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67 3 Toward the Centralization of Power Let us pick up the thread of history around 1720 and examine the evolution of the kingdom until the death of Ndabarasa in 1796, which triggered a particularly destructive civil war. Over the course of almost three quarters of a century, the kings and the elite at the court succeeded in creating a centralized kingdom by laying their hands on all the cattle and the land, the essential factors of production, by fashioning effective, multiple, and permanent armies, and by developing the court, which became the pivot of the realm. Thus a system of government was elaborated here that was unique in the whole region of the Great Lakes. According to the traditions, this period is clearly divided into two parts separated by the rupture that occurred around 1766 when Rujugira seized power. Gisanura,1 Mazimpaka, and Rwaka ruled before the rupture and Rujugira and Ndabarasa after it. The latter two kings apparently also instituted fundamental reforms. Yet, despite this, the traditions are far more fascinated with the personality of YUHI Mazimpaka than with that of Rujugira or Ndabarasa. They praise his physical beauty,2 his poetic sensitivity, his visionary talents, his exceptional fertility , which gave him numerous descendants, and his love of cattle, which led him to commit all sorts of follies on behalf of his favorites, especially on behalf of his cow Nyagahoza and his herd of long-horned cattle (Inyambo ). This love of cattle also explains why all the subsequent YUHI are supposed to be cattle kings. His beloved capital “Kamonyi in the heavens” was a bucolic and peaceful paradise. In contrast, his martial qualities are not underlined, even in his praise name.3 But the destiny of this monarch was tragic. This visionary was often drunk,4 yaws ravaged his beauty, and his sensitivity turned into such paranoia that he ended up exterminating those he loved the most, and turned into a madman.5 We have here an exceptional personality that could not be stereotyped like that of CYIRIMA Rujugira, the wise reformer, or his son Ndabarasa , the intrepid warrior. The memory of their actions explains why the names of CYIRIMA (and MUTARA) will henceforth open the sequence of regnal names and why KIGERI will henceforth be associated with the picture of a fighting king. But their personalities fade compared to that of Mazimpaka. The two wings of this diptych as presented by the traditions oppose the personality of a king to the great deeds of his two successors. But an historian cannot accept the idea that there was such a complete contrast. Yes, the coup certainly provoked a great rupture that led to the subsequent reform of the royal ideology, and the coup was certainly traumatic since it had a strong impact on all the traditions that speak of earlier times. But the fundamental centralizing reforms had been effected well before the rupture and hence it is better not to subdivide this period. The Seizure of the Herds and the Land The curtain rises around 1720 and reveals the following scene: Gisanura is king, but the great chiefs Mpaka in Nduga and Mayaga, Mpumba at Gishubi in Ndiza, Kogota in Rukoma from Kamonyi to Ruhanga, Kazakanyabuseri in Marangara around Kabgayi, and Rugabyi, son of Bwakiya, in the Burembo of Ndiza are all independent. Those are all the chiefs south of the middle Nyabarongo save for Busanza in the far south. But Gisanura succeeds in convincing them to recognize him as overlord, allowing them to remain lords in their lands.6 We thus learn that practically the whole country south of the Nyabarongo was ruled by five major chiefs, the majority of whom were probably still descendants of Ndori’s allies in the region. If one also takes into account the considerable amount of land that was owned by the ritualists in Buriza and northern Bumbogo, it becomes evident that the king still did not control extensive personal domains. Ndori’s successors had not managed to extend their authority, and their centralizing power was still as fragile as it had been at the outset. But starting with Gisanura the kings and their courts attempted to obtain a stronger hold over their subjects and succeeded in this endeavor . It was an enterprise of long duration, which was grounded in part in the strength of the royal armies, but consisted mainly in the seizure of those great herds that constituted the wealth and power of the lords. Remember also that the...

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