Case Study on Swazi culture

INTRODUCTION & HISTORY

The Swazi are part of the millions of Bantu-speaking peoples of Africa who migrated at different times from farther north and eventually arrived to the south-eastern region. They brought cattle and seed for cultivation, and handmade products of iron, wood, skin and clay.

There occurred physical mingling and cultural diffusion and borrowing. In their process of historical growth, the Swazi developed their own political system, a dual monarchy that, though unique, fits into the general category of centralized chiefdoms. At the head there is a hereditary king Nwenyama (Lion) of the Dlamini clan, and a queen mother Ndlovukazi (Lady Elephant).

Swaziland is a country of 11.200 m2 at the south east of the continent, limiting with South Africa, Mozambique, and Ethiopia. It is of great importance to this society the abundant supply of water. People do not consider droughts or floods as acts of God or nature, but as signs of royal displeasure.

The Swazi had no script by which they could transmit their past to paper, and their approach to time was episodic rather than chronological. They remembered floods, wars, and famines and the major time unit was a reign. Swazi historians are generally old men interested in the past and their versions of history frequently contradict each other. They recall the name of some twenty-five kings, but they only agree in the last eight, beginning with Ngwane II. He and his kinsmen settled in Shiselweni, the “Place of Burning”. There he died and annual pilgrimages are made to the place where he is buried.

Nwane’s grandson, Sobhuza I, came into conflict with Zudze from the Ndwandwe clan for some garden lands. Sobhuza was a pacifist and, in order not to have problems with the Ndwandwe, he moved north. They encountered Nguni and Sotho groups, and forced them to declare their loyalty to the Dlamini clan or else they’d be destroyed. Swazi refer to this people as Emakhandzambili (the found ahead). Sobhuza I later created alliances by marrying Zidze’s daughter and sending two of his own daughters as wives for Shaka, of the Zulu. When he died, he left his successor a strong kingdom, respected and feared by neighbouring tribes.

Mswati, Sobhuza’s son by Zidze’s daughter, was the greatest of Swazi fighting kings. He reorganized the army into age regiments. He established homesteads as mobilizing centres for men in outlying districts. His name was the terror of the north conquered groups were rebuilt as part of the Swazi state. It was a period of intertribal conflict and many chiefs and relatives came to him looking for protection.

Immigrants and clans conquered by Mswati are known as Emafikamuva (those who arrived after). Of the clan names, one fifth are regarded as True Swazi, one seventh Emakhandzambili, and the rest are “those who arrived after”. The name “Swazi” is an English mispronunciation of Mswati.

Before his death in 1839, Sobhuza had foreseen in his dreams the arrival of white-skinned people. During Mswati’s reign, Boers (descendants of Dutch colonists) had begun to settle on the west of the present-day territory f Swaziland. In the south British colonists were also settling and competed with the Boer for control of the region. Boer wanted grazing land for their cattle and a port on the Indian Ocean, and they tried to gain control over Swaziland. In the 1840s, the Swazi welcomed the first Europeans into the continent and became allies with both groups. In 1846 the Boer signed an unofficial treaty with a Swazi outcast, in which they were entitled most of Swazi western lands.

In 1868 Mswati died and he had not chosen a main wife. Mbandzeni was selected as the heir, but he was murdered by his jealous brothers. Finally a successor was chosen, but he put his mother to death and a woman from her same clan was selected queen mother.

In 1880 the Swazi provided military assistance to the British against the Pedi, and the British government recognized Swazi independence. During Mbandzeni’s rule Swaziland was taken over by white settlers. Offy Shepstone was hired to govern and settle disputes among the white community in Swaziland. Despite the trust placed on him, he worked for his own benefit and by the end of Mbandzeni’s reign, most of Swaziland’s valuable resources and land had been sold off to whites. He died in 1889, a heir ruled only briefly and died. Gwamile, his mother, and an older prince were selected regents and in charge of raising the future king Sobhuza II. This was a period of violence and conflict due to the scarcity of land. Gwamile is remembered for her wisdom and moderation during this time.

In 1894, the British handed Swaziland over to the Boers as a protectorate. Rinderprest, a cattle disease, destroyed Swazi’s source wealth. There was a tax imposed on people, which had to be paid in cash, and that forced many Swazi to start to work on the city for white employers.

