Psychology of witchcraft among the Shona people Myth and

Reality:

Case Study of witchcraft among the Shona people of Bikita District

of Zimbabwe.

By

Andreas Zvaiwa

Abstract

Bikita is one of the 59 districts in Zimbabwe. The district lies 80 km East

of the town of Masvingo. It has a considerable number of ethnic groups,
but the Shona are predominant. The Shona nowadays is no longer a
single cultural group but a mixture of other cultural groups that have
moved into the district. This study will be on the Psychology of Witchcraft
among the Shona people in that district. It will be argued that witchcraft
is a well-known practice across cultures in the history of mankind and
that the practice can be explained through the Freudian and Jungian
theories of the Psyche whereby witches operate in the unconscious area
of the psyche. The paper rejects the idea that witchcraft is a moral issue
and suggests that it is a psychological issue. Because of the current
Covid -19 pandemic, it has been difficult to carry out on-the-spot
interviews, so most of the information was collected through telephone
interviews using a mobile phone. In a few instances, however, the
researcher had the chance to witness activities that were deemed to be
witchcraft.

Keywords: Witchcraft, witch doctor

Introduction

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The paper is not a legal reflection but an attempt to look at witchcraft in the context
of African psychology as enriched by Freud and Jung. Reference will be made to
some legal issues or acts but I am not interested in these except when they give
relevance to my study. My interest is to look at how the two psychologists – Freud
and Jung could be used to attempt an explanation of the dual forms of existence of
those who practice witchcraft in Africa, especially in the Bikita District. My theoretical
framework in this reflection is based on both Jung and Freud and their idea that we
have three elements in our psyche that push us to behave in certain ways: the “id,”
the “ego” and the “superego”.

What is witchcraft?

Witchcraft (also called witchery or spell craft) broadly means the practice of, and belief
in, magical skills and abilities that can be exercised by individuals and certain social
groups. Witchcraft is a complex concept that varies culturally and societally; therefore,
it is difficult to define with precision and cross-cultural assumptions about the meaning
or significance of the term and if defined it should be applied with caution. Witchcraft
often occupies a religious, divinatory, or medicinal role, and is often present within
societies and groups whose cultural frames of reference include a magical worldview.
It is not a religion to be believed in. Its origin is as complex as its conceptualisation
since people seem to accept the phenomena with some fear. Chief Chabata who was
interviewed on this phenomenon said that to understand witchcraft one must be a
witch. Some people think that its source is some supernatural powers given to certain
individuals. The supernatural power, however, is divided into the power of Satan and
the power of God. Although witchcraft can often share common ground with related
concepts such as sorcery, the paranormal, magic, superstition, necromancy,
possession, shamanism, healing, spiritualism, nature worship, and the occult, it is
usually seen as distinct from these when examined by sociologists and anthropologists
(JSTOR March 1994:253). Sociologists believe that witchcraft played a social role in
society both negative and positive. It negatively brought fear to society but at the same
time created order. In other words, the order came as an antithesis of chaos.

In psychology, witchcraft is unique because it gives dual existence to the person

practicing it. The individual lives in both the conscious and the unconscious worlds as
indicated by Freud’s theory of the conscious and unconscious.

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The Problem

“A few studies of Shona beliefs and medicine have been produced. Some of these
studies have been primarily concerned with traditional healers and their medicines,
others have attempted to examine the place of religion in witchcraft” (Chavhunduka,
1978). (Chavunduka, 1998), defines witchcraft as the practice “of people with
psychic powers.” He does not take a psychological view, but a sociological view of
witchcraft. He seems to see the problem of witchcraft as emanating from the lack of
acknowledgement of the craft by mainly western-influenced writers instead of looking
at the commonality of its existence as a psychological phenomenon. This study
attempts to demystify the social existence of witchcraft and looks at it from a
psychological standpoint.

The purpose of this study

This study attempts to demystify the mystery surrounding witchcraft among the
Shona people by giving a psychological explanation of witchcraft among the Shona
people of Bikita. The Shona people in Bikita form the largest ethnic group in that
district. This district is in Masvingo Province and is bordered by Zaka to the South,
Gutu to the North, and Masvingo Province in the West. It is popularly chanted by
local artists as “Bikita, Zaka rinopisa, makomo, varoyi, zvidhoma.” This means in
Bikita and the adjacent Zaka, goblins, and witchcraft are predominant. This has not
just been prejudiced against the people of Bikita, but a common perception that is
often based on a lack of fundamental research on both the culture and environment
of the people. It however indicates the prevalence of such beliefs in and about the
area. The question is, “Is witchcraft in Bikita a psychological machination or a
conceptualised reality?” This question has been neglected by researchers in the
past.

