The Pygmy tribe is the people of equatorial Africa: photo, video, film about the life of African Pygmies. Dwellings, songs, growth. How do African pygmies live (24 photos) Pygmy tribe in Africa

Baka pygmies inhabit the rain forests of southeastern Cameroon, northern Republic of the Congo, northern Gabon, and southwestern Central African Republic. In February 2016, photographer and journalist Susan Shulman spent several days among Baka pygmies, making a short report about their life.

Tropical rainforests are natural environment a habitat. The main occupations are hunting and gathering, in this harmonious unity with nature they live for centuries, and their world is determined by the presence of the forest. Pygmy tribes are scattered across Africa over an area of ​​178 million hectares.

Pygmies differ from representatives of other African tribes in their diminutiveness - their height rarely exceeds 140 cm. In the photo above, members of the tribe perform a traditional hunting ceremony.

Susan Shulman became interested in the life of the Baka Pygmies after hearing about Louis Sarno, an American scientist who has been living among the Baka Pygmies in Central Africa for 30 years. rain forest between Cameroon and the Republic of the Congo.

Louis Sarno is married to a woman from the tribe, all these years he has been studying, helping and treating Baka pygmies. According to him, half of the children do not live up to five years, and if he left the tribe for at least a year, he would be afraid to return, because he would not have found many friends alive. Louis Sarno is now in his early sixties, and the average life expectancy of Baka pygmies is forty years.

Louis Sarno not only provides medicines, but also does other things: he acts as a teacher for children, a lawyer, translator, archivist, writer and chronicler for a community of 600 Baka pygmies in the village of Yandubi.

Louis Sarno came to live with the Pygmies in the mid-80s after hearing their music on the radio one day and decided to go and record as much of that music as possible. And he doesn't regret it one bit. He has the opportunity to regularly visit America and Europe, but always returns to Africa. We can say that the song brought him to the heart of Africa.

Baka pygmy music is yodeling-like polyphonic singing against the natural sounds of the rainforest. Imagine the polyphony of 40 female voices and the drumming rhythm of four men on plastic drums.

Louis Sarno claims he's never heard anything like it before, and it's divine.

Their hypnotic music usually acts as a prelude to the hunt, as the tribe sings to summon a forest spirit named Bobi and ask him for permission to hunt in his forest.

Dressed in a suit of leaves, the "spirit of the forest" grants permission to the tribe and blesses those who take part in tomorrow's hunt. In the picture above, the pygmy is about to go hunting with a net.

The basis of the diet of the tribe is the meat of the monkey and the blue duiker, a small forest antelope, but in recent times these animals in the forest is becoming less and less. This is due to poaching and logging.

“Poachers hunt at night, they scare animals with torches and calmly shoot them while they are paralyzed with fear. The nets and arrows of the pygmies of the tank cannot compete with firearms poachers.

Deforestation and poachers seriously devastate the forest and greatly harm the way of life of Baka pygmies. Many of these poachers are from the neighboring Bantu ethnic group, which makes up the majority of the population in the region,” says Susan Schulman.

As a result of the gradual depletion of the rain forests in which the Baka live, the future of their forest home is in question, as it is not clear where all this will lead.

Historically, the Bantu tribe considered Baka Pygmies "subhuman" and discriminated against them. Currently, relations between them have improved, but some echoes of the past still make themselves felt.

As the traditional life of the Baka pygmies becomes more difficult and problematic day by day, the younger generation has to find work in the Bantu-dominated cities.

“Young people are at the forefront of change. There are very few opportunities to earn money for them. As the resources of the forest in terms of hunting are depleted, you have to look for other opportunities - and this is usually only temporary work for the Bantu, who offer, say, $ 1 for five days of hunting - and even then they often forget to pay, ”says Susan.

Most low people on the ground, whose average height does not exceed 141 cm, live in the Congo Basin in Central Africa. "The size of a fist" - so translated from the Greek pygmalios - the name of the pygmy tribe. There is an assumption that they once occupied the whole of Central Africa, but then were forced out into the region rainforest.

The daily life of these wild people devoid of romance and associated with the daily struggle for survival, when the main task of men is to obtain food for the entire village. Pygmies are considered the most non-bloodthirsty hunters. And indeed it is. They never hunt for the sake of hunting, they never kill animals for the desire to kill, they never store meat for future use. They do not even bring a killed animal to the village, but butcher, cook and eat right on the spot, calling all the villagers to a meal. Hunting and everything connected with it is the main ritual in the life of the tribe, clearly expressed in folklore: songs about hunting heroes, dances that convey scenes of animal behavior, myths and legends. Before the hunt, men smear themselves and weapons with mud with the dung of the animal they are going to hunt, turn to the spear with a request to be accurate, and set off.

