The Dangerous Journey: Symbolic Aspects of Boy's Initiation among the Wagenia of Kisangani, Zaire 9783110825039, 9789027933577

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The Dangerous Journey

C H A N G E A N D C O N T I N U I T Y IN AFRICA

MONOGRAPHS UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE AFRIKA-STUDIECENTRUM - LEIDEN

MOUTON PUBLISHERS • THE HAGUE • PARIS • NEW YORK

ANDRÉ DROOGERS

The Dangerous Journey Symbolic Aspects of Boys' Initiation among the Wagenia ofKisangani, Zaire

Foreword, by J. VANSINA

MOUTON PUBLISHERS • THE HAGUE • PARIS • NEW YORK

An earlier version of this book was published in Dutch as a doctoral thesis submitted to the Free University, Amsterdam. The original title was: De gevaarlijke reis, Jongensinitiatie bij de Wagenia van Kisangani (Zaire). The translation of this work was made possible by a grant from the Netherlands Organization for the Advancement of Pure Research (Z.W.O.). The English translation was prepared by Maria J. L. van Yperen.

ISBN: 90 279 3357X © 1980, Mouton Publishers, The Hague Typeset by Cédilles, Amsterdam Printed in the Netherlands

'The journey we have made was full of danger' (from a novices' song at their return from initiation camp)

Bua koena na mokalabe; Don't talk about it t o your wife; ebesa so, tell your father, bua n ' n j o k o . but not your mother. (Kalimasi Albert in an interview) To all women, because they are not allowed to read this book.

Foreword

The Wagenia of Kisangani are well known to tourists because of their spectacular fisheries near the falls of the Zaire river. They live on the rim of Kisangani, the third major city of Zaire. The spectacle of daring men in dugouts, braving the fury of the river, is an unforgettable sight. Yet anthropologists had neglected them like so many other peoples of the Equatorial rain forest. Dr. Droogers who taught social and cultural anthropology at the university campus of Kisangani found himself naturally attracted to do some fieldwork among these people. And so, when in 1970 an initiation ritual took place, he was on the spot. He proceeded to form a team consisting of two Dutch graduate students in anthropology and a number of educated Wagenia assistants. Their efforts resulted in this book. It is a meticulous ethnography of the event, placed in a wide theoretical context. And what a happening it was! A musical score of symbols and rituals. But why would an urbanized, predominantly Christian people, with schools, hospitals, missions and churches still cling to a complex expensive initiation accompanied by circumcision? And it was not just a folkloric festival but a business of paramount importance. Such an event attests to the tenacity of culture which is, after all, a particular collective way of perceiving reality and coping with it. Coping certainly has special resonance in a city that had been the focus of major national upheavals from 1961 to 1967. The impact of these dramatic events, as well as the intrusion of a 'modern' way of life was evident, throughout the initiation. For while making men out of boys, the rituals delivered a commentary on the times, the way of life and the state of society. The tenacity and the malleability of the institution strikes the ordinary reader, who may also feel overwhelmed by the luxuriance of symbols, especially as he discovers their inherent grammar. All cultures, of

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Foreword

course, exhibit such a tenacity and it only surprises in cultures other than one's own, where it is taken for granted. All cultures are complex. The wealth of symbols again is to be expected. Perhaps experts in development should read this book. They will derive much profit from it. As it is, their schemes fail — not without much attendant human misery — more often than not, because of their myopia about culture. Anthropologists probably will be enthralled. The flexibility of the ritual may strike them the most. It has long been suspected that in Africa, rituals are not liturgies, carefully reproduced from one happening to the next one. Accounts about them invariably have tended to streamline and generalize, to create the impression of liturgy. This one does not. It reminds the reader that rituals also are public performances in which both masters of ceremony and participants can vary detail, to make of the event a relevant statement of the here and the now. This ethnography documents in fascinating detail how a sequence of rituals stays the same and yet changes. Initiation among the Wagenia is highly structured and yet as fluid as the clay in a potter's hand. In his analysis Droogers stresses, inter alia, the concept of homo ludens, man at play, first developed by the great Dutch scholar Huizinga. Through play, structure is ordered, reordered and flexibility achieved. As the penultimate chapter reveals, this ritual exhibits some formidable structuring and, in part, it is the product of 'playing around'. Each initiation will show differences in structuring, though all will equally be structured. The dynamics of ritual are in part impelled by changing social structures or changing expressions of social stresses and solidarities. They are, however, not entirely determined by the need to adapt to social norms. Boys learn to be men, but manhood is not a cut and dried legal status alone! Culture has an autonomous field, a field prior (logically) to social organisation because culture is perception and also plays with perception. The playful and 'make believe' aspects of the rituals therefore are more than a commentary on the times and about society, more also than just a cathartic release of tension through acting out. Initiation rituals among the Wagenia are also an exploration of reality through imagination: 'it could have been otherwise' or even: 'it is otherwise'. This last feature also is the essence of religion in its search for 'ultimate reality'. It also is central feature in the processes of change.

Foreword

IX

Droogers gives us here perhaps the most detailed microstudy of a boys' initiation to be found in the whole recent literature about the topic. Certainly it is one of the best observed and recorded, in part no doubt because of the availability of a team of observers. But the book is more than an addition to the etnography of a group that belongs to a still inadequately described ensemble of peoples in the rainforest. Above all, it succeeds as an admirable dialogue between description and theory, and that makes it indispensable for any future study about such initiations. And surely, as perceptive a statement about the nature of culture as is proposed here, should attract the attention of all cultural anthropologists. J . Vansina

Preface

So many people have contributed to this book in one way or another that with some exaggeration it can be said to be my book only to the extent that my pigheadedness exceeded the wisdom of all these other people. Wisest of all were my informants, patient expounders of their culture and delightful personalities. I cherish especially fond and precious memories of Imbele, Kalimasi and Naoyaye. The assistants, namely Kombozi and Balabala in the earliest stages of the research and Alingi for the remainder, were invaluable mediators. The latter revealed himself an excellent amateur anthropologist, and has made a major contribution to the research. Ms. L.Lagerwerf,Ms. C. Meijers and H. Dijkstra did field research among theWagenia in 1969 as part of their M. A. course. I, too, gained considerable experience from this. The latter two were able to return to join in the initiation research in 1970. This made it possible for a greater number of aspects of initiation to be studied than I could have managed on my own. I am most grateful for the work done by them. Ms. Meijers has moreover read the manuscript of this book and given useful comments. The original Dutch version of this book was published as a PhD thesis for the Free University of Amsterdam in 1974. The present English version incorporates a number of minor corrections, partly on the basis of new fieldwork (on a different subject) among the Wagenia in 1976-77. My supervisor in 1974 was Prof. H. G. Schulte Nordholt, who gave me intensive and inspiring guidance. Professors J . van Baal and J . Blauw read the manuscript and provided useful criticism. Several searching discussions on the content of this book were held with Dr. P.L.Geschiere and A. D.Willemier Westra. Prof. D.C. Mulder, director

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Preface

of the Institute for the Study of Religion of the Free University has generously allowed me the necessary time off from my usual work at the Institute for the writing of this report of the Wagenia research and the preparation of the English version. Mme. A. Barlovatz, Dr. F.H. von Meyenfeldt and J . Jansen supplied me with personal communications elucidating a number of aspects of initiation. J. Bokdam, Ms. A. G. van der Horst, Dr. J. Schipper, Dr. J.J. Spa and Ms. M. van Veelen gave me valuable advice on botanical, medical, historical, linguistic and editorial problems. My contacts with Alingi were continued after the fieldwork through the good offices of F. Tas and Ms. Marie Tas. I am grateful to all of these persons for their kind help. The members of the Symbolic Anthropology group (Free University 1973-74) led by my supervisor and Dr. J. Tennekes have been of great help to me with their instructive and stimulating discussions. I wish to extend my thanks to A. R. Holzer for the prints of the photographs, and to him, Ms. Holzer, H. Dijkstra and W. van Velzel for making the negatives available. My thanks also to W. Blokzijl for his accurate drawings of the figures for the Dutch edition of the book, and to J. ter Haar for his help in adapting these figures for the present edition. I am indebted to Ms. M. van Yperen for her patience in translating the book into English, and to Dr. J . F. Carrington, an outstanding authority on Kisangani and environs, for reading the English manuscript and providing it with his comments. The fieldwork on which this study is based for the greater part was financed partly by the Université Libre du Congo of Kisangani and the Free University of Amsterdam. The 1976-77 fieldwork which prompted the slight changes in this book was made possible by the financial and material aid of the Netherlands Foundation for the Advancement of Tropical Research (WOTRO),the Free University of Amsterdam, and the Centres de Recherches Interdisciplinaires pour le Développement de l'Education (CRIDE) of the Université Nationale du Zaïre (Campus de Kisangani). The English translation of the book was financed by a grant from the Netherlands Organization for the Advancement of Pure Research (Z.W. O.), while its publication was made possible by the Afrika-Studiecentrum in Leiden. My heartfelt thanks to all of these institutions and organizations. Every person is the sum of all the people with whom he has ever

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XIII

been in contact in one way or another. I wish to express my indebtedness to everyone from whose guidance I have ever benefitted, whether they are mentioned here or have remained anonymous. I am particularly grateful to my parents for the opportunities they have offered me. My wife has performed an infinite number of thankless tasks for both the research and the report. She declines to be thanked, which says more than can ever be expressed in any preface. A.D.

Contents

FOREWORD

byJ.Vansina

PREFACE LIST OF FIGURES AND PLATES INTRODUCTION

History of the Project. Techniques used The Description Theoretical Background 1 . THE CONTEXT OF WAGENIA INITIATION

The Wagenia and their Territory History Segmentation and Kinship Leadership The Relation between the Sexes Religion

vn xi x v m 1

1 8 12 23

23 31 35 48 52 54

2 . FOUR ASPECTS OF WAGENIA INITIATION

61

Stories about the Origin of Initiation The Commencement of Initiation The Interval between Initiations The Group of Future Novices

61 65 72 77

3 . THE DEPARTURE

The Different Categories of Novices The Calendar Payments The Nocturnal Feast Ornaments

91

91 95 98 99 108

XVI

Contents

Circumcision Day The Roof Dance To the Circumcision Ground The Texts of the Songs 4 . CIRCUMCISION AND THE RECEPTION IN CAMP

116 119 131 139 147

Circumcision

147

The Ikpandei

164

The Reception in Camp

174

5 . THE CAMP PERIOD

193

The Camps Isolation Recovery Painting of the Body The Men Dialogues and Songs The Men and the Novices' Food Suffering Mokumo Kabile

193 200 207 214 218 223 230 235 237 250

Kaböbo

252

Initiation — an Explicit Education? Other Activities The Camp Chief Punishment

265 268 273 278

6 . THE RETURN

283

To the River

283

Tolange

290

To the Village Gradual Integration After Initiation

292 303 315

7 . TRANSITIONAL SYMBOLS

The River, Baths, Shaving the Head Nocturnal Events Restricted Freedom of Movement Payments

323

323 326 328 330

Contents Festivities and Finery Colours Triad Banana Summary 8 . STRUCTURING AND RESTRUCTURING

Premises The Process of Structuring Symbols The Playful Aspect Restructuring The Effect of Initiation The Future of Initiation

XVII

333 334 338 339 341 345

345 346 353 359 367 369 374

T H R E E APPENDICES

377

LIST OF KIGENIA WORDS

381

BIBLIOGRAPHY

385

INDEX OF NAMES

393

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

397

List of figures and plates

Figures 1. Africa, Zaire and Kisangani 2. The Wagenia and Kisangani 3. Graph of water-levels of the river near Kisangani before 1961 4. 5 , 6 . The Wagenia territory in 1 8 8 3 , 1 9 5 6 and 1971 7. The area upstream of Kisangani 8. The segmentation of Bina Nsoko 9. The segmentation of Bina Nsilekpe 10. The localization of the bebanda 11. Map of the area surrounding the inland lake bordered by Bina Mongula, Bina Kaekesse and Bina Nkulu 12. Bina Mongula 13. Number of circumcision days per river bank per month . . . 14. Elika's relatives 15. The camps and their population 16. Plan of a camp and its front yard 17. The five kabobo groups 18. Table of initiation symbols and their use in other rituals 342,

24 25 28 30 32 38 39 39 41 43 96 113 194 198 259 343

Plates Frontispiece. A mother dancing for j o y at the novices' return from the initiation camp. (Photograph by author) The photographs appear between pages 146 and 147. 1. Part of the area in which the Wagenia live, seen from the north (cf. fig. 6). (Photograph by author) 2. A fish-trap construction in the cataracts. (Photograph by A. R. Holzer)

List of figures and plates

XIX

3. Imbele playing the talking drum at the beginning of a circumcision feast. (Photograph by A. R. Holzer) 4. Novices to-be sitting on display during the circumcision feast preceding their own. (Photograph by A. R. Holzer) 5. Roof dance. The net and driving-wheel indicate the professions of the novices' fathers, viz. fisherman and car mechanic. (Photograph by W. van Velzel) 6. 7. A small novice dancing on the roof in the midst of his paternal relatives, before being carried off on the shoulders of his maternal kinsmen. (Photographs by A. R. Holzer) 8. A novice dressed up in chiefly array being carried to the circumcision ground. (Photograph by A. R. Holzer) 9. Aman playing a special kind of flute (cf. pp. 136,137). (Photograph by author) 10,11. A novice being counselled by his maternal relatives supporting him just before his circumcision. (Photographs by A. R. Holzer) 12. A circumcision ground. In the centre the circumciser is at work. The women have remained behind on the river bank. (Photograph by W. van Velzel) 13. The circumcision blood is caught in a bowl to prevent sorcery. (Photograph by A. R. Holzer) 14. A newly circumcised novice being attended by his maternal kinsmen. (Photograph by W. van Velzel) 15. A novice's male maternal relatives beating the water with sticks and jumping into the river for joy at his passing the circumcision test without incident. (Photograph by A. R. Holzer) 16. Novices awaiting their departure for camp after their circumcision. (Photograph by W. van Velzel) 17. The last novice, or ikpandei, stabbing a goat before entering camp. (Photograph by H. Dijkstra) 18. Novices in camp. The majority are painted white. (Photograph by author) 19. Three novices wearing parade dress. The middle one, being an ikpandei, in addition wears a raffia neck-chain. (Photograph by author) 20. Junior and senior novices. The boy on the right is displaying clear signs of growth in camp. (Photograph by author) 21. The novices leave camp preceded by the first novice of the pre-

XX

List of figures and

plates

vious initiation. (Photograph b y W. van Velzel) 22. A novice doing a faithful imitation of the head of state during the parade at the return t o the village. (Photograph on the left b y G. Holzer, on the right b y W. van Velzel) 23. A small novice, making benedictory gestures, makes his entrance at the parade in the role of archbishop. (Photograph by G. Holzer) 24. The w o m e n making donations of m o n e y in the course of the parade as an expression of gratitude for the men's care of the novices. (Photograph by W. van Velzel) 25. 26. Novices on the begging tour or ilamcL (Photographs b y author) 27. A wrestler challenging his o p p o n e n t at the wrestling matches. (Photograph by author) 2 8 . Wrestlers coming to grips with one another. (Photograph b y author)

Introduction

HISTORY OF THE PROJECT. TECHNIQUES USED

I was attached to the Université Libre du Congo, at present part of the Université Nationale du Zaïre, as lecturer in cultural anthropology for the period from January 1968 to September 1971. Even before my departure for Kisangani, however, the possibility of combining teaching with research had been considered. The Wagenia, living within easy reach on the outskirts of Kisangani, seemed to present themselves as an obvious object. Accordingly the research, which initially was of a general, exploratory nature, was started in July 1968. At this stage I used mainly interviews. The informants were paid, initially in kind and later in coin. The data collected during these first few months bear all the traces of the usual problems that beset a research project in the preliminary stages. I knew too little about Wagenia culture to be able to assess the quality of the information given. I had moreover not yet won the Wagenia's confidence, so that it had been impossible to discuss secret subjects (like initiation) or suspect matters (such as sorcery) with any measure of success. The value of quick research with the aid of Western sociological research techniques is quite relative in the African context. An added difficulty in the beginning was the (mostly imaginary) unsafety of the area, which prevented me from living among the Wagenia. The reputation for unsafety did not attach specifically to the Wagenia, but was an outcome of the politico-military events which had occured in and around Kisangani in 1964,1966 and 1967. Consequently the belief had taken root that another 'événement' would take place in 1968, again in the summer, as in the previous years. Fortunately these suspicions turned out to be unfounded.

2

Introduction

At the end of three months I drafted a form for a door-to-door population census in two villages (covering over 3,000 inhabitants). The data on which this was based were not, in retrospect, always correct. The actual survey was conducted by two assistants. Questions were asked inter alia about the age, occupation, matrimonial relations, religion, school attendance and fishing activities of the respondents. Here and there the results show the influence of certain erroneous preconceptions, however. For example, where I had originally understood there to be three ways of concluding a marriage, there later turned out to be four. Consequently the replies to the question as to the kind of marriage were of little value. Other questions, on the other hand, proved no impediment to the giving of correct answers. Bearing these reservations in mind, I shall therefore use the results of the survey all the same. I first went to live in the Wagenia village at the end of 1968. At that time, too, work was started on the construction of a Wageniastyle house to accomodate me and my family on all our subsequent visits there. It was ready for me to move into not long afterwards. The building of the house and my personal residence in the village proved invaluable in winning the people's confidence. For the remainder of my stay in Kisangani (until the end of October 1971) I went regularly with my family to live in the village. Because of my teaching commitments at the University I was dependent for my field work on vacations and weekends. As many working visits as possible were made in between, however. The drawback of this procedure was that I never lived in the village for a continuous period any longer than two or three months. It nevertheless offered the decided advantage of allowing the total research to cover a period of over three years, a favourable condition which is enjoyed by few who are engaged in continuous research projects — which on the average span one year at most. This enabled me to observe also changes that take place only slowly. It furthermore put me in a position to strike a proper balance between participation and observation. This way also, to my mind, the sense of aversion with respect to the project on the part of both the researcher and his subjects which is apt to arise in the course of so many intensive research projects was avoided. Study of the language formed part of the preparatory work. I had a good enough command of Kigenia to be able to conduct and

History of the project

3

understand simple conversations. A more important advantage of learning the language, in my view, however, was that it allowed me to keep a check on the interpreter, of whose services I availed myself almost constantly. In addition study of the language is essential if one wishes to become acquainted with certain key concepts, besides constituting an important aid in winning people's confidence. In my opinion language-learning has become too much of a methodological dogma among some anthropologists. Learning a language in minute detail is a time-consuming business, while it remains the question even then whether one will understand all the subtler shades of meaning. I suspect most ethnographers suffer from an excess of self-confidence on this point. The method I have followed seems to me more satisfactory. At most of the interviews a tape-recorder was used. When later the recordings were worked out, the interpreter was almost invariably present. This way any obscurities could be discussed with him straightaway. It further afforded an opportunity of having a retranslation made by him, which could then be checked against the original. Of a number of interviews the literal Kigenia text was transcribed, along with a translation, depending on the importance of the subject. Aside from the interviews, much time was spent on contacts with people living in the neighbourhood. Although such contacts were time-consuming and not immediately productive, they did further our integration into Wagenia society. Our relations with boys from the neighbourhood turned out later on, in the course of the initiation ritual, to be extremely useful. In the initial phase of the research I had a number of Wagenia secondary school pupils from the highest classes to assist me. My experience was that they generally started off enthusiastically enough, in view of the earnings and the novelty of the work. In the long run they began to show a distinct dislike, however, because they would have earned enough money for the time being and their interest was waning. For most of the time I worked with a slightly older Mugenia assistant, Alingi Luba Akombea. He had an office job in town, from which he was given time off for part of the research. Alingi had a quick understanding of what was expected of him as an interpreter, and, moreover, showed himself to have an excellent, intuitive insight into what the research basically involved. Without being asked, he

4

Introduction

would keep a watchful eye on any events taking place in my absence, or he would tip me off about worthwhile activities. In the course of the interviews he would sometimes ask astonishingly pertinent questions on his own initiative. I had the impression many a time that he was quite capable of conducting research independently. Relations with him were continued after the field period. During the research into initiation the presence of a not-tooyoung assistant proved a great boon. For Alingi remembered much more of the previous initiation ceremony than the pupils, who had been quite small at the time. My original intention had been to make a special study, after finishing the general, exploratory research, of the role of Christian groups in Wagenia society. A serious start was, in fact, made with this,partly in the framework of a field-training research project undertaken by three postgraduate students of the Free University of Amsterdam under my supervision in the summer of 1969. The work on this came to a halt at the end of 1969 in connection with a period of leave. When in March 1970 the initiation ritual suddenly began, or rather, burst forth, I decided provisionally to focus my attention on it. The research into Christian groups could always be resumed at a later stage, whereas the initiation was a rare event. The last ceremony had taken place in 1956. There was to have been another one about ten years later, but nothing had come of that for a variety of reasons to be set out in Chapter 2. In the years up to 1970 there were constant rumours that a ritual was underway, but nothing happened. When the rites were eventually held in 1970, this came as a surprise to not a few of the Wagenia themselves. Since it was uncertain whether another ceremony would ever be staged again, it was all the more important not to let this unique opportunity go by. The circumstance that it had not been possible to plan and prepare the project beforehand in the study had to be taken into the bargain. I tried to make up for this shortcoming in the course of the research, so as to have a sound hypothetical basis to proceed from still. There appeared to be so much going on within such an extremely short space of time in connection with the initiation that it was impossible for a single observer to register it all. An opportunity presented itself, however, of getting two of the three students from Amsterdam who had taken part in the field-training project among

History of the project

5

the Wagenia in 1969 to come to Kisangani. They assisted me with the initiation research for the months of July and August 1970. As a result, events taking place in more than one initiation camp at a time could be kept under observation. At the same time attention was given to certain aspects of the matter in the village context, such as the attitude of the women and girls and of those who absented themselves on principle. I have had the notes of these two students at my disposal for the present report. In the farewell phase of the initiation I attended at least half of all the circumcision ceremonies. Because there were so many other things taking place simultaneously, and as deviation from the rules was so common, the high frequency of the circumcision ceremonies was a lucky circumstance. A limitation of my observation here would have resulted in a distorted picture. I was accompanied to most of the circumcision feasts by a Mugenia assistant. Of the songs sung here and elsewhere tape recordings were made (a total of about 15 playing-hours), the texts of which were transcribed and translated later. The fact that I had already been doing research among the Wagenia for nearly two years proved a tremendous asset. When the initiation ceremonies commenced I possessed sufficient background knowledge. Moreover, I no longer had to worry about introductions. I had furthermore left the stage at which I indiscriminately noted down fact and fiction far behind me. The two students who assumed responsibility for part of the project also had the advantage of having already been introduced in consequence of their research in 1969. In the first phase of the ritual, namely the farewell marked by a circumcision ceremony, all the villages were kept under observation. This was possible thanks to the practice of holding circumcisions in one place at a time, a few exceptions aside. For the next phase, namely the period in camp, I decided to concentrate my attention on only one of a total of fourteen camps. The choice of the camp closest to our house offered definite practical advantages, partly also because relations with the people of the neighbourhood here were the closest. One of the students spent considerable time in the camp of a neighbouring village. At first there was some hesitation as to whether I should be admitted to the small temporary camp where the first three novices stayed. This hesitancy was prompted chiefly by the question of

6

Introduction

whether and what I should have to pay for the right of admission. When, however, one of the novices developed a high fever as a result of circumcision a few days after the operation, my help was enlisted. This finally put an end to all doubt, and from then on I was free to come and go as I pleased. This incident also made it easier for the men to come to me for a loan to buy building-materials when a start had to be made with the construction of the more permanent camp. The hospitality I enjoyed at this particular camp facilitated my admission to the other camps. On the boys' re-emergence from the camps, the attention was again divided over several camps. In contrast to the boys' entry, which, being spread over a number of groups, had taken up about four months, their departure took place on a few consecutive evenings.This made it impossible to attend the latter at all of the camps. I nevertheless went to witness this part of the ritual as much and as often as I could. At the camp, I was assigned the role not only of researcher, but also of an initiate, especially since, like the men, I was free to come and go. I nevertheless kept an eye on the activities of both the novices and the initiated men. As regards participant observation I would like to note the following. Bruyn ( 1 9 6 6 : 1 5 ) , citing Junker, has given the following typology of participant observation: absolute participation, participation as an observer, observation as a participant, and absolute observation. I have mainly observed as a participant, as my role of observer was publicly known and was not blurred by a participant role. That is why I was not given a full share in the men's activities, though I was implicitly classified with them. I even so spent a lot of time in the camp, also at times when there were no men present there. Whenever I entered the camp, I was expected to give the same salutation as the men on entering or leaving. If there was any food on hand, I would sometimes eat some, just as the men did. Just like them, I would beg the novices for it in the characteristic, prescribed way, in the manner of a bird flitting past. One or two times the novices asked me for ideas for their parade at the arrival of new novices, but to prevent the introduction of innovations I invariably gave noncommittal answers to such questions. Where necessary, I distributed simple medicines. My wife and one of the students cooked several times for the novices, which was much appreciated. This moreover

History of the project

7

gave us an idea of how food was divided among the novices. Sometimes women in the village would ask me to take a pot of food to camp if none of the males of the family were available to do so. Several more similar examples may be cited. I was constantly both a stranger and an intimate. One of my informants, Kalimasi Albert, gave expression to this marginal position most aptly in a fable very early on in the research (cf. Appendix 1). On several occasions I subjected groups of boys and men to structured interviews. The number of persons interviewed on all of these occasions was a constant 15-25. I interviewed one group of boys prior to their circumcision and their entry into camp. A group of newly initiated was interviewed two months after the ritual. This was repeated, with different questions, a year later. Some of the same questions, supplemented by others, were moreover put to a group of boys who, although they had reached the right age, had been prevented from undergoing initiation by their parents on religious grounds. In conclusion, representatives of groups initiated on previous occasions of which any members were still alive were questioned about the circumstances of their initiation. A supplementary source of information was provided by the captions to a large number of photos taken in the course of the initiation which were written by my assistant Alingi. Concerning the processing of the data I should make the following remarks. During the general explanatory phase of the research the data were arranged according to subject. Looking back now, I realize that this system of indexation was introduced prematurely, and that the subject index would have been set up differently had I done so later. In addition, I kept a journal in which regular entries were made concerning the atmosphere and the progress of the research. The data yielded by the census were transferred onto Cope-Chat cards, which considerably facilitated processing. From the start of the initiation I consistently noted down all the data in the journal, not only because the chronological order seemed important, but also because I knew too little about the ceremony to be able to devise an efficient subject index at that stage. Efforts in that direction in the course of the initiation were also unsuccessful. Only at the end was an index of 180 subject headings made up. The journals were reread, and the subjects to which the information pertained noted in the margin. Then a card index was made according

8

Introduction

to these subjects. An index of personal names was compiled at the same time. All the data on initiation which were collected later were arranged in an index of approximately 140 headings, which largely corresponded to the index of the journal. Questions regarding gaps and obscurities in the material collected during the initiation were arranged according to the same system. These questions also concerned other aspects of Wagenia culture, insofar as they had any bearing on initiation. In the period from September 1970 to October 1971 an attempt was made to clear up all of these obscurities in the data. I was able to avail myself of Alingi's services for the whole of the last three months of that period. Alingi also accompanied me on a limited round of visits to the villages of other tribes in the area, with the aim of milking a (necessarily superficial) comparison of initiation rites, in the course of the project. The knowledge I had meanwhile acquired about Wagenia initiation was seen to facilitate my introduction here. A visit of several days was paid to a group of Wagenia near Kirundu (cf. Fig. 7), 225 kilometres upstream from Kisangani. This visit was most helpful in clarifying the question of what the different Wagenia groups have in common. By a lucky coincidence an initiation was just in progress here, moreover. The method of studying the symbols that were used in the initiation ritual will be discussed in a later part of this introduction (p. 13).

THE DESCRIPTION

Concerning the requirements which an anthropological study can rightfully be expected to meet, Nash (1966:10) has observed the following: 'The chief evaluating factors in judging an anthropological study are the completeness, the coherence, and the comprehensiveness of the report. If a report is internally inconsistent, if it does not cover what it purports to cover, and if it does not give a reader enough information to make his own judgement as to the reliability of the report, it is a poor monograph.'

The description

9

A few remarks should be made concerning the material included in the present book. This is because the collection and selection of the data used here were subject to a number of limitations. Hence the report of my research will not always possess the assertive tone the reader of ethnographic reports is sometimes treated to. It should be pointed out at the outset that I do not aim to give an encyclopaedic description of Wagenia initiation, much less of Wagenia culture. A researcher cannot go on collecting facts indefinitely. He may be driven to despair by the unexpected emergence of new data in the final stages of his research. But if these new facts can be placed within the system he has come to discern in the course of the research, the time has come nevertheless to end the research. Since his data will never be completely consistent, owing to major or minor changes, tensions and conflicts in the culture concerned, he should not suppress those facts which he has found it absolutely impossible to place in his description. Facts of this sort may often contain clues as to symbolic meanings which have not yet been, or no longer are, generally accepted. The description is subject to other limitations as well, however. The researcher's power of observation is limited. When he is busily observing something in front of him, he cannot possibly notice what is going on behind his back. The circumcision ceremonies in particular turned out by a most fortunate coincidence to be repeated. This enabled me to repeat my observations a score of times or more. Thus it was possible for activities taking place simultaneously in the village, at the circumcision ground and in the camp to be observed all the same. Working with a team of researchers likewise proved invaluable. It would be naive of course to demand perfect results. The ideal fieldworker is a person who has eyes in front as well as at the back of his head, and who participates and observes at the same time and at all times. He is never ill, and not in need of sleep, rest or food. He is always present at the right moment and in the right place. He is able to work out his data while still collecting them. Obviously this kind of ethnographer does not exist, no more than does the ideal ethnographic description. Another limitation concerns the fact that the present ethnographic description is a micro-description, particularly as far as the part dealing with the camp period is concerned. My data on this pertain to two of the total of fourteen camps. I personally nevertheless

10

Introduction

prefer an in-depth study of a single camp plus the connected village to a superficial study of all the camps and the entire tribe. Finally, there is the limitation that a subjective element is inevitable in any description. An anthropologist is a designative being writing about designative beings. If he conducts his research in a culture other than his own, the risk of subjectivity is even greater. The intuitive, sometimes emotional kind of observation that is characteristic of participant observation, even if the latter involves more observation than participation, will automatically be reflected in the description. I am not able to measure fear or joy in an empirically justified way. What I can do, however, is try and enter into these feelings and communicate them. It will not always be practicable to allot special space to interpretation in the description, therefore. Description itself involves interpretation as the result of selection of the facts. I shall attempt even so to draw some sort of a dividing-line between facts and interpretation within the framework of each chapter. In addition I shall try, where possible, to indicate the source of the relevant interpretation by pointing out whether it originates from the Wagenia or from the researcher. As far as my description itself is concerned it is important to note that, as I shall explain in the next section, I have chosen man's symbolizing capacity as point of departure. This implies that the privilege enjoyed by so-called primitive peoples of being the subject of a separate science is without foundation. The distinction between primitive and modern man, like all similar distinctions, must necessarily create the impression that there are two different kinds of people. It is not without significance that so far no-one has come up with a suitable alternative term for the peoples studied. Although there is a historical explanation for the distinction, in actual fact it is totally misplaced and offensive, and should be abolished at the earliest opportunity. This would be possible if anthropology in general were to take man's symbolizing capacity as point of departure. This would at the same time enable it to rehabilitate itself in the younger countries — something for which it is unquestionably high time. Anyone whose attention has been drawn to the frustrations of a person like Okot p'Bitek(1970) will readily agree with this. It will be important for anthropology, in the interests of its precarious future, to show a consistent interest in man in general, including Western man.

The description

11

In view of the problems of Western culture, this will open up a whole new field to applied anthropology. A knowledge of the West could constitute a contribution to studies of modernization processes. Cultural anthropology would moreover be able to play a role in the increasing amount of interdisciplinary research (Heijnsdijk 1970:92). In the method of description followed in the present book not just the differences between the Wagenia and Westerners will provide the keynote, therefore. The similarities are just as important. In their own way, the Wagenia do exactly the same fundamental thing as Western man, that is, they define, defend and shift boundaries with the aid of symbols. Primitive is synonymous with primordial human (Fortmann 1971a: 34). The report is chronological in structure. This will make it possible for the systematic sequence of the symbols in the course of the ritual to be shown. The disadvantage of this arrangement is that it precludes the separate discussion of important recurrent themes. The reader will have ample opportunity to prepare himself for the occurrence of these themes in the remainder of this introduction, however. An obvious advantage is that thus the selection of data for description will not result in facts that do not fit in with the themes remaining unmentioned. The emphasis I wish to place in the description on dynamism has led me only rarely to use the present tense, especially in the descriptions of the initiation ritual itself, as this might suggest that the description is an ideal and typical representation of a situation as it was, is and will be. What I witnessed in 1970 has no eternal value. It was a historic event in that it was a new version of an old initiation ritual. As will become apparent below, this ritual is subject to the structuring and restructuring intervention of those involved. The report incorporates information regarded as secret by Wagenia men. I have gone on the assumption that this secret character was relative, however, as in actual fact most women were informed of what was going on and only played the game for the sake of the men. Moreover, this so-called secret character is restricted to Wagenia society, and it is unlikely that for the time being there will be any Wagenia women able to read this book. But if there are, they are free, like all non-Wagenia women, to leave the rest of the study unread and content themselves with the cold comfort offered by the dedication of the book.

12

Introduction

The indented passages, in conclusion, contain, besides quotations, data which, without being indispensable for the main argument of my exposition, nevertheless function as illustrations of the same. In the description some persons have been referred to by means of fictitious names.

THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

So far in the present introduction I have explained how I came to conduct the research for this book and how it was carried out and described. At this point it will be necessary for me to present my credentials by setting out my theoretical points of departure. At first sight this book seems to be full of facts. It is nonetheless not purely descriptive in character. Out in the field, under the strong impact of the factual and the unique, a researcher may sometimes make resolutions to write in that particular vein. But back in his study, he will become aware of the influence of the specialist literature on his research. The researcher has not exactly gone out into the field as a blank page. And, what is more, others have dealt with similar problems in a manner which may be useful to him in the analysis of his own material. There is definite interplay between theory and practice. An introduction is usually read first, but written last. Matters presented as certainties not infrequently have only become clear in the course of reporting. Because the theoretical considerations are set out at the beginning, the reader may easily get the impression that they have served as a sieve for sifting the material. In actual fact, however, the theoretical principles have been subject to correction and recorrection by constant confrontation with the material. Even so, by denying that whoever takes note of the material does so in a specific way one would be deceiving oneself. The relevant literature, moreover, prompts certain questions to which affirmative or negative answers may be given. The research in question is 'problem-centred research' (Kluckhohn 1953:509). Apart from the theoretical insights gained prior to or in the course of the investigation, these problems, too, will have to be given a place in the introduction. I am not aiming at completeness. My sole objective is simply to demonstrate how an apparently specialistic investigation of initiation

Theoretical background

13

among a small African tribe also touches on certain general anthropological problems, and may possibly contribute to an eventual solution of these problems. Symbols play an important part in the initiation ritual described in this book. It is not only in rituals that symbols are found. For man is unique in his propensity to use symbols for structuring his world and to orientate himself by the structures so created (Bauman 1973:52). Culture is indebted for its existence to symbols and the use made of these by men. In order to clarify this, I shall begin by making a few remarks on the characteristics of symbols. Here I have based myself on the following authors: Van Baal 1971:157ff.; 1972: Ch. 2 and 3; Bauman 1973: 48-52; Firth 1973: Ch. 2; Fortmann 1971b:93ff.; Kuypers 1957; Langer 1954: Ch. 3; Ponsioen 1952. Symbols are used independently of the presence of the things for which they stand. They refer to and evoke a picture of the thing symbolized. Man is distinguished from the animals by his capacity for keeping symbols and the things they symbolize apart without overlooking the fact that they belong together (Leach 1970b: 43). This way he is able to attach new meanings to a particular symbol, and conversely, to represent a specific symbolized thing by new symbols. Symbols help to designate things. In this process, certain distinctions are drawn, demarcations made and rules defined. Man, in naming the objects surrounding him, creates a certain order. He accumulates and transmits knowledge by means of symbols. Symbols are based on conventions and make communication possible.Man is able to play with his denotations, to play-act and to attach meanings in a playful, temporary way. Man is a homo ludens thanks to his symbols (cf. Huizinga 1952 4 :4, 5). He is able to juxtapose certain things which he knows will only belong together for as long as the game lasts. People do not always distinguish symbols and their meanings from one another. It seems wrong to me, however, to ascribe this tendency especially to so-called primitive peoples (cf., e.g.,Dammann 1963:5; Kristensen 1954:7-14; Langer 1954: passim; Van Peursen 1970: Ch. 2;Ponsioen 1952:243; Verhoevenn.d.: 129), as this would be denying their human character as defined above. Man's designative activity is not constant. Bauman speaks of man's 'continuous and unending structuring activity', but this seems to me to be putting it rather too strongly. Ritual activity, on the other hand, does fit this description, at any rate among the Wagenia. Ritual

14

Introduction

marks the high tide of 'symboling' (to quote White 1959:3). But man may also content himself with the results of denotation by his ancestors handed down to him by tradition. In that case the activity of giving meaning to something gives way to that of distinguishing the meaning of that something. Possibly also the question as to meaning will never even arise. Changing circumstances, such as Western influence on non-Western cultures, for example, may compel man to introduce changes in his symbolic universe, however. His structuring activity may be directed at existing patterns as much as at chaos. Symbols are combined together to form a system. They do not exist in isolation from one another. Things are designated and demarcated one from the other in their relation to one another. This interrelation is not arbitrary, but reveals definite regularity. One of the principal aims of my investigation is to trace this regularity. An attempt will be made to discover why particular symbols occur at specific moments in the ritual. There is a certain order, which may, however, be subject to change. I am concerned with these changes as well. I wish to consider the Wagenia initiation ritual as a process of structuring and restructuring. This brings us face to face with the first of a number of themes running like differently coloured strands through the texture of the book, namely the changing position of the boys undergoing the initiation ritual (who will mostly be referred to as 'novices', as opposed to 'initiates' for men initiated on earlier occasions). These boys initially belonged to the group of women and the uninitiated, having outgrown this classification as they grew older. At that point they risked ending up in a position where they were neither one thing nor the other and belonged nowhere. The initiation ritual thus serves to regulate their position. As novices they are in an intermediate position between the uninitiated and the initiates. As the ritual progresses, they move further and further away from the women's group and come to belong more and more to the men's group. I shall investigate by what symbols this is indicated. The transition through which the boys pass is not detached from the rest of the society, however. Their changed position touches on other aspects of Wagenia society as well. Because the boys pass from the women to the men, from their mothers to their fathers, the ritual provides an occasion to give expression to this particular opposition.

