Tswana Legal Maxims

Opening Paragraph Like many other peoples, the Tswana of Bechuanaland Protectorate often cite proverbs and similar sayings to specify rules of conduct. In this paper I discuss a number of those generally used in the context of litigation; some are statements of general principles, akin to the ‘maxims’ of Roman law, others relate more particularly to judicial procedure. Many were actually quoted at trials witnessed by myself or recorded by clerks of tribal courts, the rest were mentioned incidentally by informants when discussing points of Tswana law. The great majority are classed by the people themselves as ‘proverbs’ ( diane , sing. seane ), and some of these (though not all) are included in the collections of Tswana proverbs published by Plaatje and Seboni; others were introduced simply by some such phrase as Molao ware , ‘The law says’, or Kamokgwa waSetswana , ‘According to Tswana custom’. Since I am not here concerned with their linguistic aspects, I do not attempt to distinguish recognized proverbs from other kinds of maxim.