IDNO

N.19262.ROS

Description

Full-length frontal portrait of a Basabei? woman standing (probably with a baby on her back - not visible) in front of a white screen with a metal frame. She is wearing dark-coloured cloth, strands of white beads? around her head and she is wearing metal bracelets on her arms. She is holding four? milk gourds and a long reed? or bamboo? walking stick.

Place

E Africa; Uganda; Elgon; Mount Elgon; Sabei

Cultural Affliation

?Basabei

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 C30/217/ 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: Similar image published in Roscoe, J., 1922. The Soul of Central Africa: An Account of the Mackie Ethnological Expedition. (London: Cassell and Co.), p. 274, with the caption: "Sabei: Men and Women carrying Food.” Similar image also published in Roscoe, J., 1922, p. 274 with the caption "Sabei: Porter carrying Cowskins”.
Similar images also published in Roscoe, J., 1924. The Bagesu and other tribes of the Uganda Protectorate: The Third Part of the Report of the Mackie Ethnological Expedition to Central Africa. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.), p. 58, with the caption: "Men and women of Sabei carrying loads”. [ED 10/10/2007]

Context: "Milk, which was at one time regarded as an essential article of diet, gradually became less used, until it was looked upon by adults more as a luxury than as a necessity, though mothers still declared it essential for the children. It was drunk fresh and whenever possible mixed with blood, either of cows or of wild animals killed in the hunt.
The chief food of the people was millet, which was ground between stones and made into thick porridge. Sweet potatoes were boiled and eaten whole, as were also plantains, though the latter might be baked in the embers of the fire. Maize when young was roasted in the cob, but when it had been left to ripen fully it was first boiled and then roasted. Various kinds of dwarf beans were grown; these were seldom used fresh but were removed from the husks, dried, and stored until required, when they were soaked for some hours and boiled until soft. Numbers of wild plants were also used as vegetables.
They ate all kinds of animals except lions, leopards, dogs, and hyaenas. The blood of the animals killed was caught in vessels, cooked and eaten.
Salt they obtained from various trees, which were burned and the ashes washed with water. The water was then filtered off and evaporated over slow fires.
The people who had two meals daily, one in the morning and one in the evening. In fine weather they ate their meals outside, but, if it was wet, in the hut. The husband, wife, and family ate out of one pot, sitting in a circle around it.” (Roscoe, J., 1924. The Bagesu and other tribes of the Uganda Protectorate: The Third Part of the Report of the Mackie Ethnological Expedition to Central Africa. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.), p. 57). [ED 10/10/2007]

Context: The men took the cows out to pasture, but the women cleaned the kraal and milked the cows when they returned at night. The milk-vessels were gourds, those in common use varying in size from small gourds which held about a pint to large vessels holding a quart, while some large bottle-gourds held as much as two gallons. Leather straps were attached for carrying the gourds, and after use the vessels were washed out with water and grit of pounded stone, and hung up to dry. When dry, they were fumigated with burning reeds or elephant grass, after which some of the ash was dropped into them, stirred round with a stick and shaken out, any that remained inside being allowed to mix with the milk.
Milk was usually drunk fresh, though clotted milk was also largely used. Little milk was kept for butter, for the people did not eat it and only used it in small quantities for rubbing on their bodies.” (Roscoe, J., 1924. The Bagesu and other tribes of the Uganda Protectorate: The Third Part of the Report of the Mackie Ethnological Expedition to Central Africa. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.), pp. 61 - 62). [ED 10/10/2007]

This catalogue record has been updated with the support of the Getty Grant Program Two. [Elisabeth Deane 10/10/2007]