Professional Documents
Culture Documents
John Picton
African Arts, Vol. 24, No. 3, Special Issue: Memorial to Arnold Rubin, Part II. (Jul., 1991), pp.
34-49+93-94.
Stable URL:
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0001-9933%28199107%2924%3A3%3C34%3AOAAIAT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-D
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Fri Jan 25 12:44:20 2008
On Artifact and Identity J
at the
Niger-Benue Confluence
JOHN PlCTON
diate and more relevant than whatever process. Time and time again, when we E t in arcadia ego
it is we think we mean by the use of an find the same kinds of artifacts in use The photograph in Figure 2 was
"ethnic" label.3 Indeed, this paper is among neighboring populations of dis- taken on New Year's Day, 1970, in
about the continuing need to stop think- tinct language, political affiliation, or Lagos. Arnold Rubin is among a
ing that such terms inevitably signify whatever, we habitually note that here group of people who had come to
the boundaries of categorically distinct is something that has crossed an ethnic know him, to like him, and to love
populations. We must learn instead to border. But surely, if the distribution of him. He had arrived in Nigeria to set
understand how individual people, a particular kind of artifact is not con- up a further period of field research
households, and communities build strained by the boundaries of language in the Benue valley; his family
their identities with one another, and or political affiliation, then it is more would soon be joining him. The
understand the place of artifacts in that precise to note that such boundaries do others in the photograph are, left to
right: Andrew Ogembe, my field
assistant, now also, sadly, no longer
living; Margaret Picton, my mother;
Susan Connell, later my wife, whose
work in Akoko-Edo provides much of
the data summarized here; and
Richard Osuagwu, who organized
and took the photograph, and who
looked after us all.
Before Arnold arrived I had
studied his contribution to the Lagos
Museum archive (often referred to
these days as the Kenneth Murray
archive, because he, of course, started
it). During his time in my Lagos
apartment, we talked for hours and
hours, comparing research
experiences and sorting out the
future of African-art studies. Arnold
went on to do something about it,
whereas I continued thinking about
those conversations: indeed,
although William Fagg taught me to
look at African sculpture, it was
Arnold who taught me to think about
it. Twenty-seven years later, Arnold
arranged for me to teach at UCLA
in the 1987 fall quarter. The
conversations resumed, and the Ebira
papers I have written since then are
the result.
.*
.--.
*.
Kabba
Igbrra
dlvlslon
"......-f
I
;
.................
,
:Q
ONDO
'.
f'"-i..
.i
: OOboroke
lOkene
.,
I;
*;a'4
lEganyl
:=
.. .-..
1
Alaokuta 0: 2
l t -
", ~k~edoi...' lOsoso x U
Ikpeshlo.:
. 01a l ; :..,,......
'*. 3.
.,.-,,..
.
Ogbeo Adamode f
i igara l
.................
.::"'
'.., ookpela ''...-..+'
l ..:BENUE
STATE
..' Otuoo
lkao"'..., Akoko-Ed0
i d~v~s~on
".........I:.' BENDEL S TATE
?i
ioldah
-
,
lAuchl
0 15 30
3 THE NIGER-BENUE CONFLUENCE AREA. NIGERIA 4 ADMINISTRATIVE BOUNDARIES IN THE CONFLUENCE AREA, 1970
YORUBA GROUP
I
Eblra
1
Yoruba, Akoko 1comprsng eleven languages), lgala ........... Eblra , ,,
UNCLASSIFIED
Ogor-Magongo ( i l l . Ukaan (121. Akpes (131 ,,-"
KEY
......
...
:
ORA
,oren ,,,vir,.,n, E
B
- Z - N.Central E D 0
ED0
ISHAN Li. LY
---
KILOMETERS >I. ' -
0 15 30
: e
0 Ebira-Etuno
not exist for that artifact, and perhaps ethnic or "tribal" labels, and of the need understood as no more than a slipshod
for the institutions of its manufacture, to understand the sense of identity from representation of the complexities of
use, and distribution. People live simul- within, rather than continually impos- individual and social identity.
taneously within several dimensions of ing it from without, constitute part of The artifact traditions of the region
relationships, and the boundaries exist- my contribution to that long-running include textiles, pottery, sculpture, met-
ing in one dimension will not and need and still essentially unresolved debate alwork, and masquerade. Some are com-
not necessarily coincide with the bound- about relationships between aesthetic mon to the entire area, others are
aries within another. Moreover, the categories and social categories (e.g., distinctive of particular localities, and
boundaries and identities signified by or Bravmann 1973, Kasfir 1984, Vansina yet others exhibit continuity well be-
embodied within one set of artifacts can 1984).The continued use of words such yond the region under discussion. There
be denied by others. Recognition and as Yoruba and Ebira in this paper is a may be no obvious fit between the dis-
discussion of the frequent irrelevance of convenient shorthand, but should be tributions of certain artifacts, languages,
or social institutions. For example, Ebira Edo-related, but including some unclas- I remember a negotiation between fish-
masquerades have been widely copied sified languages. (Indeed, without Susan ermen whose first language was
by surrounding non-Ebira commu- this paper could not have been written.) Urhobo and a district head whose first
nities.4 It seems that we still know all To the southeast of Ebira is the area language was Ebira, for rights to fish
too little about the process whereby a known as Etsako, also Edo-speaking. where the inhabitants' first language
sense of identity is mediated and con- The riverain eastern border is occupied was Igala.
structed by and with and within arti- on both sides of the Niger proceeding The languages of the confluence area
facts. This is an urgent and potentially downstream from Lokoja first by Basa- (see Hansford, Bendor-Samuel & Stanford
highly productive area of field engage- ngge communities and then Igala. To the 1976; Fig. 5) are currently regarded as
ment, likely to reveal significant point- east, along the Benue valley, the Basa- Niger-Congo languages and classified as
ers to the formulation of interpretive ngge area marches alongside Basa- Kwa languages, with the following four
models for the writing of history. kwomu (i.e., "true" Basa); communities exceptions: Basa-kwomu, the "true" Basa,
The identification as Yoruba of the known as Basa-ngge are in fact Nupe, in placed within the Western Plateau group
most northeasterly of Yoruba-speaking which language the name apparently of Benue-Congo; and three unclassified
communities is based at least as much means, "We are not Basa" (Gunn & languages4gori-Magongo, Ukaan, and
upon linguistic analysis as on broader Conant 1960:72, n. 1). Fishermen from Akpes. The Kwa languages are classified
cultural continuities, for the importance almost everywhere also seem to be here. as follows: the Yoruba group (including
of a specifically "Yoruba" identity is in
itself a phenomenon emerging within or
following upon, and as a consequence is
a phenomenon of, the colonial period.
This is not to say that "Yoruba" is a colo-
nial invention-far from it-but the pre-
colonial bases of what has emerged as a
specific Yoruba ethnic identity are still
far from clear. These communities form
a series of "mini-states" (Obayemi 1976:
201-9; the map he gives is particularly
clear) known as Iyagba, Ikiri, Abinu,
Oworo, Igbede, and Ijumu (including
Owe). During the colonial period these
were grouped together around the
administrative base of Kabba. To the
west, Iyagba and Ijumu march with the
Igbomina, Opin, Ekiti, and Akoko
regions. To the north, Iyagba, Ikiri, and
Oworo march with Nupe-speaking peo-
ples. To the east this area is bounded by
the confluence and the lower Niger. To
the south, Ijumu (in particular, Ogidi
and Owe) and Abinu once evidently
marched with a variety of Edo-speaking
peoples, until these latter were pushed
to the south by Ebira. The boundary
between the lands of Owe and Ososo,
the most northerly of Akoko-Edo settle-
ments, once passed through the middle
of what is now Okene market, Okene
being the administrative center for Ebira
established by the colonial regime.
People calling themselves anebira (i.e.,
people of ebira, a word that refers to the
outward manifestation of a beneficent
destiny) have come to occupy a very
roughly triangular area of some 64 kilo-
meters coming inland from the lower
Niger by some 64 kilometers at the
riverain eastern side. To the southwest of
Ebira is Akoko-Edo, a modern adminis-
trative grouping of a number of commu-
nities whose inhabitants speak some
half-dozen mutually unintelligible lan-
guages, as Susan Picton found, mostly
PHOTO S W N PICTON
8. WOODEN DOOR.
AKUKU, AKOKO-€DO, 1968
9. WOODEN DOOR.
OJA-OKE. OKULOSHO. AKOKO-EDO, 1966.
by sacrificial accumulation that it is where (Picton 1990). 28. A PERFORMER WEARS A MASK
impossible to know what they originally An Ebira history of art would be writ- CARVED BY A SMITH.
looked like (Fig. 27). Similarly, decora- ten in terms of a coming together of GBELEKO. OWE-IJUMU. YORUBA. 1964.
tive embellishment, such as abrus seeds masking traditions with an eastward dis- 29. MASK OF AN EBIRA-STYLEMASQUERADE.
and pieces of mirror, can obscure the tribution and a technology, shared with (BEING A WOMAN. SUSAN PICTON WAS
original shape more or less completely. their immediate neighbors north and NOT ALLOWED TO SEE IT.)
Much of the commentary on Ebira south, with in part (e.g., textiles) a west- OSOSO, AKOKOEDO. 1969.
wooden masks would also be true of the ward distribution; and this technology
masks carved for Ebiiaderived masquer-
ades in northern Edo and Ijurnu villages
came to be served by the ironworking
skills of Edo-speaking smiths originating
30. MASK OF AN EBIRA-STYLEMASQUERADE.
(AGAIN. SUSAN PICTON WAS
NOT ALLOWED TO SEE IT.)
!i
(Figs. 28/30; see also Borgatti 1976: figs. 2, to the south. For many villages of the
daughter had continued Kaka's work as Questions about the historical and social
a sculptor. This remains to be followed placing of artifacts can only be answered
up. The metropolitan Igala style is not in terms of particular local events given
pan-Igala, of course, as Roy Sieber de- the very complexity of the categories.
monstrated so many years ago (1961): This complexity could be explained as a
beyond the metropolitan area there is function of the confluence historically as
another range of schematic styles, each a meeting point, but such an explanation
probably the work of no more than a sin- would be a mistake, not simply because
gle carver. Umale, living near Dekina and it might be a misconstruction of conflu-
identified by Susan Picton, provides us ence history and society, but perhaps
with one of the very few of these hands because the certainties and relative sim-
to which we can put a name (Fig. 33). plicities that seem to obtain elsewhere
Also under the rubric of the "exotic" I are also misconstructed. In my paper on
would also place those masks in some Ekpeye masks and masking (Picton
Etsako communities whose characteristic 1988b), I noted that the Niger Delta
shapes and colors seem to have much in seemed to be an area in which individual
common with northern Igbo masking artifacts, cults, motifs, and the like -and
traditions, and about which Borgatti has even the names of such things, irrespec-
already written (1976,1979). tive of whether two things with the same
A tension runs through this paper name in two different places looked at
between the need to avoid ethnic labels all like each other-had unique and indi-
and, paradoxically, the need to use them. vidual distribution networks, which
u 1
V L I I>IVII.
different
~~~~-~~~ Yet
-~ the similarities
~ - ~ ~ -
~ ~ to the ideoloev
u,
of Gelede mas- Volkerkunde i n Berlin. the Voortrekker Museum in
lli, 1 ~ ~again1 ~ sufficiently
: remote to need separate listing, querade and with Nupe ritual will be patent (Drewal & Pietermaritzburg, and the Natal Museum in Pietermaritz-
1983; Nadel 1954)' burg for making their collections available to me for this
11. The Edo group (and here I only list those relevant to this
11. On this basis I commissioned a serles of masks from research. I am erateful to the Natal Museum, and es~eciallv
paper):
iKarimu for the Lagos Museum. I remember discussing them to Dr. Brian StuYckenberg, for institutional support duiing m;
a. North-Central Edo languages: wlth Arnold. Knowing that I was interested in sculpture, stay in South Africa in 1972-73 and 1977. I thank Dr. Roy
ii. Ikpeshl
. .
i. Etsako ( ~ r o p e r,l known
v as Yekhee) iKarimu would sometimes carve other things to impress me Sieber for commenting on an earlier draft of this article.
with his skill. Here was a man interested in art, whose skills 1. The center of the Zulu kingdom was located between the
iii. Otuo (properly known as Ghotuo) might, in more diverse circumstances, have been enabled in upper reaches of the White and Black Mfolozi rivers in
iv Uneme (the smiths)
ways that were not open to an Ebira farmer. South Africa, a n d its b o u n d a r i e s extended from the
v Ate-Okpela
12. This historical model is, of course, entlrely my own Pongola River in the north to the Thukela River in the
vi. Ososo invention. south, between the Drakensberg Mountains and the Indian
vii. Sasaru-Enwan-Iawe 13. This argument has several obvious starting points and Ocean. The boundaries changed over time. At the height of
viii. Ora reinforcements along the way One is my own fieldwork; his power, Shaka virtually controlled the area between the
N B.: Edo proper, the language of the Benln Kingdom, another is Rene Bravmann's Open Frontiers (1973); and Thukela and Mzimkhulu rivers, sending military parties
and Ishan are also classed in this group. another is Arnold Rubin and a seminar he gave his graduate against numerous Nguni-speaking peoples living in south-
b. North-West Edo languages: students at UCLA when I was visiting: he said the messier it ern Natal.
