The hunter Matenda had three wives, and each of them was endowed with a miraculous ability. Their very names spoke of this. One was called Ndozanta, which means “She who sees in dreams”, the other Songanzila, which means “Showing the way”, and the third Fulla Fulla - “Reviving the dead.
Matenda was a great hunter, and his wives always had plenty of meat. But one day bad times came, there was drought and famine everywhere. The people in those places suffered great need. Matenda’s wives also ran out of food. They became emaciated and crying asked Matenda to get them meat. Matenda went hunting in the nearby forest, but did not meet anyone there and went further to places that were not yet so impoverished. There the hunter picked up the trail of a buffalo and set off in pursuit. After a long journey, he saw the beast. Matenda carefully approached the buffalo at a sufficient distance, shot and killed it. But before the hunter had time to reload his gun, a buffalo jumped out of the thicket and killed Matenda.
The wives in the village waited a long time for Matenda to return, but they never did. Then Ndozantu fell asleep and in a dream she saw a forest, and in the forest, a dead Matendu next to a dead buffalo. She told the other wives about this dream. They knew about her miraculous ability to see the truth in a dream and realized that Matenda had really been killed.
“Come on,” Songanzila said then, “I’ll show you the way to our husband.”
They set off and walked all day through forests, rivers and mountains. At night they reached the place where Matenda died. Then Fulla Fulla collected roots and herbs, lit them, began to cast spells over her husband’s body - and Matenda came to life.
But as soon as this happened, a dispute broke out between the three women: who should get most of the meat. Further - more: the conversation turned to who did more for Matenda and who is now his main wife.
“If I had not seen in a dream that he died, we would still be crying, waiting for his return,” Ndozantu said.
“And if I had not led you to the place where he lay dead, we would have mourned his death at home,” Songanzila said.
“But none of this would have been of any use if it weren’t for me,” objected Fulla Fulla. “If I hadn’t given his life back, we would be burying our husband right now.”
They argued and argued and decided to do this: let each one cook a pot of meat, and the one from whom Matenda takes food first will be his main wife, and she will get a large share of the spoils. This is what they did: they took identical pieces of buffalo meat and boiled them each in their own pot. When the food was ready, they came to Matenda. He thought for a long time, finally took the pot that Fulla Fulla handed him and said:
“Even though you saw me in a dream, Ndozantu, you would not have been able to give me meat until they found me.” And when you found me, Songanzila, I still couldn’t eat anything because I was dead. But Fulla Fulla gave me my life back, and now I can eat the meat she gives me. This means that her gift is the most precious of all.
That was the end of the matter, and many later said that Matenda had judged correctly. But the women found his trial unfair. The only right thing, they said, would be for Matenda to take the meat from all three and eat it, mixing it. It remains unclear what would be better.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru