The Tree Where Man Was Born

by Peter Matthiessen

  When the air grows cold we come down off the rock. In the cave, Hadza are gathered at the fire, shoulder to shoulder like the swallows, clicking endlessly in their warm tongue, with big sighs and little groans of emphasis and soft n and anh and m sounds, hands moving in and out among the embers, the scraping of a knife blade on a stone, a cough, a whiff of bangi, until finally the people of the Seven Hearths depart. The last man squatting, Magandula, crawls off to his sleep with a loud self-conscious sigh that tells the white men, stretched silent as two dead beneath the stars, that the worldly Magandula, although patient to a fault, has no place among such simple folk. Already Giga the fire tender is breathing his night breath that sounds like a man pulled down in flight; I watch his face, asleep, and feel a tingling at the temples. Giga has been in Africa forever, he is the prototypic model of a man, the clay, and one loves not Giga but this being who is mortal, a kind humorous fellow of great presence and no small intelligence who will die. And Gimbe, too, singing his songs and playing his sweet irimbako, and even the brash Magandula, donning his magic street shoes for his flight from the old ways: to perceive them in their sleep—Enderlein, too—is to perceive and to make peace with one’s own self.

  Toward dawn, Giga hurls faggots on the fire and rolls himself a fat and lumpy smoke and coughs and coughs and coughs to his heart’s content, and one forgives him even this. Soon the cricket stops its singing, and after a silence there is birdsong, the bell note of the slate-colored boubou, the doves and turacos, a hornbill. At sun-up comes an electric screeching that signals the passage of swift petal-colored lovebirds.

  The Hadza hunch close to their fires, getting warm; when the sun has heat in it, the day begins. Soon the akwetepi, the “little people,” come past the cave, first boys with bows, then younger children seeking berries—“Shai-yaamo!” they call. And the answer is Shai-yamo mtana, to which they echo a soft m-taa-na. They pull berry branches down and strip them, laughing. At the fire, long-legged in shorts and boots, the restless white men sip their tea and listen, warming cold hands on their tin cups. In the next days we will go away without the game scout Magandula, who is muttering about poachers in the region, and asks if he might linger in the bush.

  The last day at the cave is slow and peaceful. The hunters come down from the Seven Hearths to a discreet fire from where they can spy politely on the visitors; they carve and chew and soften and sight new arrow shafts, bracing them by inserting them between the toes, or cut pipe holes into new pieces of stone found in the river.

  “Dong-go-ko.” One man sings softly of zebras and lions. “Dong-go-ko gogosala . . .”

  Zebra, zebra, running fast . . .

  The women are out gathering roots and tubers, and also the silken green nut of the baobab which, pounded on a stone and cooked a little, provides food for five months of the year. The still air of the hillside quakes with the pound of rock on rock, and in this place so distant from the world, the steady sound is an echo of the Stone Age. Sometimes the seeds are left inside the hull to make a baby’s rattle, or a half shell may be kept to make a drinking cup. In the rains, the baobab gives shelter, and in drought, the water that it stores in its soft hollows, and always fiber thread and sometimes honey. Perhaps the greatest baobab were already full grown when man made red rock paintings at Darashagan. Today young baobab are killed by fires, set by the strangers who clear the country for their herds and gardens, and the tree where man was born is dying out in Hadza Land.

  From a grove off in the western light, an arrow rises, piercing the sun poised on the dark massif of the Sipunga; the shaft glints, balances, and drops to earth. Soon the young hunters, returning homeward, come in single file between the trees, skins black against black silhouetted thorn. One has an mbira, and in wistful monotony, in hesitation step, the naked forms with their small bows pass one by one in a slow dance of childhood. The figures wind in and out among black thorn and tawny twilight grass and vanish. Once more as in a dream, like a band of the Old People, the small Gumba, who long ago went into hiding in the earth.

