WHAT ARE THE TYPES OF POLYANDRY? :3. ASSOCIATED

The last form of polyandry is a combination of polyandry and polygyny, as women are married to several men simultaneously and the same men are married to several women. It is found in some tribes of native Americans as well as villages in northern Nigeria and the northern cameroons.

Other Classifications: Equal polygamy, Polygynandry


The LELE of the Kasai-ASSOCIATED POLYANDRY with partible paternity

Unity within the village is very important, and
the sort of polyandry they practice supports that.

Polygyny is a widely accepted and high status form of marriage for the Lele. Polyandry occurs when the village acquires a hohombe, or a village wife. She will have come from another village, either by force, seduced, taken as a refugee, or betrothed from infancy, and is treated with much honor by the people in her
new village.

A village wife is married to several men in the village who may or may not have other wives already. The position is very prestigious for a woman, as is evidenced in her honeymoon period.

A village wife is treated with much honor and enjoys her honeymoon which lasts for a period of 6 months or longer. She does not cook, draw water, cut firewood or carry out any tasks expected of the other women. As she is also allowed to accompany her husbands on hunting escapades, whereas that is not normally allowed. And since she didn't cook, she would eat the food and delicacies sent to her husbands from their mother's and/or the other wives.

She would sleep with a different man in her hut every two nights, and may have relations with any village member during the day.

When the honeymoon period ends, the
village wife is allotted a certain number of husbands, sometimes as many as five. She lives with these men, cooks and has relations with them. Within time, she may eliminate husbands from her household until she has just two or three.

A child of the village-wife is called mwanababola, meaning "child of the village" because he or she belongs to all the men (partible paternity). And they share responsibility for paying any future dowries.

As noted before, the non-fraternal polyandry practiced by the Lele is of high status, as is the village wife (although other women in the society, outside of the union, are of fairly low status). The status of men within the union seem to be equal during the honeymoon period,
when they all have equal access to the village wife.

Also, after the village wife has chosen the final two or three husbands to live in a polyandrous state with, there is no mention of any sort of hierarchical system among those men.

Probably the most important thing to note about this system of polyandry is the function it serves. Although the form is very different from other African forms, as well as Indian forms, they all serve a similar purpose: forming alliances.