Regents of the University of California

Robes of the Sokoto Caliphate

Author(s): Colleen Kriger
Source: African Arts, Vol. 21, No. 3 (May, 1988), pp. 52-57+78-79+85-86
Published by: UCLA James S. Coleman African Studies Center
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3336444 .
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 Robes of the Sokoto Caliphate
COLLEENKRIGER
"robeof honor,"as it is known in
T he
the literature, has been an important
official garment in the Islamic world
since the eighth century. In the Sokoto
Caliphate (ca. 1810-1908, now northern
Nigeria) this voluminous tailored vest-
ment was referred to as the rigan giwa,
"robe of the elephant" (riga=robe;
giwa =elephant). It was distinguished by
the color of cloth used to make it and by
its embroidered imagery, either the com-
position called "Two Knives" or the re-
lated "Eight Knives." Like the epigraphic
inscriptions on robes of honor elsewhere
in the Muslim world, the embroidery
signified good fortune and victory in
war.
According to other interpretations the
rigan giwa is a garment indicating ethnic
affiliation or social prestige (Heathcote
1972a:12,14;Perani 1979:53)rather than an
official robe of the Caliphate. A great
deal of confusion has arisen in the litera-
ture from the various ethnic attributions
- Hausa, Nupe, Yoruba - that have
1. THE CHIEFOF PATEGIAND HIS FOLLOWERS. been given to robes embroidered with
PHOTOTAKENBY THE REV A.W. BANFIELDIN NUPE COUNTRYCA. 1903. Two Knives and Eight Knives imagery.
They are, however, unclassifiable in
these terms. Members of many ethnic
groups contributed to their production
in the Sokoto state, the garments chang-
ing hands at different stages in the pro-
cess. Moreover, their most important
feature was their use by the Muslim elite,
regardless of ethnic affiliation (Fig. 1).
A- The rigan giwa was used to signify rep-
?r_ resentatives of the Caliphate administra-
tion, and over time it became an indi-
cator of high status and prestige. Con-
sequently during the nineteenth century,
:r?r 4 robes that looked like them, though of
.
lesser material and quality (Fig. 3), were
in increasing demand and became avail-
'?; :
:: •
• i 71 1?
able in the marketplace. The jihad, and
•
questions concerning who could legally
rpm be enslaved, made it critical to be iden-
tified not only as Muslim but as affiliated
with the current regime (Lovejoy
1982:208-9).1 For this reason, the produc-
tion and use of robes resembling the
rigan giwa proliferated as the Caliphate
expanded, contrary to Heathcote's
suggestion that the reformers would
2. THE REV.A. W. BANFIELDWITHA NUPE MALAMIN PATEGI,1903. BANFIELDDID NOT USE HIS ROBE FOR PROSELYTIZ- have discouraged embroidered clothing
ING: HE WORE IT HERETO ESTABLISHA RELATIONSHIPWITHTHE SCHOLAR WHO TAUGHTHIMTHE NUPE LANGUAGE. (Heathcote 1972a:13). They were consid-
THE MALAMWEARSA BLACKROBE OVERA WHITEONE. ered essential, for instance, to foreign

52

3. "EIGHTKNIVES"EMBROIDERYCOMPOSITIONIN COTTONON A SILKAND COTTON ROBE.
COLLECTEDBY COUNT CHARLESDE CARDI, A TRADERIN THE NIGER DELTAAREA FROM1862 TO 1898. MUSEUM FOR TEXTILES,TORONTO.
visitors. Both Barth (1965, vol. 1: 513) and
Nachtigal (1971, vol. 4:frontispiece; vol.
2:179-80) found wearing an embroidered
robe to be a worthwhile though costly
investment for their travels. Other Euro-
peans were advised to don them in
slave-raiding areas to insure safe pas-
sage, and missionaries in Lokoja during
the early 1890s adopted a policy of wear-
ing them, as they believed these gar-
ments gave them greater authority
among the upper classes (Fig. 2) (Nott
1896a:595; 1896b:29; J.A. Robinson
1891:111;C.H. Robinson 1897:90).
Robes of honor in the greater Islamic
world have varied over space and time
and cannot be characterized precisely.
Our sources for early Islamic textiles are
mostly written descriptions of the gen-
eral uses and characteristics of garments,
including this type. Before the thirteenth
century, textiles were often adorned with
inscriptions praising Allah and wishing
for blessings and victory. The name of
the current caliph was cited, and some-
times the workshop location and date as
well. The name of the vizier, the caliph's
principal minister, who usually was re-
sponsible for overseeing the manufac-
ture of robes of honor (Pence-Britton
1938:20), might also be included. Ser-
Ok
jeant has called the inscriptions a prop-
aganda for the ruling dynasty (1972:18-
20, 23-24, 182), and dynastic changes
were accompanied by changes in the in-
scriptions and colors of robes and ban-
ners.2 Not all inscribed gowns were
robes of honor. That type was distin-
guished by a high quality of workman-
ship and precious materials. Silk was
often the ground cloth, with inscriptions
woven or embroidered in silk or gold
(Gervers & Golombek 1977:82, 85). In the
Mamluk Empire (Egypt, Syria, and the
Western Arabian peninsula, thirteenth-
sixteenth centuries), blazons granted by
the sultan, representing signs of office,
supplanted historical inscriptions
(Mayer 1933:3-4). Robes of honor during
this period featured hems or linings of
rare and costly materials (Mayer
1952:57).
These garments were awarded by
superiors to their subordinates, demon-
strating their relationship or indicating
the offer of protection, and were also
awarded to officials upon their new ap-
pointments (Serjeant 1972:16,22, 24). Be-
fore the thirteenth century they were
primarily given by the caliph to his
emirs, but in the Mamluk Empire, prin-
ces, governors, and high officials also
ror
IL;
4L-?
presented them to their subordinates or
to foreign ambassadors. Robes of honor
became increasingly associated with mil-
itary rank during the Mamluk period,
and to refuse one was considered an act
of rebellion (Mayer 1952:62-63).
The robes may have appeared in parts
of sub-Saharan Africa at very early
dates. Arab geographers reported what
seems to have been the official use of
robes and turbans there from the
eleventh century onward (Hopkins &
Levtzion 1981:82, 85, 94, 97, 188-89, 260,
265, 274, 299, 303). It is possible that in
the Central Sudan robes of honor were
used in Kanem, Songhay, Agadez,
Borno, and the early Hausa states. They
were certainly known to the early
nineteenth-century Sokoto community.
For instance, Shaikj Usman dan Fodio's
vision in a dream, which figured in his
decision to wage holy war, included the
presentation to him of such a robe by the
founder of the Qadiriya order, 'Abd al-
Qadir (Martin 1976:20).
The significance of tailored garments
in Muslim culture and robes of honor in
the administration of a Muslim state
must have been a factor in the efforts to
promote the textile industry in the
Sokoto Caliphate. Textile production
53

L,_
4. "TWOKNIVES"EMBROIDERYCOMPOSITION,SHOWN
IN DIAGRAMBECAUSE THE ORIGINALIS IN BLACKON
BLACK INDIGOCLOTH. COLLECTEDBY FIRST LIEUTEN-
ANT PICHT,LATE19THCENTURYULMERMUSEUM.
had been important in the region of the
Hausa states long before the founding of
the Caliphate around 1810, but the
nineteenth century saw a dramatic
change in the scale of production. Re-
ports of European travelers repeatedly
referred to the thriving textile industry
and trade, and by the early twentieth cen-
tury, when the British compiled their
census reports, the numbers of people
occupied in textile work were surpassed
only by those in the agricultural sector
(Meek 1925, vol. 2:214-15).
