Comparative History: Memory and Heritage of Slavery

XVII​th​ Century Kongo:

Lieux de M​é​moire, A Past Revisited

by

George Kintiba, Ph.D.

1
 Introduction

A new field of study in the history of slavery is the problem of collective

memory. It is memory of humiliation, torture, and traumatic marks left not only on

the victimized individuals, but we would also add the hurtful symbols of

degradation, loss, and sometimes of guilt on the memories of those left behind in

their ancestors’ land. This essay is a suggestive attempt to capture the XVII​th​ century

Kingdom of Kongo’s Lieux de Mémoire. The Kingdom of Kongo is one of the greatest,

XIII​th​ – XVII​th​ centuries, kingdoms of West Central Africa and the first in the annals of

history that embraced Catholicism in sub-Saharan Africa and maintained diplomatic

ties with Portugal and the Vatican, siege of the Catholic Church. It is important that

we highlight from start that the historiography of precolonial Central Africa seeking

to address the problem of collective memory stands as the stepchild of African

1
historiography. This is because African historiography is still in its infancy stage

and calls for a strong interdisciplinary approach today in order to make it relevant
2
and attractive.

The first chapter—​Early Encounters: Kongo-Portugal​—gives a brief but

important historical background of early Kongo in order to capture the central

themes of XVII​th​ century Kongo. The first point, ​Kongo Cosmology and Christianity,

helps establish the ground to understanding these two different worldviews that are

1
(Vansina 1966, 3-4)
2
(Lonsdale 1981, 140-46); (Pekka 2000, 246)

2
forced to live side by side. Their contact creates the problem of acculturation, an

Africanized form of Christianity and new religious movements such as the

Kongolese Antonian Movement. The second point, ​Terms on the Construction of

Kongo Collective Memory,​ ​ gives us the freedom to sample terms that would allow us

the choice to pick up few Kongolese and Portuguese concepts to better make an

attempt to capture that which is central to Kongo collective memory.

The second chapter, ​Lieux de Mémoire and Religious Symbols,​ is an attempt to

connect few religious symbols to specific localities. The location, as an important

tangible ‘lieux de mémoire’—sites of memory in English—in dialogue with religious

signs shed lights on the way a site of memory is the given location where one

discovers similar religious used by both Kongo and Portugal. Those religious signs,

though similar, differ in meaning because of their origin. The first point of the

chapter is ​the City port of Mpinda and New Religious Symbol,​ the first location where

Kongo’s cosmogram meets the Christian cross is a fascinating example case study

shedding lights on religious meanings and the use of that symbol in politic. The

second point, ​Mbanza Kongo: Big House of Fetishes vs. Catholicism​, suggests to look

into the capital as a site of memory where the kingdom’s political and economical,

social and religious life are approached to tackle the question of collective memory.

Both the city port of Mpinda and Mbanza Kongo are two of many important Kongo’s

sites of memory to help preserve Kongo’s past and avoid reconstructing its history

based on the present.

3
 Early Encounters: Kongo – Portugal

By 1482 Kongo was a well-established kingdom and Nzinga Kuwu sat on its

throne. It was that year that the Kingdom of Kongo first encountered Portuguese

explorers—Diego ​Ç​ão and his men. It was also the beginning of Kongo integration into

the Atlantic world, which expanded progressively southwards to the Ndongo, Benguela,

Angola, and Loango. These contacts created dramatic new developments with important

requests to the Portuguese crown for missionaries and technicians, carpenters, teachers,

and masons. Three years later, 1485, the very first exchange of four Portuguese

missionaries and four Kongo noblemen from the city port of Mpinda sealed the official
3
act of integration. By this time the kings of both kingdoms knew most important facts

about each other’s monarchy.

The intensity of the trade to follow was predated by numerous encounters and the

relationship between Kongo and Portugal​ before the founding of the Portuguese colony of

Angola in 1575 by nearly a century and resulted in a unique blend of African and
4
European political practices and cultural synthesis. ​These contacts for Portuguese grew

out of their need for expansion southward and the establishment of colonies ​on off-shore

islands, like São Tomé in 1485, or, more significantly, in the Central African mainland in

3
(Vansina 1966, 45)
4
(Heywood and Thornton 2007, 49)

4
Angola from 1575. The surge of tens of thousands of captives exported on Portuguese

shipping after1605 and the uniquely Afro-Atlantic culture of many of those Africans was
5
a product of this interaction.” ​From the Kongo perspective, it was these gradual contacts

that would determine Kongo’s politics and religious struggles. Diogo ​Ç​ã​o’s third trip

would be very important because King Nzinga Kuwu of Kongo sent a Nsaku clansman as

ambassador to Portugal and a number of Kongo younger men to be educated in

Portuguese schools. The education of these younger men were paid in gifts of ivory and

raphia clothes, copper anklets and slaves to Jo​ã​o II, king of Portugal. The return of the

Nsaku clansman four years later would bring another important aspect in the contact

between Kongo and Portugal: the arrival of new missionaries and artisans, but most

importantly of Portuguese explorers whose mission was to find the route to Abyssinia for

King Manuel I of Portugal wanted to establish a large African Christian kingdom that he

believed would be adjacent to Abyssinia, the land of Prester John. King Manuel I’s dream

was to surround the Muslim world by Christian forces. ​Also Manuel​,​ believed that Kongo

bordered on the Portuguese settlements in Mozambique and the empire of Mwene

6
Mutapa which lay inland from them. Among other important aspects of the first contacts

and relations between Portugal and Kongo were: the first Kongolese baptism—that of the

governor of the Atlantic province of Soyo—and the first recorded visit of a Portuguese

commander, Rui, of a fleet to Mbanza Kongo, the capital of Kongo. There is also the

need to underline the erection of the first known Catholic Church in Kongo and the

5
(Heywood and Thornton 2007, 52)
6
(Vansina 1966, 47)

5
baptism of King Nzinga Kuwu as King João I with the royal family and most of Kongo
7
nobility in June 1491.

