THE TUGEN OF KENYA.
TUGEN
LOCATION
Like other sub tribes of
kalenjin, the tugen live in the Tugen Hills of Baringo District, with its sub
groups
The arror occupying kabartonjo and some parts of kerio valley
The lembus occupying koibatek district with concentration around eldama
ravine town
The samor come from central baringo.
The endorois occupying a large area of marigat and morgotio
It’s an area of harsh
ecological conditions where they grow millet and maize and raise cattle, goats
and sheep. When the rains fail and their cattle are raided by their neighbors
or diminished by disease or famine, the leave their scattered homesteads and go
hunting and gathering in the bush. The stories the elders tell are stories of
hunger and of the need to migrate in order to find a better place to live. The
Tugen are cephalous. There are no central institutions such as kingship,
chieftainship or priesthood to maintain and cultivate a general history of all
Instead, there are many 'histories', each local group its own distinctive
history. However, the Tugen, like other Kalenjin, have a cyclical age-set
system which provides them with a general frame of reference to fix past events
in the flow of time, and determines their concept of history.
MODE
OF DRESSING
The tugen people had skin
from animals as a customary clothing. Heavy brass coil earrings was worn by
both men and women. This stretched their ear lobes down to the shoulder level.
Necklaces made of beads were also worn. Beads for the ladies were worn during
ceremonies. A thorn was pierced through the upper part of the ear and beads
woven on the stretched ear lobe.
The beads would also be
worn on the upper arms, elbows, wrists and ankles. Beads would be woven in form
of a crown and worn on the head.
FOOD
Being a Nilotic ethnic
group inhabiting rift valley and growing maize and millet and rearing animals,
their cuisine is ugali (kimyet). This is made from ground millet. They would
add vegetable mostly traditional and due to adequacy of animals they would
slaughter for meat. They fermented milk which they call (mursik) and would have
charcoal dust in it to make it appear grey. The mursik would be stored in
gourds (sotet) honey was highly sought after and was used in preparation of mead.
(Alcohol made of fermented honey mixed with water)
HIERACHY
AGE SETS are social
groups, hierarchically arranged, which mark the flow of time by organizing men
and women in certain categories based on age and generation. The Tugen
distinguish eight age-sets, which exist for men and women:
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MEN
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WOMEN
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Kimnyegen
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Chelemei/ cheptinap
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Nyongi
(maina)
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Ritual leaders
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Chepargamei/ chepingwek
Selengwech
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Chumo
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Political leaders
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Chepingwek/ chesiran
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Sowe
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Chesiran/ chemusinya
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Korongoro
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Warriors
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Chemusinya/ chesur
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Kipkoimet
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Initiates
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chesur
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kaplelach
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children
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Kusantya/ chemei
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Now Chumo owns the world,
until the next age-set grows. Then Sowe will own the world. Chumo will show
Sowe the right way to follow. So they stay. Sowe follows behind Chumo. When
Sowe knows everything, then Chumo tells them: 'Now the world belongs to you.'
Nyongi taught Chumo. Nyongi has finished its work. Nyongi sleeps now. They say
to Chumo: 'It's your turn. We sit.' If there is a meeting of elders, then
Nyongi sit and watch how Chumo fulfils its duty. If they make a mistake, Nyongi
says: 'You failed to take the right path.' Then Chumo feels sorry. When Chumo
gives the world to Sowe, Chumo becomes the master of ritual. Kimnyegew sleeps.
They will come back again, when Kaplelach is initiated.
LEGAL
SYSTEM
Like any other community,
wrangles were present as a result of so many things. From marriages to cattle
raiding to competition for wife between father and son. These internal
conflicts were solved by council of elders in courts set under trees. Offending
parties would normally comply with hefty fines imposed on them by the court.
Punishment such as beating and would be administered by the offenders age set.
Local groups of women would also sanction men deemed guilty of “crimes against
women “
MUSIC
The kalenjin people have
a very strong sense for their songs. Evenings would often be spent singing
around the fire and telling stories as a form of entertainment and education.
MARRIAGE
Traditionally marriage
had two stages
Engagement (koito)
Wedding (katunisiet)
Bride price was usually
paid on the day of engagement and in the form of cattle. A man was allowed to
have as many wives as possible. Once the bride price was paid, divorce was
extremely rare. As the names of the women's age-sets demonstrate, there was no
agreement among the informants about the exact order of these categories.
