A bride, a groom, a village : A dance of the elders and lovers

Inside a Kikuyu Marriage Rite:

It has been so fun since I set out to learn about my heritage and, since one of my friends is getting married very soon, there isn’t a better time to investigate about all the wedding drama and comedy. So, I want to invite you to time travel with me to the past. We just arrived in the village and we’ve never been here before. We are only here to observe, okay? In this village, we visit a particular homestead. The soil is brown, obviously, it’s well swept, thatched-up mud huts, arranged in a way they are facing each other, forming a circle. There’s a makeshift granary in sight and some beans are cooking on a strategically placed three-stone fireplace outside. How do we know it’s beans? The aroma fills the air. The aroma of beans isn’t the only thing in the air though, the tang of cow dung is very prominent too, you can almost taste it. You can smell the green grass too, it smells weird. The cow moos. Some chicken are making a fracas. It’s a site to behold really. Three women sit by the fire. One looks notably older, must be the mother. We look around for the father but we miss him.

All of a sudden we hear really loud screams. “We just arrived, and these guys have already began fighting?” You ask. “That’s a woman screaming dummy.” Yes, you are the dumdum in this story😂. “I don’t want to get married! Please let me go. Where are my relatives? Save me, I do not love him!” She got louder and louder. We had to check it out and since we are from the future, we just teleported there😉. To our shock, people were standing there watching, while a group of young women were dragging the ‘victim’ to wherever they were. It was very dramatic and strange. Some were congratulating her. “We are only here to observe,” we remind ourselves of our mission like some aliens. But, we had so many questions that needed answering so we started digging.

This is what we found out: The girl’s name was Nyambura and we were in a village belonging to the Agĩkũyũ tribe, from Kenya and all that drama was part of a marriage ceremony. What do you mean? I’m glad you asked. Waiyaki’s and Nyambura’s paths had met quite a few times, at the river between their two valleys and they had winked and smiled into each other’s hearts. They were in love.

After great thought, Waiyaki had decided that no ‘Muthoni’ ( a random girl’s name) matched up to Nyambura, he was going to marry her in a few weeks when she will reach the age 17, she will be ready for marriage. He talked to his father and his father did his due diligence to ascertain her character, that she was from a good non-witchy family and crucially, that she wasn’t from ‘that’ clan. All was good so Waiyaki embarked on his next task which was to ‘kũhanda ithĩgĩ’ or ‘kũmenya mũciĩ‘, Greek for going to know her home. He took two of his friends and visited Nyambura’s home. Here the intention was clearly made known but not expressly stated. The boys asked, “Say a boy wanted to be adopted into this family, would that be okay?” Nyambura catching the drift, then asked which one of them wanted to be adopted and the boys identified him. Keep in mind, at this point, the girl could still refuse this invitation.

But how could Nyambura refuse Waiyaki? Using our futuristic powers, we’re able to see different ways of how this could have gone. i.e., Waiyaki could have asked Nyambura if she could cook good porridge, and she could have said yes, and invited him to her home. Some clans did that. Or, maybe Waiyaki knew that Nyambura, like you my friend, aren’t able to cook good porridge to save your life so Waiyaki had chosen the first route.

It was now time for him to officially ask for her hand and he needed his father’s hand for this. His father brew the best sugarcane beer and invited Nyambura’s father through a squad of men, and he accepted after learning their intentions. In the event called ‘Njũrio’ , Nyambura’s dad gave her a horn with the brew which she in turn gave to Waiyaki, who drank it after she permitted it. Nyambura was officially off the market. In another alternative image: Waiyaki’s friends brought two guards of the brew to Nyambura’s home, where she poured it in a horn to confirm that she liked Waiyaki. Again, Waiyaki chose the first route.

“What do you think happens next?” You ask excitedly. “We came here together, right?” I retort. Waiyaki cannot believe that Nyambura will be his, soon. He’s very eager so he speaks to his father a few days later about wanting to now ‘buy’ the girl. The father informs the mother and goes to find that out. Typically it was about 30-40 goats and like 6 sheep. Waiyaki wanted to pay it all right away but, how dare he? “The house of Gĩkũyũ and Mũmbi does not pay the bride price in full. It is meant to keep both clans connected so, we do it gradually.” His father instructs him.