The most significant factor in this
rapid expansion was Sokoto labor
policies. Institutionalized slavery pro-
vided an important source of manpower
for producing and processing raw mate-
rials and for spinning and weaving
(Lovejoy 1982:201-7). Cotton and indigo
plantations, often owned by wealthy
merchants and members of the aristoc-
racy and worked by slaves, were estab-
lished throughout the Caliphate. These
were concentrated especially heavily in
what Lovejoy has described as the "tex-
tile belt," consisting of southern Katsina,
Kano, northern Zaria, and Zamfara. In-
digo dyeworks were at the belt's core,
and cotton and grain cultivation in the
outlying areas. Raw cotton was trans-
ported over distances up to 160 kilomet-
ers (Lovejoy 1978:356-58).
Much of the production of thread was
probably the work of slaves. Little re-
search has been done on spinning, de-
spite the fact that the British listed it as
the most important nonagricultural oc-
cupation for women in northern Nigeria
in the early twentieth century. Process-
ing and spinning cotton are extremely
labor-intensive operations; even after
the introduction of imported cotton
thread from Europe, spinners out-
54
L--
5. "TWOKNIVES"COMPOSITION,SHOWN IN DIAGRAMBECAUSETHEORIGINALIS IN BLACK
ON GLAZEDBLACKCLOTH.COLLECTEDIN NORTHERNNIGERIA,1982. MUSEUMFORTEXTILES,TORONTO.
numbered weavers by a ratio of over two
to one (Meek 1925, vol. 2:224-26).3 Al-
though the practice of wife seclusion
must have contributed to the huge
female labor force necessary for thread
production, it can be assumed that a ma-
jority of the work was done by female
slaves.
Manufacturing centers were estab-
lished for treadle loom weaving by both
enslaved and free men. All over the
Caliphate, large numbers of slaves were
brought into the emirate capitals to
weave strips that were sewn together in-
to garments (Last 1967b:231-32; Lovejoy
1978:353-58, 361, 366-67; Mason 1981:54,
94; Shea 1983:101-2;O'Hear 1983:126-30).
The earliest evidence of this comes from
Clapperton, who reported that in 1824
male Nupe slaves were producing blue
checked cloth in Sokoto (Denham &
Clapperton 1831, vol 4:146). Cloth pro-
duction became particularly heavy from
Kano southward into northern Zaria,
and in Katsina, as well as the areas
around the Caliphate capitals of Sokoto
and Gwandu (Lovejoy 1978:361,367). In
the second half of the nineteenth cen-
tury, Ilorin and the Nupe emirates also
developed into important textile man-
ufacturing centers. Emirate policies set
low rates of taxation on textile work in
Kano, Sokoto, and Ilorin, providing in-
centives for skilled freemen to immigrate
to these areas (Shea 1975:43; 1983:101;
O'Hear 1983:136).
Much of this high-volume manufac-
ture of textiles, including robes, was
geared for export, but such was not the
case for elaborately tailored, embroi-
dered robes. If a large scale of production
indicates an orientation toward export-
ing, then such robes were probably not
made to be traded out of the Caliphate
but were part of a more local, luxury op-
eration. Tailoring was an individual,
urban occupation of free men. Moreover,
a complex method of tailoring used for
some robes, which involved more cloth
--- - ---- - - ,r
and resulted in a heavier garment, ren-
dered them unsuitable for bulk trading
over long distances.4 Embroidery was
not an occupation that was organized for
high-volume production. It was the
part-time work of Quranic scholars who
were often itinerant, setting up village
schools or traveling between urban cen-
ters of learning (Nadel 1942:286; Heath-
cote 1972a:13-14;1972b:123).At the same
time, a potential for organization did
exist in the Quranic schools, where stu-
dents could serve as apprentices. As we
shall see, this potential may have been
developed in Sokoto, as it most certainly
was in Nupe country in the later
nineteenth century. What is important at
this point is that both tailoring and em-
broidery tended to be concentrated in
urban areas, which suggests a link with
palace officials. Much of the urban textile
production in Kano and Nupe emirates
was destined for the palace (Shea
1983:101; Perani 1977:9,30; Mason
1981:34,54,94), for its own use or for use
as tribute to the capitals of Sokoto or
Gwandu.
Although some embroidered robes
also appeared in the markets it does not
mean that they were accessible to all. As
European travelers frequently noted, tai-
lored garments were worn only by Mus-
lims. The availability of certain robes was
further restricted by their cost. The price
range for robes was extremely wide. For
instance, two examples collected on the
British 1841 Niger Expeditions were
bought for 7,000 cowries each, while at
the same time the Rev. Sch6n reported
meeting a malam near the Niger-Benue
confluence who was wearing a robe that
he claimed cost 30,000 cowries (Schon
1970:116).An elaborately tailored exam-
ple made of narrow strip cloth like a silk
strip purchased in the town of Eggan on
the 1841 expedition, with silk lining and
imported-silk embroidery, could easily
have cost over 200,000 cowries.6 Further
north, in the textile-producing and -trad-
ing center of Kano in about 1850, Barth embroidered according to high stan- The term giwa, "elephant," has been
reported that a "good" embroidered dards at relatively low cost. Because the applied in both the Hausa and Nupe lan-
robe of cotton cost 18,000-20,000 cowries early Sokoto community was so suc- guages to these robes and also to high-
(1965, vol.1:513). Nachtigal listed prices cessful in developing the new capital ranking emirate authorities: in Hausa, it
for those manufactured in the Caliphate into a center of Quranic learning, it is was a greeting to important officials such
in the 1870s, and he distinguished the therefore likely that Sokoto also became as sarki and madaki;and in Nupe, to those
class of buyer. Robes for the middle class, an important embroidery center. in the civil and military nobility (Bargery
he said, cost 12,000-24,000 cowries, A similar pattern of official robe dis- 1934:382-83).9 This suggests a link be-
while those for the aristocracy cost tribution probably also existed at the tween the rigan giwa and holders of high
48,000-80,000 cowries. Some robes, emirate level of government. Evidence office in the Caliphate as well.
more finely woven but apparently not of for this comes from the association of the It would have been important for the
silk, cost up to 160,000 cowries. The price rigan giwa with emirate office-holders. rigan giwa to be identifiable as a robe ac-
of a "poor man's shirt," on the other
hand, was only 2,000-4,000 cowries
(Nachtigal 1971, vol. 2:182-84).7
Some robes were officially distributed
by the state. The Sokoto Caliphate ad-
ministration seems to have followed the
customary Islamic practice of assigning
this duty to the vizier, especially where
robes of honor were concerned. The viz-
ier, second in power to the caliph, was in
charge of the treasury, which included
thousands of robes acquired as tribute or
booty, or sent as "gifts" to the caliph or
the vizier from their subordinates (Last
1967b:103, 196-97). He then distributed ''So
them in recognition of service. Office-
holders were invested with a robe and
turban, which signified acceptance of the
caliph's authority (Hiskett 1973:141;Last
1967b:234),8 and soldiers in military
campaigns were also awarded robes
(Hiskett 1973:185-86;Last 1967b:103).
