Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 210
as expressed in the ritual role of the Gudule and their legendary link to 'Gudulyewe' (Gudur).
The latter is found on the far eastern side of the northern Mandara Mountains (Figure 21b).
Alternatives of specialist lineage descent through Wasa and Tasa
We remember from our Dghweɗe lineage tree shown in Figure 12, that Ɗagha and Podoko
descended from Wasa, while Gudule and Ske descended from Tasa. We already introduced
the claim of the Gudule that Katala-Wandala was Tasa's first wife and the mother of Gudule
and Ske, but will discuss that in greater detail in the chapter about the bull festival. We
adopted the Gudule version in our Dghweɗe lineage tree, but here want to show that there
were also other versions. Although they all seemed to be more contentious than the Gudule
version, we still want to present them to discover what they might have in common.
Although there was quite some agreement that Gudule and Ske (Gaske) had been 'brothers' of
the same kuɗige (kitchen), others claimed that Wasa, who was seen as the ancestor of the
Ɗagha peacemakers, had a younger twin by the name of Wala, and that it was he who had
been the 'father' of the Gaske rainmakers. We will learn about the Dghweɗe naming tradition
in Chapter 3.18 and 3.19, but Wasa and Wala are the names given to twins, and Wasa was the
name for the elder one. Besides, it was claimed that the cornblesser lineage Gazhiwe (Zhiwe)
descended from an ancestor named Ghamba, this being the name given to a younger brother
of twins, or, in the case of triplets, to the third triplet. We remember that the Gazhiwe lineage
was the specialist cornblesser lineage which had descended from Gudule.
To define the three specialist lineages of the Dghweɗe as descendants of twin brothers and
their younger brother next in line seems typical for Dghweɗe thinking, and indicates
connections between the forces of fecundity, the idea of reproduction, and that of growth. We
mentioned that the origin of the Ɗagha Kadzgwara was also indirectly connected to Wasa by
the claim that he had been found in the stomach of one of Wasa's cows. Baba Musa, our local
Ɗagha protagonist from Barawa, even claimed that it was not Wasa's cow, but a cow of the
Ɗagha peacemaker lineage. We know that the Ɗagha Kadzgwara had special talents too, and
include them here among our group of specialist lineages. Central to those special talents
were often not only the supernatural powers allocated to the key representatives of those
specialist lineages, but also the ritual ownership of particular potent clan medicines.
There was another version of the alleged descent of Gudule given to us by our friends from
Kunde, claiming that there was no relationship of common descent between the Gudule and
the Gaske at all, and that it was only the Gaske rainmaker and Ɗagha peacemaker who had
been twins. Our Kunde friends claimed instead that the Gudule had come with the Vile of
Hiɗkala, and that they had migrated together to settle with the Mafa of Huduwe (see Figure
8), where the Vile clan had been responsible for the powerful smallpox medicine. We will
elaborate on that further in the chapter about the bull festival, but want to emphasise here the
link to ritual ownership of clan medicines being a key asset for the power of lineage
specialism.
We will learn later that the Vile were sometimes linked to the Vreke of Moskota, who held
regional power over a variety of clan medicines against plagues and diseases as an important
tool of ritual crisis management among the Mafa communities of our subregion during the
late pre-colonial period. We mentioned Gudulyewe and/or Gudur as a regional image of such
late pre-colonial ownership of clan medicines, although in the case of the Gudule it was
linked more to the start of the bull festival for the whole of Dghweɗe, and their legendary
potential for cornblessing and population growth. The general point we can perhaps conclude
from the current chapter section is that the Dghweɗe liked to link the ritual expertise of their
specialist lineages to the idea of twinhood and the promotion of communal reproduction. The
latter includes the ritual ownership over the efficiency of those forces for the greater local
good.
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