[75] There follows the above-mention chapter on the barbarous & cruel acts of Queen Ginga, & how she was obeyed in them, & feared not only by her Vassals but by others Chap. VII[in margin: vir diehora Chap.4]
The greatest tyranny (dear reader) of the Tyrant is rewarding bad & vicious people, because by doing this one gives them Heart & strength to be Tyrannical towards people & things; Queen Ginga did not lack knowledge of this truth as she was a most cruel tyrant, and experienced mistress of tyranny, and this dropsical tigress & furious harpy taught the true science of tyranny from her Royal throne. In the place called Coanga,[1] near Massangano, in order to harm the Portuguese she ordered all the Vassals and followers of the Portuguese to recognise her as their Queen & natural Lady, and was diligently obeyed by them, for they were not actually loyal to the Portuguese except for one who did not like vice and refused to recognise her, or her tyranny; seeing his reluctance, she ordered secretly that he should be taken prisoner, & made into oil, which was done at once, & when the oil was taken to the Queen, she not only thanked her ministers for their quickness, but rewarded them for being ready & prompt to obey her tyrannical requests which are the greatest compulsion a tyrant can impose on his followers & executors of his justice. With this oil she entertained herself and her officials as is it had been a precious & odoriferous ointment, salgalia of this
This thirsty Hind was not yet content with the barbarities she had committed, & being above all desirous of quenching her hind-like thirst, she determined with the fury of a harpy to continue the destruction of human beings of her own kind, gathered together all her forces of war and made the customary sacrifices & preventive rites in her own interest, & to her aid asked all the infernal Belzebus to help her, as [76] they have promised they will do for all those who desert the Creator & his works, & observe & keep those they renounced at their Sacred baptismal Ablution, the pomps & works of the devil. To accomplish this purpose she set out with her army to make war on a Lord Vassal of the Crown of Congo called Manioando, meaning Lord of the libata in the City of Oando, in order to defeat him & make him her obedient subject & tribute-payer, for he proudly mocked her as a woman cleverer with a distaff than a sword; when this thirsty Hind came in sight of the river where she wished to quench the thirst born of rage daughter of Cruelty, she ran forward with such anger & indignation that although they defended themselves & fought the Pastor was captured by the madria & led to the Queen who when she saw him gave him the punishment or prize he deserved for his past mockery. When he saw that death was near the unhappy man could do nothing but what Cicero did when captured by his enemies; he bent his Head & neck over the litter with his hand to his cheek, in the sight of his enemies; they did not even assent to this but his Head was cut off not with his hands to his cheek, but both tied, and on his knees, and not being content with his head they cut off his hands too; & not only his hands but his feet & trunk were divided into more parts than the conspirators of King Osiris did his body; their anger & hate ceased with his Head, but these made use of the limbs with such barbarity that in the square alone they made a pile of 237 heads besides those they added elsewhere, & ate, making it a Treat to eat them. One would roast & another boil in water what was being cooked, one raised an arm & another a leg, one a liver & one a Heart, to excite his friend's jaded appetite, & others dried the meat in the Sun or at the fire to take it to those who were taking Care of the baggage. They were so zealous in denuding them that they did not leave a vestige of flesh on their bones, & like dogs carried them in their mouths, which is an old & not a new Ethiopian custom.[2] It was only three days since there had arrived in that libata two of our Capuchin Religious of the Spanish nation sent by the Fr. Prefect of the apostolic mission for the Kingdom of Congo, donated [77] by the King to found a new mission there, & they had already sent back the people who had accompanied them, so that they could not absent themselves, but had to watch the cruel & barbarous acts of Queen Ginga & her followers; their leader, called Don Calisto Zelote,[3] was wounded & captured, & according to the Giaga custom was to be put to death, but the blessed God preserved him intact in the midst of wrath and cruelty & indignation to his greater glory & the salvation of souls, for afterwards he served as an interpreter & leader of the mission & played a great part in the Christianity of Matamba, and will not lack his guerdon and reward from the Giver of all good, & it being his character not to leave good without reward or evil without punishment.
