With the exception of those who get themselves initiated as a means of completing a medical treatment, novices are recruited from people living in the neighbourhood of a humfo and who have already taken part in ceremonies and dances over a long period of time. That is why most of them know the dance steps, the drum rhythms and the ceremony details long before being taught them during their kanzo. Having watched many possessions, hunsi to-be are familiar with the customary bearing of each deity and can recognize the gods on sight, by their tone of voice or mannerisms. Many novices out of friendship for—or to secure the favour of—a hungan or mambo, take an active part in the preparation of ceremonies. In this way they acquire a fairly intimate knowledge of the details of the cult.
It often takes many years of hard work before a candidate can put by enough to get himself initiated: apart from the fees of the priest, which can be substantial, he must also buy clothing and many ritual accessories. The mambo Lorgina told her novices of one hunsi who had come to her to discuss details of her initiation with nothing more than a straw-mat to bargain with. To cope with the costs of initiation she had started a small business and saved up penny by penny. Priests sometimes make allowances and scale down their fees if, in return for training, the hunsi will stay with him and serve him faithfully.
The difficulties which many find in getting the necessary money, and the multiplicity of circumstances which can lead a person to get himself initiated, explain why novices vary so much in age. Some very young children undergo initiation if the parents think it will do them good and if they can afford the cost. I know of a little girl of five who was made kanzo by a mambo as a mark of affection and to help her future. A pregnant woman who becomes a kanzo shares the benefits derived therefrom with the child she is carrying.
Once their decision is made, candidates for initiation usually have whole weeks in which to prepare themselves. It is in a priest’s interest to get together as many novices as possible. These assiduously frequent the humfo and seize every opportunity of picking up ritual routine and the dances which every hunsi must be able to do.
About a week before the date fixed for the kanzo—a date which the priest often keeps secret for fear of sorcerers—the novices gather in the sanctuary equipped with their white clothes and all the things they will need. This preliminary period is devoted to the carrying out of pious practices in the local churches and to frequent ablutions, particularly on the last three days before the retreat starts. They ‘freshen’ their bodies with ‘baths’ that is to say with water into which leaves with medical or magical properties have been infused. At the same time they abstain from foods likely either to blunt or excite their nerves. The morning of the ‘putting-to-bed’ ceremony (le coucher), they merely take some soup and something light to go with it, and instead of coffee they get a decoction of pois piante (Cassia occidentalis L.) or an infusion of corossol (Annona muricata) which is held to be a most effective sedative.
THE ‘PUTTING-TO-BED’ OF THE ‘HUÑO’
The coucher of the novices—to whom I will sometimes refer by the Haitian name (of African origin) huño—is the ceremony which marks the beginning of the initiation and precedes the period of withdrawal which initiates must complete within the sanctuary. It usually takes place on a Sunday evening and is marked by mutual salutations, libations, offerings and possessions, but includes also ritual acts which give it a character of its own. These last are: 1) the chiré aizan, 2) the public lessons which the novices receive, 3) the consecration before retreat.
The chiré aizan is the ritualistic fraying of palm leaves into strips from which are made fringes which the neophytes wear over their shoulders or in front of their faces. In Dahomey these fringes are used as talismans against evil spirits. After a few preliminary songs and dances, a newly-cut palm branch is placed on a chair covered with white stuff, having first been formally raised, three times, and then ‘orientated’. The chair is put on the vévé of the loa Aizan which has been duly consecrated by libations and offerings of ritual food.
The hunsi place themselves in a row, facing the palm, and sing and dance where they are; they then start tearing the leaves into strips with their nails or with pins. Here are the songs in honour of the god Aizan:
1. Aizâ sé loa
Legba e!
Chiré Aizâ
Aizaâ tâdé!
Aizan is a spirit
Legba e!
Tear the Aizan
Aizan listen!
2. Aizé vélékété
Imamu tòkâ
Lésé bo loa-a
Aizâ e, nu tut alé
Aizan vélékété
Imamu tokan
Let me kiss the god!
Aizan e, we are all going.
3. Aizâ e, Aizâ e!
Nu rêmê vivâ
Nu arrive
Aizâ dèr Ibo
Aya Aizâ!
