An imported knife
Trail - Objects of power and contested power in the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology
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This knife belonged to a chief's deputy. It is one of several objects on the trail that gained power by its association with 'foreign' people. We will see that, in different ways, appropriating and domesticating foreign objects can be a way of reinforcing the power of the owner.
This knife was obtained by the famous English anthropologist Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard, during his field work in Yambio, in what is now South Sudan. Yambio was a centre of the expansive Zande Kingdom. The town was named after the famous prince 'Yambio' (also called 'Gbudwe') who was fatally injured in a British patrol in 1903.
Twenty years after Gbudwe's death, when Evans-Pritchard conducted his fieldwork, Zande people were under British colonial administration. But colonisation had not erased their historical institutions of power, which continued to exist, sometimes uneasily, alongside the colonial government. This knife would have belonged to someone from the ruling Avongara class - the leaders of the Zande Kingdom - who also held the position as chief's deputy in the colonial administration.
The workmanship on this knife is recorded as being by Mangbetu or Abarambo people. They were neighbouring communities, living in Congo and Central African Republic, with whom Zande people had long histories of exchange. Its position as an imported piece of art - indicative of far reaching relationships and influence - increased its value and status.