The Peoples of Greater Unyamwezi,Tanzania (Nyamwezi, Sukuma, Sumbwa, Kimbu, Konongo)

East Central Africa Part XVII

R. G. Abrahams

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781138233485
• eBook ISBN: 9781315309514
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Anthropology
• Index: Social Sciences

Routledge is proud to be re-issuing this landmark series in association with the International African Institute. The series, published between 1950 and 1977, brings together a wealth of previously un-co-ordinated material on the ethnic groupings and social conditions of African peoples.

Concise, critical and (for its time) accurate, the Ethnographic Survey contains sections as follows:

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• Physical Environment

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• Linguistic Data

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• Demography

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• History & Traditions of Origin

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• Nomenclature

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• Grouping

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• Cultural Features: Religion, Witchcraft, Birth, Initiation, Burial

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• Social & Political Organization: Kinship, Marriage, Inheritance, Slavery, Land Tenure, Warfare & Justice

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• Economy & Trade

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• Domestic Architecture

Each of the 50 volumes will be available to buy individually, and these are organized into regional sub-groups: East Central Africa, North-Eastern Africa, Southern Africa, West Central Africa, Western Africa, and Central Africa Belgian Congo.

The volumes are supplemented with maps, available to view on routledge.com or available as a pdf from the publishers.

SOCIAL ORGANIZATION AND POLITICAL STRUCTURE

INTRODUCTORY

Social organization in this region is not based upon a single dominant principle of relationship. Rather, there are a number of important and distinct sets of relationships by which persons are linked with one another. The relationships in each case have their own particular nature, and although there is some overlap between the different sets, both in their personnel and in the functions which they serve, a failure to treat them separately can only lead to distortion and confusion.²⁰⁴ Among the most important of these sets of ties are those of kinship and affinity, domestic grouping, neighbourhood, chiefdom citizenship, and secret societies. Relationships of friendship between individuals and joking relationships between groups are also found. Almost all social life takes place within the framework of these different sets of relationships, and it is meaningful to talk of the social personality of an individual as the sum total of the different roles which he derives from his participation in them.

KINSHIP AND AFFINITY

There is considerable local and inter-tribal variation in the kinship organization. The following account, based mainly upon my own field research, refers primarily to the general situation found in Unyamwezi proper. Important variations from this pattern which have been recorded for this or for other areas will be referred to in the course of the discussion. It should be noted that accounts of this subject in the literature are often over-formalized, and are at times somewhat confused.²⁰⁵

The only politically important kinship groups in the region are those vested with specialized political office, and the members of these mostly form only a small proportion of the population in the areas they rule. The structure of these groups, in which unilineal descent plays an important part, and the nature of relationships between them, is discussed in the section on chiefdom organization. Unilineal descent groups, in the form of clans or lineages, are not a general feature of the kinship organization of commoners. For the commoners of a chiefdom, kinship and affinity are important mainly on the level of inter-personal relationships, and each person is the centre of an ego-centred group of cognates.

A person’s kinsfolk are often spread over a wide area, and villages are not normally kinship units.²⁰⁶ Sons fairly commonly move away from their father’s homestead during his lifetime, and, even when this does not happen, brothers often separate after their father’s death and frequently reside in different villages or even chiefdoms. People tend to take their spouses from outside the village. Normally, the network of kinship ties within a village is very large meshed, and few homestead heads within a village have such ties with more than two others. Members of the ruling family of a village are the main exceptions here. As many as fifty per cent of homestead heads in a village may be without kinsfolk in other homesteads of the same village.

Kinship relations are, in fact, considered by the people to be quite distinct from those of neighbourhood. They contrast them by saying that “debt” exists in neighbourhood relationships but not in kinship. By this they mean that a person who has received help from a neighbour should give an equivalent return (see section on neighbourhood below), whereas kinsfolk simply help each other when and how they can. Where the same people are both each other’s kinsfolk and each other’s neighbours, or where kinship obligations are in competition with those of neighbourhood, rules exist to define the relative importance of the two ties in particular situations.

Kinsfolk and affines co-operate in a number of important ways. They participate in each other’s ancestor sacrifices and rituals of birth, marriage and death, and they may also help each other from time to time in such activities as agriculture and housebuilding. It is especially from them that a person will seek seed for planting if he has run short, and they normally do all they can to help a man beset by some sudden disaster, such as the destruction or damage by fire of his house and property. In addition, children are dependent on their senior kinsfolk for their upbringing and education, and, usually, for the wherewithal of their transition into adult married status.

