hut and begin singing. This singing lasts for three days, during which time the girl eats only umtjwamo or porridge made of izimba (red Kafir-corn) mixed with soot taken from the roof of the hut. They also mix with the porridge the roots of the inqoti, a kind cf grass, and they feed her with this food, which is supposed to strengthen her. Her companions partake of it with her. At some time during this part of the proceedings two customs are observed. The lips of one of the girl guests are bound open by thongs tied round the head and the girl's gums are rubbed with charcoal. She is called upon to pronounce words containing labials, the idea apparently being to excite the risible faculties of those present, but no girl must laugh. If she does so, she is turned out. The initiate, too, has an act to perform at this period. When the fire is burning an upright stick is placed in the middle of it, and the girl has to pick out the stick with her teeth. During the singing the initiate sits clothed only in a blanket. She does not sit with her legs beneath her, but sideways with her feet at her side (the traditional
position of Zulu women in sitting during menstruation). The singing on these occasions is of the lewdest description. I subjoin some examples of some of the choruses that were in vogue 40 to 50 years ago. No useful purpose will be served by translating them, but they ought to be placed on record, and they will be readily understood by those who are familiar with the language.

(1) Maye ! Udade u tombela amadoda.
Maye ! Udade u tomb' ezikalela.
(2) Egxopozini, esihlanjeni,
Yegani amantiya abo.
O! Zhiya bo !
(3) Ye, Baba, ngemita;-
Ba libele yigukwelana.
A ba yi boni indaba le pezulu.
(4) Wena, nDoda siniginigana;
Wa wu yewuga intombi ingezansi.
(5) A ! Ye, ye ! Wabai wu wa nyonyoba;
U se nyonyoba njengesela lenhlunu.

(6) A! Ye, ye ! yebolo yewula ubolo.
(7) Ungaka, baba, si file;
U ngangomvalo.
(8) Inja emanyala
Ya ngi tundela pansi gwegolo,
Nga hla ngesula ngegolo.

They are sung as choruses and repeated over and over again. Every succeeding generation appears to have introduced new songs, and an indefinite number of them might be collected. They are alike in their indecent suggestiveness, and serve to illustrate the kind of song to which the ears of the children are accustomed from
their earliest years.

On the morning of the fourth day the initiate must go to the river to wash, that is to say, when the period of menstruation is over. Three girls run on in front, and the girl follows them accompanied by her companions. When they come in sight of the river where the three girls await their coming, the accompanying girls set up a cry: "There they are," and the initiate then breaks away from her companions, her endeavour being to reach the water. If either of the three girls can manage to waylay her they do so and spit water upon her from their mouths, and should they succeed in doing this they are entitled to beat her while she is in the water washing. When her ablutions are completed she is clothed with a short blanket, which is tied under the armpits and above the breasts, and she is anointed with red earth. The mother's hut is smeared with cow dung while the girls are away at the river. On her return home the girl is met by her mother, who kisses her on the arm, as also does her father. Those who have accompanied her are also kissed. Her relatives then make her small presents, such as beads, which are tied on the blanket above the breasts, and & her father gives her a goat, which is slaughtered and eaten by all the girls. She must not eat thick milk (amasi) for two years after this ceremony, that is if she is a girl of high caste, though, in the case of the ordinary people, a month or two will suffice. It should be noted that on the girl's return from washing her mother wears on her head the umncwazi, a cross made of hide or calico, one strip extending from ear to ear, and the other strip from the forehead to the nape of the neck. The other female relatives are at liberty to wear the umnouazi as well, but the mother alone is entitled to wear a skin under the armpits and tied over the breasts.

No man is allowed to be present at the ceremony until its conclusion, when, as already described, her father is the first to greet her. Should any man come upon the scene by accident he must hide his face and get away as quickly as possible. No doctor takes any part in the proceedings.

When the puberty rites are completed, the girl's relatives are informed that she has become an intombi (i.e., one who has passed through the ceremony of ugutomba). and the girl arranges to visit the principal ones in turn. On arriving at their kraals she will walk in, but will not open her mouth, even in salutation, until she has received a present. On her return home she may drink milk for the first time since prior to her initiation, but the milk should come from a white cow, and is boiled with mealie meal into a thin porridge. At the same time a young bullock is killed, at which point the girl is considered as ceremonially pure. The porridge being cooked, the intombi takes a small portion of it into her mouth and spits it into the fire, after which all partake of it. The ox is cut up and roasted and eaten by those who haveattained to puberty.

The intombi is placed in the charge of a woman, who is responsible for her moral behaviour during a period of generally about two years, the intention being to preserve the purity of the girl until she is married. If by any chance she breaks bounds and is found to be pregnant, her father will give an ox to the man to whom she is betrothed, the idea being that the ox is a kind of " patch to repair a rent."

The three old women from whom I obtained the above information were representative of the three main castes of the Matabele people, the Abezansi (or pure Zulu), the Abendhla (or Basuto) and the Amaholi (or Makalanga), and they unanimously affirmed that there were no immoral practices in connection with the ceremony of ugutomba in the days of Mzilikazi. When immorality took place it was without the consent of those responsible, and the Chief meted out heavy punishment for it. They stated that Mzilikazi did much to preserve the purity of the girls, but that in Lobengula's day these rigid rules became relaxed and a good deal of immorality was connived at, if not actually permitted. Indeed, it is impossible to imagine that songs such as those given, which were sung at the beginning of Lobengula's reign, could have been sung without the accompaniment of immoral practices. With later developments of initiatory ceremonies I have not concerned myself as, where they have not actually died out, they have for the most part probably become corrupted out of all semblance to their original form. My sole aim has been to find out exactly what took place when the rites were considered the essential condition to entrance upon manhood and womanhood. They are now fast dying out, and it is well they should, for they can serve no useful purpose, and only act as a drag upon progress and education; but while we can still glean information about them it is well that we should do so, or the knowledge of them will be lost for ever.