THEAFRICANS
thropologist Igor Kopytoff remarks that in the farming societies through-
out sub-Saharan Africa "There were seldom any equals-one
was either a
senior or a junior, a superior or a subordinate ....
This inequality, how-
ever, had to be instituted and maintained with circumspection, for ...
conditions also made it relatively easy for dissatisfied adherents to leave.
Hence ...
the adherents had to be well-treated in everyday life-usually
as quasi-kinsmen."62
The educational system reinforced the hierarchical principle. At or soon
after reaching puberty, boys were segregated from the rest of society for as
long as six months and prepared for adult life. In the form that prevailed
among the Basotho.. a chief would convene a lebollo (initiation school).
when one of his sons had reached the appropriate age. This was a dramatic
episode in the life of a chiefdom-the
village or cluster of villages that
recognized the authority of a single leader. Only the chief could authorize a
lebollo and make it effective,because it was he who appointed the mohla-
bani (distinguished warrior), the mesuoe (instructors), and the thipane
(surgeon) who conducted the ceremonies. The chief also supplied the cru-
cial ingredients: a bull, butterfat, and, most important of all, his lenaka.