A person’s status vis-à-vis his kinsfolk, and particularly the status of a minor, is to a considerable extent determined by the form of marriage of his parents. A large variety of marriage types have been recorded for the region, but, with the possible exception of Ukimbu and Ukonongo for which adequate data are lacking, these fall into two main categories, one with the payment of bridewealth and the other without.²⁰⁷ It is important to note that both main types of union are recognized as forms of marriage in most parts of the region. The same general word kutola (to marry a woman) is used in discussion of them, and in both cases the wife is known as nke.

To marry with bridewealth, as opposed to marriage in general, is commonly known as kukwa, and the term denoting bridewealth is nsabo, which is the ordinary word for wealth. Negotiations over the amount of bridewealth to be paid are usually conducted by two agents, bakombe, of each party. These agents are usually neighbours of the party which they represent. The husband in a bridewealth marriage obtains both uxorial and genetricial rights over his wife, and the children of such a marriage normally inherit their father’s property. The father has the right to receive any bridewealth which may be paid upon the marriage of his daughters, and he also has the obligation to provide for at least the first marriage of his sons if he has available resources, though other relatives may help in this. Should his wife commit adultery, the husband of a bridewealth union has the right to take the case to the chief’s court. The male adulterer is fined and also has to pay the husband compensation. The wife is also fined these days, but this was not so in the past.²⁰⁸

The form of bridewealth varies somewhat from one area to another, a major factor in the situation being cattle distribution in the region. Payment in cash is the general rule in the Tabora area, and it also seems to be common in Usumbwa. It is less popular in northern Unyamwezi proper and in Usukuma where payment in cattle, or their equivalent in goats and sheep, is on the whole preferred. Hoes were frequently used for bridewealth in the past, and payment in cloth, beads, guns and even slaves is also recorded.²⁰⁹

The amount of bridewealth is not fixed. It depends partly on the social and economic status of the parties to the marriage and partly on the skill of the bakombe as negotiators. In recent years, payments of between 60 and 400 shillings have been common in the Tabora area of Unyamwezi proper, and payments of between 8 and 15 cattle, or their equivalent, are often made in the Kahama area. Malcolm cites 10 cattle as the average bridewealth paid in Usukuma, but this is almost certainly too low a figure for the nineteen-fifties.²¹⁰ Recent data are not available for other areas. A considerable proportion of the bridewealth is usually transferred at the beginning of the marriage, but the arrears are not always fully paid up later.

To marry without bridewealth is described by various terms, the most common being kubola and kulehya. ²¹¹ Non-bridewealth unions were traditionally initiated by an elopement of the couple at night. Such elopement is still common today, but there is a growing tendency for non-bridewealth marriages to be arranged with the consent of the father or other guardian of the girl, particularly if she has been previously married. In non-bridewealth marriage, the husband has no genetricial rights and only limited uxorial ones over his wife. The children of such a marriage may be taken by right to live with their mother’s people when they are about eight years of age, and rights and obligations with respect to bridewealth for their marriages devolve upon the mother’s brother or other matrilateral relative responsible for their upbringing. Such children have a somewhat inferior status to those born of bridewealth unions. They do not normally inherit from their father, and they have no right to a major share of their mother’s brother’s property if he has children of a bridewealth marriage of his own. If the wife of a non-bridewealth marriage commits adultery, the husband is entitled to bring the case before the chiefdom court, as in a bridewealth union. The adulterers will be fined by the court, but no compensation is payable to the husband.²¹²

Non-bridewealth unions can normally be converted into bridewealth ones at a later date.²¹³ In addition, the people recognize the right of the father or another patrilateral kinsman of the children of a non-bridewealth union to redeem them at any time by making certain payments for them to their mother’s people. These payments vary according t...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Nomenclature
• Location
• Territorial Groupings
• Demography
• Physical Type
• History
• Language and Literature
• Physical Environment
• Economy
• Settlement Patterns
• Social Organization and Political Structure
• Main Cultural Features
• Major Phases of the Life Cycle
• Religion and Magic
• Bibliography
• Index