Everyday food of the pygmies is plant-based: nuts, edible herbs and roots, the heart of the palm. Fishing is a seasonal activity. For fishing, pygmies use a special grass, from which the fish fall asleep, but do not die. Grass leaves are dissolved in the river, the catch is collected downstream. A particular danger for the pygmies is the jungle, full of a variety of wild animals. But the most dangerous is the python. If a pygmy accidentally steps on a python more than 4 meters, he is doomed. The snake instantly attacks, wraps around the body and strangles.

The origin of the pygmies is still not entirely clear. It is only known that the first Europeans quite recently penetrated into their world and were met rather belligerently. The exact number of representatives of the tribe is not known. According to various sources, there are about 280 thousand of them. Average duration life - no more than 45 years for men, women live a little longer. The first child is born at the age of 14-15, but there are no more than two children in the family. Pygmies roam in groups of 2-4 families. They live in low huts covered with grass, which can be done in a few hours. Boys 9-16 years old are circumcised and subjected to other rather cruel trials, accompanied by moral instructions. Only men take part in such ceremonies.

The tribe has lost native language, therefore, the dialects of neighboring tribes are most often used. Clothing consists of only a hip belt with an apron. But settled pygmies are increasingly wearing European clothes. The main deity is the forest spirit Tore, the owner of forest game, to whom hunters pray before hunting.

The culture and traditions of the pygmies are gradually disappearing. New life slowly penetrates into their life, dissolving in itself the lifestyle of the smallest people on the planet.

Watch interesting videos.

Unknown planet. Pygmies and Karamojongs. ch1.

Ritual dances of Baka pygmies.

To begin with, let's get acquainted with the facts and reports of scientists about the pygmy tribes. Information about mysterious short people not as many as one would like, so all of them are important. Where and how they live, who they are: "mistake" or "regularity" of Nature; perhaps, having understood their “features”, we will be able to better consider ourselves? After all, we are all children of the same planet, their problems cannot be alien to us.

“The first ancient evidence of the pygmies was left by a Greek historian of the 5th century. to x. e. Herodotus. While he was traveling in Egypt, he was told a story about how one day young men from the African tribe of Nasamones decided to “make a journey through Libyan desert in order to penetrate further and see more than all those who had previously visited the most remote parts of it, "..." the Nasamones returned safely and that all the people [pygmies] they came to were wizards.

“Another testimony about the pygmies was left to us by the largest Roman scientist Pliny the Elder (24-79 AD). In his " natural history” he writes: “Some report a tribe of pygmies living among the swamps, from which originates the Nile"".(one*)
"One of the civilizations inhabited by pygmies and which now gone into oblivion located on Hawaiian Islands. "...". Today, pygmy tribes live in Africa (Central equatorial zone) and South-East Asia(Andaman Islands, Philippines, and Malacca rainforests)."

Hunters and gatherers in Africa are represented by three main groups - pygmies Central Africa, Bushmen South Africa and Hadza East Africa. Neither the Pygmies nor the Bushmen are a single monolith in stages - each of these groups consists of tribes or other ethnic communities located on various levels socio-historical and cultural development.

Name pygmies comes from the Greek pygmaios (literally - the size of a fist). The main countries of settlement: Zaire - 165 thousand people, Rwanda - 65 thousand people, Burundi - 50 thousand people, Congo - 30 thousand people, Cameroon - 20 thousand people, Central African Republic - 10 thousand people. people, Angola - 5 thousand people, Gabon - 5 thousand people. They speak Bantu languages.

Pygmies were one of the races that came out of Africa and settled in southern Asia, where they were very common in antiquity. The modern population of pygmies lives not only in Africa but also in some areas of South Asia, such as Aeta and Batak in the Philippines, Semang in Malaysia, Mani in Thailand. The average height of an adult male is about 140 cm. Women are about 120 cm. Increasingly tall pygmies are the result of interracial mixing with neighboring tribes.

"Pygmies. Have proportional healthy body , only reduced in size. Anatomy and physiology are close to normal".

