Kimpa Vita - a profile of courage
on July 2, 2007
Category: Women making a difference, African History, African Women
Today is the anniversary of the death of Kimpa Vita who together with her baby (Kembo Dianzenza va Kintete) and her boyfriend, were burned to death on July 2nd 1706 by the Catholic church. I only just found out about Kimpa Vita - there is so much of our African and Diaspora history that is unknown to the majority of African people. Who was Kimpa Vita? Information is scarce but Kimpa Vita is one of a long lines of courageous politicised Queens of the Kongo (parts of present day Angola and Congo) who fought against slavery and colonialists as early as the 15century. Women such as Ndona Nzinga, Ndona Mafuta and Ndona Dondwa. The importance of Kimpa Vita is that she fought against slavery and exposed the racism and misogyny of the Catholic church and also incorporated traditional religions with Christianity.
The 17th century gave birth to an icon called Kimpa Vita Dona Beatriz. She concerned herself with the restoration, spiritually and politically, of the Kongo Kingdom. Born in 1684 Kimpa Vita worked as a religious actor[kp1] and was mostly isolated from the rest of her peers. At the time when the Kongo was dominated by political unrest and civil war. Therefore Kimpa Vita’s religious ideology came as an answer to the prayers of many Kongolese people. In her message she combined traditional Kongolese culture with Christianity.
Today she is remembered in “Kanda commune, northern Zaire Province” of Angola
Tags: African Queens; Kongo; Kimpa Vita ;
I would really be interested in finding out more about these African Queens so if any one knows anything please do leave a comment
UPDATE:
Tribute to Dona Beatrice Kimpa Vita
Sphere: Related Content
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5 Comments so far
1. Nota Bene - new S&R feature « Scholars and Rogues
July 3rd, 2007 at 10:47 am
[…] Larisa Alexandrovna: Impeachment is back on the table … Black Looks recalls the obscure Kimpa Vita … A firebomb-launching blogger mellows out … Thirty percent of Americans abuse alcohol […]
2. Black River Eagle
July 4th, 2007 at 1:40 pm
I’ve read about the warrior queen Ndona Nzinga and the fits she gave the Portuguese garrisons and Vatican envoys who were stationed in the Kingdom of Kongo during the 17th Century. This is the first time I have heard anything about Kimpa Vita so thanks for the Heads Up.
The first 24 black Africans to arrive in what is today the U.S.A. were traded by Dutch slavers for food and water at Jamestown, Virginia in 1619. They were of course slaves taken from the Kingdom of Kongo (the Angola sector).
There is an excellent watercolor drawing of Queen Nzinga and her entourage by the Italian Antonio Cavazzi (1621-1678), a Catholic priest who was part of the Capuchin mission in what is today northern Angola. His drawings are some of the earliest eye witness accounts of life in the Kongo during the 17th century. You can find this work at the “Atlantic Slave Trade and Slave Life in the Americas” online project at the Digital Media Lab of the University of Virginia.
This is what probably got the prophet priestess Kimpa Vita in trouble with “the Church in Rome”:
“Beatrice wasted no time in putting her revelations into practice: she led thousands to repopulate the capital city of Mbanza Kongo ( or as the Portugese called it - San Salvador ), claimed that Jesus and his entire family were of African descent, incorporated traditional African drumming and dancing into the Roman Catholic liturgy, and discarded both crosses and traditional Congolese amulets as “unnecessary fetishes.” She claimed to die each Friday, spend the weekend “dining with God,” and return to the mortal plain each Monday with new decrees from Heaven.”
Hell, Catholics and Protestants alike will burn you at the stake for talking like that today! Serious.
3. susan
July 4th, 2007 at 3:48 pm
Not so much about Kimpa Vita specifically, and perhaps you know of these texts, but if not…
There is an excellent anthology edited by Flora Edouwaye Kaplan called Queens, Queen Mothers, Priestesses and Power: Case Studies in African Gender (1997 New York Academy of Sciences)
And also, a bit of a tangent, but still relevant to understanding the positions of power African women held historically… I think Oyeronke Oyewumi’s The Invention of Women: Making an African Sense of Western Gender Discourses (1997 University of Minnesota Press)is one of the best books around in analyzing the ways gender as a marker of difference did not exist pre-colonially (at least in parts of what is now Nigeria).
4. Sokari
July 4th, 2007 at 5:44 pm
BRE@thanks for the link to the painting and Susan@ I like the sound of the anthology so will try to find it and the others. Thanks for these links
5. Scholars and Rogues » Blog Archive » Nota Bene - new S&R feature
December 17th, 2007 at 7:12 am
[…] Larisa Alexandrovna: Impeachment is back on the table … Black Looks recalls the obscure Kimpa Vita … A firebomb-launching blogger mellows out … Thirty percent of Americans abuse alcohol […]