Ivory barkcloth beater with crosshatched end. Oval in section, and largely hollowed out. Curves slightly from the broader top end to its solid, flat-cut base. Hafted onto wooden handle [1934.8.125 .2] [EH [OPS Move] 30/3/2017]

Collection type: Object
Description: Ivory barkcloth beater with crosshatched end. Oval in section, and largely hollowed out. Curves slightly from the broader top end to its solid, flat-cut base. Hafted onto wooden handle [1934.8.125 .2] [EH [OPS Move] 30/3/2017]
Long description: Barkcloth beater consisting of an ivory head [.1] hafted onto a wooden handle [.2]. The head has been carved from a single tusk that is oval in section and currently a yellowish cream colour (Pantone 7507C). This has been largely hollowed out, and curves slightly from the broader top end to its solid, flat-cut base. The body is slightly ridged longitudinally at the upper end; a number of tool marks are visible near the lower end where the sides of the beater have been shaved. The base has been covered with incised crosshatching, except for an oval depression at the centre. The edges are slightly damaged around the working end, and the open end is split and has begun to laminate. The head has been loosely hafted onto a handle, carved from a single piece of brown wood (approximately Pantone 7508C) that has been cut roughly flat across the top, but only torn across the bottom leaving the internal fibres of the wood sticking out and exposed. The handle was split down the length from its top end, but unevenly, partially separating a narrow sliver of wood that has been pulled out to one side to create a forked top. The head was then placed halfway down this fork, at right angles to it, and bound in place using a length of 2 ply twisted plant fibre. This has a very fibrous, stringy consistency, and looks to be manufactured from strips of reddish brown bark (Pantone 4695C) which are fraying at the ends. The binding is not very tight, and 2 wedges of wood have been forced into the binding below the beater head to tighten it; these have similar colouring and texture to the handle and were probably made from the same source material. The handle is complete and looks very new, but has a couple of cut marks in its lower part and what may be scorch marks in patches across the surface. It looks very makeshift and may never have been used in this form; it is possible that an old beater head was provided with a handle for the benefit of the collector. It has a weight of 357.6 grams. The beater head is 200 mm long, and measures 41.2 by 36 mm across its broad end, and 26.5 by 21 mm across its narrow, working surface. The handle is 378 mm long, 26.8 mm wide and 25.8 mm thick at its central point; the fibre cord has a diameter of 5 mm [RTS 7/3/2005].
Geographical reference: South Sudan
Africa > Eastern Africa > South Sudan; Western Equatoria Dingba
Cultural groups: Zande
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: 29th April 1933
Acquisition information: Donated: 1934
Materials and processes: Material Animal Ivory Tooth, Process Carved
Dimensions: Width: max 200 mm total, Length: max 200 mm, Length: max 378 mm total, Depth: max 75 mm total, Diameter: max 43 mm, Weight 357.6 g
Object numbers: Accession number: 1934.8.125.1 Other numbers: 981
Research and responses: The coordinates given for Dingba by Powell-Cotton suggest it is located somewhere near Tambura, and probably in Western Equatoria in Sudan; it is not to be confused with a place of the same name in the Democratic Republic of Congo, further south.
Powell-cotton gives the Zande name for an ivory barkcloth beater as wata, a term also mentioned by Larken, who describes the manufacture of Zande barkcloth as follows: "During the rains, about July, two horizontal cuts are made round the stem four or five feet apart, a perpendicular one joining them. The bark is loosened and removed in a single piece. The outer skin is scraped away with a knife, and the dark brown fibrous remainder beaten on a log with a wata. This is usually the point of a small tusk about a foot long. The pointed end is used as a handle, the other, of which the face has been scored with a series of closely-crossing lines to a depth of about the tenth of an inch, as a stamp, the bark, lying on the log, being punched all over with it. The process is gradual, and not too much force may be employed. The fibres become spread out and the thickness of the substance reduced, though somewhat unevenly so. The resulting cloth when dry is of a light reddish brown colour, harsh in texture, and bearing throughout its not very long life the marks of the corrugations on the face of the wata" (P.M. Larken, 1926, "An Account of the Zande", Sudan Notes and Records IX no. 1, pp 34-35). Brock also described the process: 'the latter [barkcloth] is prepared with oil and beaten out with a piece of ivory cut off the end of an elephant's tusk, the end where it is cut off being grooved in a criss-cross fashion which makes a pattern on the cloth' (R.G.C. Brock, "Some Notes on the Zande Tribe as Found in the Meridi District", Sudan Notes and News 1, 1918, 254) [RTS 2/2/2004].

Search terms: Tool, Barkcloth, Beater