  Notes

  CHAPTER I

  1. Willard Trask, ed., The Unwritten Song, Macmillan, 1966.

  2. A. J. Arkell, A History of the Sudan, Oxford, 1961.

  3. Godfrey Lienhardt, “The Shilluk of the Upper Nile,” in African Worlds, ed. by Daryll Forde, Oxford, 1954.

  4. Trask, op. cit.

  5. Mary Douglas, Purity and Danger, Praeger, 1966.

  6. E. E. Evans-Pritchard, The Nuer, Oxford, 1940.

  7. Geoffrey Parrinder, African Mythology, Hamlyn, 1967.

  CHAPTER II

  1. Marjorie Perham, in Preface to Mau Mau Detainee by J. M. Kariuki, Penguin, 1964.

  2. J. M. Kariuki, Mau Mau Detainee, Penguin, 1964.

  3. Patrice Lumumba, quoted in The Horizon History of Africa by Horizon Editors, McGraw-Hill, 1971.

  4. G. P. Murdock, Africa: Its Peoples and Their Culture History, McGraw-Hill, 1959.

  5. K. R. Dundas, “Notes on the Origin and History of the Kikuyu and Dorobo Tribes,” Man, no. 78, 1908.

  6. Joseph Thomson, Through Masai Land, Cass, 1968.

  7. Ludwig R. von Hohnel, Discovery by Count Teleki of Lakes Rudolf and Stephanie, Cass, 1968.

  8. J. H. Patterson, The Man-Eaters of Tsavo, Macmillan, 1963.

  9. R. Oliver and G. Matthew, History of East Africa, vol. 1, Oxford, 1963, p. 417.

  10. Jomo Kenyatta, Facing Mt. Kenya, London, 1938.

  11. Peter Beard, The End of the Game, Viking, 1965.

  12. Placide Tempels in Basil Davidson, The African Past, Grosset & Dunlap, 1964.

  13. Peter Beard, op. cit.

  14. Karen Blixen, Out of Africa, Random House, 1937.

  15. Peter Beard, op. cit.

  CHAPTER III

  1. Gerhard Lindblom, The Akamba in British East Africa, Uppsala, 1920.

  2. Elspeth Huxley, The Flame Trees of Thika, Penguin, 1962.

  3. Dundas, op. cit.

  4. G. W. B. Huntingford, The Southern Nilo-Hamites, London, 1953.

  5. Paul Spencer, The Samburu, University of California Press, 1965.

  6. J. A. Hunter, Hunter, Harper, 1952.

  7. Dr. Alan Jacobs, Correspondence.

  8. Spencer, op. cit.

  9. John G. Williams, Field Guide to Birds of Central and East Africa, Houghton, 1964; idem., Field Guide to the National Parks of East Africa, Houghton, 1968.

  10. M. Posnansky, ed., Prelude to East African History, Oxford, 1966.

  11. Sonia Cole, The Prehistory of East Africa, Macmillan, 1965.

  12. R. Oliver and G. Matthew, History of East Africa, vol. 1. Oxford, 1963.

  13. Ibid.

  14. G. P. Murdock, op. cit.

  15. Ibid.

  16. Lindblom, op. cit.

  17. Jacobs, Correspondence.

  18. von Hohnel, op. cit.

  19. Joy Adamson, The Peoples of Kenya, Collins & Harvill, 1967.

  20. Kariuki, op. cit.

  21. Spencer, op. cit.

  22. Thomson, op. cit.

  CHAPTER IV

  1. Huntingford, op. cit.

  2. Murdock, op. cit.

  3. George B. Schaller, The Serengeti Lion, Univ. Chicago Press, 1972 (uncorrected proofs).

  4. Frederick C. Selous, A Hunter’s Wanderings in Africa, London, 1881.

  5. Parrinder, op. cit.

  6. George B. Schaller and Gordon R. Lowther, “The Relevance of Carnivore Behavior to the Study of Early Hominids,” Southwestern Jour. Anthrop., vol. 25, no. 4, 1969.

