Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 202
We infer that this is because they are members of families that had formed friendships for
arranged marriages, and it throws light on the past importance of such friendships for finding
suitable marriage partners. In Chapter 3.20 we will learn more about this, and also about the
intricacies of ‘marriage by capture’ which the Dghweɗe once practised due to inability to find
suitable marriage partners. This could lead to conflict and even war between marriagepermitted lineages, but it is not to be confused with Boko Haram abducting girls and forcing
them into marriage. Overall, the exogamy rules were very important, and ‘marriage by
promise’ was by far the preferred way of marrying.
Still, some of the social relationship terms applied to exogamy could become very inclusive
the further away they became from the local or ethnic context of their original application.
For example I came across the term gwagha during an interview in Lamang-speaking Hiɗkala
(Muller-Kosack 1994) in which it was explained to me that the word was used to refer to
one's own ethnic group as an expression of belonging in opposition to another one. This could
allegedly be Dghweɗe or Guduf or any other ethnicity of the Gwoza hills. It was subsequently
pointed out to me by some Dghweɗe friends that for example Dghweɗe who were living in
Maiduguri might refer to themselves as being gwagha in order to distinguish themselves from
the Kanuri. I was told that they might do this not only to distinguish themselves as Dghweɗe,
but would include any other ethnicity from the Gwoza LGA as their gwagha.
The latter use of the exogamy term gwagha seems to be completely stripped of any reference
to lineage exogamy, which is interesting and perhaps throws light on the fact that gwagha was
always more of an orientational rule, not being in the first place written in stone. It also
throws light on the term zbe as possibly having been in the past the more restricting, and
therefore the more important exogamy rule. Unfortunately we do not know how the exogamy
rules of the Dghweɗe might have changed during earlier times, considering that Dghweɗe
ethnicity itself is possibly a later pre-colonial development. This means that the exogamous
lineage examples listed above might be more recent than we like to think.
Generational grouping and other family connections
The term skmama refers to the sons of different fathers in the same generation of a descent
group and is perhaps best translated as ‘generation mates’. Our information on this is limited, but
as far as I understand the skmama relationship is only possible within an exogamous lineage. The
sons of one generation of skmama derive their special relationship from the fact that their fathers
were already skmama. The skmama relationship played a particular role in the sacrifice to a
deceased paternal grandfather (jije). If there was no longer a living skmama in the generation of
such a grandfather, any person who was close to him could function as his skmama. It is unclear
whether the newly appointed skmama had to be from the same lineage as the deceased
grandfather. Reportedly biological age as well as generational belonging counted towards being a
suitable skmama.
The skmama played an important role as zal jije (family priest for the deceased grandfather) in
the worship of extended family ancestors extending as far back as the deceased greatgrandfather. The other main player in this context was the senior brother in his role as dada priest
and the seventh born in his role as thaghaya. While the senior brother was responsible for the
sacrifice to a deceased father (dada), it was his seventh-born younger brother who was always
served first by him and also by the skmama. We will learn about this in greater detail in Chapter
3.12 where the ritual aspects of the house as the place of worship are described, and Figure 20a at
the beginning of that chapter shows the patrilocal spatial dimension of the role of skmama in his
function as zal jije (family priest).
The word referring to the family and family home was gwalghaya. As far as I know, there
was no linguistic distinction between the extended and nuclear or conjugal family, but the
Dghweɗe generally lived in nuclear families, meaning the father, his first wife, and/or other
wives and children. The house was the social, economic and religious centre of the Dghweɗe
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