Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 341
the shifting ancestor stones. After the fourth generation, the great grandfather's ancestor stone
was stored under the father's granary, as were other ritual pots whose ceremonial function had
ceased, apart from the personal house shrine pot (tughdhe thala) of the father of the house.
The latter marked the entry point into the network of the extended family-related ancestor
worship system of the Dghweɗe, and was smashed a certain way upon his death and replaced
by the small-aperture beer pot dedicated to the grave (tughdhe kule) of the deceased father. At
the same time, the previous tughdhe kule was replaced by a zal jije pot, representing the only
ancestor pot to be stored in the 'stomach' of thala, and we infer that it played the central role
during har jije. Unfortunately, we have not many oral data on the sacrifice for a deceased
grandfather, but know that the generation mate (skmama) of that grandfather was seen as the
ideal family priest for har jije.
We also showed that the main entrance of a homestead was called wuts gwazgafte, meaning
'in front of divinity or God'. We pointed out that the idea of a Supreme Being was rather fluid
and that for example the three-legged personal spirit pot of a man could also be seen as a
personal god pot. We further showed that the representation of divinity as part of the har
gwazgafte ritual could be referred to as a sacrifice to the house god. We also learned that the
personalised aspects of a Supreme Being only seemed to apply to the father of the house, who
could die if he did not carry out the required rituals. We illustrated how they were linked to
the front yard and main entrance area of a house for which he was responsible on behalf of his
family, which is underpinned by the fact that the father of the house blocked his neighbours or
strangers from crossing the path of his property during har gwazgafte. People who walked by
unintentionally were obliged to compensate the owner of the property for their unplanned
interference in a man's ritual relationship with his house god.
We described how the foyer of the house could be divided into a left and a right side, in
which the left side, with the lower kitchen, the ritual sauce kitchen and the granary of the first
wife, displayed more female-related architectural features. We were able to demonstrate that
the ritual significance of the male/female architectural aspects continued in the lower/upper
part of the house, such as above the door between the lower and the upper room, and the
adobe dome of the lower loft (gude tighe) of the first wife's room. Concerning the journey of
the ritual beer pots involved, we described the small aperture as a technological development
with the underlying purpose of keeping the sorghum beer fresh for several days. We linked
this aspect with the cosmological concept of 'freshness' versus dryness, not only as an aspect
of successful reproduction but also of bi-annual renewal. We underpinned this view with
ethnographic data I previously collected among the Mafa and their concept of 'freshness' as
part of their belief system. This was done to point to the possibility of a typical subregional
similarity in terms of cosmological thinking, since they were exposed to the same semi-arid
mountainous environment.
We linked the technical significance of the small aperture with the potential archaeological
interpretation of pots with small apertures found among the pottery at the DGB sites. We
further showed that ritual beer pots with small apertures were kept in situ in the foyer area of
an ancient ruin of a Dghweɗe house, and also illustrated the broken mouths of such pots
placed on a rubbish heap next to it, and thus underpinned the importance of the Dghweɗe
house as a place of worship long after it had been abandoned. Finally, we produced a list of
types of ritual pots found in a house, including personal spirit pots for children, and pointed
out that there was only one such pot for a deceased mother, while all the others seem to be for
husbands and their deceased fathers and grandfathers. We also showed the importance of
cooking pots and eating bowls made into ritual beer pots, especially in the context of children,
and also for the paternal family ancestors represented by the 'stomach' of the house shrine
(thala).
We further showed how important the production of manure was for the ritual performances,
especially for the rituals before har ghwe and har jije, and how in particular the harvesting
and threshing period entailed the ritual use of guts and stomach contents. They were applied
to the guinea corn before the harvest, and then to the guinea corn temporarily stored in the
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