ZombieWiki
Zombie Wiki / Zombie zonse / Nthano ndi zikhulupiriro
Illustration of South African witchcraft zombie
Original AI-made illustration based on the descriptions in the sources. Not an official design.
Fayilo Na. 438 mwa 446

South African witchcraft zombie

Imadziwikanso kuti: xidachane, maduxwane, witch-train zombies
Nthano ndi zikhulupiriroWakufa wamoyoUfiti

In parts of South Africa, witchcraft belief includes people turned into zombies to labour for a witch. The victims are thought of as the stolen dead: small, mute and put to work at night. Stories of 'witch trains' staffed by zombies spread once railways began carrying migrant workers to the mines and cities. Scholars treat the belief as a commentary on labour exploitation, which is the same anxiety that produced the Haitian zombi.12

Amenyane!
Kochokera
South African (Tsonga, Sotho, Venda)
South Africa
Chimayambitsa
Ufiti
A witch kills the victim, or makes them seem to die, and takes control of the body for forced labour.
Momwe umasandukira zombie
A witch's spell; in some accounts even a small child can zombify a dead person.
Nzeru
Wopanda nzeru
Malo ofooka
  • a sufficiently powerful sangoma (traditional healer) can break the spell
zolemba za kumunda

Zimene magwero akunena

1

Called xidachane in Sotho and Tsonga and maduxwane in Venda12

2

Imagined as shrunken in size, with the tongue cut out so that it cannot speak or protest12

3

Witch trains, ordinary-looking trains crewed by zombies, were said to abduct people at night12

4

Passengers were either zombified or beaten and thrown off far from home12

5

Anthropologist Isak Niehaus reads the belief as a picture of migrant labour and domination12

Magwero

  1. Zombie - Wikipedia
  2. Zombies - Encyclopedia.com

Mfundo iliyonse patsamba lino ikuchokera ku magwero awa, yolembedwa m'mawu athu. Waona cholakwika? Tiuze pa [email protected].

Dyetsa khamu. Palibe zotsatsa, palibe zokuzonda, zolipiridwa ndi munthu mmodzi. Ndalama yothokoza imaisunga pa intaneti.Siya ndalama yothokoza

Nthano zochokera ku mayiko omwewo

UmkhovuZulu, 1875

Zina zofanana ndi izi

GhoulArabicPocongJavanese / Indonesian and MalayRo-langsTibetanToyolMalay and IndonesianXiangxi walking corpsesChinese (western Hunan; attributed to Miao sorcery)CondenadoAndean (Peru and Bolivia)
Dyetsa khamuSiya ndalama yothokoza