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Zaire Peoples of the Savanna: Lunda Region
Most of the inhabitants of western Shaba between the
Lubilash
and Kasai rivers and extending east to the town of Kolwezi
are
speakers of Lunda or closely related languages. Their
distribution
extends beyond this area to Angola, Zambia, southwestern
KasaiOccidental , and southeastern Bandundu. The vast scale of
their
distribution is the legacy of the Lunda Empire
(see
fig. 2;
fig. 3).
Vansina has distinguished the northern Lunda from the
southern
Lunda and related peoples, in part on linguistic grounds,
in part
on the basis of differences in modes of inheritance and
descentgroup formation. The southern Lunda proper, the Chokwe
(also seen
as Cokwe), the Ndembu, and others are matrilineal; the
northern
Lunda (also called the Ruund) are marked by bilateral
descent. Some
contemporary conflicts between these groups, notably
between Lunda
and Chokwe, have their roots in the period of the breakup
of the
Lunda Empire in the late nineteenth century. Chokwe
raiders from
the periphery of the empire grew powerful enough to
intervene in
Lunda kingship succession disputes and briefly to seize
the Lunda
capital. Although the Chokwe were eventually ousted and
their
expansion halted, they succeeded in establishing
themselves as
competitors to Lunda power. The contemporary echoes of
that
competition have expressed themselves in the reluctance of
Chokwe
to support Lunda-led political action.
Data as of December 1993
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