DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49271#0126
Rites of transition and the conception of !Nau among the Hottentots
71
neither must she speak above a whisper. All informers lay great emphasis on these two
points. lAmatis declares that if she talks she will be a chatterbox and meddle in all sorts
of affairs later on and will get a bad name among the people. The girl must not leave the
hut except at night, and then it must be by the back opening with one woman behind and
one in front of her, to screen her from view.
Nowadays her older girl friends visit her, but I am inclined to think that in the old
days this would not have been allowed. They help her to grind sweet smelling bark or
root or leaves to make powder (sap) which is freely used on the clothes and to rub on the
skin. The Hottentots have a great variety of scented powders, each with its own name,
and in olden days some of the rarer ones were greatly sought after and exchanged for a
considerable amount. When I went inland from Walfish Bay, I was entreated to send
back a special sweet smelling rosin which could be had from the people I was going among.
These scented powders are used constantly, and a woman spends a considerable amount
of her time grinding them. !Naop, a face paint made by grinding a soft red stone to
powder and mixing it with fat, is used by the girls to paint patterns on their faces. The
time during which the girl must remain in the kharu 6ms has been differently reported
to me. It varies from 2 or 3 days to a month. Hottentots are vague about length of
time, but several girls who had been through the experience recently, told me they were in
the hut a fortnight. Most probably the time was longer in days gone by, for one of the
chief things required of a girl in the hut is that she should get fat, with smoothly shining
skin. “The girl mustn’t be hungry while she is sitting in the hut,” says JAmatis. Indeed,
immediately she is in the hut, her relatives kill for her, the feast being called kharu ^ap.
All her nearer relatives take part in this killing, even the girl’s elder married brothers if
she has any. Everything killed must be female, and chief of all must be a heifer. The
entrails, pluck, etc., must not on any account be eaten by any relative, either maternal
or paternal, of the girl — the visiting friends enjoy them.
This kharu ^Sp is the great feast for the women, all who have already passed
through these ceremonies being able to take part in it. No man or boy is allowed
to have any share in it at all. One woman of the Berseba tribe said to me: “That killing
is as great as the marriage killing.” Nowadays the Hottentots are exceedingly poor,
and cannot afford to kill recklessly as they did of old, hence the men, who formerly took
part only in the feast of rejoicing10 to be described below, are allowed to share the meat of
all but one of the first animals killed, and this concession is made use of to force the boys
to submit to a part of the proceedings11 to which they would not nowadays be willing
to submit otherwise. The only exceptions to this rule that all grown women may partake
of the meat are that no menstruating woman must eat of it, “lest the girl’s period never
10 Vide infra, p. 73, and n. 16.
11 Vide infra, p. 73.
71
neither must she speak above a whisper. All informers lay great emphasis on these two
points. lAmatis declares that if she talks she will be a chatterbox and meddle in all sorts
of affairs later on and will get a bad name among the people. The girl must not leave the
hut except at night, and then it must be by the back opening with one woman behind and
one in front of her, to screen her from view.
Nowadays her older girl friends visit her, but I am inclined to think that in the old
days this would not have been allowed. They help her to grind sweet smelling bark or
root or leaves to make powder (sap) which is freely used on the clothes and to rub on the
skin. The Hottentots have a great variety of scented powders, each with its own name,
and in olden days some of the rarer ones were greatly sought after and exchanged for a
considerable amount. When I went inland from Walfish Bay, I was entreated to send
back a special sweet smelling rosin which could be had from the people I was going among.
These scented powders are used constantly, and a woman spends a considerable amount
of her time grinding them. !Naop, a face paint made by grinding a soft red stone to
powder and mixing it with fat, is used by the girls to paint patterns on their faces. The
time during which the girl must remain in the kharu 6ms has been differently reported
to me. It varies from 2 or 3 days to a month. Hottentots are vague about length of
time, but several girls who had been through the experience recently, told me they were in
the hut a fortnight. Most probably the time was longer in days gone by, for one of the
chief things required of a girl in the hut is that she should get fat, with smoothly shining
skin. “The girl mustn’t be hungry while she is sitting in the hut,” says JAmatis. Indeed,
immediately she is in the hut, her relatives kill for her, the feast being called kharu ^ap.
All her nearer relatives take part in this killing, even the girl’s elder married brothers if
she has any. Everything killed must be female, and chief of all must be a heifer. The
entrails, pluck, etc., must not on any account be eaten by any relative, either maternal
or paternal, of the girl — the visiting friends enjoy them.
This kharu ^Sp is the great feast for the women, all who have already passed
through these ceremonies being able to take part in it. No man or boy is allowed
to have any share in it at all. One woman of the Berseba tribe said to me: “That killing
is as great as the marriage killing.” Nowadays the Hottentots are exceedingly poor,
and cannot afford to kill recklessly as they did of old, hence the men, who formerly took
part only in the feast of rejoicing10 to be described below, are allowed to share the meat of
all but one of the first animals killed, and this concession is made use of to force the boys
to submit to a part of the proceedings11 to which they would not nowadays be willing
to submit otherwise. The only exceptions to this rule that all grown women may partake
of the meat are that no menstruating woman must eat of it, “lest the girl’s period never
10 Vide infra, p. 73, and n. 16.
11 Vide infra, p. 73.