While the city port of Mpinda in the province of Soyo and Mbanza Kongo, the

capital, emerged as important cities during these first contacts between Kongo and

Portugal, the visit of commander Rui in the capital was interrupted by a war in the

northeast province of Nsundi. The relationships between Kongo and Portugal were

strengthened by Rui and his men’s participation in the war against the Tyo (Teke)

kingdom near Stanley Pool. Kongo’s victory over the Tyo’s invasion was partially

attributed to the presence of Portuguese. By 1492, Portuguese missionaries were fully

engaged in attending to the need of numerous conversions and of newly built schools.

Two years after the military campaign against the Teke in 1494, Cavazzi pointed to the

return of new Kongo pupils educated in Portugal and also highlighted a ten-year period,
8
between 1494 and 1504, of no new contacts between both kingdoms. Cuvellier, Vansina,

and Thornton gave reports of visits of ships from São Tomé, whose inhabitants

maintained the slave trade regulated by the famous document called the ​donatario o​ f
9
1486 and 1493, which gave guidelines for trading with the Kingdom of Kongo. The first

implantation of Christianism in the kingdom of Kongo resulted in a big shaking of

Kongolese traditional, religious structures, and deep disagreements that divided the royal

family of Kongo. Between 1494 and 1506, King Nzinga Kuwu and his oldest son

Mpanzu-a-Kitima rejected the new religion brought in by Catholic missionaries and

7
(Cavazzi 1965, 1:27); (Vansina 1966, 45-47)
8
(Cavazzi 1965, 1:46)
9
(Cuvellier 1946:30); (Vansina 1966, 46); (Thornton 1983, 49)

6
returned to their Kongolese ancestral religious belief. The queen mother and Mbemba

Nzinga, Affonso I as he became known later on his attributed Christian name, remained

Catholics.

The religious opposition that emerged out of the royal conflict reflected also the

fundamental opposition between two factions in Kongo political struggle for succession

to the royal throne. The participations of the nobility in these kind of struggles within the

royal family pointed to an important and new aspect this class found itself caught in

between. ​The most important revolts of the nobility occurred at the death of the king as

an integral part of the struggle to determine his successor, and were motivated by hopes

that one or another potential candidate would support their careers better than would

one party of the other… and Matheus Cordoso, the acute Jesuit observer of Kongo

politics, noted in the context of revolt in 1622… the nobles supported one party or

revolted to ‘avenge themselves on each other,’ or to ‘make a king who conforms to their
10
pretentions’. Here, one could easily note that the early encounter between Kongo and

Portugal brought some destabilization within the nobility as well because it created a

major rift within this class: ​Kongo’s politics is made all the more clear when one
11
examines the behavior of nobles whose position was not the gift of the king​. This first

religious struggles within the royal family forced Mbemba Nzinga (Affonso I) to leave

for the northern province of Nsundi where he kept contact with Portugal ​since it is

10
(Thronton 1983, 42)
11
(Ibid., 43)

7
 12
reported that in 1504 priests and religious objects were sent to him in Nsundi. These

early encounters between Kongo and Portugal would soon run into unexpected major

difficulties that would determine the future of their relationships and of the Kongo

kingdom. As the island of São Tomé lost its monopoly on Kongo trade, ship captains and

the governor started to steal, as early as 1508, Affonso I’s presents to Manuel I of

Portugal ​and hampered as much as they could the exchange of envoys between Portugal

and Kongo. Also some technicians proved to be undesirable: by 1509 some masons

refused to work and lived like nobles. The ship captains were rude to the Africans and
13
treated them like inferior beings. ​These changes led to the codification of a program by

Manuel to Christianize and lusitanize Kongo. The same program, ​regimento,​ gave more

power to Portugal ambassador and stood as a blueprint for Kongo acculturation. The

regimento went to adding such a request as the King of Kongo and his nobility to receive
14
European titles, to carry European emblems, and to follow Portuguese rules of etiquette.

In other words, it was a clear stance pointing to Manuel’s authority and kingdom being

greater than Affonso I’s.

There were many other uneasiness related to this new program of acculturation

because it sought to expand not only the power of the Portuguese ambassador, collecting

geographical and political data about the Kingdom of Kongo, but also asked the King of

Kongo to make payments to Portugal in slaves, copper, or ivory. The plan of

12
(Vansina 1966, 46). The best overviews of these events can be found in a careful reading of original
sources as in (Cuvelier 1946,​ 5​ 8-69​).​ Cuvellier points to important cargoes of religious objects that were
sent to Affonso I.
13
(Vansina 1966, 47-48); (Cuvelier 1946, 79)
14
Thornton 1983, 256); (Cuvellier 1946:50); (Vansina 1966, 48)

8
acculturation failed because on its base stood the push for cultural change on a major

scale and the ambiguity of the program itself, which was deeply connected to greed and

personal ambitions of Portuguese residing in the Kingdom of Kongo to make profit.

There was also the great unbalance related to the very small number of missionaries and

technicians as opposed to the higher number of traders and their high mortality rate. ​The

fundamental ambiguity was that Portugal was willing to help Kongo but wanted to

exploit the country economically; that it recognized Kongo as an equal and arranged for

its recognition as such in Rome by urging Affonso to send his son to the pope to give

obedience in the name of the kingdom but wanted to limit this sovereignty—commercially

by keeping monopolies, judicially by sending over judges for the Portuguese in Kongo,

and religiously by its rights over the conversion of the peoples of Africa (rights acquired
15
​ ​do). These
by the Treaty of Tordesillas and embodied in the “patronage,” the padroã

first early encounters, from the Portuguese perspective, had a triple teleology: political

and economical expansion, religious zeal to gain souls for Christ, and finally stop Islamic

push for expansion southwards. The integration and acculturation programs initiated by

Portuguese in the Kongo not only brought political and economical changes, but also

shook Kongo’s traditional and religious values as well as setting new dynamics leading

the demise of the Kingdom of Kongo in 1665.

By the end of the XV​th​ and early XVII​th​ centuries, Kongo political and economical

power were no longer viable because of the destructive impact of slavery, pressure put on

15
(Cavazzi 1965, 2: 79); (Vansina 1966, 50) See his beautiful narrative on the obedience issue.