Significance of the Study

In the minds of the Shona people of Bikita witchcraft is real. It controls human life
significantly and is even thought to explain some deaths (Bourdillon 1976:173). The
people believe that the spirits protect them from anything even death. Death is often

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attributed to the failure of the spirits to protect them from witchcraft and other causes.
Ancestral spirits have been weakened by the witch, hence succumbing to death or
calamity. It is hoped that the current study will help make the people see the
naturalness of death and avoid witch-hunting in the community. The study could help
people live in greater harmony as the practice has also created tensions and
animosity between families and neighbours. People could learn that witchery is a
psychological phenomenon and death is not necessarily caused by witchcraft. This is
contrary to the Shakespearean view uttered by Caesar that death is a necessary
end, and it comes when it wills. (Shakespeare Julius Caesar)

Limitations

Witchcraft is shrouded in myth and the researcher was limited because he was
considered an intruder by the people into their mysterious world of the powers of the
unknown. Witchcraft being part of this mystery remains unknown in terms of its real
origin. The concept of witchcraft could be considered an international rather than a
parochial practice. Unfortunately, it has been associated with what Michael Tournier
calls the practice of “the civilised savage.” Among the Scottish people, it is observed
in the Shakespearean Macbeth. These people believed in witchcraft and the power
of the witches to foretell the future. “Hail Macbeth thou shall be king hereafter”
divined the witches showing the essence of the power of the unknown given to an
individual. Witchery or witchcraft is the supernatural power that the individual has
and can use to control others. The source of this power limits this study from delving
into the origins of witchcraft since its source is given to the select. The researcher
tried to investigate the source of this power but was limited.

BANQUO

How far is it called to Forres? What are these

So wither'd and so wild in their attire,
That look not like the inhabitants o' the earth,
And yet are on't? Live you? or are you aught

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 That man may question? You seem to understand me,
By each at once her chappy finger laying
Upon her skinny lips: you should be women,
And yet your beards forbid me to interpret
That you are so. The witches disappear

That takes the reason prisoner?

Banquo echoes the dual existence of witches when he says:

‘So, wither'd and so wild in their attire,
That look not like the inhabitants o' the earth,
And yet are on't? Live you? or are you aught
That man may question? You seem to understand me,

So, wither'd and so wild in their attire,

That look not like the inhabitants o' the earth,
And yet are on't? Live you? or are you aught’

That man may question? You seem to understand me or have we

eaten on the insane root

There is a clear outline of the witches. They live on this earth and yet they do not
belong to the human world. The witches are not terrestrial and yet they live with us.
St Paul said “he who is of flesh belongs to the flesh and he who is of the spirit
belongs to the spirit.” (Col.2:13) Where do the witches belong? The witches belong
to the spiritual world which can only be understood by someone who lives in that
world.

If the Freudian and Jungian ideas are applied, these witches operate from the id. It is
a world hidden from the ordinary “inhabitants of this world.” My argument in this
study is that the witches have a dual psychological existence who’s geographical
“Thereness” is controlled by a rather unknown or mysterious existence. They have a
dual existence. The witches can have an earthly human existence and mingle with
other people during the day but take upon another realm which the ordinary person
cannot penetrate. It is this secrecy of their operations that makes empirical research
difficult. What one can only say is that it is psychological, and it is the whole idea of

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this study to posit that witchcraft is psychological and may be based on powers yet
unknown to humanity.

Among the Greeks, the Theban Plays manifest conceptual psychology of the dual
existence of the women in that play. These women live a normal life during the day
but live yet another life at night, - the life of the witches. They operate in the realm of
the unconscious and I think this is the whole psychology of witchcraft throughout the
world in the sense that the witch does not know what is happening. Once this is
unknown to the outsider, the mystery remains personal. Although the phenomenon
may differ from culture to culture, the mysterious aspect of witchcraft is universal.
Bourdillon (1976), states that the world of the witches remains unknown because
showing knowledge of it warrants someone to be a witch. I asked two religious’ nuns
to explain the possibility of the dual existence of witches and they shrunk away
saying “it is too terrifying and we should not talk about it.” Witchcraft remains a
feared area of human life.

