Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 319
Apart from the two tughdhe thala, there was also the previously mentioned tughdhe kule, a small
ritual beer pot kept in the tiny ancestor room dedicated to the deceased father (dada). The
following day, after the he-goat for the dead father had been slaughtered, they would first go with
tughdhe kule to the father's grave, and after cleaning the grave they would have libated beer onto
it and drunk together from the tughdhe kule. We do not know who else took part, other than the
father of the house and his brothers. After that they would go back to the house and store the
tughdhe kule above the door connecting the lower room of the first wife (batiw tighe) and the
upper room of her husband (batiw daghare) as the owner of the house. We notice in the latter
context how reproduction was ritually addressed, not only in religious but also in architectural
and gender terms.
Now some of the house father's exogamous lineage brothers would cook the sauce in the ritual
sauce kitchen, a task from which women were excluded during har ghwe. Unfortunately, we do
not know whether the same applied to har jije, but considering that women were excluded from
cooking the sauce during har ghwe, perhaps they also were during har jije. Neither are we certain
which lineage members cooked the ritual sauce, but we think that the term sknukwe (exogamous
lineage brother) might be correct here (see Chapter 3.6).
The house father would now send someone to call his friends and other relatives to come and
join the celebrations. We do not know exactly who was included in assemblies of kin on these
specific occasions, and infer that they were close relatives, perhaps also from the maternal side,
and tend to think that the audience and participants of the observances were significantly greater
during har jije for obvious reasons.
At this point in the interview, my friends pointed out some differences in how the 'Gharguze'1
and Ghwa'a people performed har ghwe. It was explained that the Ghwa'a people would have
started by libating beer onto three potsherds kept inside the 'stomach' of thala, while in
'Gharguze' they would have started with the food. After having poured beer or food, first on the
three potsherds representing dada, jije and wuje (just like the three ancestor stones), zal thaghaya
(owner of the house) would then do the same with the meat, and subsequently be the first to drink
or eat it. Next, zal jije would perform the same. We recognise that it was only the sequence of
beer and food which differed in the two parts of Dghweɗe. The food was most likely sorghum or
millet mash prepared by the first wife, presumably with some of the ritual sauce cooked by an
exogamous lineage brother.
All this took place inside the 'stomach' of thala. When throwing the meat, zal thaghaya or zal jije
did not throw every piece onto the three potsherds, but a certain order was followed. Firstly they
threw a little bit of lung (hafe), next they took from the liver (rve), and finally a small piece from
the front leg was thrown by zal thaghaya, while the back leg was reserved for zal jije. It seems
that in both of the traditional settlement parts of Dghweɗe the throwing of the meat came at the
end. Another difference between 'Gharguze' and Ghwa'a featured after they had cleared the top of
the grave for the deceased father, an activity which was referred to as hadz kule. Reportedly, the
'Gharguze' people did not put sorghum flour into the calabash filled with beer from the deceased
father's tughdhe kule when they libated it onto his grave.
After all that was done, including the ceremony over the three potsherds inside the 'stomach' of
thala, beer was poured from the tughdhe thala into an ordinary sauce bowl called ndafa, and a
ritual beer bowl with a stand called jahurimbe. Now ndafa and/or jahurimbe were taken out of
thala and the same ritual as described over the potsherds was carried out over the three ancestor
stones. During this ritual the two ritual beer pots (tughdhe thala) would remain filled with beer
inside thala. We have already mentioned tughdhe kule, which had been all this time resting
above the doorway at a place called dzura, the place where the two roofs met above the entrance
between the lower and upper room. It had been placed there, half full of beer, the day before.
As so often in Ghwa'a, our local protagonists refer to the Vaghagaya of Korana Basa as the 'Gharguze'.
We know that Gharguze was the pre-colonial settlement name for that part of administrative Korana Basa.
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