Several thousand people of both sexes had collected to dance and take part in the festivities; the warriors…
- Date of account
- Published 1922
- Source
- Bantu Beliefs and Magic With particular reference to the Kikuyu and Kamba tribes of Kenya Colony; together with some reflections on East Africa after the war
- Reference
- Bantu Beliefs and Magic With particular reference to the Kikuyu and Kamba tribes of Kenya Colony; together with some reflections on East Africa after the war · selected passage 34
- Rights
- public_domain
- Language
- English
- Record updated
- 2026-08-25
Record summary
Several thousand people of both sexes had collected to dance and take part in the festivities; the warriors were dressed in their war paint and had their bodies smeared with red or grey paint, and in some cases were picked out with star-like patterns
Published source text
Read the available text below. Archive transcriptions may contain OCR errors; later context is labelled separately. A recorded claim is not a finding that it happened.
Source passage
Source text · mention onlySeveral thousand people of both sexes had collected to dance and take part in the festivities; the warriors were dressed in their war paint and had their bodies smeared with red or grey paint, and in some cases were picked out with star-like patterns. The women were all in their best, and freely smeared with red ochre and oil; a large collection of elders was there, and the chief was present, as he explained, in order to keep order and prevent the young warriors from quarrelling. Over the gate of the village two long pieces of sugar cane were fastened, and all who entered the village were supposed to pass underneath. The entrance of the village was also guarded by a bag of medicines belonging to a mundu mugo; these were supposed to prevent anyone coming into the village to bewitch the candidates. In the morning the elders of kiama slaughtered a big male goat, nthengi, by strangulation, and each male candidate for circumcision had a strip of the skin fastened round his right wrist, the same strip being also carried over the back of his hand and his second finger passed through a slit in it.
Historical context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyThis material belongs to a folklore tradition. Story type, collector, community, transmission and literary editing matter when comparing it with other sources.
Modern context
Contextual commentary · mention onlyLattice compares motifs and reported features without assuming that a traditional being is a biological species or that similar stories document one external cause.
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