ABSTRACT
In order to function, a society needs more than social groups with their norms and the economics of subsistence. For Tio the ideal state of man was a blissful condition in which good fortune favoured man. Misfortune was due to ever-present evil. This chapter focuses on the causes of evil, divination, curing, and making charms, and finally the process by which people became ngàà.. According to the technique Tio used several sorts of diviners were recognized. There were those who looked into water or into a mirror and saw the face of the person responsible for the misfortune; the ngaa mpiaari, the ngaa mbulu dreams, and those who operated with a charm kaa. Most diviners were also healers. There remains a class of rituals to be dealt with: those which concerned life itself, rather than the restoration or the improvement of a good life.