The vizier was also in a position to
supervise embroidery work and select
the finest examples for presentation. r6-
Quranic scholars often supported them-
selves by embroidering robes (Heathcote ~-.rf,
1974a:20; 1974b:623; 1972b:123;1972c:166; I
-w
Nadel 1942:379; Perani 1979:96, n. 5),and
since the vizier was also in charge of the
promotion and encouragement of
Quranic teaching (Last 1967b:182), gar-
ments from the treasury could have been
k 76'

6. "EIGHT KNIVES" COMPOSITION IN IMPORTED SILK ON SILK AND COTTON ROBE. GIVEN TO COMMODORE A. P
EARDLEY-WILMOT BY THE KING OF DAHOMEY IN 1862. MUSEUM OF MANKIND, LONDON. LEFT 7. MOTIF FROM THE
WEARER'SRIGHTSIDE OF THE EARDLEY-WILMOT ROBE. THE PLAITEDCORD AND BACKSTITCHUSED AS OUTLINEDE-
VICES ARE REPLACEDBY CHAIN STITCH IN LATERROBES, WHICHALSO SHOW LESS THAN HALFTHE DENSITYOF THE
EYELETSTITCHESIN THIS EXAMPLE.

55
quired from the state. Embroidered im-
agery and certain kinds of cloth probab-
ly served this function. We have sev-
eral descriptions of the rigan giwa rec-
orded at different times and places in the
Caliphate, each specifying the color of
the ground cloth. Barth, reporting from
Kano in 1851, described it as a black,
glazed (pounded with indigo) robe (1965,
vol. 1:512);in the 1870s Nachtigal wrote
that it was made of blue and white
checked cloth (1971,vol. 2:183);Robinson
defined it in his Hausa dictionary as a
glazed indigo robe (1914, vol. 1:293); and
Banfield in his Nupe dictionary said it
was made of red and white striped cloth
(1914:150).We do not know the historical
reasons for this variation. While there
were differences in the kind of cloth
used, the garments shared a particular
embroidered imagery. In surveying
examples of giwa-type robes, that is,
those made of cloth of glazed indigo,
blue and white checks, or red and white
stripes, I found that two related em-
broidery compositions predominated:1?
the Two Knives design, occurring on
glazed indigo robes; and Eight Knives,
8. THE EARLIESTKNOWN EXAMPLEOF THE "EIGHTKNIVES"COMPOSITION.IMPORTED
WHITESILK ON WHITECOTTON ROBE. COLLECTEDBY DR. W. STANGERATTHE NIGER-
BENUE CONFLUENCE,1841. WISBECHAND FENLANDMUSEUM, CAMBRIDGESHIRE.
56
appearing more often on blue and white
checked and on red and white striped
examples. Both were used on white
robes, worn by pious and learned Mus-
lims (Clapperton 1966:204; Greenberg
1946:63; Nicholas 1975:476).11
The rigangiwa can therefore be charac-
terized as a tailored robe of one of several
colors of cloth, embroidered with a cer-
tain imagery. But if garments answering
similar descriptions were available in the
markets, was there a way of distinguish-
ing between the two? In accordance with
the pattern elsewhere in the Islamic
world, the official rigan giwa was further
set apart by value. In the marketplace the
highest priced robes could be purchased
by only a very wealthy elite who would
wear them, for example, when they were
acting as Caliphate representatives to es-
tablish trade relations with foreign rul-
ers.12 In the capital, the vizier could
select for distribution the finest of the
thousands of robes available to him.
Caliphate robes of honor were the best of
their kind.
The robes themselves clearly reveal a
complex hierarchy of value. Because a
9. "EIGHTKNIVES"COMPOSITIONIN COTTONAND SILKON A BLUE AND WHITESTRIPED
COTTON ROBE. COLLECTED BY THE REV. A.W. BANFIELD, NORTHERN NIGERIA, 1929.
ROYALONTARIOMUSEUM,TORONTO.
range of choices in material and technical
qualities is possible at each step in pro-
duction, there may be extreme differ-
ences in market worth for apparently
similar roles. My analyses of the textiles
purchased on the 1841 Niger Expedition
show that price was correlated with ma-
terials, thread quality, and density of the
weave.13 Hausa vocabulary indicates
that distinctions in quality were made for
certain patterns of weave and their varia-
tions.14 It follows that similar distinc-
tions were made for the final steps in the
process of constructing embroidered
robes. The method and quality of the
tailoring, the presence of lining, the ma-
terial used for the lining and its quality,
the materials used in the embroidery,
and the density and detail of the em-
broidery are all factors that further af-
fected value.
An example of what I believe to be a
Caliphate robe of honor is in the Mu-
seum of Mankind in London (Figs.
6,7).s5 In workmanship and materials it
is clearly superior to all others I have
analyzed. The ground cloth shows an
elaboration of the red and white striped
 :r

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I
:,??, .
'?
ia: .,1-?
i-~? ":
,-::!'i:*?I~-~9-d~?
*:: i. I ..?- ?-!
:,,;:.
:C :t ?- --~I~ ~ ?,:?
?.?. i. ..
?;c;,:
~t!:
,?;-~?
?' ~li~i~:~
~
I .,,..
r~
??
?jT~1?
?? ???- ~r'~
:j
i
i.;.
?-
'`tr.r
"'
?:. I::
:,Y? ?cr
:?
5~`.?
:?fl\

?? ??
?? .:??
~'??
r-rrtr: ~?
'~?~":' :ns
-?-?
?;r
::??s:r: ~~"
~'? -:3~

..?
?:'? ;~?r?
~~.~--~:?:?Nn, ~I? ?-rr.. ?I??
?c-~u hi
~?:-
~

10. "EIGHTKNWVES"COMPOSITION ON A BLUE AND WHITECHECKED COTTON ROBE. 11. "EIGHTKNIVES"EMBROIDERYIN COTTON AND SILKON BLUE AND WHITECHECKED
COLLECTEDBY COMMANDERCOLIN DUNDAS, ROYALNAVYOFFICER OFF THE COAST COTTON ROBE. COLLECTEDBY COUNT CHARLES DE CARDI BETWEEN1862 AND 1898.
OF WEST AFRICA,1862-66. ROYALMUSEUMOF SCOTLAND, EDINBURGH. MUSEUM FOR TEXTILES,TORONTO.

cloth referred to in Banfield's descrip-
tion of the rigan giwa. (The magenta silk
imported from Europe via Tripoli was
often described as red.) Here, the pat-
tern of the silk strip cloth is similar to
strip mentioned earlier that was pur-
chased in Eggan in 1841, which was by far
the most expensive textile in the Niger
Expedition collection. The robe is an es-
pecially fine example of the complex
tailoring method of folding each cloth
strip to make a built-in lining, adding to
its weight and value.16 It is lined at the
hem with finely woven silk strips sewn
together and cut on the bias. The entire
Eight Knives composition is done in a
smooth, glossy silk, apparently im-
ported; the embroidery is particularly
dense and even, and the workmanship is
consistent and detailed. This garment
was presented through high-level dip-
lomatic channels; it was a gift to Com-
modore Arthur P. Eardley-Wilmot, the
British Senior Officer on the West Coast
of Africa, from the King of Dahomey in
December 1862.17It can be attributed as a
Caliphate robe on the basis of the cloth
used, garment form, method of tailor-
ing, and embroidered imagery, done in
monochrome.18 Although it is not cer-
tain how it came into the possession of
the Dahomean king, it is appropriate
that he would have a Caliphate rigan
giwa, given the important trade relations
between the two states (Manning
1982:45) and the role that costly robes
played in affirming such relations.
The Two Knives and Eight Knives em-
broidery compositions share the same
vocabulary of imagery, although the lat-
ter may be more recent, apparently de-
veloping as an extension of the former.
