DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49272#0309
THE WAYAO OF NYASALAND
293
Strophanthus is specially reserved for poisoning arrows and it is doubtful if it is ever
given by mouth; Kombe is the name used in this country, but there are two species of
strophanthus in Nyasaland, Strophanthus kombe and Strophanthus courmonti. The seeds
and bark are used and, less commonly, the root. They are mixed with the roots of a
shrub called Nchazimba, pounded together and boiled, and the liquid used to anoint
the arrows. The use of poisoned arrows is a Manyanja custom adopted to some extent
by the Yao.
A number of poisons are also employed in catching fish, Ngunga and Afiwi'iz being the
most common, also Kamsimbile Ngachi (Nkadzi, Chin.), and Chinyenye.
Witchcraft. In my article on the Anyanja,1 reference is made to witchcraft and mfiti.
Beside the Nyanja mfiti or the Yao msawi, all tribes as far as I know in Nyasaland have
firmly fixed among their beliefs, the conception of the supernatural human-flesh eater.
It is a little difficult to define the term mfiti or msawi, as it has come to have the somewhat
generalized sense of one who practices witchcraft, but the original meaning is defined by
Scott,2 a person who has acquired the knowledge of occult medicine by which he can kill
his fellow men; “ what makes the power so dreaded is not that the mfiti exercises this
power for reasons of spite but (as is supposed), to eat the body of his victim.” It is at once
interesting to note that the word mfiti does not belong, according to Scott, to the personal
class of nouns but to the ya-za class, which seems to imply that they believe a mfiti to be
something outside the idea of a person. Among the Anyanja in Zomba district, however,
the word belongs to the first class of nouns (the personal class) as also does msawi in
Chiyao.
The natives believe that any man in a village may be a mfiti or it [might be more correct
to say, is capable of changing into a mfiti. Ufiti is the state of being a mfiti; in Chiyao,
usawi.
As I have pointed out under Diseases, practically all illness and death are thought to be
due to the machinations of some person or persons. The inciting motive which may cause
a man to compass the death of another may be spite, revenge, etc., or the desires of usawi.
Until recent years, when the Government legislated to put down witchcraft, the charges
of usawi were everyday occurrences. Whether or not the prevalence of the idea of cannibal-
ism has any substance in correspondingly frequent practice has never been and now prob-
ably never will be surely proved. Duff Macdonald believes it to be so.3 It is true that
native graves have been and are still rifled and that the graves of some Europeans have
been so opened in the past, as I have learned from eyewitnesses. It seems probable that
the graves were tampered with by natives with the object of removing the human remains,
possibly to be eaten or to obtain portions of the body to use as charms. Mr. L. T. Moggridge,
1 ‘ Notes on some tribes of British Central Africa,’ op. cit., p. 302.
2 Op. cit., p. 345.
3 Africana, op. cit., vol. 2, p. 213-214.
293
Strophanthus is specially reserved for poisoning arrows and it is doubtful if it is ever
given by mouth; Kombe is the name used in this country, but there are two species of
strophanthus in Nyasaland, Strophanthus kombe and Strophanthus courmonti. The seeds
and bark are used and, less commonly, the root. They are mixed with the roots of a
shrub called Nchazimba, pounded together and boiled, and the liquid used to anoint
the arrows. The use of poisoned arrows is a Manyanja custom adopted to some extent
by the Yao.
A number of poisons are also employed in catching fish, Ngunga and Afiwi'iz being the
most common, also Kamsimbile Ngachi (Nkadzi, Chin.), and Chinyenye.
Witchcraft. In my article on the Anyanja,1 reference is made to witchcraft and mfiti.
Beside the Nyanja mfiti or the Yao msawi, all tribes as far as I know in Nyasaland have
firmly fixed among their beliefs, the conception of the supernatural human-flesh eater.
It is a little difficult to define the term mfiti or msawi, as it has come to have the somewhat
generalized sense of one who practices witchcraft, but the original meaning is defined by
Scott,2 a person who has acquired the knowledge of occult medicine by which he can kill
his fellow men; “ what makes the power so dreaded is not that the mfiti exercises this
power for reasons of spite but (as is supposed), to eat the body of his victim.” It is at once
interesting to note that the word mfiti does not belong, according to Scott, to the personal
class of nouns but to the ya-za class, which seems to imply that they believe a mfiti to be
something outside the idea of a person. Among the Anyanja in Zomba district, however,
the word belongs to the first class of nouns (the personal class) as also does msawi in
Chiyao.
The natives believe that any man in a village may be a mfiti or it [might be more correct
to say, is capable of changing into a mfiti. Ufiti is the state of being a mfiti; in Chiyao,
usawi.
As I have pointed out under Diseases, practically all illness and death are thought to be
due to the machinations of some person or persons. The inciting motive which may cause
a man to compass the death of another may be spite, revenge, etc., or the desires of usawi.
Until recent years, when the Government legislated to put down witchcraft, the charges
of usawi were everyday occurrences. Whether or not the prevalence of the idea of cannibal-
ism has any substance in correspondingly frequent practice has never been and now prob-
ably never will be surely proved. Duff Macdonald believes it to be so.3 It is true that
native graves have been and are still rifled and that the graves of some Europeans have
been so opened in the past, as I have learned from eyewitnesses. It seems probable that
the graves were tampered with by natives with the object of removing the human remains,
possibly to be eaten or to obtain portions of the body to use as charms. Mr. L. T. Moggridge,
1 ‘ Notes on some tribes of British Central Africa,’ op. cit., p. 302.
2 Op. cit., p. 345.
3 Africana, op. cit., vol. 2, p. 213-214.