474 



NA TURE 



[September 7, 1905 



pophagy occurs. The domestic animals are the dog, goat, 

 pig, and hen. Cattle are absent owing to the tsetse fly. 

 The plants originally cultivated were beans, gourds, 

 bananas, and perhaps earth-nuts. Coiled basketry and 

 head-rests are absent. 



That branch of the true Negro stock which spake the 

 mother-tongue of the Bantu languages some 3000 years 

 ago (according to Sir Harry Johnston's estimate) spread 

 over the area of what is now Uganda and British East 

 Africa. In the Nile valley these people probably mixed 

 with Negrilloes, and possibly with the most northerly 

 representatives of the Bushmen in the high lands to the 

 east. Here also they came into contact with Hamitic 

 peoples coming down from the north, and their amalgam- 

 ation constituted a new breed of Negro — the Bantu. We 

 have already seen what are some of the more important 

 physical characteristics of the Negro, Negrillo, and Bush- 

 man stocks ; it only remains to note in what particulars 

 they w-ere modified by the new blood. 

 Hamiies. 



The Hamites are to be regarded as the true indigenous 

 element in North Africa, from Morocco to Somaliland. 

 Two main divisions of this stock are generally recognised : 

 (i) the Northern or Western Hamites (or Mediterranean 

 race of some authors), of which the purest examples are 

 perhaps to be found among the Berbers ; and (2) the 

 Eastern Hamites or Ethiopians. These two groups shade 

 into each other, and everywhere a Negro admixture has 

 taken place to a variable extent since very early times. 

 The Hamites are characterised by a skin-colour that varies 

 considerably, being white in the west and various shades 

 of coffee-brown, red-brown, or chocolate in the east ; the 

 hair is naturally straight or curly, but usually frizzly in 

 the east. The stature is medium or tall, averaging about 

 1.670 m. (s ft. si in.) to about 1708 m. (5 ft. 'jl in.); the 

 head is sub-dolichocephalic (75-78) ; the face is elongated 

 and the profile not prognathous ; the nose prominent, thin, 

 straight or aquiline, with narrow nostrils; lips thin or 

 slightly tumid, never everted. 



Baniu. 



Roughly speaking, the whole of Africa south of the 

 equator, with the exception of the dwindling Bushman 

 and Hottentot elements, is inhabited by Bantu-speaking 

 peoples, who are extremely heterogeneous, but who exhibit 

 sufficient similarities in physical and cultural characteristics 

 to warrant their being grouped together : the true Negro 

 may be regarded as a race ; the Bantu are mixed peoples. 



It will be noticed that as a rule the Bantu approach the 

 Hamites in those physical characters in which they differ 

 from the true Negroes, and owing to the fact that the 

 physical characters of Semites in the main resemble those 

 of Hamites, any Semitic mixture that may have taken 

 place will tend in the same direction as that of the 

 Hamitic. The diversity in the physical characters of the 

 Bantu is due to the different proportions of mixture of 

 all the races of Africa. What we now require is a 

 thorough investigation of these several elements in as pure 

 a state as possible, and then by studying the various main 

 groups of Bantu peoples their relative amount of racial 

 mixture can be determined. 



The physical characteristics of the Bantu vary very 

 considerably. The skin colour is said to range from 

 yellowish-brown to dull slatey-brown, a dark chocolate 

 colour being the prevalent hue. The character of the hair 

 calls for no special remark, as it is so uniformly of the 

 ordinary Negro type. The stature ranges from an average 

 of about 1-640 m. (5 ft. 45 in.) to about 1-715 m. 

 (5 ft. 7^ in.). Uniformity rather than diversity of head- 

 form would seem to be the great characteristic of the 

 African black races, but a broad-headed element makes 

 itself felt in the population of the forest zone and of some 

 of the upper waters of the Nile Valley. It appears that 

 the broadening of the head is due to mixture with the 

 brachycephalic Negrillo stock, for, whereas the dolicho- 

 cephals are mainly of tall stature, some of the brachy- 

 cephals, especially the Aduma of the Ogowe, with a 

 cephalic index of 80-8, are quite short, 1-594 ^^■ 

 (S ft. 2i in.). The character of the nose is often very 

 useful in discriminating between races in a mixed popula- 

 tion, but it has not yet been sufliciently studied in .Africa, 



NO. 1 87 I, VOL. 72] 



where it will probably prove of considerable value, 

 especially in the determination of the amount of Hamitic 

 or Semitic blood. The results already obtained in Uganda 

 are most promising. Steatopygy is not notable among 

 men ; fatty deposits are well developed among women, but 

 nothing approaching the extent characteristic of the 

 Hottentots and Bushmen. 



