Tanala

By Teferi Abate Adem

Antanala; (two major subdivisions; Tanala Menabe and Tanala Ikongo)

The Tanala are one of "over 18 ethnic groups" inhabiting the Republic of Madagascar, an island nation located off the eastern coast of southern Africa. They live in the southeastern part of the country on a rugged terrain that stretches from low-lying grasslands in the south to high plateaus in the north. The name "Tanala", according to Ralph Linton, simply means "people of the forest." It is broadly applied to all the inhabitants of Tanala territory irrespective of their actual ethnic origin and political affiliation. To this effect, Linton (1933:24) argues that "[t]here has never been a Tanala tribe" [in the sense of a socially or politically integrated group]. Instead, the group originated from "a more or less accidental agglomeration of groups of diverse origin" who obtained this identity when settling in this territory at different times (Linton, 1933:25). This summary is largely based on Ralph Linton's fieldwork in 1926-1927.

In 1951, the Tanala (including all subgroups and recent settler outsiders) were estimated to be 170,000 strong. In 1998, this number was estimated to be 549,575, a significant increase accounting for 3.8 % of Madagascar's total population of 14,462,509 in the same year.

The Tanala speak the Tanala dialect of Plateau Malagasy which belongs to the Malayo-Polynesian branch of Austronesian languages. Many Tanala may also speak standard Malagasy (based on the Merina dialect), in addition to other dialects, since standard Malagasy is taught in schools.

Tanala history and cultural relations were largely shaped by the fact that their settlement on sparsely populated marginal land allowed for easy incorporation of new arrivals. Also of importance was the internal division into two major groups; Tanala Menabe and Tanala Ikongo. In pre-European times, the Menabe Tanala of the mountainous north lacked a political or governmental organization unit larger than lineages (and in some cases sub-lineages). Among the Ikongo, however, a small group of lineages, which originated from neighboring ethnic groups, created their own dominance by subjugating previously autonomous villages. This difference in political organization had significant consequences for each group's subsequent responses to ambitious Merina rulers. Igongo kings (and chiefs) became victims of Merina expansion in 1810s, while the isolated Menabe villages successfully resisted total annexation up until the coming of the French in 1895. Ironically, it seemed easier for Merina empire builders to defeat leaders of relatively centralized Ikongo political units than autonomous chiefs of widely dispersed Menabe villages.

One noticeable consequence of Merina political and cultural influence on Tanala was the emergence of a stratified society consisting of three broad social classes. Chiefs and Clan Heads became nobles called Hova by Ikongo and Adriana by the Manabe. The majority (commoners) became Vahoaka by the Ikongo, and Hova by the Manabe. Descendants of formerly enslaved families, war captives and other individuals of lesser hereditary status became slaves ndevo by both groups (Linton, 1933:137).

In addition to the dominant Merina, the Tanala also have had long established ties with other Malagasy groups including the Betsileo to the west, the Bazanozano in the north and the cattle herding Bara in the north and southwest (Linton, 1933: 18). The Tanala also maintained long contacts with Europeans, Arabs and continental Africans as reflected in their rich folklore and local traditions.

The Tanala live in isolated villages often built on mountain tops hidden in dense forests. Each village contains a square central public space. Houses differ in size and materials used, mostly due to influence from neighboring groups and preferences of owners. But all the houses are rectangular and oblong, with gable roofs. Linton describes the average house as 20 feet long by 10 to 12 feet wide, and an interior height of usually 10 to 12 feet wide at the ridge-pole and 5 to 6 feet at the walls. Walls are of bamboo, mats, or rushes. Roofs are grass thatched.

The primary economic activity of the Tanala is rice farming. They grow wet rice on swampy grounds without terracing and without applying manure. Rice, together with maize, varieties of beans and manioc, is their main staple crop. They also grow bananas, sweet potatoes, and sugarcane as subsidiary activities. Cattle are important but Tanala territory is too poor to allow a large herd. Most families may also keep other domestic animals, including goats, pigs, dogs (used in hunting), chickens, sheep, cats, ducks, geese, and turkeys. Animal by-products rarely appear in the diet. Meat is used only occasionally at ceremonial sacrifices. Likewise, milk is regarded as "a luxury to be taken only when the cow seems to have more than enough to feed her calf. Butter and cheese are not made. Fishing and hunting (mostly for wild boars and lemurs) provide important supplements to the basic diet. Chickens are the main source of fresh meat for most families.

