Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 16, 1905.djvu/438

 382 Bavili Notes.

A plain iron bracelet is given to patients by Nganga Mbuniba Xicimba and worn by them as a bracelet.

Marriage - Bracelets. — Ngofo, iron marriage - bracelet, originally ivory {Ltivose) for real princesses.^ Ngofo and Funzi are the Loango and Kakongo names for the same marriage rite and bracelet.

Lembe, a heavy copper marriage-bracelet common to Loango and Kakongo.

Xibutu Xilongo, a small copper bracelet connected with the medicine given by Nganga Xibutu to protect one from evil. When a man wearing this bracelet marries, his wife also takes and wears one as a charm, in sign of marriage.

3. Zinkawci Zi Bakici (not Bad.)

(The figures of the people ; Zinkici Mbowu} or Nail

Fetishes.) The Bavili divide all people into two great classes :

1. Muntu Nzainbi (man of God).

2. Muntu a Ndongo (man of black arts). Ndongo signifies the evil spirit that is said to live in the stomach of all witches.

Now the Zinganga nkici (or the repeaters of the lore connected with the wooden images into which nails are driven) are not priests in the sense that the Zinganga

^[Compare the following, from A Visit to Lezuanika, King 0/ the Barotse, by Reginald Arthur Such, late Captain Cape Boys' Corps. (Simpkin and Marshall, 1902.) The Mogwae or Queen of the Barotse, living at Nalolo on the Zambesi in 1900, " had on a light cotton gown which hung about her like a sack, and wore carved ivory ornaments in her thick hair, and ivory bangles on each arm, reaching from the wrist to above the elbow. Her husband had on only a sesiba and a coat, with one ivory bangle on each arm. Ivory is the sole property of the royal family, and only they are allowed to wear it" (p. 53). "The Queen is not the wife of the King, but his sister. The King's wives have no particular rank, and are mostly slaves" (p. 50). Facing p. 52 is a plate of "The Queen's state barge, with figure of an elephant on the roof of shelter." — Eu.]

^ [Spelt in former notes mbao.'\