A text in the Chifundi dialect of Swahili, recorded in Mkwiro village on Wasini Island (Kenya) and translated and introduced by Martin Walsh.
Citation: Walsh, M. T. 1993. Mwaozi Tumbe and the Rain making Rites of Wasini Island: A Text in the Chifundi Dialect of Swahili. Études Océan Indien, 16: 60 85
Original Title
Mwaozi Tumbe and the Rain-making Rites of Wasini Island: A Text in the Chifundi Dialect of Swahili
A text in the Chifundi dialect of Swahili, recorded in Mkwiro village on Wasini Island (Kenya) and translated and introduced by Martin Walsh.
Citation: Walsh, M. T. 1993. Mwaozi Tumbe and the Rain making Rites of Wasini Island: A Text in the Chifundi Dialect of Swahili. Études Océan Indien, 16: 60 85
A text in the Chifundi dialect of Swahili, recorded in Mkwiro village on Wasini Island (Kenya) and translated and introduced by Martin Walsh.
Citation: Walsh, M. T. 1993. Mwaozi Tumbe and the Rain making Rites of Wasini Island: A Text in the Chifundi Dialect of Swahili. Études Océan Indien, 16: 60 85
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MWAOZI TUMBE AND THE RAIN-MAKING
RITES OF WASINI ISLAND :
A TEXT IN THE CHIFUNDI DIALECT OF
SWAHILI
by Martin WALSH
Scattered along the southern Kenya coast and down into
northern Tanzania are a number of Swahili speaking communities
whose inhabitantsidentify themselves collectively as Shirazi
(washirazi). Comparatively little is known of the history and
ethnography of these people. Their claims to Shirazi/Persian
descent - not to be taken literally - link them with the earliest pre-
Islamic waves of Swahili settlement between the 9th and 11th
centuries A.D. Subsequent centuries witnessed a process of
political and religious development whose outlines were shared
throughout the Swahili world (Nurse and Spear, 1985, pp. 68-98).
One group, the Vumba (wavumba) of Vumba Kuu, shed their
Shirazi identity following a shift of dynastic affiliation (Hollis,
1900). Other Shirazi groups also began to develop along
independent lines : by the late 16th century at least one of these
groups, the Chifundi (wachifundi), also had its own hereditary
ruler, the Guo Kuu (Lambert, 1958, p. 10; McKay, 1975, p. 266, p.
278). This political autonomy did not, however, last. In the first
half oh the 17th century all the major Shirazi settlements between
asi in the north and Tanga in the south fell to the Vumba ruler,
‘Moana Kyambi Kyandi Ivoo! (Lambert, 1953, p. 36). Thereafter the
1 The eight Shirazi ‘towns’ said to have been conquered by Ivoo, and the
people occupying them, have been identified as follows (see Hollis, 1900,
p. 282; Lambert, 1953, p. 36; Lambert, 1957, pp. 10-11): wachifundi :
‘Tumbe; near modern Msambweni; wachangani : Mdragoni; near modern
Shimoni; wamuyuni: Mwiyuni; now Aleni/Majoreni; wambayayi
Mbayayi; on Kirul island; wakirui : Kirui; also on Kirui island; wauso
‘Muuso; south of Moa, on the Boma peninsula; waulenge : Manjauli; now
Manza; wap: Mkumbi; north of Kwale/Mawe Mawili.
EI Buhurly (1934, p. 144) lists all of these as Shirazi ‘tribes’ with the
exception of the wachangani and wapaji. These can be identified with the
Etudes Océan Indien, 16, 1993.@
\Vumba consolidated their political and economic dominance over
the whole area, a position they by and large maintained through to
the colonial period (Salim, 1973, passim: McKay, 1975). In the
process many of the local Shirazi communities lost their separate
identity, and kioumba, the Vumba dialect of Swahili, still dominates
much of the coastline today (Lambert, 1957 : Méhlig, 1980, p. 22).