In 1926-1927, commercial activities were mostly limited to "a little barter [mostly of beeswax, honey and other forest products] with the Betsileo for iron implements, silver jewelry and fine cloth and with Europeans for firearms and beads" (Linton, 1933: 125). There were some government attempts to establish weekly markets at selected towns with little success.

Some Tanala are skilled woodcarvers. But their work is mostly limited to "small figurines of men and animals which are made for sale to Europeans" (Linton, 1933: 273-274). Other products include baskets, mats, raffia cloths and embroidered fans.

The average family produced nearly everything it needed. In some of the larger villages, however, Betsileo and Merina settlers supplied better off Tanala families with foreign goods (mostly trinkets and luxuries) in exchange for beeswax, honey and other forest products.

As with most traditional societies, division of labor among the Tanala is determined by gender and age. Men and boys are responsible for herding, hunting, cutting down trees, preparing farms, and do most of the fishing, hunting and house building. Women do most of the house work such as cooking, fetching water, pounding rice, and tending the children. Men and women often helped each other both in farming and house works, but women did heavier tasks than men especially in the gardens and wet-rice plots. Gender-based division of labor tended to be more rigid especially in manufacturing activities. Men did all work relating to metals, woods, bones, horns and hides. They also weaved certain types of mats and baskets and made bark cloth. In addition to weaving garments and repairing family clothing, women were responsible for making the balance of mats and baskets. Linton also observed some "berdaches" called sarombavy who adopted feminine roles.

In Pre-European times, each Tanala village owned a definite territory with boundaries established at the time it was founded. Ownership of land within the village was vested in the various lineages, except the village square called kianza which, together with other unclaimed jungles and fallow lands, was held in common. While each lineage protected its land from serious trespass and unapproved sales to outsiders, transfer of land between lineages of the same village was permissible. Within each lineage, individual family members enjoyed rights to use the land for agricultural purposes which also included access to pastures and forest products (mostly honey, wax and raffia). During colonial times, the introduction of irrigation rice, together with the increasing value of forest products, enhanced desire for private ownership of land in some villages.

The Tanala are organized into shallow patrilineal descent groups. The smallest of these groups is the lineage which consists of recent descendants of one man and his wife or wives. Each lineage is a residential unit consisting of just members of an extended family who built their houses next to each other in one named section (ward) of a given village. Attached to each ward are also wives of lineage members, children of resident lineage women and descendants of formerly enslaved families whose kin groups live somewhere else outside the village. Lineages in turn claim overlapping kinship ties and political alliance to larger sub-groups and groups which Linton (1933: 133) called "genes" and "tribes", respectively (these hierarchies are discussed below under "SOCIAL ORGANIZATION").

The Tanala use descriptive generation terms for lineage members. They follow a simple Iroquois-type classification for cross-cousins of opposite sex.

Boys and girls marry relatively young, often in the range of 18-22 for men and 16-22 for women. In the pre-European times, the Ikongo preferred local [lineage] exogamy, while the Manabe preferred local endogamy. Both groups prohibit marriages with any primary or secondary consanguineal relative and with mother's-sister's-daughter or any traceable matrilineal kinsmen. Marriage with father's-brother's-daughter is forbidden by Ikongo, disapproved by Menabe (allowed with a ban-breaking ceremony). Cross-cousin marriage is preferred among the Menabe, but forbidden among the Ikongo. Polygyny (marrying more than one wife) is allowed but doesn't seem widespread. During Linton's fieldwork, for example, two-thirds of the Menabe men were rather monogamous. Polyandry (marrying more than one husband) is also mentioned in some legends, but Linton didn't find evidences of actual practice. Divorce is easy and fairly common. The sororate and levirate are permitted. The latter is common among the Ikongo, rare among the Menabe.

