uMabhengwaneMany of you fear the combination of calendar date and weekday that is Friday the 13th. It’s part of a much older fear of the number 13 in general, about which I have a simple theory (shared by many others). Before I do that, I need to make it clear that not only do I […]
This is a moon with three names – uMandulo, uMpande & iSokanqangi. andula – the herald, the harbinger, the rituals to bring about fertility, the kites wheeling like whirlwinds in the sky. this name was adopted after the accession of uMpande to the throne, as an isihlonipho. Before Cetshwayo’s father, youngest son of uSenzangakhona, acceded […]
What do you mean in English when you talk about ‘a month’? If you speak a Teutonic language, it’s an easy association to make – ‘month’ comes from the root-word ‘moon’. In isiZulu, there is no disguising the word – izinyanga means 3 different things: Moons, Months & Herbalists (who are Moon-people possibly because of […]
Happy New Year to everyone! Ngithemba ukuthi ningene kahle kunyaka omusha (I hope you entered the new year well). There is some linguistic and anthropological interest in this day, when looked at from the perspective of isiZulu – mainly because of its special place as a borrowed custom. The isiZulu word for New Year is […]