Description (Physical description)
Catalogue card notes: Royal drum, consisting of a wooden semi-cylinder covered with hide. The drum is covered with cowries and ancient bead work, very beautifully executed. Around the top is a semi-circle of (word blank on catalogue card), covered with hide on which are sewn beads, and decorated with 4 hair tassels. Towards the base the cylinder narrows to a truncated cone. This portion of the drum, and also the head, is covered with hide, the two coverings being laced together with thongs. Over this is sewn a circular covering of leather, to which are fastened cowries and beads. The former are sewn in lines, which cover the whole except where triangles are left which are filled with glass beads of different colours, arranged in patterns. The semi-ciruclar band at the top is covered with beads sewn in spiral bands of various colours. A hide strap is fastened to two handles.
Event Date
Author: maa

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Context (Acquisition Details)
Collected by John Roscoe and present in the Museum by 1907 as indicated by the date on the catalogue card, which was updated/created in 1920.

The Report of the Board of Archaeological and Anthropological Studies on the Museum of Archaeology and of Ethnology for the year 1920, MUSEUM OF ARCHAEOLOGY AND OF ETHNOLOGY, 4 May 1921, p. 1, notes that 'T. J. Mcllwraith has likewise compiled a card- catalogue of the collections made by the Rev. J. Roscoe in Uganda, and he and Mr H. F. Bird have installed a representative series from them in a case hitherto unoccupied.'
Event Date 1907
Author: rachel hand

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Context (Field collection)
Collected by Reverend (later Canon) John Roscoe C.M.S., 1907

Event Date 1907
Author: maa

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Context (References)
Illustrated in Roscoe, John (1911). The Baganda : an account of their native customs and beliefs. London : Macmillan and Co., Fig. 5, p.27.
Event Date 1911
Author: rachel hand

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Context (Related Documents)
Catalogue card notes : Roscoe 1907 E. AFRI/ UNREGISTERED/ 20-316' followed by a physical description
Event Date 1920
Author: rachel hand

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Context (Display)
Part of MAA's Centenary Exhibition, held in the Adeane gallery, Fitzwilliam Museum, University of Cambridge, 12 March - 6 May 1984, and the Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, University of East Anglia, Norwich, 2 July - 16 September 1984.
Event Date 12/3/1984
Author: Mark Elliott

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Context (Display)
Exhibited: Displayed in Maudslay Hall on central plinth, CUMAA, from 1990- c.2002.
Event Date 1990
Author: rachel hand

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Context (References)
Included in the Museum's guidebook, Mark Elliott and Nicholas Thomas (eds.) (2011). Gifts and Discoveries: The Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology, Cambridge.
Illustrated and described as "The last years of the nineteenth century were marked by dramatic change in the Kingdom of Buganda (Uganda). A period of civil war was followed by the ascendancy of chiefs affiliated with Christian missionaries, and the Uganda Agreement of 1900 which created a British protectorate.
MAA's collections from the period came through John Roscoe (1861-1932), a prominent missionary who went on to study indigenous tradition and write essentially anthropological works. His 1911 book, The Baganda, is widely regarded as the best early survey of customary life, but it owed much to important writings by Apolo Kagwa, Roscoe's friend, and one of the Church Missionary Society's earliest converts. Kagwa was Katikiro or Prime Minister of Buganda and for seventeen years Regent in place of the young heir. He and his secretary, Ham Mukasa, travelled to England for the coronation of King Edward VII in 1902. Kagwa visited Roscoe in Cambridge and gave seventeen items to the Museum, including the brass necklet, which would have been worn by one of the King's guards, while on duty in the royal enclosure.
In nineteenth century Buganda, drums had a multiplicity of uses including announcing births, deaths and the call to war. Among important regalia were ninety-three mujaguzo, royal drums, of which Roscoe obtained one. These were kept in a royal drum house, and played suspended above the ground. Today clans continue to be distinguished by distinctive drum tattoos (mubala), as are the various Christian denomations, which use drums to summon worshippers to church.
Event Date 16/5/2011
Author: Rachel Hand

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Context (Display)
Exhibited: on display in the Uganda cube case, Maudslay Hall, between May 2012 and 22 April 2022.
Event Date 5/2012
Author: rachel hand

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Context (References)
Included in the Royal College of Music’s MINIM project (Musical INstrument Interface for Museums and Collections) following a research visit in May 2017. See https://minim.ac.uk

Event Date 29/6/2017
Author: rachel hand

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Description (Physical description)
Royal drum decorated with cowries and triangular designs in red and black glass beads. Around the top is a beaded band with four beaded vertical projections, terminating in hair tufts, possibly monkey tails.
Event Date 19/11/2021
Author: rachel hand

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Context (Amendments / updates)
The Roscoe Collection catalogued in 1920 was given numbers 1920.1 - 1920.480. These are not Accession Register numbers, and conflict with numbers allocated to other artefacts accessioned in 1920. They do not appear under any other number in any Accession Register and the only documentation for them is their catalogue cards. In 2001 they were given the temporary suffix ‘/Roscoe’ to distinguish them. This has now been replaced with the prefix ‘ROS’.
Event Date 20/11/2021
Author: Mark Elliott

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Conservation (Pest Debris Removed)
CON.2022.5314 | Pest Debris Removed
Event Date 5/4/2022
Author: Ayesha Fuentes

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Context (Related Documents)
Documentary photograph of a Royal Drum, LS.139257.TC1, now in the care of the MAA, refererence ROS 1920.316, which is noted as collected and donated by John Roscoe in 1907.
Event Date 1/7/2022
Author: Jos Dudding (Admin)

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Loan (Long Term Gallery Loan)
The Uganda Museum, 10/06/2024 to 10/6/2027, Repositioning the Uganda Museum
Event Date 10/6/2024
Author: Guey-Mei Hsu