How Witchery is Acquired

Among the Shona people witches do not give birth to fellow witches. Witchcraft is an
art learned from erstwhile or experienced witches. I was told of how young girls
become witches. The old witches observe the young girls who can keep secrets and
usually invite them to their house during the day. This begins just like a social
encounter but as time goes on the witch cooks food with some meat and gives the
girl. This is human meat that has been dried. The girl eats the human meat and the
friendship develops further. Bourdillon (1976) says that the witch believes that
human meat has some potent which makes them resist fear and stigmatisation. The
meat is meant to make the girl resilient, and it appears to work. The girl is gradually
introduced to the midnight hunt and once she succeeds, she becomes a witch and
goes with other witches during the night. What is of interest is that this girl is feared
by others in the village, and she generally does not play with her age mates, she
does not smile unnecessarily, and she is taken as being serious in her behaviour.
Like any other witch, she has two lives, which I could derive from the Freudian idea
of “psychic domination”. This, I think, is the existence of any witch. The witch exists
in the “id” jumps to the “ego” and exists in the “superego” of consciousness.

Witchcraft and the Human Psyche

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It is now an internationally recognised psychological characteristic within the realm of
the Freudian description of the operations of the psyche. Jung defines the psyche
as the spirit or the soul but modern psychology takes the psyche as the mind and it
is this latter definition that this reflection will take and attempt to relate to the mind of
the witch and the psychology surrounding the practice of this phenomenon. There is
a need to relate witchcraft to the operations of the human psyche and its dynamics.
The existence of the psyche is determined by the operations of the id, ego, and
superego. This paper limits itself to the contribution of these three to the practice of
witchcraft. If this is accepted, then it will be clear how the three elements of the
psyche share their energies and are dependent on each other. The id is the source
of this shared energy, and it passes it on to the “ego” which accepts or rejects the
demands of the “id” or superego. At the times the “ego” gets inundated with the
demands of the “id”. In the case of a witch, the ego finds it very strenuous to prevent
the movement of energy from the “superego” and unwillingly permits the witch to
pass through to the “id” and this is where the witch gets the energy since the “id” is
the source of all the energy of the “psyche”. The person with a weak ego succumbs
to the demands of the id and this seems to be what happens to the operations of the
psyche of the witch. The ego of the witch becomes too weak and allows the mind to
succumb to the desires of the id.

As indicated in Figure 1, the witches have a dual existence; one in the superego
(The conscious) and the other in the id (unconscious). I am positing that while the
ego is generally called the preconscious, in the mind of the witches this should also
be called the pre-unconscious because the movement of life shifts from one
structure to another. The personality of an individual is then determined by the
dominance of either of the three elements of the psyche. One is inclined to say that
witchcraft as a psychological process cannot be easily condemned and stigmatized
apart from calling it misdirected energy from the “id” and because of the weakness
the “id” is only allowed to temporarily operate. I am not suggesting that witchcraft is
normal but as a psychological system, it has neither moral nor ethical identity until it
is executed by the user. I am arguing that witchcraft is within the operation of the
unconscious part of the psyche therefore, its morality or lack thereof seems very
marginal. Could it be equated to dreams which dwell in the id and the person is not
aware of it unless it is executed to do something immoral or unethical? Have we not

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dismissed a rich area of research by stigmatising it as primitive, unethical, immoral,
etc.? Is witchcraft a mental disorder or an orientation of the mind? The American
DST-IV-TR does not give this phenomenon a code even in its axial analysis, so the
whole practice seems mysterious. Probably the missionaries and religious personnel
were the only ones who talked about witchcraft but from the desire to convert rather
than from psychological perspectives.

Hunter (2007), attributes witchcraft and all actions related to the phenomena to the
power of Satan. It seems he does not attempt to look at the psychology that lies
behind witchcraft. This is probably where the confusion on the definition of witchcraft
comes in. It became equated to both ethical and moral principles. Most of the
missionaries and colonial agents looked at witchcraft with fear and equated it to
human moral decay and condemned it. What is of interest is that witchcraft was
condemned in the west and when the colonialists came to Africa, they used the
same instrument to condemn what they did not know in terms of its operations in this
culture. Most of the writers who wrote about witchcraft did so as a justification for
western thoughts and civilisation. No psychological analysis was attempted because
everything was considered primitive and unwanted behaviour that was to be
replaced with western civilisation. Writers like Bourdillon (1998) Gilfand (1964)
Aschwanden(1982) and those who authored the Zambezi Missionary Journal wrote
to show those “back home’ how backward the Africans were and not about how his
psychology operated.

