< African Collections in Kansas

Kenneth Palmer Collection 1980

Gold Weights Ashanti, Ghana


E-2789
Gold weight with popular comb tooth

E-2796
Gold weight in popular pyramid design Pyramid shapes symbolize the platforms that tood in front of an Akan chief's house.

E-2801
Gold weight with lead-filled swastika design. The swastika sign probably originated in the Islamic north where such signs were found in stores to safe guard against thieves. Other theories maintain that the swastika symbolizes the hands of monkeys or it is a simplified form a crocodile with one body and two heads.

Masks
Gelede masks: "The Gelede festival pays tribute to female mystical power of ancestors, elders, and deities. These women are known as "our mothers." The power of "our mothers" is at once constructive, relating to fertility, knowledge of the secret of life, and also destructive, a surreptitious power, aje, which is more like witchcraft (Drewal, H. and Drewal M.T. 1983. Gelede. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. p. 8)."

E-3994
eregelede

E-4127
gelede

E-4120
egungu

76.6.130
igala


Dan Poro
Poro men's society mask


Palmer3
Oba head, Benin Kingdom (Edo)
Photos: Michelle Edwards


carved figures

76.6.83
sideview

twin figures
 

E-2595KP
twin figure-male


E2574,E2575
twin figure-female

E-3984
mother-child

E-1167

Tyi Wara Headpiece, Mali.
These Tyi Wara legendary antelope figures, male and female-with-infant-on-back, are danced in annual planting festivals among the Bambara people of Central Mali to represent the hope of fecundity in the crops on which the people depend for their livelihood and for procreation on which the human society also depends.

Photo: Michelle Edwards

Yoruba talking drum: Nigeria
This drum is an "Iya'lu dundun," mother drum of the dundun set, made by a folk artist who was commissioned by the drummer. Youruba is a tonal language, the pitch and quality are made to resemble the drummer's voice during ritual dances.
The hourglass shape of the drum is the feature which distinguishes it as "Iya'lu dundun" rather than the "Iya'lu bata" talking drum. The "Iya'lu bata" is shaped like a truncated cone, while the "Iya'lu dundun" is shaped like an hourglass. The two are very similar and can be used in place of each other in many rituals such as those associated with Shango the thunder god.
This drum has a double framework, the inner of wood, and the outer of parallel leather stings. The voice or tonal system derives form manipulating the tension of the leather outer strings. It is decorated with brass bells which gives musical support to the drum sequence. The master drummer is the sole caretaker of this talking drum. It is considered to be a unique extension of himself. The drum is treated with the same respects and courtesies given human beings. If it breaks beyond repair, it is given a funeral and is buried
Photo: Michelle Edwards

Shilluk dolls: Sudan

E-2960

E-2961

E-2962

E-2963

E-2964

E-2965

E-2966

E-2967

 

 

E-2968

E-2969