Music of the Khoikhoi or ‘Hottentot’ people of southern Africa. In 1497 Vasco da Gama, on landing at Cape St Blaise near the southernmost tip of Africa, was greeted with the music of four or five flutes. A band of over 100 flute players dancing in a circle was later reported by Meerhoff, in 1661, according to Godée-Molsbergen (1916). Unlike other southern and central African peoples, the Khoikhoi or ‘Hottentot’, as they later came to be called, were yellowish-brown in colour. They were pastoral nomads and spoke a language that was rich in ‘click’ consonants. Beaulieu, in 1620, noted that they also played musical bows, and in 1668 Dapper first described their unusual string-wind instrument, the Gora.
The origin of the name ‘Hottentot’ is uncertain. Maingard ascribed it to a dance-song refrain, citing Beaulieu who visited the Cape in 1620: ‘leur salut ordinaire en nous rencontrant est de danser une chanson dont le commencement, les parties et la fin est “hautitou”’. The Hottentots refer to themselves by the name ‘Khoikhoin’ (sing. Khoikhoi). Historical writings distinguish four major groups, usually referred to as the Cape Hottentots, Eastern Hottentots, Korana and Nama (or Namaqua). Their total number in the 17th century is estimated at about 50,000. Their descendants became assimilated into the so-called Cape ‘coloured’ (mixed-race) population, and scarcely any remnants of their language and culture now survive in the Cape Province of South Africa. But it has been established that Khoikhoi dialects are still spoken among a few scattered groups living in South-west Africa, Botswana and southern Angola; these groups resemble the neighbouring San (‘Bushmen’) and were previously mistaken for San (Westphal, 1963). Ethnically and linguistically, Khoikhoi are unrelated to the Bantu or the San, but possible connections with the Sandawe and Hadzapi (Hatsa) of north-eastern Africa, who also use ‘clicks’, have been suggested.
From a number of eye witness accounts since the 15th century, it appears that the principal instruments used by Khoikhoi for ensemble performance were single-note flutes. A type of drum, made from a wooden or clay milk-pot over which a deerskin or sheepskin was tied (see fig.1), was used by women for song accompaniment, and to accompany dancing. It was played with the fingers of the right hand, and some writers have noted that pitch was regulated by pressure on the membrane with the left thumb and forefinger.
Solo instruments comprised the gora and two other types of Musical bow. Among less important instruments were the bullroarer and a signal whistle made from bone. Some early observers noted the use of animal horns and, in one case, a form of horn made from a hollow seaweed stalk. In the 18th century, imitations of the European violin were attempted, and a type of three-string lute, commonly known as the Ramkie, was adopted from slaves from Malabar. This was later imitated by Bantu peoples throughout southern Africa. Khoikhoi-speaking groups in South-west Africa have to some extent adopted Western instruments such as the guitar, melodeon and harmonica. Those in Botswana use a few instruments borrowed from Bantu peoples, notably a lamellophone from the Nambzwa (Nambya or Shona) and a drum from the Mbukushu.
In former times, among the Nama and Korana Khoikhoi, flutes usually consisted of narrow reeds with a bore of about 1 cm, fitted with movable plugs of fibre, adjusted by means of a tuning-stick. In the absence of reed, flutes were sometimes made from the bark of acacia roots. The flutes were always played by adult males. Each player supplied only a single note, and these notes were sounded in alternation while dancing. The scale comprised four notes, representable as D, C, A, G, in descending order. When there were more than four players, octaves and unisons of these notes were added. The flute was blown by placing the open end on the hollowed tongue, which gripped it by suction and also formed a trough for directing the airstream across it. A Korana flautist is shown in fig.2. Kirby (1931, 1932 and 1934) has given a comprehensive description of these flutes and other early Khoikhoi instruments.
