Nyakyusa People - Societal Life

Societal Life

The women were dominated by the older men. They lived at their husband's residence, married ten years earlier than the men, lacked solidarity, developed little leadership, and had no kinsmen to protect their interests. Missionaries reported adultery, divorce, litigation, and marital instability to be widespread. The Nyakyusa were accused of having a 'frivolous' attitude towards marriage, for few women of thirty were still married to their first husband and were very often on their fifth or sixth. Women spent thirty hours a week fetching wood, and only when co-wives were sisters, or an aunt or niece, were they expected to work together regularly. Intense competition for the position of favorite among a man's various wives was thought by the missionaries to be at least partly responsible for the low status of women, which was still considered higher than other tribes.

Age dominated their whole lives. Boys guarded the fields and cattle and lived in separate camps starting at about ten years of age and lasting a lifetime. Since the women married much earlier than the men, incest was of great concern to the Nyakyusa and was resolved by putting fathers in one village and sons in another. Up to the age of ten or eleven the boys herded their father's cattle in groups, then hoed the field of their fathers and continued to eat their mother's food. They no longer slept in the houses of their fathers but joined an age-grade village of boys with a separate leader, laws, and customs and could be considered members of two villages. Men and boys are expected to eat regularly with age-mates and are encouraged to bring home two or three friends to eat; parents being proud when they do so, for if a young man often came home alone to eat, his father could beat him, or even take a spear and wound him. Isolates were not easily tolerated. The following is from M. Wilson, 'This great fool comes alone to my place, again and again, it is good to eat with friends or go around in groups of four or five.' Eating with age-mates was considered right, proper, and moral. It was considered improper, unseemly, and somewhat immoral to eat with juniors or women. Women ate alone with their young children and unmarried daughters.

Sexual morality depended on the separation of the sexual activities, 'If he sleeps at home he will hear what his parents talk about at night, the night is always full or lewd talk; he may even see them undressing. He will grow up a fool.' Once again > Wilson

When an oversupply of young bachelors and a shortage of unmarried girls was created, it was resolved by forming another settlement. It was only after a young man had his wife permanently with him that he was able to have his own fields and eat its produce. Cultivation of land demanded the cooperation of a man and a woman, while elaborate cooking demanded a woman. Until the man was married he still worked his father's fields and ate at his father's house.

When the oldest sons of a chief reach thirty-three to thirty-five years of age the father handed over the country's government to them in the 'coming out', a ceremony of great pomp. All fires were now extinguished and new fires, kindled by friction, were lit. Since the sons were now new owners of a chiefdom, other princedoms were raided for cattle and food; they also raided their own father's land for milk, cattle, and bananas.