The Chifundi, who have retained their own distinctive
dialect (chichifundi), provide an exception. According to tradition
they put up a determined resistance to the Vumba and were the
last of the Shirazi groups to submit to Ivoo's rule (Lambert, 1953, p-
36). The Chifundi text presented in this paper describes how they
were betrayed to the Vumba by Mwaozi Tumbe (the daughter of
their last independent ruler, Guo Ku Mwatumbe); how the
Vumba disposed of her in turn; and how this led to a ritual
rapprochement between the two peoples. Mwaozi Tumbe's story is
the most popular and widely known of Chifundi historical
narratives and two partial versions of it have already appeared in
print (Lambert, 1953 : Mc Kay, 1975, pp. 277-278). Neither of these
gives a detailed account of the narrative's reflex in ritual action. In
fact little at all can be gleaned from the existing literature about
CChifundi ethnography, and even the basic ethnographic/linguistic
‘map is subject to a number of confusions. Before introducing the
text itself, it may help to sort some of this confusion out.
The Chifundi and their language
The Chifundi, who probably number around 1000 people
in total, are by far the largest Shirazi group on the southern Kenya
coast?. In fact the only other undiluted Shirazi groups they
recognize are the people of Aleni (near Majoreni) and Ngoa (near
Vanga). Among themselves Chifundi distinguish two main areas
of settlement. Chifundi Chande (cha nde, ‘outside’ of the open sea)
comprises the mainland villages of Munje (Munge), Shirazi
(Chifundi), and Bodo (Bordo), together with the village of Funzi on
‘wakixyu (wakyuys) and wakoale who he does mention. The contemporary
Shirazi of Ngoa are a branch of the wamuyuni.
2 1,519 "Swahili /Shirazi" were enumerated in Kwale District in the 1979
‘census (Republic of Kenya, 1981, p. 140).
683
the nearly island of the same name’, All of these villages are
reported to have a mixed population of Chifundi and Digo.
Chifuundi cha Matweni (stony Chifundi') comprises a single village,
Mkwiro, and the tiny hamlet of Nyuma-ya-Maji, both on the coral
island of Wasini*. Mkwiro is a compact settlement of some 60
households and the majority of its 400 inhabitants are Chifundi
bom and bred in the village. There is little intermarriage with the
CChifundi of Funzi and the mainland. The Mkwiro Chifundi also
maintain relatively little contact with the Vumba inhabitants of
Wasini village at the western end of the islandS. Their main
connection to the mainland is by boat to Shimoni, a growing
tourist centre and headquarters of the South Coast Fisheries Co-
operative. Mkwiro Chifundi call the inhabitants of Shimoni
‘wachuyu (wakyuyu in Vumnba, the local dialect) and describe them
as a mixture of Shirazi, Digo, and Segeju®.
‘The comparative isolation of Mkwiro Chifundi from the
northern group is mirrored in divergent patterns of language use.
Mkwiro has its own sub-dialect of chichifundi, distinct from the
speech of Funzi and the mainland villages. These two varieties of
chichifundi were first described by Lambert (1958) in a study based
upon information collected in 1923 and 19247, Since then the
3 Lambert (1958, p.9) asserts that the whole inshore area is (or was, in the
1920s) commonly called Furzi
4 McKay (1975, p. 5, 102) mistakenly identifies Mkwiro with Kifundi
(Chifundi), an earlier name for the mainland village of Shirazi (sce
Lambert, 1958, p.9).
5 For a survey of the history of Wasini village and its inhabitants see
Marquardt (1985),
The ethnography of Shimoni, indeed of the Shimoni peninsula as a
whole, is complex and has yet to be adequately described in print.
Lambert makes no reference to Mkwiro and appears not to have visited
the village. Instead he implies that the local Chifundi live in the village of
‘Wasini, the label he gives to their sub-dialect (1953, p. 37; 1958, p.7). Nurse
(1982, p. 185) reproduces this terminological confusion and adds to it by
calling the Funzi/mainland sub-dialect ‘Shiraz’, while in later works he
refers to chichifundi as a whole as 'Chifunzi' (1984-85, pp. 245-246; Nurse
and Spear, 1985, p. 57; also Marquardt, 1985, p. 10). Mohlig (1980, p. 22)
mentions neither sub-dialect but asserts that chichifundi is only one variety
‘of wider Shirazi dialect whose speakers also include the people of Aleno
Mkwiro sub-dialect, which Lambert considered to be the most
conservative, has undergone considerable change. Mkwiro speech
has lost its affricates (/pf/, /bv/, /ts/, and /dz/), which are now
pronounced as fricatives (/f/, /v/, /s/, and /z/). Funai speakers
have, however, retained the earlier pronunciation (compare
Lambert 1958, p. 16). The Mkwiro variety has also lost its
distinctive set of of -chi- tense markers, already absent from Funzi
speech in the 1920s (Lambert, 1958, pp. 55-57). The loss of these
two features can be related to sociolinguistics factors, in particular
the growing influence of standard Swahili upon Mkwiro speakers.
