9 replies to this topic

[Anew]

This thread expands the range and scope of the (Sudan/Sahel Africa - Tattoo, Scarification & Ornament) thread, also in this forum . It continues the outlook ~ that in traditional Africa, practices survive which may be ancestral to, descended from, or have a common ancestor with similar practices in the European Stone, Bronze, and (to some extent) Iron Ages . This cannot be proven, but by comparison with the archaeological, genetic and climate records ~ and with those ancient European customs and forms which survive ~ one can address the probabilities, (be they low, medium or high), even where such cannot be quantified . I also feel that they are worthy of study .

Other threads which may bear on this topic include :

(Bucrania & Similar Forms)

(Folk Music : Gaelic & Other)

(European Light Skin Mutation)

(Polyrhythms)

(Timber Circles)





New material :

Flickr member (mesaba) has uploaded a set of (photos of Tanzanians) in a traditional context . It is very subtle, but in many of the photos one can see small rings, (both closed and open), marked on people's cheeks, (and to a lesser extent, foreheads), perhaps from a healed ritual cut . Might this symbolism be related to the stone rings and other ring features of Africa and Europe ?  

(here, for example),

(here),

(here) and (here), where the woman's jewelry is amazing ~ and bearing sectioned circles as it does, possibly related to this tradition ; and to the (farther) sectioned circle ornaments linked in the Sudan Sahel thread .

(here), where a double-ring appears .

(here) one can see rings, (closed on cheek, open on forehead), together with a round mud, wattle & thatch hut ; and an open-ring wattle enclosure .

Lastly in this group : (here), (here, enlarged), a man points out a named figure in a photo, (from a group), several of whom wear headdresses, and all (or all but one) with the upper part of their faces 'painted' white . One carries a bow .





The color white shows evidence of symbolic meaning in the European archaeological record, at places such as (Newgrange), (Duloe), and (Cordon des Druides) . It also appears to have meaning in Zambia :

(Chisemwa Chalunda) (North Western Zambia) ; courtesy (Philip Powell)

(here)

(here)

(here)

(here)

(here)

(here)

(and here)

As does the color red :

(here)

(here)

(here)

(here)

(and here) with annotation below :

Quote

Girls are initiated individually in the village, rather than in groups in the forest. They are relieved of all physical labor, pampered, groomed, and sung to, for up to three months. They are not subjected to any physical operation. Like the boys, however, they are instructed in productive skills, cultural history, and social etiquette. Much of the instructional focus and symbolic expression is on augmenting reproductive capacity and on child-rearing competency. For most of nkanga, a girl remains isolated from males in a small seclusion hut, where she is regularly visited by elder women from the surrounding area. A young attendant is assigned to each girl, to be her constant companion and to attend to her every need. A girl is to remain silent throughout nkanga, speaking only in whispers to her attendant should the need arise. Nkanga, likewise, begins and ends with a well-attended public ceremony characterized by great revelry, most notably the singing of ribald songs extolling female virtues while denigrating male vices. Symbolically, nkanga possesses many levels of meaning. It expresses the unity of females in opposition to males, while simultaneously asserting the unity of all Lunda under matrilineal principles of social organization. Like mukanda, nkanga also symbolizes the death of one's former self, and rebirth as a new social persona. Gifts, primarily clothing and cash, are heaped on the new adult member of society.

~ (www.everyculture.com)

Quote

The boys' initiation rite ( mukanda ) [...] is a month-long ritual during which time groups of boys, mostly between the ages of 10 and 15, are isolated in forest camps where they are first circumcised, then instructed and tested in productive skills, cultural history, and social etiquette. They are also subjected to hard labor and harsh discipline. Mukanda begins and ends with a public ceremony that entails round-the-clock singing, dancing, feasting, storytelling, and perhaps the appearance of masked figures believed to be the embodiment of nature spirits. Mukanda is heavily laden with symbolism meant to signify the cultural unity of all Lunda men, at one level, and the interrelatedness of all Lunda, male and female, at another. Upon completion of mukanda, a boy received the full complement of rights and duties bestowed on all adult Lunda males.

