Oral Literature in Africa (23 page)

Much panegyric is formalized, thus less variable than many other types of oral literature. Unlike self-praises and the more informal and topical praise poems there seems to be a marked tendency for the state praises of present (and particularly past) rulers to be handed down in a more or less received version. Word and stanza order is, indeed, sometimes varied from recitation to recitation, or follows the particular version approved by an individual bard (as in the case, for instance, of Southern Bantu panegyric), but the changes seem to be minor; stress is laid on conformity to tradition. In Rwanda, with its powerful corporation of bards, the exactness of wording seems even more close. In one case there were only very slight variations in four versions by four different bards of a 365-line praise poem attributed to a poet of about 1820 (Ibid.: 24ff).

The occasions for the performance of praise poetry have already been touched on in the discussion of its authors and reciters. Praise names are used when formal address is required. Among the Southern Bantu the praise name of an individual’s clan was used on formal occasions, while among the Yoruba praise names, sung or drummed, are to be heard widely on festive occasions when the drummers go about the streets formally addressing the passers-by and receiving a small reward in return. Among many West African peoples drummers at a king’s gate play not only the king’s praise names, but announce and honour important guests by drumming or piping their names as they enter the palace. A man’s status is recognized and reaffirmed by the use of these formalized praise names, particularly when, as in the announcement of visitors, this is a matter of public performance.

Among peoples to whom the concept of praise names or praise verses is common, there are many informal occasions when praises are used in the same way as speeches or commentaries in other contexts. Thus among the Kele of the Congo wrestling matches are often accompanied by a form of praise on the talking drum: the contestants are saluted as they enter the ring (‘the hero, full of pride’), there is comment and encouragement from the drums as the match continues, and at the end praise for the victor (Carrington 1949
a
: 63–5). On festive occasions among many peoples—the Yoruba are one example—singers and drummers often welcome those who attend with songs or chants of praise, usually led by a soloist who improvises to suit the individual, accompanied by a chorus. The popularity of praises means that they can be used for profit, a possibility frequently exploited by the roving Hausa soloist described in the last chapter. But they can also stir people to genuine excitement: gifts are showered on the praise poets from enthusiasm as well as fear. Among the Soninke, writes Meillassoux,

leur maniement du langage, les chaleureuses louanges dont ils couvrent leurs auditeurs, la beauté de leur musique ou de leurs rythmes suscitent d’authentiques émotions, une sorte d’ivresse enthousiaste qui entrâine à donner sans compter

(1967: 14).

Praise poetry often plays an essential part in rites of passage: when an individual (or group) moves from one status to another in society, the transition is celebrated by praises marking the new status or commemorating the old. The eulogies involved in funeral dirges are described elsewhere, but in a sense they also fall into this category. Again,
self-praises by boys at initiation, as among the Sotho or the Galla, are an important aspect of their claim to adulthood, which is heard and accepted by their audience. Among many peoples, weddings are also an obligatory occasion for praises of bride and groom either by their friends and relations or by professional bards. Accession to office is another common context for praise poetry, usually in public and in the presence of those who take this opportunity to express their loyalty. Sometimes self-praising is used on such occasions; the Hima of Ankole recited praises when a man was given a chieftainship by the king or when he dedicated himself to the king for service in battle (Morris 1964: 12).
¹²
Even when a new status is not being formally marked, praise poetry is often relevant in the analogous situation of publicizing an individual’s recent achievements, particularly those in battle or the hunt.