During the day witches are aware of their responsibility as required by the social
demands of the superego. According to Freud, humans operate mostly in the
superego using all the faculties that have been cleared by the ego. I would like to
suggest that the witches operate in the superego during the day when they are
aware of what is going on. This process is immediately sent to the unconscious id at
night when they go for their witchcraft activities. They are not aware of what they are
doing. I already mentioned the women in The Bacchae plays of Euripides, who
practiced witchcraft, and Aguae the mother of Pentheus, the king is only aware that
she is holding the head of her son when she arrives home, and the “superego” takes
over from the “id.” It is only when she goes back to the social “ego” that she is aware
the boot she received or claimed was her son’s head. It was the propensity of the “id”

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that led her to claim the head and that of the “superego” that gave her some
remorse. The latter is the social conscience.

After the night works of the

witches they return to This is a socially accepted life of humans. A witch is accepted by society
here because there is acceptance of the normative expected by
normality.
super ego society.

The ego becomes too weak and

Allows the witch to venture into the id

ego
ID Witchcraft is in this area but
the person remains the
Witchraft ideas . This is the source of same.
all energy and witchraft is within this
area. This an unconscious region of
the psyche and Freud seems to
suggest that we are merely victms of
the dictates of the ID.

Figure 1: The Operations of the Psyche of the interpretation of Freud’s

activities of the Psyche.

The unconscious behaviour of the witch is in the id part of the psyche

It seems while the ego allows a witch to return to the superego and be a social
being, it has no power to prevent the operations of the id in the witch, in this case, I
would like to believe that people with a weak ego are easily taken into witchcraft
whereas those with a strong ego will tend to resist.

CASES

Case 1

A novice witch (name supplied by a young man and villager) in Bikita was found
naked in the middle of a village in the early hours of the morning. When he was
asked why he was there he manifested ignorance of his presence. The people who
knew about witchcraft indicated that he was late to return to his house after the

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witchcraft involvement with other witches who had already returned to their homes.
Here is an example of the operations of the conscious and that of the unconscious.
Was this somnambulism? There seems to be a clear dichotomy of the psyche
system operating at different consciousness levels.

Case 2

A group of witches agreed to eat their children. (Area of Growth point suppled). They
killed and ate two children belonging to the other two witches. When it was the turn
of the other witch to supply the boot, she refused to say her child was plumper than
the others they had eaten. At the time of writing the case was at the chief’s court.
The chief had expressed disgust over the incident.

Case 3

A woman was found walking naked in the streets of Mutare in April 2020. When she
was questioned why she did that, she expressed ignorance of her whereabouts. The
explanation was that she was left by other witches who had returned to their homes
where they were normal again.

What is essential in all these operations is the proclamation of ignorance. When a

witch is caught there is always a question, he or she asks the people, ndiripi - where
am I. This is not a mere rhetorical question but a question of the conscious and the
unconsciousness. The id (the unconscious) has stopped operating and there is an
attempt by the superego to be with the rest of the social system but is confused and
therefore the question “where am I” comes forth. Most witches who are caught tend
to be ignorant of what they have been doing. There is an association between reality
and dreams when a witch feels that it was a mere dream. Freud believes dreams are
an expression of the unreal and Jung takes this as the shadow or the other side of
ourselves. Could witchcraft be equated to a dream? If so, then there is a moral
dilemma because society does not hold anybody accountable for actions that take
place during a dream. This is a complex phenomenon because the same society that
does not see dreams as reality often condemns witchcraft. A dream lies in the
unconscious area of the psyche and so do the operations of the witch.

