ABSTRACT

This paper is about an African in Nyasaland2 who was active as a diviner from about 1956 to 1964 and during that time attracted a large clientele from at least four different countries. Its purpose is threefold: first, to record briefly what is known about him, about his methods of divination and the spread of his influence; second, to discuss some of the factors that enabled him to be so influential, particularly among the Hehe of Tanganyika, a people who speak a Bantu language and who, from the time that they resisted the German conquest, have been regarded as one of the most important peoples in the country;3 third, to suggest that the way his influence spread and the way in which different people interpreted his work may illuminate the study of similar phenomena which have occurred at other times and in other places.