Ingessana ceremony for sick child

103 x 76 mm | Print gelatin silver

There are records relating to alternative images that we do not have scans for in the database:
1998.344.69.1 - Negative film nitrate , (103 x 76 mm)

Condition:

Residual chemical staining/fading [EE 1989]

Date of Print:

Unknown

Previous PRM Number:

EP.D.69

Previous Other Number:

I 2

Accession Number:

1998.344.69.2

Description:

A group of calk players dancing in a circle with thin sticks, performing at the home of a sick child, with the intention of restoring the body with soul. This community group led by a hereditary female ritual expert (tau:n) are primarily concerned with the promotion of life forces in the community, hence their ribaldry and disorganisation, and specifically with children and twins. Calk dances preceeded ritual treatment of children and were followed by animal sacrifice and more dancing.

Photographer:

Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard

Date of Photo:

1926 November - December

Region:

Blue Nile Tabi Hills ?Soda

Group:

Ingessana (Gaam)

PRM Source:

Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard

Acquired:

Donated 1966

Other Owners:

E. E. Evans-Pritchard Collection

Class:

Religion , Ritual , Dance

Keyword:

Dance Accessory

Activity:

Dancing

Event:

Ceremony Sickness

Documentation:

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

Primary Documentation:

PRM Accession Records - Accession Book Entry [p. 98] 1966.27 [1 - 24] G[ift] PROFESSOR E. E. EVANS-PRITCHARD; INST. OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY, 51 BANBURY RD. OXFORD - 1966.27.19 - S. SUDAN, DARFUNG. VARIOUS TRIBES. Box of negatives in envelopes, [1 - 242] & 1966.27.20 - Box of prints of these negatives [refers to object 1966.27.19] [1 - 242], in envelopes.

Manual Catalogues [typewritten, entitled "Ingassana"] - 69. Ceremonial dancing of Calk. I.2

Note on print reverse ms pencil - "tsalk playing at home of ill boy I2"

Notes on card mount ms pencil - "severe RCS/fading 10/11/86 EE"

Other Information:

In A Preliminary Account of the Ingassana Tribe in Fung Province, Sudan Notes and Records X, 1927, page 74, E. E. Evans-Pritchard notes 'Chalk. These are players who function at marriage, the birth of twins and the illness of children. The head of these players possesses a wooden figure of a man or of a woman, or both, and also a wooden phallus with which he plays. The office is generally hereditary, but anyone who learns the dances may play.' The calk institution is also discussed in detail in chapter 8 (pp.65-77) of M.C. Jedrej's Ingessana: The Religious Institutions of a People of the Sudan-Ethiopia Borderland (E.J.Brill, The Netherlands 1995)[Chris Morton 4/2/2004]

Recorder:

Christopher Morton 4/2/2004 [Southern Sudan Project]