1945.9.85

Collection type

Object

Description

Specimen of raffia cloth.

Geographical reference

Congo, Democratic Republic of

Africa > Central Africa > Congo, Democratic Republic of

(Boma)

Cultural groups

Kuba

Person

Field collector Wilfred Gilbert Thesiger

PRM source Wilfred Patrick Thesiger

Date / Period

Date made: Before 1909

Date collected

1907 - 1909

Acquisition information

Donated: 1945

Materials and processes

Material Raffia Leaf Plant, Process Woven, Process Embroidered

Dimensions

Length: max 710 mm, Width: max 530 mm

Object numbers

Accession number: 1945.9.85

Research and responses

Hilde Van Braeckel examined this cloth in April 1995 and supplied a set of technical notes and a colour print of it (see RDF). She identifies it as Kuba Bushong and notes that it is in a trapezium shape rather than rectangular. She measures the thread count of the plain weave at approx. 8 per cm and notes both cut-pile embroidery and stem stitch as well as a blanket-stitch hem, folded upwards, on three sides, with the fourth side being frayed. This would suggest that a second cloth, embroidered with the same pattern, might have been attached and that the cloth might then have formed the centre part of a woman's skirt, ntshakabwiin. She identifies the pattern as Mikokwoon Mikwey ('leopard's branch'). [JC 27 5 1996]

For a brief account of the collections donated to the PRM by Wilfred Thiesiger, see 'An Incidental Collection: Objects Donated by Wilfred Thesiger to the Pitt Rivers Museum', by Jeremy Coote, in Wilfred Thesiger in Africa, edited by Christopher Morton and Philip N. Grover (London: Harper Press, 2010), pp. 116-26. [JC 21 12 2010]

Search terms: Textile, Clothing, Skirt