9
Affonso I and his successors with the threat of excommunication by the governor of São

Tomé to make the royal monopoly in trade impossible, internal fratricide wars and

external repeated attacks from neighboring kingdoms as the Tyo and the Jaga. It is in this

context that Affonso I wrote Manuel of Portugal: ​There are many traders in all corners

of the country. They bring ruin to the country. Every day people are enslaved and

kidnapped, even nobles, even members of the king’s own family.​ .. ​In addition, the traders
16
​ he severity of the situation,
in the bush encouraged the chiefs to rebel against the king. T

highlights Bontinck, pointed to Affonso I’s big concern about the disrespect to royal

orders, the immediate danger to his authority, and the eventual insubordination of

territorial rulers that could lead to internal fights and more kidnapping. Thus total chaos

and the complete demise of the Kingdom of Kongo. Affonso I’s fears became true in

1526 that the king decided in July of that year to expel all whites from his kingdom to the
17
exception of missionaries and teachers. Nowhere have we been able to find Affonso I’s

total rejection of slave trade and a royal regret and complete abandonment of their

involvement in human trade.

The original contact was worsened not only because of the deep impact of the

slave trade, but also of missionaries’ deep implications in local politic, the Portuguese

factions, and new trade problems that arose due to enormous quantity of silver rings sent

to Portugal. ​These gifts plus rumors about the copper mines of Bembe led the court of

Portugal to believe that there were rich mines in Ko​ ngo, ​and that gold, silver, and copper

16
(Cuvelier 1946, 83); (Vansina 1966, 52)
17
(Bontinck 1964, 58-67)

10
were plentiful.​ ​In 1536 experts—among them a German—were sent to Kongo, but

Affonso prevented from prospecting… but a German miner stayed behind and in 1539

reported that the mineral wealth in copper, lead, and silver was greater than in Spain.

From that moment on Portugal believed that this was true and would try to compel the

Kongo kings to reveal the location of the mines and to hand them over. Even if the Kongo

kings wanted to, which they did not, this could not be done… However, Lisbon saw this

as a proof of the bad faith of the Kongolese, and it was this question of minerals that
18
would trigger off the ultimate invasion of Kongo in 1665. ​It is without doubt that

Affonso I’s reign set a pattern in Kongo history and succession to the throne for centuries

that followed.

Kongo Cosmology and Christianity

Affonso I, showed through his half-hearted efforts for educating and converting

Kongolese, had ever since been presented as a Christian saint, a naïve savage, and one of

the greatest kings of Kongo. His influence would continue unchallenged until 1640s. Yet,

in spite of those sacrifices, historians agree that both programs—conversion and

education—were not a complete success. Those programs did not annihilate or change

Kongo’s markers that defined their cosmology and meanings captured through Kongo

life span—birth, childhood, adolescence, marriage, child-rearing, old age, and dying. ​ To

be removed from the kinship network was to alter the life cycle in ways that are

unimaginable for most Westerners... To face these challenges alone, without the

18
(Cuvelier 1946, 97); (Vansina 1966, 54); (Thornton 1983, 44-45)

11
collective support and shared understandings of the natal network of kin, was tantamount
19
​ ongo cosmology, captured under the same veil of African religions,
to social death. K

recognized the presence of a supreme being but far remove from people’s affair. The

“original ancestor’s” concern was the well-being of their descendants and never of all

humanity as the Christian God. Only through a series of divine entities, a Kongolese was
20
able to communicate with the divine. It is crucial to underline here that in Kongo

religious beliefs and daily activities were intimately connected: change in the secular

world automatically impacted religious beliefs, practices, and humans’ relations with

Nzambi Mpungu,​ the creator of all things. Catholic missionaries forced and turned this

spiritual being into the Christian God. The power of the king, which was, without doubt,

of divine origin stood in strong contradiction with Kongo’s worldview.

It was at this point that Nzambi Mpungu became visibly involved in every day

affairs of Kongo. Affonso I, though a genuine conversion to Catholicism, abandoned his

ancestral ways of life and the sanctions of divine kinship that he considered them pagan

or better devilish. No longer was Nzambi Mpungu remote or inaccessible but became the
21
subject of worship by Kongolese Christians. This forced note became one of the major

points of contention between the ritual healers also known as traditional priests or

diviners (nganga) and Catholic missionaries. It was in major and important cities and

locations as Mbanza Kongo, the royal court and in the nobility, and the city port of

Mpinda that those differences were highlighted, creating a fissure in the Kongo’s

19
(Sweet 2003, 32-33)
20
(Mbiti 1970, 45)
21
(Thornton​ 1​ 998​,​ 114-15)

12
society—between the elite class and the common people. The new forced meaning

afforded to Nzambi Mpungu illustrated the attempt futility to find the true Christian God

in Kongo and also showed how Kongo cosmology was not constructed around a supreme

being in the same way as in Christianity. It was the spirits of the most recently deceased

ancestors that played prominent roles in the lives of the living. Here we find a false and

forced reading of the specific utility of ancestral spirits and their relationship to the

living.

A very simple example of this false and forced reading could be well-captured in

the following potential similarities seen between Kongo cosmology and

Catholicism/Western science. An herbal cure, for example, in Kongo was seen as a strong

spiritual remedy, asserting the ritual knowledge and power invested in the traditional

doctor most of the time viewed as diviner, ritual healer, or a curer. This was deeply

rooted in the cosmological world of Kongo from immemorial time to the present. In the

Western approach, that medical success would be attributed to scientific truth and

chemical properties. Both cures operated in the same way, but to the former the cure

came from the spirits and for the latter from a more supposedly rational science. Given

due respect to both approaches, we would term the Kongo’s approach “science of

religion” and the Western a “rational science.” The second questionable assumption, as

presented by John Mbiti, Laurenti Magesa, and James Sweet, was God as mysterious and

unknowable residing in heaven. These three scholars clearly showed this assumption

failing in African context on two counts, at least. First, African deities were all

13
well-known to their adepts by name, by their locations, personal characteristics, the type

of illness they caused, and so on. Second, the notion of heaven, as captured in

Judeo-Christian, remained unknown in African religions. To these differences, one could

add the non-existence of a belief in Africa stressing the inferiority of the quality of life on

earth to that to be enjoyed in the “other world.” There is no such thing as a promise,
22
threat, or reward by any African deity to good people to be enjoyed in heaven.

African, Kongo in particular, and European cosmologies, pointed Sweet, ​were

largely incompatible, some scholars are now suggested that the key to religious exchange

had little to do with replacing one belief system in favor of another. Rather, religious

exchange between Africans and Europeans depended upon a series of shared revelations,

revelations that resonated within both the African and European spiritual traditions.

These shared revelations occurred as early as the late fifteenth century, when the
23
​ he only way
Portuguese began their efforts to convert the Kongolese to Christianity. T

to attract Kongolese into Catholicism was the willingness of Catholic priests to make

some spiritual concessions admitting the validity of some Kongolese revelations.

Continuous revelation was the backdrop upon which Kongo cosmology rested. It was an

ordinary, continuous phenomenon through which Kongo deities and ancestral spirits

intervene from their sphere on behalf of the living. In Christianity, revelation and all its

sources were finite, limited to a very small sphere: God, Jesus, Mary (mother of Jesus),

and the saints. Revelation, for Catholics, was rare and extraordinary; its occurrence was

22
(Sweet 2003, 107-10); (Mbiti 1970, 60-85); (Magesa 1946,​ 7​ 7-89)
23
(Sweet 2003, 109)

14
judged miraculous and confirmed only by the Catholic clergy. The constant dialogue

between the invisible and the visible worlds was central to Kongo cosmology and a target

of Catholic extirpation campaigns. No one ever saw Kongo religious rituals as a heritage

and a gift to humanity, but vices that perpetrated barbarism, by nature diabolic, and
24
ultimately the work of the devil. This explanation gave one of the best description of the

big rift existing between Catholicism and Kongo cosmology, pointing to the incapacity

for Kongolese to serve the God of Portuguese and their disposition heathen that cannot be

cured. Some years later Cavazzi wrote: ​Com efeito, os feiticeiros, descobertos e expulsos
25
​ ​o falta que os abrigue. The approach taken by
de uma regiao, fogem para outra, e nã

Catholic priests showed little to no tolerance towards African rituals and practices. It was

inquisition style of Christianization of Kongo. Here, we do not agree with Cavazzi in his

interpretation of Kongolese embracing the Catholic faith—on their own terms while they

persisted in their beliefs in indigenous African forms. Nowhere did Cavazzi pointed to

the culture of terror and fear of burning whoever opposed the priests as heretics, just in

the same way priests burned ​idol houses​ and ​fetish objects​ in a public display

demonstrating the impotence of African spirits and religious leaders known as ​nganga.

The ​priest stormed into the enclosure and seized the various instruments of their worship,

then ordered the buildings set on fire. Standing amid the flames, and grasping his

crucifix, Father Marcellino quoted Psalm 68: “God shall arise; His enemies shall be

24
(Thornton 1983, 259-60)
25
(Cavazzi 1965, 1:87). Our approximate translation is: “​Indeed, the sorcerers, discovered and expelled
from one region, fleeing to another, and lack no shelter.”

15
 26
scattered; those that hate him shall flee before his face.” ​Here we find already few

elements shedding light on Kongolese collective memory.

Cécile-Alice Fromont in her article, ​Icones Chrétiennes ou symboles Kongo?

L’art et la religion en Afrique Centrale au temps de la Traite, XVII​è​—XVIIIè​ ​ siècles,

pointed to certain symbols found in both Christianity and Kongo religion but differing in

meaning. One of those symbols was the crucifix. In Kongo, the cross stood as a powerful

emblem of spirituality that predated contact with Europe. In Kongo cosmology, the

crucifix was given as a metaphor for the cosmos and the diagram for the trajectory of

human life as it crossed the realms of the living and of the ancestors. Fromont wrote: ​La

croix est un signe appartenant aussi bien au christianisme qu’à la religion traditionelle

Kongo. Dans la théologie chrétienne, elle est le symbole central unissant les membres de

l’Eglise, faisant réference au dogme fondamental de la chrétienté qu’est le récit de la

crucifixion, de la mort, puis de la resurrection du Christ… Dans la religion Kongo, telle

qu’elle est écrite dans les documents dès XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles, le symbole de la croix

était lié au Kimpasi, une association rituelle qui occupait un role essential dans

l’organisation politique et sociale de la région. Le rite central definissant le Kimpasi

consistait en la céremonie d’initiation, pendant laquelle le future member, choisi parmi

l’élite sociale et politique du Kongo, était conduit à perdre connaissance pour etre

ensuite ramene à ses sens au sein de l’enclos secret du groupe, dans sa nouvelle qualité

de membre initié… La parenté conceptuelle entre le rite initiatique du Kimpasi et le récit

26
(Thornton 1998, 72-73)

16
du dogme central chrétien suggérant la possibilité d’un passage entre la mort et la vie,

tous deux exprimés par le motif de la croix, était distinctement perçue par le habitants de
27
la région. European believed that Kongolese, in their initial stage of conversion to

Catholicism, were embracing God and the Catholic saints, and Kongolese held to the

belief that Europeans were embracing their deities. MacGaffey termed the interaction

between both groups ​dialogue of the deaf​. Here, one could clearly see that Kongo and

Portuguese worldviews were two different realities. Sweet pointed to the possible
28
misinterpretation of religious meanings on both sides—Kongo and Portuguese. But by

the time Christianity became Kongolese official religion, Kongo’s kings used the crucifix

as emblems of their leadership and power, and they became principal promoters of the

new religion in the region. The crosses of Kongo, as suggested by Cuvelier and Sweet,

were made primarily from copper as one of the fine and precious metal traded between
29
Kongo and Europe. The blending of these two traditions gave birth to a new

Africanized form of Christianity, which was the precursor of new religious movements of

the next century independent of traditional Kongolese cosmology—Dona Beatriz Kimpa

Mvita and the antonian movement. With Sweet, we would maintain that Kongo

Catholicism was a parallel belief system that complement Kongolese worldviews. In the

second chapter we would expand more on and compare certain Kongolese religious

symbols with some of Catholicism.

