A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.
Overview
Likanga appears as an exceptionally handsome, wealthy orphan with cattle and abundant stores. Young women travel to seek marriage with him. Near the village an old woman asks each to approach, but they reject her neglected appearance. The suitor welcomes them and assigns cooking. Whenever a woman tries to taste the meal, he insists that her role is preparing food, not eating it, and consumes everything himself. The women die of hunger, while their families assume they remain married in his household.
A later visitor stops when the old woman calls. She learns the fatal pattern and is told that speaking the suitor’s name will interrupt it. When she worries about forgetting, the old woman tells her to sing the name throughout the journey. After Likanga welcomes her and again prevents her tasting the cooked food, she addresses him by name. He becomes agitated, dresses for a performance and dances while playing his one-string instrument, demanding how she learned the name.
Repeated naming intensifies his response and he announces that he will throw himself into the river. The woman follows and tries to bring him out, but each further use of his name drives him back. He dies despite her attempts to save him. Returning to the deserted village, she takes what she chooses and goes home. Camilla attributes the account to Koua transmission, which Junod explains as Makoua of Mozambique in the local collection context. The narrative supplies no bodily transformation or cannibal eating: his predation is the deliberate withholding of food.
Origins & earliest records
Camilla supplies the account and identifies Koua transmission. Junod’s note discusses Makoua stories circulating near Lourenço-Marques and offers a separate comparison with other courtship customs; those customary hypotheses do not identify an individual earlier teller.
Records & interpretation
Junod (1897), XXVIII Likanga, complete pp. 309–313; Koua/Camilla transmission note pp. 309–310, old woman’s warning pp. 311–312, name-triggered dance and river ending p. 313.
In the literature
“Mais il mourut.”
XXVIII Likanga, printed p. 313 · Henri-Alexandre Junod (French)
Despite the wife’s attempts to save him, Likanga dies in the river.
Selected bibliography
Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.
- 01
Les chants et les contes des Ba-Ronga de la baie de Delagoa
Junod (1897), XXVIII Likanga, complete pp. 309–313; Koua/Camilla transmission note pp. 309–310, old woman’s warning pp. 311–312, name-triggered dance and river ending p. 313.
- 02
Les chants et les contes des Ba-Ronga — XXVIII Likanga
Henri-Alexandre Junod, Les chants et les contes des Ba-Ronga de la baie de Delagoa, Lausanne: Georges Bridel, 1897, Princeton scan. Original French recording/translation; complete selected XXVII–XXX read with their notes, not the whole volume. Original printed306/313/314/319/320 visually checked for excerpts.
Family & connections
A source-supported family tree or inspiration record has not yet been compiled for this profile. Related reading below indicates a connection in subject matter, not a proven lineage or creative influence.
Located primary passages
Specific passages supporting details in this entry, grouped by their published witness.
Les chants et les contes des Ba-Ronga de la baie de Delagoa
Henri-Alexandre Junod, Les chants et les contes des Ba-Ronga de la baie de Delagoa, Lausanne: Georges Bridel, 1897, Princeton scan. Original French recording/translation; complete selected XXVII–XXX read with their notes, not the whole volume. Original printed306/313/314/319/320 visually checked for excerpts.
- A handsome wealthy orphan repeatedly starves women who marry him. A final visitor listens to an old woman and learns his name. Its repetition provokes increasingly frantic dancing and music, then repeated river plunges. The woman attempts to rescue him, but calling him Likanga again renews the agitation and he eventually drowns. She takes his wealth and returns home.
Historical collected French rendering with colonial missionary framing, not a transparent modern community account. Printed excerpts checked in original facsimiles; other page boundaries read in retained primary OCR. No song, ritual wording, recipe or image copied.
References
Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.
- Attributed oral account in French collected primary editionJunod — Likanga in Camilla’s Koua TaleResearch access: 2026-10-05
Image credits
A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.