Zār or Zaar (Arabic/Persian: زار) is a religious custom, apparently originating in central Ethiopia during the 18th century, later spreading throughout East and North Africa.[1] Zār custom involves the possession of an individual (usually female) by a spirit. It is also practiced in Egypt, Sudan, southern Iran[2] and elsewhere in the Middle East.
A featured musical instrument in the Zār ritual is the tanbura, a six-string lyre (6-stringed "bowl-lyre"[3]), which, like the Zār practice itself, exists in various forms in an area stretching from East Africa to the Arabian Peninsula.[4] Other instruments include the mangour, a leather belt sewn with many goat hooves, and various percussion instruments.[4]
The Zār cult served as a refuge for women and effeminate men in conservative, Muslim-dominated Sudan.[1]
In Ethiopia, zār also refers to malevolent spirits.[5] Many Ethiopian Christians[5] and Muslims[6]:199 believe in these spirits. Among both groups, mental illness is often attributed to zār possession.[7] In Ethiopia, zār possession is more common among women, while among immigrants in the West, men are more commonly afflicted.[7] At the same time, many Ethiopians believe in benevolent, protective spirits, or abdar.[5] While this belief in abdar and zār fits the traditional dualism of good and evil, it is also deeply rooted in superstition.[8]
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Among extant varieties of Zār cults are "zār Sawāknī (the zār from the area of Sawākin ["Dalūka, that is, zār Sawāknī"[9]]) and zār Nyamānyam {cf. /NYAMe/ ('Friend'), god of the Akan} (the zār of the Azande)"[10] : "the Nyam-Nyam have zār nugāra, with Babīnga and Nakūrma." "Babīnga and Nakūrma ... are recognized as Azande ancestral spirits." Nugāra (big drum) = "nuqara ... of the Dega tribe ... was originally from Wau."[11] (Wau is in Equatoria province of Sudan.) "Besides the nugāra of the Azande, other zār cults mentioned were those of the Fartīt [Fartīt peoples include "the Karra, Gula, Feroge, and Surro"[12]], the Shilluk, and the Dinka peoples and the dinia Nuba cult”.[13]
Ĥēṭ is the term of for "possessing-spirit" (also known as "spirit-modality"). "The ṭumbura spirit modalities that most present-day groups celebrate are the following ones : Nuba, Banda, Gumuz, Sawākiniyya, Lambūnāt, Bābūrāt, Bāshawāt, Khawājāt".[14] Upon becoming possessed by a ĥēṭ (literally 'thread'[15]), a devotee will don the appropriate costume. Some of these ĥēṭ costumes are :-
G. P. Makris : Changing Masters : Spirit Possession and Identity Construction among Slave Descendants and Other Subordinates in the Sudan. Northwestern University Press, Evanston, 2000. ISBN 0-8101-1698-7