Aizan e, Aizan e!
You love the living
You arrive
Aizan after Ibo
Ay a Aizan!
4. Aizâ pûngwé Aizâ
Aizâ géléfré
Aizâ, go, o
Aizâ, go, o
Aizan pungwé Aizan
Aizan of Africa
Aizan, go, o
Aizan, go, o.
5. Aizâ e (bis)
M’pralé
M’pralé Géléfré
P’pr’alé
Se u ki maré mwê
Aizan e (his)
I will go
I will go to Africa
I will go
It’s you who tie me up.
6. Aizâ Aizâ e
Nèg-sòt maré chwal li
Nèg l’espri di l’a lagé
Aizâ nu tut paréy
Axzan, Aizan, e
The stupid man ties his horse up
The intelligent says he will let him go
Aizan we are all the same.
Throughout the operation the strips of leaf which fall to the ground are carefully picked up by the hunsi who plait them into a whip—used, eventually, to punish the initiates. Another palm leaf, but this time a dried one, is brought and taken to pieces in the same way. The stems are split and cut into lengths and these strictly speaking are the aizans. They are once again placed on the chair and a père-savane blesses and baptizes them.
The hungenikon, holding the fringes at arms’ length, twirls on his toes, dances round the poteau-mitan, and running with quick little rhythmic steps, salutes the doors of the humfo, the drums, the sacred trees—particularly that of Legba—the ‘side-chapels’, and returning to the peristyle holds out the fringes first to the mambo, then to the hunsi, finally to important people among the spectators. Everyone kisses the aizan with the utmost respect and then the hungenikon hastens to put them away in the initiation room. Several times over in the course of the ceremony the hunsi make the novices repeat the salutations and dance steps which they have taught them. These are the last lessons to be received in public. The pupils perform all together, facing the hunsi, who only take them on one side if they need advice. The mambo does not hesitate to scold the ones who make mistakes and even knock them about a bit—as well as showing them where they went wrong. These repetitions are known as balancer (swinging). They also include the hand-clap rhythms—which are the salutations proper to initiates.
When the mambo thinks the repetitions have gone on long enough she orders the novices to lie down, full length, round the poteau-mitan with their heads resting against the pediment. First she pours water on their mouths and feet and then traces a cross with some green powder on their faces, their palms and chests. Then she whips them on the legs. In our opinion this chastisement is not entirely symbolic for it varies from person to person and is followed by reproaches and admonitions. The novices are no doubt paying for ritual faults they have committed in the privacy of the sanctuary. Before they may get up the mambo goes up to each and taps forehead, mouth and cheek with her rattle.
T
he priest now places a large stone on the head of each neophyte. Holding it with one hand they go dancing, in procession, to salute the sacred trees and the poteau-mitan. It was only many years after I saw this rite that the hungan who presided explained to me its significance. The dance, apparently, was to imbue the novices with a spirit of solidarity and obedience. To show what he meant, he described circumstances in which the hunsi had been made to ‘jump to it’ at the mere reminder of this rite. It can happen, he told me, that a hungan visiting a humfo with his hunsi may be dissatisfied with his reception. He has only to put his hands to his head and mime a dance step for the hunsi to remove themselves—and promptly. They withdraw, singing the refrain of the song which accompanies the dance with stones.
Now there are yet more salutations to dignitaries and to the hunsi. The ‘putting-to-bed’ (coucher) of the huño is at hand. The mambo who has never stopped ‘launching’ songs, breaks off in order to give them a short talk. She outlines the beneficial effects of the rites which have been performed for them, exhorts them always to behave irreproachably and to be loyal to the humfo which made them kanzo.
In obedience to signs from the confiance and the hungenikon, the novices, two by two, approach the mambo to kiss the ground at her feet and get themselves ‘twirled’ by her. They are then ordered to take off their shoes which are put in a pile. They line up once more facing the mambo. The latter kisses each of them on the mouth, her face distorted with emotion. All the huño begin to weep silently. Becoming more and more emotional the mambo, singing and walking with rattle in hand in front of them, gradually gives up all attempt at holding back her tears which end by drowning her voice. The hunsi and the spectators crowd round to embrace the departing initiates and press their hands as though they were going away forever. It is in these farewells that the deeper meaning of the kanzo shows up most clearly. The initiates will soon return—everyone knows that. But the point is, they will not be the same. They will have become different people and it is for their symbolical ‘death’ that spectators are now mourning, no less symbolically.
