THE CHILD AND THE EAGLE; AN ILA FOLKTALE ABOUT THE ORIGIN OF MURDER
A folktale is defined as a mythical story told through oral history from generation to generation by people of a particular culture. Folktales are an important part of Zambian culture. Traditionally, these stories were passed down to the young members of the society by word of mouth (oral tradition). Elders would sit the young ones around a fire and tell them folktales as a way to explain certain phenomenon about the world and to also teach them important life lessons.
Each traditional Zambian society had its own folktales that were based on mythical stories that sought to offer an explanation for certain happenings. One such phenomenon that was explained in a mythical context was the origin of murder. In the pre-Christian era, before the biblical story of Cain and Abel offered a Christian explanation for the origins of murder, African societies used folktales to explain how murder began. An example of one such folktale was the story of the Child and the Eagle which was narrated among the Ila speaking people of Southern Province. As with many other African folktales, this story was passed from generation to generation through oral history and was told to young ones by the elders. This particular folktale as with many other folktales also had a moral lesson embedded in it.
This is how the story goes:
Once upon a time, there was a woman who had a young child. On a particular day she decided to go and do some farm work in her fields. As she arrived at the field, her child began to cry and so to stop the child from crying she suckled the child. Once the child had finishing suckling she laid it down in the shade nearby so that she could get on with the work in the field.
After a short while, the child began to cry again, and then suddenly an eagle came and sat near the child. The eagle wrapped its wings around the crying child and soothed the child. In the comfort of the wings of the eagle, the child stopped crying.
Looking from a distance, the mother noticed what had happened and she became afraid thinking that maybe the eagle wanted to eat the child. She went towards her child were the eagle was and the eagle flew away. She suckled her child and put the child on her back. Once she had done the work of the day, she returned home. Once she arrived at home, she decided not to tell her husband about what had happened with the child and the eagle.
The next morning, she went to the field to work. Upon reaching the field she again laid her child to sleep in the shade while she did the work. As she worked the child began to cry. As the child started crying, the eagle which had appeared the previous day flew next to the child and quieted the crying child. The mother was very amazed, and said “What is That Eagle doing ? It is sitting upon my child, but it doesn’t bite my child or scratch it, but instead calms the child. This is really amazing”.
The mother went over to her child and when the Eagle saw her coming, it flew away and went to sit on a tree. The woman took the child and went home. When she arrived home she was so amazed by what she had witnessed these past two days and went to her husband and said “I have witnessed an amazing thing”. Her husband responded saying “What happened?”. The woman then began to narrate to her husband, “Today is the second day of me seeing something amazing at the field where i work, i put our child to sleep in the shade, and as soon as it starts crying, an Eagle comes and covers the child with its wings and sooths the child to stop the crying.
Amazed by this narration the husband began to dispute this account and said “No, you are lying , there was never such a thing that happened.” The wife remained quiet and didn’t respond .
In the afternoon she took her hoe and went to the field. When she arrived, she put her child in the shade. After some time the child began to cry. Upon seeing this the woman said to herself “Let me go and call my husband who disputed what i said so that he sees for himself what happens when the eagle calms our baby down”.
When she arrived home she said to husband “Since you disputed what i told you, come with me now let’s go and see.” The man got up and took his bow and two arrows and followed his wife to the farm. On his arrival the woman told him, “Sit here, I will put the child to sleep in the shade, and then, when you see the eagle coming, hide yourself and watch what happens.”
The woman left the child and went away to a short distance, and the man hid himself there. Then the child began to cry very loudly. As the man was watching, he saw the Eagle come and sit upon the child. Then the man was greatly alarmed and thought the eagle would harm the child, and so he charged his bow with an arrow so that he could shoot the Eagle which was sitting on his child. But at the moment of launching the arrow, the Eagle dodged the arrow and the arrow pierced the child.
This tragic incident showed that even though The Eagle was a kind person who had been helping to sooth the child, the father of the child wished to kill it without first trying to understand what was going on. Then the Eagle cursed him, saying : “Now kindness among men is at an end ; because you killed your child in an attempt to kill me who was kind to you. Beginning with you and going on to all people, you shall kill each other.” And so murder entered the world of human beings.
This mythical folktale among the Ila people tries to explain how murder among men began. It also seeks to teach a moral philosophy that sometimes people try to harm people who show them kindness without first trying to understand how helpful that person has been. Some people react with impulse and accuse people of doing things without first getting the correct information about the good intentions that a person has. This folktale offered a teaching about how taking rash decisions in the heat of the moment can lead to catastrophic outcomes.
It is important to note that folktales should always been seen in their mythical context and not taken as factual narration of real events. They are merely a part of culture and their role is to offer explanations to certain phenomenon and also illustrate a moral teaching to the members of a particular society.
(By © Zambian Footprints)