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The purpose of this site is to try and get the world to start dealing with the interaction between culture and success in a mature and intelligent manner. Poll: Do you believe culture influences success? Yes 67.5% No 17.3% Uncertain 15.1% - Newest Articles - Per capita income figures for the countries and regions of the world. While rarely read this is Gandhi's most important written work. The traditional explanation for the noticeable differences in income across cultures was to say that they differed in their level of civilization. - Categories - - All Articles - Per capita income figures for the countries and regions of the world. While rarely read this is Gandhi's most important written work. The traditional explanation for the noticeable differences in income across cultures was to say that they differed in their level of civilization. This 1920 work by Roger Babson is a classic with in its genre. It promotes the traditional, pre-1960s explanation for the connection between success and culture. Current events in Zimbabwe are giving us an unprecedented opportunity to measure and judge the effect of white settlement and colonization in Africa. Average US Incomes by Race, Ethnicity and Religion. Max Weber's claim that Protestantism is more conducive to success than Catholicism and that Calvinism is in particular more successful is widely repeated and rarely examined. We need to recognize that culture is the personality of a group or race and we must see culture and having seen it, make it a work of art. The moral justification for welfare is supposed to be that we are temporarily helping out our fellow man through a rough stretch of road or helping the disabled permanently. If it is to become a system for continually transferring wealth from one group to another the people behind this change owe us an explanation. The great taboo of our age is not speaking about race, but speaking about culture. Bourgeoisie is more than just a term of abuse used by the Left, it refers to a real people who led real lives. Selections from the Federal Outlook Selections from a 1960's Rhodesian newspaper. How Africa Underdeveloped Africa Africa is the poorest place in the world. Why? Will Famine Come to Zimbabwe? The end of commercial farming in Zimbabwe could plunge the country into famine. The Tragedy of the Zimbabwe Commons Communally owned property always has and always will suffer from the 'tragedy of the commons' problem. Band Aid Africa recieves $15 billion a year in aid. Is it helping? |
The African Sky
by F. W. J. McCosh
It was the Nuer of the southern Sudan who frequently asked Europeans whether an aeroplane ever touches the sky.' The sky as a solid vault which joined the earth at the horizon was a common idea throughout the continent, the Ronga of Mocambique suggesting that at the horizon maize was pounded in a kneeling position, there being no room to stand upright, but that pestles could be rested against the sky.' Generally, the Shona believed that it was possible to touch the sky at the horizon but some shared the medieval European view of the danger of falling down a bottomless precipice.3 For the Zulu and the Ronga a twoway traffic between sky and earth was possible by plaited ropes suspended from the vault. Creation myths generally postulate a solid sky as with the Pedi of the Transvaaal whose Creator, Huveane, returned, after fashioning the earth, by driving pegs into the sky4 as a mountaineer might ascend an overhanging rock. Reports of meteorites possibly gave credence to the concept of a solid sky which opened to allow rain to fall.
The Sun
In traditional Africa the sun was a timepiece, and wellknown is the telling of time by its position in the sky or its position with relation to terrestrial objects as in the Shona phrase zuva ragara mit!, the sun stays in the trees, and zuva rarova nhongonyn'a, the sun strikes the top of the hill, which can be compared with its use by North American Indians as in 'the sun is above the trees the distance of a thumb and middle finger stretch', or 'the breadth of my hand above the trees'.5 It follows that the position of shadows also indicated the times of starting and stopping tasks, as the Shona mother tells her child, 'Tarisa mwana'ngu mumvuri wasvika apo, saka chigadzirira tiende kumunda.'
'Look, my child, the shadow has reached there, so get ready to go to the field.'
Yet most instances of time among the Shona refer to animals, e.g. jongwe rechina or the fourth cockcrow, i.e. 4.00 a.m. when it is time to rise; or mashambanzou, when the elephants wash, when it is getting light. In both American Indian and Shona timetables there are fine distinctions of time at the beginning of the day when the position of the sun can be related to terrestrial objects, the trees for the Indians and animals for the Shona. These examples also illustrate that time in traditional societies is not a collection of hours, minutes and seconds but a sequence of experiences. A field is not ploughed in four hours but between two positions of the sun.
What happens to the sun after sunset may depend on whether you are a Copernican, a Ptolemaean or a 'flat earther'. If, as was believed by most African tribes, the earth ended at the horizon or at a distant mountain range, then it was plausible to consider that the sun travelled over a stationary earth to reappear next morning after a journey under the earth. There were variations on this theme. The Venda of the northern Transvaal held that the sun travelled under the sea on which a disclike earth floated,6 a concept known to the Greeks of the 6th century B.C. The Ronga were divided on this subject, some believing that the sun passed under the earth at night whilst others thought that a new sun arose out of the sea each morning,7 an explanation offered by a Shona informant which has probably diffused from the coastal Ronga of Mocambique. To the Ila of Zambia the sun leapt back over the earth, from west to east each dawn; a completely unwitnessed phenomena as it was believed that such a sight would result in the death of the onlooker." The Korekore of northeast Rhodesia knew the sun as a torch carried by Mwari or God, who each evening casts the dying torch into a large hole, lighting a new torch the following morning.9 The Shona generally believed that a new sun appeared each day from the darkness of the east and was swallowed up in the darkness of the west, 'semunhu anozvarwa achizofa', 'like a man who is born and then dies'.'°
The midday sun is immediately overhead at the tropic of Capricorn on 21st December, and at the tropic of Cancer on 21st June, the dates of the solstices. Between the tropics the sun appears to cross the equator on about 23rd September and again on 21st March, the dates of the equinoxes. To the Bambara of Mali these dates are of crucial importance as they signal the commencement of sowing, harvesting, landclearing and the smelting of iron from its ore. It was the custom of each Bambara village to construct a cylindrical granary according to a traditional design transmitted down the centuries. At about the time of the solstices and the equinoxes it was the duty of the village headman to measure with his feet the shadow cast by this granarygnomon at midday, e.g. a little before the 21st June he measured the shadow each day until it was three 'feet' long when it was then known that sowing should start."
The Rainbow
In African society there was none of Wordsworth's 'My heart leaps up when I behold a rainbow in the sky'; it was never associated with pleasant and aesthetically satisfying sentiments. Instead, it was regarded as dangerous and malignant; dangerous because it would burn the trees on which it settled, and malignant because it was generally believed that it prevented rain from falling. The ha pointed to it with a grain pestle to drive it away, but the Baganda of Uganda would never risk this action for fear that the pointing finger would become stiff. There were those, such as the tribes of the lower Congo, who believed that a rainbow was a group of coloured snakes living in a termite mound; the Shona also look upon the rainbow as beginning and ending on termite mounds, although death will result if you happen to see where it ends. 12 Again, among the Shona the rainbow is not only mutsvi wemvura, the rain pestle, but mutsvi waambuya or grandmother's pestle, a puzzling title because the rainbow is curved, unlike the pestle, but the analogy is symbolic rather than material. A pestle was not only used for stamping maize but as a defensive or protective weapon especially by old women. The rainbow protected them from rain which, though required by the arable farmer, was a nuisance to an old lady herding cattle who was insufficiently agile to run for shelter.
The Moon
More attention has been given to the moon possibly because of its regular phases and because of its association with the menstrual cycle. Among the Shona the new moon is mwedzi wazvarwa, the newly born moon, but it is usually mwedzi wagara, which is explained by the first line of a children's song, 'mwedzi wagara kuna dendere', 'the new moon is in a basket'. The full moon is jenaguru, the big whiteness, or mwedzi wakura, the moon has grown, and there are various other names for the different phases, all referring to its size and brightness. The regular appearances of the new moon heralded the beginning of each lunar month when the pregnant mother added a knot or a clay bead to her string to remind her when to call the muchingi or midwife. 'The moon brings children' say the Lele of Zaire,'3 and the Sandawe of Tanzania not only believe it to be the source of a woman's fertility but that it decides the sex of the child according to the state of the moon at conception.'' Explanation of the different phases is supplied by the Bushmen; the sun slices pieces from the moon leaving it at last with merely a backbone. The moon retires in order to recuperate but on returning to the night sky it feeds so voraciously that it develops a round stomach.'5
Among the Shona the moon's phases are associated with health and sickness. Diseases, both physical and mental, are prevalent at new moon such as the lingering disease, denda, usually accompanied by a high fever; also epilepsy, cardiac disease and even madness which, however, disappear at full moon, especially if grass is added to the medicine horn and the contents sprinkled in the wind. Yet these diseases may reappear when the moon disappears or is 'dead'. The new moon is greeted with song by Shona children of which there are various versions, all commencing with mwedzi wagara e.g.