It appears that the Bantu peoples may be roughly divided 

 according to culture into two groups : a western zone, 

 which skirts the West African region and extends through 

 Angola and German West Africa into Cape Colony ; and 

 an eastern zone. (i) The western Bantu zone is 

 characterised by beehive huts, the absence of circumcision, 

 and the presence of wooden shields (plain or covered with 

 cane-work) in its northern portion, though skin shields 

 occur to the south. (2) In the eastern Bantu zone the 

 huts are cylindrical, with a separate conical roof. 



Certain characteristics are typical of the Bantu culture. 

 The natives live in rounded huts with pointed roofs ; their 

 weapons comprise spears, in which the head is fastened 

 into the shaft by a spike, bows of equal thickness along 

 their length, with bowstrings of animal products, clubs 

 and skin shields, but slings are usually absent ; the cloth- 

 ing is of skin and leather, and there is a predominance 

 of animal ornaments ; knocking out the lower incisors is 

 general, circumcision is common, though among the Kafir 

 tribes it seems to be dying out ; ancestor-worship is the 

 prevalent form of religion, fetishism and polytheism are 

 undeveloped ; masks and representations of human figures 

 are rare, and there are no secret societies ; anthropophagy 

 is sporadic and usually temporary ; the domestic animals 

 include the dog, goat, and sheep, and cattle are found 

 wherever possible ; coiled basketry is made, and head-rests 

 are a characteristic feature. 



M. A. de Pr^ville has drawn a broad line of distinction 

 between the religion of the pastoral Bantu tribes and that 

 of the hunters of the forest belt. The cattle-raisers of 

 the small pastures recognise that the rain and necessary 

 moisture depend on an invisible and supreme power whom 

 they invoke in his location in the sky. His intermediaries 

 are the rain-makers, he has no human form, neither are 

 there idols in the pantheon. In Central Africa there is 

 more than sufficient rain, but rain is of little importance 

 to the hunter. What he requires is to find game, to be 

 able to capture it and to avoid danger; the "medicine- 

 men " are not rain-makers, but makers of talismans, 

 amulets, philtres, and charms to attract the game and to 

 ensure its capture. The mysterious depths of the forest, 

 in the impenetrable thickets of which death may lurk at 

 each step, and the isolation which results in social dis- 

 organisation, incline the hunter to superstitious terrors. 

 Pasturage is governed by natural impersonal forces, but 

 hunting is individual and personal. Further, associated 

 with the mobile pastoral life of the Bantu is the patriarchal 

 system of family life, respect and veneration for old age, 

 and the autocracy of the chief ; no wonder, then, that 

 ancestor-worship has developed, or that it is the chief 

 factor in the religious life of these people. 



As I have previously indicated, there is evidence of the 

 former extension to the north of the Hottentots and the 

 Bushmen, they having gradually been pressed first south- 

 wards and then into the steppes and deserts of South Africa 

 by the southerly drifting of the Bantu. 



The mixture of Hamite with Negro, which gave rise 

 to the primitive Bantu stock, may have originated some- 

 where to the east or north-east of the \'ictoria Nyanza. 

 A factor of great importance in the evolution of the Bantu 

 is to be found in the great diversity of climate and soil 

 in Equatorial East Africa. It is a country of small 

 plateaux separated by gorges, or low-lying lands. The 

 small plateaux are suitable for pasturage, but their extent 

 is limited ; thus they fell to the lot of the more vigorous 

 people, while the conquered had to content themselves 

 with low country, and were obliged to hunt or cultivate 

 the land. In these healthy highlands the people multiplied, 

 and migration became necessary ; the stronger and better- 

 organised groups retained their flocks and migrated in a 

 southerly direction, keeping to the savannas and open 

 country, the line of least resistance being indicated by 

 the relative social feebleness of the peoples to the south. 

 In the small plateaux a nomadic life is impossible for the 