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According to J.M. Brown (1926) in Traditional Basotho, London, Seeley &Co.,
witchcraft was part of society’s fabric among the Bantu, and it was more feared than
respected. People knew the role of the witch. The ceremonies held were religious
and the person who was a witch was considered a doctor, “di ngaka, and among the
Bantu nomads, they protected the chief and always stood behind him. These
according to Brown (1926) were not only priest doctors but were women who were
involved in witchcraft, sorcery, and divination. They were also rainmakers; therefore,
the whole clan was under their control. This was a profession that was handed over
from one generation to the next within the family (Brown 1926). The future witch had
to go through an apprenticeship and be paid a fee to be a witch. The skills learned
included: throwing bones and interpreting their meaning, knowledge of the herbs,
and witchcraft. It was after acquiring the skills that the future doctor or witch was
allowed to wear a mantle made of baboon skin and allowed to sit on a hyena skin.
Basotho do not make a distinction between a witch, a healer, and a diviner;
therefore, the art of witchcraft seemed more acceptable because of those functions.
The Shona on the other hand seems to look at the functions separately. The diviner
seems to depend on the witch whom he or she consults, and the diviner can flash
out witches in a village and clean homesteads of malicious evil forces.

Amongst the Sotho today, witches are men, but mostly women, who have acquired
supernatural powers which are not given to just everyone (Ashton (1956) The Basuto
Oxford, University Press). They behave only as witches at night. During the day they
are just ordinary people, this makes them have a dual existence controlled by the
conscious and unconscious which are psychological dual personality systems. The
unconscious seems to play a dominant role. This is the basis of my argument that
witchcraft is a psychological phenomenon that has not been explained or researched
fully in Africa. Most of the witches have special powers, the Basuto witches gather
naked at night in secluded dongas and sing waiting for their friends who ride on the
backs of fleas and fly. In this, they are like Western witches who ride on brooms and
fly (Ashton 1952). In one case, they visited a village and put the whole population to
sleep while they slaughtered an ox and had a celebration. These midnight feasts
were generally not seen by ordinary people - if they did, they are believed to fall sick.
They fed on human flesh which they gleaned from badly constructed graves; The

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Basotho witches had the power to change humans into small people called
Tokoloshes who became a menace to the community.

Among the Lake People of Malawi, David Livingstone described the witches as
people who were possessed by hidden powers and their objective was to bring
disaster to the tribe. Livingstone (From Murray’s, and Livingston’s Lake People)
indicated that some of these witches were ignorant of their power or its origin. This
seems to agree with the Freudian concept of the unconscious which overtakes
human rationality. Are the witches then responsible for their actions or it is merely
attributed to the unconscious which lies within the area of the id?

Among the Shona people, witchcraft is considered real, and witches are respected
and feared (Bourdillion 1976). People are discouraged from taking food from
strangers because of the fear of witchcraft. It is ingrained in the people’s
psyche that these supernaturally powered people do exist and that their
power cannot be controlled. Recently, I got a message from a university
graduate now living in the UK who said; “I cannot come back to Africa, I am
afraid of witchcraft.’ (22 April 2020). The concept of witchcraft is a code of
ethics amongst the people because one cannot just pick up anything in case it
was dropped by a witch. Such culturally pervasive notions and fears have
protected animals, fruits, and even money from being stolen. Is this fear
merely psychological or it is a reality? People fear wandering around at night
because the witches do their business at night, people cannot take non-
frequented paths because they fear witches.

It would seem to me that witchcraft is not a mere practice of the civilized savage as
some western writers like Michael Tourneur envisaged it. Recently I spent some time
in Bikita and at night an owl came and perched on the roof of my dwelling and
started hooting. I wanted to record the hooting sound of the owl, but my tablet would
not open. When I told the people the following day, they asked me to switch it on
which I did and it responded fast. They laughed at me saying the owls were not just
ordinary birds, but they were there to remind the witches to return to their homes
after their night hunt. They explained that my machine had been disabled by the
power of the witches. This indicated what is in the psyche of the people and one
cannot convince them that witchery does not exist.

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The concept of the dual existence of good and evil is illustrated by Freud in his
perception of the shadow which has a dangerous and valuable existence. Jung
explains witchcraft in terms of the existence of the anima and the animus in humans.
He recognises the anima as the female element in a male psyche and this is
generally recognised as a witch. These are people who have a connection with the
unconscious and the underworld. I would like to think that witchcraft as I already
mentioned operates in the subconscious where it has dominated the preconscious
and the conscious part of the human psyche. These two have been made
subservient to the dictates of the id whose main idea is to maximize its pleasure and
minimise pain. With due respect for the dynamic of the feminine world, one tends to
agree with Jung that women have greater touch with the unknown world but
unfortunately during the witchcraft activities, the men consider this demonic and evil.
It is true psychological existence that needs understanding rather than
condemnation. To me condemning witchcraft is a denial of the composition and
dynamic of the psyche and a denial of the psychological component of humanity.
This does not canonize the concept of witchcraft in humanity, but rather tries to give
it a psychological explanation instead of a stigma. It is a cultural practice that
requires a relative perspective.

