The children of Madagascar / by Herbert F. Standing.

  • Herbert Standing
Date:
1887
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The children of Madagascar / by Herbert F. Standing. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    inviting mixture, hair and all ; their idea being that the more they get, the more likely they are to have little babies of their own. Then all present join in a scramble for sugar-cane or fruit, and after this the rest of the baby's hair is cut, and a good meal finishes up the proceedings. There are other curious superstitions connected with this first hair-cutting. Thus, it is thought undesirable that a person with short frizzy hair should be present on the occasion, for fear the child's hair should likewise grow short and frizzy. Again, if the baby's elder brother has died, the festival is omitted altogether; frequently in this case the grandfather of the child, or some other old' relative of the family, will get the baby on the sly and cut all its hair off unknown to its mother; the reason being that it is feared the baby will die like its brother if any fuss is made of it, so it must be angalarin-kety, as they say—that is, ' stolen by the scissors.' The first hair-cutting is sometimes made the occasion for giving the child a name, and I expect you will be interested in hearing what kind of names Malagasy parents give to their children. In the first place, I must tell you that among the Malagasy there are no family or surnames, such as are common in England and other countries. As a matter of course, a child in England will take the name of its parents, but in Madagascar the practice is often reversed, for a father will very frequently take the name of one of his children, with the prefix Raini (which means 'father of) attached to it. Thus, if the first-born child is called Koto, the father might take the name Raini* koto (meaning the ' father of Koto'). You can easily imagine that this want of family names in Mada- gascar is often a great inconvenience, for, since there is necessarily a limited supply to choose from, a very great number of people come to have exactly the same name, so that in one class of fifteen or twenty boys or girls in our schools, it often happens that there will be two or three children of exactly the same name ; and we have to adopt the plan of calling them first, second, third, &c, just as we