Mwedzi wagara kuna dendere, Dendere one mavara, Mavara anenge edzetse, Edzetse kutsetsenura.
The new moon is in a basket, A basket which is spotted, Spotted like a bullfrog, A bullfrog that grinds finely.
The last line no doubt refers to the grinding action of the bullfrog's mouth.
The eighth day of the new moon was a ritual holiday or chisi known as rusere when each village headman sounded a trumpet for three to five minutes between five and six o'clock in the evening. If possible a kudu horn was used, or, more modestly, an ox horn. On the following day a white beast was sacrificially killed so that the village would avoid the diseases associated with the new moon. The villagers' scorn for the diseases brought by the old moon was demonstrated by spitting 'ptu' in its direction when the new moon appeared.
32
Shona legends stress the analogy between the 'death' of the moon and the custom of executing the chief when his physical strength was deteriorating. The more virile successor was shown to the tribe as a new moon succeeding the old."' To the Swazi a full moon was the time to introduce a new king to his people, and his councillors were punished if they so mistimed the ceremony that it took place under a waning moon, implying a loss of strength." A full moon is generally associated with superabundant strength and health but special precautions must be taken in the period of darkness preceding the new moon when people are vulnerable to disease. In a vague manner this belief can be related to the medieval concept of planets controlling the vitality of various bodily organs the influence of the macrocosm on the microcosm.
The moon is not always female as it is among the Shona. In Malawi it is a man with two wives. One of them is the evening star, chechichani, who is a poor housekeeper, and during the fortnight he stays with her he is starved and pines away. The other is puikani, the morning star, who brings him back to life with her excellent feeding until he is quite round.'8 Chechichani and puikani are different positions of the planet Venus. A Hausa riddle from Nigeria stresses the masculinity of the moon e.g.
Q. The cows are lying down but the big bull is standing up. A. The stars and the moon.'9
Yet from the same country there comes a fable similar to a Malayan story in which the sun and the moon are both women who agree to eat their children, the stars. The sun's children perished but the moon hid hers, and when the sun discovered her deceit she chased the moon in a neverending pursuit. Occasionally the sun overtakes the moon, biting a piece out of her, which explains the formation of lunar eclipses.20
Moon worship appears not to be practised generally by Africans although mothers show their newborn children to the moon. Rather than a deity the moon may be regarded as a friend or as an enemy, just as the Ronga ascribe lunacy to the evil effects of moonlight.2' Exceptions are the Venda and the Tonga, or Toka, of the Zambezi valley who regard the moon and the sun as the gods of night and day.22 Among the Hottentots the moon is a friend, but the Bushman, hunting at night, is fearful of the effect of 'the moon's water', a sticky liquid found on bushes under moonlight which neutralises the arrow poison, allowing the wounded animal to recover and escape.23
Several Shona legends about the moon could very well have come from space fiction. A woman was gathering firewood on a chisi, or ritual rest day, a serious offence in African society as this day is prescribed by the Chief to honour Mwari or a famous ancestor of the tribe. The moon descended and removed her to the sky where she remains because the Shona see in the moon a woman with a bundle of firewood.24 Another version tells how Mwari grabbed her and placed her on the moon. The third story is about a series of space failures in which attempts were made by Rozvi subjects to capture the moon as a plate for their Chief, Changamire. They are said to have taken place during the 14th century but recent research suggests that the late 17th or 18th century is more correct. These attempts are believed to have taken place at Tikwiri mountain between Rusape and Inyazura; on Zhombwe hill near Mrewa; at Mupuyo mountain in Chiweshe; and at Firifidye near Mount Darwin. The object of each exercise was to lift the mountain by manpower to enable those at the summit to seize the moon. In each case trenches were excavated at the foot of the montain or hill, an undertaking which cost many lives through falling rocks or collapsing trenches. It was the crescent moon that was sought by the Rozvi as it was lighter than the full moon and would, anyway, develop into a full moon on earth. These incidents have generated a legend that the Chiefs' insignia, a brass crescent, recalls these exploits of the Rozvi. There is the oral evidence of Chiefs Jiri, Gumunya and Chiduku that the crescent moon motif was suggested to officials of the Chartered Company who ordered the original batch of insignias, sending a pencil sketch of a crescent moon.25
