Nuer ritual firescreen
58 x 55 mm | Print gelatin silver
Date of Print:
Unknown
Previous PRM Number:
EP.N.VII.20
Previous Other Number:
7 [3]
Accession Number:
1998.355.307.2
Description:
Looking across a homestead courtyard with a man standing in the centre (with right hand amputated), and to the left three children sitting around a large 'humped' buor or firescreen, used for lighting cooking fires as well as some ritual ceremonies.
The location is probably Nyueny village in western Nuerland where Evans-Pritchard spent 5 weeks in 1936, and the occasion is a rare gorot fertility ceremony performed in the homestead for a young married couple.
Beyond the buor can be seen a white ox that is later sacrificed by suffocation.
Both the man and the woman in the patterned cloth visible here are actors in this rite and are seen in other images.
Photographer:
Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard
Date of Photo:
1936 October - November
Region:
[Southern Sudan] Wahda ?Nyueny village
Group:
Nuer ?Leek Karlual
PRM Source:
Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard
Acquired:
Donated 1966
Other Owners:
E. E. Evans-Pritchard Collection
Class:
Ritual , Fire , Social Life
Keyword:
Fire Accessory
Activity:
Ritual Activity
Event:
Sacrifice
Documentation:
Original catalogue lists in Manuscript Collections. Additional material in related documents files. [CM 27/9/2005]
Primary Documentation:
Accession Book Entry [p.
98] 1966.27 [1 - 24] G[ift] PROFESSOR E.
E.
EVANS-PRITCHARD; INST.
OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY, 51 BANBURY RD.
OXFORD 1966.27.1-16 S.
SUDAN.
NUER TRIBE.
Sixteen negative albums containing negatives
and
prints of photographs taken by donor during field-work.
All listed in albums.
Added Accession Book Entry - [p.
98 in right hand column, in pencil] Catalogue room.
Manual Catalogues [index taken from album book VII, ms ink] - 20. People
Note on print reverse ms pencil - "7 Ox ceremony" & print front border ms ink - "NUER VII/20"
Manual Catalogues [index taken from album book VII, ms ink] - 20. People
Note on print reverse ms pencil - "7 Ox ceremony" & print front border ms ink - "NUER VII/20"
Other Information:
In Nuer Religion (Oxford University Press 1974 [1957], page 217-8, E.
E.
Evans-Pritchard describes the ceremony he witnessed in some detail.
In particular he notes that 'When a girl is espoused early in life, probably before the commencement of the menses, the premature payment of bridewealth may cause her to be barren unless a special ceremony is performed.
In western Nuerland, where I saw it, it is called gorot..
An ox was thrown and its forelegs and back legs tied in pairs.
It was then slowly suffocated, grass being first pushed up its anus with a stick, and then into its mouth and nostrils (Plate III).' [Chris Morton 1/7/2004]
Recorder:
Christopher Morton [1/7/2004] [Southern Sudan Project]