Theoretical background

15

For the same reason, father's relatives and mother's kin are sometimes literally opposed to one another in the ritual. These tensions are inherent in Wagenia society. The initiation enables the boys to assume their places in the respective areas of tension by phases. There are other areas of tension in addition to the above. Wagenia kin groups have a tendency to split up and renounce former cooperative alliances. This also comes into play in the initiation ritual. Not only are the boys definitively integrated into their father's kin groups, but the ritual in addition provides an occasion to review existing cooperative associations. A less frequent field of tension is that between left and right bank, which is of special importance at wrestling matches. The themes mentioned so far relate to tensions that are traditional in Wagenia culture. The initiation helps the novice find his way among them, while providing the grown-ups with an opportunity to show how society is structured. This structuring and restructuring activity is further stimulated, however, by the modernization process, which has not passed the Wagenia by unnoticed, particularly owing to the proximity of the town of Kisangani. Perhaps 'modernization' is not an apt term, however. As will become apparent, in most cases the old has not made way for the new, but the new has been given a place in the traditional context. In fact, Western influence has furnished the Wagenia with a complete arsenal of new symbols, of which, as is obvious from the initiation, intensive use is made by them within the traditional context. Changes in the existing order are also implicit in the emergence of strong personalities striving to thrust themselves into the foreground in Wagenia society, democratic as this otherwise is. Among the Wagenia, too, finally, set rules are apt to be transgressed by individuals manipulating symbols more or less freely. There is a difference between norm and practice. I shall distinguish between two ways in which changes may take place. The orderly arrangement of mutually related symbols (including their meanings) will be referred to as structure. Where the arrangement of these symbols remains unaltered, but certain elements of the structure are substituted by others, which are inserted in the same place, this will be referred to as 'transformation'. Where the arrangement itself is altered, I shall speak of 'structural change' (cf. Leach 1964:5; Schulte Nordholt 1971:12).

16

Introduction

In the process of tracing the structures marked by symbols a number of problems present themselves. Let me pause to consider these for a moment. While it has always been difficult to obtain a rationally formulated view of their culture from informants, more recently there has come an added difficulty in that only older informants possess the required knowledge (cf. Wilson 1971: 72). Hence the researcher has to rely increasingly on the greater or lesser obviousness of the symbols themselves, provided, of course, that they reveal a certain system. De Josselin de Jong (1956) gives some striking examples of the differences in viewpoint which may exist between the researcher and his informants. Each forms his own separate, cross-sectional sort of notion of the culture in question by a process of selection and simplification of the data, with quite disparate results. In addition to this, or closely interwoven with it, the informants have an ideal picture before their eyes. The researcher, in order to try and clarify the material provided, attempts to find a structure in which it fits. De Josselin de Jong suggests the comparison of different cultures within a given ethnological field of study as one possible way of constructing such a structure. I have restricted myself to a single culture, however, and will strive to discover a certain regularity with the aid of the symbols used here. Turner (1962; 1967:20; 1969a: 11-13) has distinguished three levels,which Richards (1956:112ff.) had referred to by different names before him. At the exegetic level, according to Turner, one asks what meanings people themselves attach to a particular symbol. The other two levels are supposed to compensate for what the researcher has failed to find out on the exegetic level. At the operational level one asks what people do with the symbol concerned in the framework of social processes; while on the positional level attention is given to the place occupied by that symbol in the total system of symbols. Although this will not always appear explicitly in the description, this is, in fact, the method I have followed. The novices underwent their initiation to a large extent as passive objects. For many of the customs slavishly observed by them they were unable to give any sort of explanation. The same applied to many of the initiated men. Although structures originate with man, they can come to live a life of their own. Man may make structures, but conversely, structures may also make man. He is independent and

Theoretical

background

17

dependent at the same time. He may strike out in new directions, but may also be driven in new directions. Even so, this book is not so much concerned with structures per se as also with active people and what they do with these structures, be it sometimes unwittingly. The anthropologist studying symbols is comparable to the linguist trying to discover rules and structures in a language which are new to the speakers of that language. The assumption from which one proceeds again and again here is that symbols are part of a system which has a structuring effect (Douglas 1966 :vii), as in the case of language (Lévi-Strauss 1967: passim), and also music (Lévi-Strauss 1964:23ff.; 1 9 6 7 : 2 0 8 ) . So one may start off by studying what might be called the etymology of symbols, that is to say, the relation between the symbols and the things symbolized. This does not hold for arbitrary symbols (comparable to sounds in language to which meaning is attached independently of their phonic quality), but only for symbols in whose case the symbol and the thing symbolized display some structural similarity, i.e., are each other's transformation. Thus one may logically suppose the cutting of hair to represent the close of a period. This does not provide the entire picture, however. So far one has, so to speak, only examined the individual notes of the piece of music. If the same symbol occurs in more than one context within one and the same culture, then it may be assumed to refer to consistently the same thing until the contrary is proven (Goody 1 9 6 2 : 3 8 ; Wilson 1957: 4). Comparative research into the occurence of the shaving of the head in other Wagenia rituals may then confirm the explanation hit on through etymological analysis. This way the symbol will no longer be regarded as an isolated element, but will receive a place in a larger whole. This may happen in other ways as well. One should pay attention first of all in this connection to the preceding and subsequent symbols in the course of the ritual ('the melody'). The shaving of the head, for instance, will then be seen to occur in between two series of symbols from two different periods. The same sequence of symbols may recur in other rituals. For a proper insight into the meaning of a particular symbol it will furthermore be useful to pay attention to the symbols occuring simultaneously with it, and which may possibly have the same meaning ('the harmony'). So the shaving of the head and circumcision are synonymous symbols, for instance.

18

Introduction

The results of this method as applied in the study of Wagenia initiation are set out in a table at the end of Chapter 7 (Fig. 18). The advantage of the method is that one thus systematizes from the material itself (cf. Leach 1970a: 819,820; 1972d: 239,240). A complete explanation is ruled out, however, precisely by reason of the activity of symboling man. Leach (1970a: 827) cites Bach's Goldberg variations as an example. Although certain structural similarities can be recognized between these, it is impossible to tell why Bach composed them as he did, and not in any other way. In the interpretation of circumcision, for example, we will also come up against this limit to explanation. The method of investigating symbols aside, there are other reasons the researcher may put forward to explain why he has drawn certain conclusions which have not been prompted to him by his informants. He is better able to take his distance from the culture concerned than his informants, even though that does not make him absolutely objective. He moreover has a much better general vision (Turner 1967:26,27). He knows at least as much as all his informants put together, and, in point of fact, more, because he has taken a number of suppositions and certainties about the workings of the phenomenon of 'culture' with him into the field. During one circumcision ceremony, to give an example, one of the men called out loudly to those standing about that anyone wanting to know anything about the initiation should ask André. After these remarks on symbols, I should say a few words about my conception of ritual. Much has been written, in rather divergent ways, about ritual, especially by British anthropologists (cf. the works of Beattie, Douglas, Fortes, La Fontaine, Gluckman, Goody, Horton, Leach, Richards, and Turner listed in the bibliography). Thus there are marked differences in the extent to which these authors proceed from functionalist standpoints, although the significance of the ritual for the society concerned is taken into consideration by all. As will become apparent in Chapter 8,1 myself shall not take a functionalist approach, though I will inquire into the effects of initiation on Wagenia society. There are also variations in the answers to the question as to whether there are strictly only religious rituals, or whether one may also speak of secular rituals (designated 'ceremonies' by those who regard rituals as exclusively religious). In La Fontaine's view

Theoretical

background

19

(1972: xvii) this problem has in point of fact already been solved. There is a tendency to study rituals as systems of symbolic classifications (Lessa and Vogt 1 9 7 2 : 3 2 4 ) , not only independently of the question as to their function, but also aside from that of whether symbols refer to 'another reality'. I for my part shall treat the terms 'ritual' and 'ceremonial' as synonyms. Wagenia initiation is a predominantly secular ritual. Its essence is not a concern with 'another reality', but guidance of the novice who is about to occupy a different position in the symbolic classification. This does not exempt me from the obligation to investigate what aspects of the ritual are of a religious nature, however. There are two more remarks I wish to make with regard to ritual. The first of these concerns Leach, Turner and Douglas' view of the marginal position of those undergoing rites of passage as sacred, notwithstanding the fact that Leach and Douglas in particular do not a priori give ritual a religious definition. A more correct procedure, in my opinion, is to take the sacred and the profane as the two poles of a continuum, as aspects rather than as types of behaviour (Leach 1 9 6 4 : 1 2 , 1 3 ) . Only where the point at issue is the margin between this and the 'other world' will it be more obvious to assume a sacred character (cf. Leach 1972b). There is yet another reason why the religious aspect of initiation merits attention. Sometimes a rather exaggerated representation is given of tribal man's religious nature. So Thomas et al. ( 1 9 6 9 : 5 ) write: 'En Afrique noire, sans être tout, la religion pénètre tout et le Noir peut se définir comme l'être "incurablement religieux".' (In Black Africa, without being everything, religion penetrates everything and the Black may be defined as an 'incurably religious' being.) I intend to investigate whether, in fact, this holds for the Wagenia. My second remark concerns the special attention I intend to give to the playful aspects of the initiation ritual, as man at play tends, in fact, to play with the existing categories as well. It is my personal belief that over-serious questioning into the function of rituals for the society concerned has obscured the view of this lighter side of initiation. In conclusion of the present section, I should indicate my theoretical point of departure with respect to the literature on initiation. Although Van Gennep (1909) is commonly regarded as a pioneer in this field, it should be pointed out that others before him have dis-

20

Introduction

tinguished the three phases of 'rites de passage' which he describes (Van Baal 1971:138 mentions Hertz and also Hubert and Mauss). Van Gennep distinguished 'rites de séparation', 'rites de marge' and 'rites d'agrégation', which, if the stress is placed on marginality, may also be designated as 'rites préliminaires, liminaires et postliminaires' (1909:14). Although the universal validity of this triad has been challenged (e.g., Van Baal 1971:138,139), it does apply to Wagenia initiation. The novices pass successively through the departure from the village, the stay in camp and the return to the village. As we shall see, the triad is extended by reason of the fact that the change from the village to the camp and vice versa is too big not to be phased as well (cf. Van Gennep 1 9 0 9 : 1 4 ) . Thus a pentad results, instead of a triad (cf. Fig. 18). Van Gennep, too, appears to conceive of the position of the marginal figure undergoing the rites of passage as sacred ( 1 9 0 9 : 1 6 ) . Also worthy of note is the distinction he draws between physiological and social puberty, which need not necessarily coincide. Cohen ( 1 9 6 4 : 1 0 2 , 1 0 3 ) gives a summary of the characteristics of initiation which is partly based on Van Gennep's work. These characteristics are: the initiation is conducted by elders (in most cases not the parents, but other members of the novice's kin group), there is indoctrination of customs (which Young, 1965:21, denies), the novice is subjected to trials, the rites are general,being designed for all the members of the relevant sex, they are directed at the group rather than the individual, and members of the other sex are excluded. An important attempt to extend Van Gennep's legacy has been made by Turner (1967:93-111; 1969b: esp. Ch. 3-5; 1973).The latter has focussed particularly on the 'liminal' phase. This, according to him, is interstructural and unstructured. So the novice has left his old status marks behind him, and not yet acquired his new ones, for example. The sole structural feature of the 'liminal' situation is the novices' submission to their instructors' authority. Turner uses the terms 'liminality', 'communitas' and 'antistructure'. In The Ritual Process (1969b) the latter term occurs only in the subtitle, if I have read the book correctly, although it is used frequently in the 1973 article. Here Turner says: 'Liminality, the optimal setting of communitas relations, and communitas, a spontaneously generated relationship between leveled and equal total and individuated human beings, stripped of structural attributes, together constitute what

Theoretical

background

21

one might call "antistructure"' (1973:216). By 'structure'he means 'social structure'(1969b: 96,125,131,166; 1973: 216n). There is no lack of what Lévi-Strauss calls structure in the antistructure, however. Turner himself states that 'a rich proliferation of ideological structure... in the Lévi-Strauss sense' may occur in the liminal phase (1969b: 133). Hence the term 'antistructure' seems rather infelicitous. It is further important to note that the communitas does not always remain spontaneous and pure, but may become ideological or normative (1969b: 132; 1973:221). My material will prompt me to come back to Turner's ideas later. The same applies to the hypothesis developed by Young with the aid of the 'Human Relations Area Files' that the degree of solidarity in a given social system conditions the degree to which status changes are dramatized (1965:1). There are several objections to this, the relevance of the hypothesis for my material aside. Young goes to work within a functionalist framework (27-29). Instead of the causal relation assumed by him, one might just as well think of a correlation. Or one might even imagine an inverted causal relation. What is more, the drawing up of scales of solidarity and dramatization through cultural comparison seems rather a precarious undertaking. These phenomena may be culturally conditioned to such an extent as to render a universally valid scale an impossibility. Not to mention the subjectivity of the researcher. For where to one person solidarity and dramatization will be clearly apparent, to another these will seem to be totally absent. The characteristics mentioned by Young in his scales have, moreover, been derived from societies which are still unaffected by the modernization process. Any person testing the hypothesis and obtaining a negative result will keep wondering whether the arbitrariness of the scale or the influence of modernization is to blame. If we should decide that the scales are useful nevertheless, and not necessarily regard the relation between solidarity and dramatization as causal, then we might investigate the position of Wagenia initiation in terms of Young's theory. Some data on socialization will definitely be presented in the study, though I have made no attempt at a systematic investigation of the phenomenon. The data have not been related to the socialization literature,either. Psychologically oriented literature on initiation has also been left out of consideration, two exceptions aside. The two exceptions concern the theories of two psychoanalytical authors. The

22

Introduction

transparancy of the material has led me to draw their publications into the discussion in spite of my lack of psychological training. The first of these is that by Bettelheim ( 1 9 5 5 ) . He views initiation as a means of solving the conflict in which the boy finds himself in consequence of man's bisexual nature. Men possess certain feminine tendencies because they envy the characteristics of the opposite sex, and vice versa. Initiation provides clarity concerning the male role. Circumcision functions as a compensation for vagina envy. The second is the theory of Whiting etal. ( 1 9 5 8 ; 1 9 6 1 ) . According to them initiation only takes place in societies in which mothers and sons sleep together. Initiation puts an end to the female identification thus evolved by the boy. Both theories will be discussed in Chapter 2. In conclusion it should be pointed out that this study is monographic in purpose. I have not ventured any comparisons with initiations elsewhere in Africa, even though these would suggest themselves rather obviously with respect to the Wagenia's neighbours. I have insufficient data at my disposal for this, however. Initiation among neighbouring tribes will therefore only be referred to incidentally in passing.

1. The context of Wagenia initiation

In this book I shall be using the name 'Wagenia' (plural of Mugenia), in spite of the fact that the Wagenia refer to themselves as 'Baenya' and in the scant literature are also variously called Bagenya, Eenya, Wenya, Waggenia, Vouaghenya, Ouenya and Wainya (Stanley 1885: 153;Maes and Boone 1935:328; Boone 1961:38; Vansinal965:61ft). 'Wagenia' is the most commonly known name, however, which is also in use among neighbouring tribes. The language will be referred to as 'Kigenia', although the Wagenia themselves speak of 'Tsheenya'. Contrary to Van Bulck's recommendations (1954), I shall retain the prefixes in the designations for the people and the language because the people themselves do not omit these. Wherever Kigenia words are used, this will be for want of suitable English equivalents. The most frequently used words are included in the list of words at the end of the book. Kigenia is a tonal language. The presence of an acute accent indicates a high pitch, the absence of such an accent a low pitch. The simplified spelling of the Kigenia words used in this book was evolved with the help of Spa on the basis of his study of Kigenia (1973). For the correct pronunciation of Kigenia words containing the letters o and e the reader is referred to the list of Kigenia words at the end of this book.

THE WAGENIA AND THEIR TERRITORY

The Wagenia of Kisangani (formerly Stanleyville), forming a group of an estimated 7000 people,who are the exclusive subject of this book, are not unknown to tourists travelling through Zaire. One can open no tourist guide or travel account of Zaire, or former Belgian Congo, without coming across at least one photo of Wagenia fishermen (for

24

The context

of Wagenia

initiation

Fig.l Africa, Zaire Kisangani

and

a recent example cf. National Geographic Magazine, March 1973). They have figured in two movies (i.e., The Nun's Story and Mogambo), as well as numerous documentaries. At every visit to Kisangani of the President of Zaire or any other high functionary an excursion to the Wagenia, living within a stone's throw of Kisangani as they do, is a must. The Wagenia derive their fame as fishermen from the way in which they have turned the opportunities offered them by their natural environment to account. At the point where they live, the river narrows considerably and drops in a series of rapids and cataracts over a several metres' high, hard rocky ledge which appears above the surface here. A fish swimming into a trap in this part of the river has to battle not only against the fast current, but also against the force of gravity to get out again. This way sometimes quite big fish are caught. A special attraction for tourists is the way the Wagenia manœuvre their canoes through the rapids and the acrobatic feats they perform when emptying the conical, 2 to 5-metre long fishtraps suspended in the rapids from structures of thick beams. The regattas which the Wagenia hold with the biggest of their canoes in honour of important guests are also famous.

The Wagenia and their territory

25

Fig. 2 The Wagenia and Kisangani The city of Kisangani lies wedged between the Tshopo and Zaire Rivers. The city centre is located on the right bank of the Zaire. Mangobo, Tshopo, Kabondo and Lubunga are suburbs (cites) of Kisangani. The city has over 200,000 inhabitants. It owes its origin mainly to its function as a transshipment point in consequence of the fact that the river is unnavigable from the waterfalls near the Wagenia onwards. Kisangani further accommodates a number of government offices and some industry. The Wagenia live approximately half an hour's walk f r o m the city centre.

26

The context of Wagenia

initiation

Below follows a random selection of quotations from travel accounts.The authors of these often resorted to superlatives to convey their impressions to the reader. Bentley (1900:289) speaks of the Wagenia as 'the finest watermen of the river'. Gatti (1946:13) describes their method of fishing in the waterfalls as 'one of the most remarkable rackets of all Africa'. Cotlow (1956:170,173) writes: '... the men have just about the most magnificent physiques I have ever seen.... Never have I seen men swim so well or handle themselves in water so expertly against such great odds'. Berger (1958:4), too, praises the Wagenia's physical strength, saying: '... ces hommes solides et crâneurs, aux muscles d'acier, au regard plein de courage et de virilité.... La réputation quasi légendaire de la tribu des Wagénias réside dans leur manière de pêcher' (these solid, fearless men with muscles of steel and looks full of courage and manliness.... The almost legendary reputation of the Wagenia tribe derives from their fishing technique). Henry (1959) calls the Wagenia 'the devils of the River Congo'. Karel Jonckheere (n.d.:20) writes about the Wagenia: 'Never before did I behold such a triumph of "savage" skill, the tenaciously preserved invention of riverside dwellers, who hit upon a means whereby animals might trap themselves. A pit in the forest for panther and elephant forms part of the same series of successes. It is child's play, however, in comparison with these stiff nets.... The Wagenia will be forever high in my esteem. They are no crab-catchers.' For some Wagenia this touristic interest is providing an attractive source of income. This they earn by taking tourists along the rapids in their big canoes, or posing for photographs as they empty their fish-traps. The tourists nevertheless get to see only one aspect of Wagenia fishing. For the Wagenia master other techniques besides fishing with traps. They also employ various kinds of nets, many of them at present 'made in Hongkong'. The most daring of these particular techniques is that involving the use of a katiló, a kind of small landing-net. It is especially frequently used in a number of villages which have no fish-trap installations, or only a few. With this net the fisherman dives underwater, groping with hands and feet to find the fish. He then brings the latter to the surface with the net and casts them into the canoe, where someone is standing ready to kill the fish, some of them quite big.

The Wagenia and their territory

27

That the Wagenia are oriented to the river is obvious from the way their villages are built in an almost unbroken chain of two to three kilometres along the banks on either side of the rapids. Depasse (1953:3) mentions a population density of 213.81 to the square kilometre. In a number of villages the houses are built along streets perpendicular to the river bank. The Wagenia themselves sometimes refer to their territory as 'the Wagenia river', which further reveals their orientation towards the river. Until quite recently the Wagenia were almost wholly dependent on fishing for their livelihood, although for some the sale of sand and stones also constituted a source of income. The fish was sold in the city market by the women. In precolonial times the fish used to be exchanged for the products of agricultural or hunting tribes at intertribal markets. 'We are afraid of the forest, just as other tribes are afraid of the water,' one informant said. The Wagenia do not make their own canoes, paddles or drums, either, but mostly buy these from the Bamanga, a forest tribe in the vicinity of Kisangani. More recently, Wagenia women have been trading not only in fish caught by their fellow-tribesmen, but also in purchased fish brought to Kisangani from elsewhere. They have, moreover, extended their trade to other products, which they buy wholesale, taking advantage of their trading position, and sell at retail on the city market. Fishing is dependent on the height of the water. It is only possible to fish with traps in shallow places. When the water is high, many of these places are unfit for this type of fishing. The best season for Wagenia fishermen is when the river is at its lowest level. The Wagenia differentiate between the seasons, which they indicate by the names of stellar constellations (cf. Fig. 3), according to the level of the water. The species of fish caught vary with the seasons. In the past there were occasional years in which the normal cycle of the seasons was disturbed and the high water-level continued for much longer than usual. As a result the map of the Wagenia area has changed considerably over the years (cf. Figs. 4, 5 and 6, p. 30). The Wagenia experienced such a period of high water-levels from the end of 1961 to the beginning of 1963, while during our stay here the lowest pre-1961 level still had not been reached. During such periods of high water, houses threatened with flooding would be demolished and fish-traps installed in their place. The tiny river Abibu or Kabondo (cf. Figs 4 , 5 and 6), which in 1956 was only a few metres

28

The context

of Wagenia

initiation

Fig. 3 Graph of the water-levels of the river near Kisangani before

1961

The difference between the lowest and the highest level was approximately five metres.The Kigenia names of the seasons and constellations are marked in. Soku is the name for the period when the level of the water is lowest, and N'njoo (a group of stars in Orion) for that when it is highest. Moitangema (the Pleiades) is marked by considerable variations in the water-level, and Mokubve (stars near Orion) by a medium level (De Ridder 1960:260, and data supplied by informants). Deviations of up to a month are not unknown.

wide and often used to run dry, at the time of the last floods reached the same width as that indicated by Stanley on his map. Subsequently a conflict broke out between the adjacent villages concerning the use of the fishing-grounds thus created. Throughout our stay, we saw the fishing-spots in the middle of the cataracts used but seldom. This was quite a different situation from that in former times, when the river was spanned almost entirely by fish-trap systems (Stanley 1885:157; Poll 1955:47). The high water-level and irregularity of the seasons had important repercussions for the employment situation in the years after 1961. As a result of the substantial population increase, the group had already begun to feel the pinch before that. There has most probably been over-fishing (Lisungi 1973).The Wagenia had previously always held out against employment in the city, and at the same time against schooling for their children. They feared that the next generation might no longer master their fishing techniques. In the 1930's a few Wagenia began to make use of the educational facilities in town.

The Wagenia and their territory

29

Most of these first school-goers found office jobs after leaving school. Dedave was even so still able to write that the Wagenia made their living principally from fishing (1957:262). De Ridder (1960:225) did n o t even mention employment in the city. A Unesco team studying the city of Kisangani in the early 1950's left the Wagenia completely out of consideration. 'The large majority of Wagenia continued as in former years to avoid regular wage earning employment. They fished for their own needs and for the growing demands of the urban population, b u t they scarcely participated in the life of the urban community. Their villages were therefore excluded from the present study' (Pons 1969: 34). After living with their backs turned on the city for so many years, the Wagenia were finally forced to seek employment there by the continuing high water-level from 1961 onward. They lived so close to town, that it was unnecessary for them to move for this. Mostly they performed unskilled labour. A census taken as part of my research at the end of 1968 showed 437 of the 605 married males (72.2%) to be employed in town. This figure was probably slightly biased in connection with the fact that the census was taken in the villages closest to town. The majority of the men engaged in fishing in the village stated themselves to be unemployed, however. To qualify the picture somewhat, it should be observed that 373 of the 437 men employed in the city (i.e., 85,3%) did some fishing in their spare time. Some of them took to fishing again only if a big arrears of wages occurred — a not unusual phenomenon. The restriction of fishing to their leasure time for many people resulted in a relatively less intensive use of nets that had to be manipulated by the fisherman. Preference was given to nets and traps that needed only to be installed and thereupon emptied regularly. An inquiry among about twenty boys revealed that none of them intended taking up fishing for a future living. Precisely because the Wagenia territory had developed from a fishing-village into a city quarter, it was all the more remarkable that the initiation ritual had retained so much of its vitality, as we shall see below — as though there was no question of increasing orientation towards the city.

T3 " . c í a ho O « ta

History

31

HISTORY

It is impossible to say anything more definite about the history of the Wagenia of Kisangani than that they moved here from upstream. Of all the groups referred to as Wagenia, they live furthest downstream. The difficulty of providing clarity about the course of Wagenia history is connected with the dispersion that is characteristic of large-scale migrations of the kind experienced by the Bantu-speaking tribes. There are, moreover, no reliable historical sources, while my own research was not primarily focused on this aspect. All authors writing on the subject (Van der Kerken 1944, Van Bulck 1948, Boone 1961, Verhaegen 1970) refer back to Moeller's work (1934, 1936). Moeller compiled his book mainly on the basis of reports by colonial officials, and unfortunately it is not certain that these researchers managed to steer clear of all the pitfalls of historical research, such as those in connection with dating on the basis of genealogies, for instance. With this reservation, I shall enumerate some of the salient features of the history of the Wagenia set forth in the literature in the following passages. 'Wagenia' appears to be a name bestowed on the river tribes along the upper reaches of the River Zaire (Lualaba) by the Arabs (Moeller 1936:48,50).The different Wagenia groups living on the banks of the Lualaba from Kasongo to Kisangani (cf. Fig. 7, p. 32) can be divided into three main groups. Furthest upstream live the Wagenia of Kasongo, sometimes also called 'water Baluba'. Then there is an intermediate group living on the river banks near Kindu. This group may possibly be of Mongo origin. From Lowa to Kisangani one finds the third group of Wagenia tribes, who, before reaching the river, supposedly lived further eastwards. All that these three groups have in common is the name and residence on the banks of the river. In every other respect they differ markedly from one another. Even the differences within each of the three groups are quite considerable, since each sub-group has been subject to influencing from and mixing with surrounding forest tribes. It is not without significance, either, that each Wagenia group, as far as I know, has its own name. The Wagenia of Kisangani style themselves Binakatende or Bantende (i.e., probably, descendants of Ntende, the seniormost ancestor), both in the language of the talking drum and, sometimes, in ordinary

32

The context of Wagenia

initiation speech. One cannot expect to have certainty about these matters until there is someone prepared to travel down the river from Kasongo to Kisangani especially to study all the Wagenia groups. Each of the three groups, as was stated above, shows some cultural affinity with the tribes they migrated with, as well as neighbouring tribes in their present territory. During a visit to the Wagenia of Banyakatende, upstream of Kirundu, the tatter's initiation rites were seen to differ almost completely from those of the Wagenia in Kisangani, and to be borrowed from the surrounding Metuku. As far a I have been able to discover, there are a score or more of Wagenia groups living between Lowa and Kisangani who are sometimes not even aware of each other's existence, despite many resemblances (cf., e.g., Spa 1973:2).

Fig. 7 The area upstream of Kisangani Only the names mentioned in the text are marked in.

According to the Kisangani Wagenia's own statements, they have been living in their present territory for only about ten generations. The name of the man who took the initiative for the migratory movement which brought the Wagenia (by which name I shall henceforth refer exclusively to those of Kisangani) to their present abode is

History

33

Mobveta. His mother belonged to theBayembo group, a sub-group of the Bambole tribe. These Bayembo lived near the falls before the Wagenia. They, too, fished with traps in the cataracts. Mobveta had evidently kept his eyes wide open on his visits to his maternal kinsmen. He had probably been deeply impressed by the place and fishing techniques. It may have been the advance of other tribes that made it necessary to find somewhere else to live (De Ridder 1960:224). The maternal kin group, the Bayembo, were driven away by the Wagenia. It is not worthwhile occupying ourselves with the further history of this migration in the present context. Let me pick up the thread of my discourse again in 1877, when the Wagenia saw the first white man, Stanley. His passage through their territory was coupled with a few skirmishes, in which two Wagenia lost their lives. There was no direct contact between the explorer and the Wagenia. Not long after this the Arabs extended their sphere of influence from the south as far as the Wagenia area. They established trading posts everywhere, also among the Wagenia. They tried to dominate the latter through the appointment of village heads. Stanley paid the Wagenia a second visit in 1883. On this occasion direct contact was made between them. He was granted the right to establish a European post on the island of Kisangani (cf. Fig. 4) on behalf of his employer, King Leopold II, in return for £160's worth of goods. This constituted the first beginnings of what was later to develop into the town of Stanleyville (the present Kisangani) on the mainland. In the course of the negotiations Stanley made his acquaintance with the Wagenia's palaver form of democracy, and at the same time, without being aware of it, with their political system, which lacks a central authority. He wrote (1885:161): 'In brief, we asked to be allowed to stay with them and build a town, and to live in peace with them as their friends and protectors. This exposition of our purpose elicited a lively response. A speaker stood up and listening to the words in short sentences from our guides, he seemed to be mechanically repeating them, while the others maintained a profound silence until the speaker ended, when all at once a furious hubbub commenced. One might have imagined they were about to fling themselves upon one another, so violent were they in gesture, and so rapid and voluble in speech. This fury subsiding, one after another got up and expounded his views on the matter.

34

The context of Wagenia initiation

If he spoke well and to the point, they who considered his words pertinent and sensible got up and arranged his grass-cloth that covered his rear parts; those who dissented poured forth a torrent of what we supposed were vituperations. This continued until they exhausted themselves, when the palaver was adjourned until the next day at the same hour.' Stanley planted his flag, and the Wagenia were thus made a buffer between whites and Arabs. They were divided among themselves, as was to be expected in a segmented society. Some villages took sides with the whites, and others with the Arabs. The latter at one stage killed three Wagenia village heads. Arabic influence was eliminated in the 1890's. Some of the Arabic slaves and soldiers settled in the Wagenia's immediate vicinity after the pacification, inter alia on the island of Kisangani (cf. Fig. 6). Relations between these so-called Arabisés and the Wagenia can still be qualified as cool today. The former considered themselves far above the 'savage' Wagenia because of their own contact with Arabic culture and Islam. The latter reacted fairly indifferently to this,as far as I have been able to ascertain. Contacts between the two groups are limited to the communal markets and the consultation of Arabisé 'féticheurs' (healer-diviners). An extremely small number of Wagenia are Muslim. One might describe the relationship between the Wagenia at large and the Arabisés as one of peaceful coexistence, of live and let live. I shall not discuss the colonial period in the present context. Its influence on the economic aspect of Wagenia culture has already been touched on above.The attendant political and religious changes will be discussed in the relevant sections below. In connection with initiation the events following the independence of Congo, as it was still called, in 1960 still merit our attention. The party-political oppositions characterizing the first years after independence did not pass the Wagenia by unnoticed. The tribe was too small to have its own tribal political party. This opened the way to internal division. The circumstance that Kisangani was a focus of national politics did not fail to contribute to this. The difficulties culminated in the so-called 1964 rebellion against the central Government. Some Wagenia made common cause with the rebels, others furiously opposed them. Many fled into the forest, where they suffered many hardships. A large proportion of the opponents was killed or threatened with death. One village, Bina Kaekesse, saw

Segmentation

and kinship

35

many of its inhabitants massacred by the rebels. The chief of this village, who in colonial times had been chief of all the Wagenia of Kisangani, was publicly executed. When a good three months later the city was recaptured from the rebels with the assistance of Belgian paracommandoes and white mercenaries, peace was restored, although in 1966 a mutiny of Katangese gendarmes took place and in 1967 the city had to cope with an uprising of white mercenaries. Although the memory of the rebellion was kept alive in the course of the initiation, I was most surprised to see how people who not long before had been at each other's throats, at the time of my research, only a few years after these bloody events, were apparently living side by side peacefully and without rancour. The open fighting out of feuds would be fatal for the intensive sort of communal life of the village. People cannot afford to be continually at odds with one another.

SEGMENTATION AND KINSHIP

Historically the Wagenia of Kisangani represent an amalgamation of three kin groups which, according to their own statements, came to be in their present territory as a result of a joint migration. The three groups did not coreside before this migration. Bina Nsoko, the group of the leader of the migration, Mobveta, which is at present the biggest of the three, is said to have originally lived near the Obiatuku, a tributary of the Lualaba, approximately 100 kilometres from the area occupied by it today (cf. Fig. 7). The second group, Bina Nkulu, reputedly came from somewhere near present-day Ubundu (Ponthierville),while the third group, Bina Lombe, originally had its home near Wania Rukula. According to Moeller (1934:82; 1936:21, 56), Bina Lombe originally was a sub-group of the Walengola, a forest tribe. Only the other two groups were supposedly real Wagenia. Be that as it may, it is these three groups which laid the foundations of contemporary Wagenia society. So the Wagenia have been characterized by a segmented structure from the beginning. They lack a central authority. This type of society is far from unusual in this part of Zaire, and is frequently encountered in other parts of Africa as well (cf., e.g., Middleton and Tait 1958).

36

The context of Wagenia initiation

The names of the three groups are derivatives of animal names, but according to my informants may also refer to their founding fathers. Nsoko is the word for gorilla, sometimes also for ape in general, Nkulu for turtle, and Lombe for iguana. One may thus possibly imagine the society as symbolizing the tripartition of the cosmos into sky, water and land respectively. The historical context rules this out, however, while there are no myths which may point in this direction, either. Nor is it possible to draw any conclusions from the distribution of the three groups on the two opposite river banks, as this has changed repeatedly over the years. One should compare Stanley's map (Fig. 4) with Fig. 10, p. 39, as an illustration of this. Traditionally there were taboos against eating or even looking at the three above-named animals in force for the members of each of the respective groups on which the animals had bestowed their names. Today these taboos are no longer generally observed. The three animals are hardly found in the vicinity of the city today, anyway. Moreover, the three groups no longer are the most important social units. The segmentation process has been responsible for their functions being taken over by their segments. There is still a certain degree of solidarity between the members of each of the three main groups in the case of conflict, but these groups have definitely ceased to form the focus of the social structure. The fact that Bina Lombe is never referred to as such, but is customarily called Bakonga, further typifies the situation. The name of Bina Nsoko, the largest of the three groups, is also seldom used. The meaning of the prefix Bina is something like 'children of, people of'. One also encounters the word bina kito, which means literally 'our people, our kin', but is more broadly used in the sense of 'our friends'. In the literature, as well as outside the Wagenia area, one sometimes also comes across Ouani, Wanya, Banya, Benya or Bainie instead of Bina. Wherever the Wagenia of Kisangani are collectively designated as Binakatende (cf. p. 31), this refers to Ntende, who was, in point of fact, the founding father only of Bina Nsoko, the group of the leader of the migration, Mobveta. We will get closer to the heart of the social structure if we observe the results of the division of these three groups. For this purpose the terms used by the Wagenia with reference to the different patrilineal kin groups will have to be discussed first. Most proper names

Segmentation

and kinship

37

begin with Bina, followed by the name of the seniormost ancestor, the ' f o u n d e r ' of the group. Among these generic names a certain order of rank prevails, one group being considered as the 'father' of another. In practice, however, any one of these terms, where used separately from the others, may possibly be applied to any group for which the relevant 'father term' is also used. Tshese is mostly used to refer to the entire tribe, though also to the three component groups. Okita refers to an entity that is smaller than the tshese, b u t may also be used to designate the entire tribe. Next in the hierarchy is the term tshebanda (plural form bebanda), which may denote groups varying from the three together making up Wagenia society to kin groups comprising only a few extended families. It is the most frequently used term, evidently because it refers to the majority of the groups to which the segmentation process has given rise, with name-bestowing ancestors of at least five generations back. Smaller than the tshebanda in most cases is the ilumba, which in turn is larger than the extended family or monginda, also sometimes referred to by the archaic Kigenia word mobvindi. A nuclear family which might have been an extended family but for the fact that the third generation has died out is also called monginda or mobvindi. For the unit with a single cookingfire, which is hence grouped around one mother, the word bolise is used. Hence the term tshebanda especially is used with reference to groups of varying sizes.This is a corollary of the fissiparous character of Wagenia society. The segment may perform the same functions and activities as those reserved to the parent group before segmentation. Together with the activities and functions, the generic name is adopted by the newly separated-off group. Such segmentation need n o t necessarily affect all activities, however. The possibility of cooperation within the larger unit to achieve particular goals remains. This may vary in each case. No activities are necessarily linked t o specific units of a particular size or with ancestors of a particular generation. Who belongs to the in-group and who to an out-group will vary from one situation to the next, which is not to say that all Wagenia will always draw the border line between ' w e ' a n d ' t h e y ' in the same way in that specific situation. Wherever the word tshebanda is used henceforth in this book, it will have to be apparent from the context which segmentation level and what particular activities are

38

The context of Wagenia initiation

meant. That is why I shall refrain from using an English equivalent of tshebanda, but will consistently use the Wagenia term. In order to translate this abstract formulation into more concrete terms, we will now direct our attention first of all to the results of segmentation. This will then be followed by a number of examples of bebanda and their potential functions. Figure 8 relates to the segmentation of Bina Nsoko. Of the earliest part of the genealogy there are several versions in circulation. The first three of the four of these which are set out below were recorded among the Wagenia of Kisangani, while the last was furnished by an informant from Batikalela, a river village of Wagenia who also style themselves Babira, 40 kilometres upstream from Kisangani. According to the latter, Moongo had six brothers and one sister, who were allegedly the founding fathers and mother of seven villages between Ubundu and Kisangani. The final column contains the names of the bebanda of which the men listed in the last column but one are the founding fathers. There was disagreement among the informants about the names of the fathers and/or grandfathers of these men, as the four different versions show.