  7. Hugh Russell, Conversations and Correspondence.

  CHAPTER V

  1. C. W. Hobley, “Notes on the Dorobo,” Man, no. 76, 1906.

  2. H. A. Fosbrooke, “An Administrative Record of the Masai Social System.” Tanganyika Notes and Records, no. 26, 1948 (hereafter cited as TNR).

  3. Ibid.

  4. Joseph H. Greenberg, The Languages of Africa, University of Indiana Press, 1963.

  5. Karl Peters, quoted in Fosbrooke, op.
cit.

  6. G. W. B. Huntingford, “The Peopling of East Africa by Its Modern Inhabitants,” from History of East Africa by R. Oliver and G. Matthew, Oxford, 1963.

  7. Robert F. Gray, The Sonjo of Tanganyika, Oxford, 1963.

  8. Ian Henderson (with Philip Goodhart), The Hunt for Kimathi, Hamish Hamilton, 1958.

  9. A. Wykes, Snake Man, Simon and Schuster, 1961.

  10. C. P. J. Ionides, “Southern Province Native Superstitions,” TNR, no. 29, 1950.

  11. Russell, op. cit.

  12. Colin Turnbull, The Lonely African, Simon & Schuster, 1962.

  13. H. K. Schneider, “The Lion-Men of Singida: A Reappraisal,” TNR, no. 58, 1962.

  14. Elspeth Huxley, With Forks and Hope, Morrow, 1964.

  15. Parrinder, op. cit.

  16. Blixen, op. cit.

  17. Robert F. Gray, “Structural Aspects of Mbugwe Witchcraft,” from Witchcraft and Sorcery in East Africa, ed. by John Middleton and E. H. Winter, Praeger, 1963.

  CHAPTER VI

  1. D. M. Sindiyo, “Game Department Field Experience in Public Education.” E. African Agric. & Forestry Journal, Vol. XXXIII, 1968.

  2. George B. Schaller, Conversations.

  3. George B. Schaller, The Serengeti Lion.

  4. Ibid.

  CHAPTER VII

  1. J. A. Hunter, op. cit.

  2. Henri Junod, from Life in a South African Tribe, Macmillan, 1912, quoted in Technicians of the Sacred by J. Rothenburg, Doubleday, 1968.

  3. Stewart Edward White, The Rediscovered Country, Doubleday, 1915.

  4. R. M. Laws and I. S. C. Parker, “Recent Studies on Elephant Populations in East Africa,” Symp. Zool. Soc., London, 1968.

  5. Ibid.

  6. David Western, Conversations.

  7. Arthur Neumann, Elephant Hunting in East Equatorial Africa, London, 1898.

  8. Dennis Holman, The Elephant People, Murray, 1967.

  CHAPTER VIII

  1. Adapted from Colin Turnbull, Tradition and Change in African Life, Avon, 1966.

  2. Thomson, op. cit.

  3. Ionides, in Wykes, op. cit.

  4. G. W. B. Huntingford, “The Social Organisation of the Dorobo,” African Studies, no. 1, 1942.

  5. Huxley, With Forks and Hope.

  6. L. S. B. Leakey, “Preliminary Report on . . . Engaruka Ruins,” TNR, no. 1, 1936.

  7. Murdock, op. cit.

  8. Elspeth Huxley, A New Earth, Morrow, 1960.

  9. Posnansky, op. cit.

  10. Gray, The Sonjo of Tanganyika.

  11. Murdock, op. cit.

  12. Leslie Brown, Africa: A Natural History, Random House, 1965.

  13. Sir A. Claud Hollis, The Masai, Oxford, 1935.

  CHAPTER IX

  1. Hollis, op. cit.

  2. Frank Lambrecht, “Aspects of the Evolution and Ecology of Tsetse Flies . . . ,” from Papers in African Prehistory by J. D. Fage and R. A. Oliver, Cambridge, 1970.

