Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 4.djvu/93

 THE OVAMBOS. 67 valley has its hamlet or, at leust, a few shepherds' huts. According to the rou^^h calculations of Pulgrave and Ilahn, in the year 1H77, the total population was 236,000, and of this iiumbtT nearly 220,000 were concentrated in the section of the country lying to the north of Walvisch Ihiy. But estimated in relation to the sujHTticiul area of the whole region, the actual density of the population would ii{)]H'ar to be rather less than one to the square mile. In re8j)ect of the origin of its inhabitants, the territ<^)ry annexed by the Germans is essentially a land of transition. All the southern division, no doubt, belongs to the Khoin-Khoin, or Hottentot race ; but in the region lying north of the h glilands pierced by the channel of the Swakop river, the dominant Bantu tribes are everywhere so intermingled with these full-blood or half-casto Hot- tentots, that it becomes impossible to separate their respective domains by any hard-and-fast line. Roughly speaking, at least three quarters of the whole hind may be assigned to the Hottentot tribes, which, nevertheless, constitute at most one-fifth the entire populuti«)n. Several groups, however, are of mixed origin, while European bhx^d is also represented by the hulf-caste Bastaards, as well as by the Boers, the Portuguese Pomheiros, the English and German traders, who regularly or occasionally visit thic region. The Buniu tribes, who occupy the left bank of the Cunene above the gorges through which this river escapes seawards, are generally designated by the collective name of Ova-Mbo (Ovambo, Ovarapo), originally applitd to them by their south-western neighbours, the Hereros. But they do not themselves recog- nise this term, nor have they any generic designation for the nation as a whole. They are ethnically relatecl to the Chibiquus of the Chella Mountains, and to the peoples dwelling beyond the Cunene known as Ba-Simbas (Mu-Xitnba), that is, to say, " Borderers," or " Riverain People," and mentioned in old documents as Cimbebas. Hence the name Cimbebasia, which is still applied to the region watered by the Cuneno and even to the whole of Damarulaiid. Most of these natives a^e tall, robust, very intelligent, and industrious. Their language differs but little from that of the Hereros, and accoiding to Duparquet even shows a marked affinity to that of the Ba-Fyots. Its true position in the Bantu linguistic family must soon be more accurately determined by the gram- matical studies of the Finnish and other missionaries settled amongst them. The Ovambo territory is shared between about a dozen tribes, who dwell chiefly along the streams branching off from the Cunene towards Lake Etosha, and who are all separated from each other by intervening border tracts of uninhabited woodhuuls. Nearly always at war, these peoples, who within their respective communities recognise the rights of property, are constantly raiding on the cattle of their neighbours. The young men, creeping by night stealthily through the intervening forests, try to seize the enemy's herds by surprise. If seen in time they beat a hasty retreat, and a few days afterwards find themselves called upon to repel similar attacks. To such tactics are limited most of the intertribal conflicts ; but real wars of conquest have taken place, and the political equilibrium has been frequently distributed amongst the Ovambo peoples.