I 1 Ntende

Generations II Moongo

III

IV

V

Lowao Moongo Mobveta Kaekesse Mongembe Lowao Moongo Ntende 2 Mongula Nsomba Nsilekpe Lesali < 3 Moenya Ntende Lowao Moongo Mbolombisa Ngba 4 Monemba Moongo Ntende Nsilonga

bebanda Bina Kaekesse Bina Ngembe Bina Mongula Bina Nsilekpe Bina Mbolombisa extinct Bina Nsilonga

Fig. 8 The Moenya mentioned in the third version was said to have given his name to the tribe: Baenya.

Continued segmentation of Bina Nsilekpe displays the following picture:

Segmentation GENEALOGY

and kinship BEBANDA

— Sooko = o Nsilekpe = O

39

- Nsila Lowao — — Kalingili L Keele -

Bina Sooko Bina Nsila Lowao ^

Bina Kalingili Bina Keele

- Ongelo

Bina Ongelo

Beenjoa

Bina Enjoa

Fig. 9 Bina Enjoa is composed of the descendants of the son of Beenjoa and those of her two daughter's sons, who both went to live with their mother's brother.

Schematically represented, the localization of the bebanda is as follows (cf. Fig. 6):

TheYasanga mentioned in Figure 10 are descended from Wagenia mothers and Bambole fathers. During a war between the Wagenia and the Bambole in precolonial times, these Yasanga took the side of their maternal relatives and went to live with them. The size of these bebanda varies from 100 to 350 persons. On the island of Kisangani there live approximately 1600 Wagenia, spread over eight bebanda. Hence these kin groups are not too big for the fairly democratic kind of decision-making process among the Wagenia. One might say that the size of these bebanda is the same as that of a parliament. There is, moreover, a definite connection between

40

The context of Wagenia initiation

the size of the bebanda and their exogamic character. They are too small not to be exogamic. At this point I would like to give a few examples of the effects of segmentation on the division of joint kinship activities among the segments of the different levels. Let us turn our attention first to the ancestor cult. This is focused on the most recently deceased ancestors. For this reason this is never the concern of the smallest possible segment with a still living ' founding father' by itself, but of several such segments combined. The people belonging to these groups all share the same ancestors, after all. It is quite conceivable that this ancestor cult is exercising an inhibitive influence on the tendency towards autonomy on the part of the segments. The ancestors are regarded as active members of the kin group, despite the fact that they are deceased. A second example concerns the rules of exogamy. Bina Mongula is an exogamic kin group. On the other hand Bina Nsilekpe, which according to Figure 8 belongs to the same segmentation level, is not exogamic. In its case exogamy is a function of the next segmentation level, as Bina Nsila Lowao, Bina Enjoa and Bina Ongelo are such exogamic units. Parallel with this we have the variation in headship. For the last decades the sub-groups of Bina Nsila Lowao have each had their own village head. For Bina Mongula, which is two levels further up, there is only a single village head, however. The situation has not always been like this. During the Arabic period there was one chief for the whole of Bina Nsilekpe, just as there was one for Bina Mongula at that time, too. In the case of Bina Nsilekpe the segmentation process is further advanced than in that of Bina Mongula, probably for demographic reasons. The five segments into which Bina Nsilekpe has become divided have on average almost as many members each as Bina Mongula by itself. In a situation where decision-making takes place mainly through the medium of palavers, a large group is in contradiction with the interests of the system. Another example concerns loyalty in the case of conflicts. A tshebanda will be loyal as a whole as long as it does not comprise both opposing parties. The greater the genealogical distance between the two parties, the further removed in age will be the generation of the ancestor of the tshebanda rallying to the support of either (cf. the Nuer, e.g., Evans-Pritchard 1951:155). Sahlins (1968:50) speaks

Segmentation and kinship

41

of complementary opposition. The number of fishing-grounds known by name according to Lisungi (1973: 34) has increased from seven to 34 over the years as a result of segmentation. The next example concerns the residential function. Frequently, though not invariably, relatives are seen to coreside in the one street. Bina Mongula occupies one such street. On comparison with Bina Nsila Lowao, each of the three bebanda of this latter tshebanda is discovered to occupy a street of its own. Here, too, demographic reasons may be put forward to account for the difference. In the above cases the residential unit is seen to coincide with the political unit. The bebanda mentioned here are indicated in Figure 11. Although the terms tshebanda and 'village' are used interchangeably, there is, in fact, a difference between the two concepts. The word tshebanda designates the patrilineal kin group. 'Village', on the other hand, denotes a territorial group, including the women who have joined the group through marriage, but excluding the daughters who have left the group for the same reason. The difference is also relevant in connection with recent neolocality. At the present day not all men go to live in their father's village after marriage. Figure 10 is not entirely correct, therefore. A number of Wagenia have gone to live in the Arabisés quarter. ARABISES

9

50

to the camp of Bina Enjoa1 and Bina Nsila Lowao

o

•D

100 m

Fig. 11. Map of the area surrounding the inland lake bordered by Bina Mongula, Bina Kaekesse and Bina Nkulu

42

The context

of Wagenia

initiation

This is explained partly by shortage of space in the territory of their own tshebanda. The main factor responsible for this has been population growth, aggravated by the floods of the early sixties, which caused part of the area occupied by certain bebanda to crumble away. But there are sometimes also other reasons. So some people of Bina Kaekesse, who found out by experience during the 1964 rebellion that to live on a small island is to be like a mouse in a trap, later moved to the island of Kisangani. In 1970, furthermore, many houses in Bina Nkulu were demolished in connection with the visit of the Belgian royal couple. On that occasion a large tract of land fairly close to the waterfalls was cleared, and many people moved elsewhere. They were compensated by the Government. Some people go to live in the Arabisé quarter out of fear of fellow villagers suspected of sorcery. So it can be stated as a general rule that the kin group is becoming increasingly less localized, and that coresidence is becoming a function per se, independent of kinship relations. In the course of the present description of initiation as well, the size of the tshebanda will be seen again and again to vary with the particular activity performed. The number of segments, of whatever level, which undertake some activity or other jointly varies from one occasion to the next. Bebanda grouping together to perform a task unitedly in one phase of the ritual, will go their own separate ways again at a later stage. Moreover, no initiation activity appears to entail invariably the same measure of cooperation among all Wagenia groups. In addition, bebanda which cooperated for a particular component of initiation on an earlier occasion, may operate independently on the occasion of the next initiation. Anticipating the remarks following below to some extent, I shall give a few examples of this in the present context. A number of bebanda sharing an initiation camp on earlier occasions may each build their own separate camp on the next. This need not prevent them from circumcising their novices at the same time, however. Conversely, bebanda sharing the same camp may each organize a separate circumcision ceremony. Lastly, bebanda with different camps may or may not stage a joint parade on the novices' return to the village. In all of these examples cooperation is an echo of the past, when initiations were held jointly whithout exception. The conducting of separate rituals, on the other hand, reflects the effects of the segmentation process.

Segmentation

and kinship

43

Fig. 12. Bina Mongula At this point some subtler shading will have to be introduced in the picture of the social structure drawn above. As it happens,there is no lack of social relations between bebanda which are genealogically distant from each other, but have reason to cooperate in virtue of the fact that they are neighbours. An example of this is furnished by Bina Mongula, Bina Kaekesse and Bina Nkulu. In Stanley's time these formed a single coresidential group. Stanley, on his map (Fig.4), marked in two settlements on Kisangani island. Judging by the name, the more northerly one was probably Bina Lesali (cf. Figs.8,9and 10).

44

The context of Wagenia initiation

The other settlement, on the south of the island, probably comprised the houses of the three above-mentioned bebanda. Population growth as well as topographical changes (cf. Figs. 4, 5, 6 and 11) have led to the dispersion of these three bebanda. Some vestiges of cooperation were nonetheless still found among them at the time of my research. On the occasion of marriages and funerals these three bebanda still shared each other's ceremonial expenses. Furthermore, the boys and youths of these three bebanda formed a single team at wrestling matches. In former times they shared a single canoe with which to reach the fish-traps that were most difficult of access, which was also used at regattas. More examples will be given in connection with initiation. Another modification I would like to introduce in the description of the social structure concerns the relations arising between the different bebanda as a result of marriage. The most popular form of marriage is that by elopement, which in its purest form concerns only the couple itself. The girl simply follows the boy of her own accord, without her relatives' mediation, although sometimes with their knowledge and connivance. The bebanda definitely assert themselves here, too, however, despite the extreme form marriage may take in the case of elopement. Of every marriage people say that the one tshebanda has married the other,e.g., 'BinaMongulahas married BinaNkulu'. One Kigenia word for wife is amokali a tshebanda, that is, 'woman of the tshebanda'. Moreover, the payments made in connection with marriage are a collective concern. After marriage, relations with the mother's tshebanda are maintained especially by the offspring of that marriage. Despite the fact that the kinship structure of the Wagenia can be qualified as patrilineal, the role of the maternal relatives should by no means be discounted. Below follow a few examples. A person maintains a joking relationship with his maternal relatives, in the sense that he is more especially the target of their jokes, all his life. If the maternal relatives overdo things, then sister's son is free to appropriate some belonging of theirs (e.g., a chicken). He may moreover go to his maternal relatives any time he has an empty stomach. In the event of his getting into conflict in his own village, or his feeling uneasy there from fear of sorcery, for example, he may take up permanent residence with his oncles (as they tend to be called more recently). In addition he will 'eat', as it is called, a share

Segmentation and kinship

45

of the catch from the fish-traps of his maternal relatives, who are entitled to a special payment on the death of their sister's son for this reason, on behalf of his mother. If they have no fish-traps, he may go katilo fishing with them. Sister's son may further reinforce his mother's tshebanda at wrestling matches or regattas. Whenever there is some payment or settlement to be made, especially on the occasion of marriages and burials, he will have his share in this, too. Every person has a personal name which is used exclusively by his oncles. Those with a command of the language of the talking drum identify themselves at the beginning of every message by mentioning the drum name of their mother's tshebanda as well. In the course of initiation, too, mother's brothers play an important part; the data on this will be reserved for the following chapters, however. Here I wish simply to observe that the relations with maternal relatives carry considerable weight, though in the final analysis the balance does tip in favour of father's tshebanda. Broadly generalizing, one might say that relations with mother's relatives are permitted as long as this is not considered to be in conflict with the interests of the patrilineal kin group. While father's tshebanda is ultimately dominant, mother's relatives maintain a curious kind of dominance in the joking relationship. Before rounding off the present section, I would like to make a final series of remarks on the value that is placed on the continued existence of the tshebanda. If the tshebanda is to survive under the prevailing segmentary system, it is essential that there be a next generation ready to safeguard the tshebanda's autonomy. This is one reason why so much importance is attached to the possession of progeny. If a couple remains childless, recourse is taken to separation or polygamy. The demographic explosion of the 20th century has strengthened the tendency towards segmentation. A numerous progeny was a useful ideal at a time when birth and death more or less balanced each other. In spite of the changed conditions, however, the ideal remains unchanged. One novice summed up the connection between this ideal and the social structure with the words, 'I want to have children so that later a tribe will be called after me'. Another said, 'Your children will take your place later, so that your name won't be forgotten. Anyone seeing my children will say, "Look, there's a certain Augustin still alive".' Until quite recently paternity or grandfather-

46

The context of Wagenia initiation

hood was marked by the right to eat particular rare species of fish. Characteristically also, parents have another name bestowed on them on the birth of a child. So after the birth of our eldest son I was often addressed as Isakalimasi, or 'father of Kalimasi', the latter being the Wagenia name for him. My wife, who had until then been addressed as Mokalaandele, "wife of André", henceforth bore the name M'makalimasi, 'mother of Kalimasi'. When the birth of a second child followed rather later than was justified by Wagenia standards, we kept being constantly reminded of our duty. It is important for a tshebanda to be large and numerous. As initiation marks the occasion on which the next generation takes its place in the ranks, needless to say I will have ample opportunity to revert to this motif further down. Summarizing the above, we note how the Wagenia are predominantly patrilineal, how they consider the continuity of the tshebanda of vital importance, how neighbourhood ties play a role alongside kinship ties, and how the position of the bebanda is characterized by tension between the tendency towards autonomy and that towards solidarity. Especially the latter point is important. There are constant attempts to establish contact for all kinds of purposes, while at the same time there is a definite suspicion of the other person. People hold each other by one hand, while they rebuff one another with the other. We have here a structuring, constructive tendency on the one hand, and a destructuring, destructive one on the other. Popular activities like wrestling matches and regattas.are continually threatened by this tension between cooperation and autonomy, partly in connection with the increasing size of the groups involved. Over the past few years they have been held less frequently in order to avoid difficulties. The fact that no social relation is really immune against accusations of sorcery is also characteristic of the segmentation tendency. My assistant Alingi once put the tension between autonomy and cooperation into words as follows: 'To be good friends with someone, you have to have quarrelled with him first.' We saw in connection with the rebellion (p. 34) just how far this may be carried. Quite probably, however, conflicts which came to a head then are merely lying dormant at present, to come to the surface again at the next provocation.

Segmentation

and kinship

47

Within Bina Mongula a latent rivalry between Bina Ikpandei y a Mongula and Bina Boungu was discovered to exist. For the last generations the village head had been supplied by the former. At one time the latter had possessed this privilege, however. The members of Bina Ikpandei ya Mongula were convinced that Bina Boungu had tried during the rebellion of 1964 to have the then head removed. My arrival in Bina Mongula a few years later rekindled the fire. One of my first informants was the village head, Soku. The house we lived in was built in his compound. Subsequently Bina Boungu accused the others of selling themselves to the white man. Warnings were given against the construction of a house for us. All this was kept carefully secret from me, and, characteristically, I was able to maintain good relations with Bina Boungu as well during my research. The rivalry rose to the surface again upon Soku's death, when his son Njaki was appointed his successor. Njaki, however, then was often absent from the village. Hence the position of village head lost most of what little authority it still carried by tradition. One of the men of Bina Boungu, Ayo, a strong personality, therefore acted as de facto leader whenever this was necessary. Formally nothing changed. At the time of the initiation, when there was so much organizing to be done, Ayo asserted himself much more strongly than Njaki. Two events in the year following the initiation typified the situation. At a particular ceremony of payment in Njaki's tshebanda it was Ayo who acted as spokesman, while Njaki kept in the background. Moreover, in that same year A y o became 'chef de quartier' for Bina Mongula. The latter is a position in the new administrative structure of the 'commune' that is more or less equivalent to headship in the old administrative structure of the 'chefferie'. It cannot be denied that this segmentary system has a definite dynamic feature. The process is leading to increasing complexity of the structure. It is impossible to link functions such as exogamy, the possession of a single head, coresidence and the use of one initiation camp with segments of any one particular level. It can be said, however, that certain bebanda possess more functions than others, and if one wished to speak of the focus of the social system, then this surely lies with these bebanda. Some such bebanda are those of the island of Kisangani mentioned in Figure 10, for example. To the political and residential functions of these bebanda it will be possible

48

The context of Wagenia initiation

in most cases to add below a function in connection with initiation. For a palaver democracy, these genealogical groups evidently possess an optimum size. In view of the tendency towards segmentation, it is surprising that the unity of the tribe should not have suffered. So initiation is the scene not only of tribal division, but also of tribal unity. All segments hold initiation rites at the same time, in contrast with what is the custom among neighbouring tribes, where each kin group does so at a time that seems suitable to it. On the other hand — and this is the obverse side of the medal —, the bebanda seize on initiation as an occasion to assert their individual authority vis-à-vis the other segments, especially where they have gained independence with respect to initiation matters for the first time.

LEADERSHIP

Turning our attention next to leadership in the bebanda and in the tribe, it should be observed at the outset that the norm is for decisions to be made by mutual consultation among all adult males. Despite the existence of chefs or village heads, the system is essentially non-hierarchical. As a result, long palavers may take place, and decision-making is often laborious. Democracy here is not so much a matter of carrying out the will of the majority as of hearing the minority with the object of achieving a compromise. It should nevertheless be pointed out also that this ideal form of democracy functions less perfectly in practice, because men endowed with a strong personality or with rhetorical gifts may exercise a marked influence on decision-making. To all appearances the Wagenia have given shape to this latter phenomenon in the figure usually designated in pre-colonial times by the term kalondôli (pl. tolondôli), a diminutive of the less common word molondôli or molondôi (the meaning of kolondôa is 'to make a speech', 'to address an audience', 'to explain, counsel'). He was a primus inter pares. Although his position was hereditary, the right to supply the kalondôli might nevertheless sometimes be seized by another tshebanda. In contacts with other bebanda the kalondôli acted as spokesman of his own tshebanda. Without possessing penal powers, he would try to appease conflicts within his own tshebanda

Leadership

49

by giving advice. If he was unsuccessful in this, the matter would be put before the tolonddli of other bebanda. The tolondoli were conciliators, also in conflicts between their own bebanda. In the latter case they never assumed a leading role in the conflict, but took a neutral stand. They never took part in quarrels and fights, but on the contrary, tried to put a stop to these. At his installation a specific medicine was spat into the kalondolVs mouth in order that his words might always be wise and sensible. The custom of putting the kalondoli's leopard-skin hat on the head of a person who was in a fit of anger in order to soothe him speaks volumes. The tolondoli nevertheless fulfilled no religious function, as the ancestor cult was enacted on a different segmentation level from the political life. In the Arabic period the kalondoli became a mokota, a modern term for 'chief'. At the same time the responsibility for relations with the foreign administration was added to his traditional duties. He also had one ortwo assistants, called kapita (plural topital), who were selected from the other segments of his tshebanda, assigned to him. Because these functionaries were only too often exposed to the wrath of the foreign rulers, their position was no longer as much sought after as before. Even unpopular figures might be pushed forward for the position of mokota. As a result the chief might sometimes be a querulous recalcitrant, whose appointment was in actual fact a punishment for past conduct, instead of the restrained, dignified figure from the tolondoli era. This is slightly reminiscent of the way in which the Wagenia used to settle scores in vendettas, namely by indicating the most refractory villager as counter-victim to the opposing party. The whites continued the innovation of the office of mokota. They moreover introduced the new rule at the beginning of this century that one mokota had to be chosen from among those of the various bebanda as all-Wagenia representative.This way the originally ahierarchical political system of the Wagenia was adapted to the stereotype of the chiefly hierarchy. This obviously carried the advantage for the white administration that it had to deal with only one man instead of a number of village heads. According to a report of the then 'administrateur territorial', the meeting at which the all-Wagenia chief was elected took place in September 1927. My informants alleged that a meeting had been called on the same subject before that, but this is not apparent

50

The context of Wagenia initiation

from the a.t.'s report. In 1927 Lowao, the mokota of Bina Kaekesse, was appointed mokota of all the Wagenia of Kisangani. He owed his appointment to the circumstance that he was a descendant of Mobveta, the man who had led the Wagenia to their present territory. A contributing factor was probably the fact that one of his predecessors, as mokota of Bina Kaekesse, had sought the support of the whites against the Arabs on behalf of the pro-white Wagenia. Lowao even so enjoyed no special prestige with his fellow-me&ota. There were rumours that he had purchased his appointment. Another important factor was that,unlike the other candidates, he was able to speak Swahili. The a.t. wrote: 'Loao jouit d'une influence morale, mais n'a aucun pouvoir sans l'assentiment des s/chefs dirigeant le clan' (Lowao enjoys a certain moral influence, but has no power without the assent of the subchiefs ruling the clan) (i.e., Bina Nsoko). And with reference to Lowao's influence with Bina Nkulu and Bina Lombe he wrote: 'Loao n'a aucun pouvoir coutumier sur ces groupes' (Lowao has no customary power at all over these groups). But, 4 il est d'ailleurs fort écouté grâce à ses qualités personelles: l'on peut considérer Loao comme un modèle de Chef, il se plie facilement à toutes les prescriptions du Gouvernement mais sans platitude et surtout sans jamais oublier sa qualité de Chef coutumier, défenseur des droits de ses sujets' (he otherwise makes himself well heard thanks to his personal qualities. Lowao can be considered a model chief, for he complies with all the Government's prescriptions readily, though without platitude, and above all without ever forgetting his position as customary chief, defender of his subjects'rights). There are three things that strike us here. Firstly, Lowao's personality was a factor in his appointment. Secondly, the Belgians did not shrink from introducing a drastic change in the political system, although they knew that their decision had no roots at all in Wagenia tradition. And finally, Lowao adopted an attitude which may be considered exemplary for the standpoint adopted vis-à-vis white penetration by the Wagenia in general, which was aimed at maintaining their own status as much as possible. The new dignitary became president of the court of justice, was put in charge of fisheries, and was made responsible for the organization of the services and taxes imposed on the Wagenia by the Government. I personally do not get the impression that the appointment

Leadership

51

of a central chief had any influence on the tendency towards segmentation. As it happens, the unity of the tribe was unaffected by such division. Moreover, the supreme chief took charge especially of external relations, thereby meeting the requirements of the newly arisen situation. Within the tribe, however, he was the first among his equals, like the kalondoli in the tshebanda. After independence in 1960, the Wagenia 'chefferie' was replaced by a 'commune', at present called 'zone', which embraced both the Wagenia and the Arabises. The city of Kisangani was divided into a number of such 'communes', which came under the control of an appointed mayor. Administratively the Wagenia thus came to be part of an urban community. As we saw above (p. 29), the daily trek to town for work started at about the same time. In both respects the Wagenia were obliged to become more city-oriented than ever before. The 'chefferie' was re-instated for a short period in 1968 and 1969, evidently as a result of a temporary change in policy at the Department of Internal Affairs. During that time the son of the last all-Wagenia chief, who had been killed in 1964, acted as administrative representative of the Wagenia. He did not enjoy the authority his predecessors once seem to have possessed, be it in moderation. Members of the younger generation in particular tended to be quite negative about the value of hereditary positions. The institution of the 'commune' entailed the appointment of so-called 'chefs de quartier'. This function was not necessarily automatically assigned to the tshebanda that had previously supplied the mokota. The number of 'chefs de quartier' was not the same as that of the former mekota, either. For all practical purposes, the situation at the time of my research was such that in most bebanda people had gone back to decisionmaking by palaver, particularly in matters in which the tradition was also involved. Without this being institutionalized, most decisions were made by middle-aged men who had often been initiated together. The mokota's position had been undermined and reduced to something less than the former kalondolVs position by the dissolution of the 'chefferie'. A certain individualization tendency of Western origin, stimulated by modern education and the money economy, probably had something to do with this as well. For the administration of justice there was a 'commune' court, of which the

52

The context of Wagenia initiation

former Wagenia chief was a member. This court was quicker to punish than had been the case in the old days, when the chief, possibly with the assistance of the assembled men, had been more intent on conciliating the opposing parties.

THE RELATION BETWEEN THE SEXES

Of the fields of tension enumerated in the introduction, a number have already been more closely examined. The segmentation tendency and the relation to the maternal relatives have been discussed above. The man-woman relationship will be considered in the present section. We have here an opposition that finds expression in a variety of ways. The point at issue is not only that the two sexes are different in all kinds of respects, but also that on some occasions they are actually literally opposed to one another. At one time the relation will be a complementary and perfectly equal one, at other times there will be question of a one-sided male dominance. There will be ample opportunity for demonstrating this in the description of initiation. At this point, however, I would like to give a number of examples taken from other aspects of the culture. At the birth of twins it is customary for men and women to abuse and rail at one another. Twins are symbolic of the man-woman relationship (even though the comparison is not entirely appropriate), as in the Wagenia view twins are considered as rivals. They have to be given as equal treatment as possible for fear of sorcery by one of the two. A second example has been drawn from funerary practices. When a man dies, the men have the right to cause the women suffering in one way or another, and vice versa. This may consist in dropping chili juice into the eyes of the victims or setting them heavy, useless tasks. It is possible to get out of this by making a payment, however. Men are dominant in the notions of sex. Sexual intercourse is gennerally referred to by metaphors denoting a fight, as between a goat and a leopard or a hen and a civet, a fight in which no one intervenes. When asked about an imaginary choice between being a girl or a boy, most novices stated themselves to prefer to remain a boy. The reasons they gave were that women suffer during coition and at

The relation between the sexes

53

childbirth, and have to work hard in general. A few argued that girls and women are prone to promiscuity, a concept which in a polygamous society needless to say is virtually restricted to 'le deuxième sexe'. This became apparent at difficult births for one thing. Such a birth might be attributed to the woman's infidelity as well as to the man's escapades, but while women were censured for this, men went scot-free. A final example will be taken from the prevailing food taboos, which apply mostly to women. My informants explained this by saying that the weak sex is vulnerable and hence needs to be protected against dangers. But in a more prosaic mood they explained the phenomenon as a means of reserving the choicest food for the men. These examples do not even so tell the whole story. For Wagenia women took advantage of their specific position to achieve a certain independence and autonomy. By selling wares on the city or village market they enjoyed independent incomes, which not infrequently made the men financially dependent on their wives. Although normally the fish was caught by the men, it was sold by the women. On all kinds of occasions the women had their own independent place, their special little world. At feasts, ceremonial payments and funerals, as well as during church services, the women sat separately. When there was dancing, women mostly danced together, and they took part in the celebrating in their own special way. They were indefatigable, as they seemed to be also in their ordinary daily activities. Women revelled more exuberantly than the men, in the same way as at funerals they wailed and lamented with greater emphasis. When collections were held, at funerals, for example, the men usually gave their contributions secretly and furtively, while the women, conversely, did so with a great deal of show and came to present their gifts openly in a long file. In former times there were a number of rites which were reserved for women but which might be attended by men. These were exclusively healing rites. The women formerly used to have their own wrestling matches, furthermore, which were different from those of the boys and men in that they were more informal and had different holds. It is important to note in addition that childbirth is still a female concern from which men are barred. I might point in conclusion to the phenomenon of primarily women being subject to spirit

54

The context of Wagenia initiation

possession, as fax as I have been able to ascertain. Most of the messages transmitted through such a woman's mouth by the possessing spirit concern current family issues. The latter would seem to suggest that women are not entirely without say. Although the men clearly lay down the law, this does not mean to say that women are invariably absent from or entirely silent at palavers. On the appointment of a new chief in Bina Mongula, women also came forward to give him their advice. Women in all probability influenced the general course of affairs in an informal way in their relation with their husbands. In former times women might try to put a stop to fights between the men of two different bebanda by entering the fray themselves. Another way was by beating drums and covered pots with burning charcoal. The burning charcoal symbolized war and all the misery wrought by it. In the same way as smouldering charcoal became extinguished when covered, the fighting had to come to an end. According to some the glowing embers were poured over the combatants. Generalizing, one might say that the men have institutionalized their own, frequently dominant, position to a high degree. But the women's own sphere, where they are able to be undisturbedly themselves, is none the less real for all that.

RELIGION

In the introduction, the question as to the religious or non-religious character of the ritual of initiation was raised. In the present chapter I am advancing relevant material taken from aspects of Wagenia culture other than initiation, so as to be able subsequently better to place the data on initiation. Hence we must not conclude this section without giving attention to the religious situation among the Wagenia. In connection with the Churches' attitude to initiation I shall also consider the Christianization process among the Wagenia. If church membership were to be taken as a criterion of the degree of Christianization, then virtually all Wagenia might be labelled as Christians. Approximately one half of the Wagenia population calls itself Roman Catholic and a sixth Baptist, while smaller percentages have joined the Kimbanguists and the Salvation Army. The Roman Catholic and Baptist Missions have been active among

Religion

55

the Wagenia since the turn of the century, while the Salvation Army first came here in 1952 and the Kimbanguists have been operating publicly since 1959. In addition there was the 'Union Chrétienne de Charité' at the time of my research. This was a Wagenia association of church members of ecumenical and charitable ideals who missed these elements in their own Church, of which they technically remained members. Some of its members regarded theU.C.C. as a new Church rather than an association alongside the existing Churches. In 1972 the U.C.C. was banned as part of the Government measures to control the Churches. Church attendances vary for the different denominations. I possess no reliable figures on this, but estimate that on average a third of the members of the Roman Catholic and Baptist Churches are to be found in church on Sundays. Polygamy is an important factor responsible for this, polygamous men being excluded from the sacraments. There is also a relatively high rate of change from one Church to another. Church affiliation within limited or extended families is not as a rule homogeneous. It is not unusual for husbands and wives to belong to different denominations. Officially Christianity and the traditional religion are mutually exclusive, but in reality they often exist side by side or co-exist in a complementary relationship, three quarters of a century of missionary effort notwithstanding. So people may be heard wishing of some act of sorcery or other that it may be successful 'God willing'. Some Wagenia stated themselves to invoke the help of the spirits of the deceased to be good Christians. Little was known about God in the traditional religion, so that it was possible for one informant to say: 'We knew so little of God before the coming of the Church that we have really only come to know Him since'. All that was known was that He had once given man a choice between good and evil, whereat man, not knowing the words for 'good' and'evil'.unwittingly chose evil. The old Wagenia name for God is Mokonga na Mbali. Of late other names for God, derived from Zaire vehicular languages, have come into use besides under the influence of the Missions. My informants translated the old name as God and Christ. As a comparison with surrounding tribes shows, the names used for God by the Wagenia are found elsewhere as well, either also as names for God, or as names for the seniormost ancestor or his son.

56

The context of Wagenia initiation

The Wagenia of Kirundu, 200-odd kilometres upstream from Kisangani, call God Mbali and are unfamiliar with the name Mokonga. The Babira residing 40 kilometres upstream from the Wagenia refer to God as Mbali or Mbali Mokonga. According to my Bakomo informants in the environs of the town of Kisangani, Mokonga was the name of the first man and Mbaio that of his son, while God was called Amabisa. De Mahieu (1975:88,275) mentions Aba-bisa as a name for God and states that Mokonga is God's son, a kind of culture hero. Van Geluwe (1957:9,149) lists Bali as the name for both God and a founding father for the Babira located a few hundred kilometres to the northeast of Kisangani. The Churches' giving the concept of God greater content has not led to any loss in importance of the spirits of the dead. If one starts from the premise that they are members of the kin groups, then it is quite understandable that the cult around these spirits should have survived along with the kinship system. Dependence of the living on the spirits of the dead and the invocation of their help are connected with the realization that it was the ancestors who instituted or preserved the tshebanda. As they have safeguarded the tshebanda against extinction and have handed down the customs, they are helping their progeny to guarantee this continuity. Deviations from the customs may be punished by them. So the spirits may cure, but also cause suffering. They may empty fish-traps and nets, but may also fill them. They have the capacity to kill, but also to save from death. They may appear to the living and transmit their thoughts through the mouths of the living. If they have suffered injury or even death as a result of sorcery or any other act in life, they may take revenge after their death. Spirits may fight one another, such as to defend the interests of their descendants. When the talking drum is played they also listen; so the drum must never be played without reason. In songs the ancestors may sometimes also be referred to. The song-leader may conclude a song with the exclamation iii bato ba nseke, 'iii, people of the earth', to whjch everyone will reply with Hii\ There are good and evil spirits, depending on the kind of life they have led. Someone who has always been good to others will become a good spirit after his death, a spirit which may cause suffering only by way of punishment, hence with good intentions. A person who has been bad to others (in other words, who was suspected of sorcery)

Religion

57

will become a malign spirit and may cause suffering for the sake of suffering, from sheer malevolence. Good and evil spirits live in separate villages under the water of the river, but may also appear in the forest. It would nevertheless be incorrect to create the impression that the Wagenia feel themselves surrounded by spirits of the deceased every hour of the day, and even more so the night. It is especially in marginal situations that spirits figure. Thus, only the fish-traps that are most difficult of access are said to be protected by spirits, to the extent that their voices and sounds are audible. Spirit possession is especially in evidence in the case of intra- tshebanda tensions. Offerings of food or beer are only made when people want something. The cult accordingly does not function in all circumstances. From the vantage point of the Western observer there appears to be question of an extra dimension to Wagenia reality not only in relation to God and the spirits of the dead, but also in the possibility of exercising an influence through sorcery. There is a great deal of speculation on this subject. Moreover, people preferably only talk about it in confidence, so that the first year I doubted whether sorcery actually occurred among the Wagenia at all. Because for the Wagenia the margin of the possible is a wide one, a neatly rounded-off picture is difficult for the researcher to obtain. The distinction that is usually drawn in cultural anthropology between sorcery and witchcraft is not found in the stereotyped way among the Wagenia. I shall in general use the term 'sorcery'. The Wagenia themselves use the word isombo. This term may stand in a narrower sense for the earliest form of sorcery, which is sometimes also called kokubva, but may also be used in a wider sense to comprehend the more recent form, termed fondlt. I shall briefly discuss kokubva and fonoli below. In either case the sorcerer and his victim not infrequently are relatives or affines. Kokubva is innate, but not always inherited — not necessarily all children will follow in their parents' footsteps. Kokubva may also be transmitted from wife to husband, but seldom in the opposite direction. A person endowed with it cannot escape it, even should he or she want to. It is possible to make a public admission of guilt and vomit kokubva up. But even such admissions are not taken seriously by everyone. A person possessed of kokubva (called moto a kokubva, or sometimes also moto zva isombo) has a fire in his stomach

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The context of Wagenia initiation

which he exhales through his mouth on nocturnal journeys, when it serves as a torch. He is able to fly across the river in a basket or pot to attend an assembly of sorcerers at which consultations about future victims are held, for example. Anyone walking outside at night may sometimes see rapidly vanishing lights. Killing is done for the sake of killing. Jealousy is an important motive. Many people suspected of possessing kokubva are deprived in some way, while their victims, on the other hand, are generously blessed, for example with progeny. In this form of sorcery hair, nails, blood, food remnants, and so on, of the victim are used, possibly in combination with sorcerer's medicines. The more recent form of sorcery, fonoli, allegedly originates from other tribes. Someone with fonoli has the ability to kill people or have them killed, and to reanimate them afterwards with the aid of sorcerer's medicines in order to make them work for him. This work is done on remote fields in the depth of the forest, or sometimes also in fishing in the river. Fonoli is also the name of a mental disease whereby the patient has a tendency to wander off into the forest or the river, as it were towards his destination, under the influence of sorcery. Another form still is that whereby someone flees into the water under threat, to be seized and killed there. There are a number of differences with kokubva. Fonoli is nonhereditary. To be able to practise sorcery with fonoli one has to have served an apprenticeship with an experienced moto wa fonoli. One may do so voluntarily or under duress. The latter may be the case where a person goes to consult a healer or diviner in connection with some trifle. If the treatment is successful, this man or woman may then reveal him- or herself as a moto wa fonoli, who in remuneration for his or her services may ask for a 'goat on two legs', for instance, a cryptogram for a human being. From that moment on the client is integrated into the guild of sorcerers and will have to kill regularly. Another difference with kokubva is that many people suspected of fdndli are anything but deprived, but on the contrary, are rich for obscure reasons. The deprived person in this case is the victim, who for various reasons is actually suffering under the situation of underdevelopment and attributes this to a sorcerer, who, in spite of everything, prospers and thrives. A third difference with kokubva is that the victim remains alive, but is stripped of his volition. Since the Government has banned traditional methods of expos-

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ing sorcerers (torture, poison tests on animals), the Wagenia have a sense of increasing powerlessness vis-à-vis sorcery. There is no recourse to be had to the magistrate, either, as anyone lodging a complaint with him runs the risk of a counter-charge of libel. I have several times mentioned sorcerer's medicines in the above. The Wagenia use a word for this (moté, pl. meté) which denotes a much wider category of medicines. It includes medicines which are obtainable on the market or from a 'féticheur' (healer-diviner) and which either give protection against sorcery or, conversely, may be used against others, supposedly even with lethal effect. The category of meté further includes all kinds of drugs, both traditional and Western. The use of some of these traditional drugs is based on an obscure causal connection between remedy and effect. As a result the Western researcher is inclined to place medicinal herbs, about which most Wagenia possess at least some knowledge, but which they indiscriminately also term meté, in a special category by itself (see also Bokdam and Droogers 1975). The Wagenia have a striking partiality for anal and vaginal douches using herb extracts. Speaking of an extra dimension to reality, I would like to mention in conclusion the so-called superstitions. So a bachelor should not eat pork, as the grunting of a pig resembles the sound made by the Wagenia to convey a refusal. And when the men of the tshebanda are on their way to a fish-trap that is particularly difficult of access, everyone remaining behind in the village has to keep silent.