Kongo Cosmogram

27
(Fromont 2009, 53)
28
(Sweet 2003, 113)
29
(Cuvelier 1946, 53-55); (Sweet 2003, 110)

17
Kongo cosmogram remained a combination of the cross with a circle at the tip of each ends of

the cross. The sun run counterclockwise to illuminate the world of the dead during

earthly nighttime and rose in the northeast for the living. The cycle in which the sun run

was an incessant return and represented the continuity of life: through birth, death, and

rebirth. Pointing to those circles, MacGaffey saw cosmograms in which two independent

poles in symbiosis representating ​God [nzambi Mpungu] and man, God and the dead,
30
and the living and the dead.

In the second design of the Kongo cosmogram, there is another important aspect

highlighted—the division of the Kongo cosmos into two distinctive parts: the physical

30
(MacGaffey 1984, 108)

18
world and the spiritual world. The entire world is sustained by a dual principle that is

constant and oppose to each other: good or evil, sacred medicines or minkisi (powers that

control the spirits of the cosmos connecting the living with the powers of the dead), etc.

In Kongo cosmogram (Tendwa Nza Kongo), we see a continuity of human lives and the

compelling vision of the everlasting community of all good men and women.

Terms on XVII century Kongo Collective Memory

By the mid XVII​th​ century, Kongo was no longer the powerful kingdom on West

Central coasts of Africa. Inter fratricide wars, the quest for mines by Europeans, the

forced depopulation caused by the Atlantic Slave Trade, and Portugal’s politics seeking

to restrict the Kongo monarch sovereignty, influences, and contacts brought Kongo to its

knees. It is at this point that collective memory and history emerged as important trends

that shaped the telling of Kongo’s history. Different and yet deeply interwoven, memory

and history could be in fundamental opposition. Terms on XVII​th​ century Kongo

collective memory give a glimpse on that which make Kongo a new field for diasporan

memory. While the terms remained connected and pointing to the history of not just

important spaces, but also localities and movements, a mere representation of change

over time helped the reorganization of the past. For Nora, who articulated the concept of

memory, ​memory installs remembrance within the sacred; history, always prosaic,
31
releases it again. I​ n other words, terms on Kongo collective memory shaped the telling

31
(Nora 1989, 9)

19
of Kongo’s history. Kongo has more to tell and lights to shed on the Atlantic slave trade

because of its contribution to the emerging south Atlantic economy and historical interest

rediscovered. It is important that we investigate the workings of memory.

As an historical space of first interest in the contact between Europe and America,

Kongo would remain one of the principal places in the discourse of origin for African

Americans. ​Recent research shows that as many as one-quarter of all African Americans
32
​ o make sense of
ultimately derive from Central Africa (and mostly Kongolese) roots. T

their past, Kongolese must create or revive certain notions of history in the present. There

were and still are concepts, persons, and locations that are important in the construction

process of Kongo collective memory: kimpasi versus corrigetor, regimento and donatario.

Nganga, tendale or ngolambolo, Hum people, Stanley Pool (Kisasa), and pombeiros,

Dona Kimpa Mvita, Nzinga-a-Kuwu, Affonso, Diogo I, city port of Mpinda, Mbanza

Kongo, Mbamba, etc. Kimpasi, a strong spiritual association of the XV-XVII​th​ centuries,

stood to oppose the corrigetor—a Portuguese ambassador in Kongo appointed by

Portugal’s crown with administrative, political, and judicial powers. The regimento, the

old document regulating the trade between Portugal and Kongo, and the donatario, the

new document, sought to exploit the Kingdom of Kongo from its population to its

economic potential. All these terms have always pointed to a certain kind of unity, which

included past, present, local, and precolonial perspectives. Contrary to such places as

Ghana and Senegal where locations infused with meanings and histories of violence and

32
(Thornton 1998, 1)

20
brutality due to slavery, the present regions of the former Kingdom of Kongo have no

specific site with new memorial and center prepared to raise an awareness of the deep

implications and devastations of slavery in the Kingdom of Kongo.

These few selected terms, persons, and locations, highlighted above, pointed to

memories that are deeply tied up to past uses of sites. This triple fold runs the danger of

ceasing to be a physical location and become an historical abstraction due to the present

state the problem of memory of slavery with its brutalities and consequences have been

placed. In other words, the importance afforded to the question of Kongo collective

memory. Beyond Kongo, Robben Island near Cape Town, South Africa, stands as a

model that gives life to the collective memory of injustice, brutality and violence. It

reminds us of more recent injustices under South Africa’s apartheid regime. Here visitors

travel by boat and bus to view Nelson Mandela’s cell and the living quarters of other

political prisoners… At the site, decisions to represent various histories… undergo

33
negotiations that consider the influence of the moral aspects of memory. ​By exposing

these Kongolese sites, a constant and renewal sense of its global importance will shed

more lights and revive Kongo’s collective memory as it exposes the realities of the

Atlantic slave trade at the same time giving to these lieux de mémoire a chance to enter

not just the tourist economy, but also helping the African Diaspora to know another

region of the African continent that was deeply affected by the Atlantic slave trade.

33
(Macgonagle 2006, 253)

21
 Lieux de Mémoire and Religious Symbols

The focus of this chapter is to see how a sample of important locations in XVII​th

century Kongo became sites where same religious symbol, used in two complete different

worldviews, cohabitated, one overpowering by imposing its meaning on the other, or

simply sought to annihilate the other. These locations, to borrow Nora’s concept of ​Lieux

de mémoire, ​or sites of memory, serve as a bond tying us to the eternal present​ a​ nd help

capture that which has been frozen in a particular time. Thus escaping from both earlier

histories and recent changes.

