The Tutsi, or Batutsi, are a people of Rwanda and Burundi in the highlands of the Great Lakes region of Central Africa, forming a substantial minority traditionally associated with cattle-keeping and the old ruling aristocracy. A related community, the Banyamulenge, lives in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo.Sharing their language, religion and much of their culture with the majority Hutu, the Tutsi were distinguished above all by cattle, by the sacred kingship and by the refined culture of the royal court, home of the celebrated Intore dancers. Their history, and the hardening of the Hutu-Tutsi divide under colonial rule, culminated in the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. This article traces their origins, language, homeland, pastoral heritage and shared history.

The Tutsi on Film

Contents

• Origins
• The Name
• The Language
• The Homeland
• The Old Way of Life
• Society and Community
• Religion and Belief
• Traditions
• Crafts
• Food
• Festivals
• History
• Today

Origins

The Tutsi, or Batutsi, sometimes historically called the Watutsi, are a people of Rwanda and Burundi in the highlands of the Great Lakes region of Central Africa, where they form a substantial minority, traditionally around one in seven of the population. They are also found in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, where a related community is known as the Banyamulenge.

Traditionally associated with cattle-keeping and with the old ruling aristocracy of the region, the Tutsi share their language, religion and much of their culture with the majority Hutu and the smaller Twa. Their exact origins are debated, but they emerged as a distinct group within a single society whose divisions of status and occupation would later be hardened, with tragic results, into rigid ethnic categories.

The Name

The people are called the Tutsi, or Batutsi in the local languages, a single person being a Mututsi. The name has long distinguished the cattle-keeping group, associated with the court and the aristocracy, from the farming Hutu and the Twa.

Scholars debate whether the Tutsi and Hutu were originally distinct peoples or groups within one society defined by status and occupation, for they share a common language and culture and lived intermingled across the same hills. Under colonial rule the distinction was fixed as a racial one, but the name Tutsi continues to denote the historically pastoral people of Rwanda, Burundi and their borderlands.

The Language

The Tutsi speak the same languages as the Hutu and Twa among whom they live: Kinyarwanda in Rwanda and the closely related Kirundi in Burundi, both Bantu languages of the region. There is no separate Tutsi language, and this shared mother tongue is one of the clearest signs of a common culture uniting the groups.

Kinyarwanda and Kirundi are rich in poetry, proverb and oral tradition, including the elaborate dynastic and cattle praise-poetry cultivated at the old royal courts, in which the Tutsi aristocracy took particular pride. French, English and Swahili also feature in national life, but the shared language remains the deepest bond of the peoples of the hills.

The Homeland

The homeland of the Tutsi is the same highland country of Rwanda and Burundi that they share with the Hutu and Twa, the famous land of a thousand hills, a region of steep green ridges, volcanic peaks and deep valleys near the sources of the Nile. The cool, fertile and densely populated highlands are among the most crowded lands in Africa.

Within this country the pastoral Tutsi traditionally sought the grasslands and pastures for their cattle, while the farming Hutu worked the cultivated hillsides, though the two lived intermingled across the same districts. The hills of Rwanda and Burundi, with their pastures and terraced fields, form the shared homeland of all the peoples of the region.

The Old Way of Life

The Tutsi were traditionally pastoralists, and their identity and prestige were bound up above all with cattle. The ownership of large herds of the region’s long-horned cattle, including the treasured Inyambo of the royal herds, was the mark of wealth, status and aristocracy, and cattle were central to ritual, poetry and the bonds of clientship.

Through the institution of cattle-clientship, wealthier Tutsi patrons lent cattle to clients, often Hutu, in return for service and loyalty, weaving the groups together in relations of mutual obligation and inequality. Milk was prized in the diet, and the whole culture of the aristocracy celebrated the beauty and value of the herd, giving the pastoral ideal a dominant place in the old society.

Society and Community

Traditional society in Rwanda and Burundi was organised into kingdoms under a sacred king, the mwami, historically drawn from the Tutsi, with an elaborate court, chiefs and hierarchy. The Tutsi aristocracy held the higher offices and the prestige of cattle and command, while the Hutu majority farmed and the Twa occupied a marginal place.

Yet clans cut across the groups, and the categories were bound together by shared language, intermarriage and the ties of clientship and neighbourhood. The relationship between the pastoral Tutsi and the farming Hutu, structured by the court and by patronage, was complex and unequal, and its transformation under colonial rule into a rigid racial order lay at the root of later conflict.

Religion and Belief

Traditional religion in the region centred on a supreme creator god, Imana, the giver of life, fertility and blessing, together with the veneration of ancestors and, in Rwanda, the important spirit cult of Ryangombe and the imandwa. These beliefs were shared by Tutsi, Hutu and Twa alike, and the king held a sacred role as guarantor of the fertility and wellbeing of the land.