The three-generation extended family, consisting of a man and his wife or wives, their children and grand children, is the ideal domestic unit. The father is recognized as head of the family, with authority over the persons and property of his children and grandchildren. Families tend to be large in size as sons, who are not considered heads of families until after their father's deaths, continue to live in houses built near their father's homestead. The homestead of polygynous men will be even larger than the commonly found family unit as each wife maintains her own house. In some case, a poor man sometimes resides with his wife's family, if the latter is rich and insists (and his children belong to her sib), but this is considered disgraceful and is relatively rare.

Inheritance is patrilineal by children of both sexes but only by sons in the case of cattle and land. A man's property is divided approximately equally among his wives, with the chief wife receiving rather more than the rest, and the share received by each wife is divided among her children (sons for land and cattle). If there are no siblings, the estate is divided among siblings by the same mother. If none, by the children of brothers.

Infants and children are cared and fed by mothers, fathers and older children. From the age of about four months on, children ride on their mother's back almost all the time. Once they become too large to be carried, children must show respect to their parents. This expectation is enforced through a number of taboos governing conduct. Children must, for example, use only the western half of the house, not the eastern half which is reserved for parents and adult visitors. Children must also show deference to parental authority at all times. A child who disrespects his or her parents is believed to be punished by illness or bad luck. Small boys and girls play together early in their development, but only to be taken apart by divergent gendered interests as they grow older. They both help parents without requiring any formal instruction.

Beyond the family, Tanala society is organized on the basis of common descent and common residence. Linton identified three structural units. These are, in ascending order, lineages, villages and tribes. The lineage consists of recent descendants of one man and his wife or wives, tracing in the male line. It is an extended family, resulting from direct outgrowth of a single stem family. Each lineage is associated with one village which is said to have been established by the founding father. The village grows as married sons of the lineage build their house close to that of their fathers. With demographic changes in successive generations, however, new lineages sprang up by fission as families moved to new wards within the village or other locations elsewhere outside. In 1920s, an average village had 50-80 families. Tribes emerged from a political integration of several villages by conquest or alliance against some common enemy. They varied in demography and political strength. Small tribes constituted few lineages which lived in different wards of one large village, while large tribes included several lineages dispersed over 50 different villages. Theoretically, all the Tanala claim overlapping membership to numerous tribes which, at the ethnic level, fall into two main divisions. All the tribes who occupy the northern part of the territory are called Tanala Menabe, while those in the south are identified as Tanala Ikongo.

In pre-European times, the Menabe Tanala were administered through a village chief called andriambavety. The chief was elected informally and deposed at will with no significant ceremonies. His duties included organizing and coordinating communal activities and managing the village's dealings with other villages. The chief was also responsible for advising and helping villagers, often using his social standing and influence. Later on under French control, this position was retained and strengthened to provide a wide variety of administrative services to villagers. In each village, the French colonial government also organized a council, locally called fokonolona, consisting of heads of lineages (large extended families), rich men, famous warriors and other notables. The Ikongo Tanala, on the other hand, had had long maintained a hierarchical political system involving units beyond the village level. Each tribe, and sometimes sub-tribe, had a paramount chief which presided over village heads. Paramount Chiefs were in turn accountable to a king locally called Mpanzaka who was ceremonially elected from among the dominant (and noble) lineages.

Village chiefs acted as arbitrators in minor disputes when brought to them voluntarily. Matters of general policy, internal disputes and minor criminal cases were settled through debates in the fokonolona (village council). When disputes between two competing two factions of a lineage became too irreconcilable, the weaker faction might secede in a body and found a new village. Disputes between villages and serious crimes were appealed to lineage and clan heads.

Linton described the Tanala as "one of the least warlike tribes in Madagascar" (Linton, 1933: 247). Linton believed that was because they were too numerically weak and politically divided to conquer neighboring groups. They also lacked cattle or other desired spoils which could provide incentives for raids between villages. During the 1810s-1890s, however, they were forced into numerous wars of resistance to conquest first by the Merina Empire and later on by French colonialism. The Tanala also witnessed frequent conflicts among villagers mostly revolving around competing political factions (along lineage lines and/or neighborhood wards).