~ (everyculture.com)

Red is more difficult to place in the European record, but it has been found in (Bonorva, Sardinia) ; (our hosts' Archaeo News link) . It may also be worth noting that the (apparent) Priestess whose frozen grave was discovered in the (Altai) wore red, (so i recall) . The coloring may, (speculatively), have come from (pomegranates) ; a fruit of symbolic (fertility) importance . I do not suggest that the pomegranate influenced this African tradition, (which appears to use red ochre), but that similarity, (and possible relation), of symbolism may be involved .

(Ochre) is itself an ancient and broadly used pigment , which may have a variety of interpretations . Relevant to this subject may be (this photo), available from the ochre page . Relevant also may be (Blombos Cave), in South Africa . There, a 75,000 year old piece of red ochre has been found, carved with what looks like chained lozenges between parallel lines, (link) . Such would make it similar to, (though far earlier than), the chained lozenges (diamonds) mentioned in (post #8) and (post #9) of the Bucrania thread .

[Anew]

Responding to the above, (regarding a photo from Tanzania) ––

Quote

(here) one can see rings, (closed on cheek, open on forehead), together with a round mud, wattle & thatch hut ; and an open-ring wattle enclosure .

–– this photo shows a small wattle enclosure which is captioned : Mudimba Tribe Grave, Village Of Combelo, Angola . It has a narrow opening which faces obliquely to the viewer . It may also have an opening across from this, though this is harder to say . If these are both tribal graves, one may consider, (particularly as Angola is within the region where human language is believed to have originated, and Tanzania not far beyond it), whether these wattle enclosures are remnants of a tradition which later saw expression in stone circles .






On another subject : the following photos, (from flickr member gbaku), show African men and women with facial scarification, taken from a 1943 photo album ––

photo, photo, photo, photo, photo, photo, photo, photo, photo, photo

Together with (possibly) marking tribe, clan and family ; together with (possibly) invoking certain charms for the benefit of the wearer ; together with being (in some cases) beautiful ; one may consider whether these scarification are expressions of a broader tradition which was/is applied to surfaces in Africa and perhaps beyond . A passage from Understanding the Neolithic, by Julian Thomas, (1999) ––

Quote

The earliest record of the use of the plough in Britain is provided by the marks beneath the South Street long barrow, dated to 3663-3367 cal. BC (2810 ± 130 bc) (BM-356) (Evans 1971, 48) . However, it is open to debate whether traces like these, or the ones from beneath round barrow Amesbury G71, genuinely reflect the use of an ard in routine cultivation (a point recognized by Evans, see Ashbee et al. 1979, 282) . Experimental work has demonstrated that ards of the kinds found at Donneruplund or Hendriksmose will only produce scoring in the lightest of sandy subsoils, and then only after part of the topsoil has been removed by hand (Aberg and Bowen 1960; Hansen 1969) . Deep marks cut into chalk like those at South Street suggest the use of a much heavier tool, a 'rip ard' (Reynolds 1981) . This latter is not a tool of cultivation but of clearance, a way of turning soil matted by roots . This could easily be a means of preparing for pasture rather than tillage . Moreover, European evidence suggests that these kinds of marks might equally relate to the early stages of mound-building, and might be integral to mortuary ritual (Tarlow 1994) . Indeed, there is considerable peril involved in interpreting as typical any feature found beneath a burial mound, whether plough-mark, fence-line or putative dwelling structure, as if the old land surface were a random sample of the prehistoric landscape, fortuitously preserved (Lane 1986) . The artefactual evidence for cultivation is restricted to a single digging stick recovered from the Baker Platform on the Somerset Levels (Rees 1979) . Nevertheless, the evidence from the continent suggests that in Bandkeramik horticulture no more advanced technology than hoes, digging-sticks and spades was employed (Kruk 1980; Rowley-Conwy 1981; Sherratt 1981; Jarman et al. 1982)

Mr. (professor?) Thomas' argument, (though significant), is largely off the topic of this post . However, i am quite curious about the marks found below South Street Long Barrow and Amesbury G71 . It seems to me that such marks may have been a way of familializing, charming and/or sanctifying the ground, in a manner (perhaps) similar to the facial scarring shown in the photos above ; and in a tradition perhaps related, depending on whether the (continuing)  African custom shares a common root with that practice .