Women's age-sets are of little importance in social, political and ritual life,
a fact which reflects women's actual exclusion from politics and the public
sphere. Indeed, after marriage, women leave their own age-sets and identify
with those of their husbands. Moreover, whereas men's age-sets are clear-cut
categories with defined boundaries, women's age-sets are split: Chumo, for
example, marries the youngest women of Selengwech and the oldest of Chesiran,
while Sowe marries the youngest Chesiran and the oldest Chemusinya. Thus,
although according to marriage regulations, men should marry women from the
parallel age-set, they are also allowed to marry women from the following
age-sets. Therefore, the correspondence of the women's age-sets to those of the
men is not an exact one.
TABOO
Like every tribe the
tugen have their taboos. Examples being: -
Makiyanchin tipik anan
kwonyik kolany ket. (Women are not allowed to climb trees)
Makenamen chego eutab
katam (milk is never held with the left hand)
Mokiyenye teta en tumin
komowa lakwet (we never slaughter a cow in a ceremony before a child is
circumcised)
RITE
OF PASSAGE
The time for initiation into one of the
age-sets is determined by the elders. They watch the sky, the movements of
stars, moon and sun. Only if the constellation of heavenly bodies is considered
beneficial will initiation be allowed. Also, there must be enough food to feed
the initiates during the period of seclusion. In times of hunger and war,
children will not be initiated. Not only do celestial and ecological conditions
determine the time of initiation, but also, the antagonistic relation between
elders and young men influence the times for the opening or closing of an
age-set. Elders say that they try to postpone the initiation of young men,
because young men and elders compete for women. Sometimes the elders delay the
'coming out' of young men and marry the young women who were initiated into the
parallel age-set. Or else they refuse initiation altogether to the young men,
who then 'steal' it, going to Pokot, Nandi or Elegeyo instead; then they return
to Tugen to marry those women whom the old men had wanted to monopolize for themselves.
Elders also say that before, all members of an age-set were initiated at the
same time. The initiates came from a wide area to koi, the 'stone', where
circumcision took place. Initiation into an age-set not only fixed a central
point in space, but also in time: a point of reference for a large part of a
society in which people otherwise lived dispersed and isolated. So in a sense,
initiation provided a framework for social synthesis. When the initiates
emerged from many months' seclusion, the age-set was closed for about ten to
fifteen years until time was ready for initiation into the next age-set. Later
this changed: during colonial times, the period of initiation became longer and
, and today initiation takes place every year there is no any closed period.
The unifying character of initiation is also diminished because there is no
longer one stone for the initiates of a wide area; instead, every hillside or
neighborhood has its own stone where local 'children 'are circumcised.
Moreover, the timespan between succeeding age-sets has become shorter; whereas
previously, an age-set was separated from the next one by approximately fifteen
years, now the time-span between two age-sets is only eight to ten years. Thus
time for Tugen has accelerated and become precious. Parents of modern initiates
say that they want to initiate their children as quickly as possible, because
'they don't want to waste time!'
Initiation in one of the
age-sets marks the 'birth' of the social person and essentially determines the
social identity of an individual. If you ask a Tugen: 'Who is this person?’ he
will answer, e.g.: 'He is a Nyongi'. If you ask for his age, people will give
you the same answer. There is no rigid division of labor between different age
sets. After initiation, young men are called muren or 'warriors', but in time
of war every able man goes to The transition from the grade of muren to that of
a political elder is marked by a ritual called sohro~ which is performed
individually for each man, and not collectively, as at initiation. However,
because a man has to do sohro before his son can be initiated into an age-set,
the time-span allotted to him for this is limited. Thus the rule assures the
synchronized transition of sons into muren and fathers into boisiek (elders) or
political elders. In addition, the social position of the grandfather is
altered. When his son performs sohro his grandchild is initiated, and he will
retire from political leadership and now 'owns the ritual', a ritual elder.
Elders say that one age-set is the 'teacher' of the following age-set. In
rituals that mark the life cycle, there are always motiren or teachers who
belong to the age-set 'in front' or above the person for whom the ritual is
done. Ritual elders are motiren of the political elders, and political elders
are motiren of the muren, who during initiation are motiren for the young men
under circumcision. Thus the hierarchically ordered age-sets correspond to a
pyramid of wisdom.