So while these Religious, named Father Buonaventura da Correglia & Father Antonio da Trevelli,[4] the first from the Province of Aragon & the second from that of Valentia, where there they saw such horrendous barbarities as they have not seen since, & which would be incredible to anyone who does not know the black people of this Ethiopia, inner, Oriental and Outer. The Queen caused them to appear in her presence & had several discussions with them, and encouraged them to be of good will and not to take fright at the things they had seen, which were the wars of Ethiopia & its Giaghi, and that she would shortly send them off through the Congo; & meanwhile she gave them things to eat & drink, & in the meat she sent them there were signs of what Animal it was, such as ears, feet or hair, which showed the kind of Animal so that they should know it was not human flesh. Finally she offered them male & female slaves, and a good send-off through the
When this cruel harpy had arrived with her army at the place called Mucucu,[7] one of her principal concubines, called Gandu[8] which means Crocodile in their language, fell ill and died; she loved him very much, & it may be supposed that there was no sacrifice or Ceremony among their barbarous customs which she did not carry out, or demons she did not invoke, or doctor who might have cured him, but in spite of this he was taken from her by Lord death, who wishes everyone to pay the traveller's tribute, & which is owed to him by the law proclaimed by the same author of life to our first Father Adam and our mother Eve, to whom he gave the order not to taste the forbidden apple, & they disobeyed, & underwent punishment so that all their descendants must pay tribute to death, without having power to appeal against it, nor any judge who could sentence otherwise; so when he had paid the traveller's tribute to death his body was given an honourable burial according to the heathen custom, nor did they fail to celebrate his obsequies in their barbarous manner with much show of grief, during which they consumed much gunpowder in firing volleys, drank much European wine, ate much meat, & also sacrificed many people in the Giaga manner.
When the obsequies of her concubine were over, the closest one to him in order took his place & office; he finally situated himself on the bank of the Coango river, & captured many people with whom they renewed mourning for the dead concubine, sacrificing some of those people to serve him in the future life (a form of madness followed by the heathens not only in this black Ethiopia, but elsewhere too). Among the prisoners there was an officer called Cabututu,[9] who was put to death in a most cruel way by the Queen; This inventor of barbarities ordered him to be sawn in half through the middle of his head without anyone objecting or mourning, or appealing to the sentence given by the great judge against whom there is no other appeal because he is the ultimate tribunal, to whom others appeal, & the prisoner's life ended miserably in this way. These were [dear reader: crossed out] the cruel & barbarous acts of this woman, which she ordered to be done [80] without any compassion or mercy. Who ever saw such barbarity in a woman? & who ever heard of a harpy crueller to the human countenance than our Ginga? She did not remain unpunished for the sins she had committed, or the acts of cruelty, because there was a most virulent plague among her army which took the lives of many people even among the Royal family, & also many officers, & among these died Cabilla Canzinze Lord of the Province of Malemba[10], whose death left the Queen somewhat downcast; she had recourse not to blessed God as she should, nor to his ministers & house of prayer, but sent for all the magicians she had in her army, & invoked all the devils in hell; the first used all the remedies that their art taught them, & to the second they made various sacrifices, without anything they did or said being of any use. Finally, not wishing to inculpate their Queen they made the soothsayers appear to be the cause of the deaths and to have invented the plague to diminish the Queen's strength; it was not difficult for the Queen to believe it, and she gave such complete credence to the idea that she ordered them to be burned alive as inventors of the plague. When they had heard the Royal sentence they competed to bring wood to avenge the deaths of their relations, friends & c; the soothsayers were burned alive, & when their bodies had been consumed by earthly flames, their Souls remained for ever in the eternal flames to be consumed, but those will never die for they are not transitory but eternal. O Blind Queen, mad priests, & ignorant vassals, did these deaths perhaps calm the divine wrath? Perhaps death obeyed the Priests, or bent its back to the proud Queen? It did not