[kevin.b]

Anew,
    Here in England many fields are set out to RIDGE and FURROW,( ditch and embankment on a larger scale?)
http://www.flickr.co...ton/4119551795/
That field is only a few miles from my shop.
They look visually hap hazard, but they are not, they are set out to the matrix locally there, I check.
In the base of the furrow is normally drainage channels composed of pebbles.

Alternate spin flows travel on this geometry, and the people close to the land obviously knew all of this intimately, to us now they seem strange.
Kevin

[Anew]

Here's something that might be related to causewayed enclosures ; Flickr member 'patrickoverseas' has posted a set of photos of Bushmen, (among the world's most ancient extant cultures), in the Botswanan Kalahari near Ghanzi .


The first part of the set is dedicated to what appears to be a ceremonial dance in which men tread an irregular ring around a group of women sitting by a fire, (who appear to chant or sing) . The men are careful during part of this to plow the dust with their feet so that a double ditch flanked by ridges is formed ; something which can be seen in this photo, this photo, and this photo . They then tread a second, more circular, ring around the fire itself . Later,  one of them treads through the ring(s) in one or more places, cutting them in a manner perhaps analogous to a causeway .


Such a tradition, if it extends back to the Urkultur, would have been well placed to travel with the human diaspora . One might imagine that the causewayed enclosures of Britain, (if they recall this tradition), were intended as an homage to, (or to have been seen as trod out by), a group's gods or towering ancestral spirits .

13 December 2012 : Unfortunately, this set has become inaccessible.

[kevin.b]

Anew,
Wonderfull pictures( whats the green flare in each????)
The soles of our feet and the palms of our hands are antennae.
They are holding in stick in one hand, believe Me when I say I do this with a brass rod ( think of staffs etc that preists use)
Our hands are chirile, thus they are alternate positive and negative.
The surface is the surface, but the duality of opposite spin charge seperate in elevation, at all scale.

FIRE releases the forces that created the wood.
I will post one of those photos on the thread of Paul C Muir about orbs,on the portal as he does tremendous investigations into what I believe is been shown on that photo, especially the green flares and white illuminated stick( camera people will call it flash flare)

Kevin

[Anew]

Aarrrr, what's that green flare !?



Thanks, Kevin . Here's what i make of it .

I take it as axiomatic that anything which manifests itself in this physical world must have a physical explanation, (as opposed to things like walking on water, which are physically impossible and thus could not have happened) ; and as we both see the green flare, it must be physically there, (in the photo-files at least) . It consistently appears on the opposite side, (across the frame's center), from the fire, and i believe that it may be the fire itself, reflected and inverted by some part of the camera body or optics, onto the sensor ; perhaps the dark coating of the camera's interior reflects infrared as green light . But, i see no need for a physical explanation to be the only factor . A mystical, spiritual, twinning/twining, belief-driven, field-within-coincidence or other similarly paranormal factor may exist beside or behind the physical one ; to play a role in its manifestation at a given place or time . To me, as i believe these people may be doing a dance/ritual which traces back to the dawn of human civilization, this is a perfect place for a mysterious green light to turn up in photos .



"FIRE releases the forces that created the wood."

That i am going to think about . It makes sense from what i believe to be a Neolithic/Bronze Age perspective .



Their use of sticks/rods is noted, this turns up in many Traditional African contexts and appears to be quite ancient .







Postscript, 3 January 2012

Quote

perhaps the dark coating of the camera's interior reflects infrared as green light

I think the infrared was reflected as infrared onto the sensor, and the green pixels were sensitive to it .

[Anew]

The Mursi culture of southern Ethiopia has a (world famous) tradition of piercing women's lower lips to insert a plate which they feel makes her more beautiful . Often these plates are plain disks , but where they are embellished the patterns are themselves interesting, look ancient and can suggest elements of the British Isles' archaeological milieu . Some links :

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; This one shows twin rings with a joining cairn-like buckle and what may be symbols for the sun and moon.

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; Another look at the above.

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; A very similar lip plate.

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; A radial pattern involving a small central ring and U shapes.

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; A small ring surrounded by double-rings and U shapes in a five-fold symmetry.

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; A holed plate on a beautiful young woman.

Note also her earring's resemblance to their traditional shield, (http://www.flickr.co.../in/photostream), and/or British bell barrows.

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; A holed plate with U shapes in a six-fold symmetry.

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; A mixture of designs including U shapes and dots.

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; Another look at same.