“Among the pygmies, there are few sexy (Amazons) - and easily excitable (Bushmen who have a constant erection), there are very infantile - and very masculine (bearded, muscular, with large facial features, chest, unlike Negroids, hairy). African pygmies are very musical and plastic. They hunt elephants. Nilotic giants live next to them, the most tall people on the ground. They say that the Nilotic people willingly take pygmy women as wives, but they are afraid of men.

It was previously thought that the low growth of the pygmies was due to the poor quality of food and some kind of special diet, but this version has not been confirmed. There are other races living nearby - the Masai and the Sumburu in Kenya, who do not eat much better, but are considered the tallest in the world. At one time, for the purpose of experimentation, a group of pygmies were fed fully and for a long time, but their growth and the growth of their offspring did not increase.

pygmies Central Africa can be divided into three geographically distinct groups: 1) the Ituri Basin Pygmies, known as Bambuti, Wambuti or Mbuti, and linguistically divided into three subgroups: Efe, Basua, or Sua, and aka (more on that in this article); 2) the Pygmies of the Great Lakes region - the Twa, inhabiting Rwanda and Burundi, and scattered groups surrounding them; 3) pygmies western regions rainforest - baguielli, obongo, akoa, bachva, bayele, etc. In addition, there is also a group of East African pygmies - boni.

Now the pygmies are in hard times, they are dying out due to diseases like measles and smallpox, which, in combination with nutrient-poor food and heavy loads lead to high mortality. In some tribes, the average life expectancy is only 20 years. Higher and stronger Negro tribes oppress the Pygmies and survive them on unsuitable areas for existence.

Some scholars are also trying to connect short period the life of the pygmies with their growth (compare the lifespan of an elephant and a mouse). In general, all researchers of this people agree that the study of pygmies helps to better understand the principles of evolution and human adaptability to different conditions environment.

The great demand for bushmeat causes pygmies to poach in nature reserves. The unreasonable extermination of endangered animals may soon become a threat to the existence of the pygmy tribes themselves - a vicious circle from which it is already impossible to get out.

Pygmies go to poach in the reserve, their weapons are trapping nets and spears.

Here is the prey, catching an antelope is a great success.

“Pygmies are a nomadic people. Several times a year they leave their homes and, together with all the simple belongings, go through hidden paths to the most remote forest corners.
"... Pygmies live in huts that look like small green tubercles."

“Pygmies maintain fire constantly. When moving to another parking lot, they carry burning brands with them, since it is very long and difficult to carve a fire with flint.

“There is no real clay capable of holding the buildings together, and the rains destroy the pygmy” buildings. Therefore, they often have to be repaired. Behind this occupation you can always see only women. Girls who have not yet acquired a family and their own home, according to local customs They are not allowed to do this job."

Pygmy is a representative of one of the nationalities living in equatorial forests Africa. This word Greek origin and means "a man the size of a fist." This name is quite justified, given the average height of the representatives of these tribes. Find out who the pygmies of Africa are and how they differ from others in the hottest continent.

Who are the pygmies?

These tribes live in Africa, next to Ogowe and Ituri. In total, there are about 80 thousand pygmies, half of which live along the banks of the Ituri River. The height of the representatives of these tribes varies from 140 to 150 cm. The color of their skin is somewhat atypical for Africans, because they have a slightly lighter, golden brown. Pygmies even have their own national dress. So, men wear a fur or leather belt with a small apron made of wood in front, and a small bunch of leaves in the back. Women are less fortunate, often they only have aprons.

Houses

The buildings in which representatives of this people live are made of twigs and leaves, fastening everything with clay. Oddly enough, the construction and repair of the hut here is the responsibility of the women. A man, having conceived the construction of a new house, must go to the elder for permission. If the elder agrees, he gives his visitor a nyombikari - a bamboo stick with a peg at the end. It is with the help of this device that the boundaries of the future home will be outlined. This is done by a man, all other construction worries fall on the shoulders of a woman.

Life style

A typical pygmy is a forest nomad who does not stay in one place for a long time. Representatives of these tribes live in one place for no more than a year, while there is game around their village. When the fearless animals run out, the nomads take off in search of a new home. There is another reason why people often move to a new place. Any pygmy is an extremely superstitious person. Therefore, the whole tribe, if one of its members dies, migrates, believing that the forest does not want anyone to live in this place. The dead man is buried in his hut, a commemoration is held, and the next morning the whole settlement goes deep into the forest to build a new village.