The cyclical age-set
system also determines the limits of physical life. Elders say that formerly,
children who were born to uninitiated girls or fathered by uninitiated boys
were strangled before they took their first breath. Only men and women who are
circumcised and members of an age-set are full social persons who are allowed
to produce children. Members of the oldest age-set, whose name was given to the
age-set of new-born children, had to commit suicide. The Tugen elders of this
remnant age-set went to a cliff and sang and danced to its edge, from which
they fell to their deaths. Age-sets of fathers and sons must never be adjacent,
but must be separated by at least one other age-set. Elders say that very often
there is hatred and envy between fathers and sons, even though they should love
each other. Members of the age-set that separates fathers and sons act as
motiren in rituals carried out for the latter, teaching, praising and punishing
the sons of fathers who acted as their own motiren in rituals. In a way,
motiren function as go-betweens for the two generations, and also as
substitutes for the fathers, whose teaching and punishing roles they assume.
However, Tugen age-sets are not generation sets, because not all the sons of
one man belong to the same predictable age-set: according to the Tugen, his
youngest children are 'stolen' by the following age-set and are thus separated
from the set of their father by two age-sets. Nonetheless, the general rule is
that fathers and sons are separated by only one age-set. Following this rule, a
man belongs to the same age-set as his great-grandfather and his
great-grandchildren. Tugen say that in the succession of age-sets there is no
beginning and no end, because age-sets 'go round'. This is why, for example,
the old Kimnyegew call the young Kipkoimet their fathers, since they are the
'recurrence' of their fathers, who were also Kipkoimet.
NAMING
Age-sets which have the
same name are identified with each other, but Tugen do not believe that the
members of one age set are the reincarnation of the previous age-set which bore
the same name. There is a homologous relation between the circulation of age
set names and the circulation of the personal names of individuals who are
given the names of deceased ancestors of the lineage.
The Tugen do not believe
in reincarnation, they give their children the names of ancestors. For example,
Bartonjo was a good ancestor, thus many people bear his name. The child which
bears the name Bartonjo stands for Bartonjo, but it is not Bartonjo
Factors considered when
naming individuals include:-
Time of birth
According to event
According to ancestors,
girls were not named after ancestors.
Place of birth
When naming boys, “kip”
is usually used as a prefix then followed by either of the above factors.
Example
KIPROTICH
KIP – Prefix
Rotich – time of birth
(born when cows were coming back home after grazing in the evening.)
In tugen the prefix “kip”
and “chep” can both be used for male individuals.
On the one hand, bearing
the name of an ancestor individualizes a child, while on the other, it
incorporates it into the chain of ancestors with the same name. The child is
not only an independent, self-reliant being, but also the recurrence of one, or
rather many, ancestors. Parents who give their child the name of a good
ancestor hope that the child's destiny will be influenced by the ancestor in a
good way, although the ancestor will never act directly as a protector' or·
guide during the child's lifetime. Likewise, age-sets with the same name have
certain characteristics in common. Tugen say that Korongoro is 'hot, troublesome,
and warlike', and Tugen expect that every age-set with the name Korongoro will
be hot, troublesome and warlike, whereas the age-set Kaplelach is said to be
'cool and peaceful', and Tugen expect all the following age-sets which bear the
name Kaplelach to have the same characteristics. Likewise, they expect those
events which occur during the time of an age-set when its members are warriors
or political elders to occur again in the next cycle. On this level, history is
a cycle of events which repeats itself eternally, in which nothing is lost, and
in which new events cannot develop. On another level, the cyclical concept of
history is suspended: every age-set is divided into two or three sub-sets,
according to the age of the members. These sub-sets are given nicknames, in
order that an outstanding event taking place during initiation be remembered.
Thus one sub-set was called 'kilo', because initiation took place when the
colonial government introduced the kilo as a measure. Another sub-set was called
'rain of cleaning the stones', because such rain fell during initiation. These
nicknames are never repeated; though related to a unique event, they are soon
forgotten. Likewise, children are given not only the names of ancestors, but
also names to events which took place during their birth. For example, there
are children called kemei 'hunger', because they were born during a famine; or
taram, 'locust', because locusts came and destroyed the millet; or chumba
'European', because Europeans were present at the time of their birth. Thus on
the one hand, in relation to age-set names and personal names of ancestors, the
Tugen concept of time seems to be cyclical, while on the other hand, sub-set
names and personal names are based on unique, non-recurring events which are
soon forgotten.
As stated earlier, The
Tugen do not believe in reincarnation. Like other kalenjin people they prayed
to a God they called (Asis) this means sun. This took toll when Christianity
and Islam started trending.
CEREMONIES
Formerly as a community
wide festival (kipsunde) was held. This usually followed a harvest season. This
with time faded away and ones like birth, circumcision, marriages started being
acknowledged widely.
Seen!
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