Linton described traditional Tanala religion as extremely practical, largely directed to improving the future of an individual by acquiring benefits or averting misfortunes. At the core of this "extreme practicality" is the belief that human affairs are subjected to a dual control, that of "beings" (a variety of deities, supernatural non-human beings and ancestral spirits) and that of "fate" (personal destiny believed to have been decided at birth). These "beings" are believed to interfere in the daily affairs of individuals either by way of assisting (e.g., guarding against evil forces) or hurting (e.g., causing injuries or other misfortunes) them. Tanala religiosity is mostly dedicated to influencing the will of these beings and changing the direction of personal destiny through numerous prayers and sacrifices.

The extreme practicality of Tanala religion meant less place for organized religious authorities in the form of priests, mystics, philosophers or theologians. They broadly recognize two religious practitioners, each specializing in dealing with one of the dual forces believed to control human wellbeing. One is a ritual leader or priest who presides over prayers and sacrificial ceremonials directed to mediating the influence of ancestral spirits and other beings. The other is a medicine man, locally called ombiasy, often consulted when one wants to know his or her destiny, or reverse its direction. The medicine man does this dual task of detecting and controlling destiny through divination and by magical means, respectively. The Tanala also show respect to the guardians of the village tombs ( kibory) who, although mostly ordinary family heads, are responsible for maintaining these important religious centers and the trees surrounding it.

Tanala ceremonies and rituals revolve around life cycles (primarily weddings and burials) and religious practices. The naming of infants is mostly regarded as a private family event and doesn't often draw much attention. Likewise, the widely practiced custom of blood brotherhood, a ritual by which children of two non-related families take an oath to become friends for life, is a family affair attended only by selected witnesses. Occasionally, however, each village may organize an annual naming ceremony in which cohorts of children born over the year are named at once. In this ceremony, each child receives the name of one of his or her dead ancestors whose good destiny is believed to be a good guardian to their namesakes. But even this village-wide ceremony tends to be short lasting. It culminates quickly after a communal meal (sometimes involving a sacrificial ox) and some invocation and prayers to the ancestors whose names are being given to the children.

The Tanala have a rich folklore and delight in telling and hearing stories. Other art forms include wood carvings used as memorials to the dead, for magical purposes, or as decorations on containers for charms. Designs used in decorations are limited mostly to arcs of circles and crescents.

Illnesses, like all other misfortunes, are attributed to capricious interference by malevolent supernatural beings. The Tanala acknowledge some ancestral spirits who are possessed of more than ordinary power. These spirits typically appear in the dreams of a person to demand for a sacrifice. They grant good fortunes when satisfied with one's prayers, invocations and sacrifices for them. If not pleased, however, these spirits are believed to use their ghostly power to cause harms including sickness. This circumstance calls for the services of the ombiasy (medicine man) who, by means of divination, could discover the causes of the spirits discontentment. If the diagnosis goes well, the ombiasy will prescribe a remedy or charm that would heal the sick.

The Tanala believe that one's soul is drawn back after death to the place where one's umbilical cord was buried. For this reason, members of each lineage maintain a secluded communal tomb known us kibory where their souls will meet. Typically located on a prominent section of the lineage land, each of these tombs is regarded as the center of the lineage's religious life. Details of funeral ceremonies differ from clan to clan, mostly due to differential influences by missionaries and neighboring ethnic groups. And within each clan (or lineage) burials vary (e.g. in costs and time required) by cause of death and the deceased person's wealth and family status. The most commonly observed burial involves washing the body with cold water, braiding and oiling the hair, placing some jewelry on the neck and hair, and wrapping the body in lambas (mantles or mats). The body is then carried to the village assembly house where it stays for some days, depending on costs of feasts, before its final rest in the tomb. Inside the tomb, each new body is placed on top of previously buried bodies. Bodies of sorcerers, persons who died of contagious diseases (notably lepers and smallpox victims) and infants who died while under a month old were not admitted to the lineage tomb. With special burials often located on a remotely located marshy ground, lineage members seek to exclude the souls of these dangerous bodies from that of other lineage members who died a normal death.

Colburn, Lisa L., 2001. "Madagascar," in Countries and their Cultures, Vol. 3, Laos to Rwanda. Melvin Ember and Carol R. Ember, eds., MacMillan Reference, USA.

Gordon, Raymond G., Jr. (ed.), 2005. Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Fifteenth edition. Dallas, Tex.: SIL International. Online version: http://www.ethnologue.com/.

This culture summary was written by Teferi Abate Adem in November 2007.