  3. Blixen, op. cit.

  4. Adamson, op. cit.

  5. Gray, The Sonjo of Tanganyika.

  6. Myles Turner, Conversations and Correspondence.

  CHAPTER X

  1. From Olivia Vlahos, African Beginnings, Viking, 1967.

  2. Dorothea Bleek, “The Hadzapi or Watindega of Tanganyika Territory,” Africa, no. 3, 1931.

  3. F. J. Bagshawe, “The Peoples of the Happy Valley,” Jour. of the African Society, Part II, no. 24, 1925.

  4. Dorothea Bleek, “Traces of Former Bushman Occupation in Tanganyika Territory,” South African Jour. Sci., no. 28, 1931.

  5. L. S. B. Leakey, Stone Age Cultures of Kenya Colony, Cambridge, 1931.

  6. Peter Enderlein, Conversations and Correspondence.

  7. George J. Klima, The Barabaig, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970.

  8. Posnansky, op. cit.

  9. James C. Woodburn, “Hunters and Gatherers,” Brit. Mus. brochure, 1970. See also Selected Bibliography.

  10. Ibid.

  11. G. M. Wilson, “The Tatoga of Tanganyika,” TNR, no. 33, 1952.

  12. Woodburn, op. cit.

  13. B. Cooper, “The Kindiga,” TNR, no. 27, 1949.

  14. Klima, op. cit.

  15. R. A. J. Maguire, “Il-Torobo,” TNR, no. 25, 1948.

  Glossary

  (All words are Swahili where not otherwise indicated)

  askari soldier, warden, guard

  banda shed, thatched hut, rondavel

  bangi [from Indian bhang]: (Cannabis) hemp, narcotic

  bao ancient pebble game

  biltong dried strips of wild meat

  boma stock corral, thorn-walled shelter

  dawa medicine, charm, talisman

  debe 4-gallon kerosene can

  donga gully, ravine, dry except in rains

  duka trading post or general store

  en-gang [Maasai]: home village

  kanga shawl (of East Indian print batik)

  karibu welcome to . . .

  kikoi (see shuka)

  korongo small stream, drainage line

  laibon [Maasai]: medicine man

  magadi soda, soda lake

  mbira marimba

  miombo dry forest, mostly Brachystegia

  morani [Maasai; pl. il-moran]: warrior

  mswaki toothbrush bush (Salvadora)

  mzungu [pl. wazungu]: white person, European

  nyika wilderness (especially dry thorn scrub waste

  between highlands and the sea)

  ol duvai [Maasai]: bayonet aloe (Sansevieria)

  panga cane- or brush-cutting machete

  pombe local beer (usually from maize)

  posho ration (especially ugali)

  shamba farm plot

  shifta [Somali]: bandit (literally “wanderer”)

  shuka rectangular piece of cloth, printed or dyed, worn as herdsman’s cape or toga; also, as kikoi, or man’s “skirt” (on the East African coast)

  ugali maize meal, porridge

  Selected Bibliography

  Abrahamson, H. The Origin of Death. Kegan Paul, 1952.

  Adamson, Joy. The Peoples of Kenya. Collins & Harvill, 1967.

  Arkell, A. J. A History of the Sudan. Oxford, 1961.

  Bagshawe, F. J. “The Peoples of the Happy Valley,” Jour. of the African Society, Part II, no. 24, 1925.

  Beard, Peter. The End of the Game. Viking, 1965.

  Bleek, Dorothea. “The Hadzapi or Watindega of Tanganyika Territory,” Africa, no. 3, 1931; idem, “Traces of Former Bushman Occupation in Tanganyika Territory,” South African Jour. Sci., no. 28, 1931.

  Blixen, Karen. Out of Africa. Random House, 1937.

  Brown, Leslie. Africa: A Natural History. Random House, 1965.

  Carrington, Richard. Elephants. London, 1958.