Eclipses
The traditional Shona would assent to Gloucester's statement in Lear, 'These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us', as eclipses of the sum were regarded as occasions fraught with extreme danger, requiring the assistance of the ancestral spirits to release the sun from darkness. During a total eclipse of the sun in Uganda in May 1947 it is recorded that at one village the inhabitants beat their drums and prayed on their knees. Less disturbed was a colony of bats which emerged from the church and flew around until the sun reappeared when they returned to their quarters in the roof of the church.26 And although Africans would not strive after a causal theory of the solar system or any regular phenomenon, it is when there is a deviation from the normal course of events, or the appearance of the unexpected, that an explanation is demanded and sought. Among the Shona an eclipse of the moon signals the death of a prominent person such as a Chief. It is usual to say 'mwedzi waora', the moon is rotten, when it is in eclipse, although the educated are heard saying 'mwedzi wadzikatidza', the moon is screened or overshadowed, which it certainly is. How the moon dispels its 'rottenness' and recovers its 'ripeness' is not understood but it is interesting to note that the Trobriand islanders of the Pacific refer to the first quarter of the new moon as 'the unripe moon'.27
Among the Kaguru of east Africa a solar eclips occurs when 'the earth is caught' and is a period of great anxiety in which the ancestral spirits and God are asked to free the sun from darkness. No similar concern is shown for the eclipse of the moon, nor do the Kaguru refer to solar eclipses as reference points in time. The appearance of Halley's comet in 1910 is cited but it was not considered an important event or a portent of danger.28
Two months after an Ndebele impi had left for the Zambezi valley there was a lunar eclipse which to those left behind was taken as a sign that not only had the raid been successful but that a Chief had been slain in battle, conclusions which were subsequently confirmed. A less fortunate raiding party in 1885, whilst crossing the Kalahari en route to lake Ngami, were worried by the nonappearance of the expected full moon. Anxiety turned to terror when the eclipsed moon at last showed its horns of light, and the impi, thinking itself bewitched, turned for home, a march in which many died of thirst in the desert."' Perhaps the most famous and wellknown solar eclipse in Africa occurred on 25th November, 1835 whilst the migrating Ngoni under Zwangendaba, or Zongendaba, were crossing a drift on the Zambezi river near Zumbo.
The Planets
Although the Shona do not distinguish by name between planets and fixed stars they are all nyenyedzi they are aware of some of the planets the most well known of which is Venus. It appears in the morning as hweva or hweva zuva, derived from kukweva 'to pull' as ft was believed that it pulled up the sun at dawn, a form of astromonical tug. The Karanga looked upon Venus as the moon's wife so that the phrase mukadzi womwedzi was usually added to the name of the star.3° Whilst hweva is certainly Venus there is some doubt as to whether it is also the evening star, vhenekerasvimborume, which 'gives light to the bachelor' to see his way clearly to his girl friend, which some believe to be Jupiter, known as the lover's star. Anticipating the sequel, vhenekerasvimborume is also known as mwenga, the bride.
Another early morning star in the east is nymatsatse which may be Mercury although it is sometimes confused with Venus. Its presence is welcomed by fishermen because it implies a profusion of eels or nyamasase, and one informant told me that his grandfather fished for eels in the rivers of the Macheke and Rusape districts as late as 1950. The stars were indeed read by the Shona, not for astrological purposes but to assist in food gathering by hunters and fishermen. They were aware of the rings around Saturn, chirema, the lame or abnormal star, and believed that they consisted of 'small stars held by an unknown attraction, awating a time when they would fall away to an independent life as do children when they leave the home', which is not too inaccurate a description when modern astronomers describe the rings as consisting of small icecoated particles, each with its own orbit.3' Murongazuva is said to be Mars.