The gora is a unique form of mouth-resonated bow, sounded by blowing on a quill attached to the bow-string. Two other types of musical bow used by the Nama and Korana have been described by Kirby in detail (1932 and 1934); he considered both to be adaptations of the ordinary hunting bow borrowed from the San early in the 17th century. One type was a simple, unbraced mouth bow played only by men. One end of the stave was held in the right-hand corner of the mouth, while the other was supported by the left hand. The string was then plucked by the right forefinger and the fundamental tone elicited; at the same time the player, by altering the shape of his mouth, could select and amplify certain higher harmonics, as in playing the jew’s harp. Kirby has transcribed a melody based on the 3rd to 8th partials with the omission of the 7th partial. This form of musical bow and its playing technique are widely distributed in southern Africa. Another slightly larger type of musical bow was played only by women. Mouth resonance was not employed. Instead, the lower end of the stave rested on the ground, as shown in fig.3, or against a skin milk-bag, wooden dish or even a tin can, which served as a resonator. Some later accounts described a different technique from that depicted in fig.3: the player, sitting on the ground, placed the top of the bow against her left shoulder and, in addition to the fundamental obtained from the open string, produced a stopped note a tone higher by pressing her chin against the string. The 2nd harmonic partials of both these notes were also produced by touching the centre of the string with the left-hand forefinger. This technique appears to have been restricted to the Nama and Korana and to the Bantu-speaking Tswana, who most probably borrowed it from them. In Uganda, however, Trowell and Wachsmann have noted ‘chin stopping’ among the Acoli (Acholi) and the Alur, though a different type of bow is used.
There are a number of accounts of Khoikhoi flute-ensemble performances from 17th- and 18th-century observers; most refer to the Nama Khoikhoi. The first reference to flutes among the Korana was by Wikar in 1778 (according to Moritz, 1918), and it seems that their flute dance was essentially the same. There is also evidence, from early in the 19th century, that certain San, and also some of the Bantu-speaking Tswana, had adopted the Khoikhoi flute dance, which is still performed among the Tswana. The Venda and neighbouring peoples of the northern Transvaal also have a flute dance, but there are basic differences, which suggest it was not derived from the Khoikhoi dance. Among the Nama and the Korana, flute dances were apparently the most important form of collective musical activity. They were performed on special occasions, such as when a chief wished to honour a distinguished guest. The dance usually lasted from before sunset until the following morning, and oxen were slaughtered for the dancers. Among the Korana there were occasional ‘competitions’ between villages in which the flute dance was important. Some 18th-century writers suggested a connection between the Nama flute dance and moon worship.
The flute players, who were always adult males, danced anti-clockwise round their leader who beat time in the centre with a stick. Women formed an outer circle (or inner circle, according to one report by Tachard in 1686), moving in the opposite direction while clapping their hands and dancing. L. Schultze described a Nama performance, seen in 1907, as follows: ‘The dance movements of the men consist of small jumps, both legs being bent weakly at the knees, and the feet placed one before the other. The dancer moves slowly forwards and backwards in this manner, bent forward, his head bowed over his chest, and his lips on the reed. The women “chassez” forward with small, and often most graceful steps, swaying about, protruding their posteriors, and rocking their buttocks from the haunches, clapping their hands loudly before their faces, while they sing with an expression of the greatest excitement. There is no fixed number of dancers’. A detailed discussion of Khoikhoi flute dances is provided by Kirby (1934). He cited all the major documentary sources and supplemented these with the results of his own fieldwork.
An early reference to song is given by Grevenbroek (c1689; ed. I. Schapera, 1933), who noted that women, among the Cape Khoikhoi, ‘sing an old song, nearly always the same, and to accompany it they strike their hands on a skin which is stretched over a pot’. Kolb and Lichtenstein attempted transcriptions of songs. The use of intervals from the harmonic series resembling those produced on the gora has been noted, as has the use of a four-note scale matching the tuning of flutes in the flute dance. However, two of the six traditional Korana songs transcribed by Kirby (1932) are hexatonic. In recent field recordings of songs from Khoikhoi-speaking as well as San groups in South-west Africa, Botswana and southern Angola, the four-note ‘flute-dance scale’, representable as D, C, A, G, is common, but variants such as D, B, A, G and D, B, G, F also occur. In songs from this area, a form of yodelling is quite common, in which alternating vowel qualities are used rather than words. In earlier literature, a similar feature may possibly account for Nama song texts such as that cited by J.E. Alexander (1838): ‘He also sung in low chorus, “Uwahu”, to the “ei, oh! ei, oh! ei, oh – oh! oh! oh!” and the clapping of the hands of the women’. However, there is considerable evidence that not all Khoikhoi song texts were sung on vocables, and it seems that speech-tones had a definite influence on melody when lexical texts were used.