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; One covered with dots.

It is striking how much the African tribes use dots . These could be fore-runners of cupmarks

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542 ; A girl of the Surma tribe with an earring showing concentric circles.

[Anew]

To explain my thinking in the context of the previous post,

What i think these photos offer, (beyond a look at a fascinating culture little changed by modernization), is a view of preserved elements of a symbolic lexicon which reaches back to ancient times . I believe this is important to understanding the British Neolithic & Bronze Ages because i see enough parallels between them and African traditional culture that i believe Britons were expressing a symbolic lexicon which was developed outside their Isles ... most likely in Africa and quite possibly by the original human culture, which i call the 'Urkultur' . I believe that a symbology would have accompanied the original human language, and traveled with the diaspora* into Eurasia and beyond . From it, different groups would inevitably have selected different, (but sometimes overlapping), sets of elements to express and to hold as important ~ these becoming part of their identity .

*It is worth noting in this context that the diaspora was a sequence of waves complicated by the Ice Ages' periodic compression of the Eurasian population into Iberia(?), southern Russia, the Trans-Caucasus area, Middle East, et cetera ~ providing opportunity for symbolism carried by different groups to remix . There is the possibility that people at times migrated back into Africa ; but i think it's clear that the overall movement was outward from the continent . There is also the very (very) remote possibility that people were traveling back and forth between the Neolithic and Bronze Age British Isles and the Omo Valley, but such direct contact is not necessary to explain the similarities, and not what i mean to suggest .

Though people might have added symbols along the way, and these might coincidentally resemble eachother, i feel the stronger explanation assumes that tribes largely conserved their chosen parts of the inheritance into the Iron Age . In particular, think the lexicon's emphasized and widely distributed elements are those least likely to have been improvised coincidentally by different groups in scattered places . Thus i take the appearance on these plates of U-shapes, (present in the Irish, British and Pazyryk archaeological record), paired rings, (present in the British archaeological record), and disks with center-holes, (those of Britain and China), as indication of probable common origin ... though because of the greater distance involved, i must allow that the probability Chinese holed disks were a local improvisation would be increased .

This is in part because i believe early societies were relatively level, (sociologically), meritocratic, and very interested in the continuity of the group and its traditions . I believe they saw their inherited symbology as part of that continuity . This is also in part because i feel that the primary drivers for the change of a such a lexicon would be changing technologies and ways of life ~ and that there would be a lag time involved, particularly if these changes were perceived as being good by the people, or if they empowered the religious leaders . I feel that the millennia preceding the transition to (in many places transient) agriculture and pastoralism was accompanied by little change in symbolism, (because it was accompanied by little change in way of life) ; and that the transition itself, since it came in the context of a rising standard of living, but not yet to severe expression of the ills of despoiled lands and internally divided societies, would have been seen as an affirmation of the value of the old symbology ... which would have been expressed within and upon monuments, artifacts, et cetera . For a time .

[Anew]

Here's a photo of a woman with a now-rare trapezoidal lip plate :

http://www.flickr.co...157608644175542

I wonder if its symbolism might be linked to Hill o'Many Stanes in Scotland :

http://www.stonepage...manystanes.html

[Anew]

Replying to myself in post 4 of this topic,

Quote

Here's something that might be related to causewayed enclosures ; Flickr member 'patrickoverseas' has posted a set of photos of Bushmen, (among the world's most ancient extant cultures), in the Botswanan Kalahari near Ghanzi .


The first part of the set is dedicated to what appears to be a ceremonial dance in which men tread an irregular ring around a group of women sitting by a fire, (who appear to chant or sing) . The men are careful during part of this to plow the dust with their feet so that a double ditch flanked by ridges is formed ; something which can be seen in this photo, this photo, and this photo . They then tread a second, more circular, ring around the fire itself . Later,  one of them treads through the ring(s) in one or more places, cutting them in a manner perhaps analogous to a causeway .


Such a tradition, if it extends back to the Urkultur, would have been well placed to travel with the human diaspora . One might imagine that the causewayed enclosures of Britain, (if they recall this tradition), were intended as an homage to, (or to have been seen as trod out by), a group's gods or towering ancestral spirits .

13 December 2012 : Unfortunately, this set has become inaccessible.

But this set has not: . Its opening photos show what i was talking about .