The hunsi remain stationed behind those candidates for whom they have acted as personal teachers and when the moment of departure comes they wrap a cloth round their protégés’ eyes. Then, rather roughly, they push them into the room—the djèvo—where they are to remain shut up for a week.
THE RETREAT
What goes on behind the locked doors of the djèvo is a secret which initiates may not reveal. However, they are not all so discreet. Piecing together scraps of information and using some of the written sources, I believe I have succeeded in reconstructing the main outline of the series of rites which lasts the whole week—from the coucher to the bulé-zin on the Saturday night. Some facts cannot be reconciled with each other and a few inexactitudes may have managed to creep in, but on the whole I am convinced that the picture here presented is correct.
Once they are in the djèvo the novices put on a tunic of plain white cloth which is the initiate’s normal dress. With their backs to the door, legs stretched out, they sit on a heap of mombin leaves. The priest cuts a lock of hair from the tops of their heads, removes the hair from their arm-pits and pubes, and takes nailparings from their left hands and feet. These bits of the body, which represent the ‘good angel’ (le bon-ange) or the soul, are wrapped in a banana-leaf with grilled maize, sweets, acassan and the blood and feathers of sacrificed chickens. The whole is placed in a pot of white china—the head-pot (pot-tête or pot-kanzo) which stays with the novice throughout the retreat. Later this is placed on the sanctuary altar where it remains as a token of the good behaviour and obedience of the initiates-to-be. In this way the hungan, the custodian of the pot, gains complete control of his hunsis’ souls and either with threats or by witchcraft, can bring to heel any who behave rebelliously or badly. Those who don’t wish to remain attached to a sanctuary take their head-pots away and hide them carefully in some nook of their houses.
The novices now undergo a second head-washing (laver-tête), and a much more important one than that which takes place automatically whenever a person is first seized by a loa. On the novice’s head, carefully washed with an infusion of medicinal herbs, the officiant clamps a poultice of bread soaked in wine, vermicelli, grilled maize, acassan, rice cooked in milk etc.—the whole sprinkled with syrup and blood. These ingredients, wrapped in mombin leaves, are held together in the folds of a white cloth which envelops the head and covers the eyes. They are removed seven days later but the initiate’s hair, fouled by the decomposition of so much organic matter, may only he washed when initiation has been completed—just before the new kanzo goes home. The infusion of mombin leaves which is used for this final washing, is carefully saved and put in a bottle for the initiate to use whenever he feels heavy or ‘hot’ in the head. If need be, the whole of this ceremony can always be repeated.
The main effect of the laver-tête is to establish a permanent link between the neophyte and a loa. In ritual language this ceremony corresponds with the placing of the loa maît’-tête (the loa master of the head). From then on the novice is consecrated to one particular spirit who will be his protector and will ‘dance in his head’ more often than other loa. Whereas in Dahomey and Nigeria a person is visited solely by the spirit to whom he has been pledged, in Haiti no loa claims a monopoly. Despite the rights a maît’-tête holds over his servant he does not take offence when another loa uses his ‘horse’.
How is a maît’-tête chosen? Theoretically Loco, the sanctuary guardian, is invoked by the priest and then tells him the maît’-tête of each initiate. In fact most neophytes have been possessed long before their initiation. They therefore take as their protector whichever loa first descended upon them or visits them most often. If troubled by doubt they put themselves in the hands of a priest who is experienced in such questions and knows how to recognize signs which clearly reveal the identity of the loa looking for a new servant.
In some sanctuaries the priest or the priestess, flanked by acolytes, calls upon the loa, beginning, as is proper, with Legba. As soon as a neophyte, by trembling or any other symptom, shows that the loa is wandering round him, he is made to sit down and is asked if it is really this spirit which he wants as guardian. If he says yes his mat is carried to the far end of the room. A novice who has never yet fallen into a trance should experience a mild frisson during the invocation of the spirits, otherwise initiation is not complete.