  Cave, F. O., and James D. MacDonald. Birds of the Sudan. London, 1955.

  Clark, J. Desmond. The Prehistory of Africa. Praeger, 1970.

  Cole, Sonia. The Prehistory of East Africa. Macmillan, 1965.

  Cooper, B. “The Kindiga,” Tanganyika Notes and Records (hereafter TNR), no. 27, 1949.

  Davidson, Basil. The African Past. Grosset & Dunlap, 1964.

  Douglas, Mary. Purity and Danger. Praeger, 1966.

  Douglas-Hamilton, Iain. “The Lake Manyara Elephant Problem,” unpub. ms., 1969.

  Dundas, K. R. “Notes on the Origin and History of the Kikuyu and Dorobo Tribes,” Man, no. 78, 1908.

  Dyson, W. S., and V. E. Fuchs. “The Elmolo,” Jour. Royal African Inst., no. 67, 1937.

  Evans-Pritchard, E. E. The Nuer. Oxford, 1940.

  Fage, J. D., and R. A. Oliver. Papers in African Prehistory. Cambridge, 1970.

  Fordham, Paul. The Geography of African Affairs. Penguin, 1965.

  Fosbrooke, H. A. “An Administrative Record of the Masai Social System,” TNR, no. 26, 1948; idem, “A Stone Age Tribe in Tanganyika,” South African Arch. Bull., no. 11, 1956.

  Graham, Aleicester. The Lake Rudolf Crocodile (unpub. ms.).

  Gray, Robert F. The Son
jo of Tanganyika. Oxford, 1963; idem, “Structural Aspects of Mbugwe Witchcraft,” in Middleton and Winter, Witchcraft and Sorcery in East Africa. Praeger, 1963.

  Greenberg, Joseph H. The Languages of Africa. University of Indiana, 1963.

  Gregory, J. W. The Rift Valley and the Geology of East Africa. London, 1910.

  Gulliver, P., and P. H. Gulliver. The Central Nilo-Hamites. London, 1953.

  Henderson, Ian (with Philip Goodhart). The Hunt for Kimathi. Hamish Hamilton, 1958.

  Hobley, C. W. “Notes on the Dorobo,” Man, no. 76, 1906.

  Hollis, Sir A. Claud. The Masai. Oxford, 1935.

  Holman, Dennis. The Elephant People. Murray, 1967.

  Horizon Editors. The Horizon History of Africa. McGraw-Hill, 1971.

  Hunter, J. A. Hunter. Harper, 1952.

  Huntingford, G. W. B. “The Peopling of East Africa by Its Modern Inhabitants,” in Oliver and Matthew, History of East Africa, vol. 1, Oxford, 1963; idem, “The Social Organisation of the Dorobo,” African Studies, no. 1, 1942; idem, The Southern Nilo-Hamites. London, 1953.

  Huxley, Elspeth. The Flame Trees of Thika. Penguin, 1962; idem, A New Earth. Morrow, 1960; idem, With Forks and Hope, Morrow, 1964.

  Ionides, C. P. J. “Southern Province Native Superstitions,” TNR, no. 29, 1950.

  Junod, Henri. Life in a South African Tribe. Macmillan, 1912, quoted in Technicians of the Sacred by J. Rothenburg, Doubleday, 1968.

  Kariuki, J. M. Mau Mau Detainee. Penguin, 1964.

  Kenyatta, Jomo. Facing Mt. Kenya. London, 1938.

  Klima, George J. The Barabaig. Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1970.

  Laws, R. M., and I. S. C. Parker. “Recent Studies on Elephant Populations in East Africa,” Symp. Zool. Soc. London, 1968.

  Leakey, L. S. B. Adam’s Ancestors. Harper (Torchbooks), 1960; idem, “Preliminary Report on an Examination of the Engaruka Ruins,” TNR, no. 1, 1936; idem, Stone Age Cultures of Kenya Colony, Cambridge, 1931.