2. Four aspects of Wagenia initiation

STORIES ABOUT THE ORIGIN OF INITIATION

Initiation came from upstream. This was the gist of most of the stories about the origin of Wagenia initiation. People would sometimes shout this in the course of some manifestation or other in connection with initiation. Curiously enough, it was in that case said in Kibira, the language of the neighbouring Babira tribe, instead of Kigenia. It was commonly believed, in fact, that initiation had been borrowed from the Babira, who live upstream from the Wagenia. Another feature which the stories had in common was the constant variation on the theme, found elsewhere as well, that the first owners of initiation had been women, and not men (cf. Sierksma 1962, Weidkuhn 1973). So it was told how the women and girls were fishing or washing at the riverside when they noticed an empty canoe drifting along with the current, which finally caught against the bank. It contained a knife, and according to others medicinal preparations for treating wounds and a set of directions for use in pictorial form as well. Even the so-called 'initiation animals' —i.e., musical instruments producing animal sounds — were found in it. Allegedly the coming of the canoe had been predicted by the ancestors. According to some it came from Obiatuku, the territory of origin of the Bina Nsoko section of the Wagenia tribe. Whenever the ancestors were asked anything in connection with initiation, it was customary for the name of the place where the initiation objects had been found b y the women according to this tradition to be mentioned first of all. This was one of the rare instances of a reference to the ancestors in connection with the

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origin of initiation. It was evidently difficult to relate common institutions to the ancestors in such a segmented society, as no ancestors of the tribe as a whole were known. It was said, however, that initiation had been bestowed by Ntende, the seniormost ancestor of Bina Nsoko, upon his descendants before the great migration to the present place of abode. Bina Nkulu and Bakonga, the other two migration groups, sometimes also claimed descent from Ntende. Because the initiation objects were found by the women, they were the first to conduct the ritual, so the stories inform us. After a night's vigil, three girls were adorned. They then performed a dance on the roof of a house, after which they were borne to the river, where their clitoris was removed with the knife in the canoe. But alas, the girls died immediately after undergoing the operation. Then the men in their turn took three boys and circumcised them. These guinea-pigs survived the operation. They remained secluded in a specially constructed camp in the bush for a year in order to recover and gain strength. When they re-emerged from this they had grown beyond recognition. According to one informant, the men did not take three boys, but one sick little boy suffering from smallpox, who was believed to be incurably ill. It would have made little difference whether he died as a result of smallpox or circumcision. However, he survived the operation and was moreover cured of his disease. Thus the idea that sickly little boys should be circumcised in order to cure them was confirmed. After this success initiation became a male affair, according to the informants. Allegedly the division of rites between the sexes, whereby either the men or the women gained the exclusive right to specific rites, also dated from this time. With the exception of initiation, all the rites concerned were healing rites. They were no longer performed at the time of my research. According to one version of the story, which differed from those above in a number of details, there were two women in the canoe as well. The names of these women were not without significance. So one was called Kabea, meaning 'shouting', 'calling'. She drew the attention of the women on the bank with her shouts. The name of the other was Tshoo. This was not only a usual Wagenia woman's name, but also the word for initiation. This particular version differed from

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the others on another point as well. For it mentioned the women on the bank as belonging to Bina Nsilonga and Bakonga, the groups living furthest upstream (cf. Fig. 10, p. 39). One informant gave an altogether different explanation. According to him the idea of circumcision had been taken from the apes, which have no foreskin, so he asserted. He said he had heard this from the Bakomo, a large neighbouring tribe of the Wagenia. Moeller (1936:299) also mentions this Bakomo explanation. Some Bakomo living in a village in the vicinity of Kisangani, when asked whether they were familiar with this account, answered in the negative. They claimed that circumcision had come to be practised after it had been observed that the foreskin of some little boys retracted, or even seemed to disappear,during sleep. This idea was found among the Wagenia as well. The latter did not look for an explanation of the origin of circumcision here, however. They believed that the ancestral spirits might come to circumcise little boys at night. The informants mentioned various concrete examples of this. Sometimes blood or nail marks would be found on the victim's penis in the morning, they said. So the Wagenia never let an uncircumcised boy sleep alone. They thought us reckless in allowing our son to do so. According to De Mahieu (1975:119, 120), the Bakomo claim to have taken the idea of circumcision from the squirrel, which bit apes in the relevant place whenever they passed overhead on a branch under which it was hiding. In one Babira village a little way upstream from the Wagenia the story of the canoe that was washed ashore was also told. While the Wagenia attributed initiation to the Babira, the latter stated themselves to have borrowed it from the Wagenia after it had become a male custom there. Their story deviated from the various Wagenia versions in that the canoe contained no knife, but a sharp blade of grass which could be used for circumcising. The Wagenia sometimes used this same blade if the foreskin would not come away from the glans. In that case it was inserted between the foreskin and the glans before the boy concerned went to sleep at night. As Dr. J. F. Carrington informed me, he had been told by the Lokele, who live downstream from the Wagenia, how they had once offered the latter an initiation ritual. On that occasion they had tricked the Wagenia into believing that a sharp fishbone had to be jabbed into the boys' ears until blood was drawn. After the

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Wagenia, believing this, adopted the practice, a few boys had died of their wounds. The Wagenia then discovered that they had been taken in. Needless to say, my Wagenia informants vehemently denied this story. I would not, like my informants, wish to regard the story of the canoe that was washed ashore and the origin of the male monopoly of initiation as historical. It says more about certain customs practised at present than about the genesis of these customs in the past. It was used to justify particular existing practices. The sole historical conclusion one may perhaps draw is that initiation came from upstream. But even this may be an unreliable piece of data, namely, if it is no more than a variation on the theme of upstream coming before downstream. Just as all other Wagenia, those of Kisangani are certain to have been subject to considerable influencing from surrounding tribes, including the Babira, in the same way that they themselves must have influenced others. In any case, there were a number of similarities, as well as differences, to be observed between Wagenia initiation and initiation among the neighbouring tribes. In most cases the so-called initiation animals were known here, too, and circumcision was likewise linked to initiation. Similarities were moreover discovered in the terms for the different categories of novices. The distinctive features of Wagenia initiation were the custom whereby the initiation was held by the entire tribe at the same time, the long interval between initiations, and the orientation to the river. Let us now turn our attention to the interpretation of the story as an instantaneous exposure of present practices rather than a motion picture of actual events in the past. The male monopoly of initiation was justified by appealing to the failure of female initiation. It seemed as though women had forfeited the right to concern themselves with initiation for good, even if it left male initiation intact. They were not even supposed to know anything about it. Because the women had had their own healing rites assigned to them, they had no business to interfere in the men's rites. It would be dangerous for them to have anything to do with the initiation secrets, moreover. Some women said that there was, in fact, little or no talk about initiation among the women. They believed they might fall ill, or no longer be able to bear or suckle children as a result of discussing such matters. Anaemia was called 'the initiation disease' by the Wagenia,

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and was ascribed to the discussion of initiation without permission. This polarity between men and women was slightly more accentuated in some versions than in other. One of them mentioned a quarrel between the men and women about the question as to who should, in fact, be the owner of initiation. According to another informant, the girls undergoing the clitoris operation shouted a Lokele word meaning 'the women's tshebanda' the moment the knife touched them. The men for their part allegedly had their guineapigs call out 'men's tshebanda' during circumcision. In 1970 those undergoing circumcision called mostly the by-name of the village to which they belonged. From a genealogical viewpoint an all-female or all-male tshebanda is an impossibility, unless one would wish to speculate, in accordance with nineteenth-century tradition, about an earlier matriarchy. This motif seems to me rather an expression of rivalry between the sexes. Men have of old been dominant, and women subservient to the former's interests. Initiation was discovered and tried out by the women, and then surrendered by them to the men. In the same way, women were the means whereby the kin group of the male was assured of progeny. And likewise, women made up the unknowing b u t admiring audience which graced the men's games with its presence (cf. Van Baal 1970:31). The fact that the women knew everything from A to Z does nothing to alter this. It might even be viewed as a reflection of the circumstance that women feigning ignorance were not necessarily ignorant in reality.

THE COMMENCEMENT OF INITIATION

The stories of the origin of initiation also served to justify the right of the villages furthest upstream to start the initiation. After all, initiation came from upstream, or, what is more, was discovered by the women of Bina Nsilonga and Bakonga. It is doubtful whether this custom has always been in force, however, since in the not-toodistant past all the Wagenia of Kisangani lived together on the two islands indicated by Stanley on his map (Fig, 4, p. 30) as the place of residence of Wana Sironga and Wana Mikunga, that is, Bina Nsilonga and Bakonga. The right to start the initiation did not involve that the same group also took the initiative towards initiation. In precolonial times

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usually a secret meeting of village heads was called for the purpose of making a number of practical arrangements for a coming initiation ritual. This meeting might possibly, but need not necessarily, be convened by the two above-mentioned villages. In colonial times the initiative for such a meeting was usually taken by the Belgianappointed chief of all the Wagenia of Kisangani, although this did not exclude the possibility of others taking the relevant steps. Formerly the average interval between initiations used to be approximately seven years, and later approximately ten years. So as a rule the question of whether the time was right for another initiation ceremony presented no problems. Also of importance was the season. In the old days, when school holidays did not have to be taken into account, invariably the beginning of the Soku season (cf. Fig. 3, p. 28) was chosen for the first initiation ceremony. The reason for this was that in this season, when the water-level was at its lowest, the most fish were caught. This assured one of sufficient means to be able to provide food and drink at the various festivities, to pay all the additional expenses, and, last but not least, to feed the novices well in camp. To make the novices big and strong was one important goal the Wagenia set themselves with their initiation, as we will see further down. The most spectacular result that could be achieved was for sons to have become unrecognizable to their mothers after initiation. The end of initiation also used to coincide with the beginning of the Soku season, a full year later, likewise because there was fish aplenty then on which to give the newly initiated one last extra feed before leaving camp. According to one initiation song, initiation commenced after the first sighting of the Moembe bird. The latter is a black bird not unlike the white oxpecker in appearance. It is to be seen especially at the beginning of the Soku season. 'Moembe soars, Moembe swoops. Only Moembe at the dance, at the feast.' So, although it seemed clear enough approximately when the initiation should start, its exact commencement was even so meant to come as a total surprise to the novices. In one of the initiation songs, initiation was compared to a green snake, Mokalabvongo, which moves along in a zigzag line, to pounce on its prey suddenly from a tree. 'Mokalabvongo zigzags, Mokalabvongo is overhead, he descends,

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Mokalabvongo, oh my father, oh my mother, oh Mokalabvongo.' This text was also interpreted by my informants as applying to the period in camp. During that time the novice was subjected to certain trials in connection with the treatment of his wound, and would then call out for his father or mother. The symbolism was open to more than one interpretation. The meeting at which arrangements were made for the commencement of the initiation was secret partly for this reason. During this phase of the preparations the talking drum was never used. As soon as the first novices had been seized and circumcised by surprise, however, the drum was beaten to announce this fact to the other Wagenia. The usual procedure was for Bina Nsilonga to circumcise the first group of novices, and Bakonga on the opposite bank the next group. The remaining villages would then have their turn on the same or the following day, beginning with those on the right bank and followed by those on the left bank. The zigzagging movements of the snake Mokalabvongo may also relate to this particular order, as would seem to me. After this description of the more or less ideally typical commencement of initiation, I will now examine how the initiation ritual of 1970 actually began. There was some confusion at that time, as a result of which the ceremony did not start exactly in accordance with the above-described schedule, though none the less unexpectedly for all that. The previous years there had been constant rumours circulating that the ritual would commence. At the beginning of 1969 it seemed practically certain to, as the President of Zaire, Mobutu, was scheduled to pay a visit to Kisangani, and so also to the Wagenia, then. It was rumoured that a kind of demonstration would be given of circumcision and initiation on that occasion. This manifestation would at the same time mark the beginning of the actual initiation. It did not come off, however, any more than the initiation. Some parents had their uncircumcised sons circumcised in hospitals or dispensaires, or by the Wagenia circumciser, in the apparent conviction that the initiation would not take place for the time being, or perhaps ever. There were several more or less plausible reasons for the delay which one may mention. In the first place it was believed that the ritual of 1956 might have been the last one. The fact that its duration

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had been reduced for the benefit of novices attending school was open to interpretation as a sign of the beginning of the end. The right time for another initiation had already come in 1966, in view of the length of the previous interval. The longer its commencement was put off, the stronger a presentiment people began to have that initiation had gone the way of most other rituals and had become a thing of the past. When a start was made in 1970 after all, this came as a surprise to many. A second reason I may mention in explanation of the long delay in starting the initiation relates to the political system of the Wagenia. As we saw in Chapter 1, there was no central authority. Admittedly the Belgian-appointed chief functioned as apex of the hierarchy for the last decades of the colonial period, but he was anything but an influential figure, although he could take certain initiatives to get the ritual underway. For the whole of the period when the initiation ought to have taken place, except for a brief interval in the years 1968-1969, the Wagenia belonged to a 'commune' of the town of Kisangani. This had given a new impulse to the non-hierarchical character of Wagenia society. The situation did not change in the brief interval in which the old chefferie was re-established. The chief then in function cannot be said to have made up for what he lacked in institutional authority by his personality. Although he assured me again and again that the initiation would begin, nothing happened. Quite possibly his position was a delicate one, since, as time was to show, the definitive re-establishment of the chefferie was far from certain. That is why he kept as quiet as possible vis-à-vis the authorities, whom he would have had to ask permission to hold another initiation. So one might say that no one took the initiative because no one was supposed to take charge. This made the chances that another initiation would ever be held even slimmer. In the third place there were circumstances of a more temporary nature contributing to the postponement of the ritual. As a result of the military operations which Kisangani and the far surroundings had had to put up with from 1964 onward, the necessary peace for an initiation was lacking. Since the conflicts had culminated in a violent explosion in the summer of 1966, as in that of 1964, the expectation arose that more 'hot' summers would follow the next years. This expectation was confirmed by the rebellion of white mercenaries in Kisangani against the central Government in 1967.

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The Wagenia were not prepared at a time when hositilities seemed likely to break out to run the risk of having most of the boys isolated in camps which they were not really supposed to leave. Moreover, so some of them argued, the boys had weakened considerably after the 1964 rebellion, when people had fled into the bush en masse, as a result of which they were in no condition to undergo an initiation. Another factor of a temporary nature was the disturbance of the cycle of the water-levels of the river referred to in the preceding chapter. A few of the grounds normally used for the constuction of initiation camps had become submerged. Especially on densely populated Kisangani island alternative grounds were difficult to find. A transfer to the mainland presented practical problems. In addition, less fish was being caught because of the relatively high water-levels, so that there were fears that it would be impossible to meet the extra expenses entailed by an initiation. In the old days there had been examples of initiations being held at times of extraordinarily high water-levels nevertheless. In conclusion, the informants mentioned a number of reasons which can scarcely have been decisive, but which may even so have exercised some influence. So allegedly a shortage of cash funds had been seized on as an excuse to put the idea of an initiation temporarily aside. The yields from fishing had been mediocre, there was unemployment in town, and an arrears of wages had occurred. Another reason that was sometimes put forward was that there had always been people eager to effect a postponement of old, in order to give their sons a little more time to grow, so that they might do well at the wrestling matches and the necessary training for this in camp. There was disagreement on this point among the informants, however. In fact, the view that a boy should ideally be initiated at as early as possible an age was equally prevalent. This was based on the belief that initiation more or less boosted the growth of the smallest novices, as a result of which they would be relatively bigger and stronger than the biggest of the current novices when they reached the same age. Hence the relatives of smaller novices might just as likely have adopted the opposite viewpoint by urging for an early initiation. There was yet a third possible standpoint, which desired the youngest novices to keep away altogether so that they would be among the biggest and most dominant novices at the next initiation. It is open to question whether this latter viewpoint had

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any real effect on the postponement of the initiation, and whether it carried any weight at a time when the vitality of initiation itself was waning. It has been suggested that our presence was a factor in the postponement of the initiation. The Wagenia, however, were used to foreigners taking an interest in their doings. Had they wished to, they would have been quite capable of keeping foreigners at bay anyway. No more should the fact that the ritual was eventually held after all be attributed to the interest we showed, as though the Wagenia would have wished to do us a favour by still holding it. I had scarcely any contact with Bakonga, which in the end assumed the role of catalyst, and it is doubtful whether the latter were even aware of my interest in initiation. For all these various, more or less weighty reasons, initiation was very nearly postponed again, eventually to be cancelled for good, in 1970. This was prevented by the action of two Bakonga village heads. They heard in March 1970 that there had been discussions in Bina Nsilonga about holding the initiation, but that a deferment had been urged in connection with the school holidays and the necessary Government permission. They themselves did not wish to wait for this, however, and asked the mayor of the commune in whose district they resided whether he would give his permission for the initiation. He did so, in effect, because, as he later told me, Africans should be proud of their tradition. Bakonga thus began with the circumcision and isolation of the first novices on 29th March, 1970, that is, Easter Sunday. The other villages on the left bank followed suit the same day. The right bank followed on Easter Monday, beginning with Bina Nsilonga and continuing downstream from there. That the decisive step was finally taken by Bakonga should come as no surprise, since it was the most conservative Wagenia group. They lived furthest from the city. Moreover, they had the fewest children attending school, as there was no school in the Wagenia villages on the left bank. Lastly, they were seen in the course of the initiation itself to observe the various initiation customs slightly more scrupulously than the other Wagenia. Some Wagenia expressed disapproval at Bakonga's audacity in forestalling Bina Nsilonga by making the first move for the first time in living memory. Others appealed to the story of origin, however, according to which initiation had originally come from upstream

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and the women and girls of Bakonga had had a share in its discovery. Why shouldn't Bakonga have the right to begin, in that case? In reality the rivalry between the Wagenia on the two opposite river banks, which came into play at wrestling matches, was thus extended to initiation. The songs sung during the circumcision ceremonies contained frequent allusions to this unprecedented procedure. A familiar theme was seized on here. For songs were sung repeatedly about the rivalry between the two opposite banks in connection with wrestling matches. Bakonga would sing: 'Bakonga has opened the door, Bakonga has opened the initiation, the Wagenia were incapable of opening the door.' The right bank would retort with: 'Bakonga stinks of chikwang (i.e., manioc bread, a traditional food), when wrestling they throw themselves over, because they take hold of their own belt.' Bakonga: 'Lesali is light, because its people eat only rice' (rice being a modern food). 'Bina Nkulu is afraid of initiation. Bakonga will give everything it's got.' BinaNsilonga: 'We of BinaNsilonga once took pride in cutting off people's heads. Now it's all up with us. How sad. We of Bina Nsilonga once used to start with the first Wagenia novices. Now it's all up with us. Oh, woe to us.' Bakonga: Who started? Bakonga started. Bakonga, let us rejoice at initiation.' This latter was a variation on two locally wellknown texts, viz. 'Who started? Lumumba started. Mobutu is taking over. Congo will fare well.' And 'Who started? The Diabos started. The A. N. C. came, and the Diabos were beaten.' ('Diabos' was a nickname for the rebelling Katangese gendarmes who were defeated by the Congolese National Army, or Armée Nationale Congolaise, in 1966.) The Wagenia were to remain under the spell of initiation for a whole five months. In the villages a mood of pleasurable excitement and tense expectancy immediately prevailed. It was quite striking how a festivity of this kind, which seemed almost to be dying a slow death, was celebrated with so much verve that people's lives seemed to depend on it once it finally did flare up. While there had been doubts as to whether another initiation would ever be held again at all, the majority of the people appeared to regard it all as the most normal

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thing in the world once the celebrations started. This was all the more amazing as the last initiation had been held fourteen years previously. Only after the commencement of initiation did the representatives of all the kin groups involved get together in order to decide on a fixed sum for the maximum expenditure on initiation. The fact that this meeting was not held until after the start of the festivities, when a meeting had become inevitable, typified the situation. Previous efforts to hold a meeting to take the initiative towards initiation had failed.

THE INTERVAL BETWEEN INITIATIONS

Hautefelt, writing in 1923 about the initiation of 1913-1914, said that the Wagenia held an initiation every seven years. In the course of the present century this interval has become increasingly long, however. Although it was impossible to date every initiation, I have tried to place every initiation that was known to my informants. Each initiation had its own name, which was used for the group of all those initiated at that time as well. The earliest known initiations were allegedly named after the smallest novices, viz. Kembeli, Yawale and Longmbende. According to other informants these were the names of the biggest novices, who used to steal away from camp in order to pay visits to girls. The dates of these are vague. Allegedly the three chiefs slain by the Arabs in 1886 belonged to the Yawale group. The next initiation after Longmbende was called Tukutuku, after the first Western boat ever to be seen by the Wagenia. Carrington (1947:198) also mentions this initiation name for the Lokele, and dated it 'circa 1888?'. This was followed by the initiation called Nsobe na Ngela, 'iron and brass', materials allegedly imported on a large scale by the Arabs. During the next initiation, called Mbaluku (the name of the smallest novice), the chief of the Arabisés, Said ben Sabiti, died. According to De Thier (n.d.:59) this was in 1899. Of none of the initiations mentioned so far were there any persons initiated at that time still alive at the time of my research. The quality of the information on these initiations was dubious. So there was one instance of a telescopic effect, whereby an informant said that Nsobe na Ngela and Mbaluku were one and the same initiation.

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My oldest informants belonged to the Malaya group. According to them the name was derived from particular articles of value which were reportedly introduced as anew form of currency by the Arabs. Carrington (1947:198) spells the word 'bolaya' and defines it as meaning 'European axe-heads used for currency', which seems more probable in view of the date of this initiation. Olaya is the name for Europe. Carrington dates this initiation in 1900 for the Lokele. Among the Wagenia, however, it probably took place later, in view of the date of Mbaluku. Malaya was followed by M'falanga, a corrupt form of 'franc' with the meaning 'currency' — it was at this time, according to Carrington in 1910, that European currency was introduced. The word probably refers to Belgian currency. The administration of Congo was taken over by the Belgian State in 1908. Coins had been minted here as early as the time of the Free State, but that was too long ago for the M'falanga initiation to be dated by it. The initiation observed by Hautefelt (1923) took place in 1913 and 1914.1 have an idea that this was the M'falanga one, as the next initiation group was called Aloma, a corrupt form of 'Allemands', in connection with World War I. Of course the initiation of 1913 and 1914 may have been that of Aloma, but in that case there would have been four initiations in the space of fifteen years, while the next one after that, Mangele, was not held until 1926. The latter name refers to the cigarettes introduced at that time. The Lokele initiation of 1924 was called Bengele (Carrington 1947:198). Thanks to Dr. Carrington, we are able to date the Wagenia Mangele initiation in 1926, however. As it happens, he possessed a Baptist parish newspaper, Mboli ya Tengai, from that time, the June number of which contains reports of unrest in the Wagenia parish in connection with an initiation. The Mangele initiation was seized on as an occasion for an attack on initiation by the Baptist missionaries. The sons of church members were removed from the camps. It was allegedly because of this that the remaining novices had to remain in camp twice as long as usual (i.e., two years). After Mangele came Bangele, named after the English or 'Anglais', who undertook an expedition through the then Belgian Congo in the 1930's, in the course of which they also visited the Wagenia. The next initiation after that was called Saio, after the place in Ethiopia where Congolese troops scored their principal victory, namely over

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the Italians, in World War II (3rd July, 1941, Martelli 1962: 200; Schipper 1970:52). These troops are said to have come to the Wagenia waterfalls in order to clean their equipment after their repatriation in the second half of 1944 (Schipper 1970:63). The Saio initiation was probably held in 1945 and 1946. It was then another ten years before the next initiation took place, namely the Baudouin initiation, held from June to December, 1956. It was named after the King of Belgium, who visited Congo in 1955. The initiation of 1970, which forms the special subject of the present book, was called Mobutu, after the President of Zaire. Drawing up a list of the dates established above, the following picture emerges: 1888 (?), 1893-1894 (?), 1899,1905-1906 (?), 19131914, 1919 (?), 1 9 2 6 , 1 9 3 5 (?), 1945-1946,1956,1970. This shows that the interval was originally five to seven years, but later increased to ten or even fourteen years. There are two questions which need to be settled in this connection. In the first place, I will need to give an explanation for the former interval, and in the second place I shall have to trace the causes of the increasing length of this interval. These are by no means easy questions to answer, as the counter-question of one informant hints, viz. 'Why weren't you born a black man?' I shall even so make an attempt to indicate the causes and effects of this phenomenon. This will not be possible without at least some speculation, and even then the result will not be very satisfactory. The interval of approximately seven years was justified by the majority of my informants by reference to the wrestling matches for which the boys were trained in camp. These took place between members of the same initiation group, who moreover belonged to the same grade within that group. The informants argued that a long span of time between initiations was necessary in order to have enough boys to man the different grades. These grades were differentiated according to age, length and strength of the wrestlers. If the interval were too short, then there would not be enough wrestlers. It was pointed out in this connection that an initiation usually announced itself by a growing popularity of wrestling. Then the time seemed ripe to officially admit a new group of wrestlers to the matches. Initiation seeded this development. This way of arguing explained the continued occurrence of the long interval. It said little about its origin, however, turning this into

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a chicken-or-egg problem. One might equally well imagine the requirement to adapt to the system of wrestling grades to have been met by arranging as frequent a cycle of initiations as there were number of grades. For if only boys of the same age could be set against each other, what was the point in trying to initiate boys of widely varying ages at the same time? It would seem not improbable that, on the contrary, the number o f grades increased with the increasing length of the interval. I shall comeback to this in Chapter 8, where the number of grades will be reduced to three. Another reason for the long interval may have been the elaborateness of Wagenia initiation. Neither time nor money was spared to make it a success. Normal life was partly brought to a standstill because of it. There was no indication, incidentally, that the Wagenia themselves argued this way and sought to postpone the ritual for this reason, although the informants were prepared to admit the logic o f this consideration. A third reason for the interval o f seven years or longer may have been that the Wagenia, all segmentation notwithstanding, were loth to follow the example of neighbouring tribes, which tended to hold initiations per kin group as soon as there were a sufficient number of candidates (e.g., among the Walengola, not more than ten). The Wagenia tribe was so small, especially in olden times, before the population explosion, that it was certainly no trouble for the different groups to wait for each other. The above three reasons relate more specifically to the first of the two questions raised above. By way of answer to the second question I wish to make the following observations. It is not improbable that the Baptist Mission's opposition to initiation has undermined its matter-of-course character. These missionaries were more successful among the Lokele, incidentally, the last initiation here (of a different kind from that among the Wagenia) being held in 1926. Among the Wagenia the Baptist Church only stopped taking disciplinary measures against members who had taken part in initiation in 1970. Such measures had been taken by it on the occasion of every previous initiation, however. It had further become customary for the civil administration to be approached for its permission prior to the commencement of an initiation. This hesitancy was reinforced by the above-mentioned irresolu-

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tion inherent in a society that lacks a central authority. Initiation kept being postponed, as it were, until it became inevitable. The circumstance that in 1970 some of the novices were married was described by a number of informants as abnormal — a sign that in former times things had not been allowed to get out of hand to this extent. The lack of strict regulation of initiation, which left sufficient margin for variation and improvization, supposedly also encouraged this course of affairs. If a fixed term had been set for this, postponement would have been more difficult. The above-discussed views according to which initiation at an early age stimulated a boy's growth and a delay strengthened the ranks of top-grade wrestlers (who were the most important) may also have exercised some influence on the increasing length of the interval in connection with the increasing differences in age between the novices. A reason why the boys had not grown as rapidly the past few decades which was put forward by some informants was "because they had started wearing Western clothes'. Allegedly the boys had been insufficiently strong to be initiated because of this. I am inclined to view this as an instance of retrospective rationalization rather than a genuine reason. The reverse of the increasing length of the interval has been, needless to say, a growing divergence in the novices' ages. The novices were by no means exclusively of the age of puberty. The difference in age was even bigger than the length of the interval, because there were both families keen to initiate their boys when very young because of the 'boost' to their growth, and families who kept very young boys away so as to be able to supply the biggest novices at the next initiation, or in order to avoid having to pay the extra expenses. At the 1970 initiation the latter two arguments were probably less cogent, since the chances seemed very high that this would be the last initiation. Be that as it may, the ages in 1970 varied from five to approximately twenty. The increased interval enhanced the possibility that a father and his son might belong to two successive initiation groups. As a result of the increased variation in the ages of the novices, we should pause to ask whether there was actually still question of initiation as an accompaniment of a change or transition. It is impossible to believe that initiation had the same meaning for all of these

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novices. The ironical situation is arising whereby, assuming that we are dealing with a 'rite de passage', we have to watch carefully for any elements indicative of a transition. It is not unlikely that, since initiation had become such a rare phenomenon among the Wagenia, in contrast with former times, it no longer answered its original purpose, namely the accompaniment of the transition of the individual from childhood to manhood. This function was probably fulfilled in some other way. For many novices the initiation came too late, just as for the youngest it probably came too early. For the oldest among them the initiation seemed to be no more than an occasion to put the finishing touches to something that was already an accomplished fact, or to formally confirm a transition that had actually already taken place. As regards the youngest novices, on the other hand, they seemed to be initiated 'on credit'. Initiation had become a survival. My first assistants had been initiated at the age of six to seven. They proved unable to give absolutely reliable information on initiation, because there were too many things they were mixing up or had failed to understand at the time. For this type of novice the next initiation was a kind of revision, whereby many memories fell into place. In the Wagenia case the difference between social and physical age assumed such absurd proportions as to render the use of these terms in the present context pointless. An initiated boy of five would in that case be the social senior of a boy of 19 whose parents had stopped him from going to the initiation camp for religious reasons. A comparison of initiated boys with abstainers may possibly tell us something about the significance of this difference, as well as about the effect of initiation on those initiated. I shall come back to this at the end of Chapter 6. THE GROUP OF FUTURE NOVICES

It will be possible to go into some of the questions raised above at this point, where I will be discussing the group of novices prior to their initiation. The principal question here concerns their position vis-à-vis the women and girls and vis-à-vis the men's group. I shall subsequently investigate how these boys prepared themselves for their initiation.

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With the w o m e n and girls, they belonged to the social category of the non-initiated, from w h o m the secrets of initiation were carefully concealed. Only infants and senile old w o m e n were allowed to enter novice camps, because they were unable to tell what they had seen there anyway. Non-initiated persons were forbidden to watch circumcision from close by. Whenever one of the so-called initiation animals appeared in the village, only initiated persons were allowed to go out into the street. When initiation matters were being discussed b y the men, no one else was supposed to be present. If any outsider approached, he or she would be shooed away, or the conversation would abruptly stop. The meeting about the commencement of initiation was preferably held at the wide river-beach, so that all other persons could be kept at a distance. Most of the interviews held b y me were witnessed b y an inquisitive y o u t h f u l audience at the doors and windows, which was invariably sent packing as soon as the conversation turned to initiation, however. Only initiated persons were permitted to use the strong term katuba, a special initiation term whose primary meaning denoted the banana tree-trunk on which the newly initiated was made to sit in camp. If an uninitiated person were to use this word — which, on the other hand, he was allowed to hear — t h e n immediate steps were taken against him. If he was a boy, he w o u l d be initiated forthwith and isolated in a small one-man camp. His relatives would have to provide all Wagenia with f o o d and drink as a penalty. If the offender was a woman, in the old days she would be severely punished, or even put to death. One informant told the following story: 'Otakali, the mother of Monana, w h o came from Bina Kalingili, was in court before Chief L o w a o . The Chief said, "Otakali, y o u go back to y o u r husband, w h o m y o u have deserted". T h e w o m a n replied, " I will not go back, katuba". The Chief summoned Isankali to beat the talking drum. All the Wagenia proceeded to Bina Nsilonga, over there on that hill (a usual assembling place). There Otakali's husband t o o k a lance and said, " I want to kill someone, because I w o n ' t live m u c h longer". His relatives have been pursued b y death. Batshomba is dead, Monana is dead, A b v u t a i s dead, her child is dead.... If there had been no whites here, the woman would have been thrown into the river and drowned.' My referring to the non-initiated as a social category implies that

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I will have to differentiate between the members of this category. In this connection I will give a number of examples of the way in which non-initiated boys were clearly distinguished as a group from the women and girls. There was moreover sometimes question of such boys taking part in men's activities. I will begin with the latter. In a number of instances there was anticipation of the fact that the boys would belong to the men's group one day. In the old days there used to be roof shelters in every village, where no women were allowed to come. Non-initiated boys did have admittance to these, although they were only allowed to sit on the ground and listen, and not to join in the conversation. Participation in wrestling matches was only allowed to initiated boys, but this did not exclude the possibility of non-initiated boys organizing regular informal matches of their own, mostly under the supervision of an adult, by way of exercise. In olden times a ball-game whereby the ball was not supposed to touch the ground was played. The teams for this were made up of members of the same initiation group. Non-initiated boys were allowed to play their own match, however. In regattas officially only initiated boys and men were permitted to take part. In practice older non-initiated youths also appeared to participate, however, provided they were strong enough to help their team score a victory. In Bakonga it was still customary in 1970 for novices to be divided over a number of small camps located in the village (tolange) after their stay in the big camp. Here their uninitiated younger brothers could come and go freely, contrary to what was the practice in the big camp, and as opposed to the women, who had no access here, either. In conclusion, sons were supposed to work for and with their fathers. They performed all kinds of services especially in fishing, at least, if they had attained the required physical condition. An uninitiated boy of 19 said, 'I don't help my mother any more, because I'm not a girl'. A case apart was that of the healing rite itoo, to which strictly only men who had fathered a child were admitted. There was a variation on this called mabvela, to be admitted to which a man had to have two children, one of either sex. This was unconnected with whether or not a man had been initiated. Uninitiated men also had the right of entry, provided they met the conditions. This deviation from the normal pattern may possibly have had something to do with the dominant role of the Babira in this rite, because they possessed the necessary technical knowledge and ritual

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objects. Hence the above was probably a Babira rather than a Wagenia custom. I shall now go into the question of in what way the boys differed from the other persons in the category of the non-initiated, namely the women and girls. This brings us back to the ideas of Whiting et al. and Bettelheim discussed in the Introduction (p. 22). They explained circumcision and initiation as stemming from an identification with the feminine principle, or from envy of female sex characteristics or biological functions. Looking first at children's games, we see how boys and girls might play together until the age of about ten. What strikes one here is that the boys played male roles in these games. So they might construct the framework for a 20-30 centimetres' high toy house, which the girls would thereupon finish by filling in the walls with clay. These boys and girls were imitating their fathers and mothers here. Especially popular with children of this age was the game of fathers and mothers. Boys and girls of this age also bathed together, and displayed a certain rivalry in splashing each other. In another game the boys, now playing the part of cops, would chase the girls as robbers. When the girls danced the boys would not join in, but would act the male part of drummer. Some boys' games clearly anticipated the male roles they would fulfil later. So they would build miniature fish-traps close to the river bank or, after rain, in small channels. They would sometimes move pieces of wood, bearing the names of actually existing canoes, along the ground, in imitation of a regatta. I have also seen them make small dolls of lianas, which they then put in a wrestling position. They would beat these with a stick to see which of the two would be floored. There were further such games as marbles, or soccer with clay players and a red berry for a ball. Real soccer was also very popular. There were moreover recurrent rages for building car models from wire or cardboard boxes. From about the age of ten boys might possess their own casting-net, which they would fish with from the river bank or a canoe. In this they differed from the girls, who usually fished with jute bags. Boys had little knowledge of specific girls' games. I asked a number of non-initiated boys whom they preferred, their father or their mother. The answers varied widely. Twelve stated themselves to like their mother better, because she prepared their

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food or gave them pocket-money, and also because, after all, one owes the gift of life to her. Fourteen others gave preference to their father, however, mostly for financial reasons. Twelve boys stated themselves to have no clear preference. To the question put to well over 20 uninitiated boys as to whether they would prefer tobe a girl if there were any real possibility of their becoming one, a predominantly negative reply was given (see p. 52). Boys also acted as a separate group from the women and girls. On two occasions at a nocturnal feast I noticed a number of boys of about six to ten suddenly materializing from the surrounding darkness decked out in branches and rags. They began to dance around the women, who were dancing in a circle, moving in the opposite direction and making grotesque gestures and grimaces, as in parody of the women's dance. Boys over the age of ten can be said to play progressively less with girls, but to seek contact with them in other ways. The first courtships and amorous encounters, of which some boasted loudly, took place at this age. Boys were aware of the significance of their sex long before this. They understood the purpose of sex differences perfectly well, and showed themselves to be completely familiar with their future role. Once two novices of five and seven gave a demonstration of the sex act which revealed a thorough knowledge. On another occasion a little boy of three cried out, on beholding the curves of a toy swan belonging to our son, 'Look, it's pregnant'. The fact that the 1970 initiation had little to do with the assumption of the male sex role, for the bigger novices, at any rate, was also evident from the number of married candidates for initiation. The situation was such, meanwhile, that a marriage of an uninitiated youth was not always appreciated. The usual argument was that the husband's absence during the camp period would put his wife's fidelity to too severe a test. She would risk becoming the target of the usual jokes and taunts. While some girls stated themselves to be unprepared to marry an uninitiated youth, 'as someone like that is still a child', others had no objection to this at all. In former times, when the interval was shorter, there were almost definitely never any married novices. The above picture is even so in need of some slight modification. Boys were free to go around naked, if they wished, as though their sex did not matter, up to the age of about seven. In the old days this

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used to apply to all non-initiated boys, excluding the biggest. Probably school has changed this. In addition, of course, little boys were extremely dependent on their mothers, if only for sheer survival, for the first years of their life. This was already apparent from the fact that mothers and sons slept together. People justified the latter practice by appealing to the fear of circumcision by spirits, that is, taking the children's maleness into consideration, in fact. A daily recurring scene was that of children running to meet their mother coming home from market, to see what she had brought them. Children also often accompanied their mother as long as they were too young to venture out by themselves. It would be incorrect, however, to make it seem as though the father was totally irrelevant, or only gradually took the place of the mother. In most cases children had dealings with both parents from the beginning. Returning to Bettelheim and Whiting et al. for a while, I feel quite confident in saying that I have never noticed any signs of envy at the female role on the part of boys, or of the development of an identification with the female principle. I furthermore came up against the problem of the novices' ages being so widely divergent that the conflict which these authors assumed to exist would have been solved by some means other than initiation anyway. Boys were conscious of the role of their own sex at an early age and independently of initiation, at least in its present form. There is nonetheless a grain of truth in the notion that men sometimes behave as women, and vice versa. In the case of the Wagenia one is able to quote concrete examples of this. As regards the women, however, I would like to put forward the dominance, and hence greater prestige, of the male role as an explanation. Moreover, the women were not always able to resist the temptation of making the men look ridiculous. Any instances of men acting like women stemmed from the same inclination, in my opinion. There is besides an element of independence vis-à-vis the women discernable in this. But this is anticipating the instances which will be mentioned further down in the description of initiation itself. All I would like to observe in addition here is that of the seven women and girls questioned accordingly by Miss Meijers, one of the Amsterdam students taking part in the project, four would prefer to be a boy or man. Six of the seven were interested in par-

