1940.7.0114

Collection type

Object

Description

Beaded hide skirt with hide tassles.

Geographical reference

Tanzania, United Republic of

Africa > Eastern Africa > Tanzania, United Republic of

Arusha Mbulu

Cultural groups

Iraqw

Person

Field collector Samuel Peach Powell

PRM source Samuel Peach Powell

Date / Period

Date made: Before 1940

Date collected

By 1940

Acquisition information

Loaned: 1940

Materials and processes

Material Animal Leather Skin, Material Bead, Material Iron Metal, Process Beadwork, Process Embroidered, Process Stitched

Object numbers

Accession number: 1940.7.0114

Research and responses

For discussion of Iraqw skirts, bibliography, and illustration of a comparable example in the collection of the Commonwealth Institute, London, see '2.41' (entry on Iraqw skirt), by Jeremy Coote, in Africa: The Art of a Continent, edited by Tom Phillips (London: Royal Academy, 1995), p. 156; also in German in Afrika: Die Kunst eines Kontinents (Berlin: Zeitgeist Gesellschaft, 1996), p. 156; revised as '20: Skirt' in Africa: The Art of a Continent - 100 Works of Power and Beauty (New York: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 1996), pp. 65-7. [JC 11 2 1998]

Related Documents File - Appears on undated typed list: "One M'Bulu skirt (N. Tanganyka Tribe) worn by Morumbo". List is annotated by hand on back: "List of Curios" and "Far from complete". Handwritten note: 'Far from complete'. See RDF 1940.7.0114 for correspondence between Margaret Carey and Jeremy Coote regarding the Royal Academy publication and Coote's request for conservation information regarding the coating of the cupreous rings with what is identified to be 'fat the Iraqw used for rubbing into their skin' which Carey recommends removing in order to prolong the life of the skirt. [GI 17/12/2001]

Associated publications

Illustrated in black-and-white as Figure 4 on page 124 of Volume 1 of The Encyclopedia of Africa South of the Sahara, edited by John Middleton (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1997), where it illustrates the entry 'Art: Eastern Africa', by Jeremy Coote (pp. 122-32). See also brief discussion of Iraqw skirts on p. 123. [JC 11 2 1998] Illustrated in black-and-white as Figure 3 on page 159 of Volume 1 of New Encyclopedia of Africa, edited by John Middleton and Joseph C. Miller (Detroit etc.: Thomson Gale /Charles Scribner's Sons, 2008), where it illustrates the entry 'Art, Regional Styles: Eastern Africa', by Jeremy Coote (pp. 156-166); see also brief discussion of Iraqw skirts on the same page. [JC 9 11 2007]

Search terms: Clothing, Skirt