DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49272#0376
360
HARVARD AFRICAN STUDIES
same time so that the bean is contained in one hand; the other player has to guess in which
the bean lies and this he does by striking with the finger the hand in which he imagines
the bean to be. If the striker guesses correctly, he moves his man and his slave to the first
sleeping-place. It is then his turn to hide the bean. So it goes on till one or the other arrives
at the slave-market. Here he barters his slave for trade-goods and returns in the same way;
whoever gets home first wins, and the loser is said “to have died on the road,” a not uncom-
mon event in the old days. It is interesting to note that cheating is sometimes attempted
by palming beans between the fingers, so that in the hand guessed, the bean is palmed be-
tween the fingers, and, in the other hand, a bean is released from between the fingers into
the palm.
Njengo (nsikwa, Chin.): a kind of ninepins, which takes its name from the object
which is thrown to knock down the ninepins. The game is played by youths and men,
equal numbers sitting in two parallel rows fronting each other on the ground, the two rows
composed of a dozen or more persons, a few yards apart. Each person has set up in front
of him on the ground a maize cob from which the grain has been stripped, or each may
have a number of them, perhaps six. In the former case, the cobs are perhaps two feet
apart, in the latter only a few inches. Each player is provided with several njengo, from
six to twenty-four in number. The njengo is a piece from the side of a gourd, slightly con-
cavo-convex and circular in plan, with the edge often cut into serrations. A piece of reed is
fixed through a hole in the centre, projecting an inch or an inch and a half from the convex
surface, thus forming a kind of teetotum, two or three inches in diameter (Pl. XXII, fig. 9).
It is held between the thumb and second finger by the foot-piece; by a sharp movement of
the fingers, it can be spun out of the hand and, at the same time, jerked forward by another
sharp movement at the wrist. At a given signal, the players on both sides start
launching forth their little tops which spin away towards the maize cobs of the opposing
side, the object being to knock them down. When there are many on a side, each with
a number of cobs, many fall with the first onslaught, but as fewer and fewer remain, it be-
comes more difficult, and players try to show their skill by aiming at the cobs farthest
away from them, along the opposite line. The game goes on till only one cob is left stand-
ing; then, if a player of the opposite side knocks it down, he puts one of his own up again,
and the side which had the one remaining puts one up, and so the game may go on. When
they are tired of playing, they say, “Kwende tunusye,” “ We must finish the game,” literally
“ Come on, we must smell.” 1 A knife is then stuck in the ground on either side, the blade
pointing to the opposite side, and each man, when he has hit the knife of the opposing side
with his njengo, is considered to have shown his skill, and goes off. The last man remaining
is laughed at as being a fool at the game. If a headman is playing, he makes sure of hav-
ing his try first, so that he will not be left in to the last. The game has a great fascination
for the natives and it is said of Malemya, the uncle of the present chief (1913), that he was
1 Vide supra, p. 357.
HARVARD AFRICAN STUDIES
same time so that the bean is contained in one hand; the other player has to guess in which
the bean lies and this he does by striking with the finger the hand in which he imagines
the bean to be. If the striker guesses correctly, he moves his man and his slave to the first
sleeping-place. It is then his turn to hide the bean. So it goes on till one or the other arrives
at the slave-market. Here he barters his slave for trade-goods and returns in the same way;
whoever gets home first wins, and the loser is said “to have died on the road,” a not uncom-
mon event in the old days. It is interesting to note that cheating is sometimes attempted
by palming beans between the fingers, so that in the hand guessed, the bean is palmed be-
tween the fingers, and, in the other hand, a bean is released from between the fingers into
the palm.
Njengo (nsikwa, Chin.): a kind of ninepins, which takes its name from the object
which is thrown to knock down the ninepins. The game is played by youths and men,
equal numbers sitting in two parallel rows fronting each other on the ground, the two rows
composed of a dozen or more persons, a few yards apart. Each person has set up in front
of him on the ground a maize cob from which the grain has been stripped, or each may
have a number of them, perhaps six. In the former case, the cobs are perhaps two feet
apart, in the latter only a few inches. Each player is provided with several njengo, from
six to twenty-four in number. The njengo is a piece from the side of a gourd, slightly con-
cavo-convex and circular in plan, with the edge often cut into serrations. A piece of reed is
fixed through a hole in the centre, projecting an inch or an inch and a half from the convex
surface, thus forming a kind of teetotum, two or three inches in diameter (Pl. XXII, fig. 9).
It is held between the thumb and second finger by the foot-piece; by a sharp movement of
the fingers, it can be spun out of the hand and, at the same time, jerked forward by another
sharp movement at the wrist. At a given signal, the players on both sides start
launching forth their little tops which spin away towards the maize cobs of the opposing
side, the object being to knock them down. When there are many on a side, each with
a number of cobs, many fall with the first onslaught, but as fewer and fewer remain, it be-
comes more difficult, and players try to show their skill by aiming at the cobs farthest
away from them, along the opposite line. The game goes on till only one cob is left stand-
ing; then, if a player of the opposite side knocks it down, he puts one of his own up again,
and the side which had the one remaining puts one up, and so the game may go on. When
they are tired of playing, they say, “Kwende tunusye,” “ We must finish the game,” literally
“ Come on, we must smell.” 1 A knife is then stuck in the ground on either side, the blade
pointing to the opposite side, and each man, when he has hit the knife of the opposing side
with his njengo, is considered to have shown his skill, and goes off. The last man remaining
is laughed at as being a fool at the game. If a headman is playing, he makes sure of hav-
ing his try first, so that he will not be left in to the last. The game has a great fascination
for the natives and it is said of Malemya, the uncle of the present chief (1913), that he was
1 Vide supra, p. 357.