Bantu folk lore (medical and general) / by Matthew L. Hewat, M.D.

  • Hewat, Matthew L.
Date:
[1906]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Bantu folk lore (medical and general) / by Matthew L. Hewat, M.D. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    night; owls hooting as if from the top of cattle or hut etc. They also have superstitions about the bird “ Broomvogel ” or “ Intsikizi ” e.g: it is terribly unlucky to kill one ; about a cow or ox entering a hut or a calf lying down when its mother is being milked ; about the killing of the Umntani- zulu or mantis, the insect called the “ Hoten- tots God by the Boers. And many other things or acts of like nature into the descrip- tion of which it would be foreign to the present subject to enter. The following superstition and practice with reference to the dead existed in the early times, though it is seldom heard of now. When the head of a family died without saying where he was going e.g. suddenly ; immediately after his expiring the sons or daughters were compelled to place a piece of old leather or some similar thing between his teeth or into his mouth to show that he had died unhappily, in conse- quence of being bewitched. This had the effect of bringing all his acquaintances under suspicion of having bewitched him and the general public were in great danger of being accused by the “ Isanusi ” of witchraft. The death of such an one is at once reported at the