oracle-set;
divination-board;
divination-rubber
- Museum number
- Af1898,-.247.a-b
- Description
-
Rubbing board oracle; shoe-shaped divining board (a) and rubber (b) carved from wood.
- Production date
- 1894-1898 (circa)
- Dimensions
-
Height: 14.60 centimetres (a+b)
-
Height: 7.50 centimetres (a)
-
Height: 8 centimetres (b)
-
Width: 24 centimetres (a)
-
Width: 8.80 centimetres (b)
-
Depth: 9 centimetres (a)
-
Depth: 7.40 centimetres (b)
- Curator's comments
- "Iwa oracle. The surface is wetted and the upper part rubbed over it. If it sticks the omen is good."
This is illustrated in Captain Guy Burrows' book, 'The Land of the Pigmies', London 1898, p.56.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
Exhibited:
2006/7, Kenya, Nairobi Gallery, Hazina: Traditions, Trade and Transitions in Eastern Africa
- Acquisition date
- 1898
- Acquisition notes
- Af1898,-.68 to 302 were purchased from Captain Guy Burrows for £70, paid from the Christy Fund. Nos.68 to 295 are recorded as from the Welle district in the northernmost part of the modern Democratic Republic of Congo - an area in which Captain Burrows worked from 1894-1898, and wrote about. The Christy register records Burrows' notes of the groups and places from which each object came, and this source information is recorded in these records.
- Department
- Africa, Oceania and the Americas
- Registration number
- Af1898,-.247.a-b
- Additional IDs
-
CDMS number: Af1898C3.247a-b (old CDMS nos.)