Mining

Pygmies feed on what the forest gives them. Therefore, in the early morning, the women of the tribe go there to replenish supplies. On the way, they collect everything edible, from berries to caterpillars, so that every pygmy of the same tribe is fed. This is an established tradition, according to which the woman is the main breadwinner in the family.

Outcome

Pygmies are accustomed to the traditions of their lives, which have been established for centuries. Despite the fact that the government of the state tries to educate them in a more civilized life, cultivation of the land and a settled existence, they continue to be far from it. Pygmies, photographed by many researchers studying their customs, refuse any innovations in their everyday life and continue to do what their ancestors have been doing for many centuries.

Pygmies are first mentioned in ancient Egyptian inscriptions of the 3rd millennium BC. e. in more late time in ancient Greek sources. In the XVI-XVII centuries. they are called "matimba" are mentioned in the descriptions left by the researchers West Africa. In the 19th century, their existence was confirmed by the German researcher G. Schweinfurt, the Russian researcher V.V. Junker and others who discovered these tribes in tropical forests basins of the rivers Ituri and Uzle. In 1929-1930. P. Shebesta's expedition described the Bambuti Pygmies; in 1934–1935 the researcher M. Guzinde found the Efe and Basua Pygmies.

Number and population

The total population of pygmies is about 300 thousand people. . Including in Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda over 100 thousand people. Zaire - 70 thousand. Congo - 25 thousand. Cameroon - 15 thousand. Gabon - 5 thousand. They speak Bantu languages, the Pygmies of the Ituri River speak Sere-Mundu languages.

Pygmies make up the Pygmy Negroid race, they are short in stature, have a yellowish skin tone, narrow lips, and a narrow and low nose bridge. Before the Bantu settlement, the pygmies occupied the whole of Central Africa, then they were forced out into the region of tropical forests. They were in severe isolation. Preserved archaic culture. They are engaged in hunting, gathering and fishing. The weapon is a bow with arrows, often poisoned, with an iron tip, sometimes a small spear. Traps and traps are widely used. developed applied art. They retain many features of the tribal structure, wander in groups of 2-4 families.

Occupation

Pygmies only eat what they find, catch or kill in the jungle. They are excellent hunters and their favorite meat is elephant, but more often they manage to get not very large animals or fish. Pygmies have a special technique for catching fish. The method they use is based on poisoning fish with plant poisons. The fish falls asleep and floats to the surface, after which it can be collected simply by hand. Pygmies live in harmony with nature and take only as many fish as they need. Unclaimed fish wakes up after half an hour without any damage.

Who are the pygmies PYGMIES - people living in the equatorial forests and migrating from camp to camp, depending on the time of year. Pygmies make up the Pygmy Negroid race, they are short in stature, have a yellowish skin tone, narrow lips, and a narrow and low nose bridge. The average life expectancy of pygmies is from 16 to 24 years, depending on the specific people, so evolution made sure that they quickly reached the state of an adult, albeit a short person, in order to have time to have children. It is believed that these are the most ancient inhabitants of the Congo Basin. According to the latest estimates, the number of pygmies in the world varies from 150 thousand to 300 thousand people. The vast majority of them live in the countries of Central Africa: Burundi, Gabon, DRC, Zaire, Cameroon, Congo, Rwanda, Equatorial Guinea, Uganda and the Central African Republic.

The first mention of pygmies was made in ancient Egyptian records dating back to the 3rd millennium BC. Later, the ancient Greek historians Herodotus, Strabo, Homer wrote about the pygmies. real existence of these African tribes was only confirmed in the 19th century by the German traveler Georg Schweinfurt. Russian researcher Vasily Junker and others.

The growth of adult male pygmies is from 144-150 cm in height. Women are about 120 cm. They have short limbs, light brown skin, which serves as excellent camouflage in the forest. Hair dark, curly, lips thin.

Pygmies live in the forests. The forest for them is the highest deity, the source of everything necessary for survival. The traditional occupation for most Pygmies is hunting and gathering. They hunt elephants, antelopes and monkeys. They use shortbows and poisoned arrows for hunting. Apart from different meat, pygmies are very fond of wild bee honey. In order to get to their favorite delicacy, they have to climb 45-meter trees, after which they use ash and smoke to disperse the bees. Women collect nuts, berries, mushrooms and roots.

