SOME NOTES ON THE BASUTO TRIBAL SYSTE:\I, 

 POLITICAL AND SOCIAL. 



By J. C. MacGregor. 



It is difficult to say when and how the present system of the 

 Basuto came into being, but it must have been a very long time 

 ago indeed. As far back into the centuries as tradition takes 

 us — in some cases over twenty generations — we find the same 

 system at work, differing perhaps in detail in the various tribes, 

 but identical in principle in them all ; which goes to show that 

 they all come from a common source. 



Not being able then to get at the beginning of things one can 

 only attempt to describe the outlines of the system, as it has 

 been for many generations, and as, with very little modification, 

 it is to-day. 



The chief of a tribe may be said to begin his public career at 

 the time of his circumcision, that is to say, in the usual course 

 of things, during his father's life-time. A number of lads of his 

 own age — sons, some of them, of his father's circumcision mates — - 

 undergo the rite at the same time, and these are henceforth his 

 mates, adopt his circumcision name and go through life with 

 him as councillors, officers and messengers — his eyes and ears 

 among the people. They would marry about the same time ; 

 their children would intermarry ; and when the eldest son of 

 our young chief came to undergo the lite in his turn, the eldest 

 sons of his father's mates would go with him and remain his j^er- 

 sonal followers till death. The second son would be accompanied 

 by the second sons of his father's mates and so on. 



Thus it came about that every son of a chief at a very early 

 age had the nucleus of a following, which increased according 

 to his popularity, his father's favour, or other circumstances ; 

 and sometimes, as has been seen in the course of their history, 

 younger sons have been in a position to secede from the parent 

 tribe and form tribes of their own. This indeed is how the 

 various tribes came to be formed, and. if it did not happen 

 oftener than it did, it is probably due to the ties of blood and 

 affinity which bound a young chief's mates to those of his 

 elder brother. 



When the sons of a chief reached a suitable age, they would 

 leave their father's village, and set up villages of their own : usually 

 near their maternal uncles, who were supposed to nurse and serve 

 their sister's child : and, in this way, it sometimes happened 

 that the eldest son of a secondary wife had more people than 

 a younger son of the chief wife, as the maternal uncles of the 

 latter would be with his elder brother. One son of the chief, 

 however, always remained with his father. He was called 

 Mosala-lapeng (the one who remains in the house). He was 

 usually a younger son of the first wife, and his duties were to 

 assist, and act for his father in every act of chieftainship, and 

 support him in his old age. During his father's life-time his 



