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Volume 992

Lecture Notes in Physics

Series Editors
Roberta Citro
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Peter Hä nggi
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Andreas Wipf

Statistical Approach to Quantum Field

Theory
An Introduction
2nd ed. 2021
Andreas Wipf
Theoretical Physics, Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Jena, Germany

ISSN 0075-8450 e-ISSN 1616-6361

Lecture Notes in Physics
ISBN 978-3-030-83262-9 e-ISBN 978-3-030-83263-6
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-83263-6

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive

license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2013, 2021

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively
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any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and
retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or
dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed.

The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks,

service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the
absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the
relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general
use.

The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the
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at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the
editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the
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To Ingrid, Leonie, Severin, and Valentin
Preface to the Second Edition
This new expanded second edition has been totally revised and
corrected. The reader finds two completely new chapters. One covers
the exact solution of the finite temperature Schwinger model with
periodic boundary conditions. This simple model supports instanton
solutions—similarly as QCD—and allows for a detailed discussion of
topological sectors in gauge theories, the anomaly-induced breaking of
chiral symmetry, and the intriguing role of fermionic zero modes. The
other new chapter is devoted to interacting fermions at finite fermion
density and finite temperature. Such low-dimensional models are used
to describe long-energy properties of Dirac-type materials in
condensed matter physics. The large-N solutions of the Gross-Neveu,
Nambu-Jona-Lasinio, and Thirring models are presented in great detail,
where N denotes the number of fermion flavors. Towards the end of the
book, corrections to the large-N solution and simulation results of a
finite number of fermion flavors are presented. Further problems are
added at the end of each chapter in order to guide the reader to a
deeper understanding of the presented topics. This book is aimed at
advanced students and young researchers who want to acquire the
necessary tools and experience to produce research results in the
statistical approach to quantum field theory.
It is a great pleasure to thank again the many collaborators,
teachers, and colleagues already mentioned in the first edition of this
book. In addition, I would like to thank the group in Frankfurt (Laurin
Pannullo, Marc Wagner, and Marc Winstel) and my more recent PhD
students and postdocs for a fruitful collaboration on interacting Fermi
systems in the continuum and on the lattice. Several new sections in
this second edition are based on an early collaboration with I. Sachs
and an ongoing collaboration with the group in Frankfurt and with J.
Lenz, M. Mandl, D. Schmidt, and B. Wellegehausen. I would like to thank
Holger Gies and Felix Karbstein for many inspiring discussions about
interacting Fermions, and Julian Lenz, Michael Mandl, and Ingrid Wipf
for proofreading the new chapters.
Andreas Wipf
Jena, Germany
June 2021
Preface to the First Edition
Statistical field theory deals with the behavior of classical or quantum
systems consisting of an enormous number of degrees of freedom in
and out of equilibrium. Quantum field theory provides a theoretical
framework for constructing quantum mechanical models of systems
with an infinite number of degrees of freedom. It is the natural
language of particle physics and condensed matter physics. In the past
decades the powerful methods in statistical physics and Euclidean
quantum field theory have come closer and closer, with common tools
based on the use of path integrals. The interpretation of Euclidean field
theories as particular systems of statistical physics opened up new
avenues to understand strongly coupled quantum systems or quantum
field theories at zero or finite temperature. The powerful methods of
statistical physics and stochastics can be applied to study for example
the vacuum sector, effective action, thermodynamic potentials,
correlation functions, finite size effects, nature of phase transitions or
critical behavior of quantum systems.
The first chapters of this book contain a self contained introduction
to path integrals in Euclidean quantum mechanics and statistical
mechanics. The resulting high-dimensional integrals can be estimated
with the help of Monte-Carlo simulations based on Markov processes.
The method is first introduced and then applied to ordinary integrals
and to quantum mechanical systems. Thereby the most commonly used
algorithms are explained in detail. Equipped with theses stochastic
methods we may use high performance computers as an
“experimental” tool for a new brand of theoretical physics.
The book contains several chapters devoted to an introduction into
simple lattice field theories and a variety of spin systems with discrete
and continuous spins. An ideal guide to the fascinating area of phase
transitions is provided by the ubiquitous Ising model. Despite its
simplicity the model is often used to illustrate the key features of
statistical systems and the methods available to understand these
features. The Ising model has always played an important role in
statistical physics, both at pedagogical and methodological levels.
Almost all chapters in the middle part of the book begin with
introducing methods, approximations, expansions or rigorous results
by first considering the Ising model. In a next step we generalize from
the Ising model to other lattice systems, for example Potts models, O(N)
models, scalar field theories, gauge theories and fermionic theories. For
spin models and field theories on a lattice it is often possible to derive
rigorous results or bounds. Important examples are the bounds
provided by the mean field approximation, inequalities between
correlation functions of ferromagnetic systems and the proofs that
there exist spontaneously broken phases at low temperature or the
duality transformations for Abelian models which relate the weak
coupling and strong coupling regions or the low temperature and high
temperature phases. All these interesting results are derived and
discussed with great care.
As an alternative to the lattice formulation of quantum field theories
one may use a variant of the flexible renormalization group methods.
For example, implementing (spacetime) symmetries is not so much an
issue for a functional renormalization group method as it sometimes is
for a lattice regularization and hence the method is somehow
complementary to the ab initio lattice approach. In cases where a
lattice regularization based on a positive Boltzmann factor fails, for
example for gauge theories at finite density, the functional method may
work. Thus it is often a good strategy to consider both methods when it
comes to properties of strongly coupled systems under extreme
conditions. Knowledge of the renormalization group method and in
particular the flow of scale dependent functionals from the microscopic
to the macroscopic world is a key part of modern physics and thus we
have devoted two chapters to this method.
According to present day knowledge all fundamental interactions in
nature are described by gauge theories. Gauge theories can be
formulated on a finite spacetime lattice without spoiling the important
local gauge invariance. Thereby the functional integral turns into a
finite-dimensional integral which can be handled by stochastic means.
Problems arise when one considers gauge fields in interaction with
fermions at finite temperature and non-zero baryon density. A lot of
efforts have gone into solving or at least circumventing these problems
to simulate quantum chromodynamics, the microscopic gauge theory
underlying the strong interaction between quarks and gluons. The last
chapters of the book deal with gauge theories without and with matter.
 This book is based on an elaboration of lecture notes of the course
Quantum Field Theory II given by the author at the Friedrich-Schiller-
University Jena. It is designed for advanced undergraduate and
beginning graduate students in physics and applied mathematics. For
this reason, its style is greatly pedagogical; it assumes only some basics
of mathematics, statistical physics, and quantum field theory. But the
book contains some more sophisticated concepts which may be useful
to researchers in the field as well. Although many textbooks on statistic
physics and quantum field theory are already available, they largely
differ in contents from the present book. Beginning with the path
integral in quantum mechanics and with numerical methods to
calculate ordinary integrals we bridge the gap to lattice gauge theories
with dynamical fermions. Each chapter ends with some problems
which should be useful for a better understanding of the material
presented in the main text. At the end of many chapters you also find
listings of computer programs, either written in C or in the freely
available Matlab-clone Octave. Not only because of the restricted size of
the book I did not want to include lengthy simulation programs for
gauge theories.

Acknowledgments
Over the years I have had the pleasure of collaborating and discussing
many of the themes of this book with several of my teachers, colleagues,
and friends. First of all, I would like to especially thank the late Lochlain
O’Raifeartaigh for the long and profitable collaboration on effective
potentials, anomalies, and two-dimensional field theories, and for
sharing his deep understanding of many aspects of symmetries and
field theories. I would like to use this opportunity to warmly thank the
academic teachers who have influenced me most—Jü rg Frö hlich, Res
Jost, John Lewis, Konrad Osterwalder, Eduard Stiefel, and especially
Norbert Straumann. I assume that their influence on my way of
thinking about quantum field theory and statistical physics might be
visible in some parts of this book.
I have been fortunate in having the benefit of collaborations and
discussions with many colleagues and friends and in particular with
Manuel Asorey, Pierre van Baal, Janos Balog, Steven Blau, Jens Braun,
Fred Cooper, Stefan Durr, Chris Ford, Lazlo Feher, Thomas Filk, Peter
Forgacs, Christof Gattringer, Holger Gies, Tom Heinzl, Karl Jansen, Claus
Kiefer, Kurt Langfeld, Axel Maas, Emil Mottola, Renato Musto, Jan
Pawlowski, Ivo Sachs, Lorenz von Smekal, Thomas Strobl, Torsten Tok,
Izumi Tsutsui, Sebastian Uhlmann, Matt Visser, Christian Wiesendanger,
and Hiroshi Yoneyma. On several topics covered in the second and more
advanced part of the book, I collaborated intensively with my present
and former PhD students Georg Bergner, Falk Bruckmann, Leander
Dittman, Marianne Heilmann, Tobias Kä stner, Andreas Kirchberg,
Daniel Kö rner, Dominque Lä nge, Franziska Synatschke-Czerwonka,
Bjoern Wellegehausen, and Christian Wozar. Last but not least, I am
indebted to Holger Gies and Kurt Langfeld for a critical reading of parts
of the manuscript and Marianne Heilmann for translating the German
lecture notes into English.
Andreas Wipf
Jena, Germany
June 2012
Acronyms
A μ Gauge potential
A(ω, ω′) Acceptance rate for ω → ω′
β, β T Inverse gauge coupling ∼ 1∕g 2 or inverse temperature 1∕k B T
Dirac operator and free Dirac operator
Closed path or loop
χ Susceptibility
Formal path integral measure
D μ Covariant derivative in μ-direction
[d∕2]
d s =2 dimension of irreducible spinor in d dimensions
F, f Free energy and free energy density
F μν Field strength tensor
ϕ x , φ x Microscopic and macroscopic lattice field at lattice site x
Field operator at spacetime point x
Euclidian field operator at spacetime point x
Effective action, scale dependent effective action
Γ, Γ k External source at spacetime point x and at lattice site x
j(x), j x Lagrangian density or Legendre transformation
Spacetime lattice
Λ Energy of spin configuration ω
H(ω)
Hamiltonian operator of quantum system
K(t), K(τ) Propagator at real time t and imaginary time τ
N t , N s Number of lattice points in time and space direction
Observable in a classical statistical system and in quantum
theory
Polyakov loop and its gauge invariant trace
Pω Equilibrium probability for configuration ω
ψ(x), ψ Fermionic field in continuum and on the lattice
x
Other documents randomly have
different content
 VIEW FROM NCHICHIRA OVER THE ROVUMA, LAKE
NANGADI, AND THE MAVIA PLATEAU