City port of Mpinda and New Religious Symbols

Mpinda was very important in the history of Kongo because, as the kingdom’s

city port, it was the main point of contact with the outside world—especially São Tomé

and Europe, lately. Mpinda was also the province of Soyo’s capital, where one of the

kingdom’s most powerful governors resided. Most Kongo kings understood Mpinda’s

critical role and appointed family members or very close and trusted subjects to its

governorship position. Mpinda was the first locale where the first conversion to

Catholicism in the kingdom of Kongo took place—the provincial governor and some

members of the nobility. It was during the fourth voyage, 1491, that ​its commander, Rui

da Sousa, baptized the chief of Soyo and then went with the missionaries and the artisans

22
 34
to the capital … and some of the Kongolese elite became well-versed in the

commandments, prayers, and sacraments of the Church. On there were Christians “only
35
​ s a provincial capital, Kongolese went to Mpinda to be instructed in the
in name.” A

new faith. Bontinck pointed to an important fact that it was at the city port of Mpinda that

Portuguese missionaries, navigators, and explorers saw signs and rituals that resembled
36
central symbols of the Christian faith—the cross and baptism. While the cross stood as

a sign of salvation for Catholicism and Portuguese, it represented the cycle of life from

birth to death. Baptism, in Catholicism, was a ritual of initiation in which one was

integrated into or pledge their allegiance to the person of Jesus of Nazareth. In Kongo

cosmology, it was done with water as well, sometimes mixed with different herbs, and

stood as an introduction to either a specific circle or a way to chase evil spirits in a person
37
or just part of a treatment against some specific attack on someone’s body. In other

words, the cross and baptism gave symbolic meanings and contested histories. As

symbolic meaning, many Kongolese were caught in the vortex of religious struggles.

As a place where Catholicism and Kongo spiritual beliefs first met, Mpinda stood

as a prominent Lieux de mémoire where Kongo influential chiefs, governors, nobility,

Portuguese, and merchants made their fortunes by engaging in international trade.

Among the first attributes given to Mpinda as a site of memory, the religious aspect

emerged. Underneath the surface, the religious aspect is a messy and nuanced history that

34
(Cuvelier 1946, ​89); ​(Vansina 1966, 45-46); (Cavazzi 1965, 1:153-55)
35
(Sweet 2003, 112)
36
(Bontinck 1964, 54)
37
(Fromont 2009, 59)

23
we see because some historians of religion do not want to investigate to its core because

of religious norms and restrictions. The conversion in Mpinda and throughout the

kingdom of Kongo showed that ​many Kongolese were familiar with “the broad outlines

of the Faith” and readily added these elements of Catholicism to their arsenal of spiritual

beliefs. But to argue that the Kongolese were Christians, and leave it like that, is to strip
38
them of their spiritual core. ​The major problem that we see emerging here and now and

resonates throughout our search as we progress in our analysis is the absence of one

collective memory at these tangible lieux de mémoire. In the present-day Democratic

Republic of the Congo, Republic of Congo, and in Angola, little to no attention or

investment have been made to preserve the history in those sites.

As an important lieux de mémoire, Mpinda was also considered as such because

of its strategic, political, and economical location. It was from Mpinda that Portuguese

caravels and lately French, Dutch and British boats unloaded European goods and loaded

slave cargoes destined for Europe and the new world. ​The slaves, who had become a

staple to the Europeans in the capital, from there were brought to Mpinda and from there

other Europeans shipped them to São Tomé… at one time the same ship took 320 slaves

that were shipped to Portugal as a gift of the King of Kongo to the King of Portugal, the

same ship also took 190 slaves who had been owned by masons working at the capital…

Everybody… seems to have participated in the trade, and wages in effect were paid in
39
slaves. ​On the external politics, the relations between Kongo and Portugal were central,

38
(Sweet 2003, 112)
39
(Thornton 1983, 83); (Cuvelier 1946,​ 93); (​ Vansina 1978, 52)

24
but when French, Dutch and British ships started to visit Mpinda, Portuguese Kings tried

to prevent Kongo from having contacts with other European powers. There were

instances where Portuguese stationed in Mpinda reacted strongly against that presence

causing big diplomatic crisis with other European countries involved in the region. Local

Portuguese ventured to capture French ships, shoot at British, and blocked entrance to

Dutch vessels in Mpinda. Here, one could foresee the commercial and colonial conflicts

that would put those European nations at odd against each other during the Berlin

Conference on the West Central Africa question. On the historical note, we disagree with

both Childs and Lovejoy who miss to balance the role undertaken by the actors involved

in by terming that Africans are presented as victims while Europeans are depicted as

oppressors.

From the time of the Jaga invasion (1600) to the recovery under Alvare I and

Alvare II, Mpinda continued to play an important role in the slave trade, underlining its

role as one of Kongo’s important lieux de mémoire: moving from a space defining a

sense of a place to a name deeply connected with the transatlantic slave trade. Despite the

fact that Mpinda still not carry the same historical value as Gore Island in Senegal, but as

a historical location it has not ceased to carry the transatlantic slave trade imprints. The

intensity and volume of the trade passing through Mpinda in the late XVI​th​ and during the

XVII​th ​centuries expanded the trade from slaves to ivory, redwood, and copper. While all

authors pointed to internal fights for succession to Kongo’s throne as one of many

reasons that led to weaken the kingdom; they also agreed that seventeenth century Kongo

25
was the end of Kongo’s hegemony. Thus the rise of (A)Ngola, Matamba, Ndongo,

Dembo, Kakongo, Bungu, and finally the arrival of the Jaga in the region that

destabilized and dismantled Kongo. The strong presence of the Dutch traders at Mpinda

brought new tensions in the region. The Dutch were Calvinists and had major theological

differences with Catholicism, which put them at odds with Portuguese forcing Kongo to

do something against them. Their religious influence was quick denounced and
40
threatened of expulsion.

Mbanza Kongo: Big House of fetishes versus Catholicism

Mbanza Kongo, literally the ‘city of Kongo,” and indeed it was the city of Kongo

for the King resided at the capital. Lately, the name would be changed to Sao Salvador,

which pointed to the heavy religious Catholic influence in the kingdom. As the city

where the king lived, Mbanza Kongo was the political, the economical, educational, and

religious center of the kingdom. While provincial capitals held centers for religious

instructions, Mbanza Kongo because of its primacy over provincial capitals, was the only

place in the kingdom where mission stations and schools were built. Initially, many

schools were built in different parts of the kingdom, but the limited number of European

clergymen and trained lay people forced Kongo King to concentrate the education of

young Kongolese in Mbanza Kongo. On one hand, it was the lack of teachers and the

expensive cost of training in Portugal gave the King no other alternative but to engage in

40
(Cuvelier 1946, 93-105); (Vansina 1966, 132-34)

26
education locally. On the other hand, Mbanza Kongo gave to the King the unique

opportunity to follow more closely the training of his young subjects and reduce the cost

of their education, since the payment in slaves was one of the way Portugal wanted to be

paid.

