Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 16, 1905.djvu/428

 376 Bavili Notes.

of an insult, to throw this light upon a person. Bits of looking-glass are to be found fixed in trees, and in the eyes and stomach of many fetishes. The light thus thrown is called ntenia lu mucno. Then there is the divining mirror of Nganga Mpuku Nyavibi} used when the Mambomas (chiefs whose duty it is) cannot agree who shall be elected Maloango, or King.

II. Photography. When one wanders about a native village with a camera and points it at people with the intention of taking their photographs, they invariably at first run away. They say that they are afraid that the photographer wishes to take away their life or Monio.

Fetishes.

[Mr. Dennett classifies the objects revered by the Bavili as (i) nkici ci, "powers on earth," i.e. certain sacred groves, places, trees, rivers, animals, etc., etc., which have fetish power (answering pretty much to the Polynesian mana) inherent in them by nature; and (2) fetishes to which power has been communicated by certain cere- monies. Of the first class he says little in the present paper, but several items in his list of 7ikici kici, " personal protective charms" appear to belong to it. In the second class he distinguishes nail-fetishes from others, laying stress on the difference of the sources from which their several powers are supposed to be derived, on the differ- ing methods by which the power is communicated to them, and by which they are invoked or consulted, and finally, on the contrasting occasions of their use. Mr.

^ [Mr. Dennett in some notes not yet printed speaks of a grove sacred to Nyanibi Mpukii. Nzambi or Nyambi is a name of deity ; Mpuku is the rat (see below, p. 396). The Nganga referred to is apparently the priest of this grove. Every Nganga has his own method of divination. See N. W. Thomas, Ciystal- Gazing, p. 56.]