The Fixed Stars
Compared with the inhabitants of Asia and Europe, the African peoples of the southern end of the continent appear to have shown a limited but specialised interest in the sky. They sought the intervention of their ancestor spirits when plagued by illness, drought or crop pests, and the future was foretold by mediums, zvikiro, who interpreted the wishes of the spirits. In Asia and Europe the future was divined by astrologers, usually priests, from the position and pattern of the stars. It would, indeed, have been difficult for a preliterate society to have practised astrology, a subject which demanded the exact recording of past events in order to forecast the future.
The Karanga of Rhodesia agreed with the Venda that stars are suspended from the sky and that a falling star has broken away. Another Karanga point of view is that they are doors into the sky, and yet another claims that they are the eyes of departed husbands who wish to see their wives and children ,32 although this belief contradicts the general view that the family spirits, the midzimu, remain close to their earthly home. Yet informants
35 have told me that the midzlmu are capable of travelling but frequent the family home In times of crisis. Further, there are some Shona who associate the planet Mercury with a form of heaven. The notion of stars as torches or fires is common, for example, the Korekore believe them to be candles or torches carried by the midzimu, and that a shooting or falling star, nyenyedzi yadonha, is an arrow shot from the bow of a mudzimu against an evil wandering shave, to be distinguished from the shave which can confer a skill on the person it possesses.33 There are various other interpretations of falling stars such as heralding a death; a sorcerer, muroyi, on his, or usually her, travels; your future wife is to be found where the star falls: or simply that you will be lucky.
The Bushman's Interest in the Stars
If the southern African tribes have shown relatively little interest in the stars this cannot be said of the Bushmen. On their hunting expeditions no shelters were constructed apart from a semipermanent camp when only the flimsiest of grass screens were made. They were thus more familiar with the appearance of the night sky and relied on the light of the stars to find their way back to camp after a hunt. Just as the evening star, vhenekerasvimborume, lights the path of the Shona bachelor, so the bright stars Sirius and Canopus shine for the Bushmen. Believing that a star's brilliance was due to the sun's heat, it was the custom to point a burning brand from the fire to these stars as soon as they appeared, an example of imitative magic. One of their myths tells how a certain girl of their tribe, wanting more light from the sky, threw up the white ash from an old fire to form the Milky Way. She is also reputed to have torn up the red and white roots of a plant and to have thrown the pieces towards the sky where they formed the red and white stars. Like some Shona they believe that a falling star announces a death, but the Bushmen say that when the hammerkop, or kondo, sees the star, it flies to the bereaved relatives to break the news.
Star Groups
The constellations as known to Europeans were named some 4 000 years ago by the gifted Sumerians who lived in what is now southern Iraq. As they were inhabitants of the northern hemisphere some of our constellations were unknown to them but these were subsequently named by navigators and astronomers in the 17th and 18th centuries. The few star groups named by Africans do not necessarily coincide with the usual constellations with the exception of the very compact Pleiades, known to the Shona as chisimira or planting time, and chimutanhatu which refers to the six visible stars. It is not a complete constellation but an asterism and part of the constellation Taurus, the Bull. They were named by the Greeks after the daughters of Atlas and Pleione, but there are many more stars in this asterism. The Plelades are known to most Africans and are mentioned in accounts of such widespread tribes as the Venda of the Transvaal, the Komo of Zaire, the Pondo of the Transkei, the Ila of Zambia, the Zulus and the Hottentots, to whom they signal the beginning of the agricultural year, unlike the nonagricultural Bushmen who do not recognise the Pleiades. Various forms of imagery result in different names bestowed on the group.
I he Ila name means 'the hairs on a man's chest', whilst to the Komo it is i basket of pangas since the appearance of the Plelades is the signal for treefelling and the preparation of new lands.
