Angola--part: North Lunda and South Lunda

How is the land laid out?

North¹ and South² Lunda are in northeast Angola and consist of 149 thousand square kilometers. While still part of the plateau, the lands here are falling off toward the north and east. The provinces are demarked from the rest of the nation by two tributaries of the Zaire³ system: the Lui and the Cassai.⁴ The Lui starts in southwest South Lunda and flows along the provincial boundary to join the Cuango⁵ and continue north. The Cassai starts quite near the Lui and flows east along the provincial boundary, and then turns left sharply to head north along the national one. Between them are numerous rivers like the Luangue⁶ and Cuilo.⁷

Tourists visit Dala Waterfalls.⁸

Map

Who lives there?

Less than half a million people live here. About two-thirds of them speak Chokwe, more than three in ten Ruund⁹ and less than that Lunda.^10,11 The majority of the people probably follow local religions. Among the Chokwe this means a belief in a creator god called Kalunga, and in place-centered and ancestral spirits called mahamba. Bad experiences are attributed to the latter, or to their invocation by sorcerers (wanga). Diviners (nganga) can provide diagnostics about these supernatural influences, commonly by tossing a basket with up to 60 objects in it, and reading their resulting arrangement.¹²

There are no large cities, and neither of the two principle capitals predominates. Camaquenzo Airport serves the northern capital of Dundo (2010 population of 40,000) and Saurimo Airport serves the southern capital of Saurimo (2010 population of 78,000).^13,14

Who was there before?

Bantu languages moved into the area in the last two millennia. The Ruund people, centered in Katanga, created an empire in the 17th century. They conquered people south of them who called both themselves and the Ruund 'Lunda,' and so the empire is known by that name. The Chokwe expanded northward in the 19th century and took over the former empire, absorbing large numbers of enslaved women and thus coming into regional linguistic hegemony.

Around the Area

northeast
east
south
southwest
west
northwest

Footnotes

1. Norte in Portuguese
2. Sul in Portuguese
3. Or Congo River. The Congo is most narrowly the name of its lower course and the Zaïre of its middle course.
4. Called the Kasai in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Its downstream end there is called the Kwa.
5. Called the Kwango in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
6. Called the Loange in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
7. Called the Kwilu in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
8. https://www.thecrazytourist.com/15-best-places-to-visit-in-angola, accessed December 22, 2018.
9. Also called Northern Lunda.
10. Also called Southern Lunda.
11. Due to external displacements in both directions, these proportions are tentative.
12. The source for information about the Chokwe religion is www.uiowa.edu/~africart/toc/people/Chokwe.html, accessed May 26, 2007.
13. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_and_towns_in_Angola, accessed December 22, 2018.
14. Regularly scheduled service on a commericial airline, in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_airports_in_Angola, accessed December 22, 2018.