1934.8.38

Collection type

Object

Description

Spear with iron leaf-shaped blade and socketed base on a long wooden shaft [RTS 11/7/2005].

Long description

Spear consisting of an iron spearhead with a leaf-shaped blade with a raised rib running down the centre of each side and rounded shoulders that curve in to a solid, round sectioned shank. This opens out at its base to form a socket, with a slightly open seam on one side. The blade is currently a metallic gray colour (Pantone 420C). The socket has been fitted onto a wooden shaft, carved from a tree branch with some surface irregularities and a circular section, tapering in to its butt, and stained an orangey brown colour across the surface (Pantone 7516C). There are also traces of a black coloured resinous material around the socket, presumably used as a fixative to hold the spearhead in place. The spear is complete, with some rust on the blade and a few cracks down the shaft body. It has a weight of 415.2 grams, and a total length of 2226 mm. The spearhead is 415 mm long, of which the blade part is 223 mm in length, with a maximum width of 54.3 mm and thickness of 5.6 mm; the shaft has a diameter of 9 mm, while the socket base measures 15.3 by 14.8 mm across. The shaft is 15.8 mm in diameter, narrowing to 6 mm at its butt [RTS 11/7/2005]

Geographical reference

South Sudan

Africa > Eastern Africa > South Sudan

Bahr el Jebel Mongalla

Cultural groups

Bari (Nilotic)

Person

Field collector Percy Horace Gordon Powell-Cotton

Field collector Hannah Powell-Cotton

PRM source Percy Horace Gordon Powell-Cotton

Date / Period

Date made: Before 1933

Date collected

12th February 1933?

Acquisition information

Donated: 1934

Materials and processes

Material Iron Metal, Material Wood Plant, Material Resin Plant, Process Forged (Metal), Process Hammered, Process Socketed, Process Carved, Process Stained

Dimensions

Length: max 415 mm spearhead, Width: max 54.3 mm blade, Length: max 223 mm blade, Length: max 2226 mm, Diameter: max 15.8 mm shaft, Diameter: max 15.3 mm socket, Weight 415.2 g

Object numbers

Accession number: 1934.8.38 Other numbers: 284

Research and responses

For an essay on the variety and cultural significance of spears in South Sudan, particularly among the Dinka and Nuer, see ‘“Spears” that are not Spears’, by Jok Madut Jok, in Pieces of a Nation: South Sudanese Heritage and Museum Collections, edited by Zoe Cormack and Cherry Leonardi (Leiden: Sidestone Press, 2021), pp. 110–114.

The accession book entry implies that the object was collected from the town of Mongalla, rather than from the province of that name; this town is located in the modern administrative district of Bahr el Jebel [RTS 11/11/2003].

Search terms: Weapon, Hunting, Spear, Spear-head