It is through this ritual that girls are taught about socially accepted behaviours of Xhosa women,[1] while also encouraging them not to have sex before marriage.
At the end of its larval stage, caterpillars encase themselves in a little grass-like mat cocoon until they are ready to emerge as adults.
The kind of grass that the girl sits on during the ritual, called inkxopho,[further explanation needed] bears a resemblance to the cocoons encasing of the caterpillars on the tree, hence the name intonjane.
She then wears a necklace made from a string of a live ox’s tail hair, referred to as ubulunga.
The first week is marked by the initiate being placed behind a curtain without any of her clothes, apart from a black doek, and inkciyo,[2] a beaded skirt that serves as a garment covering the pubic area.
[3] Her body is painted with white ochre, representing contact with the ancestral spirits and seclusion from tribal life.
After slaughtering the goat, a young man is selected to roast a piece of meat called isiphika.
In the morning after the last day of the party, the initiate goes to the river to wash the white ochre and it is replaced by the yellow one referred to as umdike.