Customs
As with many of the peoples of southwest Tanzania, in marriage ceremonies the groom carried a bow in his right-hand and an arrow in his left "to pierce any man who seduces your wife".
At a chief's burial a grave is dug inside the chief's hut, but only after a whole sheep is buried. The chief is placed in a sitting position on his royal stool, with a brightly colored bird's feather placed in his hair.
The main crops of the Wanda were finger millet, sorghum, sesame, peanuts, and maize. These crops were cultivated on ridges. Iron tools and weapons were not produced by the Wanda, these being traded in, mostly from the Fipa.
The Wanda worshipped gods, certain large trees, and the graves of certain chiefs.
Read more about this topic: Wanda People
Famous quotes containing the word customs:
“Thus far women have been the mere echoes of men. Our laws and constitutions, our creeds and codes, and the customs of social life are all of masculine origin. The true woman is as yet a dream of the future. A just government, a humane religion, a pure social life await her coming.”
—Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902)
“Is a civilization naturally backward because it is different? Outside of cannibalism, which can be matched in this country, at least, by lynching, there is no vice and no degradation in native African customs which can begin to touch the horrors thrust upon them by white masters. Drunkenness, terrible diseases, immorality, all these things have been gifts of European civilization.”
—W.E.B. (William Edward Burghardt)
“The correct rate of speed in innovating changes in long-standing social customs has not yet been determined by even the most expert of the experts. Personally I am beginning to think there is more danger in lagging than in speeding up cultural change to keep pace with mechanical change.”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)