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1930.86.31

Fringed skirt made from split plant fibre. [FB 26/02/2015]

1930.86.31

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Collection type
Object
Description
Fringed skirt made from split plant fibre. [FB 26/02/2015]
Geographical reference
South Sudan
Africa > Eastern Africa > South Sudan
Cultural groups
Zande
Date / Period
Date made: Before 1930
Date collected
1927 - 1930
Acquisition information
Purchased: 31/12/1930
Materials and processes
Material Plant Fibre, Process Split, Process Tied, Process Twisted
Dimensions
Width: max 260 mm rolled, Length: max 400 mm
Object numbers
Accession number: 1930.86.31
Research and responses

Brock describes the circumcision process and ceremony, as took place in the Meridi district in 1918. He describes the boys as wearing 'a kind of abbreviated ballet skirt made of dried banana leaves cut into thin strips', while being trained to perform the circumcision dance, and a 'rokko' or loin cloth of fig tree bark during the final ceremony when this dance is actually performed (R.G.C. Brock 1918, "Some Notes of the Zande Tribe as Found in the Meridi District", Sudan Notes and Records 1, 251-2). See also Larken's discussion of the circumcision rituals (P.M. Larken, 1926, "An Account of the Zande", Sudan Notes and Records IX no. 1, pp 28-30) [RTS 7/5/2004].

RDF 1930.86 contains a letter from Evans-Pritchard to Mr. Malcolm dated 12 December 1930, offering him some 81 Zande and Nuer objects. As Malcolm was curator of the Wellcome Historical Medical Museum, it seems unlikely that these objects were ever sent to the Pitt Rivers Museum and this letter is only useful as background for Evans-Pritchard's attitudes to the intended future use of his material, and as evidence for the temporary storage of these objects in Professor Seligman's office in the London School of Economics at the time. The file also contains an undated list of 48 objects, which does not seem to match accessioned material and could be the list of rejected items that Balfour mentions in another letter on file, dated 31 December 1930 [RTS 10/1/2005].

Search terms: Clothing, Ornament, Status, Ritual and Ceremonial, Skirt, Waist Ornament, Ceremonial Object

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