The influence of Catholicism on Kongo politics was so great to the point that

candidates, in seventeenth century, for the throne thought that a papal bull was enough to
41
guarantee their accession to the throne. Mbanza Kongo was also the locale where

Kongo traditional priests, commonly known as ngangas, and catholic missionaries

collide. In Kongo cosmology, the King’s power had a divine origin; the ngangas helped

to its establishment, played an important role in the King’s court as a diviner, a counselor,

the reference point to connect with the invisible world, and as a spiritual protector. The

arrival of catholic missionaries put that long revere tradition and the divine kinship nature

of the King to question. It is important to know that in Kongo cosmology, the ​whole

political structure… is associated much more closely with divine kinship. Characteristic

features of this system are: the belief that kings or chiefs must be witches possess

iloki—the ability to help or harm others without outward—and the series of tests which
42
the candidate king must undergo at his accession. There was never a good relationship

between ngangas and Catholics missionaries. Both groups resented and represented a

serious challenge for each other. Catholic missionaries threatened the Kings with

excommunication and succeeded to convince them that ngangas were ​witches and priests

41
(Bontinck 1964, 34); (Vansina 1966, ​56); (​ Cuvelier 1932​, 80-82); (Ibid. 1946, 80)
42
(Vansina 1966, 100); (Childs 1949, 68); (Bontinck 1964​, 60-9)

27
for idols​ accusing them of being responsible for the misfortunes including the deaths in

the kingdom. One of the most influential Capuchin priests, Father Marcellino convinced

King Pedro, in XVII​th​ century, to ​expose these wrongdoers on the public plaza to receive

“the fury of the people” and the penalty of death. His language could scarcely be lost on

the ngangas against whom it was directed, including Dona Beatriz. It represented the
43
theological side of the political negotiations between priest and king. While the ngangas

saw the priests as a serious threat and their work a cause of instability and all evils

brought on Kongo, Capuchins charged ngangas and their enterprises as ndokis, those

working evil by using supernatural means.

It is important to point that for many Kongolese, kindoki (witches) was used for

either good or evil purposes. It was, however, the purposes and intentions of the user that

counted. It was never the possession of the power or its nature. Standing against the witch
44
(feiticeiro) was the principal duty Capuchins engaged against from their arrival in 1645.

In order to instill fear and impose Catholicism, the threat of excommunication on the

Kings and the nobility became so big that Kongo leaders gave in on the pressure and

accepted to use the same methods of punishment developed and utilized in Europe during

the inquisition time. The famous case remained the execution of Dona Beatriz Kimpa

Mvita, the leader of the antonian movement, burnt alive on Sunday, July 2, 1706. Her

death was not only a victory of Catholicism over Kongo belief system, but also King

Pedro’s incapacity to rule over Catholicism and the complete annihilation of the nganga’s

43
(Thornton 1998, 70)
44
(Cavazzi 1965, 2: 34-39); (Thornton 1998, 70-1)

28
role in Kongo’s society and affairs. ​Pedro suspected that priests’ insistsence was not

simply to comfort the condemned. He was particularly suspicious of Father Bernado,

who had constantly exhorted him to seize and execute Dona Beatriz even when he felt he

had important reasons of state to tolerate her teaching. He disliked the priests’ haughty
45
attitude, and now felt that his resolve to conduct the execution had been challenged.

While one could see the deep uneasiness the King was wrestling with, he still wanted to

show to the priests his allegiance was to the catholic faith than anything else. ​Father, h​ e

said passionately​, if perhaps you think that I will not carry this out, because I want to

spare them from death, remove such thought from your mind, because I swear by that

God which gave me the government of this kingdom… and who made himself flesh and

came to die for us on this cross – he gestured to the silver crucifix at the end of his royal

staff – that nothing else will be done to these cuorits, except that which has been
46
​ he king’s faith to Catholicism seemed to
determined, that is, to die being burned alive! T

prevail and he wanted to reassure the priests that the death sentence would be carried out.

His statement clearly pointed to the shift taken in the concept of divine kinship. Kongo

cosmology was dead before Catholicism, at least in the open.

Another important fact pointing to the Capuchins’ fierce battle sought to purge

Kongo from its “devil worship” was the burning at Kibangu of a Kimpasi society

initiation lodge, considered one of the big ​Witchcraft House. I​ n some locations, the

priests used the children at the hospice they run to precede them to spy the place out.

45
(Thornton 1998, 179)
46
(Ibid.)

29
When there were credible news of witchcraft house, the priests would ​snuck up on the

enclosure, sending two small boys first to spy… ​ then…​ the priest stormed into the

enclosure and seized the various “instruments” of their worship, then ordered the

buildings set on fire. Standing amid the flames, and grasping his crucifix, Father

Marcellino quoted Psalm 68: God shall arise; His enemies shall be scattered; those that
47
​ hough the ngangas lost their battles to the priests,
hate him shall flee before his face. T

there were still certain religious/judicial ceremonies of divination known as the trial of

the ​jaji ​that were not so offensive to the devout or faint of heart, not all operated as well

as communal trials or ordeals. Some functioned as revelations whose aim was to uncover

the cause of individual misfortune. In spite of the fear and burdens of embracing

Catholicism, as a foreign religion, Kongolese practiced some form of Africanized

Christianism.

