Fetichism in West Africa. Robert Hamill Nassau

native regards massive rocks and large trees—the ombwiri homes—need not be felt by white people, who are themselves considered awiri, without its being clearly understood whether their bodies are inhabited by the departed spirits of the Negro dead, or whether some came from other sources.

      The awiri are generally favorably disposed, especially to their former human relatives; but it is necessary to gratify them with religious services constituting an ancestral worship. While some of them reside in great rocks or trees, others dwell in rivers, lakes, and seas.

      Awiri, if they love a person and desire to favor him or her, have the special power to grant a gift desired by most Africans, viz., the birth of children. The awiri live mostly in the region of their own former human tribe. It is possible, however, for them to go everywhere; but they usually remain within their old tribal limits. If, however, a tribe should remove or become extinct, their awiri would still remain in that region, and would affiliate with the new people who might come to occupy the deserted village sites.

      Awiri have a period of inactivity, the cold dry season of four months (in western Equatorial Africa), May to September. At that time they become very small, inactive, and almost lifeless (a condition of hibernation, somewhat like that of bears; or of inertia, as when a snake casts its skin?).

      4. There is another class of spirits called Sinkinda (singular, “nkinda”), some of whom are the spirits of people who in the ordinary stations of life were “common,” or not distinguished for greatness or goodness. Others of these sinkinda are of uncertain origin, perhaps demons whom Njambi had created, but to whom He had never given bodily existence.

      Almost all sinkinda are evilly disposed. They come to the villages on visits to warm themselves by the kitchen fires or out of curiosity to see what is going on, and sometimes, temporarily, to enter into the bodies of the living, especially of their own family. The entrance of a nkinda into a human body always sickens the person. It may enter any one, even a child. If many of them enter a man’s body, he becomes crazy.

      Sometimes the nkinda, when asked who he is, says: “I am a spirit of a member of your own family, and I have come to live with you. I am tired of living in the forest with cold and hunger. I wish to stay with you.”

      Often when people are sick with fever or cold, the diagnosis is made that some nkinda has come on a visit. If it is of the same family as those whom it is visiting, it comes and goes from time to time, to please itself; but it is never, like an uvengwa, visible.

      Sometimes these sinkinda are called “ivâvi” (sing. “ovâvi,” messenger). They come from far and bring news, e. g., “An epidemic of disease is coming,” or “A ship is coming with wealth.” Sometimes the news thus brought proves true. (Is this our modern spiritualism?) In such cases the coming of the nkinda is regarded as a blessing, in that it warns the living of evil or brings them wealth. The information is always carried by the mouth of some living member of the family. If these sinkinda are asked by a non-possessed member of the family, “Where do you live?” the reply is, “Nowhere in particular. But at evenings we gather about your town, to see you and join in your dances and songs. We see you, though you do not see us.”

      5. Mondi. There are beings, “myondi” (Benga; singular, “mondi”), who are agents in causing sickness or in either aiding or hindering human plans. These spirits are much the same as those of the fourth class, except that in power they seem to be more independent than other spirits. But they are not always simply passive in the hands of the doctor; they are often active on their own account, or at their own pleasure, generally to injure. They are worshipped almost always in a deprecatory way. They often take violent possession of human bodies; and for their expulsion it is that ilâgâ, sinkinda, and awiri are invoked. They are invoked especially at the new moons, but also at other times, particularly in sickness. The native oganga decides whether or no they be myondi that are afflicting the patient. When the diagnosis has been made, and myondi declared to be present in the patient’s body, the indication is that they are to be exorcised.

      A slight doubt must be admitted in regard to these myondi, whether they really do constitute a distinct class, or whether any spirit of any class may not become a myondi. The name in that case would be given them, not as a class, but as producers of certain effects, at certain times and under certain circumstances.

      The powers and functions of the several classes of spirits do not seem to be distinctly defined. Certainly they do not confine themselves either to their recognized locality or to the usually understood function pertaining to their class. These powers and functions shade into each other, or may be assumed by members of almost any class. But it is clearly believed that spirits, even of the same class, differ in power. Some are strong, others are weak. They are limited as to the nature of their powers; no spirit can do all things. A spirit’s efficiency runs only on a certain line or lines. All of them can be influenced and made subservient to human wishes by a variety of incantations.

      There are other names which, while they belong to spirits, apparently indicate only peculiarities in spiritual manifestations, and not representatives of a class.

      1. There may enter into any animal’s body (generally a leopard’s) some spirit, or, temporarily, even the soul of a living human being. The animal then, guided by human intelligence and will, exercises its strength for the purposes of the temporary human possessor. Many murders are said to be committed in this way, after the manner of the mythical German wehr-wolf or the French loup-garou.

      This belief in demoniacal possession of a lower animal must not be confounded with the equally believed transmigration of souls. The former is widespread over at least a third of the African continent. In Mashona-land “they believe that at times both living and dead persons can change themselves into animals, either to execute some vengeance, or to procure something they wish for; thus, a man will change himself into a hyena or a lion to steal a sheep and make a good meal off it; into a serpent to avenge himself on some enemy. At other times, if they see a serpent, it is one of the Matotela tribe or slave tribe, which has thus transformed himself to take some vengeance on the Barotse.”[27]

      2. Another manifestation is that of the uvengwa. It is claimed to be not simply spiritual, but tangible. It is the self-resurrected spirit and body of a dead human being. It is an object of dread, and is never worshipped in any manner whatever. Why it appears is not known. Perhaps it shows itself only in a restless, unquiet, or dissatisfied feeling. It is white in color, but the body is variously changed from the likeness of the original human body. Some say that it has only one eye, placed in the centre of the forehead. Some say that its feet are webbed like an aquatic bird. It does not speak; it only wanders, looking as if with curiosity.

      My little cottage at Batanga is a mile and a half from the three chief dwellings of the station. One afternoon in 1902 I went to the station, leaving my cook and his wife in charge of the cottage. When I returned late at night, he asserted that an uvengwa had come there. A few yards in front of the door of the house is a mango tree with its very dense dark foliage. The trunk is divided a few feet from the ground. The light from the open door streamed into a part of the front yard, leaving the tree trunk in dark shadow. The woman going out of the door had started back, screaming to her husband that she saw an uvengwa standing in the crotch of the tree and peering around one of the branches. The husband went to the door. He asserted to me that he also had seen the form. In their terror, neither of them made any investigation. Possibly a chalk-whitened thief had taken advantage of my absence to prowl about. But the two witnesses rejected such a suggestion; they were sure it was a visitor from some grave.

      3. Other spiritual manifestations are spoken of as the personal guardian-spirit and the family guardian-spirit. These do not constitute a separate class, but are the special modes of operation adopted by the ancestral spirit or spirits in the protection of their family. Its description belongs properly to a later chapter under the name of the Family Yâkâ fetich.

      The manner of invocation of all these five classes of spirits, in the case of obscure diseases, is very much the same now as what Dr. Wilson described fifty years ago. What he saw on the Gabun River tallies with what I also saw thirty years ago at Benita, and subsequently in the Ogowe. Even at Gabun, in the present day, though the Mpongwe have