Eight Knives seems to have been ab-
ruptly introduced, for there are no
known examples of nineteenth- or early
twentieth-century compositions repre-
senting intermediary stages. Evidence
also indicates that although both types
were used on Caliphate robes, Eight
Knives was more prevalent during the
nineteenth century and could therefore
be interpreted as signifying the new
dynasty established at Sokoto.
The stability over time of the Two
Knives imagery is the most convincing
evidence of its antiquity. It has occurred
most often on black robes and white
robes, and we find references in the liter-
ature to a long tradition of wearing black
robes with white robes, one on top of the
other (Fig. 2). The Hausa language has
had different regional terms for this prac-
tice, indicating its wide distribution in
Hausaland prior to the establishment of
the Sokoto Caliphate.19 A black robe
and a white cotton and silk robe collected
at Eggan market in 1841 on the Niger Ex-
pedition show abbreviated versions of
the Two Knives composition; the roun-
del over the wearer's right chest is miss-
ing, and there is no patterning to the
couched embroidery of the two "knife"
shapes. A black robe embroidered with
Two Knives, now in the Ulmer Museum,
has been published as dating from the mid-
seventeenth century (Fig.4). Accession in-
formation shows, however, that the robe
probably dates from the late
nineteenth century.2o Nevertheless it
remains an important piece, showing
the consistency of the Two Knives design
over time.21 Its embroidery closely re-
sembles that on a black robe collected in
northern Nigeria in 1982 (Fig. 5) in
stitches used, composition, and scale.
In contrast Eight Knives transformed
considerably during the nineteenth cen-
tury. In 1897 von Luschan illustrated
what appeared to be a process of change
in the imagery of twenty of these em-
broideries in German collections
(1897:250). The examples he showed
were not dated, however. Drawing from
several museum collections, I have
selected eight robes decorated with the
Eight Knives imagery whose dates could
be reasonably established, covering a
period of ninety years, from 1841 to 1930.
The modifications over time parallel the
sequence illustrated by von Luschan.
The most dramatic change takes place in
a motif running vertically along the
right-hand edge of the composition as it
is viewed. On early robes (Figs. 8,10), it is
shown as several parallel lines forming a
curved band or arc;22on later ones it has
become a series of squares and rectan-
gles containing knot forms, interlaces,
checkerboards, or crossed lozenges
(Figs. 9,11). Such transformations during
Continuedon page78

57
of prejudiced beliefs about the practice of
Afro-Caribbean religionsheld by people out-
side the religions.
As for the "sense of aestheticplay"in the
religions, I really didn't mean that this was
anythingnew. I agreethatthe statueof Darth
Vaderas GuedethatI saw in a Bel-Airehounfor
last November was simply the latest trans-
formationof a religiousimpulsethatadopted
chromolithographsfor analogous reasons in
the last century.I feel that in documenting
such representations,I am simply updating
the observationsmadeby Mr.Courlanderand
othersover the last decades.
DonaldCosentino
LosAngeles
Universityof California,
AKOPHOTOCORRECTION
May I make a correctionto RobinPoynor's
"AkoFiguresof Owo and Second Burialsin
SouthernNigeria"in yourNovember1987is-
sue? All three photographs on page 63 are
mine, and Figure2 was takenin the Palacein
Owo in late 1958.
FrankWillett
TheUniversityof Glasgow
CLARIFICATION ON SO'OMASKS
In ourarticle"So'oMasksand HembaFuner-
aryFestival"(Nov.1987),a sentencewas omit-
ted fromthe captionforfigures3 and4, which
reads: "So'osociety member's mask(?)..."
Retaining the next sentence, "Some so'o
masks are kept inside members'houses and
are not used in masqueradeperformance"
would have made sense of the "?"That is, we
are making a distinction between a
"member'smask"and a "dancemask."Also,
on page 33, column 1, line 13, the phrase
should be "morefrequenthuman warfare."
ThomasD. Blakely
andPamelaA.R. Blakely
BrighamYoungUniversity
CONTEMPORARY ARTIN GREENLAND
IverymuchenjoyedtheFirstWordon arcticart
(Nov.1987)and secondJohnPovey's views. I
was in Greenlandlast summer and became
familiar with Greenlandic art and the art
school at Nuuk, the capital.The development
of modern art there has followed much the
same path as that in the Canadianarctic,in-
cluding the strong influence of individual
Europeans.It has not yet reachedthe degree
of commercialsuccess of Canadianarcticart,
especially here in the U.S. (You will have
noticed by now that I've avoided using the
word "Eskimo."The Greenlandersfind it as
offensive as Americanblacks find the word
"negro."Welearnedthis withinthe firsthour
of being there. Yet in the Canadianarcticthe
same does not apply.)
The point madeaboutWesternersplacinga
high value on priorritualuse with regardto
Africanart is an importantone. I don't think
thatthey do so only becausethey value ritual
use for its own sake. Ritualuse is usuallyas-
sociated with objects that are aesthetically
superior(atleastin Europeaneyes) compared
to contemporarycopies, reproductions, or
whatevertaxonomyof nouns and adjectives
one chooses to apply to the stuff recently
hackedout. Thereasonsforthis have all been
78
thrashed out by others. However, as John
Povey pointed out, sub-Saharan Africans
have notyet producedthe kindsof contempo-
raryart one sees in the arctic,save for a few
rareexceptions.
I'vegiven this much thoughtsince being in
Greenland.TheGreenlandershave in a sense
made a breakwith their "traditional"repre-
sentationalartforms.Theircontemporaryart
stands on its own merits.Yettheirsculptures
and paintingsand sketchesoften depict now
vanishedtraditions.Thusthereis stilla linkto
the past, but unlikethe vast majorityof Afri-
cans who sculpttoday,they are not imitators
or copiers.
The factthat there is a marketin the West-
ern worldfor the imitationsandcopiessculp-
ted in Africa in part, I think, impedes the
emergence of contemporaryart and artists.
For the market serves as the patron, and
bends the artiststo its will in both subtleand
forcefulways. Only when the marketbegins
to reject this type of art or independently
makesa demandfor new Africangenres will
changeoccur.Theremustbe thousandsof tal-
ented Africanartists imprisonedtoday in a
cycle of sculpting copies from art books in
orderto earntheirdailybread.Whileso doing
they cannotachievethe freedomnecessaryto
use theircreativity.Theyarelimitedto exercis-
ing only theirtechnicalskills.
PascalJamesImperato
New York StateJournal of Medicine
Sokoto Robes
Continued frompage57
the nineteenthand early twentieth centuries
suggestthatthe EightKnivescompositionwas
notyetafirmlyestablishedvisualstatementand
was probablymorerecentthan Two Knives.
Furthersupportfora youngerage forEight
Knivesimagerycomesfromevidencethatthe
rigangiwa probably served as a model for
workshop productionof embroideredrobes
in the laternineteenthcentury,and that this
was the favoredof the two compositions.A
transitionto workshopproductioncan be ob-
served in the contrast of workmanshipbe-
tween early- and late-nineteenth-century
robes.Earlyexamplesshow denseandconsis-
tent embroiderytechniques. Even more im-
portant, the careful workmanshipsuggests
the hand of a single embroiderer.Laterrobes
lack such detail and consistency,and the re-
pertoryof stitcheshas been reducedto three
main ones: patterned couching, chain, and
eyelet. These changes strongly suggest a
greaterscaleandorganizationin the embroid-
ery process. The 102examplesof embroidery
collected by Frobenius in Nupe country
around1910,now in the Museumfir V61lker-
kunde, Munich,23confirm such workshop
productionand, in some cases, the stages in
production.24But their most remarkableas-
pect is their homogeneity. Of the 65 pieces
thatarepockets,showing the mainportionof
the embroiderycomposition,48 displayEight
Knivesand only 17show TwoKnives;another
15 pieces are fragmentsof EightKnivescom-
positionsthatmaybe partnersto the pockets.
