Kanuri

By Martin J. Malone and Ian Skoggard

Beri-beri, Bornu, Borno, Yerwa.

The Kanuri are the fifth largest ethnic group in Nigeria and the dominant ethnic group in Borno State located in northeastern Nigeria. They are also found in all of the major cities of northern Nigeria and in the neighboring sections of Chad and Niger. The southwestern section of the Republic of Niger is predominantly Kanuri. Borno State is located between 11 and 13 degrees north latitude and 11 and 13.5 degrees east longitude. It is bordered on the north by the Republic of Niger, on the northeast by Chad, and on the east by Cameroon. The Kanuri have been organized into a state since before the first millennium AD, and have been a Muslim emirate since the eleventh century.

The climate of the Kanuri region is typical sub-Saharan savanna. Rainfall averages 56 to 69 centimeters per year, nearly all of it falling from June to September. The Harmattan, the wind off of the Sahara, blows cool from mid-December to mid-March, and then may heat up to 38 degrees Celsius. The temperature may remain that high for weeks at a time, until the rains start in June. Most of Borno is flat, except for the southwest, where the rugged Bauchi plateau rises steeply. The eastern part, on the shores of Lake Chad, is marshy. Because of the flatness of the terrain, the summer rains create swamps, and travel becomes impossible. The soil is sandy and is covered with scrub brush, scattered thorny trees, and occasional baobabs. There are also deposits of hard green clay at the bottoms of ridges, which provide material for buildings and pottery.

There are 3,628,000 (1991) Kanuri in Nigeria, representing 4.1 percent of the country's population. Kanuri also reside in Chad (100,000), Cameroon (56,500), and Niger (50,000). Most Kanuri live in the northeastern state of Borno (pop. 2,596,589).

The Kanuri language is part of the Western Saharan branch of the Nilo-Saharan family. Kanuri is unrelated to Hausa, the lingua franca of northern Nigeria, although most Kanuri can speak some Hausa.

Although there are semi-legendary views about early Kanuri roots in Yemen, little is known of the earliest phases of Kanuri culture. Contemporary Kanuri are the descendants of the ruling Saifawa family of the Kanem Empire (846-1893) which at its peak in 1300 rivaled the Mali kingdom in the west. They converted to Islam in 1087. As a result of civil war, this family left Kanem in the fourteenth century and, after nearly a century of internal strife, established a new empire southwest of Lake Chad. The area to which the Saifawa moved was inhabited by various peoples about whom little is known. Now they are known collectively as the Sau- -reputedly a race of giants. For a period of several centuries, the efforts of the Saifawa to consolidate their power and expand their kingdom's boundaries led to the incorporation of many distinctive groups within Kanuri society. This process has not ended. Intermarriage, commerce, politics, and other factors have combined to produce a people who are culturally heterogeneous.

The Kanuri have had a strong influence on surrounding peoples, which include the Budum of Lake Chad, the Mandara and Kotoko (or Mogori) who live southeast of the Kanuri, the Marghi of the Damboa district, the Babur in the hills south of the Kanuri, the Bolewa located southwest of the Kanuri, and the Bede of Gashua, within the Kanuri territory. All of these groups have acquired various aspects of Kanuri culture, mainly the Kanuri language and Islam. Many, including the Hausa, were at one time subjects of the Kanuri Empire.

The Kanuri live in settlements ranging in size from the large city of Maiduguri--which is the capital of Borno and has a population of 275,000 (1990)--to tiny hamlets of three or four households. About two-thirds of the population live in villages of from 1,000 to 5,000 people. About one-quarter live in cities of more than 10,000. Hamlets are found about every 1.5 to 3 kilometers, and larger villages every 8 or 10 kilometers. Settlements are comprised of walled compounds, made up of mud- or grass-mat-walled houses, with thatched conical roofs. Farms extend in a circle from the settlement, with scattered farms, pastures, and free land beyond.