halt its steps, nor cease its wrath, but advance with so much carnage as to show clearly that the innocent people's deaths had not calmed the divine wrath, but excited it to a greater vengeance, because it proceeded until the author of life ordered it to cease by the use of his Clemency & mercy, & this he showed after many days after the execution of his just punishment of the Queen & her Vassals; but o inveterate habit of evil, was it perhaps corrected? No, she persevered in her barbarity & cruelty, & ordered other acts to be done similar to those mentioned above; she ordered, I say, one man to have his legs cut off at the knees [81] because he had not been willing to bend them in obeisance to her as she demanded, nor were cries or complaints any use to him, nor did anyone come forward to intercede for him, but he ended his life miserably, just as we not once but a thousand times would have ended through not bending our knees to our living Lord not as he demands, but as we owe it to our Creator & redeemer to whom we owe the price of his most precious blood, & withal he does not punish us, but shows us love & benevolence because if we repent of the errors we have committed, & make amends for it he puts us with paternal love into the possession of his Kingdom as if we had never sinned against him or transgressed his Holy law & precepts, something which the haughty & proud creature does not do.
This barbarous woman was not only obeyed in her express orders, but also in signs she gave, & some people came forward in the direction of her known wished and derived great comfort & happiness in being rewarded for their barbarous affection; & they were not lazy but she showed herself prompt & diligent. In causing adversities & punishments she did not lose heart of the Soul, and having finished one barbarous act she invented a bigger one.
They observe, dear reader, that when one of her maids of honour ran away, or one of her pages, which often happened, she made use of the following form of barbarity: having caught her or him in flight, he or she was by her orders tied to a post in the square of her court, in front of which she ordered a great fire to be lit, and behind it gathered together all her servants, both men and women, all armed with sharp knives, and if the fugitive was a woman she ordered that all the women should each cut off one of her ribs wherever she liked best & roast it and eat it while dancing & jumping about; the poor woman saw herself being torn in pieces alive, cooked and eaten, & sometimes by her own father & mother, & the same was done if it was a man; let the reader think whether this rousing of people to terror only happened once, for the Queen's servants affirm that she often behaved in this barbarous way, & that they very often had to watch and listen to it even against their will, and further that it was necessary for them to clap [82] their hands according to the black people's custom, & show approval of their Queen & Lady's barbarity, as if it had been the heroic actions of the Roman Emperors; but I speak also of what I have seen, having seen her exact the death penalty against three young people, simply because of one slip into lechery, at a time and in a place where everything shrieks of immodesty in people's bodies, words & deeds, & a great volume could be written about it. I leave the subject to avoid contaminating the hearers' ears, & also because it would not be believed by anyone who had not been outside
She behaved with barbarous cruelty to those who passed in front of her and stumbled or tripped, whether from fear or because a stone or piece of wood was at their feet, or whether it happened by accident; she ordered their heads to be cut off from their trunks immediately saying that she cut it off because it was doing its owner harm, & that she was like a Goddess in that nothing was hidden from her & all revealed, & they madly affirmed that their Lady & Queen not only knew what had happened in the past but what was going to in the future, which if it was true was not because of any excess of virtue in her, but must have been through the work of the devil, and allowed by blessed God in order to inflict more punishment on her Vassals & others.
Here was another cruel act she committed: one of her servants kept a young woman he loved very much, with whom he had enjoyed much pleasure and enjoyment, & to punish him for his sin & past pleasures & pastimes she ordered that he must kill her with his own hands, and he obeyed at once with great diligence, & then she ordered his ears to be cut off in memory of the sin he had committed; this punishment is often carried out in this Ethiopia when women are involved and also in other cases, and if it were used among Europeans many would, through shame rather than terror, abstain not only to avoid the occasion of sin.