I always, of course, have my only and highly-prized map handy,

and a glance at it shows me that such a chief as Namagone really
exists, and that his village is on the right bank of the Rovuma, in 38°
26′ E. longitude, so that one troop of these Wangoni must at some
time or other during their retreat have got as far east as this. This
was confirmed by several other men sitting by. Kambale says that he,
too, was at Namagone’s when a boy, and Liambaku, a younger
brother of Majaliwa’s, states that he was born at the Lukimwa.
Makachu is just about to continue his narrative when Majaliwa,
the senior of those present, opens his withered mouth, with its worn-
down stumps of teeth, to say: “From the Lukimwa we went to
Kandulu’s, the Yao chief; the Wangoni drove us away from there;
first we went to Namagone’s, and then to Makachu’s, where we
remained a year. But the Wangoni came again and drove us out once
more, and we came to Nchichira. But even here they have attacked us
once, and that was at the time when you Wadachi (Germans) built
your boma at Lindi.”
No one else offers to speak, so that I can put in a word in my turn.
“You have so much to say of the evil the Wangoni have done you,
but are they not your brothers?”
 Lively gesticulation all round the circle. “No,” is the unanimous
answer, “they are our worst enemies.”
“But surely you can understand and speak their language?” Again
a most decided negative. Further cross-questioning elicited the
following explanation:—
“We people of Nchichira call ourselves Wangoni, but we call the
people from Songea Mafiti. They came from a far country long ago,
but we do not know what country they came from. Our fathers
always lived on the Lukimwa, and if it were not that the evil Mafiti
had raided us so often, we should be living there still. We are no kin
to the Wamatambwe, but we are good friends with the Wayao; our
fathers always took refuge with them in time of war.”
A detailed study of the Wangoni at Nchichira thus shows that, as
already stated, they are a conglomerate of all possible elements, who
during the long Mafiti troubles fled to this remote corner and became
amalgamated into a sort of tribal unit of their own. How much they
resemble—or try to resemble—the Yaos, nothing shows more clearly
than the fact that almost all the women wear the kipini or nose-stud;
the pelele is quite a rarity among them. Though disappointed of the
new and strange traits I had hoped to meet with, had the Wangoni
proved to be true Zulus, I cannot help feeling a certain pride in
correcting the old mistaken view of these people which is even now
current on the coast: yet I cannot deny that the discovery made me
less unwilling to leave Nchichira than I should otherwise have been.
Knudsen has been spending the whole time which I have devoted
to my inquiries among the Wangoni elders, hunting in the alluvial
valley of the Rovuma, with its rich variety of high, dense forest,
tangled scrub, and open, meadow-like glades. I often thought I could
hear his gun, so close under the boma of Nchichira do these hunting-
grounds lie, and, more than once, standing on the plateau, I have
fancied my eye could follow his stooping figure as he advanced
quickly and yet cautiously along the bottom of the valley.
The one evening walk possible at Nchichira is very short, but
reveals almost an excess of beauty. The sun has just set behind the
distant Nyasa, and, quite exhausted, I lay aside pencil and note-book,
light a fresh cigar (we have had in a supply by this time, not derived
from the Indian’s store at Lindi, but genuine Leipzig ones), beckon
my camera-bearers to follow, and leave the boma at a good round
pace. We walk along the palisade till it comes to an end, and then we
have reached the goal; the Rovuma Valley in all its glory is lying
immediately at my feet. It is no easy task to depict a sunset in words,
and here, where to the peculiar character of the country, with its
remarkable contrasts between the highest degree of erosion and the
greatest amount of alluvial accumulation is added an indescribable
richness of colour in the evening sky, the pen fails—if only because in
the presence of such beauty it is impossible for a person of any
feeling to put his impressions on paper. If I could photograph in
colours what a picture I should have! But as I am confined to the use
of common, or at most orthochromatic plates, I shall have to do the
best I can with my note-book, after reaching home, to give some idea
of the glory I have been witnessing.

