VaDoma
The people of the Zambezi escarpment — hunter-gatherers of the Kanyemba region who resisted settlement longest in Zimbabwe, and who are known worldwide for a hereditary foot condition that outsiders have made into their entire identity.
VaDoma people
Vadoma 2.jpg · Wikimedia Commons
Identity
Population: Estimated 1,000–2,000 in northern Zimbabwe
Location: The Kanyemba and Chapoto areas of the Zambezi valley, on the Mozambique and Zambia borders
Language: Dema, a Shona-related variety, alongside Chikorekore Shona
Language family: Niger-Congo → Bantu
Traditional governance: Family and lineage organisation without chiefs of their own; administratively under neighbouring chieftaincies; Zimbabwean district administration.
Clans, Sections & Sub-groups (3)
Most African peoples are federations of named sub-groups — clans, sections, chiefdoms or sub-tribes — each with its own dialect, territory and traditions.
Kanyemba communities
Households of the Zambezi confluence area.
Chapoto communities
Households of the escarpment above the valley.
Settled families
Those now farming and attending schools in valley villages.
Gallery
1 images
Culture
Clothing: Skins and bark historically, now cloth obtained by exchange and wage work.
Food: Wild fruit, honey, roots, game and river fish; increasing reliance on maize obtained by trade, labour or aid.
Ceremonies: Hunting and honey-gathering rites; healing ceremonies; funerals following valley practice; limited formal ceremonial life compared with farming neighbours.
Marriage customs: Marriage largely within the community, partly by preference and partly through the exclusion imposed by neighbours; bridewealth minimal.
Initiation rites: No formal initiation cycle recorded; competence in tracking, honey-gathering and forest knowledge marks adulthood.
Stories & Oral Literature
A People Reduced to a ConditionContemporary account
Some VaDoma families carry ectrodactyly, a hereditary condition producing a two-toed foot, and international coverage has made this the community's entire public identity, usually in sensational terms. The condition affects a minority; the community's actual situation — landlessness, exclusion from schooling and the loss of hunting grounds to a national park and to settlement — receives almost no attention.
The Last Foragers on the ZambeziLivelihood
VaDoma continued hunting and gathering in the Zambezi valley into the late twentieth century, well after neighbouring communities had settled to farming. Wildlife legislation, the establishment of protected areas and the settlement of the valley have effectively ended it, and families now combine casual labour, small-scale farming and what foraging remains possible.
Proverbs
“The bush feeds those who ask it quietly.”
Foraging knowledge and restraint.
“The stranger names us by our feet.”
The community's own comment on outside attention.
“Honey is found by the bird and the patient man.”
The honeyguide partnership and the skill it requires.
Mythology & Spiritual Beliefs
Creation: A creator distant from affairs; ancestral spirits and territorial powers of the valley active; mediums consulted as elsewhere in the Zambezi region.
Beliefs: Ancestral spirits; territorial spirits of the valley approached through mediums; healing with valley plants; limited Christian presence.
Ancestors: Ancestral claims to hunting ground carry little weight against protected-area law, which is a central part of the community's predicament.
Gods, Goddesses & Spirits
Mwari / Musikavanhu
The creator, named as in the wider Shona world
Territorial spirits
Powers of the valley and the escarpment
Ancestors
Consulted in illness and difficulty
Architecture
Traditional settlements: Small camps and hamlets of grass and branch shelters; increasingly, pole-and-mud houses in settled villages.
Building techniques: Branch and grass shelter construction; traps, bows and honey-gathering equipment.
Village layout: Small clusters near water and foraging ground; settled households arranged like their farming neighbours'.
Artifacts
Hunting and honey equipment
Craft
Bows, traps, axes and containers of the foraging livelihood.
Mana Pools landscape
Heritage site
UNESCO-listed Zambezi floodplain adjoining VaDoma territory.
Valley plant knowledge
Heritage
Medicinal and food plant identification in the escarpment ecosystem.
Grass and branch shelters
Architecture
Light structures of the mobile foraging pattern.
Historical Timeline
Pre-1900
VaDoma forage the Zambezi valley and escarpment, in exchange relations with farming neighbours.
1900s–1970s
Colonial settlement, tsetse control and wildlife legislation restrict the valley's use.
1980s–1990s
Protected areas and settlement schemes further reduce foraging ground.
1990s–present
International coverage focuses almost entirely on ectrodactyly.
Present
Landlessness, exclusion from schooling and loss of foraging ground define the community's situation.
Sources & Further Reading
Open sources
- Minority Rights Group: ZimbabweMinority Rights Group International
- UNESCO: Mana Pools National ParkUNESCO
Premium & scholarly sources