The last aspect that deserves some attention was the regulation of the trade from

Mbanza Kongo because of repeated abuses and lack of central control that brought the

Kongo to its knees making it more vulnerable to internal conflicts and ultimately to

repeated external attacks. Around 1545 a new King, Diogo I, came to power with the help

of local Portuguese who paid allegiance to the throne of Portugal. The new king sought to

reestablish the royal monopoly over the trade with Portugal and sought to stop

contraband activities initiated by Sao Tome towards the coast of Angola. In a letter dated

January 1549, Diogo I complained to Portugal about some local Portuguese, priests and

47
(Thornton 1998, 72-73)

30
laymen, residing in the kingdom committing crime to be judged in Kongo courts. Sao

Tome would counterattack with a letter sent to Portugal denouncing discrimination

against Portuguese traders in Kongo and suggested to lay down an embargo on the trade

to Mpinda while opening a new trade with Luanda. The internal problem on trade led to a

war, and it was this situation that was the opening door to a series of war, internal and

external, throughout the last part of sixteenth and the entire seventeenth centuries.

Portugal took a different approach to block Kongolese embassy to Rome, abandoned his

support policies towards Kongo and allowed Sao Tome to trade directly with new rising

kingdoms such as Ndongo, Angola, and the Tyo. The religious situation did not improve

for there were tensions between Sao Tome and Mbanza Kongo, which culminated in the

expulsion of the Bishop who just arrived in Kongo. The relationships with the Jesuits

turned sour soon after because of disciplinary majors by the Catholic Church, such as

polygamy or marriage with close relatives. On the hills of the Jesuits came the

Franciscans, who run into some major problem as well. This situation persisted until

1665, the year the kingdom of Kongo was officially destroyed by loosing a battle to the

Teke people in Ambuila.

Mbanza Kongo as lieux de memoire has helped capture the political, economical,

religious and social aspects of Kongo collective memory that were and are still painful

especially when the emphasis remained on memories of slavery, acculturation with the

importation of Catholicism. On slavery, all the authors spoke of one dimension—selling

slaves—but no reference was made to the problem of national identity in the kingdom

31
and the suffering the slave trade caused to the Kingdom of Kongo. While we found great

historical descriptions, in contrast with the interest in resistance no suggestions were

given in terms of raising awareness on constructing a collective memory, museums to

immortalize the importance of various aspects as emotion and values, as well as

performativity, most of the time neglected by social scientists and historians.

Conclusion

The establishment of a collective memory in the kingdom of Kongo is a series of

work in progress. As we delved into XVII​th​ century Kongo, we first encountered the issue

of power, fratricides wars, collision of two religious worldviews, acculturation, and most

importantly the destabilization and destruction of Kongo kingdom due to internal and

external factors, such as the quest for mines and the burning issue of the Atlantic slave

trade. Slavery was an integral part of Kongo life from the emergence of this kingdom to

its destruction. It left unwritten, written narratives, and images of torture, violence, and

sorts of suffering inflicted on the slaves. But important tenets found in slavery, not

well-articulated in Kongo, were the themes of desolation and domination, incurable

trauma and powerlessness, guilt and loss that continually struck those left

behind—Kongolese not taken into slavery. Mbiti pointed to a guilt that one never

recovered from in his African Religion. While initial narratives of the encounter,

32
Kongo-Portugal, pointed to peaceful exchanges, nothing was giving on Kongo

cosmological relationship living-dead because Kongolese first saw Portuguese as those

returning from the underworld. As painful memories remained forcefully elicited, a

progressive report and full accessibility afforded to Catholicism and the Portuguese in the

Kingdom of Kongo led to a full program of acculturation.

The establishment of Christianity in the kingdom challenged such deeply rooted

notions as divine kinship. Kongo’s cosmogram—however similar with the Christian

religious symbol of the cross—was used as an entrée into Kongo cosmology. Affonso’s

reign in the history of Kongo set a new pattern that change the course of governance in

the Kongo. The new educationnal program, that he set in motion and paid in slaves,

ivory, rafia clothes, and rings of copper, was to become the guiding principle for future

policies to be taken by his successors. Affonso I and Diogo I emerged as the two Kongo

kings who had the audacity to stand up against the abuses on the slave trade orchestrated

by local Portuguese in the Kongo. They sought to find ways to remedy to the problem by

engaging the Portuguese crown, even though Portugal did not respond favorably.

The city port of Mpinda and Mbanza Kongo, the kingdom’s capital, were

important sites of memory for their chronological, political, religious, and economical

roles in XVII​th​ century Kongo life. As a century full of internal and external intrigues and

fights, these cities were respectively the first point of encounter with Portuguese and the

last location slaves ever laid their feet on African soil before their non-return voyage to

33
either Europe or the New World, on one hand. On the other hand, the capital was the final

bastion where there was a show of power between the ngangas and catholic priests to

prove to the kings whose power was real, legitimate and from a divine origin. Mbanza

Kongo was also the place where the Capuchin priests in a big demonstration show of

power burn Kongo big house of fetishes—a visible sign of the ngangas source of power

and place where they communicated with their invisible, heal the sick, protect the people

from known and unknown, visible or invisible attacks. Mpinda stood as the first location

where the catholic priests saw for the very first time a sign resembling the Christian

cross—Kongo cosmogram—and the first Catholic Church built on mainland sub-Sahara

Africa.

As lieux de mémoire, these cities stood as remembering traumatic centers

producing intolerable feelings, which awoke deep feeling of pain and consequently

of total lost and guilt. No king in precolonial Kongo and modern countries of Angola,

the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the Republic of Congo ever thought about the

construction of a site where Kongo collective memory of slavery was preserved. But

there is a need to point to exceptional case where a statue was erected here and

there pointing to a specific physical site of memory of the atrocities that took place

in the Kongo. XVII​th​ century Kongo evoked a troubled period in the political,

economical, and religious life of Kongo. Although there is no single to solving

conflictual situations, our suggestive essay’s focus has been to raise the issues of

34
acculturation and Africanized Christianity as they remain closely attached to the

question of slavery and collective memory.

35
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Cavazzi, G. A., Descriçao historica dos tres reinos do Congo, Matamba e Angola. 4​th
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Cavazzi, G. A. 1965. Descriçao historica dos tres reinos do Congo, Matamba e Angola.
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Childs, G. M. 1949. ​Umbundu Kinship and Character.​ London: Oxford University

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 ​ adison: University of Wisconsin Press​.
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