Zulu

UNKULUNKULU a s' aziwa. Yena umuntu wokukt^ala; wa dabuka ekukyaleni. Umfazi wa-

UNKULUNKULU is no longer known.1 It is he who was the first man ;2 he broke off3 in the be-

as it is said in other accounts, " A si sa m azi," We no longer know him. There no longer exists amongst us any knowledge about him. The same expression is used when speaking of the man from whom the isibongo (surname) of a house or tribe is derived, ka s' aziwa. He is lost to memory, nothing is known of him or his deeds.

nkulu. It has been said that by umuntu we are to understand simply a person. But umuntu means a human being. And it is more in accordance with the religious system of the natives to give it that meaning here. They are ancestor-worshippers, and believe that their first ancestor — the first man — was the creator. Unkulunkulu means the old-old-one, the most ancient man. In like manner Arjuna ad dresses Krishna as, " Thou first of the gods, the most ancient person." (Hardwick. Christ and other Masters. Vol. /., p. 242. ) And the king Satravata addresses " Hari, the preserver of the universe," thus, " O first male ; the lord of creation, of preservation, of destruction !" (Id., p. 314J

by fissure or division. Thus the swarming of bees is an ukudabuka. The division of small tribes from larger ones — as the small tribes of

ginning.4 We do not know his wife ; and the ancients do not tell us that he had a wife.5

Umahhaule and Unjan from the Abambo, the large tribe of Usingela ; or as the Americans from the English — is spoken of as an ukuda- buka. So if a village has become large, and the eldest son leaves the paternal kraal, and commences a new centre, that too . is an ukuda- buka. So the different kind of cattle, English, Dutch, and Zulu, are said respectively to have sprung from (dabuka) the English, Dutch, or Zulu. It is also said of trees. So of the Reformation it would be said that the Reformed Churches sprang from (dabuka) that of Rome ; and Dissenting Churches from that of England. Or what is perhaps more to the point, the mode in which Minerva was produced from Jupiter's head was an ukudabuka. As we shall see below, ac cording to the Hindu mythology, primitive man was produced by a division (ukudabuka) of the substance of Brahma. The use of the word necessarily implies the pre-existence of something from which the division took place. When it is said therefore that Unku- lunkulu broke off in the beginning, we must understand either that he broke off from an eternal or at least pre-cxistent spiritual being, or from an eternal or at least pre-cxistent material being. When it is said, wa dabuka elulilangeni (he broke off from uthlanga), we may have the intimation of an eternal spiritual being, a belief in whom formed a part of the creed of the ancestors of the Amazulu ; and when it is said, wa dabuka emhlabeni (he broke off from the earth), it cannot be doubted that we are to understand it as intimating a belief in the eternity — at least in the pre-existence- — of the world.

in the Zulu use of this phrase as in our own. We must understand it here as meaning, in the beginning of the present order of things, and not, from all eternity.

G Dabula. — My native interpreter maintains that although above it is said that Unkulunkulu is not known to have had a wife, yet that this phrase implies it, But this is scarcely borne out by the fact that iu other accounts he is said to break off cattle, &c., from Uthlanga. It seems rather that we are to understand that at first Unkulunkulu broke off, and having broken off, became the means of breaking off all other things.

Ku tiwa wa tuma unwaba ; \va ti, " Haniba, lunwaba, u ye u yo- kuti, Abantu ma ba nga li." Lwa liamba unwaba, Iwa Lamba kanci- nane, Iwa libala end/tleleni ; Iwa liamba Iwa d/ila umuti, o igama lawo ku ubukwebezane.9

Wa za Unkulunkulu wa tuma intulo ngasemva kwonwaba, se lu hambile ngesikati esipambili unwa ba. Ya liamba intulo, ya gijima, ya tehetsha kakulu, ngokuba Unkulunkulu e tizc, " Ntulo, u fike u ti, Abantu a ba fc." Ya liamba ke intulo, ya ti, " Ngi ti, Ku tiwa, Abautu ma ba fe." Ya buya intulo, ya fika kunkulunku- lu ; Iwa ba unwaba lu nga ka fiki, lona Iwa tunywa kuk^ala; lona Iwa tunywa ku tiwa, ma luyokuti, " Abantu ma ba nga fi."

It is said lie sent a chameleon ; he said to it, " Go, Chameleon, go and say, Let not men die." The chameleon set out ; it went slow ly ;8 it loitered in the way ; and as it went, it ate of the fruit of a tree, which is called Ubukwebe zane.

At length Unkuluukulu sent a lizard10 after the chameleon, when it had already set out for some time. The lizard went ; it ran and made great haste, for Unkulunkulu had said, " Lizard, when you have arrived, say, Let men die." So the lizard went, and said, " I tell you, It is said, Let men die." The lizard came back again to Unku lunkulu, before the chameleon had reached his destination, the cha meleon which was sent first ; which was sent, and told to go and say, " Let not men die."

cally, to mean a source of being. A father is the uthlanga of his children, from which they broke off. Whatever notions the ignorant of the present day among the natives may have of the meaning of thu tradition, it may be concluded that originally it was not intended to teach by it, that men sprang from a reed. It cannot be doubted th at the word alone has come down to the people, whilst the meaning has been lost. Comp. M. Casalis' account of the religious notions of the Basutos, p. 240.

among the natives to the present time, and is manifested by the dislike they entertain for the chameleon. It is frequently killed. But it is used as a medicine ; among other uses it is mixed with other things to doctor their gardens, that the birds may not destroy the corn ; it is employed because it weiit slowly, and therefore will prevent the birds

Lwa za Iwa fika, Iwa memeza, Iwa ti, " Ku tiwa, Abantu ma ba nga fi !" Ba ti abantu ba ti, " O ! si bambe izwi lentulo ; yona i si tshelile, ya ti, * Ku tiwa, Abantu ma ba fe.' A si sa li zwa elako. Ngezwi lentulo abantu V eza 'ku- fa."

At length it arrived and shout ed, saying, "It is said, Let not men die ! " But men answered, " O ! we have heard the word of the lizard ; it has told us the word, 'It is said, Let men die.' We cannot hear your word. Through the word of the lizard, men will die/'11

from hastily entering the gardens ! But the lizard is an object of much greater hatred, and is invariably killed if the person who sees it is able to kill it ; but it is very cunning, and, as they say, " escapes only by its cunning." As they kill it they say, " Yiya ! i sona lesi 'silimane esa gijima kukyala sa ya 'kuti, ' Abantu a ba fe.' " Let be ! This is the very piece of deformity which ran in the beginning to say that men should die,

to the Hottentot account. But there it is the Moon — a Hottentot god, according to Kolb, (The Present State of the Cape of Good Hope, (Medley,) Volume /., page §5) — which sends an insect to man with the message : — " Go thou to men, and tell them, l As I die, and dying live, so ye shall also die, and dying live.' " The insect, meeting with the hare, entrusts the message to him ; but when he reaches man, he says, " I am sent by the Moon to tell you, ' As I die, and dying perish, in the same manner ye shall also die, and come wholly to an end.' " (JBleek's Hottentot Fables, p. 69.^

The New Zealand legend again may be compared, where we meet with rather a foreshadowing of redemption through One destroying death by passing through it, than an account of the cause of death entering into the world. Maui is made liable to death by some acci dental omission of a part of the baptismal ritual, — a cause as trivial as the delay of the chameleon, or the false message of the hare.