Zande youths with drum and gong

104 x 78 mm | Negative film nitrate

There are records relating to alternative images that we do not have scans for in the database:
1998.341.476.2 - Print gelatin silver , (104 x 78 mm)
1998.341.476.3 - Print gelatin silver , (102 x 75 mm)

Date of Print:

Unknown

Previous PRM Number:

EP.A.476

Previous Other Number:

47 3 (+110)

Accession Number:

1998.341.476.1

Description:

Two youths (one playing gong identified as Tabia) playing a skin drum (gaza) and a wooden gong (gugu) in the centre of a compound. These two instruments formed the basis of most feast dances (gbere buda) as well as the seances of abinza (witchdoctors).

Photographer:

Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard

Date of Photo:

1927 - 1930

Region:

[Southern Sudan] Western Equatoria Yambio

Group:

Zande

NamedPerson:

Tabia

Publication History:

Contemporary Publication - Reproduced as Plate IIa (facing page 96) in E. E. Evans-Pritchard's The Zande Trickster (Oxford 1967), with the caption "Gong and Drum" [CM 11/8/2005]

PRM Source:

Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard

Acquired:

Donated 1966

Other Owners:

E. E. Evans-Pritchard Collection

Class:

Music , Shelter , Dance

Keyword:

Musical Instrument Drum , Musical Instrument , Building House , Dance Accessory

Activity:

Performing , Singing , Dancing

Event:

Dance

Documentation:

Original catalogue lists in Manuscript Collections. Additional material in related documents files. [CM 27/9/2005]

Primary Documentation:

PRM Accession Records - [1966.27.21] G PROFESSOR E. E. EVANS-PRITCHARD; INST. OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY, 51 BANBURY RD. OXFORD - S. SUDAN, AZANDE TRIBE. Box of negatives in envelopes. Nos. 1 - 400
Added Accession Book Entry - [In pencil in column] Catalogue room.
[1966.27.23] G PROFESSOR E. E. EVANS-PRITCHARD; INST. OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY, 51 BANBURY RD. OXFORD - S. SUDAN, AZANDE TRIBE. Box of prints in envelopes, nos. 1 - 400 (prints of negatives in 1966.27.21)

Manual Catalogues [typewritten, entitled "Zande Photographs (E-P)"] - 476. Youths (one of them Tabia) beating gong and drum. 47/3 (+110)

Note on negative m/s ink - "+110"

Other Information:

Ethnographic context - In Witchcraft Oracles and magic among the Azande, 1937:101 E. E. Evans-Pritchard notes that 'Their great wooden gongs (gugu, also called borua) are Mbomu. A smaller kind, karakara...came from beyond the Uele. The skin drum (gaza, ndimo) is Mbomu." In Man and Woman among the Azande, 1974: 115-116 he relates "..when I [the narrator] went through the settlements I told all the youths about the dance. Some of them told me "we have already heard the dance-gong, that which you beat in the morning." I said to them "all right, I am most eager to dance today." ... The master of the dance stayed away for a short time and then he came to where we were and saluted ... He then went to the homestead of the dance and mounted the gong there. All stopped dancing. He spoke to them thus 'it is I, Aramasi, who am giving this dance today to lament my younger brother with it. ... He then got down from the top of the gong. Balingbandali mounted the gong [to beat it] and Nambaga took possession of the drums... the dance began in full swing." Two MP3 format recordings of Zande gongs (although in the Congo instead of the Sudan) (entitled bia gaza ('drum song') are available at: http://ilam.ru.ac.za/home/moa/moa038.htm The handlist entry for EPA.474 (both print and neg missing) indicates that the youth on the gong is Tabia.[Chris Morton 28/11/2003]

Recorder:

Christopher Morton 13/11/2003 [Southern Sudan Project]