Zulu, a dying language?

by Chris Ellis

CAME out from England to Eden- ies and educated, middle-class Zulu dale Hospital over 45 years ago. families. Changes have been fewer in I At Edendale in the late sixties and the rural areas where modern influences early seventies almost none of the pa- are less although the modern media has tients spoke or understood any English. deep tentacles via television and smart There was a firm hierarchical structure phones. to Zulu society and children tended not Recently, I consulted with a five- to speak unless requested and often re- year-old Zulu boy with a sore throat. mained motionless by the side of their I wanted to examine his throat and I parent, whose authority was paramount. said ‘vula umlomo’, which means ‘open No one spoke English partly because your mouth’, but he did not understand black children had mostly been denied me so I said ‘khamisa’, which means basic education and therefore access the same thing ‘open your mouth’. His to English. Zulu mother then said ‘he does not For the last two decades I have no- understand Zulu, he is going to learn ticed that if I address a child in Zulu in it when he goes to school next year’. I my rooms they usually hesitate before am sure this is an exceptional case but replying. This may be because of my I have been treating Zulu patients now poor Zulu, but I suspect that it is be- for over two generations and there has cause their everyday life is surrounded been a transition in both language use by English. I then speak in English and and inevitably with culture as well. This immediately we are into a conversation. is both understandable and natural. My practice is in so I also listen to Zulu spoken in the this may be a phenomenon of the cit- street and now find that many words that

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Natalia 48 (2018) Copyright © Natal Society Foundation 2018 Zulu, a dying language? we take for original Zulu words are in medicine I have noticed over the years fact adaptations of English or how we have struggled to communicate words. Many more English words are concepts or conditions for which there daily being inserted or absorbed into were no words in the . everyday Zulu conversation (called loan There were old Zulu words for anxiety words). Purists may roll their eyes at and sadness which are now expressed this change, but in fact it enriches the as istress as well as measurements Zulu language and means it is dynamic such a hypertension which is presented and adaptable. as ‘pressure’ and a disease such as In 1883 Reverend A.T. Bryant came diabetes which is described as shukela out from England and spent a lifetime (sugar). We like direct translations in in Natal, becoming fluent in Zulu. He our ordered minds but often this is not records an uneducated (in the colonial possible. A condition in one culture may sense) Zulu girl of about 18 years hav- not exist in the other (called a culture- ing a Zulu vocabulary of over 18 000 bound syndrome). An example is twasa words. I am not sure how he came to of which a very simplistic description this number and it may be a bit of an is a syndrome of presentations and exaggeration, but whatever the number signs when someone is called to be a it was a large vocabulary considering traditional healer. There is no direct it is estimated that one only needs a translation or explanation but we like to vocabulary of 800 words to get by in search around and find an approximate a language. equivalent such as religious conversion The vocabulary of Zulu was well or vocation. There are also conditions known to be so big because of the dif- where culture influences the expression ferent names of cattle, birds, mammals, of a disease and the words with which plants, trees and insects and their differ- they are presented. For instance, indiki, ent colours, topical configurations and which is generally understood to be a characteristics. For instance, cattle were condition caused by being possessed described by horn shape, and colour and by a spirit has different expressions patterns on the hides, whereas grasses and interpretations of the experience were described by types, colours and depending on the context and belief seasons as were the seasons them- system in which the individual person selves. In fact, the Zulu lexicon was lives and was raised. Western science, not necessarily large because of the indoctrinated by Aristotelian classifi- names of objects but it is also packed cations, likes to define, delineate and with an incredible variety of nuances capture into boxes all human emo- to many words, which are not found in tions and activities. Indiki is therefore English, and therefore this expanded the translated in the medical text book into language. This is similar to Inuit people possession trance and further defined who have twenty or so different words as ‘the replacement of the customary for snow and ice. sense of self identity by a new identity We all have a specific vocabulary attributed to the influence of a spirit, of words depending mostly on our deity or other person’. It becomes a work environment. Lawyers, cooks, sanitised and sterile version of the accountants, electricians and medical original expression and experience. doctors all have their own lexicons. In Words and idioms are thus subtly