Mention of communal dance-songs is infrequent in earlier literature, but these seem to be the most important form of collective musical activity today among Khoikhoi-speaking groups (often mistaken for San) in South-west Africa, Botswana and southern Angola. The flute dance appears to be no longer known, though the use of a four-note vocal scale resembling that of flute-dance music is common. It is possible that the music derives largely from San sources, since neighbouring San practices are very similar. Dance-song performances may either be recreational, connected with initiation, or for healing by inducing a state of trance in one or more participants. Women and girls, divided into groups around a central fire, sing and clap in hocket style while dancing. An outer circle of male participants enhances the rhythm with leg-rattles while dancing, but they do not sing. Additional percussion may be provided by striking on metal hoe-blades to yield rhythmic patterns.
A. de Beaulieu: Mémoires du voyage aux Indes orientales du général Beaulieu (Paris, 1664)
O. Dapper: Naukeurige beschrijvinge der Afrikaensche gewesten (Amsterdam, 1668, Eng. trans., 1670; Ger. trans., 1670/R)
G. Tachard: Voyage de Siam des Pères Jésuites (Paris, 1686)
P. Kolb: Caput bonae spei hodiernum (Nuremberg, 1719, Eng. trans., The Present State of the Cape of Good Hope)
M.H.K. Lichtenstein: Travels in Southern Africa in the Years 1803, 1804, 1805 and 1806 (London, 1812–15/R)
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L. Schultze: Aus Namaland und Kalahari (Jena, 1907)
E.C. Godée-Molsbergen: Reizen in Zuid Afrika, i (The Hague, 1916/R), 57
E. Moritz: ‘Die ältesten Reiseberichte über Deutsch-Süd-west Afrika’, Mitteilungen aus der deutschen Schutzgebung, xxxi (1918), 87
P.R. Kirby: ‘The Gora and its Bantu Successors: a Study in South African Native Music’, Bantu Studies, v (1931), 89–109
P.R. Kirby: ‘The Music and Musical Instruments of the Korana’, Bantu Studies, vi (1932), 183–204
P.R. Kirby: ‘The Reed-Flute Ensembles of South Africa: a Study in South African Native Music’, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, lxiii (1933), 313–88
I. Schapera: The Early Cape Hottentots Described in the Writings of … Johannes Gulielmus de Grevenbroek (1695) (Cape Town, 1933/R)
P.R. Kirby: The Musical Instruments of the Native Races of South Africa (London, 1934, 2/1965)
P.R. Kirby: ‘A Further Note on the Gora and its Bantu Successors’, Bantu Studies, ix (1935), 53–61
L.F. Maingard: ‘The Origin of the Word “Hottentot”’, Bantu Studies, ix (1935), 63–7
M. Trowell and K.P. Wachsmann: Tribal Crafts of Uganda (London, 1953)
E.O.J. Westphal: ‘The Linguistic Prehistory of Southern Africa’, Africa, xxxiii (1963), 237–65
M. Wilson and L. Thompson, eds.: South Africa to 1870, The Oxford History of South Africa, i: South Africa to 1870 (Oxford, 1969)
E.O.J. Westphal: ‘Observations on Current Bushman and Hottentot Musical Practices’, Review of Ethnology, v/2–3 (1978), 9–15
D.K. Rycroft: ‘Comments on Bushman and Hottentot Music recorded by E.O.J. Westphal’, Review of Ethnology, v/2–3 (1978), 16–23
DAVID K. RYCROFT