IDNO

N.19115.ROS

Description

Landscape view of houses of the salt-workers on the shore at Kibero.

Place

E Africa; Uganda; Bunyoro; Kibero

Cultural Affliation

Banyoro? (Bakitara)

Named Person

Photographer

?Roscoe, John R.

Collector / Expedition

Roscoe, John R. [Mackie Ethnological Expedition, Uganda, 1919 - 1920]

Date

1919 - 1920

Collection Name

Roscoe Collection

Source

Format

Film Negative Black & White

Primary Documentation

Other Information

This negative was kept in an envelope marked C30/64/ by the cataloguer. The envelope was kept in box marked C30/ by the cataloguer.
Previously stored on Shelf 4, in group of 4 wooden boxes numbered 180.

Publication: Image published in Roscoe, J., 1922. The Soul of Central Africa: An Account of the Mackie Ethnological Expedition. (London: Cassell and Co.), p. 158, with the caption: "Bunyoro: Houses of the Salt-workers on the Lake Shore at Kibero”.
Image also published in Roscoe, J., 1923. The Bakitara (or Banyoro): The First Part of the Report of The Mackie Ethnological Expedition to Central Africa. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), p. 241, Plate XXXI, with the caption: "Lake Albert. View of salt-works at Kibero.”
Please see: Roscoe, J., 1923. The Bakitara (or Banyoro): The First Part of the Report of The Mackie Ethnological Expedition to Central Africa. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) for detailed information on salt. This can be found on pages
Salt, brought to the kraals, p. 191
-buying, p.178, 191, 324.
-cow as totem after taking, p. 7, p. 13
-for the cows, p. 60, p. 117, p. 118, p. 191, p. 192.
-from volcanic springs, p. 6
-method of preparing, p.10, p. 233, p. 234.
-milk taboo after cows had, p.187, p. 192.
-taboo on, during pregnancy, p. 240
-salt-makers, huts of, p. 233.
-supplied salt for the king, p. 118.
-salt works, p. 232, p. 233
-sacred pool at, p. 234.
-village at the, p. 234. [ED 10/1/2008]

Context: "The giving of salt to the cows is considered essential to their health, and the cows themselves seem to enjoy the day on which the salt is administered. ... In order to provide the cows with the amount of salt they require, he has to purchase large supplies, and for it he barters goats, sheep and butter. He will even sometimes kill a bull and send the meat, or some of it, in exchange for the necessary salt; this is the method chiefly adopted by the king, who does not condescend to barter, but gives presents of meat.
The salt districts are therefore of great importance and are worked with considerable skill by men and women whose whole lives are spent in the production of the necessary supply. The salt-works of Bunyoro are situated at Kibero, a district which lies along the shores of Lake Albert and on the lower slopes of the escarpment.
Hundred of natives from all parts of the country visit these salt-works to purchase salt. There is a covered market-place in which the purchasers sit while the vendors measure out quantities of salt in accordance with the value of the goods brought to barter. These barter goods are a strange medley, for the purchasers bring goats, sheep and fowls, food of various kinds -such as sweet potatoes, millet and other grain -cooking pots and firewood, and also barkcloths and skins for girdles. The King’s clerk is always present to levy a toll upon all the salt going out, for this is one of the chief sources of the royal revenue. The tax is levied in kind, and the man uses a special measure to deduct the king’s due from the salt measured out for each purchaser. There is a special hut in which the salt intended for the use of the king and his household is purified. There the salt undergoes two or three washings and evaporations, and comes out quite white.
When the purchasers have secured their quota of salt they make it up in packages weighing from thirty to one hundred pounds, and tied up with plantain fibre. This method of wrapping things up deserves a little notice. Plantain trees, so called, are not woody growths, but consist of a central pith or core about an inch thick, round which grow layers of a fleshy material full of cells of water. The stem of a good tree is from ten to twelve inches in diameter, and as it grows the outer layers of this fleshy material dry and are pulled off by the gardeners. Some of them are from eight to nine feet long and eight inches wide at the base, and when quite dry are as strong as thick brown paper. There are no plantains in the neighbourhood of the salt district, so that the intending purchasers have to bring with them their material for packing salt. It is really wonderful to the see the expert way in which the natives will wrap up the salt, laying these fibres together and making up long bundles, usually some four feet long by eight inches in diameter. So skillful do they become that, if fibre is not available, they will even at times make use of blades of course grass as wrapping for salt or other things” (Roscoe, J., 1922. The Soul of Central Africa: An Account of the Mackie Ethnological Expedition. (London: Cassell and Co.), pp. 159 - 163). [ED 3/10/2007]

This catalogue record has been updated with the support of the Getty Grant Program Two. [Elisabeth Deane 10/1/2008]