She haughtily ordered a father to kill his own daughter because of an act of lechery she had committed, and at once, to obey the barbarous order of his Queen, he took a sharp knife in his hand & with an ardent will raised his arm to execute the deed, and was not held back by an Angelic hand like the old Adam; but that monster was quicker [83] in compassion for the unfortunate father who had to kill his daughter with his own hand, withal he felt it greatly that he had not carried out the Queen's command, so that she should know his readiness for her orders; the act of lechery she had committed had brought the unfortunate daughter not only the death of her body, but also the eternal death of her Soul, which we must dread above all things.
Sometimes as a whim, & at other times because she had not obtained what she wished from some young people, she ordered them to be killed when after committing these barbarities the executioners went to ask for the reward she owed them out of propriety for having always been ready at a sign, not only a command when they were required to inflict punishment, with or without justice, she said that a King or a Prince does not need to account for what he does, and need only account to blessed God; nor was she wrong, but did not consider how strict an account she would have to give to him while she behaved so barbarously to the Creatures who are the work of the Creator.
Once she ordered three people to be beaten for no reason, except that they had passed in front of her, even at a distance, without bending their knees to her their Lady & Queen, & I have been a spectator of this more than once, & ran to intercede with her for their pardon, which she did not deny, in order not to fail in respect to priests, but she said this did not offend her, because what she did not do at once she would do another time if anyone stumbled into error; her whip was always prepared for anyone who transgressed her commands, which was why she was so much feared & obeyed, as is known to all, both Friends and enemies.
She imitated Wenceslas the Bohemian by not covering her sword when she was on her Horse or have it ready to vent her barbarous desires; for when she was on Horseback they only go in costume and had her minister of justice as an escort ready to execute her commands, and I have several times seen him with my own eyes exercising his powers with great faithfulness, & he seemed gifted by mother nature with all the necessary qualities for a barbarian minister, strength, spirit, cruelty & promptitude.
The following, dear reader, is observed which I cannot pause in my writing long enough to [84] describe: this barbarous & immodest woman kept a great number of Concubines, ( as you have heard elsewhere) whom she forced to wear women's clothing, & sleep with her waiting-maids, not only in the same House, but on a level, foot to foot or head to head, & they had to observe chastity to such an extent that she even punished them for disturbances caused by the sound of feet or hands, & sometimes she visited them to see if any had fallen into the trap, & if she found them they were rigorously punished the next day. The heads of some were cut off, others had their limbs broken, & others she made impotent & forever chaste in their actions; she admitted no excuses, nor did she accept complaints & lamentations which they uttered at having been tempted by the occasion of sin being at hand; she stopped her ears to everything & made herself deaf, & however execrable it might seem to the world to say "this is what I want & this is what I order, my will amounts to reason" that is what she said with honeyed lips & without fear or shame at vile flesh she said "this is what I want, this is what I order, you must bend to my pleasure, my will, I want no arguments" and everyone avoided punishment because it was always to be feared.
Two of her maids in waiting whose blood boiled in the flower of their fresh Youth consented to consummate an act of lechery and in that place where all is immorality, the following punishment was meted out to the poor girls, told by someone who was a witness of it; she did not want them to die by a single blow, nor to make them incapable, but ordered that in punishment for the sin they had committed & their passing enjoyment the ends of their hands must be cut off, & then treated with vinegar & salt, & that every day a part should be cut off in the same way until on the ninth day they reached the elbow; but on the eighth day the unfortunate girls suffered such pain & convulsions that they ended their lives, paying with such torment for the brief pleasure of their senses; let everyone wonder at the cruelty of this barbarous woman, who herself was as immoral as possible & and example of every kind of wickedness.
When she wanted to settle in a new place, or go on a journey where she had not been before, this cruel harpy ordered two children's sides to be cut open [85] and their hearts to be pulled out and roasted, & ate them with the great people at court; then she caused the open wounds to be tightly tied & a white bandage to be tied round the children's temples, & placed them in the middle of the way by which she was going to pass so that they should serve as guides on the new journey or dwelling-place, & this action was a kind of preservative in order not to be injured by anyone, for as these guides had no hearts, neither had the Spirit of strength to harm her; wonder at her madness & the stratagems of the devil in order to have souls at his command.