Such an overwhelmingdemand for this im-
agery by the end of the nineteenth century
testifiesto its currencyin the Caliphate.
An iconographicalanalysis demonstrates
associationsof motifswithofficialinsigniaand
protectivedevices. The motifon the wearer's
right chest and backhas been repeatedlyre-
ferred to as tambari,or "king'sdrum"(e.g.,
Menzel 1972, vol. 3: no. 112; Mischlich
1942:116).The tambarisignified Hausa chief-
taincy(Smith1960:160;Nicolas1975:147; Fer-
guson1973:273) andhas beenincludedin emi-
rate insignia (Harris 1932:105-6; Daniel
1932:82-83).I do not mean to suggest, how-
ever,thatit is a directvisualrepresentationof
a drum.Tambari has also beena titleforHausa
and Tuaregwarleaders(Barth1965,vol. 2:356;
Harris1932:105),25 and it may well be thatthe
title came to be associatedwith their robes.
Componentsof the motif,suchas the crossed
circleand the spiral, have appearedon pen-
dants, weapons, and on palace and mosque
facades across the Sahara region, contexts
that indicate protective properties (Gabus
1958:42,54, 67, 76, 79,154-55,371,379;Nicolas
1975;pls. 1,2;Prussin1976:16-19; 1986:221).
Another motif appears twice on the
wearer's left side. Eight-pointedstars have
been noted as talismanson Islamicbanners
used both in war and on pilgrimage(Welch
1979:76-77).The double square, or eight-
pointedstar,served as protectionagainstthe
"evil eye" in Moorishiconography(Wester-
marck1904:217).Itswidespreadappearancein
the Islamicworld in Quranilluminationand
on tomb covers furtherindicates protective
functions(James1980:21;Safadi1978).Robes
acquiredaroundthe 1930sand latershow this
motif changed beyond recognition and no
longeractive(Fig.9).
A motifthatappearson the pocketedge of
TwoKnivesembroideriesalsoappearsin early
EightKnivescompositions.It is a squaredi-
vided into nine equalsquares(3 x 3), with five
of them (the cornersand center)completely
filled in with embroidery. On later Eight
Knivescompositions,it has been transformed
into a crossedlozenge or interlaceform. The
only namerecordedforthis motifis "houseof
bees" or "house of five."26By name and by
form,then, it refersto the numberfive, noted
as a charmagainstthe evil eye (Westermarck
1904:212-15; Tremearne1968:175).
The3 x 3 squarebelongsto a largefamilyof
magicsquareswhose historyis ancient.Rep-
resentingthe universe in Chinese iconogra-
phy from the fourth century B.C., magic
squaresfirst appearedin Arabicliteraturein
aboutA.D. 900.Sufimysticsadoptedthe 3 x 3
square,which to them representedperpetual
motion. In written examples of the square,
numberswereplacedin eachcompartmentso
that the sum in any directionequaledfifteen.
Two squaresof 3 x 3 cells appearon a talis-
manicbowl attributedto the Mamlukperiod
(Ittig 1982:88-90).27 Magic squares with
numbers, along with messages in Arabic
script, were drawn on sub-Saharancharm
gowns, and variationsof magicsquareshave
been noted as amulets (Meinhof1923-24:224-
26; Prussin 1976:18;1986:76,90-91;Bravmann
1983:25,37-41).
As already mentioned, the arc-shaped
motif on the wearer's left side of the Eight
Knives composition underwent substantial
transformationin the nineteenth century,the
parallel lines of early examples becoming a
vertical series of interlaces and crossed
lozenges. In all cases, however, it is termi-
nated by a three-tieredpointed form at each
end. Anotherverticalmotifin the lower pock-
et area, usually showing several cloverleaf-
shaped protrusions, underwent a similar
transformation;laterrobesshow it as an inter-
lace or series of crossed lozenges. On early
twentieth-century robes, these two vertical
imageshave becomealmostindistinguishable
from one another. I have not found specific
referencesto names foreitherof these vertical
motifs, but there is some evidence that they
may have been associated with various rep-
tiles. Both have components that are in-
cluded in a corpus of embroidery imagery
whose Hausa name translates as "heads of
lizards."28All of the "lizardheads" extend
from interlaces or knot forms such as those
appearingin the robe embroidery.
An obviousinterpretationof the association
of lizardswith interlaceformswould be thatit
demonstratesa process by which abstractIs-
lamic imagery was incorporatedinto a prior,
non-Muslim veneration of reptiles. But such
an interpretation would be misleading be-
cause it fails to take into account the wide
range of Islamic iconography and the com-
plexity of its incorporationsouth of the Saha-
ra. The conjunctionof reptilianand interlace
imagery has a long and widespread history.
Pairs of dragons with interlacingtails repre-
sented the dragonor serpentthought to cause
eclipses and naturaldisastersin Hindu, Cen-
tral Asian, Persian, and Islamic traditions.
The dragoninterlaceis believed to have been
introducedinto Islamicart from CentralAsia
via the Turkishdynasties, and came into use
in the Maghrebduringthe MamlukEmpire.It
was incorporatedinto the talismanicvocabu-
lary of Islamand was used, for example, with
magical inscriptionson medicine bowls and
on gates as protectionagainstthe entry of evil
pl. 2; Ibrahim1976:12-
spirits (Ittig1982:91-93;
14;Azarpay1978:367,fn, 21). Similarcontexts
for the use of both reptilianand interlaceim-
agery have been noted in the formerSokoto
Caliphate region and environs (Clapperton
1966:142;Heathcote 1974a:21;Kirk-Greene
1961:75; Prussin1976:16-19; Gabus1958,vol. 2:
379-80;387-88).Moreover,theremay well be a
historicalrelationshipbetween eclipse dragon
myths and sub-Saharantraditionsof the rain-
bow serpent. The Hausa Gajimari,like other
legendary rainbow serpents, was associated
with the presenceor absence of rainfall.It has
been describedas a rainbowin the sky and a
double-headedsnake on earth, pairedwith a
female thunder deity (Greenberg1946:40-41,
56). Its appearancein the sky, bicephalous
form, male-femaleaspect, and the reference
to thunder correspond to attributes of the
eclipse dragon. Gajimarimay have been as-
sociatedwith interlaceimagery,since the em-
broideryon the shoulderof the robeshas been
referred to as bakan gizo, or "rainbow;
Gajimari" (Mischlich 1942:116; Bargery
1934:63).Whether such an association was
originallyintendedby the embroiderersis not
clear,and it may well be that it stems froma
popular readingof the imagery.