In 1902, the British won the Anglo-Boer War and Swaziland became a British protectorate. They continued with the tax policy and brought Zulu police (very violent) to enforce tax collection. In 1907 the land was divided in “white areas” and “native areas”, and all Swazi were forced to move to the latter, which represented only one third of the country and was poor in resources. The British controlled the people using their own political institutions.

Gwamile decided to fight the white in their own terms, and created a school of western education for the king and princes. Later Sobhuza was sent to Lovedale College in South Africa. When the Swazi were given the right to collect taxes, the queen mother used the money to pay the king’s education and cure the cattle disease. Sobhuza was installed king in 1921 and fought to regain land through the British courts and established the Lifa Fund to buy back land for the native people. In 1968 he achieved the independence of his country and the power of the ...

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KINSHIP AND LOCALITY

The clan (sibongo) is the furthest extension of kinship. Every swazi acquires by birth his father’s clan name. The centralized monarchy replaced the heads of autonomous clans and clans are graded by their closeness to the royal clan. In the past brothers, of the same clan separated with some followers and created new clans. The link between them is retained in extensive praise names, and marriage between them is prohibited. Marriage is exogamic as regards clanship. Only the royal clan is allowed to marry members of linked clans, but a king will never chose a woman of a linked clan as his main wife; the future queen mother is always chosen from an outside clan. Polygyny is regarded as a social ideal and grades prestige, and he is expected to unify and centralize his position by taking wives of all sections of his people..

A number of lineages are contained under each clan name. They define legal rights but do not provide a framework for political structure. Kinship reinforces local ties but they are not the same. The clan and lineage structure emphasizes the agnatic (patrilineal kin) as distinct form the elementary family, in which relationship with both parents is recognized. Yet, it isn’t either the case of some matrilineal societies, which interpret birth as a sort of immaculate conception, or impregnation by a clan spirit. A child is “one blood with its father and its mother”. The biological tie between father and child must be confirmed by law and ritual, for the physiological father is not automatically the sociological father. Rights of fatherhood are acquired through lobola (the transfer of values, especially cattle) from the family of the man to that of the woman. If no lobola has been given, the child remains with her mother’s family, but she will be separated from him and given in marriage to another man. The child retains the sibongo of his father, who may probably lobola his offspring even if he rejects his mother.

The most important daily interaction takes place in the family environment of the homestead. It is there where husband and wife, parents and children, grandparents and grandchildren, siblings play their roles in dynamic interpersonal relationships. This behaviour is patterned by a classificatory kinship system.

There are a limited number of broad categories under which Swazi embrace relatives that in other societies are kept distinct. The term father, associated with someone who is both feared and respected, is extended from one’s own father, father’s brothers and half-brothers, and sons of his father’s father’s (grandfather’s) brothers. The term mother, a more indulgent relationship, addresses one’s own mother, her sisters, her co-wives, and his father’s brother’s wives. Children of these fathers and mothers are his brothers and sisters, and their children grouped in the same category as his own grandchildren. There are usually accurate descriptions of degrees of closeness. “The father who bore me” is distinct from “my big father” (father’s elder brother) or “my little father” (father’s younger brother). The father’s sister is the “female father”, and the mother’s brother is the “male mother”. Their children are included in a single term, which can be translated as cousins.

An outstanding feature in Swazi kinship is the father’s authority over his children. The headman is the “father” of the homestead. The king is the “father” of the country.

There is a distinction between kinship ties and homestead ties. In control of the homestead is a patriarchal polygynist headman, umnumzana, whose prestige is enhanced by the size of his family and the number of other dependents. Many wives are symbol of status, and their children build up the lineage of the father and the size and influence of his homestead. It is built according to a definite plan that reflects the status relationships of the occupants. It consists of a central cattle pen, sibaya, with its main gateway facing the raising sun. Men and boys have free access to it, but women may only enter on special occasions. Grouped round the western end of the fenced sibaya are the living quarters. The only fixed point as regards placement of the wives is the main enclosure with the “great hut” indlunkulu under the charge of the headman’s mother. It contains the family shrine and because of its sacred character, it may not be approached by anyone considered ritually “unclean” (menstruation, mourning, frequent sexual intercourse). It is specifically devoted to paternal relatives, and the headman’s wives cannot enter and must avoid it without respect, although their children may even sleep in it.