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ticipating in an initiation for girls if this existed. Other aspects of the reversal of roles will be discussed below. The boys' relation to their maternal kin has already been touched on in the preceding chapter (p. 44). I will come back to it again and again in the further course of my description. It is impossible to generalize about the relationship of the novices-to-be with their maternal relatives. Some boys never visited the latter, while others did so regularly, either with or without their mothers. It should no more be supposed that mother's relatives dominated a boy's life initially, to give place to the patrilineal kin of their sister's son later, either after initiation or at some other time, than that father only became important for the boy later on in life or after initiation. This does nothing to alter the fact, however, that there were some boys who for one reason or another were living in the village of their maternal relatives. Nor did mother's relatives cease to exist as soon as it became clear that the patrilineal kin group constituted the boy's ultimate destination. This latter was already a foregone conclusion at the birth of the boy as the son of a man belonging to a particular kin group, with which he would coreside, anyway. What is more, the prospect of being initiated one day put him on the men's side, in particular those of his own patrilineal kin group, from the beginning. In the passages following below we will see how boys always had to take the fact of their initiation into consideration, sometimes from an early age, and what attitude they adopted towards this. In the first place there were a number of things taboo to an uninitiated boy from early childhood. Thus he was never allowed to be present when an animal — fish, bird or mammal — was slaughtered by cutting off its head. The consequence of this was supposed to be continued bleeding of his wound after circumcision. He was furthermore forbidden to break off a particular plant called mosombo, Afromomum giganteum (OLIV. et HANB.) K. SCHUM., as this would allegedly give his foreskin the same tendency to regrow as this plant. Mosombo was used among other things in the course of initiation (see p. 157, 207), but according to my informants the above taboo had nothing to do with that. A clear symbolic connection does not, in fact, appear to exist. A third taboo the boys were supposed to observe was that on the eating of a small crab called ikacL If they did eat this creature, this would cause holes to appear in a swollen penis, through which their

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urine would pass, after circumcision. The patient would become emaciated and suffer severe pains. My informant said that he himself had witnessed such a case. The remedy against it was rubbing the penis with the ashes of burnt crab claws. I have not been able to obtain an explanation for this from my informants. When I suggested, with reference to Douglas (1966:3,4), that a crab was an 'impossible' creature, just as extraordinary as the complaint in question, in fact, people rather took to the idea. It does not explain why the two are linked together especially in this case, however. A vague parallel is found in the Wagenia belief that someone may become ill as a result of either himself or a relative allowing a crocodile to escape after catching the animal. Like the crab, the crocodile is an animal that is difficult to place. A final taboo that had to be observed by non-initiated boys was that against sleeping alone, as mentioned above (see p. 63), for fear of removal of the foreskin by ancestor spirits. As the day of circumcision approached, special preparations began to be made. The women were to be seen busy making the leg bands, armlets and necklets which the boys would wear. If the family did not possess a leopard-skin hat with parrot feathers, the traditional chief's hat, or a hat of monkey-skin, then people would try to borrow one from a befriended or related family. The married daughter of the family living opposite us one day came home to borrow a leopard-skin hat. Before she was allowed to take the hat, some beer was poured over the grave in front of the house in order to appease the former owner of the hat, who lay buried there. This was coupled with the announcement that the hat was being taken by such and such, that no harm was intended with it, and that she would bring the thing back again. Three elderly relatives, including a woman, were present at this. Fathers procured their sons loin-clothes of pounded bark to wear. A lively trade in these developed. At this time the boys were moreover warned against sorcery. They were not allowed to go too far away from home for fear that someone might cast a spell over them. The motive for sorcery was mostly jealousy, especially on the part of childless persons who begrudged others the possession of sons for initiation. The novices were advised to avoid people and villages suspected of sorcery. In one village, which had a reputation for sorcery, a commotion

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was caused by the b o y designated as future camp chief suddenly falling ill and having weeping fits. His father consulted an expert in town, who, for a fee of 50 Zaires ($ 100 at the official exchange rate), was able to inform him who the culprits were and how the b o y could be cured. According to his diagnosis, a few of the people who had blessed the camp chief elect on his appointment by spitting on him, following the established custom, had spat out medicine along with their saliva, which had caused the b o y to fall ill. The suspects belonged to kin groups other than those of the camp chief. The b o y eventually did become camp chief, as originally planned, and the different kin groups shared the same camp after all. Other groups which had shared a camp with these bebanda before did not wish to cooperate any longer, however. The children during this time played a new game called initiation. The girls participated, too, playing male parts. Occasionally boys might be seen practising the dance they were to perform on the roof of their parental home later. Even the smallest boys, who would not be initiated this time, devoted themselves to this kind of activity. My diary entry for 19th June, 1970, reads: 'In the village a small group of ten to fifteen b o y s was playing at initiation. They had adorned themselves with liana caps and raffia armlets. They were circumcised one by one. A slightly bigger boy, of about twelve, wielded a piece of b a m b o o with which he " c u t " a piece o f f the penis bared especially for the occasion. Two others meanwhile beat out the rhythm that is normally played during circumcision, on a drum and a tin. As soon as another 'operation' was over, everyone cheered and the newly circumcised set out for a small improvised camp. The walls of this were formed by a piece of cloth around a telegraph pole and a bush. After a while they got bored with the game and went back to playing soccer.' All this took place after the actual initiation had begun and there were already some novices in camp. The boys had had a chance to see what was going to happen to them, even though they were not allowed to watch the circumcision at close range. A few days before their own circumcision day, or, more usually, on the day of the departure of the last group before their own from the village, most of the boys sat on display in front of one of the houses. They sat in a row on small stools, which would be used again later on their return from camp. They wore a very grave and important ex-

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pression, and had already put on part of the finery with which they would be adorned on the day of circumcision: leg bands, armlets, necklets, a bark loin-cloth, and a belt, mostly of brass rings, around their waist. In the old days they also used to wear massive brass bangles and anklets, but these had now become rare. Their skin had been rubbed with oil, so that it had acquired a light sheen. Sometimes also red colouring-matter was used to paint their bodies. According to my informants the novices used to sit on view much longer in the old days. They stayed close to home for fear of sorcery. Because of the practice of sitting on display the farewell never came abruptly, but was announced and prepared in advance. It moreover allowed the families concerned to display their wealth in progeny in this emphatic way. Not all the boys sat on display, however. A number of them avoided this. Only the novices who would be circumcised at the final circumcision, the 'rear guard' (makpandéi, s. ikpandéi), definitely observed this custom. In contrast with the other boys, they were sometimes painted for this occasion, usually in whites and yellows, as on the day of their circumcision. While sitting on display like this, the boys would receive all kinds of good advice. Anyone who felt impelled to give this could do so. A frequently given piece of advice was not to fight in camp and to obey the men's orders. The novices were further exhorted to undergo their circumcision and the period in camp bravely. It was especially important to the maternal relatives to persuade the boys of the necessity of this. It was they who would carry them through the village to the circumcision ground near the river, where they would stand by the boys during the operation, after the roof dance. If the boys showed any sign of fear or pain, the maternal relatives would share in the resultant disgrace. During the farewell phase they had more responsibility for the boys' supervision than the paternal relatives. What struck one about the sitting on display, finally, was that this way the 'séparation' was as it were administered in doses. The same effect was achieved by circumcising the boys and taking them to camp in groups. Prior to initiation attempts were made also to have boys born of marriages of Wagenia with members of other tribes, who did not reside with the Wagenia, come to Kisangani to undergo the ritual. Most of these boys continued to live with the Wagenia when everything

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was over, probably because the journey away from home alone had constituted atremendous strain on their relatives' financial resources. I asked a number of boys varying in age from 7 to 19 a series of questions before their departure for camp to find out what their attitude to initiation was. A selection from the questions and answers is reproduced below. I have quoted the boys almost verbatim here, and have made no attempt to translate their answers into scientific jargon. I am far from claiming that this group of respondents was representative. Hence no special significance is to be attached to the figures in brackets at the end of the replies. To the question of whether they were afraid to go to the initiation camp, two of the 22 replied in the affirmative. They feared the curses and threats of the men, and the bashings given boys circumcised under an anaesthetic in hospital, who had therefore suffered less pain than boys circumcised in the traditional manner. At the end of 1968 I made a count which showed that of 640 unmarried and as yet uninitiated boys and youths from 4 to 20 years of age, 338 were already circumcised. Below the age of 8 the number of uncircumcised was larger than that of the circumcised, and above 8 smaller. A number of boys became visibly more tractable vis-à-vis older persons as initiation approached, moreover. Boys with a reputation for naughtiness at home became the special target of jokes and were told that they would be made to pay for their behaviour in camp. The boys who stated themselves not to be afraid gave one or more of the following answers: all my friends will be there, too (6) why, its the custom (4) it's a feast (4) there's lots of food (2) dancing on the roof before is fun (2) initiation is very old ( 1 ) there are smaller novices than myself (1) even if I'm afraid, I still have to go through with it (1) I'd like to know what exactly goes on (1) well, I want to myself (1) my father wants it (1) you can't refuse to do something instituted by the ancestors (1) no explanation (2).

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One third-year secondary school-boy made some quite sceptical remarks to me about initiation and all the stories of miraculous happenings in connection with it. To him this constituted a special reason for taking part, because he wanted to know what was true of all the rumours. I have twice noticed a boy being taken to task by his mother or grandmother during a circumcision ritual for wanting to go to camp with his friends before his time. The next question was about whether the boys were afraid of circumcision. Some of the boys had already undergone this, as we saw above. Three stated themselves to be (or to have been) afraid, one of them observing that he was afraid that all his private parts would be removed. In the next question the boys were asked why they should have to be circumcised at all. To this the following answers were given, some of which are mere rephrasings of the question rather than genuine answers: to get rid of the foreskin (8) to be able to go to camp (5) against bad health (see p. 62) (4) to increase the enjoyment of sexual intercourse (4) it's the custom (3) why, all men are circumcised (3) it's a requirement for enrollment at school (2) (a false rumour) to be one of the initiated (2) you can't die uncircumcised (2) you have to be circumcised before you're an adult, because the foreskin comes away from the glans then and circumcision is more difficult (1) you don't count for anything if you're not circumcised (1) my mother wants it (1) I don't know why (4). Is it a good thing to have to go to camp, and if so, why? Two boys replied in the negative, the one out of fear of punishment, the other because he had heard that the wound from circumcision would be treated with stinging substances. The others replied in the affirmative, appealing to the following arguments: you have to grow strong, eat a lot and become big (5) you're there with your friends (4) it's nice there (4)

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you learn the secrets of initiation (3) you play all kinds of games (3) that's just the way things are (2) you learn wrestling there (2) you become an initiated man (2) initiation was started before us, we simply have to follow (2) it's compulsory (1) you can't stay away by yourself (1) it's the custom (1) you would't count later (1) it's important (1). What do you think you'll learn in camp? songs (12) wrestling (11) camp secrets (7) making hats and armlets for the parade (5) games (4) dancing (4) setting liana dolls against one another to wrestle (3) parading (2) military discipline (2) stories (2) friendship (1) how to live with other people (1) curses by the men (1) how to have sexual intercourse with Mokolongani (1) (the latter being the name of the wife of one of the so-called initiation animals, and in addition the nickname for the couch slept on by the novice, which has a hole in it to suspend the circumcised penis through while he sleeps on his stomach.) I don't know (3). Are there any unpleasant things about camp as well? the so-called initiation animals, namelyKabile (16),Mokumo (11) and Tshuamba (7) treatment of the wound with stinging substances (10) the possible appearance of the spirit Pengenge (5) the imprecations of the men (4) sorcery (2) trials (2)

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your enemy taking revenge on you (1) the bashings you get if you've been circumcised in hospital (1). One boy, on another occasion, mentioned the lack of bathing facilities in camp as a disadvantage. He himself intended to have a good bath before going to camp. The next question was: Why do you have to dance on the roof before being circumcised? from pride and joy (7) to show that you're going to camp (6) to show how many novices your family is supplying (5) it's the custom (3) to celebrate your departure with your relatives (2) to make the boys who are not going look ridiculous (1) I don't know (4). Why do you have to stay in camp without seeing the outside world for so long? you have to eat a lot and grow big and strong (13) if you were to see the outside world you'd grow thin (6) it's the custom, that's how the ancestors wanted it (4) you have to be secluded from the women, otherwise you'll become thin (3) you have to be initiated (2) to play (1) to wrestle (1) to dance (1) I don't know (4). The last question was designed to elicit information on what the boys already knew about what was in store for them. As it turned out, only two of the 22 were informed of one or more initiation secrets. Others had heard vague stories, but knew nothing of the details. The majority had absolutely no idea of secret initiation matters. At any rate, they did not mention them in their replies to the question. A few had got to know slightly more as a result of one of the camps already existing at the time not being properly screened off, so that it was possible to look inside, or because they were living close to a camp and were within earshot of what went on there. In some cases the boys had been informed to some extent by initiated older friends or relatives.

3. The departure

THE DIFFERENT CATEGORIES OF NOVICES

The first novices of the 1970 initiation were circumcised and isolated on Easter Sunday and Monday, 29th and 30th March. These trailblazers, called mâk'ili (s. likili), were seized, put on their relatives' shoulders and carried to the river beach for circumcision completely by surprise. The word mâkili was also used to refer to the three guinea-pigs at the first Wagenia initiation ever, after the men had taken the right to initiation from the women (see p. 62 above). The first mâk'ili of 1970, those of Bakonga, were seized in the midst of a game of soccer prearranged by the men. Special delight in setting this trap was taken by the previous initiation group. The mâkili's circumcision was quite a simple affair by comparison with the ceremonies for the other novices, which will be described in detail below, because it took place so unexpectedly. In contrast with the other novices, the mâkili did not perform a roof dance before their departure for the circumcision ground, and, unless there was sufficient time, were not adorned with the attributes which their successors were to sport. Their circumcision day was not preceded by a nocturnal feast, nor were their heads shaved before their departure to the circumcision ground and camp. While all succeeding novices were to be carried by their male maternal relatives, with the mâkili this was only the case if these relatives happened to be on hand. Because of their sudden departure, the mâkili enjoyed the shortest séparation and the longest marge of all the novices. Hence there was considerable difference between the celebrations for a likili and those for other novices. There were some similarities between him, as trail-blazer, and the last novice, the ikpandéi (pl. makpandéi), however. Both had to make a round of the village naked

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and with a small, Western-made brass bell in their hands after their circumcision. With this bell they announced their approach, as a sign that they were still allowed to be seen by the women after being circumcised. Furthermore, they b o t h belonged to particular bebanda which had supplied the first and the last novice respectively of old. They would moreover go through the rest of their life bearing the names Likili and Ikpandei (or also Isume). They differed in that the one marked the beginning and the other the end of the séparation phase. The likili in particular was to fulfil similar firstling functions in the remainder of initiation. In one initiation song the likili was referred to as the 'head and gills'. In former times there was usually only one likili, probably because the group from which novices were recruited used to be much smaller. At the 1970 initiation there were two or three makili in most camps. There was nonetheless always only one charged with the above-described demarcative function. Within the group of bebanda sharing an initiation camp there might be more than one family with the right to supply makili. This is explained by the former demographic situation, when bebanda were much smaller.The risk of being without a likili then was reduced by giving more families the right to supply makili. If a particular tshebanda in which no one had the right to supply makili eventually came to have a camp of its own as a result of segmentation, the likili group was skipped. In 1970 this situation arose within Bina Nsilekpe (cf. Fig. 9, p. 39), where Bina Ongelo had a camp of its own but no makili. These latter were in the camp of Bina Nsila Lowao and Bina Enjoa. The role of likili was not particularly coveted by novices, which explains the sudden start of initiation. As soon as the first had been taken, the novices qualifying for the function of likili in other bebanda would hide themselves. Their relatives' attitudes to such attempts to evade this component of initiation varied. Some kept a special eye on the boys and protested violently if the boys could not be found. Others, on the other hand, helped them hide. We shall pause here to consider some of the motives behind these divergent attitudes among the novices and men. The boys themselves did not particularly like the idea of having to spend the maximum period in camp without their friends, or with only one or two others, especially after being the first to go through the terrifying, unknown experience of initiation. In addition the

The different

categories of novices

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boys dreaded the prospect of spending the nights in the open air by themselves. For at the time most of them were unaware that they would not be spending the first nights in the temporary camp, but in the village, in the house of some bachelor or somewhere in a separate room, provided it was far away from the women. For the men the reasons were various. Some considered it an honour to supply the likili. Others regarded this simply as a welcome opportunity to take naughty sons down a peg or two. Others again, however, thought in terms of lost manpower, of the expenses such a sudden initiation would entail, or of the discomfort the boy would experience as the first novice. In practice mostly smaller boys ended up being makili. They lacked the cunning to hide themselves, their labour could be more easily dispensed with, and, moreover, their relatives would derive less credit later from having a small boy perform the roof dance than if they provided a bigger boy for this. Kombozi, Njaki's eldest boy, was to be likili of Bina Mongula. He had gone into hiding, however, as it later turned out with his mother's relatives, who belonged to another tribe. Alibase, a man from a related tshebanda, made a scene asserting that there had to be a likili at all costs. So Kombozi's younger brother, Luba, who was five years old and only just big enough to be initiated, had this role foisted off on him. Njaki was opposed to it and cried. The first days he was in the temporary camp almost constantly, especially after Luba became ill as a result of an infection of his circumcision wound. Two male relatives went to inform his boss in town that Njaki was unable to come to work, on the pretext that he had been taken into custody for some misdemeanour. After the mdkili's circumcision the coast was clear again. The makili ceremony could never be repeated — no initiation could be opened twice. In 1970 there was one tshebanda which let the opportunity to circumcise makili go by. As a sign of disapproval the other Wagenia deposited in the village concerned the long staffs carried by the men at the circumcision ceremony. When a few days later this tshebanda repented its omission and beat the talking drum to invite all Wagenia to a makili circumcision after all, their invitation was refused. The answer was: once the initiation has gone downstream with the makili, it cannot come back again.

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For the novices of the previous initiation the first circumcision day was especially important because on that day they at last discarded the status of novice, or motende (pi. batende), which they had possessed since their own circumcision. Only then did they become bekombe (s. tshekombe), that is, adult men who not only had been initiated, but had also initiated others. Because of the suddenness with which the makili's circumcision commenced, there was obviously no camp for them yet. So a small temporary camp, where they were able to spend the days for the first few weeks, until the building in the permanent camp was ready for sleeping in, was hastily improvised for them. During this time they spent the nights in the village, of course unbeknown to and unseen by the women. Bina Mongula's temporary camp was located about ten metres from the main street of the village, not far from the houses, among some bushes and small trees (cf. Fig. 12, p. 43). A makeshift screen, initially of old rags and later of banana leaves, was put up across the path leading up to it. An old car bonnet taken from a wreck, and later a sheet of corrugated iron, served as roof shelter. For b o t h the novices and men a small bench had been put together out of some small tree-trunks and lianas. Traditionally it was the custom for a second group of novices to be circumcised and taken to camp within a few weeks after the makili. This second group was called m 'mbakdmed, meaning literally 'second' or 'next'. For this group of novices no nocturnal feast was held prior to circumcision day, either. In this they resembled the makili. They were, in fact, sometimes referred to as makili na m'mbakamed, or 'second makili'. The first makili were sometimes designated 'the makili with the bell', in contrast with the second group, which was called 'the makili of the fence', because it did not go to camp until at least part of the hut in camp was completed and the fence erected. While the first makili were the very first novices, the second makili were the first to enter the permanent camp, deriving the right to the title makili from being first in this respect. In the Wagenia mankala board game the first two holes are also referred to as likili and m 'mbakamea. Since the game as a whole, as far as its terminology and the way it is played are concerned, is an allusion to marriage, the first hole is sometimes also called ikpaoko (cf. p. 167 below). In 1970 the term m'mbakdmed was not taken

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over-strictly. Bina Nsilonga was the first tshebanda to take a second group to camp, two weeks after Easter. This was possible because their camp was situated in the bush, so that they only needed to erect a fence on the side facing the village. Although it was explicitly stated that this was a specifically m'mbdkdmea circumcision, there was a nocturnal feast held prior to the day of circumcision. The presence or absence of a nocturnal feast is even so a useful criterion for distinguishing between the second and third groups. This third group was styled manyongo (lit. 'cooking-pot') or asdngmba (without any particular meaning). The former of these two names this group owed to the fact that its departure was celebrated with a nocturnal feast with eating, drinking and dancing. One song sung during the parade in one of the camps was a variation on the theme 'Who began?...' (cf. p. 71 above). It ran, 'Who began? Makili began. M'mbdkdmea followed. Manyongo will carry on.'

THE CALENDAR

We shall now take a look at the initiation calendar. In the space of a good 4j- months some 14 camps were filled. The first of the almost 1300 novices went to the temporary camps on 29th March, 1970, while the last set out on 19th August. The first novices (those of Bakonga) left their camp eight days after that, on 27th August, all the other bebanda following within four days. Whereas for the entry considerable time was set aside, the departure took up only a few days. In b o t h cases the influence of school made itself felt. Instead of a single asangmba group, there were usually two, namely one of boys who did not attend school (so-called paresseux) and one of those who did, at the beginning of the long vacation. The m'mbdkdmea group comprised almost exclusively paresseux. Two initiations ago there had still been some camps without a single school-goer. There was a rumour circulating that some parents had tried to bribe teachers to have their sons released from school earlier. The Governor, the highest functionary in the province, had allegedly been asked, though in vain, to close the schools before the usual time. At the departure from the camps again the dates on which school

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commenced had to be taken into account. It was initially claimed that the paresseux would stay in camp until January, 1971. They had similarly had a longer time in camp in 1956. It had even so always taken a longer time to get the boys into camp than out of it again even in the old days. This was connected with the requirement of the presence of the maternal kin at the entry into but not at the departure from camp. A t the beginning of initiation the novices were still in the process of detaching themselves from these relatives, who therefore still had a part to play at that time. A t the end of initiation the latter were conspicuously absent, as a sign of their changed relationship to their sister's son. A t that time they were moreover usually too busy with the departure from camp in their own village. As a result of the long-drawn-out séparation, this period overlapped with that of the marge for the society at large, though not for the novice. By the time the last novices entered camp, the mâkili had already spent over four months there, and the average novice one month. The men were busy with circumcision and the camp both at the same time. The circumcision days were spread as follows over the entry period: Number of circumcision days per river bank per month left bank March April

1 —

right bank

total

1

2

1

1

May

5

1

6

June

3

5

8

July

5

9

14

August

3

9

12

17

26

43

Total

Fig. 13

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Among the Wagenia on the left bank, who on the whole had a slightly keener sense of initiation tradition, and moreover had fewer children attending school than those on the right bank, the camps were full sooner. I once overheard someone from the left bank telling some people from the right bank that if they tarried any longer, the makili would run away from camp from sheer boredom. On the right bank the camps only filled up with novices in the month of July, when school was closed. In this month, too, the biggest circumcision ceremonies took place. In the last weeks of entry into camp particularly makpandei were involved, mostly accompanied by some novices who had missed out on the previous circumcision days. As a rule a circumcision was held in only one place, in one tshebanda, or a number of affiliated bebanda, on any one day. This was due to the above-mentioned requirement that the initiated male maternal relatives be available to carry their sister's son on their shoulders after his roof dance, to stand by him during circumcision, and finally, to look after him until he entered camp. If on any particular circumcision day there was an especially large number of novices, almost all Wagenia bebanda were represented at it. If two ceremonies had been held on different banks or in distant villages on the same bank on the one day, such representation would have come up against practical difficulties. Aside from the novice's maternal kin, in principle all Wagenia were expected to attend a circumcision ceremony. The announcement of such a ceremony, whether by talking drum or (by way of exception) by stencilled invitation (see Appendix 2), was invariably directed to all Wagenia. In August there was one Sunday on which circumcisions were held in five separate, non-contiguous bebanda. This was possible because the number of novices at each was small and they were mostly makpandei. Hence the total number of circumcision days in Figure 13 was actually 42 instead of 43. The calendar of circumcision days was the outcome of the various bebanda reserving certain dates by talking drum. There were also occasionally men to be heard announcing their own group's ceremony at the top of their voice at the end of another group's circumcision. It might sometimes come to pass that two groups of bebanda chose the same day and time, in which case they would seek a solution by holding a palaver, sometimes with the mediation of another tshebanda. In any given month, the dates tended to be concentrated

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around the beginning (e.g., 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th and 7th July), because that was when people had just received their pay. The weekends and holidays like 1st May, Ascension Day and Whitsun were especially popular. Later, as the schedule became full, circumcision ceremonies were also held on workdays. At previous initiations, when there had been few if any men working in the city, it must have been easier to hold circumcisions on workdays. Generally the ceremonies commenced in the early afternoon, unless there was a specially large number of novices, when a start was made at the end of the morning. On workdays, which in Zaire included Saturday as well, it was impossible to start in the morning, however. The circumcision schedule was never absolutely definitive. This state of affairs was not only induced by regular arrears of wages, as a result of which people might unexpectedly find themselves without the necessary funds for a projected circumcision ceremony, but was also an outcome of the characteristic decision-making process and of delays in the construction of the camps. People were prepared to go back on decisions taken earlier with infinite patience, especially if this helped to preserve the peace. As a result of this indefmiteness I ended u p going to a previously announced circumcision ceremony for nothing several times, an experience I had repeatedly also in the case of events unconnected with initiation. Hence quite possibly the table given above is not altogether complete. I attended more than half the circumcision feasts.

PAYMENTS

The circumcision and departure of the novice for camp was accompanied with payments by his paternal relatives to his maternal kinsfolk. These payments b ore no cerem onial character, incidentally, but were made on an informal basis. This involved relatives in such a wide sense of the word, that it might sometimes even c o m e to pass that a person received part of the money he himself had advanced along with his paternal relatives back via a distant relationship with the receiving party on his mother's side. At the 1970 initiation a meeting to decide on a fixed rate was held shortly after its commencement. This way the kind of palavers which sometimes t o o k place in connection with payments on other

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occasions were obviated. For each novice, though never for more than two from the same family, the maternal relatives were paid 1.50 Zaires (i.e., $ 3). For the ikpandet, 'the last comer', double that amount was payable, in accordance with his special status. In his case, moreover, one Zaire had to be paid to each of the neighbouring bebanda with an ikpandet as well. In practice there were deviations from this fixed amount. In accordance with tradition, the maternal relatives were often given a goat instead of the agreed sum, especially for the ikpandet. The price of a goat was approximately 5 Zaires. Payment was sometimes also made in goats if the relatives of an ordinary novice were wealthy, or pretended to wealth. Once on a circumcision day two goats were hoisted onto the roof in the middle of a roof dance and displayed to the crowd, to the greater glory of the relatives concerned. So where in some cases more than the fixed sum was paid, in other cases people might pay less for lack of funds. Two brothers fell ill in camp. The cause was revealed to their father in a dream — the payments to the maternal relatives were still outstanding. These relatives were therefore invited to come and receive their share after all, in order thereupon to spit on the boys to bless and cure them. These payments should in my view be regarded as a token of solidarity with the recipients. They were a means of indicating the importance of a particular social relation. For the event providing an occasion for a payment the giver-recipient relation was quite important. The fact that at initiation the maternal relatives were the receiving party represented a sort of acknowledgment of their contribution to the continuity of the tshebanda making the payment. It was a supplementary marriage payment. As with other payments, such as on the occasion of births, deaths, and the victory of a son in a wrestling match, the amount was carefully noted down on the list of payments to the bride-givers. I will come back to these payments, which were actually gifts, in Chapter 7.

THE NOCTURNAL FEAST

Thanks to the Wagenia, Westerners in the city of Kisangani have seen their ideal of a tropical night come true. They must have heard the

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virtually continuous sound of distant drums that is such an invariable ingredient of the romantic notion of a night in the tropics every time a nocturnal feast was held prior to a day on which asangmba and makpandei were circumcised. We ourselves were not impervious to this kind of romanticism in the beginning, either. The atmosphere of such a nocturnal feast created an overwhelming impression of vitality on us. At these feasts there was a great deal of vigorous dancing and singing, much laughter, and sometimes also some quarreling, especially when someone without much authority was sharing out the beer. If we look at it all a little less through the spectacles of a tourist and a little more through the eyes of an anthropologist, however, our description will have to be focused on a number of specific aspects of the feast. The main question that arises in this connection is, who were present and what did they do? We attended a total of five nocturnal feasts in three different villages. At these feasts, all ages and b o t h sexes were represented. The core of the revellers of course was made up of members of the tshebanda of the novices who were to make the trip to the circumcision ground and camp the next day. In addition members of the boys' maternal kin groups should ideally have been present. In practice, however, their number was limited, or they were absent altogether. Furthermore, people from neighbouring villages often dropped by to take part in the celebrations for longer or shorter intervals in the course of the evening and night. What struck us was that the boys in whose honour the festivities were held played no prominent part in them at all. The nocturnal feast was a group affair, because initiation concerned not only the novice himself, but also his tshebanda, and in principle also that of his mother. This afforded the boys an opportunity to prepare themselves for the fatigues of the next day through sleep. Earlier I mentioned the sudden appearance of a group of boys aged about ten who proceeded to move around the circle of dancing women in imitation of that dance (cf. p. 81 above). This was not an example of their principal role in initiation, however. Some novices were initiated into the initiation secrets during the nocturnal feast, this marking the beginning of their farewell. It even appeared to be possible for a boy to be absent altogether from the nocturnal feast prior to his circumcision day. So Folo, a

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boy living with his parents in his father's mother's village, slept at home as usual throughout the nocturnal feast in his father's village. He was to be circumcised together with the novices of his father's tshebanda, b u t to spend his camp period in the camp of his father's mother's tshebanda. It can be stated as a general rule that the members of the younger generation were especially active in the earlier part of the nocturnal feasts, until midnight. For the adults the festivities continued for much longer. Here the women were seen to play the most active part. They went on celebrating indefatigably, and were mostly responsible for a final revival of the festivities at sunrise. Their energy is all the more incredible when one stops to think that the day before they had gone to market and prepared all the food for the night. On the day of circumcision itself again they would occupy themselves with all kinds of domestic matters first before taking part heart and soul in the actual circumcision celebrations. By the end of the festivities some women were hoarse from singing and cheering. The men were the most passive participants, dancing much less and, in fact, preferring most to sit in a deck chair with a bottle of beer. Some even took refuge in the camp, far from the din of the nocturnal feast, in order to snatch a few hours' quiet sleep. The feast was a village feast, belonging to a village phase of the initiation. The camp only figured prominently in the next phase. Although the ideal was for the occupants of the camp to sleep outside as well, this rule was made rather light of. There were also a number of people who wished to have nothing to do with the festivities. They acted as though there was nothing special going on, and slept at home, as usual. These were not only people who kept aloof from initiation for religious reasons.'Freedom for all' is a slogan that could well have originated in Wagenia society. This was also apparent from the absence of a master of ceremonies at nocturnal feasts, although there were of course always people who spontaneously assumed the role of revel master. In some villages the celebrations were held only in the early part of the night. Much depended on the weather and the hosts' financial situation. This was n o t necessarily contrary to custom, either. In Kigenia the nocturnal feast was referred to by the expression 'to sleep outside', in fact. Hence a group of people sleeping around a

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smouldering fire in the dark was just as much part of the proceedings as the merrymaking in other villages or other parts of the same village. On one occasion, when a boy who had missed all the circumcision days because he lived with relatives about 150 kilometres away and had been unable to find transport was being circumcised, there was no nocturnal feast at all. His circumcision feast was fitted in with that in a neighbouring village. When it was over he went to the camp of his own tshebanda. Now I will give a description of the activities at nocturnal feasts. The festivities were usually held in only one place in the village, because often there was only one group of drummers. If there had been more, they would have had to compete against each other to be heard anyway. On cold nights a fire was lit. If there was no moon, some oil or 'Coleman' lamps were burnt. In Bina Mongula all the nocturnal feasts were held in front of our house by way of favour in return for our contributions towards the expenses of the feast, and because the front yard was a suitable place anyway. Although the festivities were concentrated in this place, there were groups of waking or sleeping people to be seen in other parts of the village as well. The time was spent mostly in dancing and singing to a drum accompaniment. Besides, people just sat around and talked. After midnight food was served in big dishes, around which the guests crouched, men and women separately, to take out the food by small handfuls. Depending on how rich the hosts were, beer was distributed with some regularity. The above rough outline will now be filled in with a few details. Sometimes the nocturnal feast was clearly an obligatory affair. In that case people would be repeatedly asking us the time, and the whole thing created a rather forced impression. Occasionally the feast would seem to flicker out like a candle. But this was usually only illusory, and it would rekindle a moment later. Whoever wished to sleep did so. The children, who were especially energetic in the earlier part, later lay quietly asleep on the ground in front of the houses, sometimes packed close together, like sardines in a tin, undisturbed by the continuous drone of the drums and the singing.

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103

The drums were of several different types. Mostly there were one or more kettledrums, a wedge-shaped drum, and talking drums of various sizes. The same set was used on circumcision days. The talking drums provided the rhythm, as well as serving for the transmission of messages about the approaching circumcision. These drums are made from a tree-trunk with a lengthwise slit hollowed out of it, which is placed horizontally on the ground. As the trunk is hollowed out slightly more deeply on one side, it produces two tones, corresponding to the two tones of the language. Messages are transmitted through the medium of set texts, elaborated with synonyms. An expert can recognize the message by the tones alone. For a detailed study of the talking drum the reader is referred to Carrington (1949 a and b, 1971). There was combined dancing and singing together with a drum accompaniment, provided people kept dancing in the one place, both at the nocturnal feast and on circumcision day. By way of exception there might be dancing without singing. Even before initiation we had noticed how a play-back of a tape recording of songs usually culminated in an impromptu dance in which every passer-by might join in. The composition of the groups of dancers tended to change constantly. Now boys and girls would dance together, now women and girls, while at other times everyone, from the toddler to the virtually crippled greybeard, so to speak, joined in. As has already been observed earlier, the men were the least active here. The figures of the dances varied markedly. Although group dancing predominated, everyone was free to do a little individual dance on his own. The steps were usually so simple that the research team was soon able to participate in this respect as well. At one time the dancers would form an open or closed circle, either stationary or revolving, at another a group of dancers would go running through the village at a trot. The latter form was particularly prevalent at the circumcision feast. If the dancers stood in a circle, one or two of them might move into the middle for a solo dance at each new verse. If the group moved round in an open circle, one or two people would proceed to lead the dance each time the tune changed. The rear of the file was made up by children wishing to participate. At both the celebrations during the night and those on the day of circumcision the vocal repertoire varied from old songs to texts

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familiar from radio or disc. They were sung in many different languages, sometimes without any understanding of the lyrics. Marriages of Wagenia men with women from other tribes (especially Babira and Lokele) had led to an extension of the repertoire. The songs thus borrowed seemed to have been chosen for their melody or rhythm rather than their lyrics, which soon became corrupted. Furthermore, sometimes particular sentences were sung to different melodies, just as certain melodies lent themselves to variation of the text. The women especially were extremely adept at improvising new texts, some of which were forgotten the moment they were sung, while others stuck. Certain songs, because of a similarity in theme, were almost invariably sung together. The texts of the songs did not rhyme, b u t were required, as bitonal texts, to fit the melody. Carrington (1954: 28) expresses the view 'that the tonal melody of words used is the primary factor determining musical f o r m ; that indeed musical form is little more than the essential tones of linguistic elements accompanying the music'. It is worth while subjecting the themes of the songs and improvisations to a closer examination. I have based myself for this on about 40 texts collected at night-time feasts which were translatable. The corrupted foreign texts which the Wagenia themselves did not understand have been left out of consideration. A similar analysis of songs sung on circumcision days will be given at the end of t h e present chapter. Although the texts lend themselves admirably for providing a little extra local colour, I will only give examples of the three most relevant themes. I shall leave aside the well-known songs about persons who were famous or notorious for one reason or another. The songs about wrestlers will be mentioned in the discussion of wrestling in Chapter 5.1 will not give any examples of songs with the researcher as subject, either; these tended to be made up especially at nocturnal feasts, more particularly when the tape-recorder appeared on the scene. For reasons of space the examples will only be given in translation, and without the usual repetitions. The first theme I wish to mention in this connection is that of circumcision and initiation itself. ' I ' m crying for Gaby.' (Gabriel, the name of a novice. The name appeared to vary.) 'Don't cry over the knife. Over whom does the knife cry? The

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105

knife will come.' (An exhortation to the boy not to be afraid of the knife, which, on the contrary, should be afraid of him.) A second category of songs interpreted people's feelings towards their own tshebanda. 'We, Bina Mongula, we want no debts' (i.e., 'we settle our debts in time', or 'we pay people back, have our revenge'). 'We want to go home, to Bina Mongula. Bina Mongula is awaiting us.' (Home is best.) 'American women, that's what we are, we women of Bina Mongula.' (This betrays the influence of tourism.) 'We may not be numerous, we Bina Mongula, b u t we are tall, just tall, no small men.' (This was not sung, b u t was an improvisation that was loudly called out.) 'Look, our friends are maligning us; we want no quarrel, I ' m weeping.' (This reflects the tension between cooperation and autonomy.) 'Bina Mongula is Sabena.' (Called out instead of sung, 'Sabena' referring to the local airport. In other words, 'everyone comes here for the night-time feast'.) (In all of these texts the name Bina Mongula was interchangeable with that of any other tshebanda.) The third theme, on which there were many songs, was that of love and sexual activity. 'With the night comes love-making.' 'Kayo, if you're my sister, turn your back on me. If you're not, spread your legs, present your buttocks.' ' I ' m just a broom, a wall without a face. I clean the living-room. I am a papaw abandoned in a deserted village.' (A woman complaining about her husband's escapades.) 'Aimo, my love, don't wear Tergal (a brand of cloth, and also the name of a particular style of suit), that's what bandits dress in. Aimo, my love, don't eat matembela (a variety of spinach), else you'll become a gadabout (kotembela).' 'Amandala, young mother, tell your love to finish school, so he'll get a diploma, zaires, zaires, zaires (i.e., money, he'll make money), night-time frolics (coitus).' 'Douse the lamp, God wants to pass. Unite, apply a goodly quantity of ointment, move.' ('God wants to pass' is an expression borrowed from the syncretistic Kitawala (from 'Watch Tower')

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movement, and alludes to sexual intercourse. 'Apply ointment', i. e., to the penis, as an excitant and lubricant. For this purpose menthol ointment such as Vicks, etc., was often used. Lemon juice and different varieties of oil were not uncommon, either.) With this type of song the dancing was adapted to the subject. The women would go provocatively dancing towards the men, do a few steps, and then go twirling away again. In the process they made special hip movements, and to a lesser extent also shoulder movements. At one nocturnal feast the women had moreover inserted a small stick between their skirt, which they rolled with both hands, like a penis in erection. Meanwhile the song 'the penis has thus begotten' was sung over and over again. In this get-up the women again went dancing in the direction of the men, as if they wanted to change roles. At one stage when I went into our house to get the tape-recorder, a woman stood in the doorway like this to bar my way. At another nocturnal feast a number of girls had twisted their loin-cloths in such a way that a big knot was formed in front, which moved up and down as they swayed their hips, to the great hilarity of dancers and spectators alike. We will come across and try to explain similar examples of the reversal of roles in the description of the circumcision feast. At the nocturnal feasts rivalry between the sexes was further reflected in the pleasantries exchanged when for instance the distribution of beer and food provoked bickering (e.g., 'all men can do is eat'). I would like to say a few more words about beer consumption, which was fairly common at the nocturnal feasts. Although sometimes palm-wine was drunk, even so Western beer was the staple beverage (there were two breweries in the city of Kisangani). At a modest nightly feast adults would drink at least two f--litre bottles each, and more if the hosts were wealthy enough. The host's prestige was dependent on the quantity of beer consumed. Drunkenness was not considered a disgrace. Only drunk people making a nuisance of themselves were removed. Tall stories about the ability to drink large quantities of beer were quite common. A large proportion of the costs of initiation was accounted for by the custom to serve beer. On circumcision days, too, beer sellers did a roaring trade. Not uncommonly beer was sold out before the actual celebrations even began. The novices also shared in its consumption. We were being continually pestered for beer. Tipsy people were an integral part of the

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picture presented by the initiation feasts. Most of the money paid to the maternal relatives on the occasion of initiation was spent on beer. While crossing by canoe to the island of Kisangani one circumcision day, I saw the supply of beer for that day waiting to be ferried across. It came to 900 litres, which, taking the other inhabitants of the island into account as well, gives an average of about half a litre per Mugenia, adult or child. It will come as no surprise after these remarks that the Baptists, Kimbanguists and Salvation Army, who all prohibited alcohol consumption to their members, were against initiation partly because of the role which beer played at it. The Wagenia appeared to be fond of beer apart from initiation as well. Most funerals were concluded with a visit of all the guests to the 'buvette' at the expense of the deceased person's relatives. Usually at the end of the period of mourning a party was given at which beer also featured. At payments in connection with marriages invariably a few crates of beer were included in the total sum. If fines were imposed at a palaver, the beneficiaries' first course at the end of the palaver would be to the pub. The role played by beer in these cases in the old days used to be partly fulfilled by goats, which were also raised for consumption. On public holidays, too, barkeepers did excellent business. Some better paid Wagenia had made a habit of spending part of their wages at the buvette with their friends on pay-day at the end of the month. An interpretation of the nocturnal feast and the custom of sleeping in the open air will be given in Chapter 7. I shall conclude the present description with an account of a quarrel at one of these feasts. Not that I think that nocturnal feasts and quarrels go together (with the exception of the bickering over the distribution of beer, perhaps). I am only mentioning it as an illustration of inter-bebanda rivalry and segmentation. I am basing myself here on the account of Alingi, my Mugenia research assistant, who witnessed it in person. The quarreling bebanda were Bina Liele and Bina Itoke, two subgroups of Bina Njaki, itself a sub-group of Bina Ngembe (cf. Fig. 10, p. 39). The conflict broke out after one of the parties came to ask the other for some fire. This aroused suspicions that the fire might be used for sorcery. The two groups danced in two rows facing each other. When the one provoked the other with the remark that the other group was small in number, the latter replied that although

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that might be so, it at least had an ikpandet, something the opposing party could not say for itself. The quarrel reached such a pitch that one of the parties threatened to block the other's way to the circumcision ground the next day. It should be noted that these bebanda each had their own camp, whereas formerly they had shared a camp between them. Bina Liele had moved to the opposite river bank as a concrete sign of segmentation around 1920, but had been forced to move back again by the floods of the early 1960's. One of the remarks made by Bina Itoke during the nocturnal quarrel was 'go back to the other bank'.