Pygmies live in small groups of at least 50 members. Each group has a special area for building huts. Marriages between members of different tribes are quite common here. Also, absolutely any member of the tribe, when he wishes, is free to leave and join another tribe. There are no formal leaders in the tribe. Issues and problems that have arisen are resolved through open negotiations.

The weapon is a spear, a small bow, arrows. Pygmies barter iron for arrowheads from neighboring tribes. Various traps and traps are widely used.

Pygmies are the most famous dwarf tribes living in the forests. tropical Africa. The main areas of concentration of pygmies today: Zaire, Rwanda, Burundi, Congo, Cameroon and Gabon.

Mbutis a tribe of pygmies living in the Ituri forest in Zaire. Most scientists believe that they were most likely the first inhabitants of this region.

Twa a tribe of pygmies in equatorial Africa. They live both in the mountains and on the plains near Lake Kivu in Zaire, Burundi and Rwanda. They maintain close ties with neighboring pastoral tribes and know how to make pottery.

Tsva this large tribe lives near the swamp south of the river Congo. They, like the Twa tribe, live in cooperation with neighboring tribes, adopting their culture and language. Most of the Tswa hunt or fish.

A group of peoples belonging to the Negril race, indigenous people tropical Africa. They speak the languages ​​of the Bantu, the Adamaua-Eastern group and the Shari-Nile group. Many pygmies retain a wandering lifestyle, an archaic culture, and traditional beliefs.

- in Greek mythology, a tribe of dwarfs, symbolizing the barbarian world. The name is associated with the small growth of the pygmies and symbolizes a distorted perception of the true ethnic group. The Greeks determined the size of the pygmies from an ant to a monkey. According to various sources, this tribe lived on the southern periphery of the Oikumene - south of Egypt or in India. Herodotus attributed the habitat of the pygmies to the headwaters of the Nile. Strabo listed the pygmies along with large-headed, nest-eared, beardless, noseless, one-eyed and hook-toed half-dogs.

There was a legend that the fertile soil layer of the Egyptian river valleys gives rise to pygmies, so they sometimes acted as a symbol of the fertility of the semi-fairy lands of the south. To harvest the ears, they armed themselves with axes, as if they were going to cut down the forest. Pliny the Elder claimed that the pygmies built their huts from mud mixed with feathers and eggshells, while Aristotle settled them in underground caves.

A characteristic motif of the mythology of the pygmies is geranomachy. Legends said that the pygmies fought cranes for three months every year, riding rams, goats and partridges, trying to steal or break the eggs of birds. Moreover, military campaigns, which took the pygmies three months a year, they made to the southern Russian steppes, where there were crane nests. Their enmity was explained by the legend of the transformation into a crane of a pygmy girl who opposed the tribe. The symbolism of geranomachy was found on vases, mosaics, Pompeian frescoes and gems.

Another symbolic motif associated with the pygmies was heraclomacy: myths tell that the pygmies tried to kill the sleeping hero, taking revenge on him for the victory over their brother Antaeus. Hercules gathered the pygmies into the skin of the Nemean lion and took them to Eurystheus. family relations with Antey were intended to emphasize the semiotic image of the pygmies, its astonic aspect. A popular technique in artistic creativity was the reduction of pygmies and giants into a single storyline.

Pygmy was also the name of the Carthaginian deity, whose head, carved from wood, was placed by the Carthaginians on warships to intimidate enemies.

Pygmies in Africa

The word "pygmy" usually means something small. In anthropology, it refers to a member of any human group whose adult males do not exceed one and a half meters in height. But the basic concept of this word, as a rule, refers to African tribes pygmies.

The growth of most African pygmies is from 1 m 22 cm to 1 m 42 cm in height. They have short limbs. The skin is reddish-brown in color and serves as camouflage in the forest. The head is usually round and broad, with curly hair.

Most Pygmies are traditional hunters and gatherers. They prey on antelopes, birds, elephants and monkeys. For this, small bows and poisoned arrows are used for hunting. Women usually gather berries, mushrooms, nuts and roots.

Pygmies live in small groups. Each tribe consists of at least fifty members. There is a territory for building huts for each group. But with the threat of extinction of food, each tribe can take a different territory. Marriages between members of different tribes are common. In addition, any member of the group is free to leave one and join another tribe whenever they wish. There are no formal leaders of the tribe. All problems are solved through open negotiations.

Sources: www.africa.org.ua, ppt4web.ru, www.worldme.ru, c-cafe.ru, www.e-allmoney.ru