Ingessana medicine men
103 x 76 mm | Print gelatin silver
Date of Print:
Unknown
Previous PRM Number:
EP.D.89
Previous Other Number:
D 12
Accession Number:
1998.344.89.2
Description:
A man being ritually cleaned of witchcraft through the mouth by two kaik (sing.
kai), or medicine men, probably within his own homestead stockade.
Kaik 'operate' to cure people through divining and diagnosing illnesses caused by ghosts or evil spirits (nengk).
Specifically, the kai is able to see the 'ghost-seed' which the spirits implant in the patient's body, and which he then extracts with his fingers and casts aside.
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
Activity:
Divining
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"] - 89. Medicine man. D.12
Note on print reverse ms pencil - "medicine men ("kai") at work D 12 [?]Gjoni"
Manual Catalogues [typewritten, entitled "Ingassana"] - 89. Medicine man. D.12
Note on print reverse ms pencil - "medicine men ("kai") at work D 12 [?]Gjoni"
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 'Kai.
This is the medicine man.
His functions are the curing of disease and consequently the discovery of the users of witchcraft.' The kaik are discussed on page 66 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 9/2/2004]
Recorder:
Christopher Morton 9/2/2004 [Southern Sudan Project]
