There was great lack of meat in the country and people’s mouths were sour from eating leaves of manioc and of sweet potatoes. So two women went to catch fish so that they might collect at least small fish to bring and broil. One of them was pregnant, and she in particular, saliva was dripping from her mouth. They went along the bank until they found a stretch of water in which fish were feeding. They dammed it and were skimming it ardently with a wooden bowl as hunger for meat drove them on. When the water was getting lower they could see the fish turning about in it. While they were intending to jump into it with their fishing-nets to catch the fish, that little bird Bulbul flew and perched in a tree above this water and sang
‘Women, as you are just catching fish, war has come,
Pregnant one, you are only fishing, but death has come,
Women, war has come, death has come.’
The pregnant one scraped up some marsh mud and threw it at him. He flew to another tree and continued singing there. The other woman broke off a piece of wood and flung it at the bird. He escaped it, thanks to his ghosts (good luck). He therefore flew off, saying to them ‘I was good enough to warn you of the war.’
The women caught so many fish that their containers were all full. They got out of the water on to the bank and were cutting up the fish, laughing and rejoicing. Then they heard away, heard grass shaking and trees breaking and spears clanging against one another. They were unable to move because of the great fear that had seized them. One of them cried that Bulbul might have been speaking the truth: ‘O sister, we are dead.’ When they tried to run away two men burst in upon them with fire in their eyes. The women prayed them to spare their lives and take them for their wives, but the men had been in war for a long time and had killed many people and did not heed their supplication. People’s blood had turned their eyes into those of fierce savages. One of them dashed at the pregnant woman, and when she tried to plunge into the water he cut open her belly at the edge of the water and only her corpse dropped into the water. The twins who were in her womb spilled out alive into the water. The men had already speared the other woman and they gathered up their fish and went on their way.
These twins remained alive in the water and they ate just sand till they grew up. They were a boy and a girl. When they reached the age when children can be sent to fetch water and fire they came out on to dry land. Their skin was very light as they had grown up in water. The boy was very handsome; and as for his sister, her beauty defied description. Her brother used to collect wild fruits for them to eat. He carved wooden arrows with which he used to shoot birds and rats which they roasted and ate. The children grew up to be adults. This young man became a great hunter, his strength was that of two. They left the river bank and went wandering over the countryside. They went on till they arrived at the homesteads of the people killed during the war and found dilapidated huts and granaries and also hoes and other tools left by the dead. So this youth built a hut for him and his sister to sleep under, and then prepared cultivations and planted in them the seeds they had found in the old dilapidated granaries. Their home was very fine, but nobody would have much to do with them because they did not want to visit the homesteads where people had been killed and their blood had flowed into the streams. Only some men who had gone hunting came and appeared in their home. They were astonished at this splendid homestead. But when the head of the home appeared before them they were struck dumb by his grace and beauty, who had such wonderful soft hair. Whoever saw him was at once made aware of his great strength. When his sister came out to give them water, as they were very thirsty, they could not take their eyes off her. They even forgot about the water. In all their lives they had never seen a woman as beautiful as she. As the young man and his sister resembled each other as two termites, for they were twins, the hunters at once knew they were brother and sister. So when they returned to their home they spread the news about Gburenze—as they called him on account of his hair—and his sister. People came from afar to see them.
The renown of Gburenze’s sister came to Ture’s ears. Ture then bundled his wives, Nanzagbe and Nangbafudo, off to their brothers’ homes. Ture then gathered fighting men whom he sent against Gburenze to go and kill him and bring his sister to him. That evening Gburenze’s sister went to fetch water and she saw a fish on the surface of the water which said to her ‘Men of war will burst upon your brother to kill him on your account.’ She returned and told Gburenze. Very early in the morning Gburenze came out and sat on his stool with his curved knife in his hand and looked towards the path. After a short while men rushed at Gburenze. His sister sat on the verandah of their hut singing this war song:
‘Gburenze, fight the war brother,
Gburenze, fight the war brother,
Ture has gathered all the people,
To come and kill Gburenze for me ooo,
Gburenze, brother of Nangume,
Gburenze, chop the men to pieces.’
When Gburenze threw his knife at the men they were all killed except a left-handed man who escaped. He fled with all speed to Ture and told him ‘Alas, Ture; but oh no! Everybody is dead save me who have run to tell you about it.’ Ture was enraged with the left-handed fellow. Ture nearly speared him to death but he escaped because his father’s ghost was with him. Desire for Gburenze’s sister gripped Ture’s heart and he set up and sent another war party against Gburenze, but only what happened before was repeated and the left-handed man escaped. He fled again to Ture. Ture dispatched yet another war party. When this party arrived Gburenze’s sister did not sing her song. Gburenze flung his knife to no purpose; the men did not die as before. The men-at-arms surrounded him and speared him. The men rushed to lay their hands on Nangume [the name means “mother of sand,” she (and her brother) having been nurtured on nothing but river-bottom sand in their infancy, vide supra] to carry her off to Ture, but when she sang this song
‘Hii, who told you people to touch
Gburenze’s sister! Your hands will stay
Now at your breasts!’
the hands of the men became stiff on their breasts. She sang again:
‘Stand away from Gburenze’s sister—
Your hands will be loose as before.’
