Case file · Folklore / legend
Kinjikitile and the maji water
In 1904–1905 the medium Kinjikitile Ngwale, possessed by the spirit Hongo at Ngarambe in southern Tanganyika, gave out sacred water (maji) that he said would turn German bullets into water.
1905 CE · -8.15, 38.50 · status: official
The account
The promise united many peoples in the Maji Maji rebellion against forced cotton growing, which broke out in July 1905. Kinjikitile was hanged in August 1905. German forces answered with a scorched-earth campaign; famine and fighting killed perhaps 75,000 to 300,000 people. The point is approximate, around Ngarambe.
The sceptical view
The water did not stop bullets; historians debate how far the medicine created the rising and how far it gave form to anger already there.