The Kanuri are sedentary hoe agriculturists, although almost all of the men practice some other occupation as well. The economy is complex, with commerce, transportation, and construction constituting the other main elements of the private business sector. Government and public-service jobs provide another major source of employment today; manufacturing and industry are still relatively unimportant. Millet is the staple food crop, supplemented by guinea corn (sorghum). Groundnuts (peanuts) are grown for sale. Hunting is of minor significance, but fish are an important resource to villages along the shores of Lake Chad and the Yobe River. Horses are symbols of prestige. Most households use donkeys as draft animals. Sheep and goats are commonly kept. For beef, most Kanuri rely on the pastoral Shuwa and Fulbe (Fulani, Peul) cattle herders, with whom they exchange grain and craft work for the beef they need. In a few areas, the Kanuri keep large herds of cattle.

The Kanuri diet consists of large quantities of millet, served either as porridge or as dumplings. A vegetable soup, also containing meat, groundnut oil, salt, and other condiments-- especially red peppers--is poured over the millet. The diet is universal, but the soup contents vary according to socioeconomic class. Cooked foods are sold in the markets, and a wide range of canned foods are available to city dwellers. Goats and sheep are slaughtered for religious ceremonies. Islamic food taboos are observed.

Each medium size village holds a market once a week on a specific day, except on Fridays, the Muslim Sabbath. Under this system, there is a market every day within a five to ten kilometer radius of any one village. Markets are referred to by the day of the week on which they are held. Each village shares some, but not all, of their markets with other villages, linking the entire countryside in an overlapping network of weekly market cycles. In this way certain commodities are traded widely throughout a region.

The Kanuri have been long time traders. The Kanem-Bornu Kingdom was partly an effect of the trans-Saharan trade. The Kanuri occupied an important position on the trade routes linking North and West Africa and established colonies in the Western Sudan and Sahara to secure their trade routes, for example the Saharan town of Bilma which lay halfway between Lake Chad and Tripoli. The major items of trade were slaves, cotton cloth and iron. The trans-Saharan trade was disrupted with the division of Africa among the colonial powers at the end of the nineteenth century.

Farming, craft production, trade, and government are the main occupations. The first two are usually combined in rural households and involve both men and women. The last two strictly male occupations. Butchers, blacksmiths, barbers, petty brokers, money lenders, and drummer-entertainers are low-status occupations.

In the past, the Kanuri had a feudal tenure system. Nobles lived in the capital and administered their land holdings through subordinates. Fiefs were not fixed, but could be redistributed, re-divided or broken up at the pleasure of the monarch. Furthermore, the fiefs of each noble were dispersed throughout the kingdom undermining the possibility of him establishing a localized power base. In 1914, The British consolidated the fiefs into 21 large districts each with an appointed district head who answered to a chief minister, WAZIRI, and council (Native Authority council). The new bureaucracy undermined the power of the monarch by limiting the number of government offices the monarch could offer his political followers.

Although agnatic relations take precedence for legal matters and inheritance, kin relations are recognized through both lines. Kin terms make no distinctions for agnates above the parental generation or for cousins, who are all classed as brothers and sisters. Agnates generally live together in their own wards within a city, town, or village. Although there are no corporate lineages as such, in the eyes of the law these groups of neighboring agnates are treated as corporate units, in the sense that they are responsible for the actions of their members. People without agnates upon whom they can depend are social outcasts.

The most important criteria distinguishing kin are generation and birth order, expressing the significance of seniority in Kanuri society. In-laws are also grouped into junior and senior categories. Kin and affines with at least one intervening generation between them practice terminological reciprocity, that is, they address themselves by the same name. Sex differentiation occurs only in the parent and child generations. All members of the first descendent generation (siblings and cousins) are lumped together (keeping sex distinctions.) Parallel and cross cousins are distinguished in the parent generation. This mixed terminological system suggests that the Kanuri had a unilineal past before they became more sedentary during the eleventh to thirteenth centuries.

