CEREMONIAL KILLING.

Thames Star, Volume LVII, Issue 15883, 23 July 1923, Page 3

CEREMONIAL KILLING.

AFRICANS AS 'LEOPARDS. One of the chief causes of homicide in tropical Africa, says Lord Raglan, telling of administrative experience in the Nineteenth Century, is the custom that a young man must kill someone, not necessarily in fair fight, before he can marry. Sometimes he goes to a distance from his village, and throws his spear at the first solitary peison he meets, whether man or woman. Blood feuds are another cause of homicide. Usually they arise from a first murder, for which the blood price has -not been paid. The trouble is sometimes settled by allowing the next of kin of the dead man to marry a girl of the murderer’s family himself, or to give her in marriage to someone else, and thus receive the price paid for a wife. As in all primitive races, there is a belief in sorcery. It is considered lawful to put to death persons who are reputed to be possessed of the evil eye, or to be able to change themselves into leopards. It is not unusual for a woman to state in evidence that it is true that she can turn helself into a leopard, this being a family gift. She will admit having killed a man’s sheep while in this guise, because another man bothered her till she agreed to do so. The second man admits this, and gives the reason that the son of the first took the wife of witness’s son. “Where is she now?’’ “He was so frightened w r hen the leopard killed the sheep that he gave her back.” “Then you had better pay for the sheep.’’ “Very well.” Case settled.

A person in leopard shape is said to be impervious to spears. The proper way to treat him is stated to be to wait till he resumes his own shape and then kill him. In one case evidence was given that a man kept the bones of his ancestors in pots, and would turn them into leopards and hire them out for the purpose of intimidation. Instead of leading a free and easy existence, as most Europeans suppose, the African spends a large part of his time observing superstitions and performing and attending ceremonies, which are more numerous than in Eu-ope. Rain makers sometimes cause trouble. Though they are usually clever both at foretelling rain and at inventing excuses, they are occasionally charged with non-fulfilment of contract. Lord Raglan once had a case in which a village bribed a rain maker to keep the rain away from a hostile village.