The quarters of the wives are distinct from the previous one. After a time of service to her mother-in-law, a wife is given her own sleeping, cooking and store huts, shut off from the public by a high reed fence. The hut of So-and-So is the enclosure where she leads a private existence with her children. She is also allotted her own fields and cattle for her use, so that her hut is a semi-dependent social and economic unit. The headman uses his mother’s house as daytime base, and is expected to spend nights equally between his wives. Young children sleep with their grandmother, adolescent girls have a private hut behind their mother’s, and their brothers build barracks at the entrance of the homestead.

A king’s homestead follows the same plan but on a larger scale. He has several royal homesteads strategically placed throughout the country, and his wives are distributed in each of them. In each reign, the homestead where the king’s mother’s indlunkulu is placed is considered the state capital. There his wives live in a communal enclosure with a single narrow gateway in the surrounding reed fence. Each time he visits the royal homestead; he stays in a personal sleeping hut deep in the harem. At the entrance of it there is a hut related to his marriage to the two first wives, and is used as a guardroom by a trusted man in charge of looking after the women. Unrelated dependents live in a double row of huts surrounding the mother and wives enclosure, and some men are permanently stationed in regimental barracks to protect people.

When a headman dies, he is buried in the entrance of the entrance to the cattle pen. After a period of mourning, the place is abandoned and his heir awakens the family home in the vicinity. The old huts are transferred to the new site, and the old one becomes a treasured and fertile field for cultivation, which the new headman and his mother (the dead headman’s main wife) will share among the occupants.

The king must awaken his father’s royal homesteads, and inaugurate new places of his own. He perpetuates the old homesteads by sending some of his wives to live there and one of his sons will become the chief prince of the area.

Swazi marriage is essentially a linking of two families more than of two persons. This marriage is consummated with the bearing of children. Swazi marriage is of enduring nature, as seen with the application of the levirate. When a man dies, his wife shall be inherited by one of the male relatives to bear children in his name. The woman main role is the bearing of children; if she cannot bear any children, her family must either return the lobola or provide her with a relative as junior co-wife, to bear children to “put into her womb”.

High lobola is a symbol of the permanence of marriage, and divorce is rare in Swazi society. The amount of lobola depends on the women status, and if she is chosen to be a king’s main wife, many headmen will probably contribute to the paying of the lobola. This issue is controversial in modern Africa, as it is condemned as the buying and selling of women, but its permanence has led to a deeper sociological level. The woman is a valued member of the community and the transaction symbolizes her past status and her future security. By lobola, her children are made legitimate and acquire the benefits of their father’s lineage; and her family is compensated by the loss of her services.

A first wife is never the main wife. This election may depend on pedigree, and a chief’s daughter has advantage over any other. Other factor may be considered, such as marriage to a specific kin. In this case the most important is the one who has the clan name of the man’s paternal or maternal grandmother. These kinds of marriages are generally arranged by parents and bestow a higher status.

The traditional marriage ceremony dramatizes the necessity of two intermarrying groups to create permanent alliance between them. Throughout the ritual, her family must express reluctance at losing her. Her father asks the ancestors to protect her while her mother (more empathetic) gives her a series of recommendations. They remain behind while she leaves her home accompanied by a group of supporters. She is friendly received by the groom’s group, but she may not smile nor respond. The most dramatic moment is when she stands at her husband’s cattle byre and mourns in song the loss of her freedom, and cries to her brothers to come rescue her. They, who have been hiding, rush to help her in a demonstration of family loyalty and unity. But they all know that she must finally accept the role of woman and wife, and she returns when her future mother-in-law calls her back with the promise of a cow. Later she is covered with red clay, symbolizing the loss of her virginity and a baby form the man’s lineage is placed on her arms as a promise of motherhood. Finally, she distributes presents to her in-laws, whose favour is so necessary for her future happiness. The ceremony lasts several days and culminates in a feast in which an ox provided by the groom’s family is divided in two and each family receives half. The winter after the ceremony the groom’s people bring the lobola for her marriage, and after a mock attempt to give it back, her family accepts it and may even promise a second daughter as a junior co-wife.