Most spectacular and public are the frequent occasions on which rulers are praised. Sometimes this takes a very simple form—as on the bush paths in northern Liberia or Sierra Leone when a petty chief, carried in his hammock, is accompanied by praises as he enters villages and the local dwellers are thus instructed or reminded of his chiefly dignity. Or it may be a huge public occasion as in the Muslim chiefdoms in Nigeria—Hausa, Nupe, Yoruba—when at the ‘Sallah’ rituals (the Muslim festivals of Id-el-Fitr and Id-el-Kabir) the subordinate officials attend the king on horseback, accompanied by their praise-singers. Their allegiance is shown by a cavalry charge with drawn swords outside the palace; the official praise-singers take part in the gallop, piping and drumming the king’s praises on horseback. Any sort of public event (the arrival of important visitors to the ruler, the installation ceremonies of a chief, a victory in battle) may be the occasion for praises by official bards or other experts; the ruler’s position is commented on and recognized by the stress laid both on the dignity of the office and, more explicitly, on the achievements of its present incumbent. Periodic praises are often obligatory. Among some of the Yoruba the praises of the king, with the complete list of his predecessors and their praises, must be recited once a year in public. In many Muslim kingdoms the ruler is celebrated weekly by teams of praisers (reciters, drummers, pipers) who stand outside the palace to eulogize his office, ancestry, and power, sometimes including at his request those of his
friends or patrons. In return the ruler acknowledges their praise by gifts or money which are often given publicly.

The manifold social significance of praise poetry is clear. It can validate status by the content of the praise, by the number and quality of the performers, and by the public nature of the recitation. This validation is often acknowledged by gifts. Praise poetry stresses accepted values: the Hausa praise their rulers in terms of descent and birth, the Zulu emphasize military exploits, and the Nupe voice their admiration for modern achievement in their praises of the ruler’s new car (Nadel 1942: 140–1). This kind of poetry can also act as a medium of public opinion, for up to a point praisers can withhold praise or include implicit or explicit derogatory allusions as a kind of negative sanction on the ruler’s acts. Further social functions are publicizing new status or achievements in a non-literate culture, flattering those in power or drawing attention to one’s own achievements, preserving accepted versions of history (particularly the exploits of earlier rulers), serving as an encouragement to emulation or achievement, and, not least, providing an economically profitable activity for many of those who engage in it. But consideration of the obvious social functions of praise poetry must not obscure its very real literary qualities. It was also appreciated for its intellectual and aesthetic interest, and for the fact that on some occasions it was recited purely for enjoyment—in the evening recitations of the Hima, or in the salons of important Hausa prostitutes where there was nightly praise-singing and witty conversation.

Many of these general points will emerge more clearly in a detailed discussion of the praise poetry of the Southern Bantu, the praise poetry which has been most fully documented and described. Obviously the details of occasion, tone, performance, and, most of all, style are peculiar to the societies which practise them. But the importance of praises in Bantu society has something in common with praises of other aristocratic or kingly societies in Africa, and a consideration of Southern Bantu praise poetry during the remainder of this chapter can throw further light on the general aspects that have been discussed so far.
¹³

II

The praise poems of the Bantu peoples of South Africa are one of the most specialized and complex forms of poetry to be found in Africa. Many examples have been published in the original or in translation (though as yet these are probably only a fragment of what could be found), and there is a large literature about them by scholars in South Africa. Elsewhere, in general studies of African oral literature, they have tended to be ignored, or, in the most recent general account (Bascom 1965), mentioned only in passing under the heading of ‘Briefer Forms’, which is an odd way of classifying such elaborate and lengthy poems.

These praise poems have been described as intermediary between epic and ode, a combination of exclamatory narration and laudatory apostrophizing (Lestrade 1937: 295). A certain amount of narrative is involved—the description of battles or hunts, and the exploits of the hero. But the general treatment is dramatic and panegyric, marked by a tone of high solemnity and a lofty adulatory style. The expression is typically obscure and intense, and the descriptions are presented in figurative terms, with allusions to people and places and the formalized and poetic praise names of heroes.

This poetry occurs widely among the Southern Bantu cluster of peoples in South Africa where it is regarded by the people themselves as the highest of their many forms of poetic expression. It has been particularly well documented among the Nguni-speaking peoples (a group which includes Zulu, Xhosa, and Swazi as well as the offshoot Ngoni of Malawi) and the Sotho groups (including, among others, the Lovedu and Tswana); and it also occurs among such people as the Venda and the Tsonga-speaking groups. Although at different periods and among different peoples there are differences of tone and form which would have to be considered in a detailed account of this poetry,
¹⁴
in general they share the same form and here they will be treated together. Besides these famous Southern Bantu forms, similar poems occur elsewhere among the Bantu, notably among the cattle-owning aristocrats of East Central Africa. The poems of the Bahima in Ankole, described by Morris (1964) as ‘heroic recitations’,
and the ‘dynastic poetry’ and ‘historical poems’ of Ruanda (Kagame 1951
b
; Coupez 1968) have something in common with Southern Bantu praise poetry and they could perhaps be classed together.
¹⁵

Although normally addressed to distinguished human beings, praise poems can be concerned with almost anything—animals, divining bones, beer, birds, clans. Even a stick may be apostrophized in high-sounding terms, as in this Zulu poem:

Guardsman of the river fords,

Joy of adventurers reckless!

(Dhlomo 1947: 6)

Praises of animals are very common, usually of the male. Among the pastoral Zulu cattle are a particularly popular subject, but wild animals also appear. The lion is referred to as the ‘stone-smasher’, or ‘awe-inspirer’, or ‘darkness’, and the crocodile is the

Cruel one, killer whilst laughing.

The Crocodile is the laughing teeth that kill.

(Lekgothoane 1938: 201)

Some animal praises are more light-hearted and humorous than the solemn panegyrics of prominent people. Consider, for example, the following Southern Sotho praise poem with its vivid and concise description of a pig:

Pig that runs about fussily,

Above the narrow places, above the ground;

Up above the sun shines, the pig grows fat,

The animal which grows fat when it has dawned.

Pig that runs about fussily,

With little horns in its mouth.

(Lestrade 1935: 9)

But even praises of animals are often marked by solemnity and allusiveness. Indeed there is often an intentional ambiguity in the poems between animal and person, and some poems can be interpreted as sustained metaphors. The following Northern Sotho poem appears to be about a leopard; but the allusion is to the chiefs of the Tlokwa, whose symbol was a leopard:

It is the yellow leopard with the spots

The yellow leopard of the cliffs

It is the leopard of the broad cheeks

Yellow leopard of the broad face, I-do-not-fear

The black and white one, I-get-into-a-small-tree

I tear off the eyebrows
¹⁶

Clawer am I, I dig in my claws

My people (adversaries) I leave behind

Saying: this was not one leopard, there were ten.

Mr. Claws, scratch for yourself

Even for a big man it’s no disgrace to yell if scratched

Leopards of the Tlokwa country

Of Bolea, where the Tlokwa came from

Wild cat with the broad face

Both
impala
buck we eat and cattle

You died in Botlokwa

In the Tlokwa-land of Mmathsaka Maimane

Tlokwa-land of the sons of Mokutupi of Thsaka

Where do you go in Tlokwa-land (to seize cattle)?

It is full of blood, it has got the liver

Leopard of Bolea.

Yellow leopard of the clan Maloba the great

Yellow spotted one

Poor nobody, active smart fellow that summons together a huge gathering

My victim goes away with his scalp hanging down over his eyes

Leopard of the many spots

Leopard of the very dark spots

Leopard grand old man (formidable one)

Even when it can no longer bite, it still butts its adversaries out of the way with its forehead.

(Lekgothoane 1938: 193–5)

The most developed and famous forms, however, are those in which people are directly praised and described. In some areas these include self-praises, such as those composed by boys on their emergence from traditional initiation schools or by warriors on their return from battle. Others occur in the relatively informal context of a wedding when a woman may be praised (which is otherwise unusual). Most ambitious and elaborate of all are the praises composed and recited by the professional bards surrounding a king or chief. The following extract from one of the many praises of the famous Zulu king, Shaka, illustrates the use of allusion, metaphor, and praise name which are combined with some narrative to convey the bravery and fearsomeness of the king as he defeated his enemy Zwide: