Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 331
The ritual significance of the loft (gude) above the lower room of the first wife
We refer to gude as the two loft areas above the lower and the upper rooms. They consist of
domes made of clay, with an entrance through the ceiling which was accessible by a ladder
from the side of the room. My understanding is that both the adobe dome and the storage
space it created inside were called gude. In the previous chapter we saw a photograph of
Buba's first wife's lower room, and also one of her gude, where the built-in clay container was
partly visible (Plate 32d). We remember that the container was for grain and other valuable
things. The image below shows another view of the inside of Kalakwa's first wife's lower loft
(gude tighe), but this time including the corner where the ritual pot referred to as tughdhe
gude was stored, together with other ritual pots linked to her loft area.
We see in Plate 43a what looks like an upturned cooking pot to the left (a), and perhaps not
only one, but two tughdhe next to each other, a small one to the left (b) and a much larger one
(c) to the right. There is also a potsherd (d) to the right of the cooking pot, and a small
calabash (e) underneath the larger beer pot. We remember potsherds being important in
representing family ancestors inside the 'stomach' of thala during har ghwe. Because we can
only see the bases of the two presumed beer pots, we cannot be sure which one is the tughdhe
gude or the tughdhe batiw tighe. We can see the bottom of the smaller pot (b) looking slightly
blackened, and perhaps it is also a cooking pot and not a tughdhe at all, but the image does
not reveal what type of pot it is.
The name tughdhe batiw tighe refers to a ritual beer pot of the lower room (batiw tighe), which
belonged to the first wife and was where she slept, while tughdhe gude refers to a similar
ancestor-related pot kept in the loft of that room. Bulama Ngatha had informed me that gude
also contained a ritual pot related to the deceased father. Zakariya Kwire and dada Ɗga told
me there was a gude ritual which would be carried out before har gwazgafte, meaning before
threshing. We are not sure whether there was a separate gude ritual, but recognise its potential
significance, and neither do we know for sure whether tughdhe batiw tighe and tughdhe gude
were simply two different words for the same ritual beer pot.
We were also told
at one point that a
jahurimbe
beer
bowl and/or a
suteke beer pot,
both used during
adult
initiation
(dzum
zugune),
could be stored
inside the first
wife's gude. Of
course all this
gives the lower
gude a high ritual
significance, like
many other female
related elements of
the architecture of
a
traditional
Dghweɗe house. We remember that the lower kitchen and the 'stomach' of thala were next to
each other, while the granary of the first wife was next to the ritual sauce kitchen of her
husband. There was also the space above the entrance the connecting lower and upper room,
where tughdhe gude was placed overnight during the har ghwe ritual. We remember the use
of a sauce bowl ndafe which was used to libate beer over the ancestor stones. Perhaps the
potsherd seen in our lower gude image was a representation of the deceased father, but this is
only an informed guess. It does however suggest that the lower gude was indeed a place of
Plate 43a: Tughdhe gude and other pots in Kalikwa's first wife's gude
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