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THE LIVING RACES OF MANKIND 



handles, heavy two-edged swords of the Arab pattern, 

 bows, and barbed or poisoned arrows. The spearmeu 

 carry long, heavy, oval leather shields of the same type as 

 those of the Masai; they are about 5 feet long, and, like 

 those of the Masai, are decorated with heraldic designs. 

 Their huts are well built, and are circular, with 

 high walls and a conical roof. 



The main industry of the Kikuyu is agriculture, and 

 they are the most skilful and industrious husbandmen 

 in British East Africa. The extent of their plantations 

 is enormous. " The cultivation of Kikuyu," remarks 

 Lugard, "is prodigiously extensive; indeed, the whole 

 country may be said to be under tillage." Their chief 

 crops are beans, millet, dhurra, plantains, sweet 

 potatoes, yams, sugar-cane, tobacco, and castor oil. The 

 Kikuyu once had many cattle, but the Masai and 

 the rinderpest have decimated the herds. They have 

 many sheep and goats, and every village has hives of 

 wild bees, for whom wooden hives made from hollow 

 logs of timber are hung in the trees. 



The affinities of the Kikuyu are not well estab- 

 lished. Their nearest neighbours in the south and 

 east are Bantu, and on the north and west the Masai. 

 Their language is Bantu, but is different from that of 

 their Bantu neighbours. Their nearest affinities appear 

 to be with the Negro tribes of the group of the 

 Azandeh, or Niam-niam, of the Upper Congo. They may therefore be regarded as an eastern 

 outlier of the belt of Equatorial Negroes, cut off from their western allies by the Masai invasion 

 along the line of the Rift Valley. It is possible that the tribe contains some Hamitic infusion, 

 in which case it may be described as Negroid rather than Negro. 



The evidence for the affinity of the Kikuyu with the Equatorial Negroes rests on their 

 physical appearance, their mental characteristics, their general culture, and especially on their 

 religious rites. They circumcise in a remarkable manner, different from that of the East 

 African Bantu and similar to that of the Masai. They are intensely superstitious, and attach 

 great importance to fetish rules and religious observances. The Kikuyu have greater faith 

 in the sanctity of blood -brotherhood than the usual East African Bantu. Strangers are not 

 allowed to enter the country until the path has been sprinkled with the blood of newly killed 

 goats. The rite of blood-brotherhood as celebrated by the Kikuyu is as follows: The stranger 

 and a Kikuyu elder sit side by side on the ground on a log of wood; the arm of each is 

 slightly cut, and the blood smeared on to pieces of the liver of a freshly killed goat. The 

 weapons of the two men are placed together over their heads, and a knife is drawn backward 

 and forward along the weapons by a man who sings a wild incantation. While this is being 

 done the men exchange their pieces of liver and swallow them. After such a celebration a 

 stranger is safe from attack from the particular section of the Kikuyu nation with whom the 

 rite has been observed. 



THE AZANDEH, OR NIAM-NIAM. 



The most typical tribe of the Equatorial Negroes is that known as the Niam-niam, 

 Azandeh, or Zandey, which lives about the watershed between the Bahr-el-Ghazl and the 

 North-eastern Congo. They were once a powerful and numerous people, with a reputation for 

 ferocity. In appearance they are very unlike most of the surrounding tribes, for they have 

 a round, broad head and a circular face; the eyes are almond-shaped and sloping, the nose is 



Photo by Richard Buchta. 



A NIAM-NIAM NATIVE. 