The taperedshapes that give the embroid-
ery compositions the names TwoKnives and
Eight Knives pose several problems in in-
terpretation.Formally and technically,they
have been the most stableelementsof the em-
broideries.Although they are knife-like,it is
not certain that they do indeed represent
knives. Aska,the term for the taperedshape,
is more accuratelytranslatedas "razor"than
"knife."It may, instead, refer to users of the
robes, askarbeing an Arabic-derivedHausa
term for soldier (Menzel1972,vol. 3: no. 114;
Fletcher1912:79-81;Mischlich1942:116; Fergu-
son 1973:320;Bargery1934:40).On the other
hand, Heathcotehas illustrateda series of ta-
pered, knife-like shapes applied to a
twentieth-centuryHausa leathermirrorcase,
adding that the design was known as laya
(Heathcote 1974a:29,fig. 17 [1]).29The term
laya, or "charm,"in conjunctionwith knife-
like images parallels the use of sword and
dagger forms as amulets in, for example,
Egypt and Morocco (e.g. Schienerl 1979:30;
1980:8). Yet another interpretation derives
from the referenceto the robe embroideryas
fuska, or "face," in which case the tapered
shapes might be seen as distinguishingfacial
markscalledaska(Ferguson1973:311; Fletcher
1912:80;Bargery 1934:40).30
It is also possible that the original Two
Knives embroiderymotif was derived from
representations of Dhu 'l-Fakar, the two-
pointed sword of the Prophet frequentlyde-
pictedin Islamiciconography.The sword was
thought to have magicalproperties,with the
two points used to put out the eyes of the
enemy (Mittwoch1965, vol. 2:233).It there-
fore may have operatedas protectionagainst
the evil eye, which would correspond to its
crucialposition over the heart of the wearer.
An image of Dhu 'l-Fakarwas engraved on
the Bladeof Gajere,one of the state swords of
KatsinaEmirate;the blade has been dated to
the early fourteenth century (Bivar1964:21).
The mythical sword might also have been
known to Muslimswho made the pilgrimage
to Mecca, since Dhu 'l-Fakarhas been por-
trayedon pilgrims'bannersfrom at least the
seventeenth century(Denny 1974:71-73).The
motif could have retainedits magicalassocia-
tions while losing its precisereferent,thus al-
lowing it to be modified. Its expansion into
Eight Knives is achieved by the addition of
two groupsof threepointed forms, thatis, 2 +
3 + 3=8. I have not been able to establish
whether there is any numerologicalsignifi-
cance attachedto these numbers."3' An alter-
native would be to read the pointed shapes
both horizontallyand vertically,as for magic
squares. In each instance, the pair added to
threewould makefive, a numberused as pro-
tection against the evil eye.
I have shown that administrators of the
Sokoto Caliphateformed policies promoting
the production and regulating the distribu-
tion of robes. The believers had waged holy
war to reformIslamicpracticein the area, and
they looked to various sources - classical
texts, popular history, and reports of the
greaterIslamicworld frompilgrimsand trad-
ers - for their model of an Islamicstate. It is
thereforereasonableto suggest that the pro-
duction and use of embroideredrobes, espe-
cially robes of honor, formed an essential
componentof that model. Whetherbestowed
on high officialsor awardedto clientsand fol-
lowers in holy war, embroideredrobes dem-
onstrated a system of reward, alliance, and
protectionin the Caliphate.The evidence in-
dicates that they looked like the garment de-
scribed as the rigan giwa, "robe of the
elephant."Thefinestexampleswerepresented
as robes of honor. They later served as mod-
els for workshop production to meet the
growing demand for Caliphaterobes.
It is probablethat, as in otherIslamicstates,
imagery or inscriptions on robes served the
importantideologicalfunctionof distinguish-
ing between different regimes. The Eight
Knives embroiderycould well have been in-
troducedby the early Sokoto communityjust
after the founding of the Caliphate around
1810.Its imagery is particularlyappropriate
for representinga state established by jihad,
since its visual elements, drawnfroma broad
Afro-Islamic vocabulary, referred to
leadershipand also offeredprotectivepowers
in holy war.32It was by far the composition
most frequentlyfound on robes produced in
the Caliphate and was worn by its soldiers
and elite. In view of this, the currentpractice
in the literatureof classifyingthese garments
by ethnic group is misleading,for by wearing
such a robe one was, above all, demonstrat-
ing religious and politicalaffiliationwith the
Muslimbelieversof the Sokoto Caliphate. O
Notes,page85
books frompage26
Continued
scholarship. Among the earlierauthors who
also have gone out of their way to provide
such dataareWilliamFagg(1968),SusanVogel
(1981),and most methodicallyMonni Adams
(1982).Walkeris to be commendedfor setting
a precedent in this first catalogueof the Na-
tional Museum of AfricanArt for both track-
ing down and including this information.
One hopes this will becomea standardpartof
futureexhibitioncataloguesas well.
Owing to the currentdearthof data on the
collectionhistoriesof most Africanartworks,
Walkeris able to offerdetailedprovenancein-
formationfor only a few of the objects. In a
perusalof those entriesthatdo includerelated
data, Europeanmuseums seem to have been
more systematic collectors (and dis-
seminators) of this information than mu-
seums in America.And, anthropologicalmu-
seums to date seem to have been more con-
cerned than their fine arts museum counter-
partswith obtainingand giving out pertinent
informationon the earlycollectionhistoriesof
their works. Museums as a whole, however,
are farmore forthcomingwith this data than
privatecollectorsare.Thelong-standingmys-
tique as regardsage seems to be one of the
79

The collectionof Bauleand otherslingshots
was started about four years ago by Scanzi
from his Abidjanresidence. At the time there
was virtually no market for such objects in
IvoryCoast;publishedexamplesof WestAfri-
can slingshotscouldbe countedon the fingers
of one hand. As he began showing interestin
buying decoratedslingshots, the Hausa trad-
ers - who collect art from ruralareas for re-
sale in Abidjan- startedbringingback from
their buying trips greaterand greater quan-
tities of these items. A majorityof the pieces
illustratedin the book were sold to Scanziby
Ivoirian,Malian,and Burkinabe' artdealersin
Abidjanwho act as middlemen between the
itinerant Hausa runners and the relatively
large European expatriateclientele. When I
showed PotomoWakato a number of the art
dealersin the open-airPlateaumarketplacein
Abidjan,they each recognizeda few pieces as
ones they had sold to Scanzi.
Scanzi'sinterestin slingshots and the sub-
sequent publicationof the book have caused
the market for slingshots in Ivory Coast to
catapult,so to say. Alreadyit is difficultto find
decoratedones in the marketplacesof Abid-
jan, Bouak&,and Korhogo.Those pieces that
are available are being sold for increasingly
higherprices. And, as with most other facets
of the Africanart market,sculptorsand trad-
ers are quickly learning to supply the bur-
geoning Europeandemand for old and used
slingshots by carving and faking "instant
ethnographicantiques."
Bringing to light a largely unexplored di-
mension of West African sculptural art,
PotomoWakais an interestingaddition to any
collectionof books on Africanart. Its publica-
tion, however, serves not only to introducea
little-known category of artifactsbut also to
make evident the dynamic relationship be-
tween African-artbooks and the art market.
By simultaneouslyarousinginterestin a class
of objects previously unknown and under-
valued by collectors of African art, and ab-
sorbingfor themselves large quantitiesof the
items, the authors have createda potentially
prosperous market with high demand and
limited supply.
Christopher B. Steiner
UniversiteNationalede Cite d'Ivoire
NEWPUBLICATIONS
SongyeMasksand FigureSculptureby Dunja
Hersak. Ethnographica, London, 1986. 199
pp., 121b/w& 8 colorphotos, 4 plans, 3 maps,
bibliography,glossary,index. $45 cloth.
The Anatomy of Architecture:Ontology and
Metaphorin Batammaliba ArchitecturalExpres-
sion by Suzanne Preston Blier. Cambridge
UniversityPress, New York,1987.314pp., 85
b/w illustrations, map, notes, bibliography.
$44.50cloth.
AfricanSculpturefromthe UniversityMuseum,
Universityof Pennsylvaniaby Allen Wardwell.
Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1986. Distrib-
uted by the Universityof PennsylvaniaPress.