ORNAMENTS

The last hours before the circumcision ceremony was due to begin were spent dressing the novice. Sometimes the latter could be seen wearing arm and leg bands quite early in the day, as though his farewell had already begun. Before being allowed to wear the necessary apparel, a boy had to have his head shaved first. This was mostly done by the novice's mother or her sister. There appeared to be no strict rule about this in practice. In one case the job would be done by father's mother, in another by the man operating as village barber in his spare time. Just as when the maternal relatives absented themselves from the nocturnal feast (p. 100 above), the rules giving these relatives a special place in the structure were infringed here as well. The Wagenia might have invented not only the saying 'freedom for all', but also 'rules are there to be broken'. This kind of attitude seems a not insignificant condition for a segmentation process of the type to which Wagenia society was subject. Besides having their heads shaved, most of the novices also had some kind of colouring-matter applied to their body, or their head, or both. The colours varied 'like the dishes of food at the nocturnal feast', as someone put it. Although white was the most commonly used, ochre and pink and small blue dots or stars were also popular. These pigments were extracted from the earth, except for the blue colouring substance, which was derived from bluing. Sometimes painting of the body was combined with the application of specific designs. So lighter-coloured parallel stripes would be produced by drawing two fingers along the boy's arms and back while he was still

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wet with paint. Or imprints of leaves were made on his skin, or lines with a frayed twig. At two circumcision ceremonies I saw boys with white lines across their eyebrows and noses. Some novices were not painted at all, and only had some fat or oil rubbed into their skins. I shall go into the symbolism of colours in Chapter 7. At this point it may be said, however, that the Wagenia are no Ndembu (Turner 1966). The asangmba group comprised the greater majority of the novices. They fulfilled no special function distinguishing them from the other novices. That is why it was not necessary to give them special distinguishing marks, in contrast with the ikpandei or the last comer, who did have an obvious function and was always painted in the same way (cf. p. 164 below). Whereas for the shaving of the head definite preference was given to specific persons, this was not the case with the application of paint, any more than dressing up. Shaving of the head was obligatory, painting optional. The novice's further attire was subject to some variation. Hence shaving of the head was pre-eminently suitable as a symbol of a break in this phase. The novice was leaving something of the old phase behind him, and was entering a new period as a tabula rasa in this respect. I shall give more attention further down in this chapter (p. 131) to the fact that it was mother's kin who shaved his head. Basically the novice's attire consisted of a chief's array. Every family made a special effort to procure this standard outfit for its sons if it was not already part of the family possessions. The most usual procedure in this case was for them to turn to the maternal relatives for help. In some cases the chief's attire was hired from a befriended family. There were even so plenty of novices who had to do without, and hence had to wear something else. A chief in full array used to wear a bark loin-cloth, a shoulder-belt with a sheathed knife, a hemispherical leopard-skin hat fitting closely to the head, a chain of leopard teeth, and in addition, neck-, armand leg-bands, and sometimes also a waist-belt. I will now proceed to describe each of these items in closer detail. The loin-cloth of pieces of pounded bark (of the Ficus recurvata DeWild.) sewn together constituted the traditional men's attire. At present it is replaced in daily life by fabric loin-cloths or trousers.The wearing of the latter has of late been stimulated by the Government.

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Under the influence of the united Zaire party on official occasions the chieftains' bark loin-cloths were usually replaced b y fabric cloths with party slogans or the portrait of the head of state printed on them. Because loin-cloths were not a scarce article, every novice wore a loin-cloth. The necessary pieces of bark for it were procured from tribes living in the surrounding forest. It consisted of a rectangular piece of cloth pleated at one end so as to produce a fan shape, and was secured around the waist with a cord, with the narrow end in front. Because it was usually t o o big, it mostly hung loose at the back. As the wearer walked, this loose end would sway with the movement of his body, thus creating a rather springy effect. Hence in one song the novice was compared to a wagtail. The bark loin-cloth was used again in a later phase of initiation. A loin-cloth was also worn b y the wrestlers at wrestling matches. In some cases the skin of a civet cat, which closely resembles that o f a leopard, was attached to the back o f the loin-cloth, sometimes with a small bell fastened to the tail. The mâkili and makpandéi always had such a bell, but other b o y s might also wear one. Sometimes the bell was attached to the back of the belt. Wrestlers o f t e n adorned themselves with one or more civet skins and a bell at the back of their loin-cloth. Neither the civet skin nor the bell formed part of the chieftain's array, however. The shoulder-belts were made o f leopard skin. If there was none available, the novice might wear scarves, strings of beads or raffia cords slung diagonally across his chest and back. If there was a knifesheath attached, the novice would take the knife out and describe movements with it in the air during his roof dance and as he was being carried through the village on the shoulders of his male maternal relatives. If there were no sheath and knife, he would carry something else in his hand, such as a knife with bird designs or a small grass broom (formerly part of the chieftain's array). I have also seen novices carry scarves in their hands, and once even a civet skin. The knife sheath was usually long and rectangular in shape. Some Arabisés were specialized in the manufacture of these. In one case I saw a sheath with cross and crescent designs on it. When viewed at close quarters, these appeared to have been dictated b y the material — the lid o f a tin of the type that is opened b y a little ring, still carrying the English directions for use.

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The chieftain's leopard-skin hat was hemispherical in shape. It was mounted with red parrot feathers, whitish-brown owl feathers and, in the case of the All-Wagenia chief, white hen feathers. These hats were scarce and fairly expensive, although there might be more than one family possessing such a chief's hat in any given village, since the chieftainship might pass from one family to another, and a kap'ita also wore such a hat (cf. p. 49 above). At one circumcision ceremony it was proudly announced that the hat worn by one of the novices had cost 18 zaires ($ 36). The charge of hiring this sort of hat was an average of 1 zaire. If a family possessed such a leopard-skin hat, it was usually worn by the favourite son. Other types of head-covering were less prestigious. As substitutes for the leopard-skin hat, in the first place black and white or greyish brown monkey-skin hats were used. They were also hemispherical in shape, with the tail hanging down at the back, and were sometimes also adorned with feathers. If there was neither a leopard-skin nor a monkey-skin hat on hand, anything might be worn. I have seen, among others, straw hats, jockey caps, woollen caps and even a fez being worn. Both at the circumcision ceremony and the later parade the modern counterpart of the chief's hat, a boat-shaped leopard-skin cap, known as the toque révolutionnaire, which was often worn by the President of Zaire and other high functionaries, was widely used. There were some novices, in conclusion, who went through their circumcision ceremony bareheaded. There were two types of leopard-tooth chain in use. The bigger of the two consisted of twenty to thirty leopard teeth going all the way around. This was the kalondôli or mo ko ta's chain (cf. pp. 48 ff. above). The smaller chain was made up of only five to six teeth, supplemented by beads. This was the type with which the kapita used to adorn himself. Once I saw a chain of imitation leopard teeth skilfully carved from wood. For the neck-, arm- and leg-bands and belts almost invariably raffia strung with beads and small copper or plastic discs was used. The belt was usually made exclusively of copper discs cut from a tube and made up into a belt of four to eight parallel strings. The armbands were worn around the upper arm, the leg-bands just below the knee. Like the loin-cloth, these items of the novices' attire were in general use. This the novices supplemented with mostly modern elements.

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Sun-glasses were especially popular, even if there was heavy cloud and the glasses were much t o o big. Sometimes, in default of the real thing, the shape of a pair of sun-glasses was painted on the novice's face. Sun-glasses had long been a highly coveted item, n o t only because of the strength of the sun, but also on account of the prestige which the possession of a pair conferred on the owner. This trend was reinforced by the Zaire President's habit of wearing dark glasses. Hence a pair of sun-glasses constituted, in fact, a very fitting complement to the chieftain's array, just like the toque révolutionnaire. The village chief's example had been supplemented by that of the chef d'état. Besides sun-glasses, shoes, socks, wrist watches and once even a pair of earrings were used as extra adornments. The wearing of special clothes for a special occasion is such a universal phenomenon that I need not go into it further here. I do wish to go into the question of why the novice gave particular preference to wearing a chief's array on his circumcision day, however. For this we need to investigate what special significance the wearing of a chief's attire had. From the example of the offering made when lending a leopardskin hat to someone (p. 84 above) it was evident that this was n o t just any hat. The chieftain's array had to be treated with circumspection, as was apparent from all kinds of rules. So the wearer was not supposed to p u t it on himself, no more than he was allowed to p u t the chain around his neck himself. If the wearer was not really entitled to wear the items in question, a few words of reassurance were usually addressed to the ancestors, their former wearers, as they were being p u t on. Before being put on, the hat or chain was raised gradually higher in the vicinity of the wearer's body, while the spectators were asked 'Here?' each time it was raised, to which they then replied in the negative, until it was held above his head, when everyone answered 'Yes'. As a sign of benediction, the bystanders would then spit on the wearer. The acts of blessing and putting on the hat were closely related matters. Before Lesali pulled the canoe in which the Bina Nsoko were to migrate to their present territory out of the water, he first paid a visit to his grandfather. The latter p u t a hat — into the making of which the skin of a mermaid had gone, as the story goes — on his head by way of blessing. Lesali thereupon dragged the canoe to the surface, and the journey began, under the leadership of Lesali's brother, Mobveta (cf. p. 33 above).

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Alingi's son Elika was to go to camp, and on the morning of the day of his entry there, following the nocturnal feast, a short ceremony was conducted near the grave of Kalimasi,his father's mother's father (cf. Fig. 14), who had died in 1969, in the middle of the village. This was necessary because Elika lived most of the time in his father's mother's village, but for his initiation was going to the camp of his father's village. There had always been a relation of friendship between him and Kalimasi, to the Fig. 14 extent that the latter had sometimes hinted that Elika would succeed him as chief. Hence there was every reason not to let Elika's departure to the camp of the other village go by without any ceremony. A few members of father's mother's kin group assembled at the grave (genealogically they were FM, FMB, FMFW, FMFZ, and FMFFFBSS, cf. Fig. 14). At the head of the grave lay the chief's hat that had belonged to Kalimasi, while a glass had been put in the middle of the grave. One of the relatives had brought a bottle of beer. In a short speech he explained the situation to the dead man and invoked his protection for Elika. Then he took a mouthful of beer from the glass and spat it over the boy. The latter further had his chest and back rubbed with some earth from the grave and the hat put on his head. At the same time some beer was poured over the grave. The others attending the ceremony likewise took a mouthful and spat it on Elika. As all this was going on I myself happened to be asleep. It was observed by my wife and Miss Meijers, however. At the request of one of the members of the kin group I was subsequently awakened in order to spit on Elika and put the hat on his head as well. The wearer of the chieftain's array was not allowed to walk in the rain or have his feet touch the river water. A person wearing the chiefly raiment was not supposed to flee in times of armed conflict, either, as this amounted to an evasion of the role implied by the wearing of this apparel, namely that of peacemaker (cf. p. 49 above).

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As the Wagenia knew nothing about hunting, they had to procure the leopard skins and teeth from bush tribes. According to one informant, in the old days the Wagenia used to have hats made of fish stomachs; b u t they later became much more oriented towards the bush tribes (as became apparent from initiation as well). With the supplier of the chieftain's array the purchaser maintained a relation that was longer than life. I personally witnessed how some Bamanga who had once sold a chief's hat made a journey of a score or more kilometres on foot on the death of the chief in question to demand the payment to which they were entitled. In the case of an important article such as this the buyer-seller relationship did not seem to end with the conclusion of the transaction, as was evident from this particular example of continuing payments. When I purchased a chief's hat and chain from some members of another tribe once, the transaction did not terminate with the payment of the price, b u t was followed up with the sellers spitting on b o t h the buyers and the articles in blessing. It was quite an honour to be allowed to wear the chiefly array as a non-chief, as the wearer was also expected to display, or even possess, the dignity of a chief. The point of putting the hat on a person's head in order to soothe him (cf. p. 49 above) was that the wearing of the hat obliged the man to stay calm. At the conclusion of a contractual marriage the bride's sister attending her wore the chief's attire as a token of harmony between the two parties, as presupposed by the marriage, and with the aim of ensuring an amicable introduction of the bride with her in-laws. (Marriages by contract, in contrast with the marriage by elopement mentioned on p. 44 above, were arranged by the relatives of the two partners.) Soku, the chief of Bina Mongula, and one of my first informants, once had the daughter of his recently deceased brother participate in a regatta in his own place adorned with the chiefly ornaments. To him this constituted a consolatory gesture with which he gave expression to his feeling of responsibility towards the girl. Within the tribe, however, it was strongly condemned, under prediction of all kinds of calamities, which in fact never occurred. It shows anyway that this was a unique gesture, and that Wagenia culture left sufficient latitude for variations of this kind. It was also Soku who paid us a special visit at our house in town

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in order to show us the chieftain's dress. On that occasion my wife was specially chosen to wear the ornaments. The fact that it was the skin and teeth of the leopard which were used for the chieftain's array was connected with the leopard's being regarded as king of the animals, although in some fables he was also portrayed as a dunce. This symbolism has been adopted into the nationalistic sphere. The leopard is depicted on the state seal. The national soccer team bears the name 'Léopards'. A number of leopards form part of the setting in the gardens of the presidential palace. And, as we saw above, the toque révolutionnaire was made of leopard skin. The authority of the chief and of the head of state belong to the same plane through the symbolism of the leopard. Let us now turn back to the question of why the novices were preferably got up as chiefs on their circumcision day. The informants answered this question by referring to the prestige conferred on the wearer by this style of dress. I would like to go one step further by suggesting that in this way the boy was obliged to behave in such an exemplary manner, now or later, as to vindicate this claim to prestige. By the wearing of the chieftain's ornaments he had to be made aware of his extraordinary position and his responsibility as a future member of society. For one day he was the primus inter pares that a true chief, with his ideal and dignified demeanour, was supposed to be at all times. If the boy came from a chiefly family there was some chance that he himself might be a real chief one day, a possibility that was not excluded for the others, either. If the importance of the occasion had to be given expression through the wearing of special clothes, then the chief's attire was pre-eminently appropriate on this important day of initiation. Although the informants did not prompt this reply to us, they did repeat it after us. In conclusion of the present section on ornaments, I would like to mention that some men and women were adorned with the same bands around their arms, legs and necks and with similar belts as the novices.These ornaments were sometimes also worn by dancing-girls on other festive occasions. Some imaginative variations were the leg-bands and belts of clanging shells or bottle-tops worn by a number of women. People might also decorate themselves with plant materials. Many men wore monkey-skin caps of the same type as those worn by novices. One man regularly appeared with a cardboard

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imitation of a bear skin style of hat mounted with a few feathers. The intention behind it all was to underline the festive character of the occasion. The same is true of the practice of some people to paint themselves in various colours, just like the novices. Only where a pair of twins was being initiated did this painting of the body have a different significance. At the birth, death or illness of twins their relatives usually painted themselves as well. Sometimes the paint was applied in an even layer, sometimes only in a series of splotches or a few dots between and beside the eyes. Hereby the relatives indicated that they shared in the special status enjoyed by twins. Twins, in fact, were exceptional all the time, but were especially so at some passage or other. The exceptionalness of twins was evidenced by a variety of customs. The news of the birth of a single child was never announced by talking drum, but that of twins was. They had set names, like the child born of the same mother after them. There was a special song about twins which told of their equality, for fear of jealousy or sorcery between them. This song was sung at every special occasion in connection with twins, from the cradle to their grave. Mothers of twins had special healing powers attributed to them. The extraordinary birth of twins was coupled with the just as extraordinary ridiculing between the sexes. This began in the talking drum message, in which the mother's tshebanda was abused in sexual terms. But derisive remarks like 'big penis', 'big testicles', 'bald vagina', 'big vagina' and 'buttocks like Itshonja's big-hipped daughter' were exchanged by individual men and women as well. The dual unity of and rivalry between twins reflected the same characteristics as the two sexes. There was no room for the usual male dominance in this symbolism, however. Twins occupy a special position elsewhere in Africa as well (cf., e.g., Lagercrantz 1941; Evans-Pritchard 1956:128-133 (cf. LéviStrauss 1 9 6 3 : 79ff. on Nuer twins); Turner 1 9 6 9 b : 4 4 ff.; and Southall 1972).

CIRCUMCISION DAY

In the present section an outline will be given of the events on circumcision day. It will be supplemented by a number of general re-

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marks on this festive day. The details will be discussed in the following sections and the next chapter. On every circumcision day events followed a more or less set pattern. First the boys were adorned in the way described above. At the beginning of the festivities they would climb onto the roof from the rear of the house, to display themselves to the crowd gathered in front of the house and dance on the ridge to the rhythm of drums and singing. While so doing they were surrounded by patrilineal relatives and father's sister's sons. After thus dancing on the ridge of the roof for a few minutes, each novice would then give way to one of his brothers (real or classificatory). He himself was lifted onto the shoulders of his male maternal kinsmen from the edge of the roof at the front of the house. This was done with all novices, including the biggest. When all the sons of one particular house had had their turn, the procession moved on to the next house, mostly one of another tshebanda. There the roof dance would begin anew, untill all the boys of that house, too, had had their turn and been lifted onto their kinsmen's shoulders. This might be repeated once or twice more. All along the way there was lively dancing and singing, especially by the boys' close relatives. At a big circumcision feast the procession might include over fifty novices. When all the boys had been picked up, the procession would proceed in the direction of the river beach, to one of the permanent circumcision grounds. Here the circumcision, at which only men were allowed to be present, took place. When it was over, the procession would go in the direction of the camp or camps, following the same route at first. Here, too, female spectators were usually turned away. In camp the novices were received by the likili. If there was a sufficient number of novices who had been in camp for a longer time, these would stage a militarystyle parade in welcome. In 1970 for the first time this parade was repeated in the village in the presence of women and girls at the departure from camp. At the parade in camp a speech was delivered to the newly arrived. This might be followed by the appearance of a few of the so-called initiation animals, that is, musical instruments producing animal sounds which were played by men. The wounds were treated at the river beach, and later again in camp. The above is a rough outline of a circumcision day programme. In the present chapter I shall confine myself to a description of the events up to circumcision. The sequel will follow in Chapter 4. There

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the circumcision of the ikpandei, the last novice, will also be discussed. The atmosphere of a circumcision day may be imagined roughly as follows. Within the shortest possible time what was a quiet village would be transformed into a scene of exuberant gaiety. A large crowd of people, all in the highest of spirits, would take the village over completely. A mood of spontaneous solidarity prevailed. As the procession grew, the scene became more chaotic, with here, there and everywhere groups of men and women dancing around individual novices sitting high above the crowd on the shoulders of their maternal kinsmen. Each group sang different songs and did different dances. Drums were being played especially near houses where roof dances were being performed, while on the way from one house to the next, and eventually to the circumcision ground, there was dancing and singing without drum accompaniment as well. The groups of dancers were surrounded by less directly involved, less active and less profusely perspiring spectators. Particularly if there had been no rain for a few days there were clouds of dust rising everywhere. If the boys dancing on the roof performed well, there was general joy and satisfaction. The crowd was quite a motley one, and was composed of young and old, rich and poor, men and women, educated and uneducated, faithful and marginal churchgoers, people in rags and people decked out in their Sunday best, sober people and tipsy people, Wagenia from almost all bebanda and people from other tribes. Petty quarrels, such as about the distribution of money or beer, were also part of it all. The circumcision festivities drew some attention from the city of Kisangani. A number of Wagenia making a living by peddling Wagenia jewellery acted as self-appointed guides to tourists they had lured away from town. A Mugenia working as announcer for the local radio station announced one circumcision feast over the air, which further increased outside interest. Madly photographing Europeans formed an integral part of the picture presented by the circumcision feast. All this interest nevertheless had no effect on the way in which the Wagenia conducted the feast. They carried on with whatever they were doing quite unperturbed, as though there was no one watching them at all. No whites were admitted to the camp. A university colleague of mine said to me, when visiting one such circumcision feast, 'I feel just like a voyeur'. To this I, as an an-

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thropologist, could only reply, 'Yes, and some of us have to make a living by it'. At some circumcision feasts a certain boredom did eventually creep in. This was especially true if there were no important novices, or if there was only a small number of novices. In that case there was less widespread exuberance, because fewer kin groups were involved. As was mentioned above (p. 85), during the circumcision feasts the boys who would play a leading part at the next ceremony sat on display.

THE ROOF DANCE

Before the ceremony could start, first of all the novices had to be made ready and dressed in full array. Furthermore drummers, who usually came from neighbouring villages, had to be on hand. These normally received a few bottles of beer or a corresponding sum of money in remuneration for their services. Thirdly there had to be bearers, namely male relatives on the mother's side, available. In conclusion the arrival of men from neighbouring bebanda was awaited. Their presence was especially important for the beginning since it was more particularly they who carried the miti — 3- to 4-metre long, thin sticks stripped of their bark which were moved up and down in time with the music during the dancing. The announcement that the miti were approaching was the usual sign for the start of the celebrations. Instead of these long sticks other kinds of staff might also be carried, such as those made of palm ribs (used in the construction of houses and fish-traps), or anything else that came on hand, sometimes with leaves and all. I joined in in my own fashion with the microphone in my hand. As a rule the bebanda supplying the drummers and miti-beaxeis were also those which combined with the village of the hosts to form a team for the wrestling matches. Whether the miti should be regarded as phallic symbols is open to question. The only indication in this direction would be the custom of throwing these sticks into the water, like the foreskins, after circumcision. To the informants the idea of a phallic association seemed unusual. On one occasion a spear was carried instead of a stick, which might imply that the sticks were used as

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substitutes for spears. The roof dance was not devoid of martial elements,either. I have seen similar sticks used in other tribes (e.g., the Bamanga and Bakomo) to beat men who submitted themselves to this form of trial to show off their endurance on their bare chests and backs with horizontal strokes. At Wagenia circumcision feasts this feat was displayed if any of the novices had maternal relatives belonging to any of these tribes. By the time the circumcision festivities actually commenced, the women would as a rule already have been running through the village dancing and singing for quite some time, in some cases to the accompaniment of a small portable drum. By that time, too, the talking drum had been beaten regularly to announce the beginning of the celebrations. In houses where a roof dance was to be performed a crowd of relatives, whose kinship ties entitled them to a share of the beer which they now came to claim, had meanwhile assembled. The novices were sitting ready inside, usually all together in a small separate room. Most of them were given one last feed before the start of the festivities. Some people might drop in at the last minute to spit on the boys' chests and backs in blessing. The house where the novice was to perform his roof dance was not necessarily his parental home. Generally one house per tshebanda was used for this purpose. By way of exception, for instance if the number of novices was only small or there was no suitable house available, novices might dance on top of the house of another tshebanda. Shortly before the commencement of the festivities boys were to be seen making their way from one house to the next dressed in full array, sometimes covered with a cloth, and sometimes without any covering at all. In most cases the roof of the house where a dance was going to be performed had been provided with some bamboo strips or old boards from a canoe to prevent slipping on the leaf thatching or burning of the feet on the sun-scorched corrugated iron sheets. Sometimes the roof was decked with small flags and bunting. Occasionally there was also a piece of cloth tied to a pole, while sometimes the national or party flag was flown. Shortly after the visit of the Belgian royal couple one house was decorated with small Belgian and Zaire flags. In most cases a small ladder hastily improvised from some strips of bamboo had been put ready at the rear and front of the house to facilitate ascent and descent.

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The moment the roof dance began the crowd of relatives was turned out of the house to join the throng outside. There was always a large number of persons taking an active interest in the proceedings from beginning to end, even if they were not as immediately involved as the novices' close relatives. Mostly there was a crowd of an estimated thousand persons in all. The boys' fathers almost invariably played rather a modest role. Often they were the only persons to regulate the proceedings in any way at all. By and large the organization of the feasts ran silently, and everyone was in the right place at the right time. During the roof dance most of the fathers were to be seen bustling about in the vicinity of the house to make sure that their sons were ready in time. During the procession through the village the responsibility for the novices passed to their male maternal relatives, and what small part their fathers had had was virtually played out, although they could dance along with the youths. At the actual circumcision fathers were more often than not absent. Only after the boys got to camp and had first been attended to by their maternal relatives were their fathers assigned a role of some significance again. The roof dance usually started with the youngest novices and ended with the oldest. This order was occasionally broken if a younger novice was going to fulfil an important function, such as that of camp president or ikpandei, in the course of initiation. In that case his turn would come last. Each novice, once even a partly paralysed boy, danced solo on the ridge of the roof in turn. In general the boys assumed a grave, important air the moment they displayed themselves on the ridge after ascending the roof from the rear. Some would smile diffidently at the cheers of the crowd and play their part rather forcedly. Others would put on a special act as they came on, raising their hands in the familiar manner of the head of state, or blowing kisses to the crowd or making benedictory gestures. Often when an important novice made his entrance for the roof dance the drums were silenced to accentuate his appearance. On some of these occasions everyone else on the roof at the time would stop in the middle of their dance and sit down, to set off the novice's height, as it were. A frequently made gesture in the case of other novices, too, was that designed to indicate their size. Hereby a man would point out the length of the boy with his arms first, to lie down

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on the roof in front of him, as though he were looking up at a giant, subsequently. The novice was invariably represented as being big and strong. Some boys took advantage of the opportunity to announce by gestures the manner in which they wished to be circumcised. If a boy spread his arms horizontally, this meant that he did not wish to be supported while undergoing the operation. By putting three fingers in the air he indicated that he wanted to be circumcised in three phases — the ultimate in voluntary suffering, which conferred enormous prestige on the person undergoing it. Sporadically there were boys who were obviously very nervous. They did hardly anything, and just stood there with twitching mouth, as though on the point of crying. The dance of many of the bigger boys was rather posed, while the smaller boys did their earnest best with endearing artlessness. The enthusiasm of the crowd was a function of the quality of the dance, although for bigger novices, makpandéi and camp presidents it was unrestrained a priori. A boy was considered to dance well if he succeeded in rhythmically moving the lower part of his body. He was then allowed to remain dancing on the ridge for a little longer until being succeeded by another. Occasionally, if a novice had to make way for the next dancer too soon or if the drums stopped playing too quickly in the middle of the performance of the last dancer, petty quarrels might break out. For the men on the roof the dance of their own protégé could never last long enough. While swaying of the hips constituted the usual, basic mode of dancing, as we saw in the discussion of the nocturnal feast, the novice's dance seemed at first sight to have an extra dimension. The sexual connotation of the swaying of the hips on circumcision day may be interpreted as an allusion to circumcision. The rhythmical movements might be considered as being suggestive of coition, even though the strong sexual overtones of the dance were obvious without this, too. I once saw a little boy practising his roof dance in the village who took off his loin-cloth in the middle of it to see if his penis was moving along in time. As the roof dance was not devoid of other allusions to sexuality and procreation, which will be described below, an interpretation of the boys' dance in these terms seems certainly not too far-fetched. One or two boys made so bold as to introduce innovations in their

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roof dance. So one obviously drunk boy danced around in a little circle, to the slightly embarassed enthusiasm of the crowd. As during the nocturnal feast, the women were in the highest spirits. The majority held scarves in their hands, which they waved in time with the music.They redoubled their dancing and cheering particularly if a boy danced well. They also tried to imitate the dancers. Occasionally they shouted 'sukusu', the name of a popular modern dance. There were also women scattering rice as an expression of joy, according to some informants for the same reason as that why the inhabitants of New York City throw ticker-paper at the American President when he visits their city. I have noted down the improvised words sung and spoken by one elated woman in the course of the roof dance of a number of boys belonging to her kin group. 'Mother's child, mother's child, iyo, can he dance. Eat well (in camp). My, how well Albert's little son dances. That's it, Roger, iyo, tata (little father). Dance well, my little one, Angelema's and Endenda's little boy. Tata, alas, who will come and find me behind the house at night? What food will I prepare at night? Dance well, Hilaire, with whom will I be left tonight?' For most women initiation was a gay and festive event, even if it meant saying goodbye to their sons. But pride at their offspring took precedence over grief at the latter's departure. Only widowed or childless women sometimes gave vent to grief. They were immediately consoled and comforted by the other women, however. In some villages the women had bought dress material in bulk so as to be able to all appear in the same dress on circumcision day. My wife and Miss Meijers were invited to join them in this. Some women said that, out of consideration for the novice, it was improper to express sorrow at his departure. On the contrary, one should try to distract his mind from the operation and the uncertainty ahead of him by seeing him off with every possible festivity. There were invariably a number of men, and sporadically a girl or woman, dancing with the boys on the roof. People had the right to dance on the roof with the boys in father's or mother's village. By way of rare exception the novice's maternal relatives might join him, but strictly speaking this was against the rules. Their place was in front of the house, at the edge of the roof, where they were to take their sister's son on their shoulders. The Wagenia's tolerance of deviations from the rules has already been mentioned earlier.

