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Overview

Kambala-Matindi is the successful bird in a Louyi tale of children eaten by their travelling father. After successive losses, the father lies on his back and offers a daughter to the bird able to open his belly. Other birds try and fail. Kambala-Matindi pierces the belly, and the children emerge alive. The mother and father rejoice. The bird looks at the daughters, chooses one and carries her away as its wife.

Naloungwana asks for a wife too, but the father refuses because that bird did not perform the required rescue. Jacottet’s note compares Kambala-Matindi with the tiny bird that opens Séédimwé’s body in a separate Subiya tale; it does not supply a biological identification. The larger marriage narrative later repeats the father’s child-eating violence, but no bird succeeds in a second rescue. The successful episode must therefore be read alongside that failed repetition rather than taken as a permanent safeguard over the family. The tale does not explain the bird’s household or the carried daughter’s later life.

Small rescuing birdBelly opened after others failChildren released aliveDaughter carried away as wife
01

Origins & earliest records

Jacottet’s 1901 Textes Louyi publishes the original-language tale and French translation. The introduction distinguishes Kaboukou, Akaende and Maroumo; the selected tale’s individual contributor assignment is not confirmed from its inspected heading.

02

Records & interpretation

Complete selected episode and surrounding notes read. Outcomes and unexplained transitions are preserved; neighbouring rescue stories do not replace this tale’s final events.

In the literature

“les enfants sortirent”
Louyi narrative contributor individually unresolved; collected by Édouard Jacottet · Jacottet Textes Louyi: Kambala-Matindi
XXVIII, printed82, first rescue · Édouard Jacottet, French

The children emerge after the bird pierces their father’s belly in the first rescue.

Selected bibliography

Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.

  1. 01

    Études sur les langues du Haut-Zambèze, III: Textes Louyi

    Édouard Jacottet; individual teller unconfirmed · 1901

    XXVIII, pp. 81–83; rescue and promised marriage on p. 82, later unsuccessful rescue reported on p. 83.

  2. 02

    Jacottet Textes Louyi: Kambala-Matindi

    Louyi narrative contributor individually unresolved; collected by Édouard Jacottet · 1901

    Édouard Jacottet, Études sur les langues du Haut-Zambèze, third part: Textes Louyi, Paris: Ernest Leroux,1901. Title and complete introduction independently read; misleading catalogue1869 date rejected. French translation with Louyi originals. Introduction names Kaboukou(1895), Akaende and Maroumo(1900), but retained contents omit promised tale-level initials, so individual attribution for these selections remains unresolved.

Family, evolution & connections

The swallowed children’s household - Jacottet XXVIII

Parentage explicitly stated in the French translation of this Louyi account.

  • Unnamed father and mother
    • Unnamed rescued daughter; later spouse Kambala-Matindi
    • Other unnamed children; count not normalised

The parents and children follow the text’s family terms; the daughter’s later spouse is recorded in her label. Unnamed characters retain descriptive labels. Repeated child counts are uneven, so no fixed census or invented names are supplied. The bird’s marriage is not drawn as biological parentage. French translation inspected; original Louyi not independently translated.

Jacottet, Textes Louyi, XXVIII, French pp. 80-83
Documented · canonical kinship

Unnamed rescued daughter in Jacottet XXVIII

After releasing the children from their father’s belly, Kambala-Matindi chooses and takes one daughter as wife, fulfilling the father’s offer. The daughter is unnamed; no descendants are stated.

Jacottet, Textes Louyi, XXVIII, French pp. 80-83

Located primary passages

Specific passages supporting details in this entry, grouped by their published witness.

Études sur les langues du Haut-Zambèze, III: Textes Louyi

Édouard Jacottet, Études sur les langues du Haut-Zambèze, third part: Textes Louyi, Paris: Ernest Leroux,1901. Title and complete introduction independently read; misleading catalogue1869 date rejected. French translation with Louyi originals. Introduction names Kaboukou(1895), Akaende and Maroumo(1900), but retained contents omit promised tale-level initials, so individual attribution for these selections remains unresolved.

  1. After other birds fail, Kambala-Matindi pierces the father’s belly and releases his eaten children. It chooses one of the daughters as its wife and takes her away. Naloungwana requests a daughter but is refused because the successful rescuer earned the promise. The subsequent journey ends in another failed recovery; the source does not state that Kambala-Matindi itself attempted and failed. A comparative note likens its small size to another rescue bird, rather than identifying a zoological species.

    XXVIII, complete80–83; successful rescue and reward82

French historical translation inspected; Louyi original not independently translated. Full volume, religious practices and other comparative works not claimed completely inspected. Individual narrator attribution held unresolved because detailed contents promised by preface are absent from retained table.

References

Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.

  1. Digitized primary collected textJacottet — Louyi leopard marriageResearch access: 2026-10-05

Image credits

A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.

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