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Natalia 48 (2018) CC-BY-NC cc Natal Society Foundation 2018 Zulu, a dying language? changed to suit Western explanatory phone-earplugs-screen culture, which models and thought processes. What brings instantaneous games and pro- appears to be happening is that the older grammes in English into the ears of the generation are still speaking ‘correct’ young, will do to African languages. At or orthodox Zulu whereas the younger present, worldwide, one language dies generation are incorporating the words every fourteen days. The three main re- and language of the modern media and maining languages in two generations’ online technology and losing some of time will be English, Mandarin and the deeper culture-bound significance Spanish. So Goodbye, Zàijiàn, Adios; of the language. and, maybe, Hambani Kahle. It is said that when a language goes under 100 000 speakers it is almost Response by Adrian Koopman unsaveable and you would think that I WOULD like to pick up on three Zulu, with up to eight million people interconnected aspects of Chris El- speaking it, was safe. Nevertheless the lis’s discussion document: the issue of pressure on it, especially by English, is loan words (or adoptives), the notion almost overwhelming. The Zulu now of purity in a language, and the idea spoken on the street is greatly different that a language may die if it becomes from that of fifty years ago. There has swamped by or subsumed into another been a loss of many of the old Zulu ‘A’ language. words or respect (hlonipha) words. This First, let me make the point that all does not mean that Zulu is dying but it languages are dynamic and evolve con- is, in fact, a living adapting language tinuously. Language purists are people because in place of the older vocabulary who attempt to arrest language change, it is incorporating words from English almost always assuming that an earlier and modern technology to make it more form of a language is more pure than the practical and useable. It has become form spoken today, and that a language both resilient and vibrant. English itself is pure if it has no loan words from any has sucked in, like a powerful vacuum other language.1 cleaner, an enormous number of loan My second point is related to my first: words. If you speak English you know all languages that come into contact parts of at least a hundred different with other languages are influenced in languages. one way or the other by neighbouring The sign of irrevocable demise of a languages. People who talk of pure Zulu language is when it is not spoken in the as spoken before contact with colonial home, which obviously is the case with settlers forget that the Zulu lexicon, in- the patient with the sore throat, although deed the whole Zulu phonological sys- I am sure this is still an isolated case. tem, had been influenced by centuries Nevertheless, the currently proposed al- of contact with earlier San languages. ternative, which is the didactic teaching Ellis’s discussion document gives the of a language in schools and universi- impression (perhaps not intentionally) ties, will be immensely expensive and that the influence of colonial languages mostly ineffective. It is not nearly as is a relatively recent thing. It is not – the effective as speaking it at home up to influence on the Zulu language from the age of five or six or more. Dutch-speaking and English-speaking We do not know yet what the smart- explorers, travellers, missionaries,