When they backed away from her their hands became as supple as before. They said among themselves ‘Let us tie up her brother to carry him to Ture. She will follow after us.’ They bound the body but when they tried to lift it it was as heavy as a rock. The men strove in vain to lift Gburenze’s body, it would not move from the ground. The men were wet with sweat and their barkcloths were torn off their loins, but alas, no! Gburenze lay on the ground like a rock. Then Nangume said ‘Gburenze, my brother, let us go please!’ When they tried again to raise him he was as light as a dry leaf. Nangume strapped her door and followed them. They arrived at Ture’s home with the body, but when they tried to put the body down, oh no! It was a rock! Ture rushed out of his hut where he had been preparing a bed, thinking that Gburenze’s sister had arrived. He saw only Gburenze’s corpse. When he started to insult his captains they said ‘Ture, Gburenze’s sister is already approaching the home. A princess does not walk like a slave.’ Ture sat down without taking his eyes from the path. The carriers stood waiting with the corpse of Gburenze on their heads. Ture’s eyes were fixed on the path, so he did not notice what was happening with the corpse of Gburenze. Suddenly Ture saw Gburenze’s sister herself coming like a princess walking on the ground. Ture gazed at her with his mouth hanging open. Her beauty stunned Ture. He could not imagine himself being good enough for her at all. She came and told the men to put down the corpse. They put it down. She cast her eyes about her and saw Ture looking at her as if she were god. She then sang
‘O Ture, Ture has killed Nangume’s brother,
O Ture, you stay in your place please!’
When Ture tried to stand he was as if glued to his stool and the stool as if glued to the ground. Whenever Ture looked at her, tears fell from his eyes. People said to him ‘Well, Ture, you often claim to be a worker of wonders, is that not a beautiful woman you are facing?’ She went and sat very close to Ture. Ture was imploring her to let him loose. She would only answer ‘Ture, I shall let you loose. But rest first in that position.’
The men started cutting up Gburenze’s body into a pot and they made a fire, and when they tried to lift the pot into which they had put the body for cooking it was too heavy for them. Nangume sang a song and they lifted the pot and put it on the fire. They replenished the fire beneath the pot in vain, Gburenze’s body would not cook. His sister sang and the flesh was cooked. She sang a song and they put down the pot from the fire. When they tried to eat Gburenze their mouths seemed to have been tied in place with leather straps. Nangume sang and they ate up Gburenze. She said to them ‘O sirs, gather his bones for me when you have eaten all your flesh.’ They gathered up the bones for her and she wrapped them up (in leaves), and leaving Ture where he was, she left for her home with her brother’s bones. When she was on her way Ture would have speared himself to death if there had been a spear at hand. Terror of her seized those people present and nobody wanted to approach her. After Nangume had gone Ture’s wives heard that the woman for whose sake he had chased them away had pinned Ture to the ground beneath his granary and that all had deserted him and he was almost starved to death. So they returned to their husband and fed him in that place of his.
Nangume went home with the bones of her brother and covered them with a small pot and sat beside them, singing. She did not eat that day. At night she slept near the pot. When she turned it over the following morning she saw a lizard under the pot. She put the pot back and sat singing more songs without eating. The following morning she opened it and saw a rat, and she covered it again. The third day she found a baby under it. She covered this baby under a large pot. The fourth day she found a young boy under it. She took him and put him on a bed, closed the door, and sat outside the door weeping. When she entered the hut the following day she saw a handsome young man inside. They thus lived in their home as husband and wife.
When they had become husband and wife they spent two days, at the end of which she said ‘My husband, come let me show you today the man who sent a force against me because he wanted to marry me.’ She concealed from him that he had come out of her brother’s bones. Until their death he never knew this fact. He had found a beautiful woman and did not want to ask her questions lest she reject him. He believed that that was how people were born and that was how they found their wives. It was only when people resettled that district that their children found husbands and wives for themselves. As soon as they reached Ture’s home Nangume said ‘Ture, get up to salute my husband please.’ Ture then sprang from that spot to which she had bound him. Fear of her seized Ture, for he was afraid she might do what she had done to him before. He therefore fled and hid himself in the bush until Nangume had left with her husband. When he came out of the bush his wives jeered at him on account of this woman he had wanted to marry.
— from the Yambio District in the Sudan, noted by
Richard Mambia sometime during the years 1961-1963