This cruel harpy & inventor of barbarous acts had a large number of dogs, & fattened them with human flesh, causing children of twelve Years & over to be killed for this purpose; her Kitchen existed in order to cook it, as if it had been game, & she even made women giving birth come to an assigned place to watch the dogs eating their babies, as you will hear at greater length elsewhere.
When she wanted to wage war she invoked the help & favour of the dead & of demons & before the war obtained some of the enemy, whether male or female, to make them into oil and powder with which she anointed herself, & threw some at the enemy claiming that it would diminish their strength,& increase that of her army; but her adversaries' diligence & cunning was no less, so that many times when she thought she would win she was defeated, & needed time to save her own & others' persons.
Dear reader, I ask for permission to end this treatise, because to continue is to go into a labyrinth whence I cannot come out, a sea where I can neither navigate nor find a harbour, & finally to relate things which in my judgement will make you wonder if they could possibly be as I described them, had they not been related by a Portuguese priest in around the year MDCXXXXII who was at Queen Ginga's Court and one day was admitted to an audience,[11] & on entering the square found a tree called in their language Bondo or Alicunde of enormous size [86] surrounded by remains of men & women.[12] The good priest was amazed at this strange sight, & was even more so when he came to where the Queen was and saw how her head was adorned with them, & so were those of her great people & concubines. These were the private parts of people taken in war or used in sacrifices, & others were the result of punishing those guilty of lechery; she also adorned her temples with children's hands, & wore others before & behind, as if they were sable skins, & I have seen the Giaghi wear them in various places.
When she wanted to begin a warlike action she always observed the Seutonic precept of not delaying between saying and doing, & was always invoking all the demons in Hell, making them her usual Sacrifices before and after the war. She was most faithful not to God whom she had rejected, but to the devil to whom she had tied herself tightly, & if she promised him one thing she gave him ten to show how liberal she was.
After dreaming of some death (which is easy to believe) she would have thirty or forty people killed when she awoke, according to what kind of dream it was. There was no means she did not use to reach her diabolical purpose, no remedy she did not obtain, no barbarous act she did not commit, no Cruelty she did not practise, no ferocity she did not show, as if she had the qualities of all the Gaighi inside herself, & had inherited those of the Laestrygoireans & Cyclopes who were believed so inhuman and barbarous; she was feared by all and loved by few, and if I wish to know why, I say that our Ginga became the terror & horror of Ethiopia. Dear reader, the wise believe there are three things in the world that generate love, that is beauty of body, giving of great benefits, & love which wants to be paid with love in return; now ask if Queen Ginga had any of these three, and you will find she lacked beauty as she was small by nature & badly made, with hands marked with white, & could even an Ethiopian author call beautiful?[13] As to benefits, [87] if she did ill to everyone whom could she make love her? And if love wants love in payment how can that be where there is no love" I can find no law in the world, if not the divine one that obliges me to love my enemies; and if you want to know what is fear & whence it proceeds, I say it proceeds from deformities either in attitudes or actions, of oppressing people by injuries given words, deeds & by hate, avenging oneself on one's neighbour, & these appeared to the supreme degree in this dropsical tigress & Heart thirsty not for Water but for human blood, as you have heard hitherto in the telling of this story, & it is so too in what remains to be told, & I leave to the pious readers the task of considering the cause & passing sentence at leisure.
