Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 99
Our second legend further illustrates our ethnoarchaeological presumptions, by comparing
two versions of Katala and the role of outsiders in creating powerful new lineages. One is
about the Dghweɗe and their claim that Wandala originated from the hills, while the other one
is from the Wandala Chronicles and introduces us to four noble strangers. The latter functions
as a legendary motif for the early emergence of the Wandala in Ishga-Kawe, which is where
they resided before Kirawa, most likely as the result of a severe drought. In the case of Katala
from the hills, we will also show how she was seen as the ancestral mother of the
forementioned pair of rainmaker and cornblesser specialist lineages of Dghweɗe.
Katala-Wandala of the hills is also linked to the Dghweɗe house of Mbra as part of the Tur
tradition, via her father Wandala-Mbra and Tasa-Mbra, whose first wife was Katala and who
was the daughter of Wandala, according to Dghweɗe sources (see Figures 9 and 12). We need
to wait for the contextualising details to be revealed when we arrive at the relevant chapters in
Part Three. In the next chapter section we highlight that ethnoarchaeological narratives should
perhaps not be too minimalist or abstract in ethnographic terms.
Katala-Wandala of the hills
The Wandala Chronicles mention Katala as the mother of Wandala as part of the early history
of the Wandala dynasty, while in Ishga-Kawe, south of Dikwa, Forkl (1995:200) counts seven
chiefs before Agamakiya: Dafla, Wandala, Katale, Faya, Bakar Aisami, Kawe, and at the
beginning, Malgu. Katala is the daughter of Faya (ibid:106), who is the son of Bakar Aisami,
the last of the four noble strangers from the east. The other three settled in Wadai, Bagirmi,
and Ngazargamu 9, while the last one made a promise of allegiance to Malgu of Isga-Malgu.
He married a daughter of Malgu and subsequently settled in Isge Malgu, where he increased
in number with Malgu as their chief. Malgu had two sons: Wandala and Kawe, but Kawe and
not Wandala became Malgu's successor, and moved the capital to Isgha-Kawe. After Kawe
died, Bakar Aisami became their chief.
After Bakar Aisami's death, Malgu's son Wandala claimed the chieftaincy, but Faya turned
out to be stronger (in number) and Wandala fled with his people to a place called Tsa
(according to Eldridge Mohammadou 1982:214, endnote 12), a former Malgwa village south
of Dikwa near Gawa (see Figure 1). When Faya died he did not have a male successor, and
his daughter Katala became chief, and when she died her son Wandala (a different Wandala)
became chief. He was followed by his son Dafla who in turn was followed by his son
Agamakiya. It was Agamakiya who reunited the two Wandala factions, those of Tsa and his
own in Ishga-Kawe. He achieved this by offering the descendants of Wandala-Malgu, due to
their genealogically more senior position, the ritual custodianship of the land (tliga).
Agamakiya became king of Wandala and owner of the land from Isga-Kawe to Kirawa and
Tsa, because he represented the majority of the descendants of Malgu in terms of number.
This is how Katala appears in the Wandala Chronicles. She is the granddaughter of a stranger
from the east, and she has a son by the name Wandala, while the original Wandala, the son of
Malgu, had to surrender his senior position of descent to the more numerous line descending
from a noble stranger. This stronger line eventually brought about king Agamakiya who was
seen as the first Wandala king, because he reunited the two factions by giving the more senior
Wandala lineage the position of custodianship of the earth for the kingdom as a whole. We
will see, in our chapter about outsiders as founders, how Mughuze-Ruwa became the most
numerous maximal lineage in Dghweɗe, but kept, in terms of locality, the more senior Gudule
lineage as a reproductive guarantee of communal custodianship. The legend of Gudule and
Situated 150 km west of Lake Chad in the Yobe State of modern Nigeria, the remains of the former
capital city are still visible. The surrounding wall is 6.6km long and in parts it is still up to 5m high. It
was the capital of the old Borno empire from about 1460 to 1809 and became the leading centre of
Islamic education under Sultan Idris Alauma. In 1808, Ngazargamu was taken by the Fulani jihad.
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