Witchcraft as Conceptualised by Different people

It seems that individuals view witchcraft differently (Figure 2. Below)

Gender Education Residence Occupation Answer to the question: Do witches

and witchcraft exist?
1. F Diploma Rural Teacher Gave a detailed account and
connections she has with diviners.
2. M Post Grad Urban Admin There is no witchcraft, but African
science.
3. M Graduate Urban Teacher There are witches and they are real.

4. M Graduate Urban Teacher It is people’s imagination, there is

no witchcraft.
5. M Graduate Se Urban Bus Witches are there, recently they
Manager caught someone walking naked in
the streets of Mutare.

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 6. F Graduate Urban Housewife Not committed
7. F Nurse Urban Nurse Yes, I do/ ask me I was once
bewitched. We need to sit down
and talk about this. Detailed how
she was bewitched.
8. F Graduate Urban Teacher Not committed
9. F O level urban Sweeper Not interested
10. F Dip Rural Teacher I do not believe in witches or
witchcraft, and they do not exist in
our area.
11. F Grade 7 Rural housewife No witchcraft
12. M Graduate Urban teacher I don’t know.
13. F Graduate Rural Teacher Yes, I do. I lost both my parent’s
nations to
witchcraft. The witches are
associated with old people.

Figure 3: Summary: Responses to the Question “Is there witchcraft?”

Yes 5 38.46%
No 3 23.0%
Don’t know 1 7.9%
Not committed 2 15%
Indifferent 1 7.9%
Scientists, not witches 1 7.9%
Witchcraft among the Shona people in Bikita

‘Bikita, Zaka, makomo, varoyi, zvidhoma.’ This is a slogan one generally hears. Why
do people create such labels for this area? A few years ago, a man was asked by
the missionaries at Silveira Mission to dig a furrow from the Zizhou River to the
mission and he did and until recently this furrow supplied water to the whole mission
and its gardens. This man was known for his witchcraft and magical practices, and it
is believed he used lightning to dig the furrow. This furrow now is disused, and the

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man is dead. He used to do a lot of magical operations which people never
understood but this has been dismissed by others as a combination of witchcraft and
magic. In schools in this district, there were girls called “Tondekeni”. If such girls
pointed a finger at you in anger, then you were cursed. These girls possessed extra
powers whose sources were unknown. The missionaries with all good intentions
tried to perform exorcism rituals on the girls to get rid of their powers which they
perceived to have come from evil spirits. Were the girls aware of what was going on
or were they victims of the dictatorship of the id?

Witchcraft and Tsikamunda

‘Tsikamutanda’ comes from the concept of a dead person’s wife who at the
magadziro ceremony was meant to jump across the walking stick left by her
husband. She worked forward and backward and if she did not stumble over the
stick, then, she was clean, but if she did then she had to confess to the elders on
infidelity following the death of her husband before cleansing rituals were carried out.

Chavunduka. (1998), defines witchcraft as the practice “of people with psychic
powers.” Unfortunately, he does not take a psychological view but a social view of
witchcraft. This probably is the psychological approach taken by a group of “witch
hunters” called Tsikamutanda who do witch hunts and work with the social
psychology of the people. These individuals ask the chief to call the whole village
and tell the people that the village has evil individuals and there is a need for
cleansing. Socially each village has some people who are suspected to be practicing
witchcraft. These are people who generally are well to do and often get better
harvests than others. They are suspected of possessing special medicine called
divisi. They are the first culprits for the tsikamutanda. I came across a young woman
who was a border jumper and had over twenty-nine head of cattle and her brothers
accused her of having a chikwambo. A chikwambo is a goblin that feeds on special
food. The tsikamutanda came and indicated that the goblin was feeding on the
human liver from the woman’s relatives who had died. The Tsikamutanda asked the
woman to take a chicken, cut its neck off, and burn it. She did. It was claimed the
goblin was gone and the tsikamutanda was given five heads of cattle and he
disappeared towards the east. A year later he was dead. From my findings a senior

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Tsikamutanda was not happy with the exorbitant payment demanded by the junior
Tsikamtanda, so he bewitched him and retained the cattle.

