Blood Lines

Several people have asked me if I were related to a "so and so Nasilele".

I am writing this post to explain how our family name of "Nasilele" come about.

I hope it will assist to dig up some of my "lost" relatives at Mukapani and Nalunembwe villages as will soon be explained below!

I'm the first born son in the Nasilele family. We were originally five children, however, three of our sisters passed on between 1990 and 2008. Our last born is my brother Mukololo.

We come from the Namushakende area of Mongu district in a village called Moonga. (Also known as "Mbulumakanda" meaning "Tortoise of the Lakes".

The village headman's title is "Mwandawande" meaning "Foot of a Lion."

A former headman in the 1960s, by the name of Thomas Mwikisa Muwindwa , wrote a famous Lozi novel called "Imute wa Kalilo".

The name "Nasilele" is of that of our late grandfather, Joshua Nasilele, whose father was from a village called Mukapani.

His mother, Njahi (of the Subia clan from Seshele) , escaped to Moonga village whilst pregnant with Nasilele during one of the tribal wars of those days. The village was on her father's side of place of birth.

One interesting thing about our grandfather and father is that they never had African maiden names.

Even myself, I was given the name "Henry" by one of the missionaries at Sefula. The name "Musialela" was given to me by my grandmother, in memory of her brother who died as a youth soon after having one child called Uyoya. Most of the maiden names in our Nasilele family are from her family !