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Natalia 48 (2018) CC-BY-NC cc Natal Society Foundation 2018 Zulu, a dying language? hunters and settlers goes back at least guage, these adoptives or loan words 180 years. He is correct, though, in say- have shown how resilient and strong ing that many words regarded as pure the language is, and here I am in entire Zulu today are in fact adopted from agreement with Chris Ellis. A language, English and Dutch/Afrikaans: words and English is certainly such an exam- like ibhulukwe (< broek), ibhala (< ple, can absorb a considerable number barrow), and ihembe (< hemp). of lexical items from other languages Evidence of this early adoption of and still retain its essential character. words from colonial languages is seen An example is the word ‘kwatile’ above, clearly in the Vocabulaire de la Langue where the original adjective kwaad from Zoulouse (Vocabulary of the Zulu Lan- Dutch has been given the verbal perfect guage) appended to the second volume tense ending –ile, creating a new word of Adulphe Delegorgue’s Voyage dans that is essentially Zulu in nature. l’Afrique Australe published in Paris Whether or not Zulu will die as a in 1847 and translated into English as language because it is no longer being Travels in in 1990 (vol. spoken at home by Zulu children is a I) and 1997 (vol. II).2 Delegorgue, a question I must leave to other com- hunter, explorer, naturalist and writer, mentators. travelled through what is now KwaZu- lu-Natal at the time of the reigns of Din- Response by Mark Hunter gane kaSenzangakhona and his brother CHRIS Ellis’s timely piece raises im- Mpande (the 1830s and 1840s) and was portant questions about the status of accompanied by Dutch-speaking wagon Zulu in post-apartheid society. Is Zulu drivers and servants, and Zulu-speaking a dying language, he asks, or is it a hunters and guides. He recorded as part dynamic and adapting force? of his more than 650-item vocabulaire Before we discuss Zulu’s possible de- a number of words he considered to be cline we might consider its rise, or more Zulu, but which we can see today were accurately institutionalisation. Across in fact early Dutch and English adop- the African continent it is now well tives. Some he has clearly marked as du known that it was missionaries, early Hollandais (from Dutch). Examples are settlers, and some African interlocutors, duur makar for ‘a mix-up’ (marked as who established the linguistic boundar- du Hollandais), Ghisman for an Eng- ies that created separate languages. lishman (regarded as Zulu), kouatile In other words, linguistic variation for ‘angry’ (< Du. kwaad + Zulu suf- was present in the region, shaped by fix –ile), and nike betaye for ‘pay’ (< the age, gender, geography, as well as Zulu nika ‘give’ + Du. betaal ‘pay’). by much-vaunted differences that came There are many more such examples to be called ethnicity. But in a colonial in Delegorgue’s vocabulaire. setting, as anthropologist Judith Irvine Since these early days of language notes, ‘Language, ethnicity, and terri- contact, the Zulu language has of course tory were supposed to coincide and to absorbed hundreds upon hundreds of define population units on an adminis- words from other languages, mainly tratively manageable scale.’ Crucially, from Dutch/Afrikaans and English, but the separation of languages depended many from other languages, including on a conception of ‘tribes’. It was these Xhosa. Far from destroying the lan- entities to whom the colonial state

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Natalia 48 (2018) CC-BY-NC cc Natal Society Foundation 2018 Zulu, a dying language? power devolved power in geographical agreements after trade unions estab- areas called locations, then reserves, lished themselves in the 1970s, and the and eventually homelands. Of course language of customer service as manu- this never went unchallenged: Zulu was facturing jobs gave way to service jobs. especially contested at the time of the A young person is today more likely to ANC-Inkatha conflicts. work in a telephone call centre than a However, despite the tendency to factory. And employers also use English police linguistic boundaries, we don’t competence and accent to screen mul- have to look hard to see that what came tiple candidates when unemployment to be called Zulu was always a hybrid rates are so tragically high. phenomenon. The first Zulu dictionary But does this mean that there is a was compiled by Bishop Colenso in demise of African languages? In simple 1861. Notably, he placed asterisks by terms – no. Zulu is still the most spoken the side of words ‘corrupted’ from other language in homes, increasing from languages, typically English or Dutch. 23.8% of the national population to These include some surprising entries 24.6% if we compare the 2001 cen- such as isicatulo (defined as ‘any cover- sus and the 2016 community survey. ing for feet’, or ‘shoe’). Moreover, the newspaper Isolezwe, Turning to the question of how Zulu established in 2002, now has a remark- is changing in the current milieu. There able one million readers a day. The 7 are perhaps three forces that might be o’ clock SABC News rotates daily from noted. Most obviously, Zulu became Zulu to Xhosa, blurring the boundaries one of democratic ’s of these languages, while promoting an eleven official languages. However, as alternative to English. is widely noted, English’s use in busi- There may be some parents who ness, politics, and the workplace made themselves learnt Zulu at home but it the ‘first among equals’. And unlike now speak English to their children, Afrikaans in the apartheid era, the state but the numbers are small. This does made few attempts to intellectualise not mean that Zulu vocabulary is not African languages, for instance through changing. But this has to be seen in the developing African-language literature. context of the multilingualism of black This brings us to the second change, South Africans, especially those living which is the fact that many middle- in urban areas. class black South African learners now This contrasts with the situation of attend what are colloquially called native-English speakers. In the apart- ‘multiracial’ schools (formerly white, heid era, this group would have learnt Indian, or coloured schools). The main Afrikaans at school as a second lan- attraction, parents will say, is native- guage, and crucially needed to speak it English speaking teachers. This is in to access certain government jobs. But direct opposition to, and in part reac- Afrikaans has now lost its special sta- tion to, the policy of Bantu Education tus and monolingual English speakers which promoted African languages as a (albeit still required to learn a second medium of school instruction. language at school) are not generally The third change is the importance disadvantaged in the job market. of English in the workplace. English Indeed, a major failure of language became the language of formal written policy, one attracting surprisingly little

