Zulu Weaponry – Shields
By Pat Rundgren
The generic name for a Zulu shield is iHawu. If you ask a Zulu for anything other than that, you’ll probably draw a blank. However, Europeans tend to try and complicate the issue and categorise shields into various shapes and sizes.
You very rarely find an unusually tall Zulu. They tend to be shorter, say, than most Europeans. This was especially true at the time of the Zulu War when people tended t be smaller anyway. It follows, then, that if a Zulu requires some form of protection for his vital parts – in other words, a shield, or what we might today refer to as body armour – it doesn’t have to be the size of a surfboard to cover you from your neck to your crotch. Plus a huge shield is a bugger to lug around all day. The large shield, or isiHlangu, is therefore normally reserved for ceremonial occasions.
A battle shield tended to be smaller (3 feet to 4 feet long but a couple of feet wide) and onion-shaped, known as umBumbuluzo. These shields normally date from around the 1906 Zulu Rebellion.
Even smaller shields, sometimes quite tiny, are used for activities such as dancing. Remember that a shield was multi-purpose – it also acted as a sunshade, raincoat, table or sleeping mat. A warrior carried it on the run by tucking it under his arm, where it acted as a radiator, directing cooling wind onto his cheat.
Your shield was given to you by the King and was usually colour-coded to your Regiment, or ibutho, when the Zulu Exchequer was in an exuberant mood. Towards the latter part of the 19th Century this practice changed as similarly coloured cattle became more difficult to find. New recruits tended to be given black shields, and as they progressed to veteran status they received replacement shields bearing more and more white areas. Very senior warriors carried all-white shields – hence T.V. Bulpin’s sometimes confusing reference to “the White Men of Zululand”.
Shields were made of bull’s hide – one from either flank. Cow’s hide was unsuitable as it was too thin to deflect an opponent’s blade. Stretched out to dry in the sun, a genuine shield is quite thick – if it’s like paper it’s cow hide and a tourist trap. It has a distinctive ladder-like pattern on the front where the leather has been woven together to make a handle and also reinforce the back of the shield and retain the umGobo stick, which is threaded through the loops at the back to hold everything in place. The stick is usually tipped with animal skin, such as genet or serval cat, which becomes a regimental device. Even this stick has an ulterior purpose – if one runs out of weapons the stick can be withdrawn and used as an auxiliary weapon. It goes without saying, then, that the stick is sharpened and fire-hardened at the bottom end.
Apart from being highly decorative, the amaGabela also serve a practical purpose by deflecting or snagging the opponent’s blade in battle. Since the handle at the back of the shield, which is ALWAYS held in the left hand, is slightly off-centre (for better balance), in a genuine shield there are ALWAYS one or two more amaGabela, on the bottom. If the numbers top and bottom are the same, it is probably a later model or even a tourist piece, since Zulu craftsmen know that tourists like things to be symmetric In Zulu War period shields, the amaGabela always reach the top and bottom of the shield. Newer ones only have them half way up.al.
