James Frazer - The Golden Bough - A Study in Magic and Religion (Third Edition, Vol. 08 of 12)

Among the Bechuanas it is a rule that before they partake of the new crops they must purify themselves. The purification takes place at the commencement of the new year on a day in January which is fixed by the chief. It begins in the great kraal of the tribe, where all the adult males assemble. Each of them takes in his hand leaves of a gourd called by the natives lerotse (described as something between a pumpkin and a vegetable marrow); and having crushed the leaves he anoints with the expressed juice his big toes and his navel; many people indeed apply the juice to all the joints of their body, but the better-informed say that this is a vulgar departure from ancient custom. After this ceremony in the great kraal every man goes home to his own kraal, assembles all the members of his family, men, women, and children, and smears them all with the juice of the lerotse leaves. Some of the leaves are also pounded, mixed with milk in a large wooden dish, and given to the dogs to lap up. Then the porridge plate of each member of the family is rubbed with the lerotse leaves. When this purification has been completed, but not before, the people are free to eat of the new crops. On the night after the purification every man was bound, as a matter of ritual, to sleep with his chief wife. If she had been unfaithful to him during the past year, it was incumbent on her to confess her sin before she fulfilled her part of the ceremony. Having confessed she was purified by a medicine-man, who fumigated her with the smoke produced by burning a bean plant. Thereupon husband and wife cut each other slightly under the navel, and each of them rubbed his or her blood, mixed with “medicine,” into the other's wound. That completed the purification of the woman, and the pair might now proceed with the rest of the rite. Should a married man be from home at the time when the annual purification [pg 070] ceremony is performed, he is thought to be in a very sad plight; indeed his chances of surviving for another year are supposed to be small. On his return home, he dare not enter his own house, for he would pollute it, and if even his shadow were to fall on one of his children, the child would die. He must wait till his wife comes to him and brings him a calabash of water to drink, which is a sign that she has waited for his return to perform the rite of purification together. But if she does not bring the water, he knows that in his absence she has performed the rite with some other man, and it becomes necessary to purge her by means of fumigation and blood-letting, as described before. But even when that purgation is completed, husband and wife may not indulge in connubial intercourse for the rest of the year, that is, until the next annual purification has taken place. The Bechuanas think that “any breach of this rule will be punished with supernatural penalties – the husband, wife, or child will die.” 212 212 Rev. W. C. Willoughby, “Notes on the Totemism of the Becwana,” Journal of the Anthropological Institute , xxxv. (1905) pp. 311-313. It is very remarkable that among several Bantu tribes the cohabitation of husband and wife is enjoined as a religious or magical rite on a variety of solemn occasions, such as after the death of a son or daughter, the circumcision of a child, the first menstruation of a daughter, the occupation of a new house or of a new village, etc. For examples see C. W. Hobley, Ethnology of A-Kamba and other East African Tribes (Cambridge, 1910), pp. 58, 59, 60, 65, 67, 69, 74; H. A. Junod, “Les Conceptions physiologiques des Bantou Sud-Africains et leurs tabous,” Revue d'Ethnographie et de Sociologie , i. (1910) p. 148; Rev. J. Roscoe, The Baganda (London, 1911), pp. 48, 144, 357, 363, 378, 428, etc.; id. , “Further Notes on the Manners and Customs of the Baganda,” Journal of the Anthropological Institute , xxxii. (1902) pp. 59, 61. Among the Baganda the act of stepping or leaping over a woman is regarded as equivalent to cohabitation with her, and is accepted as a ritual substitute for it (J. Roscoe, The Baganda , p. 357 note). The ideas on which this custom of ceremonial cohabitation is based are by no means clear.

Among the Matabele, another Bantu tribe of South Africa, no one might partake of the new fruits till the king had first tasted of them; any one who was known to have broken the law was instantly put to death. On this occasion the regiments assembled at Bulawayo, the capital, and danced in a great semicircle before the king, who occasionally joined in the dance. When he did so, the medicine-men and their satellites, armed with thorn-bushes, rushed about among the dancers and incited them to fresh [pg 071] efforts by a vigorous application of the thorns to the bodies of such as seemed to flag. The king's wives also sang and danced before him in long lines, holding the marriage ring in their right hands and green boughs in their left. On the third day of the festival hundreds of oxen were sacrificed: the flesh and blood of the black or sacred cattle were converted into charms; while the carcases of the rest were cut up and distributed among the people, who feasted upon them. The fourth day was specially set apart for the ceremony of the first-fruits. In the morning all the people went down to the river to wash, and on their return a witch-doctor or medicine-man took a dish of the new vegetables and corn, mixed with charms, and scattered the contents by handfuls among the crowd, who seized and ate them. After that the people were free to eat the new crops. According to one account, this festival of first-fruits was held at the first full moon which followed the summer solstice (the twenty-first of December in the southern hemisphere); according to another account, it took place a few days after the full moon of February, which marked the beginning of the Matabele year. 213 213 Ch. Croonenberghs, S.J., “La fête de la Grande Danse dans le haut Zambeze,” Les Missions Catholiques , xiv. (1882) pp. 230-234; L. Decle, Three Years in Savage Africa (London, 1898), pp. 157 sq. The two accounts supplement each other. I have combined features from both in the text.

The Ovambo or, as they call themselves, the Ovakuanjama, of South-West Africa, may not partake of the new fruits of the omuongo tree, which ripen in February and from which an intoxicating beverage is extracted, until certain ceremonies have been performed. Among other things husband and wife mutually offer each other one of the fruits, make white strokes with chalk each on the brow, cheeks, and nose of the other, and accompany the action with the formal expression of good wishes. If this ceremony, which seems to mark the beginning of the New Year, were omitted, they believe that they would be attacked by a painful disease of the knee-joints which would cripple them. 214 214 H. Tönjes, Ovamboland, Land, Leute, Mission (Berlin, 1911), pp. 200 sq.

The Bororo Indians of Brazil think that it would be certain death to eat the new maize before it has been blessed [pg 072] by the medicine-man. The ceremony of blessing it is as follows. The half-ripe husk is washed and placed before the medicine-man, who by dancing and singing for several hours, and by incessant smoking, works himself up into a state of ecstasy, whereupon he bites into the husk, trembling in every limb and uttering shrieks from time to time. A similar ceremony is performed whenever a large animal or a large fish is killed. The Bororo are firmly persuaded that were any man to touch unconsecrated maize or meat, before the ceremony had been completed, he and his whole tribe would perish. 215 215 V. Frič and P. Radin, “Contributions to the Study of the Bororo Indians,” Journal of the Anthropological Institute , xxxvi. (1906) p. 392.