The ceremonial year

Juba ja Nsomo and the ceremonies of the Kaonde

The moments when the Kaonde renew their covenant with the land, the ancestors and one another.

The ceremonial year

When the whole nation comes home

The chiefdom's calendar turns on its great gatherings. They are not performances — they are the moments when the Kaonde renew their covenant with the land, the ancestors and one another.

The Chief in mpande headdress and leopard skin receives the clay pot at the tasting, attended by masked dancers
6 June · every year

Juba ja Nsomo

The Day of the Tasting.

The first-fruits ceremony of the Kaonde people, hosted by Senior Chief Kasempa in the traditional capital. The name means to taste. The Chief tastes the munkoyo — the freshly brewed sorghum drink of the new harvest — blesses the food, and prays to the ancestors to keep watch over his people for another year. Only after the Chief has tasted may the harvest be shared.

Around the tasting comes everything else: the procession of the palanquin, the drums, the dancing, the display of Kaonde dress and craft, and the return of sons and daughters from every corner of Zambia to the place they call home.

Bearers carrying the royal throne along a bush road in procession
The procession

Carrying the stool

Before the arena fills, the royal chair is carried out on the shoulders of the bearers, down the red road and through the miombo, in a procession that gathers people to it as it goes.

Chiefs, government and guests gathered at the ceremonial arena in Kasempa
Nsakwa ya Ba Kaonde

The Kaonde gathering

The wider cultural gathering of the Kaonde-speaking people, hosted in Kasempa and attended by chiefs, government and guests of the nation — most recently graced by the President of the Republic of Zambia.

“These gatherings belong to all of us. They are for unity — and they must not be turned into a platform for politics.”

— The position of the Kasempa Royal Establishment on its ceremonies

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