The text and its translation
‘The changes which have affected the Mkwiro sub-dialect
of chichifundi are evident in the text of Mwaozi Tumbe's story,
reproduced below. The text was tape recorded in Mkwiro on
Friday 14 February 19868. The narrator, Mwanamize Haruni
(Madudua), born in Mkwiro of Chifundi parents, was about 50
years of age and had received no formal education. She was
known by other village women as an authority on chipumbwi, a
traditional Mkwiro performance (ngoma) which has now been
replaced at weddings and other festivities by the widespread
‘Swahili chakacha, In the recording she was accompanied by Hidaya
Ali, a close neighbour and member of the same age group who
interjected at times to correct Mwanamize’s slips into standard
Swahili and help the flow of the narrative. Hidaya's grandson,
Harithi Pandu, a Standard 7 pupil, later helped to transcribe the
text and translate it into standard Swahili.
‘The Chifundi text is reproduced below, followed by a
translation into English. In transcribing the Chifundi text
aspiration of voiceless stops, although phonemic, has not been
marked. Otherwise the following orthographic conventions have
been used :
and Ngoa (Ngowa). No evidence is provided in support of this assertion
and Mohlig later reverts to identifying ‘Chiraz' (ie. chishirazi) with
chichfundi alone (1984-85, p. 267.
8, copy of this tape, including other chichifundi materials, will be
deposited in the Cambridge Anthropology Sound Archive, Department of
Social Anthropology, Free School Lane, Cambridge, England.
d—torepresentdental = /d/
L —torepresentdental — /t/
¥ —_torepresentbilabial /B /
ng torepresentnasal = /g/
‘The standard Swahili forms (e.g, ‘kama’ for ‘kant, ‘mifupa’ for
‘mifuya’) which creep into the text have been left uncorrected. The
Chifundi vocabulary which appears in the text is listed together
with standard Swahili equivalents in Walsh (1986a).
In translating the narrative into English I have tried to
remain as faithful as possible to the sense of the original Chifundi
without being overly literal. One potential source of confusion for
readers lies in the narrator's shifting frame of locational reference.
The action begins in an unnamed walled town on the mainland
which we know from other sources to have been Tumbe, the
CChifundi capital (Lambert, 1953). Later in the text the Chifundi are
referred to as the people of Shirazi. Shirazi, earlier known as
(Chifundi, is said to have become the principal Chifundi town after
the fall and abandonment of Tumbe (Lambert, 1958, p. 9).
Elsewhere in the text they are identified as the inhabitants of
Mkwiro, on Wasini island. According to its modern inhabitants,
however, Mkwiro is a relatively recent foundation : before this
they lived on ths south side of the island at Bogoa, where Mwaozi
‘Tumbe is buried and most of the local fishermen still keep their
boats. Bogoa was abandoned sometime in the second half of the
19th century following an epidemic of what was probably cholera
Galim, 1973,p. 30). Mkunguni, mention towards the end of the
text, lies between Bogoa and Nyuma-ya-Maji and until recently
was the site of the island's only primary school. Throughout the
narrative the Vumba, at first referred to as ‘the islanders’ in
contrast to their mainland foes, are pictured as residing at Wasini.
According to their own traditions the Vumba did not settle on
‘Wasini island until around 1700, some years after the defeat of the
Chifundi (McKay, 1975, p. 78: Marquardt, 1985, p. 4). Chisite
(Kisite), the small island to which Mwaozi Tumbe was exiled, and
now a favourite for boatloads of tourists, is still uninhabited.