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The Marriage Customs of the Ovimbundu

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 August 2012

Raul Kavita Evambi
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Extract

A Young man and a young woman of the same village or of divisions of the same village look and look at each other with shy glances. The young man is in love with the girl and the girl is in love with the young man. One day the young man will speak to the other young men in the onjango and say, Fellows, Ngandi's little daughter hurts me. Now then if I had said, After a few days I shall send you to propose a trial marriage to her, would it have been all right? Then the others will say, Yeah, old man, maybe you are talking nonsense; we thought that there was something between you, as you avoid each other; there is no hindrance, it is all right in that quarter, old fellow.

Type
Research Article
Information
Africa , Volume 11 , Issue 3 , July 1938 , pp. 342 - 348
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 1938

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References

page 342 note 1 Onjango, the men's house for sitting in and eating in, the place where guests are received.

page 342 note 2 Ngandi, So-and-so, any name may be put in the place of it as the occasion requires.

page 342 note 3 Lit. ‘to want or to wish’, but really it means that which is described in the passage following.

page 342 note 4 Kalungi, addressed to more than one person, if to one person they say Kalunga. Formerly this was the title of a king and appears to have meant ‘death’. The first king of Wambu was Wambu Kalunga.

page 343 note 1 Lit. ‘if the girl's eye is dead in the young man’.

page 343 note 2 Akome, term of endearment.

page 344 note 1 Written by the Portuguese ‘Selles’.

page 344 note 2 The formal statement is addressed as though it were a gauntlet, saying to it, Lie there, and it is called Tambuisa ulonga, to cause to take up the gage.

page 345 note 1 The official chaperon, lit. The-one-who-carries-on-the-back.

page 345 note 2 Expletive indicating disgust.

page 346 note 1 Etevo, fine for bad manners or breach of etiquette.

page 346 note 2 Tiapi, tiapi.

page 346 note 3 Lit. the brides.

page 347 note 1 This is a fine long decorated girdle, worn by married women.

page 347 note 2 Lit. the brides.

page 347 note 3 The plural of onjango.

page 348 note 1 Maid, page, to assist with wood and water and to carry food to the onjango.

page 348 note 2 Lit. marriage.