First published in 1952 by the International African Institute.
This edition first published in 2017
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1952 International African Institute
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ISBN: 978-1-138-23217-4 (Set)
ISBN: 978-1-315-30463-2 (Set) (ebk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-23536-6 (Volume 29) (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-138-23542-7 (Volume 29) (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-30483-0 (Volume 29) (ebk)
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T HE preparation of a comprehensive survey of the tribal societies of Africa was discussed by the Executive Council of the Institute as far back as 1937, but the interruption of its activities during the war resulted in the postponement of the project. Events and developments during recent years, however, have led to a wide recognition of the need for collating and making more generally available the wealth of existing but uncoordinated material on the ethnic groupings and social conditions of African peoples, particularly in connection with plans for economic and social development. Moreover, it appeared that the International African Institute, as an international body which has received support from and performed services for the different Colonial governments, was in a very favourable situation for undertaking such a task.
The Institute, therefore, in 1944, applied to the recently established British Colonial Social Science Research Council for a grant from the Colonial Development and Welfare Fund to finance the preparation of an Ethnographic Survey of Africa, and a grant was allocated for a period of five years from 1945, and was subsequently extended for a further period of three years. A committee, under the Chairmanship of Professor Radcliffe-Brown, was appointed to consider the scope and form of the survey, and collaboration was established with research institutions in South Africa, Rhodesia, East Africa, French West Africa, Belgium and the Belgian Congo.
The aim of the Ethnographic Survey is to provide a concise, critical, and accurate account of our present knowledge of the tribal groupings, distribution, physical environment, social conditions, political and economic structure, religious beliefs and cult practices, technology and arts of African peoples. The material will be presented as briefly and on as consistent a plan as possible, and the text will be supplemented by maps and comprehensive bibliographies.
The Ethnographic Survey is being published as a series of separate, self-contained studies, each devoted _to one particular people or cluster of peoples. It is hoped that publication in this form will make the results more quickly and readily available to those interested in specific areas or groups. A list of the sections which have already appeared is given on pages 61-62.
Since the unequal value and the generally unsystematic nature of the available information constituted a chief reason for undertaking this survey, it will be obvious that the material here presented can make no claim to be complete or definitive. Every effort has been made, however, to scrutinise the available literature and to check it by reference to unpublished sources and to workers actually in the field; thus it is intended to present a clear picture of our existing knowledge and to point out the directions in which the need for further studies is most pressing. Any assistance from those who are in a position to remedy deficiencies and correct inaccuracies by providing supplementary material will be greatly appreciated.
The International African Institute expresses its thanks to the many scholars, research workers, administrative officers and missionaries in Europe and Africa who have so generously responded to our requests for information and have spared time to correct and supplement the drafts. Our thanks are specially due to Professor Max Gluckman who supervised the preparation of the present study and allowed the writer to make use of some of his own unpublished manuscripts; he has also corrected the older authorities at certain points from his field material. We gratefully acknowledge our debt to the Trustees and Director of the Rhodes-Livingstone Institute for permission to reproduce extracts, charts and diagrams and to make use of maps from Professor Gluckmans published papers on the Lozi; to C. G. Trapnell and J. N. Clothier, and to the Government of Northern Rhodesia and the Government Printer, Lusaka, for permission to quote at length from the Ecological Survey of Northern Rhodesia and to reproduce one of the diagrams from the Survey.
D ARYLL F ORDE ,
Director,
International African Institute .
The Lozi Peoples
The name Lozi has been used in Northern Rhodesian Government publications since about 1936. Trapnell, the former Government ecologist, and Clothier, in a book published in 1937 but written earlier, refer to the tribe as Rozi .
According to Stirke and Thomas, when the Kololo entered Barotseland from the south (see section History and Traditions of Origin) they found, near Sesheke, a tribe of Subiya, who paid tribute to the Luyi, pronouncing the name Luizi, which the Kololo in turn corrupted into Lozi or Ba-rozi . The missionaries of the Paris Evangelical Mission, being already well learned in Sesotho, decided to utilise Kololo for their teaching (see section Language). For some reason they elected to spell Barozi as Barotse, from which Barotseland is derived. The term Barotse is used by Gluckman to refer to the Barotse nation, comprising 25 Bantu-speaking tribes. The Barotse Province of today, which they occupy, is considerably smaller than the area of the old kingdom, the Barotseland of the missionaries and early travellers. The Lozi are the dominant tribe of the Barotse nation. Loziland proper, the home of the Lozi, is the Central Barotse Plain (called by the Lozi bulozi, or ngulu ).