Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
An equivalent initiation school, called the Sande, exists for girls. The subjects taught in the
Sande include cooking, dancing, sex education, and the art of herbalism. Symptoms, diagnosis, and
treatment of common ailments with herbs are the only aspects of traditional medicine allowed in
the Sande; the art of divination and any contact with spirits are forbidden.
Traditional birth attendants receive similar training in Sierra Leone, in Sande or Bundo schools.
The birth attendants are graded after training to reflect the level of experience, compassion, courage
in time of stress, and expertise. Initiates start as traditional birth attendants (TBAs) to midwives,
then move on to Niso or Sows, and with time may attain the professional class of “Majors,” Barigba
or Digba. The highest class of midwives is given the title of “Too Perfect.” Kargbo pointed out that
the most accomplished birth attendant in the village is often the Major or Digba, and that she is
very influential in women's critical life stages, such as pregnancy, childbirth, and menopause.
3
The
Sande schools are also managed by the Digba. Marriage and pregnancy are essential prerequisites
for becoming a TBA.
Such institutes also exist in Cameroon. A typical school was described by Garnier and Fralon
as consisting of a multichamber house, with medicines and poisonous and “magic” powders in the
inner chamber.
4
Also in the room were charms cut in antelope, panther, and other animal bones;
stones; little statues; and animal and human remains. The priest in charge of the center has to
sacrifice a chicken for each of the initiates to appease the gods and spirits before the secrets of the
inner chamber are revealed to the boys. Apart from the actual training in the art and techniques of
traditional healing, the initiates are drilled to withstand cold, heat, solitude, and darkness; they are
expected to be brave and not easily frightened by the sight of blood.
In East and Central Africa, among the Bantu peoples, such training centers are usually located
near msolo trees
(Pseudolachnostylis maprouneijolia
and
Caesalpinia
species). It is also customary
in most parts of Africa for the village head or traditional ruler to undergo all the initiation rituals
of various healers' guilds, societies, and shrines. It would be considered extremely foolish for the
ruler to appear in public to perform his duties without first performing cleansing rituals, fortifying
himself with magical herbs, and reciting the appropriate incantations. The master or chief instructor
of the initiation center is usually included among the counselors in a typical village palace.
The modern type of schools are known to have existed in ancient Egypt; physicians were instructed
in the art of healing in the “per ankh” or “house of life,” and numerous Greek philosophers, includ-
ing Pythagoras, Thales, and Plato, who came to Africa to study mathematics, religion, science, and
medicine, are believed to have received instructions in a per ankh.
5
Although the universities in
ancient north African cities included medicine in their curricula, the ancient priest-physicians, like
their counterparts in other parts of Africa, often kept the best of their knowledge secret.
tYPES OF traDItIONaL hEaLErS
There are basically five types of traditional healers in Africa: the diviner or fortune-teller, the
herbalist, the midwife and birth attendant, the surgeon, and the specialist medicine man. It is, how-
ever, not uncommon to find an individual belonging to all or several groups. There are also special-
ist medicine men who restrict their practice to certain types of illness.
It has been observed that among the nations of antiquity, the Egyptians were alone in the devel-
opment of specialty in medicine.
5
Early history of African medical practice showed that the dis-
eases of each organ were under the care of a specialist; it was often the practice to have several
medicine men attending to a seriously sick patient, each physician contributing the knowledge of his
area of training. This was long before the West had any form of medical specialization.
There were guilds, or societies of healers, for every aspect of health; the diviners and priests
were separate from the herbalists or physicians, and the surgeons constituted another specialty
group unto itself. As pointed out, it was common to find a healer belonging to more than one group.
