Prince Charles, Prince of Wales is presented with a traditional Masai stick during his visit
When he visited Tanzania in a dusty ceremony in a Masai village in the shadow of Kilimanjaro on Wednesday November 2nd, the prince was bestowed a new honour by a tribe for whom nothing is more important than cattle.
Now the heir to the British throne is also to be known as Oloishiru Ingishu, or "he whom the cows love so much they call for him when they are in times of distress".
With the title, given by Mathayo Rimba Olemirai, the senior elder at the village of Majengo, came a three-legged "olorika" stool fashioned from baobab wood and a bead-wrapped knobkerrie called a rungu, handed only to revered elders.
The ceremonies took place on the final day of the Prince's tour of Tanzania, accompanied by his wife, the Duchess of Cornwall, as the couple visited the country's far north, close to its border with Kenya.
Chiefs' wives also honoured the Duchess with the name Ngoto o Engera, or "Mother of the Children" and gave her three wide, flat necklaces intricately inlaid with thousands of white, yellow, green and red beads.
"These are things we give to very important visitors, and they are used at times of ceremonies including weddings and the circumcisions of our warriors," said Mr Rimba, who guessed his age at 60 and who has 45 children by three wives.
The Masai traditionally believe that their gods bequeathed to them ownership of every cow in the world. Part of every warrior's initiation rites is to be told he has the sacred right to claim back any cattle in the possession of anyone else.
Mr Rimba said, however, that now that the Prince was "our friend", his 800-strong head of cattle, at Highgrove and at Home Farm in Gloucestershire, were safe.
"We cannot steal from him, he is our friend. We will take back cows from any other person though," he said.
Other Masai men watching as the Royal couple sat through a 50 minute talk with tribe elders were surprised to hear that the future King of England had such a modest herd.
"That is only a very average amount," said Thomas Lemboko, 48, who lives near Majengo, his eyebrows shooting up in surprise.
"There are men here who have two times that many here. Really we are richer than him. That shows us we have ways to help ourselves even without help from foreigners."
As the Royal couple prepared to leave, dust rose from the open savannah as hundreds of tribesmen wrapped in the red robe of the Masai performed a warrior's "singolio" dance, jumping high in the air and stamping their feet as they landed.
Their wives and daughters sang nearby, and elders flicked flywhisks made of wildebeest manes to keep insects away.
The Prince and the Duchess were visiting Majengo to see British-funded work helping Masai girls continue from primary to secondary school, and other projects advising on fresh ways to earn money for the Masai, whose nomadic way of life is threatened by climate change and increased commercial farming on their ancestral pasturelands.
"I very much look forward to hearing about how the government responds to your concerns and these challenges," the Prince told the village chiefs.
"I think I realise, probably more than many, after 30 years or so of trying to draw people's attention to the challenges and problems that so many communities will face and are facing due to climate change.
"I'm enormously grateful for the club you have given me – the stool may have to wait a little bit – but the club will enable me to wage an even fiercer battle against the issues of climate change."
The couple then visited a school near the town of Arusha and then did a final safari in a game park before their ten-day African tour ends.
Source: Telegraph
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