DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49272#0261
THE WAYAO OF NYASALAND
245
then listens to an account of the circumstances attending the illness and death. The point
at issue is whether there is any evidence pointing to death from unnatural causes which
requires consulting a diviner. The chief practically always agrees with the relatives, and it
is said that he will never press them to go to the wachisango unnecessarily. The case may
end with this conference, or here may begin the long series of events described under usawi.1
During the month subsequent to the funeral, certain taboos have to be observed. The
widow may not bathe, and with the exception of the awilo, all who attended must refrain
from sexual intercourse. At the expiration of this period, beer is brewed in the village, and
all the friends and relatives are again summoned. This beer-drinking is called “ the beer of
rottenness,” or “ the beer of resignation.” In addition to the beer, food is provided, and
everyone helps himself without ceremony. Chindimba is sung and danced and at the pres-
ent day, bands of trained dancers attend, including ching’wenyeng’ wenye2 A pot of beer is
sunk into the ground, marking the site of the dead man’s house. The night of matapata3
sees husbands and wives reunited, and the widow may go through ceremonial intercourse
with a man appointed for the purpose called litunu or mbilo. Sometimes the widow refuses
litunu, and is given medicine instead to cleanse her; her body is then no longer “ hot ” and
likely to bring disease to those about her. A widow does not marry again for two or three
years. A young man who loses his wife has no longer any standing in her village after
matapata. He is usually given a present, with the suggestion that he go elsewhere. After
the death of an infant, the mother is considered unclean. She sleeps on a mat apart from
her husband till after the ceremony of shaving, and then undergoes a ceremonial coitus
with her husband — in which case he is called litunu — after which, ordinary cohabita-
tion is resumed. If she has been a widow, or if the child was born “with disease,”4 another
man acts as litunu.
The morning following matapata, all the fires in the village are extinguished. A fresh
blaze is then kindled with the fire-drill, lumangu, either in the chief’s house or in some spot
nearby, and from there, fire is carried to all the houses. The ashes of the old fires, the
stones supporting the cooking pots, and the porridge sticks are taken to the cross-roads,
and there destroyed. Everyone then shaves all his own hair, head, axillae, and pubis.
The custom of the second shaving by the awilo, described in Africana,5 is, I think, an
adaptation from the Anyanja. A year later, beer is again brewed, and all the relatives
summoned to the village to partake of it. There is dancing, but no ceremony.
The Yao bury their dead in regular graveyards in wooded country, the thicker the
forest the better, often two or three miles away from a group of villages. Different villages
bury their dead in different parts of the burial ground; relatives are usually buried near
one another. Graves are never revisited, and no one would enter a graveyard except at the
time of a funeral, and then only after obtaining permission from the chief. Such spots are
1 Vide infra, p. 296.
2 Vide infra, p. 370 and PL I.
3 Beer-drinking.
4 Vide infra, p. 286.
5 Macdonald, op. cit., p. 111.
245
then listens to an account of the circumstances attending the illness and death. The point
at issue is whether there is any evidence pointing to death from unnatural causes which
requires consulting a diviner. The chief practically always agrees with the relatives, and it
is said that he will never press them to go to the wachisango unnecessarily. The case may
end with this conference, or here may begin the long series of events described under usawi.1
During the month subsequent to the funeral, certain taboos have to be observed. The
widow may not bathe, and with the exception of the awilo, all who attended must refrain
from sexual intercourse. At the expiration of this period, beer is brewed in the village, and
all the friends and relatives are again summoned. This beer-drinking is called “ the beer of
rottenness,” or “ the beer of resignation.” In addition to the beer, food is provided, and
everyone helps himself without ceremony. Chindimba is sung and danced and at the pres-
ent day, bands of trained dancers attend, including ching’wenyeng’ wenye2 A pot of beer is
sunk into the ground, marking the site of the dead man’s house. The night of matapata3
sees husbands and wives reunited, and the widow may go through ceremonial intercourse
with a man appointed for the purpose called litunu or mbilo. Sometimes the widow refuses
litunu, and is given medicine instead to cleanse her; her body is then no longer “ hot ” and
likely to bring disease to those about her. A widow does not marry again for two or three
years. A young man who loses his wife has no longer any standing in her village after
matapata. He is usually given a present, with the suggestion that he go elsewhere. After
the death of an infant, the mother is considered unclean. She sleeps on a mat apart from
her husband till after the ceremony of shaving, and then undergoes a ceremonial coitus
with her husband — in which case he is called litunu — after which, ordinary cohabita-
tion is resumed. If she has been a widow, or if the child was born “with disease,”4 another
man acts as litunu.
The morning following matapata, all the fires in the village are extinguished. A fresh
blaze is then kindled with the fire-drill, lumangu, either in the chief’s house or in some spot
nearby, and from there, fire is carried to all the houses. The ashes of the old fires, the
stones supporting the cooking pots, and the porridge sticks are taken to the cross-roads,
and there destroyed. Everyone then shaves all his own hair, head, axillae, and pubis.
The custom of the second shaving by the awilo, described in Africana,5 is, I think, an
adaptation from the Anyanja. A year later, beer is again brewed, and all the relatives
summoned to the village to partake of it. There is dancing, but no ceremony.
The Yao bury their dead in regular graveyards in wooded country, the thicker the
forest the better, often two or three miles away from a group of villages. Different villages
bury their dead in different parts of the burial ground; relatives are usually buried near
one another. Graves are never revisited, and no one would enter a graveyard except at the
time of a funeral, and then only after obtaining permission from the chief. Such spots are
1 Vide infra, p. 296.
2 Vide infra, p. 370 and PL I.
3 Beer-drinking.
4 Vide infra, p. 286.
5 Macdonald, op. cit., p. 111.