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Where necessary, the dancers on the r o o f might instruct the dancing novice on h o w to dance. The m a x i m u m number of people dancing on any given roof was a b o u t twenty. I have o f t e n seen house owners try t o stop relatives intent on dancing f r o m climbing o n t o the r o o f as well. N o w and then a group o f girls might dance on the r o o f with the novice. T h e y m o s t l y did so with the u p p e r part of their b o d y uncovered, and the lower part covered with a rectangular piece o f cloth in front. This c u s t o m of having the novice's sisters dance with him was fairly old, its aim being to show the spectators that the family possessed not only sons. Whereas in former times Wagenia w o m e n used t o go around so scantily clad that the Wagenia o n c e saw themselves obliged to d e f e n d their w o m e n f o l k ' s honour b y waging a small-scale war against taunters f r o m other tribes, in 1 9 7 0 public nudity was b e c o m i n g an embarrassing thing. This was apparent f r o m the set, slightly a n n o y e d expression on s o m e o f the girls' faces and the haste with which they changed when the dance w a s over, as though to say that it was no fault of theirs if their fathers had taken it into their heads t o have them dance like that. That the c u s t o m in question was a dying one was apparent also from the fact that on all other occasions girls danced with the u p p e r part o f their b o d y duly covered. There was no limit to the imaginativeness of the p e o p l e dancing on the r o o f with the novices, especially with regard t o c o s t u m e . S o I saw one m a n with an old saucepan on his head and a m a c h e t e in one hand and a home-made ornament of leaves and small sticks in the other. T h e Wagenia had no m a s k s , so that the one time a m a n danced on a r o o f wearing one was an exception. There was once also a dancer who held an inflated plastic t o y hen in his hand. A r o u n d the time o f the Belgian royal visit m a n y dancers waved Belgian and Zaire flags during their performance. Although these examples are intended merely as an illustration o f the imaginativeness o f the dancers, the ornaments might also b e functional. T h e case is that during the r o o f dance p e o p l e were in the habit o f portraying specific themes. These might b e apparent from the telling get-up o f the dancers, or from things they carried in their hands. Or they were suggested b y charade-type m i m e s , in which the players acted out certain concepts for the instruction and a m u s e m e n t of the crowd in front of the house. Although an obvious innovation,

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sometimes the actors resorted to the spoken or written word. The themes on which variations were thus made up were circumcision, sex and procreation, the profession of the novice's father, and pride in the native tshebanda, while sometimes also simply caricatures of certain figures were aimed at. I shall give a few examples of this here. Circumcision was alluded to by making a cutting motion and at the same time pointing in the direction of the boy dancing on the ridge. Some novices might also make this gesture themselves. The showing of a pair of scissors, once the size of a pair of hedge-clippers, was intended to convey that the boy had already been relieved of his prepuce by modern methods in a clinic. By this means the Wagenia of the right bank made f u n of those of the left bank. For the latter still clung to traditional circumcision with the knife on the river bank, whereas the Wagenia of the right bank have tended to make greater use of medical facilities in the city (cf. the song on p. 145). I have also seen men sitting on the roof with a beer bottle or pounder clenched between their legs and rubbing the tip with a pained expression on their face. These objects occurred as phallic symbols outside the context of initiation as well. This brings us to the second theme, namely sex and procreation. The coupling of this with the first theme was by no means accidental, it should be noted. Quite frequently the men on the roof made jerking movements with the lower part of their bodies that were unmistakably suggestive of sexual intercourse. One man once pointed to the erection under his loin-cloth. Although sex may be an end in itself for the Wagenia, it is also to be regarded as a means towards the continuation of the tshebanda, a most important ideal (see p. 45 above). So I more than once saw the conception and birth of particular novices portrayed, in homage to their parents. Coition in these cases was enacted by two men. The one playing the female part would make a gesture to indicate swelling of the belly, and thereupon lie down. After that others would proceed to produce something supposed to represent the infant from under his loin-cloth. The real parents and son were pointed out all the while. The whole act was designed to convey that b u t for his parents this big, strong boy would never have been. Some women in the audience also alluded to this theme by word and gesture. So there were certain set phrases quite often to be heard from the mouths of women, such as, 'It's very good to have children',

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or 'The mother of the child with the child'. Once, when a married novice whose wife was pregnant was performing his roof dance, his mother-in-law enacted coition and swelling of the belly in the audience. And I have heard one woman shout at the top of her voice, while pointing to her breasts, 'I may have small breasts, b u t they have suckled many a child'. Women repeatedly pointed out their sons or grandsons to us. A third object for the housetop pantomime was the father's occupation. The idea behind this was to pay tribute to the father for keeping the boy alive by his labour all this time. Both traditional and m o d e m male activities were portrayed here. So one might see men manipulating a big net of the type used in fishing from either the river bank or a canoe. In villages with katilo-fishing rights demonstrations of fishing with this small landing-net were given on dry land. The fish caught was represented by a beer bottle, which was then smashed to pieces with a club like that with which normally fish caught with a katilo are killed. Furthermore, the metal bars used to make holes for the posts of the fish-trap frames in the rocky river-bed might be manipulated. Apart from these activities, urban occupations were also enacted or represented by specific objects. A steering-wheel made of sticks and lianas indicated that the father was a driver. The inner tube of a car tyre being held aloft conveyed that the father was a car mechanic. The house of a buvette-ovmex on circumcision day was decorated with gramophone records which on ordinary days were played in his bar. Another subject, to which I already alluded in the discussion of sex as a theme, was that of pride in the native tshebanda. This was enacted in various ways. Firstly, there were frequent allusions to the tshebanda's glorious war record. In this connection the novices usually wielded some weapon or other, or, if they were wearing the chiefly array, the knife going with this, as they were performing their dance. Other objects, such as small decorated hatchets, spears, bows and arrows, clubs, and even a wooden imitation knife and a toy gun bought in town were also used for this, however. Some novices held their hatchet back to front, like a pistol. The men dancing with the novices might also carry such objects, as well as home-made imitation guns and pistols, and shields or objects meant t o represent shields, such as dishes and plastic buckets. Aside from the mtti, the men might wield spear-like

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objects, such as an umbrella stem or a table leg, for instance. In some cases they fought a mock battle, either among themselves or against the imperturbably dancing novice. In the latter case the attacker invariably portrayed his own defeat. Sometimes an eating gesture was made, meaning: if there were no government, we would eat our enemies. Evidently in less peaceful days the entire display was intended as a provocation to potential enemies. Once a real fight broke out during a roof dance, with a bottle of beer as stake. The second way in which pride in the native tshebanda was expressed was by pointing out the perseverance with which hardships had been overcome. Particularly families which had suffered under the bloody rebellion of 1964 gave expression to their pride at the newly advancing generation of sons replacing their murdered fathers in this way. Here the emphasis clearly lay on initiation as the presentation of the new generation. So one novice carried a plate with the name Kalonda inscribed on it on his hat, this being the name of a man from the same family who had been killed by the rebels in the city in 1964 in retaliation for a former allegiance. At the same time a plate bearing the words uwa bao, which is corrupted Swahili for 'kill them', a popular cry at public executions in that period, was displayed. Another reference to the rebellion was provided by the realistic enactment of a murder on a kinsman, in which the actors pretended to kick and beat a man until he remained lying motionless. At one circumcision feast a notice with the following text appeared on a roof: 'SOYEZ LE BIENKOYA (= le bienvenu) Nul barrage dressé par les anti-Bonghanda ne peut nous empêcher d'être toujours en avant et de se multiplier encore d'avantage. Nous vous assurons que nous avons beaucoup trimer pour conduire la famille Bonghanda à la prospérité en autant de temps que les rebelles ont mis pour la mener à la ruine.' (WELCOME. No barrier put up by the anti-Bonghanda will prevent us always being ahead and multiplying still more. We assure you that we have made every effort to bring the Bonghanda family to prosperity in as much time as it has taken the rebels to bring it to ruin.) At the same time a banana trunk was carried in by one of the roof dancers, which the audience immediately understood as a reference to the saying iba yd bosb na yd mailt, 'the first and the next field', i.e., just as there were children in the previous generation, so it is

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now my turn to beget children (as though the latter were agricultural products like the banana). That a banana tree served as symbol for this proverb was far from surprising, as this plant puts out new shoots as soon as the old stem is cut down. On another roof a mock battle modelled on those of the rebellion was staged, while a sign bearing the present name of the square on which the executions took place, Place des Martyrs, was held up. But events other than the rebellion also prompted the performance of little plays of this kind on the roof. In 1970 a large number of houses in Bina Nkulu had been appropriated and demolished by the State in order to make room for a big open space with a so-called paillote, where the festivities for the Belgian royal visit could take place. It was also to be used in future for the reception of other important visitors and tourists. The signs displayed during the roof dance on the roofs of two houses of two particular bebanda remaining after the execution of this measure carried the following texts: 'La seule maison restée. Comprend cent-cinq (105) personnes, les garçons, les filles et les vieillards. Pdt (pendant) la guerre, les gamins joueront au football, les filles apporteront des cailloux et les femmes iront au marché.' (The only house left. Includes 105 persons, boys, girls and old people. During the war the little boys will play football, the girls will fetch stones and the women will go to market. (In other words, life will go on almost as usual.)) 'La famille Bina Bileka. Auparavant elle avait 5 maisons, actuellement il nous reste q u ' u n e seule. Toute autre a été détruite par la réconstruction de la nouvelle paillotte.' (The Bina Bileka family. Formerly it had 5 houses, at present only one is left us. The others have been destroyed by the reconstruction of the new paillote.) Pride in the native kin group might further find expression in symbols indicating the wealth of the group. So many men danced with lengths of material hung from a cord around their waists to show that there was a reserve of unused cloth. On one roof four bottles of beer were shaken and their contents allowed to spurt out as a sign that the owners could afford such waste. On another roof beer was ostentatiously drunk during the roof dance. I have also seen novices throw small coins or lollies into the crowd during their roof dance. One man of means arranged for his younger brother's circumcision day to coincide with the opening of a buvette, which he advertised during the roof dance by pointing in the direction of his business.

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Some bebanda tried to acquire prestige through any of their novices occupying important positions. At the same time the kin group's riches were hinted at. Tombaela, the father of the boy who was to be camp president in Bina Ongelo bore the by-name François Tombalbaye. When his son was due to perform his roof dance a sign was displayed bearing the words 'Vive François Tombalbaye, président de la République du Tchad. Un long voyage commence par un pas.' (Long live François Tombalbaye, president of the Republic of Chad. A long journey begins with a step.) This represented a variation not only on the father's by-name, but also on the custom of regarding initiation camps as states, complete with functionaries. Since mostly the State of Zaire was taken as model, with this variation an element of genuine variety was introduced. When the president elect appeared on the roof, the drums were silenced (under the protest from a few of the older men, who did not think it proper that the roof dance should be interrupted and felt that speeches were only in place in camp). The younger brother of the novice's father, who himself had been rot on the Belgian model, at the previous initiation, held a short speech announcing that the président would see to it that all wage arrears were paid. As a token of this a piece of paper and a pen were handed to the president, who thereupon proceeded to sign the appropriate ordonnance-loi. This was an allusion to the custom whereby a camp president treated the entire tribe to food and beer at the planting of the flag either in camp during initiation or in the village later. In the course of a similar speech in another village the father stated that, although the costs of the previous initiation had not yet been fully paid, he had already put 30 zaires (60 dollars) aside for the men. At this a Zaire flag was thrust into the president's hands (an allusion to the planting of the flag which was to follow later), and his roof dance began. On this occasion, too, signs were displayed, saying, among other things, 'Quartier présidentiel vous accueille avec des bras ouverts' (The presidential quarter welcomes you with open arms), and 'Dr. Nimo Michel, président dynamique de la tsheamba de l'I.T.B. Justice, Paix, Travail' (Dr. Nimo Michel (the name of the boy), the dynamic President of the tsheamba of the I.T.B. (the usual terminology for referring to the head of state, and the name of the camp, which will be explained

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on p. 142). Justice,Peace, Endeavour (the State motto).) The latter text had also been printed and copies of it nailed to a number of trees. A final example of expressions of pride in the native tshebanda was that of the wearing of a loin-cloth hanging down as far as the ankles. Its inordinate length was an indication of the size of the kin group. In conclusion I would mention the representation of certain states and feelings by miming. So someone would sit down at the edge of the roof with a wronged expression on his face, as though to say, 'No one is taking any notice of me'. Once marijuana was smoked on a roof, with the smokers showing by elaborate signs the euphoric state they were in. Marijuana smoking was prohibited by law, it should be mentioned in passing. After this description of the roof dance, I would like t o attempt an interpretation of the custom. In the previous chapter (p. 9 0 ) I have already put forward a number of explanations given by novices. Dancing on the roof represented a public farewell, the informants said. It underlined the tshebanda's growth and wealth in sons. One elderly informant said, 'It is a population count'. It was further regarded as an expression of joy. To this I would like to add that the roof dance served to a high degree to dramatize the novice's departure, especially for the novice himself. I personally was once invited to join in the dancing on the roof of our neighbours in Bina Mongula, and the most vivid impression I have retained of it is the spectacle of the swaying, cheering crowd, whose eyes were all turned to the dancers on the roof, in particular the novice. S o m e boys, especially the smaller ones, were visibly impressed by this, often even in anticipation. It was also asserted by some that the dance was intended to dispel the b o y s ' apprehension of the painful operation and the temporary isolation. One might further imagine that his public appearance here would oblige him to maintain his own and his family's honour later, during circumcision, too. Any novice creating a strong, grown-up impression during the roof dance would make extra sure not to lose his reputation during circumcision. The fact that the boy danced chiefly together with men on the roof was no coincidence, either. It gave him a foretaste of his life in the typically male society of camp. At the same time one of the themes of initiation was thus acted out: the boy was acting in unison with his paternal relatives, while his maternal kinsmen stood looking on.

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This leaves us with the question of whether the fact that the dance was performed on the roof had any special significance. In m y view the sole reason for dancing here was that it was a conspicuous place. I know of a case of the spirit of a deceased man appearing to people from the top of a roof. In a like way the leaders of the 'Union Chrétienne de Charité' (see p. 55 above) had made it their custom to climb onto a roof to pray early on Sunday mornings. For an explanation of this practice they appealed to the àuthority of the Bible, though I personally think it just as likely that it was influenced by Wagenia tradition. Nor should any special significance be attached, in the opinion of informants, to the boys' proceeding from the rear to the front of the house. This was no more unusual than the Western convention of having actors enter the stage from the wings rather than the auditorium. TO THE CIRCUMCISION GROUND

After all the boys (who might total more than twenty) had performed their roof dance on top of one particular house, the procession would move on to the next house, where more novices were picked up. The novice made the trip from the roof to the circumcision ground on the shoulders of his male maternal relatives in a wide sense of the word. The maternal relatives have already been mentioned several times in the aforegoing. If all went according to the rules, they attended the nocturnal feast. The boys' hair was shorn or shaved off by female maternal relatives. And finally the male maternal relatives acted as bearers on circumcision days. As we also saw above, the maternal relatives received a payment ipso facto because their sister's son was being circumcised. Further down we shall see how the bearers received an additional payment in remuneration of their services during the procession through the village. Mother's relatives were intensively involved in the entire proceedings. On one occasion I heard a woman loudly calling the name of her village on the appearance of her sister's son on the roof. The novice might also call the by-name of his mother's tshebanda, after that of his own, while undergoing circumcision. This just about sums up the maternal relatives' role at circumcision. In camp the men from mother's tshebanda were only

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occasional visitors, while during the integrational phase following the period in camp they were virtually always absent. By way of rare exception a boy might pass his initiation period in the camp of his maternal relatives, however. This might be the case where fears were held of sorcery in the camp of father's relatives. A boy might even move to the other camp on this account right in the middle of this period. Another reason for a boy's staying in the camp of his mother's tshebanda might be neglect by his paternal relatives following divorce, for example. In explaining the part played by the maternal relatives, the decreasing significance of that part in the course of initiation should be taken into consideration. In point of fact, they performed important tasks only during séparation. Leave-taking was primarily a farewell from mother and her kin, even though it was not a permanent goodbye. The initiation effected merely a shift in emphasis, insofar as this had not occurred already, from mother and her relatives to father and his tshebanda. During the separation phase mother's relatives played a prominent part once more for the last time, after that to give way to the boy's patrilineal relatives for the rest of his life, and, as a symbol of this, for the rest of the initiation proceedings. In the light of the above, the presence of mother's relatives at the nocturnal feast becomes more comprehensible, though in practice little seemed to come of this any more, possibly because they were not allotted a special task. The role of the maternal relatives particularly in connection with transitional symbols was quite striking. Shaving of the head obviously symbolized a break (Van Gennep 1909: 238). An old period was closed and a new period beginning. The act of carrying the novice also constituted a symbol of transition (Van Gennep 1909:265). It represented a transfer. The novice was in transit — no longer where he was before and not yet where he was going. He was not even allowed to touch the ground with his feet in the interval between his roof dance and his circumcision. The operation itself, during which the boy was also supported by his mother's kinsmen, once again represented a severance, like the shaving of the head, designed to indicate a break. The severance of the ties with mother's relatives even so was not a permanent one. It was a matter of the novice's slackening these ties, but not renouncing them. This became apparent from the payment made to these relatives, whereby appreciation of their solicitude for

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their sister's son was expressed. This payment was not the last to take place between the paternal and maternal relatives in the boy's life, what is more. Notwithstanding the patrilineal tendency, relations with the bride-givers were never broken off completely, but were continued via the children born of the union. In the same way as it would be wrong to speak of a radical severance of these ties, so it would be incorrect to assert that father's relatives played no role in the boy's life until his initiation. For their presence was definitely felt before this, just as that of the maternal relatives would continue to be felt after initiation. Father's tshebanda became unmistakably dominant at this juncture. As a sign of this father's relatives danced on the roof with the boy, as though the case had already been decided in their favour anyway, so that they could leave the maternal relatives to their own devices with an easy mind. On the boy's reaching adulthood the biologically conditioned state of dependence on mother, as whose deputies the maternal relatives acted, in point of fact, came to an end. This was the time when the boy definitively became a member of the group formed by his father and brothers, when he ceased being a child and became a man. Hence during initiation the patrilineal system was renewed and reaffirmed. The fact that the boy had resided in his father's village all his life facilitated his transition to his ultimate destination. After these explanatory remarks I shall now turn back to the description. As a rule the boy remained on his kinsmen's shoulders until the circumcision ground was reached. The bearers changed regularly. Especially in the case of big novices, carrying a weight roughly their own was no mean task. Feats of physical strength were by no means alien to the Wagenia, however, as has already been testified by their fishing activities, regattas and wrestling matches. We shall see time and again below that to make the boys big and strong was one of the principal goals the Wagenia set themselves with their initiation. Each bearer and novice was surrounded by a group of dancing people. If the novice was married, his wife might follow him among them and hold her husband by his belt or hand. This provides an illustration of my remarks (p. 72 ff. above) on the growing interval between initiations. While the boy was being initiated because he supposedly still belonged to the women's group,his wife was walking by his side as a living symbol of his maleness. The bearer also took part in the dancing, the novice being more

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or less turned around his own axis as he was being moved to and fro in time. Between houses usually a halt for some on-the-spot dancing with drum accompaniment was made every few hundred metres. Whenever a big drum was passed, it was played for a moment to provide an extra accompaniment to the dancing or to beat out a message concerning initiation. If rain was threatening, the characteristic message was beaten out which defies the rain to fall. Whenever there was such dancing on the spot a circle might form, with one person leading the dance. This circle could be of mixed composition, although it was just as likely for a circle to be formed around the women and novices by the men. As the circumcision ground came nearer and the actual leave-taking approached there were almost constant round dances of this kind. If there was sufficient time, the procession would follow a roundabout route through the village first, to go in the direction of the circumcision ground by a fixed route only for the final stages. On arrival there the dancing would continue for quite some time, because the circumcisers could not attend to all the boys at once anyway. If there was an especially large number of novices, say more than fifty, it might even come to pass that, while some of them had already been carried away to the circumcision ground, for the others somewhere else in the village the roof dance had yet to commence. On one occasion the procession, on reaching the last houses of the village, made an about-turn and then a mass run for the circumcision ground. Mostly, however, things went at a slower, more relaxed pace. The women were in the habit of dancing towards novices they knew in order to press 10-makuta notes (= 20 dollar-cents) between their lips on the way to the circumcision ground. This was invariably removed again straightaway by one of the men dancing around these novices, the money being destined for the bearers. Sometimes a careful account was kept of the money so received in order to avoid quarrelling over its distribution. Generally the bearers collected about 2 zaire (= 4 dollars) in this way, which they almost invariably converted into beer at the end of the festivities. The fact that the women gave the money to the boy and not direct to the bearers symbolized the former's marginal position between his paternal and maternal relatives. Occasionally boys were to be seen dancing on the roof with the notes already in their m o u t h or on their forehead under their hat. If a boy wanted to keep the money for himself, he was loudly

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taunted with the words, 'What would you want to do with the money in camp, what can you buy there?' Advantage of this intermediate position in the relation between paternal and maternal relatives was taken when a mediator between two palavering bebanda in disputes over such matters as payments was needed. As a rule someone belonging to one of the parties, but whose maternal relatives belonged to the other, with the relationship being sufficiently distant for the man in question not to be most immediately involved, was sought for this. Aside from inserting these notes between the novices' lips, the women busied themselves over money in another way. Even before the commencement of the roof dances they went around the village in groups to collect money. Part of the latter they handed over to the bearers. The rest the women, who might be related to the boy either through his father or his mother, kept for themselves in order to be able to buy themselves beer. In view of the pride in sons, it is understandable that the novices' relatives were on their guard against sorcery directed at them. So a careful watch was kept on the women bringing the boys money and on the people who, in accordance with the custom, came up to the novices to rearrange part of their costume if it had become disarranged as a result of the rocking and swaying of the dancing. Once during a heavy downpour one woman walked in the rain all by herself, while everyone else took shelter, shouting accusingly, 'Who has brought down rain during our initiation?' On one house a notice bearing the exhortation 'Leave all envy behind you' in Swahili was displayed during the roof dance. There were also songs agitating against sorcery. During the circumcision feasts the initiation camps were closed to outsiders. A constant guard was kept at their entrances to prevent persons bent on sorcery from penetrating inside while the men of the village were busy with the circumcision celebrations elsewhere. At the 1970 initiation there were once a funeral and a circumcision feast in the same tshebanda on the same day. The effect of this on the the circumcision feast was characteristic. The deceased man's son went walking past all those attending the feast, calling, as he pointed to his son who was being carried to the circumcision ground, 'My father is dead, but there he goes'. This is another illustration of the view taken of initiation as the advance of the new generation,

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by which continuinty of the tshebanda is ensured. So there was no reason for not holding a funeral and a circumcision on the same day. The two events were complementary. As a result the nocturnal feast and circumcision ceremony were never put off in connection with a death. At another circumcision feast the procession carrying the novices crossed the path of a funeral procession from another village. The drums were silenced, everyone stood still, and most people crossed themselves as the coffin passed. Some of those in the circumcision procession joined the funeral procession to help carry the coffin for a while, according to Wagenia custom. Frequently at the circumcision feasts a crooked, m o n o t o n e pipe in the shape of an inverted letter h could be heard playing. It was played by blowing into the top of the longer of the two legs, into which a hole had been bored. This produced the same sound as blowing into the end of a hollow key. I saw several men playing this pipe, also at the departure from the camps, in the course of time. They had all kinds of objects, such as a piece of bandage, a small parrot feather, a length of coiled plastic wire, a vertebra and a Zaire flag attached to them. The bore was alleged to contain medicines. Although this object was called literally 'initiation pipe', I have the impression that it could be used to utter curses and threats against people threatening to disturb the normal course of affairs in general. Pipes of this kind were found among other tribes in the area as well, the one described above originating from the Bamanga. At one circumcision feast a simpler type, which was straight and about a decimetre in length, was used. Sutton Smith (n.d.: 59) tells of a pipe among the Lokele which was blown to cause injury to the unknown thief of a person's belongings. This was usually done after first issuing a public warning to return the stolen goods. In 1970 the h-shaped instrument was played against women who allegedly harboured intentions of disclosing the secrets of initiation. After blowing on it, the imprecation 'May the woman disclosing the initiation from now on never bear children', for instance, would be shouted. Other curses were that such loose-tongued women might become as crooked as the pipe, that they might never be able to suckle children again, or that they might bear crippled or dead children. There was no greater calamity one could predict a Wagenia

To the circumcision

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woman than that her fertility was in danger. Aside from women, the pipe was also played against a particular novice suspected of lighting the fire in one of the camps which will be mentioned below (p. 206). Hautefelt ( 1 9 2 3 : 2 0 7 ) , who observed the Wagenia initiation of 1913 and 1914, mentions a kind of pipe which was blown to keep the women away from the circumcision ground. Before rounding off the present chapter with an analysis of the texts of some of the songs sung at circumcision feasts, I would like to point to the phenomenon of the reversal of roles between the sexes. Some examples of this have already been given in the description of the nocturnal feast. But it was occasionally also to be observed at circumcision feasts. At one circumcision feast a woman carried a small stick with black and white rings inserted in her loin-cloth to resemble a phallus. At another feast a woman carried a banana stem between her loin-cloth in the same way. The latter was a symbol of both the penis and fertility. We have already seen above (p. 127) that the Wagenia were familiar with the banana as a symbol of continued fertility. Among the Walengola, a neighbouring tribe on the left bank of the Zaire, I observed how a few women had dressed up one of their number as a man, complete with a skilfully made imitation phallus, one circumcision day. This she-mam acted like a complete simpleton and was led from one group of men to the next while the other women sang a satirical song. I have never seen this sort of thing carried as far among the Wagenia, however. As we shall see below, Wagenia men were not exactly self-effacing on other occasions, particularly in camp, either. Men dressed up as women for the roof dance were seen twice. I have also seen men wearing a ladies' wig, some with a dainty scarf tied around it, several times. Novices also occasionally wore ladies' wigs. At one circumcision feast 13 of the 17 novices dancing on the roof wore earrings, evidently a local variation. I was told that during the independence celebrations of 1960 there had been large-scale transvestism on either side. During my stay in Zaire boys with girls' scarves around their heads were occasionally to be seen at the annual independence day celebrations. A reversal of roles sometimes also occurred in connection with the singing of particular songs. Women quite frequently sang songs which were strictly speaking reserved to the men and appropriate

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to the actual initiation in camp, but could of course also be heard in the village, as the camp was never far away. Once a few old women carried the miti which are usually borne by men during the circumcision ceremony. I further saw a woman giving a lively demonstration on dry land of manipulating a men's fishing-net once, as though she had caught a huge fish in it. I twice saw women wielding a hatchet while dancing. Likewise the women jumping into the water after the circumcision of a boy belonging to their kin group, in the same way as the men, were playing a male role. Looking for an explanation, one might interpret the reversal of roles in the women's case as an expression of envy at the male role. But this does not explain why the men did the same. My informants, when questioned about this, stated that in the old days male transvestism had been uncommon. The sporting of an artificial penis by women had been much more widespread, but this habit had fallen into disuse under Christian influence. The two men who dressed up as women were unable to state a clear motive for this on questioning. One said he had done it for a joke, while the other asserted that the idea had occurred to him because he and his wife took about the same size in clothes. I even so do not wish to confine myself to examples of women playing men's roles. In explanation of this latter I need only point to the dominant position of men, which the women then supposedly made the target of their spite and derision through a reversal of roles (cf. Norbeck 1963:1256-1260). It would be a mistake, moreover, to go looking for an individual explanation for each case in which an attribute of the one sex was copied by the other. It seems more correct to assume that a disruption of the cultural order may act as a catalyst for reversal at another point in that same order (cf. Turner 1969b: 183-185;Douglas 1960:ch. 6). In the indefinite atmosphere characterizing a transition, other classifications and categories, too, may be affected by the liminal euphoria in which everything is still possible. The novices' temporary position between two stools led people to play a game of musical chairs in other spheres of life as well as soon as there was the slightest room for association. The opposition of initiated versus uninitiated came to be related to other oppositions. These thus were interchangeable. Circumcision offered an open invitation to exploitation

The texts of the songs

139

of the field of sex differences for reversal. How this association was made in the case of the birth of twins was seen earlier in this chapter (p. 116). This does not offer a completely satisfactory explanation for transvestism at the independence celebrations. Here there was definitely an element of disruption of the existing order as a result of the transition from the colonial period to independence. But how the association with the sex roles was made from this particular transition is not clear. Here, too, an opposition was involved, at any rate. I would like to give just one more example of a reversal of roles in this connection, though this time in a field other than that of sex differences. Twice at a circumcision feast I witnessed people suddenly bursting into a Christian song in the midst of all kinds of other songs. Thus an element belonging to one particular context was introduced into another. This created incongruity of a kind which to some was amusing, but to others may have been offensive. So it might be interpreted as a harmless joke aimed at churchgoers who refused to have anything to do with initiation. To me it would seem, however, that here as well the indefiniteness of the marginal phase was reverberating in another sphere of life under the influence of the gaity of the moment. The association was probably multiple. There was singing as in church, even though the songs there were of a different kind. The songs may moreover have been directed against the Church's attitude towards initiation. In the first case a third association suggested itself quite obviously. Here the singers went dancing through the village at high speed, the text of the song being: 'Let us rejoice, we have come to the way of God'. In the other case the song was one that was normally sung exclusively in the 'Union Chrétienne de Charité'. Whereas this union as such had not adopted a definite stand vis-à-vis initiation, and many of its members took an active part in it, its three leaders were having nothing to do with any of the initiation activities. Whether the song was directed against them I do not know.

THE TEXTS OF THE SONGS

As in connection with the nocturnal feast, I would now like to subject the texts of the songs sung on circumcision day to an analysis.

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I have chosen approximately 75 texts which were translatable as basis. Of most songs different versions, to a maximum of ten, were recorded. A number of themes recurred again and again. Pride in the native tshebanda was reflected in 19 texts or fragments of texts. Circumcision itself was the subject of 15 songs, and the novices' departure that of 13. Twelve texts had the relations between the sexes as subject. Eleven texts dealt with the numerousness or otherwise of the naave group. In addition there were songs about historical events (7 times), as at the nocturnal feast. Besides these few fairly frequent themes, there were a great many subjects which were treated in from one to three texts. So there were songs railing against sorcery and songs about death, famous wrestlers, twins (if there were twins being initiated), the rivalry between the two opposite banks in connection with traditional versus modern circumcision, and the importance of procreation. I shall now take a closer look at some of the above-mentioned categories, and give a few examples of each. Songs reflecting pride in the native tshebanda appeared to be relatively the most frequent. This linked up with the desire for autonomy on the part of the bebanda in Wagenia society as a whole. These songs showed no trace of the segmentation process, on the other hand, at any rate not of the most recent effects of this. The informants were not actually conscious of this process. 'Bakonga will outstrip the Wagenia in all things. Round up the strangers, so they may go home, those who do not pass by day (i.e., who have something to hide). Lomame and Lobenga (two Bakonga village chiefs).' 'We of Bina Nsilekpe, we are vindictive, we leave nothing unavenged, we are like the fog, we blind people.' 'Bina Ngembe and Bakonga, Bina Nkulu has become capital, Bina Nkulu has become the government (the literal words used for this were 'the white man'), Bina Nkulu has become Europe, do you hear, Bina Nkulu has become capital' (cf. p. 128 regarding the Belgian royal visit and the construction of apaillote). Closely related to the theme of pride in the native village was that of the prolificness of the native kin group. Towards non-prolificness an ambivalent attitude was assumed. Although on the one hand people expressed regret at this, on the other they tended to regard it as a

The texts of the songs

141

handicap which redounded to the group's greater glory if the latter played a prominent role notwithstanding. 'You who are numerous, be numerous. We Nsilekpe and Ongelo (have) two camps, Mbolombisa and Yasanga (have) one camp. We are initiating Ngonge, one boy; this is the end of us, woe to us. You of the camps, initiate yourselves; we are putting on a show with Andre's house, we have no initiation camp (in other words, we have only a small camp); there comes Amanga with a briefcase' (with money, Amanga being the rich man of the village). 'Go ahead, Wagenia, Bakonga is coming' (we may not look strong, but we will certainly catch up with you, we can afford to be behind). 'We are the mothers of a populous village, the village that steals people. If there were no whites (i.e., government) around, we'd be the leopard on the hill.' 'You tiny families in a big village, Meuwa of Yasanga, Amita of Nsinga, you will dread Bakonga. We will follow later, without haste. We of Bina Nsinga have no pregnancies, (but) we are awake.' For villages counting only a few boys an initiation feast was an exceedingly painful affair, even though hopes for the future ('our turn will come') were constantly reiterated. Conversely, procreation was regularly glorified, sometimes in a short line inserted into a song. So there was a popular song called 'Ambamba kelekele' (Ambamba, thanks), on which the following variation was sometimes made, 'Childbirth, thanks'. I further mentioned songs on the events being celebrated themselves, namely the novices' departure and circumcision. 'Mother, I'm being initiated, with the little bell and the belt. My tears fall like the rain.' 'Behold the child first, Wagenia. It's getting difficult' (circumcision is drawing near). 'Don't leave, you're causing your body anxiety.' A few songs were sung preferably at the actual moment of farewell, which people really would rather have deferred. While some novices were already descending to the river beach, the others were still being carried around on the shoulders of their dancing maternal uncles. 'The initiation has begun, Wagenia, go to the beach (while we remain here a little longer). Tshebeke is not afraid of the rain, Tshebeke protects against the rain. The initiation is doing steps on the

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spot; go to the beach, Wagenia. Leave us, we are still drinking beer' (Tshebeke is a bird with a circling flight). 'Leave with the women's dance, Ilongo, return with the women's dance, Ilongo' (Ilongo also being a bird. In this dance people move to and fro). There were also songs in which the novice was given a last piece of advice or was prepared for what was ahead of him. 'When you leave for camp, don't come telling tales (about camp) in the village.' 'Little novice, don't give the initiation away' (the smelliest are bound to be the first to let their tongue run away with them). In one song the singers made believe that the novice had to come from afar by boat. It contained a reference to a Bakonga camp,namely 'I.T. B.' {— Integrated Tug Boat — personal communication by Dr. J. F. Carrington), the name of the boats on the service between Kinshasa and Kisangani. It also contained an allusion to the food normally delivered by these boats, which the women were to prepare for the boys in camp. 'You who are initiating, initiate. We have wired Mokako, we are waiting for the boat and the telegram. I.T.B. is mooring with bananas and fish.' Variation: 'The plane has just arrived with Mokako with the flag.' (The significance of the flag will be discussed in the next chapter.) The novices received advice in connection with circumcision as in the following song addressed to one Kaboa: 'Don't cry Kaboa, don't cry at circumcision. If you don't cry we'll go to Baraka's (a buvette), we'll spend zaires (in celebration), how angelic your face is.' If this had no effect and the boy cried nevertheless, the song 'Knife, you were not afraid, the heart has regrets' was sung. In another song the novice was compared to the wagtail (because of his loin-cloth bobbing up and down at the back) crossing the river (a passage that was just as dangerous as circumcision and initiation). 'Kalenda, you'll drown; where is the water; you're crossing the river, you're afraid of the water.' In the next song the word 'ibekubeku' imitated the sound of the novice's weeping and panting (bvekubveku = panting). 'The foreskin of the child's penis hurts. Ibekubeku, zero (there's

The texts of the songs

143

no help anywhere). Cut off the foreskin. The men ibekubeku. The testicles ibekubeku.' The circumciser, Mbile, was admonished in three different texts. Below follow a few lines from the first two of these. 'Mbile and Liya (his assistant), drink no more, don't go and cir cumcise our ikpandei on the beach (if you're drunk).' 'You there, you're twisting the penis, Mbile, what's this, what's this.' In the third text the women addressed the circumciser about the penis causing them suffering during coition. One might therefore also regard it as a request for revenge, something to the effect of 'if we suffer, let the penis suffer, too'. 'Mbile, circumciser of the penis, look at the penis, for the penis is drunk (variation: the penis upsets).' The circumciser was sometimes also compared to a court of law, viz. 'Let us go to court first'. For a proper insight into the relation between the sexes the following popular text is important. In it the women expressed their scorn and suspicion at the men's doings in connection with circumcision. They said they were being deceived by the men, who did not really circumcise, but only rubbed blood onto the boys' penis. Meanwhile, the women were expected to prepare food for the boys in camp, of which in all probability, bordering on certainty, the men would also eat, thus bringing themselves under suspicion of arranging the whole thing for the sake of gorging themselves. Not one of the women really believed what she was singing, because it was only too obvious that the boys actually were circumcised. They were moreover allowed still to see the likili and ikpandei after their circumcision. 'They're tricking us, they're drawing the penis back; we were at the beach, they took blood and rubbed it onto the penis. We were at the market to buy them manioc leaves for ntongo' (ntongo being a nutritious dish prepared especially for novices, but also for women in childbed, for example). On this song the following variation was sung by the men: 'They're drawing the vagina back', whereat the men and women shouted abuse at each other, exchanging such names as 'big penis', 'swollen vagina', etc. Initiation as a male affair, and more specifically circumcision, since

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here the male sex organ was the centre of attention, aroused the women's resentment, which then found expression in such songs. This was already apparent from the women's practice of singing men's camp songs after them. There were a few songs relating to the period of abstinence after the birth of a child, until the latter was able to walk, or at least sit. This was a time in which a woman might delight in giving her husband the cold shoulder. 'If your husband isn't good to you, refuse him, give him (food) in a torn leaf (so that it will immediately spill out again). The bachelor gets excited by day, his penis is like a stick' (the husband has a bachelor role forced onto him). 'He lets the sperm (lit. 'oil') from the penis run into his pants, she folds her loin-cloth about her vagina.' The father: 'Mother of the child, listen to what I say, for just one day it will not matter, (give) the gift of the bed, begin the struggle with the knife.' What strikes one here is that circumcision therefore did not amount simply to making a superficial mark on the body, as though toothfiling or tattooing would have done equally well. There was a clear line linking it to the sexual aspect. So the following text was often sung together with the song 'Ibekubeku' (cf. p. 142): 'Friend in the village, the oil of the penis has been discharged'. From among the less frequent themes I shall make a selection of just a few. References to death in the course of the circumcision feast were quite conspicuous. Not only was circumcision compared to death in this way, but it was also an allusion to the relativity of prolificness, although there was also a song to be heard in which death was talked about rather matter-of-factly. It is not, to my mind, evidence of the phenomenon of initiation being symbolized as a rebirth after death, as observed by Eliade (1958; 1965:3), however. 'Death belongs to no-one, death knows no-one.' 'Don't find fault with death, it is death. Death is a struggle, don't be jealous (of us, a large [populous] tshebanda).' 'We don't weep over the dead.' In view of the above-mentioned fears of sorcery during initiation the following fragments of texts will cause no surprise: 'Leave (sorcerer's) medicines alone, Wagenia.' 'Leave sorcery on the river, keep clear of sorcery in camp.'

The texts of the songs

145

'Go ahead, Wagenia, the medicines will follow.' The wife of a married novice had the following song addressed to her: 'The novice's wife, she will see the grass' (men will try to make love to her in the tall grass). The Wagenia of the right bank (close to the city) had no qualms about circumcising European fashion, while those of the left bank, as we saw on p. 125, gave preference to the traditional method of circumcision with the knife. 'The knife does not like Bina Ngembe and Bakonga (they are afraid), the scissors favour Bina Nkulu and Lesali' (so that they are not afraid). Or: the knife produces puny youths, the scissors robust ones (an allusion to the wrestling matches, which were usually held between teams from opposite river banks). 'Bina Ngembe and Bakonga still retain the foreskin, we, Bina Nkulu and Lesali, have already been circumcised.' Conspicuous by its absence as a motif was the relation between paternal and maternal relatives, even though the songs about the native tshebanda might be interpreted in this sense. While singing the song 'Little novice, don't give the initiation away' (see p. 142 above) to me, one informant improvised the following text: 'The initiation is secret. Quick, quick, carry him on your back, let us go to the beach, even if he's not yours] the sun is already high in the sky; let him go to the beach, even if he's a stranger.' That the Wagenia were by no means confined within the bounds of a closed tribal society is evidenced by the variation on the song of thanks 'Ambamba, kelekele', which ran 'Mobutu kelekele' (Thanks, Mobutu), or even 'Baudouin kelekele'. This was open to several interpretations. Firstly it was a tribute to the head of state which fitted in with the general tone of the publicity media, whereby Mobutu was depicted as the father of the independent state. Secondly, it was sometimes explained on further questioning as an expression of appreciation of the fact that Mobutu, too, had been circumcised and initiated in his own tribe. And its third meaning derived from the circumstance that the group of boys circumcised in 1970 had had the name Mobutu bestowed on it, just as the previous group had been given the name Baudouin. So there was a song which ran 'Mobutu is waiting for us', which actually meant 'You Eire now entering camp, b u t we, your girls and mothers, will wait for you'. For a correct

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interpretation of the above texts the reader is reminded of the visit of the Belgian and Zaire heads of state to the Wagenia at the time of the circumcision feasts. Baudouin was a common boys' name among the Wagenia, moreover, just as the names of the entire Belgian royal family were encountered here until the abolition of Christian baptismal names in 1971, in fact.