Swazi men may never treat their sons as equals, as there is a conflict of interests between them. This conflict inherent in parent-child generations is not present in grandparent and grandchild. They are, in fact, recognized as allies. The most highly rated marriage is one that is arranged for a man to a woman of the clan of his father’s grandmother. Among the Swazi, married sons are expected to live in the homestead of the father, but between sons’ wives and their father-in-law there is the strictest avoidance, mainly because father and son relationship contains an element of the Oedipus complex: unconscious rivalry for the woman as mother and as wife.

As it is an agnatic patriarchal society, there is even less intimacy between a father and his daughter, as she leaves her home and produces children for another lineage. Her mother is said to share the sadness, and together with the lobola, the groom’s family sends a special beast, the “wiper away of tears”, which is later inherited by the youngest son. Girls can never inherit her family property, and are less involved in conflict. Her brother have “nothing to fear form her, and much to gain”, for it is the lobola paid for her that allows them to pay the lobola for their wives. She is a most privileged guest when she visits her married brother and she may use freely her sister-in-law’s possessions. His children are alse told to fear this woman, the female father, more than their own mother.

POLITICAL STRUCTURE

When Swazi were conquered some functions of traditional authorities changed, but the network of kinship allowed the political system to continue even under the British administration.

Both the king and the queen mother still receive elaborate deference. Their subjects crouch when addressing them and refer to them by flattering titles. Both are regularly treated with kingship medicine to give them personality.

Swazi constitution is complex. Superficially, all powers center in Nwenyama and Ndlovukazi, but tyrannical exercise of their powers is restrained by their own relationship, by a hierarchy of officials whose positions depend on maintaining kingship, by a developed system of government, by councils of state and by the pressure of subjects who could transfer their military strength and support to rivals. The structure of Swazi kingship restrains despotism.

The dual monarchy is the first control on abuse of power. The king owes his position to a woman whose status determined his selection for kingship. There is a balance of power; he is educated and shoulders more of the administrative responsibilities, letting the burden of ritual fall primarily on her. He is associated with the “hardness” of thunder, she with the “softness” of water. Sacred national objects are in her charge, but they are not effective without his cooperation. They are expected to assist and complement each other.

Conflict between the king and the queen mother has always been recognized as a potential menace, and in order that she does not favor another son more than the heir, there is a rule by which “no king is followed by blood brothers”. Once a woman has been appointed queen mother, she is prohibited from bearing a second child, and when the king dies, she is excluded from the levirate custom. Direct conflict is also avoided by the spatial separation of the king’s homestead to his mother’s. She is not allowed to move far away from the shrine, and she may spend weeks without the visit of his son. A queen is expected to live longer than the king, she is expected to train her successor and hand over power when the heir has achieved maturity.

Rulers maintain their position by delegating authority to related and non-related officials. Nepotism is accepted in Swazi government, for power radiates from the king to his lineage, who are “children of the sun”. The more important princes are sent as district chiefs and are expected to build up the prestige of the monarchy.

For Swazi, “there is only one king”. Not only may he not have any blood brothers, but also there are several restrictions on his half-brothers. They may never enter his wives’ enclosure, touch his clothes, eat from his dishes, or use the “medicines of kingship”, for they are considered a menace to his person. On the one hand his relatives want to build up the Dlamini kingship, but on the other they do not want him to be too powerful.

For the role of protecting the king from royal rivals and enemies are ritually created blood brothers known as tinsila (body dirt or sweat). These men are drawn from commoner clans, which will for sure have no interest in prejudicing the king. They are of his same age and are chosen as soon as he is appointed, so that they will grow up together. Through a ritual in which blood together with magical substances is rubbed onto incisions made on the bodies of the two men, they become blood brothers and they may touch him, wear his clothes, eat form his dishes, etc. These tinsila are called “father” by the people, including the princes. The relationship created between the king and his “twins” is not equalitarian. They benefit the king more than he benefits them. They are expected to protect him; Swazi believe that any attack against thje king shall be deflected by tinsila, and so close is the identification with them, that they remain sociologically alive until the king dies himself.

There are also junior tinsila appointed at certain times for specific routines or rituals. There are also a series of individuals drawn from commoner clans, whose role is to protect the king from close physical contact with members of the royal lineage.

