23 September, 2012
For a trial period, the Wellcome Collection series The thing
is … is being held on a Sunday afternoon at 3 PM. A sneak peak at a mystery object with a tour
of associated items within the Wellcome Collection is provided for the visually
impaired. For further details of this series, read on ...
An Edinburgh friend accompanied me, and Catherine Walker showed us some examples of Yoruba art and objects. We then had a preview of a copper alloy anklet which was to be discussed and were introduced to Steve Martin, a historian, writer and journalist and who was going to present the talk at 3 o’clock.
I mentioned to Steve that I had been to the Bronze
exhibition at the Royal Academy, where there were many objects from the Ife and
Benin cultures. Steve didn’t want to
give too much away about the mystery objects in advance of his talk, but we had
an interesting discussion about metallurgy in both West Africa and East Africa,
where there have been some interesting findings regarding iron and steel
production in Tanzania.
The object itself is an anklet and has a diameter of about
the size of a 12 inch LP, with a depth of about 2 inches. An image of the object is below
Nigerian copper alloy anklet
Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
Credit: Wellcome Collection, London
Steve was joined by Timandra Harkness, a writer and
presenter. The format is similar to the
series with Quentin Cooper, with many fewer puns and though less inquisitorial,
was possibly more discursive.
The metal industry in West Africa has often had the tag
diffusion attached to it. There is
always an assumption that indigenous African metal working was really a result
of foreign introduction, whether from North Africa or Europe. While many of the bronzes and Ife and Benin
could be based on imported copper alloys, discoveries of the area to the east
of the River Niger, i.e. south-eastern Nigeria, has shown the Igbo- Ukwu culture
capable of producing bronze from local raw materials. Apparently, there are tin deposits in the
area of Joss, so a copper-tin i.e. classical bronze was made.
Traders from Europe, starting with the Portuguese, found that a money based
system of ‘manilla’ could be developed.
The local Africans would use these as currencies among themselves, and
these manillas were to become the trading system of much of the slave trade
which was later developed by the north Europeans. Manilla production went into serious
industrialisation in first the Low Countries, then England, with Bristol and
latterly Birmingham being the main source of copper alloys. This was a shift to copper and zinc – a
classic brass.
Manillas, thus, were exported to West Africa, exchanged for
slaves who worked the sugar plantations in the West Indies or the cotton
plantations in the USA, with the commodities returning to western Europe. October is Black History month and provides
an opportunity for reflecting on the part base metal bashing played in part of
the trade routes in the past.
The role of the anklet viewed above was described by Steve,
though whether this is a form of ornament or female enslavement within a
community is debatable. I’ve checked out
a few blogs and while some proclaim that these anklets were a symbol of male
dominance over the females, others appear to be more apologetic saying that
‘women liked to develop an attractive gait’.
This is a question beyond my pay grade, given my replacement hip joint
(steel/ceramic) !
Steve mentioned the term ‘adala’ and the Pitt Rivers Museum
in Oxford has examples of these: http://web.prm.ox.ac.uk/bodyarts/index.php/permanent-body-arts/reshaping-and-piercing/165-brass-anklets.html
.
Within the Wellcome Collection there is another spiral
anklet which encompasses virtually the whole leg as far as the lower thigh and
an image of this can be found on the Wellcome Image website, from which the
image below has been taken:
Copper anklet, Ibo people, Nigeria 1880 - 1930
Credit: Wellcome Library, London
Credit: Wellcome Library, London
Conclusion
I found this a very stimulating object and talk and it
neatly fits in with the Wellcome Elements series which covered gold, silver and
bronze. It also links in well with the
precious metal - base metal combination raised in the recent Noble Art of the
Sword exhibition at the Wallace Collection.
I attended a Study Day at the Wallace which included discussion of West African iron production in a bloomery, with a
funnel system to increase the air-flow and provide higher temperatures for iron
smelting. The current Bronze exhibition
at the Royal Academy has many fine examples of West African bronze/brass
work.
I have also visited the British Museum to ‘see’ for myself
the Benin bronzes in the collection on display.
The Benin bronzes were taken as booty in 1897 and examples of manillas
can also be found in the British Museum.
Little work has been done on checking the metal content of
some of the alloys. It should be easier
to check copper alloys in a non-destructive way, unlike steel.
The next talk in The Thing Is ... series is on 14th October. More information is available on: http://www.wellcomecollection.org/whats-on/events/the-thing-is-mad-dogs-bite.aspx
To book a place or for more information, you can email access@wellcomecollection.org or call 020 7611 2222.