152pp., 73 b/w &22 colorphotos, 5 maps, bib-
liography,index. $43.95cloth, $14.95paper.
ManandHis Vision:TheTraditional WoodSculp-
ture of BurkinaFaso by Esther A. Dagan.
Galerie Amrad, Montreal, 1987. 64 pp., 173
b/w photos, map, bibliography.Textin French
and English. $18paper.
fromtheKingdom
ShoowaDesign:AfricanTextiles
of Kubaby Georges Meurant. Thames and
Hudson, London and New York, 1987. Dis-
tributedby the University of Michigan Mu-
seum of Art. 206 pp., 36 b/w & 102 color
photos, drawings,3 maps, bibliography,glos-
sary.$24.95paper.
Who'da ThoughtIt: Improvisation in African-
AmericanQuiltmaking by Eli Leon. San Fran-
cisco Craft and Folk Art Museum, 1987. 88
pp., 16 b/w & 46 color photos, bibliography.
$15.98paper.
KRIGER, notes, from page 79
Research for this article was carried out in museums and ar-
chives in North America and Europe, 1983-1986.
I would like to thank Drs. Zdenka Volavka and Paul
Lovejoy for reading and commenting on earlier drafts of this
paper, which was developed from my M.A. thesis (York
University, 1985). An abbreviated version was presented at
the Seventh Triennial Symposium on African Art, held at
UCLA in April 1986. I would also like to thank the Pasold
Research Fund for partially supporting my research in Great
Britain in June 1986.
1. For a discussion of the issue of who was a believer and who
was not, see Last and Al-Hajj 1965: 232-39.
2. Lombard refers to the operation of an official "language"
of colors (1978:117).
3. For a discussion of imported cotton and cotton yarns as
well as magenta waste silk from Europe, see Johnson 1976:97,
100-2.
4. The robes exported from Kano to Borno have not been
clearly described, but the weight of textiles was an important
factor in the trade (Shea 1975:80-82, 111, 173, 276). According
to the illustration in Nachtigal's account (1971, vol. 2:182),
robes traded to Borno were made by the simple, lightweight
method of tailoring.
5. Museum of Mankind, London. Accession numbers 43,3-
11.22 and 43.3-11.53.
6. A robe measuring 130 x 245 cm. would require about
eighty strips of the size strip purchased for 2,000 cowries.
7. Prices have been converted into cowries according to
Lovejoy (1974:584).
8. The alkyabbawas a hooded cloak given only to emirs.
9. Sarkihas referred to the emir, chief, or headman of a town,
guild, or village; madaki was a high office in the Sokoto
Caliphate - third in the line of succession in Katsina and
Hadejia, first in line in Zaria (Bargery 1934: 738; Banfield
1914:207). The rank of ndaeji or ndeji has been associated with
the highest rank among the offices of the civil nobility. Uban-
dawakireferred to the second highest rank among the offices
of the military nobility (Banfield 1914:354, 460; Nadel 1942:
100-1). According to Imam Imoru, zaki, or "lion," was a term
used to refer to the king (Ferguson 1973: 211).
10. I surveyed published and unpublished museum and field
photographs, and came up with a sample of 53 robes with the
Two Knives or Eight Knives embroidery composition. This
sample was the basis for my visual analysis. From this sam-
ple, 11 robes were selected according to their dates of collec-
tion and became the subjects of my technical analysis. My
finds were corroborated by the 102 embroidery pieces col-
lected by Frobenius, which I studied through photographs.
11. Imam Imoru described "palace malams" wearing expen-
sive and elegant clothing (Ferguson 1973:227).
12. In the textile trade to Asante, which consisted mostly of
unfinished pieces, a few costly robes were selected by the
wealthy caravan leaders for presentation to foreign rulers
(Lovejoy 1980:124).
13. My analyses of the 1841 Niger Expedition collection are
currently being prepared for publication.
14. Zabakois poorer qualitysak'i cloth;gansark'i is poor quality
cloth like sak'i, only the weft is black and not black and blue
(Bargery 1934:117, 361).
15. Accession number 1920.2-11.1. The robe is registered with
the following information: "Given to Vice Admiral Eardley
Wilmsley by the King of Dahomey between 1836 and 1866"
(pers. comm., B.J. Mack, Assistant Keeper, Museum of Man-
kind, 1985). There are no Eardley Wilmsleys or Wilmsleys
listed in the British Navy for the years 1836-1866. There is,
however, an Eardley-Wilmot, who served as senior officer off
the coast of Africa from 1862 to 1866. He became a Vice Admi-
ral in 1876.
16. Each strip in the body of the garment is half patterned,
half solid color. The strips are folded in half and sewn so that
the patterned part shows on the outside and the solid-
colored half becomes a lining on the inside of the robe. The
strips are woven with configurations for this purpose, which
suggests close production relations between tailors and
weavers. Unfortunately, there has been very little research on
tailoring, especially nineteenth-century methods of hand-
tailoring. A case study of twentieth-century Kano deals
mostly with tailors using sewing machines (see Pokrant
1982).
17. Public Record Office, Kew, Surrey, England: Admiralty
File 53/8428.
18. The robe does not correspond to the description by Renbe
Boser-Sarivaxbvanis of "Dahomey robes," which have a dif-
ferent garment form and are embroidered in polychrome
(1972:34). Further confirmation comes from the illustration of
a late-nineteenth-century "royal costume" from Dahomey
(Brooklyn Museum 22.1500, 1501, in Sieber 1972:41).
19. The wearing of two robes simultaneously, one black and
one white, was called in Hausa ri'biye (Sokoto), ha'di (Kano),
and gami (Katsina) (Bargery 1934:852).
20. Three robes from the Ulmer Museum have been pub-
lished in Lamb 1975 and Lamb & Holmes 1980. In both cases,
the authors attributed all three robes to the Weickmann col-
lection (collected prior to 1653) although in fact only two of the
robes belong to that collection. The black robe, along with a
white robe, was collected by a First Lieutenant Picht, proba-
bly in the late nineteenth century They were given to the
Ulmer Museum in 1910 by the Gewerbemuseum, along with
another portion of the Weickmann collection; hence the con-
fusion. I am grateful to Dr. Erwin Treu of the Ulmer Museum
for his patience and generosity in helping me sort out this
misunderstanding. I have so far not been able to track down
Lt. Picht, but he may be the same Picht listed as a trader who
gave two garments from Cameroon to the Berlin Museum fiir
V61kerkunde early in the twentieth century (see Menzel 1972,
vol. 3). The Ulmer robes could have been collected in
Adamawa or the Grassfields area.
21. An enlarged and expanded version of Two Knives has
been depicted on twentieth-century robes, but has not dis-
placed the version illustrated here.
22. This version of the composition is also known on the robe
collected by Barth between 1849 and 1855, now in the Berlin
Museum fiir V61kerkunde, accession number III C 15288
(Menzel 1972, vol. 2: no. 593).
23. Accession numbers 15-26-56 through 15-26-157. There is
one entire robe, and at least ninety of the fragments appear to
be from robes. I am very grateful to Dr. Maria Kecskbsi and
her staff for their generous assistance and encouragement.
24. For example, many of the fragments are pockets only,
worked separately. Nos. 15-26-100, -126, -129, and -130 only
have the eyelet and chain-stitch areas of the pocket embroi-
dered; patterned couching would be later added, perhaps by
a different embroiderer. Heathcote found evidence of
twentieth-century Hausa embroiderers specializing in only
one or two kinds of stitch (1972a:17-8).
