868 MASAI, TUftKANA, SUK, NANDI, ETC. 



Nandi, Luinbvva, and Elgon people usually wear their hair short, but do 

 not necessarily shave the head in either men or women. The Sabei* men 

 twist their hair into little bunches, which they load with fat and clay. 

 The Sabei men also hang to their locks of hair and to their ear-lobes 

 rather striking ornaments — neatly cut sections of large land-shells (vide 

 Fig. 492). The Kamasia and Andorobo men dress their hair, as a rule, 

 just like the Masai, in pigtails; or else (like the Gwas' Ngishu and 

 Eurkeneji) in long strings. Some of the Karamojo, however, wear their 

 hair simplv as it grows (like the Nandi). Others cut the hair very 

 short and wear over the head a cap of leather, not unlike in shape that 

 which was worn by the Norman knights when they were in undress. 

 The Nandi pull out the two middle incisors in the lower jaw, and a 

 chief or medicine man in addition has one of the upper incisors 

 removed. When a. warrior has killed a man, he paints one side of his 

 body with white clay and the other side with red, and keeps this colouring 

 on for four days. The men of Sabei wear ivory bracelets round the arm, 

 and necklaces of twisted brass or copper wire or thick iron wire. Some 

 of the iron necklaces are hung with long strings of very fine iron chain — 

 beautiful pieces of workmanship. These adornments are very similar in 

 the Nandi, except that ivory is less worn. The Nandi women often wear 

 brass wire coiled into discs, like catherine-wheels, and dependent from 

 the ears or round the neck. 



The Nandi, like the Lako and other tribes of Elgon, were much given 

 in times past to living in caves,] and, according to their traditions, 

 they followed in this respect the prognathous Negro or Pygmy tribes 

 whom they replaced. Nowadays all divisions of the Nandi-speaking people 

 build huts. The dwellings of the Andorobo are of the most primitive 

 description, recalling in shape those of the Congo Pygmies. They are 

 very small, and are made of sticks bent over in a semi-circle and covered 

 with heaps of grass and leaves. The Nandi, Lumbwa, and Lako build 

 much better houses, while the dwellings of the Sabei are like those of the 

 Masaba Bantu tribes alongside them. In Sabei the walls of the houses 

 are generally constructed of perpendicular slips or billets of wood. The 

 roof is large, and slopes almost down to the ground. The apex of the 

 roof is surmounted by a carved stick, which is sometimes phallic in 

 design. At other times this stick supports an earthenware pot, or the 



* North Elgon. 



t In the western part of the Nandi country, on the western escarpment of the 

 Nandi Plateau, there are vast cave strongholds winch were regarded by the Nandi 

 as impregnable until they were taken by Lieutenant-Colonel Evatt in the recent 

 Nandi War. Colonel Evatt reported that some of these caves were sufficiently 

 large to ba capable of holding 300 head of cattle. 