FOREST RUINED BY NATIVES NEAR

NCHICHIRA, ROVUMA VALLEY

The plateau, here, at the centre of its southern edge, is much lower
than at Newala; it may be estimated at from 1,300 to 1,500 feet. And
yet the valley of the Rovuma, with a breadth of from six to nine miles
and a height above sea-level, at its lowest point, of barely 200 feet,
makes the impression of a vast eroded ravine. Its two edges are
absolutely similar, and it must be clear to any child that the Mavia
plateau on the other side and the Makonde highlands on this are of
the same age and have the same origin. The Rovuma, working
downward like a saw, has gradually excavated this cañon across the
old tableland. Now at the end of the dry season, the river looks more
poverty-stricken than ever—a scanty thread of water trickling along a
bed over half-a-mile wide, filled with enormous banks of gravel and
sand. The river in flood must be a grand sight, but to-day the
prevailing note of the scenery is gentle and cheerful. A whole series
of terraces marking different flood-levels are visible to the naked eye
below us, while similar ones can be made out with a field-glass on
the Portuguese side of the river. The grey strip with the shining silver
thread in it looks near enough to be touched by the hand, yet
Knudsen says it is a good two hours’ walk to the river-bank—so
deceptive is the wonderfully clear air. It is true that here, too, there
are clouds of smoke rising to the sky—they are at times particularly
dense and frequent on the other side of the valley, between the river
and the Nangadi Lake. I am almost tempted to think that the Mavia
want to smoke out the unlucky Portuguese who is probably
meditating in his boma—easily distinguishable with the glass—on the
reason why he has been condemned to pass his life here: so
numerous are the concentric zones of fire which seem to surround
his lonely abode. To our right the grey bed of the river with its green
margins stretches away westward till it is lost in the distance. The
Lidede Lake is by no means near, yet it, too, by an effect of
perspective, seems to lie at our feet, so far can I look beyond it into
the interior of the continent. And over all this the western and
southern horizon glows in a thousand brilliant tints. It almost seems
as if the sun, for love of so much beauty, were departing less quickly
than he usually does between the tropics; the sunset hues pale and
fade away only very gradually. It was with difficulty that I could tear
myself away from this picture in order to take one or two
photographs of it with my smallest stop, while my dark friends stood
behind me in silence, evidently as much impressed as their master.
At first the darkness came on by slow degrees, but after a while the
shadows, growing deeper and deeper, descended more quickly over
Lidede and Nangadi; then the first sombre tones touched the
meadows and the green forest, and only the light grey of the river bed
showed up for a while amid the gathering darkness. I am a very
prosaic person, on the whole; but I am quite willing to admit that a
single sunset like this would have amply repaid me for the march to
Nchichira, even had I found no Wangoni living there.
In this valley, then, Nils Knudsen has been pursuing the pleasures
of the chase. At any time, the first chance native who comes to him
with the remark, “Master, there are elephants down there,” is enough
to send him off in ten minutes at the best pace of which his rolling
seaman’s gait will permit. He is sensible enough, however, to trust no
longer to his ancient blunderbusses, but has asked me for the loan of
one of my rifles.
One afternoon, I am sitting as usual with my native tutors. Our
Kingoni studies are not progressing very satisfactorily. If I direct the
intelligent Saidi to translate, “Your father is dead,” I infallibly get a
sentence which, when afterwards checked, turns out to mean, “My
father is dead.” If I want him to tell me the Kingoni for “My father is
dead,” he translates (quite correctly from his point of view), “Your
father,” etc., etc. I am now so far used to these little jokes that they
no longer excite me, but a worse difficulty lies in ascertaining the
forms of the personal pronouns: “I, thou,” etc. They caused me no
end of trouble even at Newala, where my teachers were by no means
stupid. Here, whatever I do, I cannot succeed in getting the third
person singular and plural. I have arrived at the first and second, of
course, by the rule of contraries; for, if I say “I,” involuntarily
pointing to myself, I am sure to get the word for “you,” and vice
versa. Resigning myself to disappointment, I am just about to light a
cigar to soothe my nerves, when I become aware of a perceptible
excitement all round me. At a rate compared with which
Pheidippides must have come from Marathon at a snail’s pace, one of
Knudsen’s boys arrives, spluttering out something which I cannot
understand. My men are all assembled in no time, and from them
and the inhabitants of the boma I hear the news of Knudsen’s
success in bringing down a large elephant. Its tusks are “so big”—the
fellows stretch out their, long, gibbon-like arms to show their girth—
and as for meat...! I could see how their mouths were watering at the
thought.
That day and the next were entirely dominated by the slain
elephant. The men kept bringing in veritable mountains of meat, and
the whole countryside smelt anything but agreeably of African
cooking. Then arrived the four feet, then the tusks, and last of all the
successful hunter himself. His triumph, however, was somewhat
damped by the fact that the tusks were small in proportion to the size
of the animal, weighing, by our reckoning, certainly not over forty
pounds. To make up for this, he brought me another piece of news,
to my mind much more welcome; the people in the valley had houses
of a style totally different from anything to be seen up here—in fact,
constructions of several stories. Nils was obliged to asseverate this in
the most solemn way before I would believe him; but once convinced
of his bona fides, I could not stay another day on the plateau. Early
the very next morning, we were clambering like monkeys down its
bordering cliffs into the river-valley.
For the last few days we have been encamped here close to the left
bank of the main river, in the scanty shade of stunted trees,
surrounded by a tangle of reeds and tall grass, in which our people
with some trouble cleared a place for the tents. At this spot there is
an extensive view both up and down stream, and, for a wonder, this
reach is free from the islands which elsewhere obstruct the channel,
so that the eye can range unhindered across a sea of sand-banks to
the further shore. The steep, eroded banks whose acquaintance we
made on the central course of the river are here, too, the rule. Sitting
at the top of one of these steep slopes, it requires some skill to hit the
hippos which from time to time unexpectedly rise in the river; even
Nils, usually a dead shot, misses time after time, to his great disgust.
These slopes are the only picturesque point in the vast desolation of
the river-bed where nothing is to be seen except sand and gravel,
gravel and sand. Between these great masses of drift, the Rovuma is
still more broken up into small streams than is the case higher up at
the mouth of the Bangala, and the wandering Wamatambwe, here
more numerous than on the upper river, have no need to exercise
their famous powers of swimming and diving, but can wade at their
ease across the shallow channels.
This is rather unfortunate for Knudsen, as it deprives him of an
opportunity to prove the truth of a story he is never tired of telling
me about the Wamatambwe. Not content with saying that they are
excellent swimmers, and not afraid of crocodiles, partly because of
their faith in the charms with which they are always provided and
partly because they are much more agile in the water than the
reptiles—he insists that they cross the river at its highest level, when
the current is too strong to launch their canoes, by simply walking
through, though the water is far above their heads. Though unable,
in face of his superior knowledge, to disprove this assertion, I find it
somewhat difficult to believe.
 The state of the river, as I have already remarked, will not allow
them to show off their diving at present, and as regards their trust in
the dawa for protection against crocodiles, my own observation does
not bear out what he tells me. At least, I see that the Wamatambwe
whom he sends across the channel at our feet, in order to pick up the
numerous ducks shot by him, always look about them uneasily when
they chance upon a deeper spot and make the best of their way to
shore.