For men, marriage usually occurs first at about age 20, and for women, at about age 14. The preferred marriage for a man is to a young virgin, 10 to 14 years of age. But this is a very expensive form of marriage, and most men cannot afford it as a first marriage, when they are themselves usually in their late teens to mid-twenties. Marriage requires a series of bride-prices given to the bride's guardian, or LUWALI. The more common first marriage is to a divorcée, for whom the bride-wealth payments are much lower. The rate of divorce is extremely high, approaching 80 percent of all marriages. In case of divorce, children stay with the father. Marriage between cousins sometimes occurs, a form that also results in a reduced bride-price.

In accordance with Islamic law, polygyny is permitted, and is highly desired by men. Concubinage is also practiced, although far less commonly than polygyny. Ideally, married Kanuri women are secluded. This practice is rare in rural areas, where the economic role of women is vital, but it is rather common in large cities, such as Maiduguri.

The basic socioeconomic unit is the virilocal extended family, which occupies a single walled compound. Although this type of unit is the ideal, neolocality is actually more common. In the case of traditional aristocracy and royalty, the households included slaves, concubines, and numerous retainers and adopted children. At this social level, the household is not strictly a kin group, although the relations are patterned on kin relations, and kin terms are used.

Social relations in Kanuri society are generally patterned upon those of the idealized family, the most common being the father- son/superior-subordinate relation. A man's prestige is based on the size of his household and the number of his clients. His followers provide farm and household labor, political support, and defense; in return, he provides food, clothing, bride-price, and possibly a bride, to each of them. Given that a man's status increases or diminishes with that of the household, regardless of his position within it, there is a premium on loyalty to the master.

Following Islamic inheritance prescriptions, males obtain two parts of inherited wealth to every one given to a female descendent. One may inherit from the mother's side of the family if there are no heirs among the patrilineal relations of the mother's descent group.

Parents inculcate in their children the conventional Kanuri norms of conduct regarding proper behavior in personal relations. Sons learn to be completely loyal, obedient and subservient to their fathers in exchange for protection, security, food and shelter. This relationship of discipline and trust, BERZUM, becomes a model for all patron-client relationships which form most of Kanuri political relationships.

Before European contact, Bornu was a feudal state, with royal lineages, a land holding aristocracy, peasants, and slaves. In the post-colonial period, nearly all the important political leaders are descendants of the aristocratic lineages, but popular elections have added commoners to their ranks. When the British took control at the beginning of the twentieth century, they abolished slavery and took over the top decision-making positions, but they left most of the social system intact. In small villages, there is little or no labor specialization, and differences in wealth are slight. In towns and cities, however, social stratification is pronounced, and differences in wealth may be great. New trading opportunities, Western education, and political power through election and financial support of others have all served to create a situation in which there are many commoners who have become as wealthy as the aristocrats. Relationships between social unequals, in which each person has diffuse obligations to and expectations of the other, is still an integral part of Kanuri culture. In the past, the principal contrast was between the nobility, including the royal family, on the one hand, and commoners, on the other. Today this contrast is being transformed to one between the modern, educated, bureaucratic elite and the traditional, illiterate peasantry.

Occupations that are related to politics and religion have high status, whereas those that are associated with things thought to be dirty, i.e. barbers, blacksmiths, well diggers, tanners, and butchers, have very low status. In between are the great bulk of commoners who are farmers, artisans, and traders. Musicians (classed as beggars) and moneylenders (who, because they charge interest, are viewed as violators of Islamic law) hold the lowest status of all. Another major dimension of social inequality in Borno is between men and women. In a pattern that reflects Islamic law as it is interpreted locally, women are legally and socially inferior to men, and they are considered a major source of instability. Accordingly, various civil and social rights are denied to women.

Borno State is one of 30 (as of 1987) states in Nigeria. Although the local political organization was restructured during and again after the colonial era, it is still largely based on precolonial values, traditions, and ideology. The SHEHU, or king, is both the political and the religious leader, although he has become more marginalized by a growing bureaucratic elite. There are twenty-one districts, each with a district head--usually a member of the aristocracy--and a district capital. The districts are composed of villages, each with its own headman (LAWAN), and of towns and cities, which may have more than one headman. Villages, towns, and cities are composed of wards or hamlets which are run by a BULAMA, usually the founder or head of the largest household.