The Psychology and Methodology of Tsikamutanda

As I was gathering material for this study, I was told that the Tsikamutandas are very
clever born psychologists who play with peoples’ fears. When there is death, the
Tsikamutanda sends his scouts to attend the funeral and collect information and then
disappear while another stays behind telling the bereaved family of a prophet
somewhere who can put things in order. He then refers them to the master
Tsikamutanda. The Tsikamutanda comes armed with the report from one of the
scouts and he is now the owner of the information which the people believe in the
collects lots of animals after he reveals the calamities of the family. The
Tsikamutanda induces fear in the people and even the chiefs are afraid of him. The
Tsikamutanda uses the psychology of fear and intimidation One of the newspaper
reporters in Bikita found that:
1. Villagers in Masvingo Province’s Bikita district heaved a sigh of relief when
two witch-hunters, known as tsikamutandas, were dragged to the courts.
2. The witch-hunters had been terrorising the area east of Masvingo town since
late 2020, taking away cattle worth thousands of dollars, allegedly as payment
for “exorcising” goblins and other items.
3. They had camped in Bikita for close to a month, traversing the length and
breadth of the district, “flushing out” goblins and snakes while taking away
cattle, goats, sheep, hens, and cash as payment.

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Figure 4 The two tsikamutanda asking an old person to confess her witchcraft.

Female and Male witchcraft

Among the Shona people of Bikita witchcraft “Uroyi” is a prerogative of women. Men
had their type of witchcraft called: chitsinga, and muposo. Chitsinga is equated to
what we call “gout”. A person gets it from a man and the legs get rheumatically
affected because muposo or chitsinga has been case onto him. The word seems to
be derived from “tsinga” meaning ‘nerve’ or ‘vein’ that when infected is believed to
make it difficult for a person to walk. The ailment is believed to be ‘removable’ by the
person who sent it in the first place. The removal is called “kuombonora.” A man
deliberately operates this and can even boast at beer parties that he can fix people
who annoy him. He is much feared in the village. He usually moves about alone and
this is the sign to people take as the source of his power. He would be aware of his
powers, but I have not been able to establish if he knows the source of his power.
Chitsinga is very painful and those affected go a long way to pay for its removal they
at times are forced to confess their evil actions to be relieved.

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Muposo is nearly like chitsinga, it is a remotely controlled type of witchcraft that can
be sent from remote places to the victim. The person affected by this can collapse at
a beer party and get paralysed until the man who sent it removes it. It is a very
complex system of witchcraft whose origin is believed to be in the Chipinge and
Birchenough Bridge area to the east of Zimbabwe near the border with Mozambique.
This kind of witchcraft was at times used to fix the parents of a woman who had
failed to honour their contract. In Bikita when there are droughts people give their
daughters to rich people and in turn get food in form of maize and other forms grains.
With the situation today a girl may refuse to go and the man sends a muposo to the
whole family. A lot of calamities could happen which cannot be explained. It could be
lightning striking the homestead or the man himself.

Origins of Witchcraft (Interview with Chief Chabata)

Uroyi hwokukamba or kutenga
This is a very sensitive type of witchcraft because the witch must be very careful in
approaching the individual. It is based on a very close relationship and carefulness not
to break the traditional law of “kupumha” to accuse someone of witchery is tricky in
this situation. An example of this is mubobobo which means having sex with someone
far away from you. This is considered witchcraft and the person needs to be very
careful to get to the person. In these situations, one could be sued if a careful approach
is not observed. In this category belong the witchcraft element of chitsinga, muposo
and muchehiwa. These can be sent to the victim by the remote system using the power
of the witch.
Uroyi hwokutememerwa
Kutemerwa in the Shona language means to have some incision on your body. The
incision is made with some medicated powder called mbanda in a very secret part of
the body. The powder will gradually circulate in the body and the person becomes a
witch. The witches in the village may wish to leave their practice with a young woman.
The girl is invited for a meal and first time it is just an ordinary meal. Eventually, the
meal is served with meat and this is human flesh because it is believed that “human
flesh is the most powerful of the witch’s medicines” (Bourdillon1976:175). The young
woman becomes a witch and as a novice goes around with the older witch. The girl is
generally feared by other girls and she stays alone most of the time.
Uroyi hwedzinza
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Some families are known for their witchcraft activities. The children born in these
families automatically become witches because they inherit this from their parents. It
is a very complex psychological experience for the family. I was told that the names of
children indicate the whole process of this type of witchcraft.
Vhomorai……...remove this
Chenesai……...Make my family clean
Tutsirai………give us more of this witchcraft.