“What do you think happens next?” You ask excitedly. “We came here together, remember?” I retort. Waiyaki cannot believe that Nyambura will be his, soon. He’s very eager so he speaks to his father a few days later about wanting to now ‘buy’ the girl. The father informs the mother and goes to find that out. Typically it was about 30-40 goats and like 6 sheep. Waiyaki wanted to pay it all right away but, how dare he? “The house of Gĩkũyũ and Mũmbi does not pay bride price at once, it’s to be paid severally to help connect the two clans coming together.” His father instructs him.

The day for paying the bride price had come: ‘Rũracio’, is the name of the ceremony. He takes his first 15 goats, all goes well, his (and his entourage’s) gifts are accepted by the bride to be, women gracefully danced while elders drunk (in private) to it. A day is set for the official engagement ceremony: ‘Gũthĩnja Ngoima’ where both clans were to participate. He’s one step closer to having Nyambura to himself.

“Beep, beep” Our time devices sent us a warning, we had to get back to our present, otherwise we were going to be left in the past FOREVER! Not wanting to miss a single moment though, we fast forwarded the events, yes, we could do that. There was a ceremony where Waiyaki gave Nyambura a whole goat’s shoulder (today’s ring) and there was no going back after this. The engagement came, Nyambura opened it up by slaughtering a sheep/ram – 5 more were slaughtered by the men, there were gifts, blessings and prayers and oh, the bride to be was given some roasted kidneys to munch on. Now, Nyambura officially belonged to Waiyaki, and Waiyaki belonged to her. He could take her any time without question.

Which brings us back to our present past. The congratulations now made sense to us. So, why was Nyambura shouting like a mad woman? Apparently, it was designed that way. Both clans would even join in and stage a mock fight to portray loss of a clan member. We wanted to see how their story would end, so we fast-forwarded it again. She was then taken to her mother in law’s hut where she would stay for 8 days and would only eat food from her home. She would be ‘reborn’ on the 8th day and feasting would begin, again. Waiyaki would then take his bride and consummate the marriage on the 9th day.

There were clans where the bride was to be abducted by the groom’s friends and taken to the his hut where she would continuously weep for 4 days 😅. The mother in law would then visit on the 4th day with gifts like fat and ochre, she would then beautify herself and go to visit her mother accompanied by two girl friends. Upon returning, the marriage would then be consummated. But, again, Waiyaki chose the–

In the Agĩkũyũ tradition, the girl had to be a virgin before marriage. So, during consummation, a new leso (wrap) would be spread on their bed. And, if there was no blood after– the girl was not a virgin and the marriage would be annulled/returned to sender or a demand was made to reduce bride price. I simply have no comment about this. But lucky for them, Nyambura was a gathirange, in their ‘Greek’ language.

What do you think about this?

The remaining bride price was then taken, more gifts and feasting. I’m starting to understand why I love lilies, because it was among the gifts that Nyambura’s father gave to Nyambura, while the mother gave her hearth stones 👀.

We were teleported to a ceremony. The ‘Ngũrario‘, which is the official traditional wedding and the last rite. Women are singing and choreographically dancing to the drum beats, dressed in beautiful brown wraps that were fashionably beaded. They had these big earrings that looked too heavy for their small ears but they were happy so–. There was a different aroma here, a pleasant one, of roasted meat. We both were tempted to partake but “we’re only here to observe.” Waiyaki and Nyambura were no longer young, they even had a few children running around. Are we still talking about the marriage ceremony? Yes. This one is usually done after the bride price is completely paid. Some say that there’s no divorce beyond this point, lest curses follow you.

We ended our tour with such nostalgia. Back to the present, a lot has changed about this process but the essence of it remains: Family and Feasting. One thing I’m glad about is that throughout the entire process, both Waiyaki and Nyambura were cognisant and consensual, that remains today.

I know there was a significance to all these ceremonies, but having fun was a major one, right? That said, please note that this was not the way things were done exactly, different clans may have done things differently. My labour was to provide a general picture of how a marriage ceremony was performed, with some sprinkles of drama of course. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did writing it.

What, in this process would you consider weird? Is there something we could borrow today?

Also, if you haven’t, read the River Between by Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o. The names of my characters were lifted from the book.

Where elders speak, love listens.

_The desk of Ms Elny.