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Natalia 48 (2018) CC-BY-NC cc Natal Society Foundation 2018 Zulu, a dying language? attention, is that native-English speak- ish Empire, it was to facilitate rule and ers are not in general being taught administration that the need was created African languages at school. to count, to order, and to rearrange peo- ple so as to ‘fix’ them under recognised Response by Debbie Whelan chiefs that led to the detailed mapping READING Chris Ellis’s provocative of groups in Zululand at the time of the article, I was struck by the question Zululand Lands Delimitation Commis- as to whether Zulu might be a ‘dying sion (, 1905). This fol- language’. It has had me questioning the lowed the already established practice, origins of the coming into existence of reflected in the Natal magistrates’ Blue Zulu itself, not only as a nation around Books, which enumerated clans and as- a specific clan group under and sociated individuals, because the collec- his brothers, but especially as a written tion of colonial taxes relied heavily on language. I’ve also been prompted to the matrix of different tribal groups with consider Adrian Koopman’s statements different identities and specific areas of as to culture always being dynamic and residence. Colonial official James Stuart subject to acculturation, when different describes stories and quotidian events in groups interact. his seminal collection of interviews (ed- Like all languages, what most of us ited and annotated by Colin Webb and today think of as the Zulu language John Wright) published as The James has itself been constructed over time. Stuart Archive, presenting a variety of Apart from archaic variants of earlier clan histories through real people and spoken Zulu, separate clan dialects were their stories.5 In his well-cited (and for marginalised; such as what Manson3 much of the twentieth century, primary) refers to as the tekela dialect that was reference work on the , Bry- spoken in the nineteenth century by the ant, mentioned by Ellis in his original amaHlubi, among others. thread, also heavily emphasises the My comments are prompted by humanness and individuality of people, considering a linear(ish) stream of the idiosyncrasies of different clan generally consulted historical texts that groups (such as the abaThembu, the present Zulu as an official and sanc- ‘many wived folk’), and their origins tioned construct. We understand, for and socio-political connections.6 example, that the Zulu fought against On the other hand, the Natal Code the British in the Anglo-Zulu War, of Native Law, which was legislated despite the fact that Zulu troops were in 1891, provided a guideline for themselves composed of many diverse standardising the operations for chiefs clan groups subservient to Cetshwayo within the locations. It also intended and the dominant Zulu rule. to inform the purpose of indirect rule.7 Early works, such as John Bird’s It was thus legislated to obliterate the Annals of Natal 1495–1845, describe individual considerations of the rule groups of peoples closely identified of traditional law between and within through family and political relation- clan and family groups, and further, ship, with specific names, personalities, eventually succeeded in grouping large legends and responsibilities in addition numbers of different people with dif- to moving and fluid areas of control and ferent identities in the region under the residence.4 As happened across the Brit- portmanteau term of ‘Native’, an action