To be a good man or woman is to be a good Muslim. The Kanuri have been Muslims since the eleventh century, and Islam influences their law, education, and social organization. The Malakite version of Islamic law is administered by an ALKALI (judge) who has been trained at the Kano Law School. However, all leaders in the Borno political system can adjudicate disputes, i.e. heads of wards, villages, towns or districts. The political hierarchy serves as an appeals court system. Cases are tried by a combination of Muslim law and local custom. The use of witnesses swearing on the evidence, called "eating the Quran," is significant in influencing the verdict.

Traditional education is based on the Quran. According to its teachings, one should be properly humble and respectful of superiors and not prone to false pride. Also, one should be devout in both rituals and thoughts. In this way, women are expected to play a subordinate role to men in the family and any defiance of male authority results more often than not in divorce. Kanuri suffer from an extremely high divorce rate, although the family itself remains a stable institution.

A source of potential conflict lies between the household retainers of political leaders and other residents of the community. The former hold only allegiance to their patron and not to anyone else in the community. However when disputes do arise over adultery, theft or some perceived insult, it is the leader's interest when adjudicating the dispute to render a verdict in favor of the resident and compensate him or her in some way. Another source of tension lies among half-siblings especially over issues concerning inheritance. Conflicts over inheritance also occur between the wife of the deceased and her husband's siblings, as well as, between the deceased's siblings and his children. Within marriage there is always tension between husband and wife over the expected deference to male authority in the household. Not all women comply to such strictures and not all men are able to enforce compliance, the result often being divorce. After Nigeria's independence in 1960, the tensions between the two dominant political parties in Borno erupted into a bloody confrontation such that today there is only one party with which all Kanuri are affiliated. According to Cohen (1970), the potential class conflict between nobility and commoners is ameliorated by the many vertical patron-client relationships which tie commoners to the interests of the powerful few.

Islam is the central ideological force in the daily lives of the Kanuri, affecting the thinking and behavior of the people in every way. The full ritual calendar of the Muslim year is followed, the fast is faithfully kept by all who are required to do so by traditional laws, and the other pillars of Islam are religiously followed by the great majority. Despite the strength of this orthodoxy, a few superimposed superstitious practices, such as the wearing of charms and amulets, are considered by most of the populace as acceptably Islamic. Of the various Sufi brotherhoods in Nigeria, the dominant one in Borno appears to be that of the Tijaniya.

Anyone who has studied the Quran is called a MALAM. Although MALAMS enjoy much prestige, they are never wealthy and depend on charity for their day-to-day sustenance. Many are teachers and conduct class in their compounds. Their pupils are distinguished by their goatskin capes and begging bowls. Those MALAM who have learned the Quran by heart are called GONYIMALAM are believed also to have supernatural powers which are used in divination and curing. "Gift-marriage" involves giving away one's daughter, or marriage ward, to a MALAM, which was considered a charitable and honorable act. Another religious role is that of the LIMAN (from the Arabic AL-IMAM) who leads the prayers on the Sabbath and religious holidays. The LIMAN may also serve as judge and counselor in the Kanuri political system.

Most life crises are marked by religious ceremony. Naming, circumcision, marriage and burials all have a religious aspect. Ceremonial holidays follow the Muslim calendar and include the new year, the prophet's birthday, the sacrifice of the ram, and the month of Ramadan. As Muslims, the Kanuri are required to pray five times a day and on Fridays attend to the Mosque for prayers.

The Kanuri decorate their vessels with distinctive geometric patterns. Traditionally men's faces were scarred also in geometric patterns signifying their tribal allegiance. There are also praise-singers, or drummer-entertainers, who are employed at gatherings to sing the praises of whoever will pay them.

Among the Kanuri as with many other Muslim peoples, there is a strong belief in the efficacy of the written word of the Quran. Quranic verses are bound in decorative leather cases and worn on a necklace as a protective charm (LAYA). Sickness and death are believed to be the result of someone's or some spirit's (JINN) evil intentions. One cure, called ALO, involves the MALAM writing a Quranic verse on a wooden board, washing the ink off into a vessel and then having the patient drink it. Besides the MALAM, there are secular specialists who deal with physical ailments such as muscular pains, swellings and broken bones. Kanuri also will seek the advice and treatment of Western- trained doctors.

