Rest Days; A Sociological Study 51 



every fourth day is a market day observed by the cessation of 

 ordinary occupations. The custom among the Wanika has 

 already been noticed. Among the Akikuyu of British East 

 Africa who emplo}^ 30-day months beginning with new moon, 

 there is a week of four days, the latter being indicated by the 

 names of the different markets held on them. Each market takes 

 place on the fourth day of the cycle and no two markets in the 

 same neighborhood occur on the same day.^^ In the Congo 

 Free State similar four-day periods closing with a market prevail 

 among the tribes of the Lualaba district,^" among the Ba-Yaka, 

 a Bantu people occupying the Kasai district/^ and among the 

 Ba-Mbala who dwell between the rivers Inzia and Kwilu. The 

 Ba-Mbala year consists of thirteen lunar months, each divided 

 into seven weeks of four days, the last day being pika, the market 

 day." 



A week of four or more days, one of which is usually ob- 

 served as a market-day and sabbath, may be traced in west 

 Africa from the Congo to the Niger. In the language of the 

 western Congo tribes the week is called himingii}^ In Loango, 

 where the natives have a month of twenty-eight days reckoned 

 from new moon, seven weeks are counted to the month. The 

 week contains four days called, respectively, nssoTia, nduka, ntono, 

 and iisllii, the first being regarded as a day of rest.** With this 

 account it is interesting to compare the statement of an old writer, 

 according to whom the Loango negroes " never work above three 

 days in succession ; the fourth is for them a general rest day, 

 during which they are not allowed to busy themselves in tillage. 



'^Dundas, in Man, 1909, ix. 38. Cf. W. S. and Katherine Routledge, 

 JVith a Prehistoric People, London, 1910, p. 105. 



*"V. L. Cameron, Across Africa, London, 1877, ii. 3. 



"Torday and Joyce, in Journal of the Anthropological Institute, 1906, 

 xxxvi. 44. 



*'Torday and Joyce, ibid., 1905, xxxv. 413. Cf. also ibid., 1906, xxxvi. 

 291 (Ba-Huana). 



*^ (Sir) H. H. Johnston, The River Congo, London, 1884, p. 455. 



" E. Pechuel-Loesche, in Die Loango-Expedition, dritte Abteilung, erste 

 Halfte, Stuttgart, 1907, p. 139. 



51 