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— Suppose you had 100 zaires. What would you do with the money? (Choose one or more of the following possibilities:) 1. put it in the bank 2. trade with it 3. divide it among relatives 4. keep part or all of it for yourself 5. give it to the poor (Total)

4 2 20 13 10 (49)

4 2 16 5 8 (35)

Except for the last questions, the older boys gave mostly positive and the younger negative answers, whether or not they were initiated. This might point to a low effectiveness of initiation with respect to the qualities mentioned. As the boys grew older they acquired a slightly different attitude anyway, with or without initiation. I further asked the novices what measure of control their fathers or mothers exercised over them and to what extent this had changed in comparison with the time before initiation. There was no clearcut trend discernible in the answers. Some boys' fathers and others' mothers kept a closer eye on them, both before and at present. Tasks were performed for both parents alike, by initiated as well as by uninitiated boys, with one or two exceptions. For the former this had not changed as a result of initiation. Only the kind of tasks changed with age. A slightly clearer change was observable from the replies to questions as to whether the boys ever accompanied their mother to her village and whether they visited their maternal relatives more often, just as frequently or less often than before. For both initiated and uninitiated boys, visits to their mother's village, with or without her, had in almost half the cases decreased, in fewer cases remained the same, and rarely become more frequent. Some boys were discovered never to have visited their maternal uncles before, either, while some were living with their mothers' brothers. I shall briefly mention a few other points on which there were no differences between initiated and uninitiated boys. Marriage was no exclusive privilege of initiated persons, as we saw in the discussion of married novices. The prohibition against going around naked which initiated boys were under had more to do in practice with age

After initia tion

319

than with being initiated. The smallest novices could still go around stark naked whenever they wished after initiation. And non-initiated boys needless to say equally respected the rule against their wearing no clothes once they reached the appropriate age. Likewise with age the 'being sent on an errand' changed to 'sending someone else on an errand'. As the answers of the boys questioned testified, being initiated or uninitiated had no influence on this. Closer friendships which might possibly arise between fellowmembers of a particular initiation group did not preclude friendly relations between initiated and uninitiated boys of the same age. Even though the uninitiated were perfectly well known as such, this set them apart only where initiation secrets were discussed. This confirmed the view I expressed earlier that initiation to a large extent initiated boys into initiation. Nevertheless, the question as to the why of initiation appeared to be answered no less unsatisfactorily by initiated than by uninitiated boys. It was true, according to six of the 21 uninitiated boys, that friendships ceased to be when the two friends were separated by initiation. For the uninitiated the right to take part in palavers posed problems. Of the 25 initiated only two felt that uninitiated persons should have a voice in affairs. Of the latter themselves, half (11 of the 21) believed they had a say. It was notable how according to my older informants the youngest initiates were supposed to keep silent at palavers. A privilege which initiated persons did and uninitiated ones did not enjoy was participation in the wrestling matches. In principle, the uninitiated were excluded from these. If there were particularly good wrestlers among them, however, a special delayed initiation might be held to reinforce the ranks. Two of the 21 uninitiated boys questioned had nevertheless already taken part in a match, while conversely some initiated boys had not yet wrestled. There were a number of differences between the boys initiated in 1970 and the men initiated prior to that. They belonged to different initiation groups and so occupied different places in the time scale. The wrestling matches were organized per initiation group. It was furthermore apparent that at the delayed initiations the newly initiated had no admission to the circumcision ground or camp yet. They would go by the name of batende (novices) until the next initiation. This phasing of the transition in olden times used to be

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reflected especially by the above-mentioned dietary rules to which the newly initiated were subject. The samba relation, which might continue after initiation, was asymmetrical, too. I would also like to point to the predominance of one particular initiation group in this connection. In 1970 this was enjoyed by that of the 1930's (Bangele), whose members were then in the prime of life. They had the most weight, despite the usually very democratic decision-making procedure. Whoever wanted a voice in affairs had to take this into account, even though he might be an initiate. In former days being an initiate was important in giving one admission to the place were the men used to gather beneath the o tanda (shelter) to discuss daily affairs. Although uninitiated persons were also allowed here, they were apt to be sent away if necessary. The youngest new initiates were expected to listen and not join in the discussion. Within each initiation group a number of special customs were in force. The friendship that might arise between fellow-novices sometimes prompted them to call their children after each other, either unilaterally or reciprocally. The mutual form of address between a man and the son of a fellow-member of his initiation group was alina. This term was often used also in a wider sense, where there was no relationship between namesakes concerned. So namesakes in general would call each other alina independently of any relation in connection with initiation. Thus I was always alina to someone called André in Bina Mongula. A term used to designate an initiation group was baisáalína, 'the namesakes' fathers'. The Wagenia moreover had a proverb 'alina alina as long as your father is still above (the ground)', i.e.,'your alina will forget you as soon as your father dies', 'don't be deceived by appearances, you're quickly forgotten'. Another way in which the solidarity between fellow-members of an initiation group found expression was in the term for each other's wives, namely mokáláisáalina, 'the wife of the namesake's father', or sometimes mokáláne, 'my wife'. A joking relationship was possible between a man and the wife of a fellow-member of his initiation group, although I do not know exactly what form this could take. It certainly had marked sexual overtones, love affairs being possible and doubles-entendres permissible. I wish to refrain from speculation about former promiscuity. The situation may have been such that at a man's death a replacement was sought in his initiation

After initia tion

321

group. The wife of an elder brother, too, was addressed as mokalane, in connection with levirate. One informant expressed the view that one could always go to one's initiation fellows for help, though not until after this had been refused by one's relatives. In some circles of friends members of the one initiation group might predominate strongly, even though nonmembers of the latter might also belong to them. Age and income were important factors here as well. What is more, the seniormost members of a particular initiation group were close in age to the juniormost of the previous one. The men belonging to such circles met and stood each other drinks at the buvette. They sometimes pooled their resources for a joint venture (such as the purchase of an outboard motor or a taxi). In former times the initiation group principle was said to have come into play when a new canoe was purchased and a feast was held. At such feasts the men of the tshebanda involved would sit together in initiation groups. In 1976 about 20 members of the 1970 initiation group founded a mutuelle or benefit society to give assistance to members and their families in sickness and death. They also celebrated festive days together with free drinks at the expense of the fund. The group styled itself Motema ya Zaire, i. e., Heart of Zaire, alluding to Mobutu, who had bestowed his name on their initiation group. At funerals it was becoming increasingly the practice for the deceased person's initiation fellows to hold a separate collection and donate the proceeds to his family. Hautefelt (1923:210) mentions that persons initiated together lived together until their marriage. I saw nothing of the kind, nor heard of any such practice from my informants, in 1970, however.

7. Transitional symbols

THE RIVER, BATHS, SHAVING THE HEAD

Most of the symbols which occurred exclusively in the context of initiation have already been interpreted in the course of the description. An analysis of those symbols which featured more than once in initiation, or which were used in rituals other than initiation as well, will be given in the present chapter. I shall begin by discussing three closely related symbols. While the village and bush lent themselves in varying degrees to human habitation, the river was by definition uninhabitable. Any stay on or in it was strictly temporary. Anyone crossing a river for the first time had to drink a little water or put some on his head to avert misfortune. The river was a convenient liminal symbol. In initiation it functioned as such three times, namely at circumcision, at the first bath taken by the novices after their departure from camp, and at the bath following the begging-tour. In the first two cases the river came in between the village and the bush, forming a threshold between 'séparation' and 'marge' and between 'marge' and 'agrégation'. The river was paid a visit 'in passing'. The river was a no-man's-land which served as a kind of rubbish dump. The novices left quite a few things here: their foreskin, bodily filth and camp clothing, as well as the paint, oil and clothing of their begging-tour. In earlier times people guilty of sorcery against others were executed by drowning in the river (De Ridder 1960:234). It was claimed that any women who entered camp (which never really happened) risked drowning in the river. Menstrual blood and afterbirth were disposed of in the river, as was the umbilical cord after it dropped off, along with the peels of the bananas eaten unmashed by the mother during her lying-in. In the latter instance the

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wish for more births and good fish catches was expressed. Miscarried fetuses were likewise cast into the river. The river's function as a toilet and washing-place was extremely commonplace. A river bath was regarded as the closure of a period, such as the novices' camp period, on various occasions. Thus a baby's first river bath, half a year to a year after its birth, was a sign that the infant had survived the first months of its life and had not fallen victim to the high infant mortality. In one case the bath was followed by a visit to church to pray for the child's welfare. After this bath the child was allowed out of doors and outside the village. It had left the first period of isolation in its life behind. A child born after the premature death of one or more children of the same mother was placed in a canoe which was allowed to float freely on the water, without human intervention, for a few moments the first day of its life. After its boat-ride through no-man's-land it was pulled ashore again with the exclamation 'we've found a baby', as though it were a foundling, which hence would not die like the mother's 'real' children. Such a child was named Bvoloiyaba, i.e., 'dead fish (floating on the water) of the river'. The exclamation was accompanied by the wish 'Catch us fish, Bvoloiyaba'. For the relatives of a deceased person there was a rule in force that they should bathe in the river after the funeral to get rid of the odour of the deceased, just like the novices washing away the odour of camp. The tools used for digging the grave were likewise washed in the river. The relatives moreover shaved their heads, though this was no longer commonly done at the time of my research. In former times persons in mourning used to refrain from washing themselves for four to six months, though more recently this had been restricted to the first week or three days after the funeral, after which everyone except the widow or widower washed. The period of mourning lasted for several more months after this. At the end of this period the widow or widower was washed in the river, dressed in new clothes and painted red. This was done by other widows or widowers respectively, just as the novices were washed by the men after the departure. For the Wagenia the mass baptism held by the Baptists in Kisangani, whereby the candidates, including Wagenia, were immersed in the water of the Zaire, constituted a familiar gesture, in view of the above. There were two examples of a bath being taken somewhere other

The river, baths, shaving the head

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than in the river, in spite of the fact that a transition was concerned. The first of these was that of the novices at the end of the diet in camp, and the other that of the body of a deceased person at his home rather than in the river at funerals. Following this the latter was dressed in new clothes. A bath and shaving of the head sometimes went hand in hand, as, for instance, at the novices' departure from camp. Another example was where the relatives of a deceased person washed in the river and had their heads shaved after his funeral. The widow or widower was subjected to the same procedure, though in their particular case at the bath at the end of the period of mourning. Likewise the head of a deceased person was shaved at the washing of the body. Various informants told me that they had had their heads shaved, at the request of the priest, prior to their christening in the Roman Catholic Church. It was noteworthy that an important transition like marriage was not accompanied with a river bath or shaving of the head. Transition rites evidently did not consistently display the same features. I was also struck by the occasional concurrence of washing (generally in the river), shaving the head, expressing wishes, dressing in new clothes and painting oneself red. One might speak of synonymous symbols here. Leach (1967) has given special attention to hair symbolism in his article on 'magical hair'. His investigation was prompted by Berg's psycho-analytical hypothesis that hair on the head is symbolical of the genitals and that shaving the hair off is equivalent to castration. Although Berg in Leach's view made incorrect use of his ethnographic material, there would hardly have been any need for him to modify his thesis had he used it correctly (1967: 81, 82, 97). (Leach did, on the other hand, reject Berg's thesis that the symbolism concerned was unconscious and individual.) In the Wagenia case shaving of the head on circumcision day did in fact coincide with the beginning of a period of sexual abstinence. The circumstance that the head was shaved again at the end of that period, however, seems to preclude any connection between shaving of the head and celibacy, as ikungusele was indicative precisely of sexual activity. The conjunction of circumcision and shaving of the head in the same ritual context to my mind pointed to a relation between the meaning of the symbols involved rather than the symbols themselves: in both cases

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the closing of a period was at issue. In this sense these symbolical acts corresponded to others from the same ritual, viz. the washing away of dirt and stench and the discharge of sperm. Thus the clipping of hair, rather than serving as a substitute for a sexual operation, coincided with that operation. The clipped hair was not treated with exceptional circumspection and was not 'magical'. Hair, foreskin, dirt from the body and sperm lent themselves obviously for the symbolization of a break in time.

NOCTURNAL EVENTS

Something special took place at night twice in the course of initiation. There was revelling and sleeping outside in the night preceding circumcision day. And the boys' river bath, their first act after their departure from camp, took place in the dark. The night following it was spent sleeping or waking out of doors. In one village the planting of the flag a few weeks after initiation, moreover, was preceded by a nocturnal feast. There were a few examples of things happening at night independently of initiation as well. At marriages prepared by the two sets of relatives, which hence involved no elopement or abduction, a nocturnal feast which might be attended by the bridegroom's sisters was held in the village of the bride during the night preceding the day of the wedding ceremony. In practices centered around death the night likewise played a role. After a funeral the deceased person's relations by both birth and marriage, excepting his or her widow or widower, slept in the open air for a whole week. These nights were not spent waking, although the last night might bear a festive character. Another feast with eating, drinking and dancing was held later, before the end of the period of mourning, a nocturnal feast forming part of this. The festivities might be continued the next day. In some cases the time for this was fixed at forty days after the funeral, in imitation of Moslem Arabise neighbours, though if there was no money the celebrations for the end of the period of mourning might also be held one or two years later. In former times, when the dead used to be buried in the house, a raffia cord was put around the waist of the corpse, the other end of which was attached to the roof. The period

Nocturnal

events

327

of mourning ended when this cord broke. The more recent practice of burying the deceased almost exclusively at cemeteries may have prompted imitation of the example of the Arabises. Apart from this, the nights of mourning were often filled with Christian practices. So people might sing hymns or listen to readings from the bible or the missal, for example. My informants could offer no valid explanation for all of these cases. So they spoke of sympathy with and fear of the deceased person in the case of mourning, and of an expression of joy in that of the carousing before the end of the period of mourning and at weddings. Needless to say, any given symbol might have more than one meaning, each of which was important at diverse events. We might speak of homonymous symbols here. So the nights were not always spent in the same way in all of these cases. It was nevertheless worthwhile looking for some common element, despite and besides the observed differences. In all these cases a transition was concerned. Although in each case the activities were adapted to that specific case, the common feature of all the given examples was that the activities were carried on during the night or in the dark. Just as the river lent itself excellently as a symbol of transition spatially, the night was an appropriate such symbol temporally. Activity at night represented a reversal of the normal course of affairs, whereby people were active during the day and slept at night. Only sorcerers were active at night (see p. 58 above). Even if people did sleep at night in the context of a transition, they did so outside, so that there was question of reversal again in a different way. A triple opposition, viz. night-day, indoors-outdoors, sleeping-waking, was possible. The normal thing would be for the culture to sleep along with the people at night, so to speak. To behave differently from what was normal at night hence seemed to be an apt expression of an abnormal situation. Just as a person in transition had fallen between two stools, so the night was an intermediate phase which normally lacked a place. Only if something abnormal, like a transition whereby a person found himself in between two positions, was going on did the night acquire a different meaning. Structurally the period between sunset and sunrise occupied the same place as the person in transition. Both were meaningless, indefinite non-entities. The normal thing was for a person to sit on a stool and not fall between two

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stools, just as it was normal for people to sleep indoors at night. This explanation was not necessarily at variance with the interpretations given by the informants, but was broader and more consistent.

RESTRICTED FREEDOM OF MOVEMENT

The marginal phases of other rituals besides initiation also included a certain restriction on the subjects' freedom of movement. The discontinuity was greatest at initiation, even though, as we saw above, there was no total isolation. The idea of seclusion was given expression in all kinds of ways. A fence was erected around the boys, in spite of the fact that they were outside society without that, too. Where there was no forest a fence was a must, however. Isolation was linked with the forest. There were strict sanctions in operation against transgression of the boundaries thus set, even if only with the eyes. Camp was so far removed from the village, in a figurative sense, that people spoke of 'another village'. To get there one had to make 'a dangerous journey'. It had a chief of its own. It displayed obvious differences with the real village: the novices' sleeping conditions were less comfortable (the women even being led to believe that they slept in the open), they did not wash, went scantily clad, in theory had no possessions, up to a point lost their own identity, and were subjected to stronger solidarity than in the village. Finally, the boys were expected to grow more rapidly than in the village, and recuperated from their circumcision here. Danger became manifest in the fear of ancestor spirits and sorcery. The essential difference of camp was strengthened by secret matters such as the initiation animals and the camp vocabulary. The isolation was more specifically an isolation from the women, about whom scabrous songs were sung. This period was concluded with a bath at which wishes were expressed and the boys were dressed in new clothes. A number of these elements were also to be found in other passages featuring a much less pronounced segregation. In the boys' case the opposition forest-village was used for this segregation, while in the others the contrast house and home — elsewhere and strange was more relevant. In all cases the subjects were removed from society and taken out of circulation for a while. Accordingly the word kolumba, 'to stay inside', with in the ritual context the implication of

Restricted freedom

of movement

329

being looked after and under supervision, while one will also reemerge, was used in all these cases. In alike way the verb kolúmbésa, 'to cause to stay inside', was used in all of them for the activities of those looking after the subjects. Linguistic usage here confirmed the unity between apparently divergent situations. At childbirth only women were present and men were excluded. After birth both mother and child were restricted in their freedom of movement. They stayed at home. As regards the mother this was explained by the necessity for her to have enough milk for her infant and to recover from the birth. Like the novices in camp, she was fed extra well. What the men (fathers and father's brothers) were to the boys, the attendant (mother or mother's sister) was to the new mother, as we saw in the discussion of the parade speeches. During this period the woman had her own cooking-fire for fear of sorcery. Intercourse between her and her husband was forbidden. To protect the mother and her infant against the spirits of the ancestors they and the room they stayed in were splashed with whitewash mixed with a herb abólo (Crinum spp.), an abortive supposed to be effective against newly pregnant women, who were denied admission to the nursery. In the same way that the novices were isolated from the women, the new mother was isolated from her own previous phase — pregnancy. Two different people in transition probably would have meant too much of a disturbance of the usual order at once. So likewise no pregnant women were supposed to come close to the wrestlers at wrestling matches. It seemed as though coition, too, was viewed as a transition, which should be omitted at the time of another transition (after birth, after the installation of a new fishtrap, at circumcision by the circumcisers and the dressers of the wounds, and during the camp period by the older novices). Another explanation, whereby coition would be precisely the normal thing (and not a transition), which gave way as soon as there was question of a passage in which a person was directly or indirectly involved, is also possible. The element of recuperation recurred in the restriction of the freedom of movement to which a newly married woman was subject. It was said that she had to look well as a sign of the special care which her in-laws took of her. Both marriage and childbearing were equated with the transition from girlhood to womanhood by the informants, men and women

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alike. There were certain similarities between initiation, marriage and birth. For a woman the birth of her first-born was naturally a major event. Marriage for a woman meant moving to a different house, in contrast to the man, who stayed where he was. The ikpaoko killed a goat on her wedding day, like the ikpandei on his circumcision day. Some regarded menstruation as a transition from girlhood to womanhood. Among the Wagenia there was no ritual accompaniment to a girl's first menses. This may have been because the first menses were supposed to coincide with the marriage ceremony if a girl married at an early age. During mourning a widower or widow was subject to restrictions on her or his freedom of movement. They slept on the ground and did not have their hair cut until the end of the period of mourning, which was marked by a river bath. Subsequently new clothes were p u t on, their body was painted red, and wishes were expressed aloud by those assisting at the bath. Periods of isolation were also to be observed in connection with several healing rites, which I have never observed personally, but during which the patient was said by the informants to stay indoors for some time. At the above-mentioned itoo and mabvela rites a special dance, for which a fence was erected, was held, and unmashed food consumed. A period of house arrest was also imposed on sterile women treated with circumcision blood on circumcision day, who stayed indoors for as long as the novices remained in camp. PAYMENTS

The Wagenia repeatedly made payments in cash or kind to one another. Some sort of regularity in these seemed far to seek. On closer examination, however, a classification into three categories proved feasible. Payments went hand in hand with the farewell and integration phases. In addition there were incidental payments for small services rendered. To begin with the latter category, examples of these have already been observed in connection with initiation. The novices' bearers on initiation day were remunerated by slipping paper money between the novices' lips, for instance. Kabile might enter the village to solicit a reward from the mothers. The person lending a leopard hat was paid a fee. Likewise the drummers and circumcisers were given a

Payments

331

reward. At the parade in the village at the end of the camp period the women collected money for the men. Aside from initiation there were examples of such payments in connection with funerals and marriages by elopement. Payments were made to the persons washing the body of the deceased and digging the grave. Moreover, the custom of making people of the opposite sex to that of the deceased person undergo trials could be evaded by making a payment. At a marriage by elopement, in conclusion, the bridegroom could pay the relatives of the bride hush money to prevent their putting any obstacles in his way. Payments in connection with a farewell phase have also already been mentioned in the discussion of initiation. The novice's maternal relatives were paid a fixed sum, for the ikpandei sometimes a goat, on the occasion of his initiation. The maternal relatives received payments on other occasions as well. Although they were parting with their sisters' and daughters' sons, they retained the right to regular compensations. So a boy's maternal relatives might claim a small fee when he won at the wrestling matches. A set sum was paid to the maternal relatives at a person's death. To this list should be added the payments in connection with marriage, of course. Such payments in every case stood for non-severance of the given relation, even though the occasion for the payment seemed to point in the opposite direction. In actual fact these were delayed payments for more specific services rendered, and hence variants of the above-discussed remunerations. Payments were further made during the integration phase at initiation. So the fish given to the men by the father might be construed as such. The novice was then allowed to eat of that particular variety again, this constituting a sign of integration. The parade collection (which was new in 1970) may possibly have been, and the payment made by the women to induce the novices to speak to them again definitely was, another example of this. For yet other examples other transition rites will be considered. A woman married by elopement returned to her village shortly afterwards to receive her relatives' blessing (which they conferred by spitting on her). She was then escorted back by the women of her village, who took a number of presents in the form of articles which the re-integrated woman would need in her household, such as firewood and food, with them.

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symbols

As we just saw above, a bride was restricted in her freedom of movement for the first months of marriage. This came to an end as soon as her husband's relatives made a payment, a kind of extended bridewealth, to her kinsfolk. She herself received presents from her husband's relatives on that occasion,such as clothes, jewellery, shoes, or a bag — things she could use now that she was allowed to go out again, for instance to the market. With this should be compared the custom whereby the novice might receive presents. After childbirth, again, the mother was restricted in her freedom of movement until her baby's first river bath, when the new father made a small payment to the attendant who had looked after her all that time (mostly her mother or mother's sister). This provided a parallel with the parade collection. A married woman was not allowed to eat with her in-laws until the appropriate payment had been made by her own relatives. The amount of this was fixed by comparing all the payments that had ever taken place in connection with the marriage between the two sets of relatives, of which a careful record was kept. The bride-givers had invariably received more than they had given, and paid the difference on this occasion, so that all accounts between them were now squared. After that the woman publicly had food put into her mouth by her husband's male relatives. This eliminated the character of the bridewealth as a guarantee for the stability of the union. According to the informants its payment might be given a positive as well as a negative interpretation. When the accounts were squared this might be a sign of confidence in the stability of the marriage. But it might equally clear the way to a separation. The former seemed t o be the original intention behind the practice, in view of the wife's sharing food, while the latter may have been rather more indicative of a side effect. Integration in conclusion characterized the payments at the end of a period of mourning. During that period the widower or widow had been forbidden to leave his or her house. They were thereupon released by their relatives' paying a set sum, as a rule 10 zaires (20dollars), to the deceased person's kin group. Immediately following this the widower or widow was bathed and had his or her head shaved, new clothes put on and his or her body painted red. The feast in celebration of the end of the period of mourning might take place at the same time, though also before or after.

Fes tivities and finery

333

Payments for anything other than services hence took place more especially between bride-givers and bride-receivers, partly in connection with the passages of the issue of the marriage. In addition there were payments between men and women and among the men themselves. In every case the givers might be the receivers in a similar different situation. As a result the word 'payment' is really rather misleading, as nothing was purchased. They were actually gifts which in the money economy had assumed the character of payments, but possessed more especially the character of confirming relations. That was why they were particularly occasioned by passages.

FESTIVITIES AND FINERY

Rather obviously, eating, drinking, dancing, singing and dressing up were indicative of the festive character of a given occasion. We should not lose sight of the fact, however, that such activities might at the same time be symbols of transition and point to the abnormality of the situation. Large-scale eating and drinking certainly represented a reversal of the usual order where normally the way of life was frugal. A feast with eating, drinking, dancing and singing occurred twice in the course of initiation. The nocturnal feast preceding circumcision day was one example, and the planting of the flag for a camp president the other. A nocturnal feast comparable to that prior to circumcision day might also be held during the last, seventh, night people slept outdoors after a funeral. This might be repeated on the occasion of the end of the period of mourning. In the case of a marriage by contract celebrations were held during the night before the bride's departure from her village, whose situation was comparable to that of the novice on the point of leaving for camp. It was interesting to see how other, non-traditional occasions were seized on as an opportunity for celebrating. So parties were given at a buvette on the occasions of a child leaving primary school, the decoration of someone, a person's recovery after a serious illness, and the return home from hospital of a new mother and her baby. For all these parties typewritten, or even printed invitations were sent round. All these examples concerned a passage. Dressing up functioned as an indication of the special position of the person concerned. I have given a detailed description above

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of the novice's dress as he sat on display, on circumcision day and at the parade. Even if only a bark loin-cloth was worn, this was sufficient to indicate the exceptional nature of the situation. A newly married woman had jewellery presented to her at the end of the period in which se was more or less confined to her house. During the begging-tour at the end of the healing rites mentioned earlier the male patient wore a bark loin-cloth and the female patient a pubic tassel. A new mother made the rounds of the village dressed up in arm- and leg-bands and a pubic tassel a few days after the birth of her first child. A baby wore finery at its first river bath. In the old days the body of a deceased person used to lie in state not inside the house, as at present, but was placed outside on a kind of chair (nkili), wearing finery and a bark loin-cloth or pubic tassel. Deceased male persons might moreover be dressed in a chief's array.

COLOURS

It will only be possible to discern any sort of pattern in the Wagenia's use of colours at initiation if we pay attention at the same time to the role played by colours apart from initiation. That the Wagenia were no Ndembu (Turner 1966) on the point of colour symbolism has already been pointed out above. Only the use of the colours red and white displayed some degree of consistency. In camp widespread use was made of whitewash, as we saw on p. 214 ff. The novices were not painted with this until they were integrated into the camp phase. White was the colour of the ancestral spirits haunting the bush. It made the novices anonymous. The ikpandei as a rule had one half of his body painted white on the day of his circumcision. This white half I explained as a kind of anticipation of camp (p. 172). The novices were also painted white in the tolange, the small post-camp camps. Their white colour at the potsherd ceremony and the subsequent parade in the village I ascribed to the transplantation of the parade from camp to the village. In actual fact the novices' colour should have been red at this time. White also occurred prior to the camp period, as a nonobligatory colour for both novices and other participants at circumcision feasts. At the wrestling matches some of the wrestlers were painted white. At both the circumcision feasts and the wres-

Colours

335

tling matches other colours, or no colour at all, were possible as well. As an obligatory colour white seemed to be confined to the marginal period in the ritual. This impression was confirmed by other uses of white. Twins were painted white or splashed with whitewash along with their relatives on their circumcision day. This was also done at the birth of twins, or at any unusual juncture in their lives, such as when they were ill. Twins were an unusual phenomenon and were marginal from birth, belonging and yet not belonging. Whereas for ordinary novices it was permissible to be painted white on circumcision day, for twins and their relatives this was obligatory. They were marginal much earlier and much longer. A deceased person was likewise marginal. White was the colour of the ancestral spirits. On washing the body of a deceased person the water used for rinsing the mouth was mixed with lime. With this same mixture of water and lime a line was drawn with the aid of a banana-leaf rib on the left arm of the deceased person's relatives, as though he had spat on them in blessing one last time. Certain objects might be rubbed with this rinse, too. The reason resembled that for painting the novices white, which was to protect them against malevolent ancestral spirits. Whitewash was used in connection with a number of different diseases, such as measles, filaria, influenza and chickenpox (in infants), as well as on abscesses. Being ill was equivalent to being in a transitional state. Illness was likewise at issue during the kabukabu conciliation rite, where quarrelling relatives whose quarrel had brought on illness made peace. They were rubbed with a mixture of blood of the fowl that was consumed, soil from the grave of the angered ancestor, moisture from the food prepared, and whitewash. Although the colour added by the blood was red and by the soil brown or black, only the white was explicitly used as a colour. Pregnant women were said formerly to have painted themselves white during the first (critical) months of their pregnancy. After the child was born both it and the mother were splashed with whitewash, along with the doors, floor, and ceiling of their room — a custom that was still in force at the time of my research. The argument for this again was that malevolent ancestral spirits had thus to be warded off. There was one other example of a white marginal figure. It occurred in the myth about the Wagenia's departure from their former

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place of residence. The canoe they wanted to travel in was lying on the bottom of the river and was inhabited by the spirit of an ancestor. The man who eventually raised the canoe to the surface, Lesali, went to ask this ancestral spirit for help beforehand, and according to the story subsequently emerged from the water white all over, with the promise of the spirit's assistance. As far as ordinary society was concerned the ancestor's sphere was marginal, like the bush with the white ancestral spirits. Where white was hence the colour of the margin, red was more especially that of the integrational period. The novices ought to have been red at the potsherd ceremony, as they usually were at their later sitting on display and the akpangmbaisa dance. Red was associated with the novices' smooth, glossy skin after their first bath closing the camp period. It accentuated the skin returned to normal. Formerly it used to be customary to paint oneself red after any bath. Hence red was a 'normal' colour. Red also occurred in conjunction with integration outside initiation. In the same way as the novices exchanged the white of the margin for the red of integration, the new mother decorated herself with red colouring matter for one or more days shortly after the birth of her child. The infant was coloured red after his first river bath. A widow or widower was bathed and painted red at the end of the period of mourning. At marriages by contract the girls from the bridegroom's village were coloured red after the arrival of the bride. After specific healing rites the patient had to complete a beggingtour coloured red, as we saw above, and expose himself to the rain in order to dispel the 'odour' of his disease. There was a type of amulet of a red material in use which was worn by newly recovered patients to protect them against renewed illness. Lesali, the white mythical figure, coloured himself and the liana with which he was going to pull the canoe out of the water red after his visit to his ancestor. At the departure of Lesali, Mobveta and their brothers their father, who remained behind, told them that if they saw the river go red this would be a sign that he had died. Formerly people used to be coloured red at regattas, which form of boat races originally were held on the occasion of the launching of a new canoe. Anyone catching a crocodile in former times would subsequently colour his arms red. When a snake was caught all the villagers used to colour themselves red.

Colours

331

There were a few ambiguous cases of the use of red as well. So people used to be painted red, and sometimes also black, in war in former times. There was an occasional red novice at some circumcision feasts (the farewell phase). In view of these examples it is difficult to lend the explanation for the use of the colour red just given above any great degree of certainty. De Mahieu (1975:116) writes about the Bakomo, the Wagenia's neighbours, for that matter, that the subjects of all their important transition and healing rites are painted white in the beginning and red in the end. The position as regards colours other than white and red was more problematic. Yellow was little used and did not seem to occupy a very clear place. One half of the ikpandei's body might be painted yellow, though also any other colour. Yellow was used along with other colours on circumcision days and at wrestling matches. Blue may have been new, in view of the use of blueing from bags, and was not used on any large scale or at set moments. Black was used during the begging-tours and ikimgusele after the novices' return to the village. It might be connected with the misery of camp (see p. 314 above). Black was further the colour of the palmnut ash substance that was sometimes rubbed into the hair, such as by a new mother or by novices sitting on display prior to their circumcision day. The ikpandei and ikpaoko might blacken one half of their face or body. The use of black in war has already been mentioned above. I have not succeeded in finding a common denominator for these cases. At the circumcision feasts and wrestling matches as well as for the potsherd at the potsherd ceremony multiple colours were used. It might be possible to link multicolouredness with the farewell phase, in view of the circumcision feast, although I do not know of any examples from other rituals. Red, white, yellow and black were the primary colours, from which the others were derived, in the Kigenia language. For orange, red and violet the same word was used, and likewise for dark blue, dark green and black, and for light blue and white. In addition to the colour the application of colour was important, as a deviation from the normal. The application of colour per se was an indication of the exceptional status of the person to whom it was applied.

338

Transitional

symbols

TRIAD

To get a transition under control, delay through phasing s e e m e d an important means. This way the transition was accentuated and could escape no-one's notice. E x a m p l e s of this have already been given in the description of initiation. F r o m the point of view of time this could apply to periods as well as m o m e n t s . In either case tripartition played a role. I shall discuss b o t h possibilities in succession. An obvious triad of periods was that of farewell, margin and integration. As we saw above (p. 2 0 ) , Van Gennep has suggested that the transitions between these phases might in turn b e phased. Every time a transition was overly p r o n o u n c e d , different kinds of intermediate terms were liable to be inserted. It has repeatedly b e c o m e apparent in the preceding sections that at birth, marriage and death, t o o , a division into periods corresponding to the phases distinguished b y Van Gennep occurred. The three phases might coincide with other tripartitions. S o a spatial division with the aid of the three terms village (farewell) — river—forest (margin) — river —village (integration) c a m e a b o u t in parallelism with the temporal division. During the farewell phase all kinds of colours could b e used, in the marginal phase white, and in the integration phase red. During the farewell and integration phases p a y m e n t s were m a d e . Another triad in initiation, linked to different periods, was that of uninitiated b o y s ( b a n j u l e ) , novices ( b a t e n d e until the n e x t initiation) and m e n who had b o t h been initiated and had themselves initiated others ( b e k o m b e ) . Accentuation b y means o f tripartition was f o u n d at certain moments as well as in given periods. This was the case with the (ideal) circumcision in three phases, a c c o m p a n i e d b y the uttering of something three times, for instance. At the first bath after the departure M o k u m o played three times. As we saw on p p . 2 1 3 and 2 1 4 above, the triad of (1) raw, (2) roasted or boiled, b u t unmashed, bananas, and (3) boiled mashed bananas was in evidence at the diet at the beginning of the c a m p period. In one version of the m y t h s of the origin of initiation the w o m e n were said to have operated on three girls, b y way o f experiment, first. When this ended in failure, the m e n t o o k three b o y s . Here again there were examples apart f r o m initiation. At childbirth the umbilical cord was not cut until after the w o m a n doing the

Banana

339

cutting had first indicated another point on the cord and the women present called 'no' twice. Only when she indicated the third point did the women call 'yes'. At funerals the coffin or bier was lifted and put down again twice. Only after it was lifted for the third time did the procession start moving. (The Wagenia claim they have copied this custom from the Arabisés — because they were susceptible to triads, perhaps?) In fishing with the katilô landing-net there was a rule in force that beginners should hand over the first three fish of a particular variety they caught to the men who had already caught three fish of that same variety. The fish caught the first three days in a new trap were for the owner and the makers of the trap, and not for women or children. The fish was eaten unsalted, in other words, in as incomplete a state as the unmashed banana. Those constructing the trap were forbidden sexual relations during work until three days after installation. There were deviations from this rule as well. At one funeral the coffin was put down only once. At the investment with the leopardtooth chain (p. 112 above) the latter was moved from the feet to the head in more than three stages. The ikpandét and likewise the ikpâokô had the three different kinds of chain appropriate to their changed status (cf. p. 165 above) put on in the same fashion. There was in fact question of a similar extension of the triad at the addition of intermediate phases to the three main phases.

BANANA

In the course of this book there has been repeated reference to the banana. Banana branches or stems were wielded at the circumcision feasts. The leaf-rib was used to beat people with. The trunk was sat on by the novices. With the rib shots were imitated. The leaves were split to serve as aprons and screens. The fruit was eaten unmashed. The fluff was used to brush the black off the skin after the begging-tour. Neither the informants nor myself succeeded in discerning any regular pattern in all this. There was only a connection between the banana and fertility (see pp. 127, 137 above), which was not relevant for all cases in which the banana was used, however. Because the banana was used so often, a single general explanation was ruled out. This was all the more true as so many

340

Transitional

symbols

different parts of the banana-tree were used. Examples of a link between the banana-tree and fertility again were also found outside initiation. One informant compared a banana-tree bearing fruit to a pregnant woman. The fruits of the banana-tree were not allowed to drop, but had to be picked before this happened. If there was a sick person in a house in the vicinity of a banana-tree he had to be transferred, as the dropping of the fruit might signify the end of him. Once again two passages were mutually exclusive. The same applied in the case of a woman in menstruation, who was under a prohibition to plant a banana-tree. If she did so all the same, it would never bear fruit. The relation between the banana and fertility was definitely in evidence in the custom of making the novices sit on a banana-trunk after their circumcision, to my mind, even though the informants did not mention this explanation and adduced other reasons for this (see pp. 176,177 above). Another example was the reference in songs to 'marrying a bunch of bananas'. This was explained as applying to a specific kind of marriage by elopement, whereby a girl eloped with her husband-to-be while on her way home from market. There were also references in songs to 'giving birth to twins with a bunch of bananas', however, which minimized the probability of this explanation. Marriage and birth (especially that of twins) are nevertheless matters that do lie in the sphere of fertility. Maybe we should look for a connection here after all. Other examples of non-initiation customs which featured the banana did not fit in with the association between the banana and fertility, however, not even if one left informants' viewpoints out of account. When a big snake was caught the neighbouring Babira and Turumbu tribes were invited to prepare and eat the animal, as the Wagenia do not eat snakes. The man who had caught the creature provided food to go with its meat, as well as red colouring matter for all the villagers to paint themselves red with. As part of the proceedings the older men formed into two lines between which they made the younger men run while they beat them with banana-leaf ribs. In this example the young men might possibly represent the dead snake. Against anonymous thieves curses were uttered while their victim beat the ground with a banana-stem. In addition there were children's games in which tops were spun on banana-leaves. The child whose top kept spinning the longest received the top of the other

Summary

341

child, who for his part then had the right to go and steal a banana from the winner's home. The game whereby a small banana-rachis was cast up in the air and caught with the aid of a liana has already been mentioned (pp. 271 above). One should not, in my view, go to all lengths to find a single explanation to fit all of these cases. Although the systematic use of symbols was a clear-cut tendency, it was not absolute and did not preclude deviations and irregularities. Only in a few isolated cases did the informants establish the link between the banana and fertility, while in two cases it was possible to apply this construction to other examples as well. The difficulty was probably provided by the plentiful supply of banana material, as a result of which particular parts were used also without any symbolic meaning. So the banana-leaf aprons in which the boys were dressed at given times and the screens of the same material which were placed on the paths to the camps had to be explained in this way.

SUMMARY

It has become apparent that the different transition rituals resembled one another to a certain degree on the point of structure and symbolism. This has brought us one step closer to the resolution of the question of why particular symbols occurred at particular junctures. The different rituals were comparable to different menus, which may vary in content but never in the order of their courses, to quote a well-known simile (Leach 1970b: 47). I discovered connections here which mostly remained obscure to the informants. Not every rite de passage incorporated the same series of transitional symbols every time. If the same symbol was used in different rituals it might acquire an adapted meaning. There was constant structuring and restructuring of transitional symbols.There was both choice and limitation, but also redundance and the retention of symbols which were not understood. It became apparent at the same time that, in view of the occurrence of transitional symbols familiar from initiation elsewhere, the concept 'transition' acquired a more comprehensive meaning. It was not only familiar passages like birth, initiation, marriage and death which were accompanied with ritual.

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