25. The title has also been used to refer to important mer-
chants, especially in the area around Katsina (Lovejoy
1980:84).
26. In Hausa, gidan zuma andgidan biyar (Menze11972, vol. 3:
nos. 119, 120).
27. I am grateful to Dr. Lisa Golombek, Royal Ontario Mu-
seum, for this and several other sources on Mamluk art. This
bowl (acc. no. L 976.34) is on long-term loan to the Royal
Ontario Museum.
28. It included the three-tiered pointed forms and each end
of the arc motif as well as the cloverleaf shapes protruding
from the other vertical motif (Heathcote 1972d:114-16;Menzel
1972, vol. 3:no. 127; Mischlich 1942:116).
29. Laya (pl. lawaye) refers to charms, usually calligraphed.
See Rubin 1984:67-70; Prussin 1986:93.
30. For a discussion of facial markings and their association
with commercial groups, see Lovejoy 1980:79-80.
31. The number three is a significant number in Sufi belief
and prayer repetitions (Schimmell11975:157).On a more popu-
lar level, five is the number used most frequently in charms
for protection against the evil eye (Westermarck 1904:212-15).
In sub-Saharan Sufism, the hexagon is said to represent an
image of Allah. I have already mentioned the eight-pointed
star as an Islamic talisman.
32. There were ongoing debates among the Shaikh, his son
Bello, and their followers about the proper forms of accept-
able protective magic and supernatural powers. See Last
1967a:8-10.
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FAULKNER,notes, frompage 31
1. Drawings of Kasiyamaliro and Chimkoko appear in a
Chichewa publication published in Malawi called Maliro ndi
myamboya Acewa(Funeral customs of the Chewas) (Makumbi
1955). Images resembling Chimkoko and Kasiyamaliro have
been found in rock paintings dating back several centuries in
Namzeze just north of Dedza in the central region of Malawi.
2. I resided in Lilongwe for two years with my husband, Scot
Faulkner, who worked in development. Our interest in Afri-
can art and culture evolved into research as we realized that a
vibrant traditional culture virtually surrounded us. In order
to document and study this culture freely, I sought clearances
and approvals from the Malawi Congress Party and regional
and local chiefs to view the Nyau dance, Gule Wamkulu, in
which the masks appear. After nearly one year in the country,
I received permission to videotape and study the traditional
Nyau dances performed in the villages. My husband and I
were finally initiated into the society in an admittedly super-
ficial ceremony, but we had the advantage of access to mem-
bers and openness among the villagers about the culture. We
have pieced together information to be included in future
works, backed up by our field research and other documenta-
tion.
3. The Nyau society is found throughout the central and
southern regions of Malawi, as well as in eastern Zambia and
parts of western Mozambique. Barbara Blackmun and
Matthew Schoffeleers (1972) have written about the Man-
g'anja Nyau association around Zomba and Chancellor Col-
lege in southern Malawi.
4. The dating for Nyau is still inconclusive. It has been de-
duced that Nyau and the dance date back to the hunting and
gathering cultures of the Late Stone Age (e.g., Clark 1972,
Ransford 1966). The history reportedly dates from the first
millennium A.D. in the Congo Basin, or possibly Nyau en-
tered Malawi with Bantu-speaking people from the Congo
area as early as A.D. 300, bringing the Iron Age and
pottery-making with them.
5. Use of these basketry masks is described by Makumbi
(1955), though precise usage of Chimkoko is unknown.
6. Detailed description of Kasiyamaliro is based on a bas-
ketry mask, brought to the U.S. by my husband and me, that
will be donated to the Smithsonian's National Museum of
Natural History.
7. The ritual with the sacrificial chicken was described to me
in personal interviews with members.
8. The role of Njobvu was described to me in personal com-
munication with members.
9. We documented the change from woven maize leaves to
burlap bags in a village dance and visit to the graveyard,
where my husband and I filmed the new burlap Kasiyamaliro.
10. I am preparing articles that will examine other masking
forms in the Gule Wamkulu and provide insights into the
Nyau society among the Chewa.
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NETTLETON,notes, frompage 51
1. See Fagg 1965, 1970; Delange 1974; De Rachewiltz 1966;
Fagg & Plass 1968; Leuzinger 1972; Leiris & Delange 1968;
Paulme 1%2; Segy 1958;Vogel 1981;Gillon 1984. Some of the
reasons advanced for this supposed lack of figure sculpture in
the literature range from the idea that black peoples do not
have the ability to create any, to the idea that there was no
suitable wood available, to the idea that the blacks, particu-
larly the Nguni with their grass architecture, were nomadic
and therefore could not carry sculpture around with them.
The fact that the Zulu and Swazi made among the most elabo-
rate and bulky headrests and milk pails from very solid
woods appears to have escaped notice altogether.
2. Interviews with black artists in both Johannesburg and the
ruralareas have revealed how little is actually known by South
Africans about their artistic heritage. Some even reject what
little they do know as inevitably "primitive," as they suspect
interested whites of trying to foist an inferior status upon
them.
African freestanding figurative sculpture has had the
widest acceptance as "art" in Europe and America. The
whole question of the status of the ethnographic object as art
is examined in Maquet 1979.
3. Both the Nasionale Museum voor Ethnologie in Leiden
and the Musee Royal de l'Afrique Centrale in Tervuren have
accurate documentation of figures in their collections. Other
mines of information include the V61kerkunde Versammlung
in Luibeck, Frankfurt's and Berlin's Museum fur V61olker-
kunde, and the Brighton Museum. The arbitrariness of at-
tribution is to be found in the case of a figure in the British
Museum (Museum of Mankind), no. 1891Af 5308, obtained in
an exchange with the Amsterdam Museum where it was rec-
orded as having been bought at Marabastad in the Transvaal.
It was later reclassified as Zulu and more recently reclassified
again as "Transvaal."Almost identical figures in the Musee
de l'Homme and in Leiden were called Zulu and later "Shan-
gaan," probably because it was finally realized that there
were few Zulu-speakers residing in the rural Transvaalin the
1890s.
4. See museum documentation on, for example, the figures
in the Museum of Mankind (British Museum), nos. 1954 Af
23, Wellcome Collection; and 1902-185, Christie Collection;
and also 1953 Af 8.1.
5. Burchell clearly records the making of decorated spoons
among the Tlaping and Hottentots of the Northern Cape; yet
in the Royal Scottish Museum, and in contrast to the collec-
tions of the ethnological museum in Lubeck, West Germany,
they are classified as Zulu or Xhosa.
6. Documentation of the use of figures in these contexts is
in Roberts & Winter 1915; Roberts 1916; Judson 1968; Junod
1929;Tyrrell1968;Distant 1892;Wessman 1908;Nettleton 1984;
Van Warmelo 1932;O'Neill 1921;Christol 1897. See also docu-
mentation and fieldnotes in the collections of Meno Klapwijk,
Dept. of Anthropology, University of Pretoria, and of Jurgen
Witt, Tzaneen Museum, input 14, as well as my own
fieldwork in Gazankulu and Bushbuck Ridge in 1979 and
1980. Van Warmelo published a photograph of a traditional
healer with a variety of figurative objects among his
paraphernalia without commenting on it at all.
7. This is now well documented in the literature but is still in
evidence in most Southern African rural areas, where re-
search is presently in progress.
8. See also my information from Tsonga informants in
Gazankulu, 1979 and 1980; and Zulu informants in Johannes-
burg, 1978.
9. Tsonga informants in Gazankulu. It is interesting that
there are a number of Tsonga headrests that include guns in