MATAMBWE FISHERMAN CATCHING

A TURTLE, WHICH A WATER-SNAKE
IS TRYING TO SEIZE. FROM A
DRAWING BY THE ASKARI STAMBURI

But this is not the purpose for which I came down to the Rovuma,
and I may give myself credit for devoting to the river only the
afternoons of my scanty leisure. Every forenoon is occupied with the
discovery as to which Knudsen was so enthusiastic. This time, for
once, he was right; but, as the simplest photograph tells more than
the fullest description, I refer the reader to the accompanying
illustrations and only give such additional comments as are
absolutely necessary to make them comprehensible.
 Our departure from Nchichira was slightly delayed by a warm
shower, falling in straight, vertical lines on the dry sand. Both nature
and man drew a long breath at this first symptom of the approaching
rains. But the pitiless sun reasserted his rights only too quickly, and
the procession started on its way, soon vanishing down the
precipitous slope. After descending a few yards, the steep path
ceased to be slippery; hot, dry stones crunched under our feet—the
atmosphere, too, into which every step plunged us another fraction
of a yard deeper, was likewise hot and dry; it became evident that the
rain must here have evaporated before it reached the ground. At last
we arrived at the bottom and entered a dense forest of huge trees.
But even here we did not find the pleasant coolness of our German
forests; the air we encountered was hot, moist and mouldy-smelling,
and the foot had to feel its way uncertainly over the quaking soil.
“If the Department of Woods and Forests only knew—there is
plenty of timber to be had here!” I was just saying to myself, when we
suddenly came to the end of it. It looked as though a hurricane had
passed, or an avalanche ploughed its way down the neighbouring
precipice. The mighty boles lay like broken matches, across one
another in all directions; a lamentable sight indeed to an economical
European eye. With great difficulty we scrambled on; the ground
became drier; here and there we stepped into heaps of ashes, and
then a glance round revealed the true state of the case. Even here, it
is man who will not leave nature in peace. The Makonde plateau,
with its area of 6,000 square miles, might surely be expected to
afford subsistence for a mere trifle of 80,000 or 90,000 natives with
their simple wants. As a matter of fact, however, we see that it is not
sufficient for them. In this case the underwood had been cut down
and burnt over a considerable distance, and the large trees had been
attacked, as usual, with axe and fire. Everywhere fallen logs still
smouldered, and the vanished shapes of splendid trees were traced
on the ground in outlines of white ashes. While I was still gazing in
horror at the work of destruction, my men brought forward one of
the criminals—no other than old Majaliwa himself. He had his axe
still in his hand, and was grinning all over with pride at his
achievements.
German East Africa has no superfluity of real, commercially
valuable timber; the famous Shume forest in Usambara and a few
others (remarkable on account of their rarity) are but the exceptions
proving the rule. The necessity, therefore, of protecting the hitherto
untouched forest areas on the Rovuma from the wasteful farming of
the natives is all the more urgent. We have a well-founded right to
prohibit the tribes living in the neighbourhood of this valley from
cutting down a single tree in it, since it is solely in consequence of the
security afforded by the German administration that they are able to
cultivate any new ground at all outside their hereditary seats on the
plateau. If the boma of Nchichira had not been planted on the top of
the escarpment, bidding defiance to the Mavia across the valley, no
Mngoni or Makonde would dream of sowing a single grain of maize
beyond the edge of the tableland. So to-day, knowing that, under our
protection, they are quite safe from Mavia raids, even in the valley,
they go down and destroy our finest forests.
A little farther on, having reached the top of an undulation in the
soil, we at last came to the wonder we were in search of—two
specimens at once. With astonishment I found myself before a
regular tower, and saw my men staring uncomprehendingly at a style
of architecture quite new to them. Majaliwa’s new palace—it was
here then, that the old man retired every day after our shauri was
over—is not, indeed, as Nils Knudsen had asserted, a three-storied
house, but, with a little goodwill we can easily make out two stories
and an attic. The ground floor is a square apartment with grass walls,
filled with pots, calabashes, ladles and the rest of a native woman’s
household requisites, and having the usual fire smouldering between
the three lumps of earth in the centre. The first floor is much more
elegantly appointed, only the access to it is less convenient than
might be wished. My early training in gymnastics enables me to
negotiate without difficulty the primitive ladder, consisting of cross-
pieces lashed to the supporting piles at intervals of about a yard; but
they give Knudsen a good deal of trouble, and how old Majaliwa and
his wife get up it every night, like chickens going to roost, is beyond
my comprehension. Their sleeping apartment is quite comfortable—a
thick layer of straw covers the logs of the floor, and the mats which
make up the bedding are of a quality by no means to be despised. As
the matriarchate is not in force among the Wangoni, no rule of
propriety is violated by the fact that Abdallah, the heir to the house,
lives in the attic. This, too, is, for a native dwelling, very neatly
arranged, with its soft bed, mats and baskets of provisions.
 PILE-DWELLING ON THE ROVUMA, NEAR NCHICHIRA