Female relatives of the king are economical and political assets handled as investments. The more important female relatives (paternal sisters, aunts and daughters) are given in marriage to foreign rulers and non-Dlamini chiefs, in whose homes they will for sure be recognized as main wives.

Close relatives of the queen mother also influence national affairs. They usually receive posts in administration, or act as intermediaries of the maternal line at times of crisis. When the king dies, they might lose direct influence, but they retain their prestige. The wives of the ruling king are recognized as “mothers of the people” but they lead a secluded life of their husband. The harmony of royal homesteads depends on the king’s treatment towards them.

King’s allies are non-related commoners. In each reign there is a big indvuna (prime minister) who lives in the capital and acts as the people’s representative. The position tends to be hereditary in the senior lineage of a limited number of commoner clans. He is drawn into a web of fictional kinship with the royal clan, but he may never attempt to kingship. Western education is recognized for this kind of post, for he deals with “white affairs”.

A final group a traditional officials controlling the king’s power and essential for national security are tinyanga (ritual specialists). They are drawn from selected clans and are asked to fortify the king and the nation as a whole. Although the no one is able to challenge the king, tinyanga contribute to enhance his inherited ritual power.

In addition to individual officials, there are two organized traditional councils: the liqoqo (inner council) and the Libandla lakaNwane (National Council). The former is a development of the family council, and is therefore aristocratic. Number of members is not fixed; it is composed by princes together with the big indvuna, and the ruler must continue with the liqoqo of his predecessor, and may add a member of his choice. There are no regular sessions and no compulsory report on activities.

The National Council is a more representative body composed of all chiefs, leading councilors and headmen. It meets in the sibaya of the capital. There is no agenda, no order of speakers, no time limit, no political parties, and no vote. There is freedom of speech and the aim is to get to an agreement, not to break up in opposition factions. The sanction of the Libandla must be made by the liqoqo.

Local government

Tribal territory is divided into districts, organized on principles similar to those underlying the central government. At the head there is a sikhulu (chief) who is either a prince, a nominee of the king, or a hereditary head of a non-Dlamini clan. In his area, composed of several homesteads, he centralizes law, economics, and ritual, and if his mother is alive, she shares with him the responsibilities. Each district has an historical background, which is the basis for limiting between one another. Local headmen constitute the Libandla of each sikhulu and may also attend the national council.

Knowledge of the principles involved in government is acquired by every adult male as part of his domestic experience. In the homestead, the headman exercises toward the occupants’ rights and obligations comparable on a smaller scale to those of a chief. When he considers it necessary, he consults senior kinsmen, who constitute his family council.

The relationship between a chief and his subjects is essentially personal. The term father extended from the family to the head of the homestead, and to the chief of the district, suggests authority and protection. He is expected to know all the families and share moments of social importance (death, wedding, birth) with his subjects. His power is paternalistic, not despotic.

Swazi political authorities are criticized by their subjects if they are aggressive and domineering. They are constantly reminded that their prestige depends mainly on the number of his followers, and he is aware that his subjects have the right to migrate if they are not happy with his procedure. Freedom to move is a primary characteristic of the traditional Swazi citizen rights.

WEALTH AND STATUS

Accumulation of wealth is not noticeable in traditional society, where rulers and subjects live in the same type of home, eat the same kind of food, and use the same limited range of utensils. Generosity is the hallmark of achievement and the main virtue of buntfu (humanity). From infancy, children are taught not to be greedy and they, themselves, soon enforce the rule of sharing. The character of a headman is judged by his hospitality. A donor must always belittle his gift, while the recipient must exaggerate its importance and accept even the smallest gist in both hands. Begging carries no shame between Swazi, To beg is a sign of deference and to give is a token of superiority, enhancing status. The person who refuses a request should suffer, and what is given is a gift that shall not be returned. A person is thanked for a favor by a further request: “do the same tomorrow”.

There is a considerable restraint on ambition and ability, rich conservatives divide their homesteads, lend out their surplus cattle and hide their money in the ground, for they fear witchcraft. It is safer to plead poverty, than to boast of wealth.

The major obvious disparity in wealth is not between traditional and “progressive”, or between aristocrat and commoner, but between Whites and Swazi.