In Greek mythology Orion was a famous hunter and his name is given to a constellation where he is represented with outstretched arms, wearing a belt and sword. Among African tribes parts of this constellation are named, as in the case of the Karanga to whom the three bright stars of the belt are nguruve, the pigs; yet the Southern Cross is known to them as vana nguruve, or 'those who have pigs'. The Korekore know these same three stars in the belt of Orion as mademba ndikuteme which may be rendered as 'regretfully, I cut you' and may refer to the throat cutting of a black bull as part of a rainmaking ritual sacrifice. Hottentots group together the six stars of the belt and sword into 'the three zebras' whilst the Venda see in them 'the rhinoceros'. As a hunter, Orion had a dog, the constellation Canis major, the brightest star of which is Sirius, the Dog star. Is it a coincidence or diffusion of ideas that have caused the Karanga to recognise this star as imbwa, the dog?
The Shona Sky
The star sketch maps which accompany this article are the work of a Manyika informant. To collate the Shona and English names would require the cooperation of members of both races with a knowledge of starlore, and therefore many of the Shona star names are given without their English equivalents. But the meanings and functions of some of the Shona stars make a delightful commentary on aspects of Shona life, as, for example, the previously mentioned vhenekerasvimborume. Ngavi, the bullock, is a star once used by tribesmen when searching for wandering stock at night. The appearance of monga, meaning 'termite mound bee', signals the presence of honey in termite mounds. Ndemara refers to teasing in a playful manner between boys and girls when the boy declares to the girl, 'urinyenyedzi yangu' or 'you are my star'.
The constellations in the star maps have been identified from a common point of reference, chimutanhatu, which, with its other name of chisimira, refers to the six visible stars of the Plelades. Orion is, therefore, chinyamunomwe, the group of seven, and chimutatu is the group of three which may refer to Aries or Triangulum, but this is doubtful. Three interesting and tentative conclusions appear from these maps. Firstly, chunyamunomwe and cliimutanhatu are represented by simplified pictures or pictograms. Further, the Shona names given to them refer not to the hunter, Orion, or to the virgin Pleiades, but to the number of visible stars in each group. Lastly, unlike most African constellations, these correspond to those groups recognised by Europeans, and therefore it is suggested that Europeans introduced them to the Shona who then gave them vernacular names. Yet the names of individual stars, ngavi, hweva zuva, etc. appear to be the original Shona names.
African imagery has resulted in at least three names for the Milky Way. The innumerable stars are likened to the uncountable elephants of a passing herd, and so it is gwara renzou, the path of the elephant. It is also gwara ravavhimi, the hunter's path, because its position indicated the time of the
night. No explanation is available for gwara remwenye, the path of the Muslims, possibly a reference to the Lemba of Bellngwe and Gutu who claim that their ancestors came from Egypt, and today practice circumcision, kosherkilling, and abstain from the eating of pork.
Stars and the Calendar
The uses of timepieces and calendars has eliminated the need for reading the sky which had been an important function of a preliterate society, a function necessitated by the difference between the lunar and the solar year and its consequences for ritual and agricultural activities. The tribesman's problem was also that of Julius Caesar in 46 B.C. when, through his astronomer Sosigenes, he introduced the leap year; and also that of Pope Gregory XIII who in 1582 decreed that century years should be divisible by 400 to qualify as leap years. Calendar problems have arisen for two reasons; firstly, twelve lunar months account for only 354 days; secondly, the time for a full revolution of the earth about the sun, or the solar year, is not an exact number of days but 365,24 . . . It is the first problem that directly concerns the tribesman and he has sometimes solved it by carrying over the balance of II days for three years which accumulates to a period of just over one month. Therefore each three year period contains two years of 12 months and a third year of 13 moons. The Venda have adopted this method but not without some difficulty because arguments arose between the young men who, perhaps, consulted printed calendars, and the older men as to whether a certain year contained 12 or 13 moons. It was perennially resolved because the Venda year is a sidereal year, or one which refers to the position of fixed stars; in this case it is tuda, the giraffe, made up of the Southern Cross and its Pointers.37 If after 12 lunations there is no sign of the Pointers above the horizon at sunset, then the next moon is aptly called khangwa vhanna or 'men forget', and the following moon becomes the first month of the new year.