Such was my first sight of the pile-dwellings of this region. It was

followed by more extensive studies, but the main features of these
constructions are everywhere the same. My first notion as to the
reason for this mode of building was that it had been adopted to
escape the mosquitoes in the neighbourhood of the river, and also for
safety in time of flood. Some of these huts, in fact, are within reach of
the inundations during the wet season; but the majority are placed
on the top of ridges well beyond high-water mark. If we ask the
natives why they build their huts in this particular way, the answer is
always the same—“Pembe” (“Elephants”). I was at first unwilling to
believe this, the elephant being an extremely shy animal, who, under
all circumstances, avoids the vicinity of man; but I was informed that
the local representatives of the species are of a somewhat different
disposition from their congeners elsewhere. Only a few days before,
one of these monsters had, quite unprovoked, seized a Mngoni going
peaceably about his business, and tossed him into the air. In the light
of these facts, the strong palisade surrounding many of these high
structures cannot be considered an unnecessary precaution. In any
case the discovery of this pile-dwelling district within easy reach of
the coast was almost as pleasant a surprise as my success in
establishing the tribal divisions at Newala.
The heat here certainly makes us wish ourselves back in the
comparatively low temperature of that place. It is impossible to
remain even a minute in the tent during the daytime, the
thermometer there standing at over 104°, while even under our
banda (a hastily erected grass shelter), we are sitting perspiring at
98° and 99°. The evening gale which was the terror of our lives at
Newala is here entirely absent, but, on the other hand, we are
tormented by a legion of mosquitoes, from which we can only escape
by retiring under our nettings soon after sunset.
“Have you anything more on your mind?” I have just asked the
indefatigable Knudsen, who seems quite worn out. “I mean,” I add,
seeing that he does not at once understand, “have you any more
ethnographical curiosities in reserve?”
“Not that I know of,” is his answer.
“Well, then, let us march again to-day, as far as the boma of
Nchichira, and to-morrow morning at 4.45 we will leave for Mahuta.”
“Let us do so at once, by all means!” replies Knudsen, and goes
into his tent to change his soaking khaki suit.
 CHAPTER XVII
ACHIEVEMENT

Mahuta, November 8, 1906.

Now for the dessert to my feast of research. If all its components

have not been equally appetising, yet several of the courses have
been good—some of them, indeed, very good—and there have been
many dainty tit-bits; while the dessert is quite in character with the
whole:—no further tax on the digestive powers, but a pleasant,
gradual transition to the after-dinner cigar, the coffee and bitters.
Thus has Mahuta, so far, appeared to me.
How ceremonious, to begin with, was our reception! It is true that
all Africans have the finest manners, whether they have already
assumed the white kanzu of the Coast men, or walk about in the
scanty loincloth of primitive man. It has always been a matter of
course, at every place I have visited in this country, for the elders of
the village to come out to meet me and pay their respects. But
Abdallah bin Malim, Wali of Mahuta, surpasses them all in the
accurate formality with which he greeted me. It is not for nothing
that he holds the highest position in this district; and we were
disposed to feel ashamed of our stained and shabby khaki suits, and
our generally dusty and dilapidated condition, when the Wali,
dressed in the long, black, embroidered coat of the Coast Arab, and
carrying a silver-mounted sword in his hand, met us long before we
reached Mahuta.
Our quarters, too, looked very promising. Having squeezed
ourselves into the boma through an incredibly narrow gap in the
palisade, we were struck with admiration. The enclosure is nearly
twice the size of all others we have seen; and a wide avenue of
rubber-trees and Mauritius aloes runs across it from one gate to the
other. The dwellings are placed in orderly arrangement on either side
of this avenue. The sight of the solidly-built rest-house made it easy
for me to dispense with the Professor’s house out by the ravine.
Before long our tents had been pitched in the open space, while the
carriers and soldiers distributed themselves, according to custom,
among the various huts and rooms of the people inhabiting the
boma. We were scarcely settled when Abdallah thought fit to call on
us. Being still in his festive garments, he seemed to feel justified in
claiming Knudsen’s long chair for himself. I was busy bathing my left
foot, which I sprained on board the Prinzregent, and which has given
me an immense amount of pain and discomfort throughout the last
few months. Abdallah’s voice was loud and not melodious; he talked
unceasingly, and expectorated all over the place with a freedom and
marksmanship which might have been envied by the proverbial
Yankee. Notwithstanding my ingrained respect for government
officials, regardless of colour, I was compelled at last, in the interests
of self-preservation, to get Knudsen to call the Wali’s attention to the
unseemliness of his behaviour;—why, not even the washenzi—the
pagans of the bush—would do thus in the presence of the Bwana
Mkubwa. The hint took immediate effect.
It is now eight a.m., the sun is already tolerably high—at this
season it is quite vertical over Mahuta at noon—and the two
Europeans are enjoying the delicious morning air. The air of Mahuta
would make it an admirable health-resort, no troublesome heat or
uncomfortable cold, no mist and no gale, but excellent drinking-
water hard by at the edge of the plateau, a clean baraza and plenty of
fowls—what can heart desire more? We are just enjoying our
morning cigars, when we hear a strange noise. Is it distant thunder?
or are the Makonde making war on us? Nearer and nearer it comes,
and as the rolling, rhythmic sound grows louder, we begin to
perceive that it is approaching from several different directions at
once, from the east, the west, and seemingly from the north as well.
We soon recognise it as the sound of drums mingled with singing.
Coming out from under the roof and between the tents, we see the
people already pouring in through the narrow gates in an apparently
endless procession.
Already the black masses have met in the midst of the spacious
boma, but fresh throngs are streaming in from both sides; the
avenue is full,—the black, surging sea spreads
out beyond it into the lateral enclosures, the
drums thunder, the voices screech, luluta, and
sing,—coloured flags, looking more like
flowered handkerchiefs than anything else,
float from long poles above the heads of the
crowd, and the whole is over-arched by the
sky with its radiant sunshine and innumerable
flocks of fleecy cloudlets. The picture is
certainly unique of its kind, and well-fitted in
its wild beauty to tempt the brush of a
Breughel.
I cannot paint, but what is the good of
having some thirty dark slides, well provided
with plates? But, then, which way is one to
turn in this superabundance of subjects? Here
is an enormous circle of men, women, and
children; six mighty drums are thundering
away at a frantic pace, and in perfect time, as THE WALI OF
if moved by some invisible force; the whole MAHUTA
vast assembly move arms and legs, mouths
and hands as one person. Outside this huge
ring is another circle of slender young girls just budding into
womanhood. Their ntungululu vibrates through the air in shrillest
treble, while their palms, raised high in the air, clap in time with the
evolutions of the other performers. “Oh! I see,—the likwata”—the
stock of human ideas is very limited, after all. Turning away in
disappointment, we see in the background, occupying half of one
side of the boma, two lines of sharpshooters, exercising under fire, in
a truly African way. The native scorns to take cover, he is a fatalist—if
he is hit, well—Inshallah! This is brought out very strikingly in the
majimaji dance, the mimic representation of the late insurrection.
The black attacking line charges at a run, regardless of even the
uncanny “rack-rack” of the “Boom-boom”—those infernal machines
out of which the Wadachi—the accursed Germans—can fire a
thousand bullets a minute. In vain—not even the strong dawa of
Hongo, the great war-doctor, can protect them from destruction. The
enemy is already surging up—how can the majimaji stand against
him? Instinctively the whole line falls back before the sharp bayonets
of the askari, as far as the dimensions of the “battle-field” will
permit, and then, howling their war-song, they charge again. This
goes on for hours.
I have done what I can with camera and
cinematograph, and now my stock of plates is
exhausted, and so am I. Meanwhile the sun
has climbed to the zenith;—five hundred
natives are standing and lounging about,
tired, hungry and thirsty, under the shadeless
rubber-trees, while we, for our part, are called
by the cooks to soup, chicken and omelette
with bananas.
Abdallah meant well in summoning this
enormous host of natives, but from the first I
MOTHER AND CHILD
saw that it was useless to have so many at
once. After a time the wali, too, understood
this, and sent once more for the village
headmen from far and near, addressing them somewhat as follows:
—“To-morrow morning you, Nyamba”—or as the case might be—“are
to come at eight and bring the people of your village, and they are to
bring midimu and mitete (dancing-masks and snuff-boxes) as many
as they have, and all the other things that you use in the house and in
the shamba and in the bush,—for the white man likes these things
and will pay you for them in pice and rupees. And the day after to-
morrow,”—he turns to the next man, “you must come with your
people and bring all the things I have just told you.” The headman, to
show that he has understood, salutes with his hand to his cap, the
next one follows, and so on in order.
The new plan is a complete success. In the morning I have time to
photograph the people individually, to take cinematograph films of
dances and games, make photographic records, and so on. The
middle of the day is spent in studying the endless variety of keloid
patterns in vogue among the population here, and the afternoon
devoted to bargaining with the men for their household and other
implements, ornaments, weapons, etc.
 TWO-STORIED HOUSES AT NCHICHIRA ON THE ROVUMA