She filled her belly with food and left time for digestion, but never gave any rest to her will inclined towards evil, but was always constant & persevering, anyone to whom she gave a sinister look was sure of death or at least severe punishment; so wrathful & vindictive was she that when she failed to act on her evil [wicked] will it was only through lack of time & opportunity for vengeance, & this was why, on many occasions when she could not vent it on strangers, she turned it on prisoners of war as if they had been the Cause of her wrath and vengefulness. When she was thirsty with wrath she lost the light of discretion & at the same time all counsel, honesty & justice, all being the effect caused by wrath on the wrathful person & his vindictive Spirit, & so she was often troubled in spirit and mind & only to be calmed by seeing the fulfillment of her desires, even when they obliged her to keep watch day & night. Finally, after her vigils & mental machinations she tried to take advantage of the maxim so often kept in the world, of giving away what one cannot sell, realising that she could not conceal the four places where the passion of wealth is ordinarily shown, in the Heart, face, words & deeds, for when she could not vent her wrath her heart was on fire, her colour changed, her tongue trembled in speaking, and all this showed she wanted to come to deeds, & if she did not it was not through lack of will but lack of occasion. They say there are three kinds of [88] men where anger is concerned: the first are those who suffer injuries willingly & forgive those who have done them wrong, and who act according to the will of blessed God; the second are those who do not do injuries or wish anyone to injure them, who act according to the nature of Adam; the third are those who do not suffer injuries but injure others, & these are acting like the devil; of such was Queen Ginga when she lived the Ginga life, as she showed clearly in her heart, her face, her words & her deeds, and for this reason we must ensure that anger does not enter our hearts, & if it enters it does not show in our faces or words, & if it reaches these it must not reach our actions, but we must leave it in order to behave as benefits those created to be heirs of heavenly jerusalem. The Person guilty of publicly offending her could delay but not flee punishment, & the question asked of the cruel & inhuman tyrant Tamerlane suited her well; he was asked why he behaved so barbarously to his enemies and answered haughtily "Do not imagine I am a man, I am not, but the wrath of God" and so Queen Ginga could have answered both white and black people: "No, I am not a woman but the wrath of God sent to punish the multitudes even if I am evil & perverse."
Wherever this barbarous woman went she always had her weapons in hand, destroying & burning the country in order to extinguish the human race, as she was a declared enemy of the Creator, of his Creature, of the Portuguese & of the Giaghi, her servants, to such an extent that she was abhorred & hated by everybody; she always behaved like a true Giaga & observer of the iniquitous Giaga laws which she had adopted, & so that everybody should know the virtues & vices of this barbarous woman* [in margin: in the Sixth Chapter of this narrative] I shall first record her vices, that is her faithful observance of them to the confusion of the few who kept the Evangelical law and who were promised a great reward by blessed God, while for these observers of the Giaga laws an eternal fire is prepared.
[1]. Coaanga = Kuhanga. A site near Massangano where Njinga quartered her army in 1648, Istorica Descrizione, Book 4, no. 21 from de Teruel, "Descripcion Narrativa", p. 89 which makes no mention of a slaughter, unless it was the one in Wandu.
[3]. Calisto Zelotes dos Reis Magros, possibly a relative of Andorinho dos Reis Magros, who was killed in the battle of Mbumbi in 1622 (Cadornega, Historia 1: 106). A Kongo priest or interpreter, captured in Wandu in 1648 and eventually rose to be her personal confessor, head of the Church in Matamba and secretary. He was killed and his goods siezed when Njinga a Mona took over after Barbara's death in 1666, ibid, 2: 223.
[4]. Buenaventura de Corella, Aragonese Capuchin, arrived in Kongo in 1648 and like his Valencian companion Antonio de Teruel, forced to leave when Spaniards were pushed out of the central African missions. Leguazzano, Descricao 2: 385, 390.
[6]. Coango =
[10]. Cabilla Canzinze = Kabila ka Nzinze, lord of Malemba. Malemba was a province between Lubolo and the Songo country near the bend of the Kwanza which fell at times under Njinga's control and at times under that of Kasanje, Heintze, "Ende" p. 240, note 255 and map, p. 241; Istorica Descrizione, Book 1, no. 18, Book 2, no. 66 and Book 7, no. 31.
No comments:
Post a Comment