The Kanuri have an accepting attitude towards death and have a strong compulsion to go to funerals. Not to go to a funeral--even of a low status neighbor--is unthinkable. The more people in attendance, the more prayers are offered, and the better are the chances of the deceased person to reach paradise. The funeral ceremony is simple: The body is washed, wrapped in a white cloth, placed on a bier and taken to the burial grounds. At the burial site, mourners pray and wail. Mourning lasts for a period of 40 days wherein special prayers are said daily and men stay close to home.

Documents referred to in this section are included in the eHRAF collection and are referenced by author, date of publication, and the eHRAF document number.

The Kanuri file consists of eleven works, nine of them by the ethnographer Ronald Cohen. Cohen wrote the classic monograph on the Kanuri (Cohen 1967, no. 1), as well as, articles on various aspects of their culture and history, including sociopolitical organization (1960, no. 3), attempts to change agricultural practices (1961, no. 4), nineteenth century political economy (1965, no. 8), marriage instability (1961, no. 10; 1971, no. 6), kingship (1968, no. 9), processes of political incorporation (1970, no. 11), and status distinctions and social stratification (1970, no. 12). Rosman (1962, no. 2) has written on the relationship between acculturation and social structure among urban Kanuri. Peshkin (1972, no. 7) wrote about the affect of Western-style education on social change in rural and urban Borno. The file is strong on Kanuri social and political organization up to the 1960s, while it is less so on religion, arts and recent social change between 1970 and the 1990s. For more detailed information on the content of the individual works in this file, see the abstracts in the citations preceding each document.

This culture summary was based on the article, "Kanuri," by Martin J. Malone, in Sixty Cultures: A Guide to the HRAF Probability Files. 1977. Robert O. Lagacé, ed. New Haven, Conn.: Human Relations Area Files, Inc. The sections on commercial activities, trade, division of labor, land tenure, political organization, conflict, religious practitioners, ceremonies, arts, medicines, and death and afterlife were added by Ian Skoggard, 1996.

• ABBA NJIMA--patron--571

• ARZIYI--good fortune--777

• BARZUM (BERZUM)--discipline-respect--577, 571

• DANDAL--main street--363

• LUWALI--marriage ward--583, 429

• MALLAM (MALAM)--Islamic teacher and ritual specialist--793

• SHARI'A--Islamic law--671, 779

• SADAQ (SADA'A)--bride price--583

• TATA NJIMA--client--571

• WAZIRI--chief minister--645

• ZOWER--divorced woman--586, 589

Botting, Douglas. The Knights of Bornu. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1961

Cohen, Ronald. The Structure of Kanuri Society. Ann Arbor: University Microfilms, 1960

Cohen, Ronald. "The Success that Failed: An Experiment in Culture Change in Africa". Anthropologica, n.s. 3 (1961):21-36

Cohen, Ronald. The Kanuri of Bornu. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1967

Cohen, Ronald. Social Stratification in Bornu. Arthur Tuden and Leonard Plotnicov, eds. Social Stratification in Africa. New York: The Free Press, 1970, pp. 225-267

Low, Victor N. Three Nigerian Emirates: A Study in Oral History. Evanston, Ill.: Northwestern University Press, 1972

Murdock, George P. Africa: Its People and Their Culture History. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1959

Peshkin, Alan. "Education and Modernism in Bornu". Comparative Education Review 14 (1970):283-300

Peshkin, Alan. Kanuri Schoolchildren: Education and Social Mobilization in Nigeria. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1972

Rosman, Abraham. Social Structure and Acculturation among the Kanuri of Northern Nigeria. Ann Arbor: University Microfilms, 1966

Tessler, Mark A., William M. O'Barr, and David H. Spain. Tradition and Identity in Changing Africa. New York: Harper & Row, 1973