It would be tempting to describe a similar astronomical procedure used by the Shona but apart from a Karanga reference to the Pleiades as a calendrical constellation, signalling land preparation,39 there appear to be no astronomical signs among the Shona in general to indicate the beginning of a new year. Generally, the moons were counted after the advent of the first rains in gumiguru or October, which, after three moons, brought them to the second rains in ndira, January, which was taken as the beginning of the new year.4° Applying this method to the year 1978 the three moons would appear on 31st October, 30th November and 29th December which would be the beginning of the year and the first day of ndira, corresponding usually to the onset of the second rains. A third explanation is that the new year was announced by the medium of the tribal spirit, the svikiro.4' The Shona, like the Venda, could not avoid the problem of adding a thirteenth month every three years but the procedure is not at all clear. It appears that there was an extra moon in April or May, and most certainly in winter as it was called bandwe which may be derived from mubandirwa or 'dry season ploughing', and kupanda nzungu or 'lifting groundnuts from dry land'.
An interesting example of stars indicating the season is found in Zaire where, to the north and east, live the Komo who experience four seasons during the year. When the Plelades appear on the horizon in November it is the signal for the men to sharpen their pangas in readiness for bushcutting and land clearing. The Pleiades remind them of their pangas which are carried in a basket, such is the meaning of amadjankoso. Panga sharpening is soon followed by the appearance of mokuphe on the evening horizon which signals the commencement of land clearing for the cash crop, rice. Mokuphe is a group of five stars forming part of the constellation Lepus, the Hare, but the Komo see not a hare but a man with head, hands and feet. The second season, from April to June, is known by the appearance of abalubalu, Ursa major or the Great Bear, of which the familiar Plough is a part. A second, but smaller, plot is then cleared for a home garden in which is planted manioc, maize, bananas and pumpkins. The Komo cannot be left without briefly mentioning the other two seasons. During the dry June to August season the men hunt and the women fish. The fourth season, regarded as the most important, is a time when the women collect edible caterpillars from the forest tree muzhanje whilst the men harvest the crops. Thus, two of the seasonal signs are astronomical, one is meteorological and the other is cultural.42
Cosmologies and Cosmogonies
A deep interest in the sky, and at least an extensive oral literature concerning it, appear to be indispensable prerequisites for the development of world systems. There is a notable difference between the awareness of possible cosmologies in north and central Africa as compared with southern Africa where interest is centred mainly on the existence of life today rather than on the creation of the world and mankind. Certainly the complex cosmology of the Dogon and Bambara of Mali is in direct contrast with the complete lack of it among, say, the Lovedu of the Transvaaal who have no interest in speculating on origins and causes.43 One can hypothesise that distance from the civilisation of Egypt can be correlated or associated with this remarkable difference, and that the diffusion of ideas lost momentum in its journey southwards. The observations of Aristotle, Herodotus and Diodorus on the blackskinned, woollyhaired inhabitants of Egypt have been enlisted to support the theory that a truly African science was born in that country, but the evidence is still controversial and speculative. However, the outstanding anthropologist, the late Marcel Griaule (18981956) whose life work was with the Dogon, said of them '. . . these people live by a cosmogony, a metaphysics and a religion which put them on a par with the peoples of antiquity . . .' truly, an immense intellectual compliment. The Dogon represent their cosmology by a model formed from a large basketwork structure placed upside down, the circular base of which symbolises the sun; the square roof is the sky, and the circle in the centre of the roof simulates the moon. Four stairways constructed on the sides of the basket face towards the cardinal points of the compass. These details are irrelevant for our purpose but what is interesting is the association of each stairway with life and the stars, e.g. the Pleiades, Orion's belt, Venus and a 'longtailed star' not identified.