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Natalia 48 (2018) CC-BY-NC cc Natal Society Foundation 2018 Zulu, a dying language? that was reinforced by the promulgation horses in contrast to the cattle-keeping of the Natives’ Land Act (27 of 1913). Zulu people. For a time, old habits prevailed: in This re-writing of ‘the Zulu culture’ 1926 the Natal Native Tribes Register added a layer of justification to the continued to identify the people resident cultural prescriptions that had been laid in Natal through clan, personality, and down by the Natal Code of Native Law adherents, allowing for the understand- in the nineteenth century and which ing of a series of personable relation- continued to inform the operations of ships across the province. In 1935, the tribal courts in Natal. The situation Government Ethnographer Nicolaas was exacerbated by the change – in van Warmelo produced a similar docu- title and conception – from ‘Native Af- ment itemising the then contemporary fairs’ to ‘Bantu Affairs’ in 1958, which clan and tribal groups across South then in 1978, became the oddly-named Africa.8 While this was a mechanism Department of Plural Relations and De- to continue the intentions of separation velopment. Thus the idea of the family, leading up to the implementation of the clan, the lineage and all relationship the Native Trust and Land Act in 1936, had disappeared under a broad-brush African people continued to be associ- conceptualisation of a political percep- ated with a fixed area of residence, and tion of the African in South Africa, as with lineage, clan and tribe. So what a single ‘other’. happened? As usual, the wheel began to turn: In the same year, Eileen Jensen Krige, revisionist publications such as those by an anthropologist based at the Univer- anthropologists Axel-Ivar Berglund,10 sity of Natal, produced the next seminal and Johnny Clegg11 began to support reference volume on ‘the Zulu’. Krige’s more intuitive and subtle understand- work, The Social System of the Zulus ings of those people living in this region was a significant contribution to an- and their specific societal constructs at thropology at the time, which provided the clan and family levels. The oblit- a supposedly definitive outline as to eration of individuality has, however, who the Zulu people were, their world been perpetuated in even more recent view, how they built their homesteads, decades by the commodification of how they decided succession, and how ‘the Zulu’ for the purposes of tourism they viewed the physical and meta- as well as through the reconstruction physical worlds.9 What this did was of apparently generic Zulu practices; nullify specific lifeways and practices and also a re-nationalisation of identity of previously distinctive groups who through a focus on the progenitor, Shaka may have resided in KwaZulu-Natal, as kaSenzangakhona, in the form of giving being officially described as ‘the Zulu’. his name to an airport (which welcomes For example, there were now blurred visitors to ‘The Kingdom of the Zulu’) edges between the northern clans and and a theme park. the Tsonga, who have historically had Contemporary unpacking of the differing diets, ways of arranging space, Zulu nation is partly inscribed in the and constructing buildings. It also land claims process, and its effects; in ignored the activities of bordering and addition to applications to the Nhlapo imported groups such as the baTlokwa, Commission by lineage or tribal heads around Nqutu who kept sheep and rode that claim that they are not Zulu. While

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Natalia 48 (2018) CC-BY-NC cc Natal Society Foundation 2018 Zulu, a dying language? the Thembu in the is a takes me back to a business conference well-known example, no tribal heads in I attended in 2008 in Pietermaritzburg. KwaZulu-Natal have thus far had any The guest speaker was a young woman, success in motivating for recognition as a celebrity who had a Sesotho first name a tribe, with its own king, separate from and a Zulu surname, although she spoke the Zulu. The Dlamini, amaNgwane and neither language, having grown up in amaHlubi have all striven for an indi- with a Sotho mother and vidual recognition, pointing to a strong a Zulu father, both of whom spoke Eng- potential for an internal collapse of the lish at home. Since she was a celebrity overarching rule of ‘Zulu’. most the Zulu people greeted her using her izithakazelo (clan praises), which Response by Phindi Dlamini is a highly regarded way of greeting I WOULD like to pick up on the fol- among Zulus and Africans at large. lowing line from Chris Ellis’s original Little did people know that this form of comment about Zulu being a dying address brought ‘havoc’ and shame to language: ‘His Zulu mother then said the addressee. When she was called up ‘he does not understand Zulu, he is go- to the podium to give her speech, there ing to learn it when he goes to school were lots of shouts and applause using next year’”. differentizithakazelo of her clan name. As a proudly Zulu-speaking woman The audience was very excited to have a and mother, I find this utterance by the celebrity, their very own Zulu celebrity, mother very embarrassing, to say the in their midst. least. Unfortunately, this is not a once She stood there, with a grin, waiting in a lifetime utterance: we hear it all for the applause to subside. With the the time – uttered with pride! I find help of the Programme Director, the such an utterance shameful on many audience resettled and she was ready to levels. If I am Zulu-speaking and yet start. She then burst into a spontaneous my child cannot speak his or her mother emotional outpouring, delivered in the tongue, then what language is she or he rhythms of oral poetry. The following speaking? Whose language is he or she is my paraphrase, but the lines had such speaking and why? Why do I want to impact that I remember almost every relegate the teaching of my child his or one to this day: ‘My father where were her mother-tongue (my own language) you? When my mother was teaching me to a teacher? What am I saying to my the little Sesotho that I know, my father child about my language, my culture – where were you? People are calling me his or her language, his or her culture? Mphemba, Ntuli, Godide … with such What are we doing to our children? cordiality and excitement. I don’t know We cannot hide behind the fact that what they mean and I don’t know how ‘English takes you everywhere’. Yes, to react. My father, from their warmth English can take you everywhere but and smiles, I believe what they are say- as what, as who? ing is good. I also believe they have an When children are young, they can- expectation … an expectation from me not tell the difference between good to respond in a particular way … My and bad, correct and wrong. They are father, I don’t know what to say, I don’t solely dependent on what the adults know how to react … My father, what around them model or say. Now, this have you done to me?’

