PROCEEDINGS OF THE ANATOMICAL AND ANTHROPOLOGICAL 



SOME NATIVE CUSTOMS AND BELIEFS IN CENTRAL AFRICA. 



By REV. ALEXANDER HETHEBWICK, M.A., D.D., Blantyre, British 



Central Africa. 



(Read 17th November, 1906.) 



My purpose in this paper is to lay before you a few of the 

 characteristic customs and beliefs of the tribes of Central Africa 

 amongst whom I have been living for the past three and twenty 

 years. These tribes inhabit the country lying along the banks of the 

 Shire River and round the south end of Lake Nyasa, the Southern 

 Division of what is known geographically and politically as British 

 Central Africa. 



The first of these tribes is that which calls itself the Mang'anja- 

 a branch of the large Nyanja tribe which covers the whole southern 

 half of our Central African Protectorate. The Mang'anja live along 

 the Shire Valley from near its junction with the Zambesi River to the 

 south end of Lake Nyasa, They are the people whom Livingstone 

 met on his first expedition into the Lake District, and whom he 

 describes in his book, The /ntiihcxi mid iff Trilitituric*. They arc 

 the original inhabitants of the country, and long ago formed a large 

 and powerful kingdom under the sway of one chief or king. But 

 among all Central African tribes the tendency is to break up into 

 petty chiefships jealous of each other, and often hostile, and the 

 Mang'anja were no exception to the rule. 



The second tribe is the Yao as it calls itself, who inhabit the hill 

 country to the east of the Shire Valley and the south of Lake Nyasa. 

 From there they stretch away along the valleys of the Lujenda and 

 Rovuma Rivers to within a hundred miles of the sea coast. Originally 