Uroyi hwekurotswa
It is believed that one way of being a witch is through dreams. The dream is only privy
to the witch and this leaves the other people out of the world of the witch. This then
goes back to the Freudian and Jungian interpretations of dreams.
Freud also believed that our dreams can access be repressed or anxiety-provoking
thoughts (mainly sexually repressed desires) that cannot be entertained directly for
fear of anxiety and embarrassment. Thus, defense mechanisms allow a desire or
thought to slip through into our dreams in a disguised, symbolic form – for example,
someone dreaming of a large stick in Freud’s view would be dreaming of a penis. It
was the job of the analyst to interpret these dreams considering their true meaning.

Jung Position: Like Freud, Jung believed that dream analysis allowed for a window
into the unconscious mind. But unlike Freud, Jung did not believe that the content of
all dreams was necessarily sexual or that they disguised their true meaning. Instead,
Jung’s depiction of dreams concentrated more on symbolic imagery. he believed
dreams could have many different meanings according to the dreamer’s associations.
Jung was against the idea of a ‘dream dictionary’ where dreams are interpreted by
fixed meanings. He claimed dreams speak in a distinctive language of symbols,
images, and metaphors and that they portray both the external world (i.e., individuals
and places in a person’s day-to-day life), as well as the person’s internal world
(feelings, thoughts, and emotions).

Jung agreed that dreams could be retrospective and reflect events in childhood, but
he also felt that they could anticipate future events and could be great sources of
creativity. Jung criticised Freud for focusing purely on the external and objective
aspects of a person’s dream rather than looking at both objective and subjective

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content. Finally, one of the more distinctive aspects of Jung’s dream theory was that
dreams could express personal, as well as collective or universal contents. This
universal or collective content was displayed through what Jung termed ‘Archetypes’.

This kind of witchcraft comes to a person in the dream. The person is told which
bushes or animals to use. If he or she reveals the dream the power of witchcraft is
taken away and he or she may die. It is a secret from either the ancestors or some
witches. This involves the acceptance of the unnatural powers of the witches. This is
the kind of witchcraft to which the person is the only one privy to the unnatural powers.
In psychology one is not responsible for actions that happen in dreams. Where is the
morality of witchcraft in this case? Are the subsequence actions to the individual moral
or immoral? Ethical or not ethical?

The Bewitched
Among the Shona people, there is no natural illness or death. All death and ailment
are caused. The question is “who causes them.” The Shona always attribute death to
witchcraft. A person falls from a tree in the village and dies. It cannot be, because this
man has been climbing up trees in the past, why should he fall and die today, of all
days? The person must have been neglected by the ancestors who allowed a witch to
cause the death. A witch is not talked about in public. It is an individual who does evil
performances secretly at night. The fact that it is a nocturnal act makes it
psychologically very complex. These witches are supposed to meet at night when they
perform their acts naked and in darkness.

Conclusive Remarks
As early as the 1890s, the colonial government looked at the practice of witchcraft with
fear and suspicion but did not attempt to follow the whole psychology of the
phenomenon, they never took psychological measures to deal with it. ‘Witchcraft is
arguably a subject that has created a lot of controversies in both colonial and
postcolonial Zimbabwe, as well as in many parts of the world (Sibanda, 2017).
Witchcraft in Zimbabwe is defined as “the use of harmful medicines, harmful charm,
and harmful magic and any other means or devices in causing any illness, misfortune
or death in any person or animal or in causing any injury to any person or animal or

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property”. This is a recognition of the reality and existence of witchcraft, and it cannot
be dealt with by suppressing it. One does not suppress a belief out of existence. To
me, people must go back to the drawing board and look at these phenomena from a
psychological point of view and not merely from a political, economic, or moral
perspective. In this reflection, I feel the attitude toward witchcraft is based on colonial
stereotypes instead of predicting it on psychology. Once the psychological view is
taken, then the whole phenomenon of witchcraft shines out for what it is - universal.
Some of the actions attributed to the witches are imaginary. These include flying to
distant places on a broom or in a winnowing basket or riding on various animals at
night.

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Euripedes The Bachae and Other plays; New York Penguin (1926)

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