Ritual and divination sought the favour of Imana and the ancestors and explained misfortune, and elaborate court rituals surrounded the person of the mwami. From the colonial period Christianity spread rapidly, and today the great majority of Tutsi are Christian, chiefly Catholic, though older ideas about Imana, the ancestors and the sacredness of cattle persist in the culture.

Traditions

The traditions of the Tutsi were bound up with cattle and with the culture of the royal court. The aristocracy cultivated an elaborate lore of cattle, with praise-poetry, special names and rituals devoted to the herds, and the court fostered refined arts of poetry, rhetoric and dance. Marriage, sealed by the giving of cattle, linked families and expressed the value of the herd.

The famous Intore, the dancers of the court, performed the stately and vigorous warrior dances of Rwanda, a tradition once associated with the training of young aristocrats and now celebrated as a national heritage. Ideals of dignity, self-control and eloquence, and the refined manners of the court, were central to the traditional Tutsi conception of nobility.

Crafts

The material culture of the Tutsi was shared with the wider society of the hills, but the aristocracy patronised refined crafts of great beauty. Foremost among these was the weaving of the elegant coiled baskets, such as the igiseke with its tall conical lid, made by women and prized as objects of art and as gifts, which have become a celebrated symbol of Rwandan culture.

The making of decorated milk-vessels, screens and mats, and the drums and regalia of the royal court, called for special skill, and pottery, ironwork and beadwork served daily life. The elegant basketry above all reflects the refined aesthetic sense cultivated in the old society and carried on by the women of the region.

Food

Reflecting their pastoral heritage, the Tutsi traditionally prized milk and dairy foods above all, and the offering of milk was a mark of honour and hospitality. Milk, drunk fresh or soured, and dishes made with it were central to the diet of the cattle-owning families, and beef was eaten on occasions of celebration.

Yet the Tutsi shared the wider cuisine of the hills, based on the bananas, beans, sorghum, sweet potatoes and other crops of the region, and banana beer was important in hospitality and ceremony. The combination of the dairy foods of the herders with the produce of the farms gave the region its distinctive cooking, in which milk held a place of special esteem.

Festivals

Festive life among the Tutsi was tied to the ceremonies of the royal court, the culture of cattle and the milestones of the life cycle, shared with the whole society of the hills. Court ceremonies, the celebration of the herds, weddings marked by the giving of cattle, and the events of the calendar were occasions for feasting, poetry, music and dance.

The performances of the Intore dancers, the drumming of the region and the recitation of dynastic and cattle poetry gave these gatherings their splendour. Today national and Christian festivals join the older celebrations, and the Intore dance and the arts of the court are cherished as part of a shared national heritage, performed with pride on public occasions.

History

For centuries the Tutsi, Hutu and Twa lived together in the kingdoms of Rwanda and Burundi, sharing language and culture, with the Tutsi aristocracy and the sacred kingship at the summit of an unequal but interwoven order. Under German and then Belgian colonial rule the distinction between Tutsi and Hutu was hardened into a rigid racial classification recorded on identity cards, and the Tutsi were favoured as intermediaries, deepening division and resentment.

As independence approached, a Hutu-led revolution in Rwanda overturned the old order and drove many Tutsi into exile, and cycles of violence followed in both countries. This history culminated in 1994, when extremist forces in Rwanda carried out the genocide against the Tutsi, in which some eight hundred thousand people, overwhelmingly Tutsi, were murdered in a few months. A movement of Tutsi exiles then took power and ended the genocide, and the country began the long work of recovery.

Today

Today the Tutsi live in Rwanda, Burundi and the neighbouring borderlands, sharing the crowded hills with the Hutu majority in the aftermath of terrible violence. In Rwanda the government has officially discouraged the use of ethnic labels, emphasising a single national identity and the work of reconciliation and remembrance in the wake of the 1994 genocide.

The peoples of the region have faced the immense task of rebuilding their societies, seeking justice, healing and coexistence. The Intore dancers, the elegant baskets and the poetry of the old court are celebrated as part of a shared heritage, and the Tutsi carry both the rich culture and the painful memory of the land of a thousand hills into a future that Rwanda and Burundi hope will be one of lasting peace.

Related Peoples of the Region

• The Nyamwezi, the Caravan Traders of Central Tanzania
• The Makonde, the Blackwood Sculptors of the Ruvuma
• The Hadza, the Last Hunter-Gatherers of Lake Eyasi
• The Iraqw, the Cushitic Highlanders of Northern Tanzania
• The Banyankole, the Cattle Kingdom of Ankole
• The Acholi, the Luo People of Northern Uganda
• The Karamojong, the Cattle Herders of Karamoja
• The Hutu, the Farmers of the Land of a Thousand Hills

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