Both the Dogon and the Bambara have had an obsession regarding the changes in the elevation of the noonday sun above the horizon which, when graphed, forms a slightly irregular zigzag line, a motif found on their shrines, calabashes, tools and weapons and introduced into some of their dances. The zigzag line is a projection on a plane surface of the apparent spiral motion of the sun as it passes daily from East to West, and also annually from North to South and back to North again in its route between the tropics. The zigzag line changes in size as the hours of daylight lengthen and as the noonday sun appears higher in the sky. The shape of the zigzag line also indicates the effect of what is known as the precession of the equinoxes i.e. the drift westwards of the equinoxes due to a continuously slight change in the direction of the earth's axis over a period of 26 000 years. This is caused by the toplike spinning motion of the Earth due to the gravitational pull of the moon on the Earth's equatorial bulge. These two tribes are thus aware of the diurnal and annual changes in the position of the sun, and although the astronomical reasons may not be appreciated they are aware of the effects of precession.
In addition, the Bambara also draw the journeys of mythical heroes, these excursions corresponding to the apparent paths of the sun, moon and planets which include Venus, Mars and Jupiter.47 Yet more remarkable is the Dogon obsession with Sirius A, the brightest star. In 1844 the German astronomer Friedrich Bessel discovered that Sirius A, far from being a fixed star, had a slight orbit due to no other cause than the presence of a nearby and hitherto unidentified star, which was observed in 1862 by an American Alvan Clark, and named Sirius B, orbiting Sirius A every fifty years. How the Dogon knew of the presence of Sirius B without optical aids is a mystery; they claim that Nommo, one of the four original ancestors of the tribe, told them, but keener perception may be the true explanation as in the case of the Shona who appear to have been aware of the rings of Saturn. The Dogon celebrate the completion of an orbit with a ceremony, Sigwe, every fifty years which allows time for some of the organisers to recollect the details of the previous ceremony.
Archaeoastronomy and Zimbabwe
Towards the end of the nineteenth century two investigators at Great Zimbabwe suggested that this and other ruins had functioned as solar and stellar observatories in determining summer and winter solstices for agricultural and ritual purposes. The Conical Tower was, perhaps, a gnomon serving the same purpose as the granary gnomons of the Dogon. Monoliths and rocks at the socalled Acropolis were believed to have been used to measure the transit of high magnitude stars. If these times were known, and the stars identified, then a comparison with present day readings of transit would enable us to date the ruins because the rate of precession is known. Such conclusions were rightly criticised as they were intended to support a preconceived theory that the ruins were of Semitic origin or inspiration; that their builders indulged in sunworship; and that the ruins were of great antiquity, e.g. 1100 B.C.49 However, the findings of the newlydeveloped science of arch archaeoastronomy, an interdisciplinary subject, might give an impetus to a reexamination of Rhodesian ruins as possible observatories. Stonehenge comes to mind but most of the investigations are associated with the Indians of north and central America. There are the towers of the Navajo Indians in Arizona, and those of the Mayas in Mexico; the giant stone wheels or circular solstice indicators of Kansas, Wyoming and southern and central Canada. The towers have apertures through which the sun shines only at the winter and summer solstices.5° These devices are characteristic of many peasant societies who, without timepieces and calendars, were anxious to know their location and orientation in space and time. At least, it might be found that observation of the sky was practised as much as in Egypt when the heliacal, or dawn, rising of Sirius A heralded the forthcoming inundation of the Nile. But before such an exercise is started there must be archaeological assurance that possible observatories now occupy their original positions which have not been changed by rebuilding, and above all, an assurance that the Shona possessed a deep and comprehensive knowledge of astronomy. The result of my own minimal questioning suggests that the Shona knew more about the stars than is credited to them today. It does appear that a society's obsession with sky and calendar was a measure of the status of their civilisation.
Acknowledgements
I wish to thank Professor G. Fortune, head of the Department of African Languages, University of Rhodesia, for the loan of the manuscript Pasi Rino; Mr. R. Wyatt for searching the files of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for written evidence concerning the Chiefs' insignias; Mr. J. Gandari, a reporter on the African Times, for the loan of his manuscript African Astrology, for his star maps, and for reading the draft of this article; Mr. A. C. Hodza, Senior Language Assistant, Department of African Languages, University of Rhodesia, who also read the draft and suggested the inclusion of the song Mwedzi wagara. However, I am responsible for any errors which may have been overlooked.
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