And the women! Closely huddled together,

their heads all, as if in obedience to one
impulse, inclined forward and downward, a
band of thirty or forty Makonde women stand
in a corner of the boma at Mahuta. Up to a
moment ago they were chattering for all they
were worth—then the strange white man in
the yellow coat came up, and all were
immediately quiet as mice, only the twenty or
thirty babies on their backs continuing to
snore or yell, according to circumstances, as
before. I have long since found the right way
to deal with women—at the first small joke the
MAKONDE GIRL WITH shyness takes its departure, heads are raised
LIP PIERCED FOR and the right frame of mind is easily
PELELE AND produced. It is, indeed, highly necessary to
ULCERATED produce this result by some means; there is so
much to examine in these heads and bodies.
Only the laughter going on all round them
induces each to let the white man look at her closely, perhaps even
touch her. Soon, however, the rumour spreads, that the stranger is a
man of wealth—of inexhaustible riches—he has whole sacks and
cases full of pice, and his servant has orders to pay over bright coin to
every native woman who does what he asks her. Friends and
acquaintances from other villages have said so, and surely it must be
true. My experience up to this point had shown me so much in the
way of queer manifestations of human vanity, that I thought there
could be no more surprises in store for me. But I was mistaken—
fresh wonders awaited me in the depths of the Makonde bush. In
truth, it seems to me a miracle that these tender lips can sustain such
huge masses of heavy wood, a hand-breadth in diameter and three
fingers thick. The wood is daily whitened with carefully-washed
kaolin. The process by which the hole in the lip is gradually brought
to this enormous size has already been described. The initial
operation is performed by the girl’s maternal uncle. Her mother sees
that the hole is kept open and enlarged, and the day when the first
solid plug is inserted is kept as a family festival. The husband cuts a
new pelele for his wife when required, each a size larger than the last,
and every time he has occasion to go to the bush he brings some of
the fine white clay she uses for bleaching the wood. The young
woman before me has a good husband, as her name Ngukimachi
implies, signifying that she has no need to deceive him as other wives
do theirs. But he knows, too, how well she looks in her pelele—it
stands straight out, a pleasure to see, and when she laughs, her teeth
flash out magnificently behind it. How ugly compared with her are
those old women yonder! They have lost their teeth, and when with
one trembling hand they carry the lump of porridge, taken from the
heap before them, to their mouths, it is dreadful to see the food
vanish into a dark cavern, when the other hand has carefully lifted up
the pelele.
The next two women are greatly to be pitied. Both are young, one a
girl, the other a young wife, but they are always sad, and well they
may be, for the adornment of the pelele is denied them. No matter
how much dawa their mothers and uncles have put on their lips, the
wound has only become worse. In the elder, the front of the lip is
quite eaten away by the ulceration, so that, with her large white teeth
showing through in the middle, her mouth is like that of Sungura,
the hare. Their looks are not improved, and even the white man, with
his big box of medicines, can do nothing to cure them. No wonder
they are sad.
 Alitengiri, too, yonder, looks serious. Death
has been a frequent visitor to her house of
late; indeed, she has lost so many of her
relations that her shamba cannot be
cultivated. She used to be very lively, and
chattered away so quickly that the eye could
scarcely follow the motion of her pelele, which
was a very fine one, so large that her lip could
scarcely support it. Now she looks greatly
changed—is she ill? or has the pelele shrunk?
But that is impossible. Let us ask what is the
matter. She does not answer—not a word can
be got out of her. But I soon observe what is
wrong; her lip must have given way and she
has mended it,—I had already noticed the PSEUDO-SURGERY.
MAKONDE WOMAN
strip of blue stuff pasted over it—and now she WITH TORN LIP
dare not speak or laugh, for fear of opening ARTIFICIALLY JOINED
the wound afresh.
There is no doubt that the largest peleles to
be found in the whole southern territory are those worn by the
women of Mahuta and its neighbourhood. Blocks of seven and seven
and a half centimetres in diameter and three to five centimetres in
thickness are not uncommon. With the black or white discs, the size
of half-a-crown, worn in the lobes of the ears which are stretched in a
similar manner to the lip, this gleaming white ornament makes up a
triad of decorations which as a whole is surely unique. They are not
enough, however, for the Makonde woman,—her face and the greater
part of her body are covered with keloids, which, at first sight, seem
to present an astonishing variety of patterns. On examination,
however, their component elements prove to be surprisingly few. The
present-day native gives to these elements such names as thitopole
(“a pigeon-trap”), chikorombwe (“a fish-spear”),[68] ceka, etc. The
first of these patterns is a curve, which might stand for the bent twig
of a pigeon-trap; the chikorombwe is more like a fir-tree; the teka is
a chitopole with a central axis. Whether these patterns have any real
relation to the bird-trap or the fish-spear, I cannot say, for the
natives do not know; but one thing is certain, none of them can
nowadays be considered as a genuine tribal mark. The novice is
inclined to look on them as such, till taught better, as I was in a most
compendious way by old Makachu. This venerable man is covered all
over with the same sort of pattern as those displayed by the women,
though some of his are much the worse for wear. I asked him why he
was thus decorated, expecting to receive a long dissertation on tribal
marks and similar institutions, and was somewhat taken aback when
he merely said “Ninapenda”—(“Because I like it so”).

MAKONDE KELOIDS

This, in fact, seems to be the sole reason for the keloid decoration
being applied at all, as well as for the choice of pattern in each
individual case. At Newala, at Nchichira, and now, at Mahuta, I have
photographed, or at least inspected several hundred persons with the
result, so far as I can come to any conclusion at present, that it is
impossible to discover from any of the patterns the nationality of the
wearer. Each of these figures has been chosen on the same principle
of “ninapenda.”
 MATAMBWE AND MAKUA WOMAN, WITH KELOIDS

It is not to be denied that there are fashions even in this form of

ornament. A new pattern is introduced from somewhere,—it finds
acceptance, first with one mother, then with another, and so quickly
spreads through a whole generation, who, of course, have to wear it
through life, so that, in fact, it might be considered a sort of badge.
Perhaps in former times the tribes in this part of the country placed a
higher value on the art; but it is no longer possible to prove that this
was so, and, in fact, the custom seems to be passing away under
modern influences. It is a great amusement, not only to myself, but
to the other parties concerned, when I suddenly ask a man or youth
to take off his shirt and show me his torso. Elderly men have a
perfect menagerie of antelopes, snakes, frogs, tortoises and other
creatures, together with chikorombwe, chitopole and teka adorning
their broad chests, while the rising generation can show little or
nothing. The latter no longer think the fashion “good form”; they
have their eye on the coast and its civilization, and if they scarify
themselves at all, are content with the two vertical cuts on the
temples in vogue among the Swahili. The Yaos and the Wangoni of
Nchichira have already pretty generally adopted these cuts, and
other tribes will go on doing so in an increasing degree, year by year.
The patterns are cut by a professional—a fundi, who makes
numerous small incisions, rubs in some sort of powder, and cuts the