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Natalia 48 (2018) CC-BY-NC cc Natal Society Foundation 2018 Zulu, a dying language?

‘I stand in my father’s land … a lost in their lives where they will yearn for soul … who am I, I ponder? Where do their roots, their culture, and they will I belong? I ask myself. This is where blame us. Then, we shall be nothing but I belong, I can feel it in my bones … heartless people who deprived them of This is where my roots are, it’s written their true self. in these people’s faces but I can’t utter a single word to show that I belong. My NOTES father, when my mother was teaching 1 Koopman, A., Zulu Language Change (Ho- wick, Brevitas, 1999). me Sesotho, where were you? At least 2 Koopman, A. and Davey, A., ‘Adulphe Dele- I can greet in Sesotho … that is how far gorgue’s Vocabulaire de la Langue Zoulouse’, my mother taught me. But I am a Zulu. South African Journal of African Languages, I should be speaking Zulu … my father 20(2), 2000, pp.134–47. 3 Manson, A., The Hlubi and Ngwe in a Colonial where were you? When parents were Society 1848–1877 (MA thesis, University of teaching their children their language, Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 1979). their culture, their identity … my par- 4 Bird, ., Annals of Natal 1495–1845 (Pieter- ents, where were you? Am I English, maritzburg, P. Davis, 1888). 5 Webb, .de . and Wright, J., The James Stu- obviously not … the colour of my skin art Archive, volumes 1–6 (Pietermaritzburg, betrays me. Am I Zulu, obviously not, University of Natal Press and University of the language I speak betrays me. I am KwaZulu-Natal Press, 1976, 1979, 1981, a lost soul in my father’s land’. 1983, 1986 and 2014). 6 Bryant, A., Olden Times in Zululand and Natal The room was silent; you could hear Containing Earlier Political History of the a pin drop. At the end of her ‘poem’, Eastern-Nguni Clans (London, Longmans she got a standing ovation and people Green, 1929). thought that was her keynote address. 7 Guy, J. in Healy-Clancy, M. and Hickel, J., Ekhaya: The Politics of Home in KwaZulu- This was a business conference and the Natal (Pietermaritzburg, University of address was expected to be on business, KwaZulu-Natal Press, 2014). but this didn’t stop the audience from 8 Van Warmelo, N., A Preliminary Survey of giving the speaker a standing ovation. the Bantu Tribes of South Africa (, Government Printer, 1935). Why? 9 Krige, E., The Social System of the Zulus Let’s ask ourselves ‘What are we do- (Pietermaritzburg, Shuter and Shooter, 1962 ing to our children?’ before we proudly [1936]). say ‘my daughter/son can’t speak Zulu’, 10 Berglund, Axel-Ivar, Zulu Thought-Patterns and Symbolism (Bloomington, Indiana Uni- a line very popular among certain versity Press, 1976). parents of today, always uttered with a 11 Clegg, J., ‘Ukubuyisa isiDumbu: bringing smile, with no shame but pride. back the body’, Working Papers in Southern Yes, we have to learn the language of African Studies, 2 (1981), pp. 164–99. business, as English is known to be, but nobody ever said this should be done at the expense of our own language. And we can easily criss-cross between these two languages and cultures. The sad reality is that no matter how much advantage we can see in moti- vating our children to learn English, if this is done at the expense of their own mother tongue, there will come a time

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Natalia 48 (2018) CC-BY-NC cc Natal Society Foundation 2018