The placing of the loa maît’-tête does not always pass off without incident: other loa sometimes try and turn him out and take his servant for themselves. Then the officiant must induce the possession desired by calling the maît’-tête with appropriate songs and by tracing his emblem on the ground.
In honour of the loa the sanctuary flags and other sacralia are put round the walls of the retreat-room. The very ground is covered with every kind of receptacle all full of the maît’-tête loa’s favourite dishes. The mats on which the initiates are to lie are placed on the vèvè of their respective loa protectors. For pillows they are issued with large stones which have been taken into the humfo at night in great secrecy. Small coins, worth about 77 centimes, are put under the stones or knotted into a corner of the cloth of each novice. Before lying down on the mat the huño kiss the ground three times, then they lie on their left side, covered with a sheet. During the seven days retreat they may neither move, laugh nor speak without permission. They are put under the supervision of an experienced woman, the manman-huño who sees to their needs and prepares their food. A bell or rattle is placed in their reach so they may call her if they need to. A whip hanging on the wall is the sign of the discipline which must obtain in the djèvo. The hungan uses it liberally at the first glimpse of disorder. All the novices are punished for the fault of one.
They are kept to a rather strict diet which could not exactly be called a fast. Nonetheless they must eat nothing salted. They get nothing but afibas (dried tripe) and chicken in the way of meat. Offal (head, feet, gizzards
etc.) is particularly reserved for them. The bulk of their diet consists of gumboes, acassan and maize soup without fats. They only drink water or infusions of piante (Cassia occidentalis), corossol (Annona muricata), bois-dine (Eugenia fragans) or cinnamon.
Every morning the novices wash in hot water. Twice a day their bodies are rubbed with oil. At these moments they are allowed to turn over on their mat or sit up for about ten minutes.
Only people who have themselves passed through the kanzo rites may enter the room where the huño are lying. A visitor greets them by clapping his hands in a conventional rhythm and the novices reply with a beat which varies according to the visitor’s rank. A parent or uninitiated friend may come to the door, but not past it. When his presence is announced, he too is saluted with hand-clapping. Such are the limits of communication with the outside world. According to one hungan, who had initiated a great many kanzo, novices are not allowed to leave the djèvo to satisfy their natural needs. Other informants told me they may leave before dawn, muffled up with a sheet.
Every attempt is made to withdraw novices from outside influence simply because during their retreat they are particularly vulnerable. They are in a state of diminished resistance and their weakened organisms lie open to the wiles of sorcerers. All precautions taken are therefore merely dictated by elementary prudence.
OFFERINGS TO THE ‘MAÎT’-TÊTE’
The eve of the day upon which the novices have to make their solemn exit, a ceremony is celebrated in honour of all their loa maît’-tête. During the preparation of each loa’s favourite dish (soups, sugary things, acassan, chocolate, coffee, sweets, syrup, cakes, cassava and fruit) the hungan draws on the ground, in flour, the emblems of the spirits to be invoked. These drawings are covered with mats on which the offerings are then laid out.
The novices sit down with legs apart. The officiant sanctifies their heads by letting fall handfuls of food upon them and sprinkling them with water, kola and liqueurs. A choir sings three songs in honour of each maît’-tête. The priest goes up to the novices with the chicken each has given him and makes it peck at their head and hands. If the auguries are favourable he walks the bird on the postulant’s head and gives it to him or her to hold in such a way that within his crossed arms it is held against his breast. The hungan takes back the bird, breaks its wings and legs, tears its tongue out with his teeth and allows three drops of blood to fall on the initiate’s head. He finishes the bird off by wringing its neck; then he tears out a few tufts of down which he sticks, with blood, to the rim of the ‘head-pot’, and to the novice’s head. He also traces out crosses, in blood, on the nape of his neck, forehead, palm of the left hand and on the left foot. Pigeons are sometimes sacrificed under a cloak. Their bodies, duly ‘cross-signed’ and sprinkled with maize and various drinks, are heaped up in a pile between the novices’ legs. Any initiate not possessed when the name of his loa was called out, usually makes up for it at this juncture.
Voodoo in Haiti Page 21