i. Okpameri-Okulosho all seemed, the more 11kelyit was to be true. 2. The king's regiments worked on behalf of the state. The
ii. Okpe-Akuku-etc. 14. Except in Gloucester, England, where there is now a large number of women formally associated with the royal
iii. Uhami-Ishua-etc. museum of packaging. However, in the conflicting identities homesteads were of value not only for their labor but also
iv Ukue-Ehuen/Ikpenmi-etc. arising as a result of the horrors of the war with Iraq, a prob- for the cattle recelved when they married, augmenting the
(Etc, here means that there are other villages, but no lem that might seem to be a mere function of descriptive national herds.
common name.) accuracy can be seen to have implications of tragic world- 3. The king's principal residences were dist~nguishedfrom
1II.The Ebira group: Ebira, also incorrectly known by a wide consequence. the typical homestead by the enormous central cattle byre,
Yoruba-ized spelling as Igbira, and spoken primarily the vast number and large size of the individual structures
within the administrative area known as Igbirra Division. arranged around it, and the high quality of materials and
References cited workmanship. These residences typically measured several
Speakers of this language are also found at Igara, the
administrative center of Akoko-Edo Division, where it 1s Beier, U 1963 "A Note on the Woodcarvings of the Obi of kilometers in circumference. Lunguza ka Mpukane stated
qualified as Ebira-etuno; and north of the confluence, Agbor," Odu 9,24-25. that "one shouting o n o n e side [of emGungundlovu,
around Koton-Karifi, where its name 1s pronounced Borgatti, J. 1982. "Age Grades, Masquerades, and Leadership Dingane's principal homestead] could not be heard across
Egbira or Egbura. Ebira and Egbira are to all intents and among the Northern Edo," African Arts 16, 1: 36-51. the other" (Webb & Wrlght 1976, vol. 1:344), and Allen
purposes entirely distinct Borgatti, J. 1979. "Dead Mothers of Okpella," African Arts 12, Gardiner calculated that emGungundlovu consisted of more
IV. The Nupe group: including Nupe (itself including Basa- 4: 48-57.
than 1,100 lndlvidual structures (1836:206).
ngge among many other d~alects)and other languages of Borgatti, J. 1976. "Okpella Masking Tradit~ons,"African Arts
4. The terms copper and brass are often used interchange-
the middle Niger region 9,4: 24-33.
ably in English sources, and the Zulu term ithusi generally
Borgattl, J. 1971. "The Northern Edo of Southern Nigeria."
also refers to either brass or copper. Precise Zulu terms d o
It will be remembered that Basa-kwomu, the "true" Basa, is M A, thesis, UCLA.
exist, however: ithusi elimhlophe (white ithusi) for brass
placed within the Western Plateau group of Benue-Congo Bravmann, R. 1973. Open Frontiers. New York.
(whlch is an alloy of copper and zinc) and ithusi elibomvu
languages. Drewal, H. J. and M. T. Drewal. 1983. Gelede. Bloomington:
(red ithusij for copper (Doke & Vilakazi 1972:809). Bryant
6. At Ososo, if a smlth comes to your house and sits down, Indiana University Press. simply defines ithusi as brass, or a thing made of brass
you would purify the chair by passing fire over it as soon as Fagg, W. and J. Picton. 1970. The Potter's Art in Africa (1905666).
he has gone. In the past if a n Ososo woman gave birth to London. British Museum 5. Also sometimes referred to as isidiya (pl, izidiya).
twins, they would be given to the smiths to be cared for. In Gombrich, E. H. 1960. Art and Illusion. London: Phaidon (4th 6. An illustration of a woman wearing thls garment appears
Ebira, no one would willingly marry his daughter to a smith, ed., 1972). in The Kafirs of Natal (Shooter 1857:151).
and no one would want a smith-girl as h ~ first
s wife Gunn, H D. and F, P Conant. 1960. Peoples of the Middle
7. According to Gedhle, ubusengawere not known during the
7. An irony will be noted: women weave cloth, including the Niger Region, Northern Nigeria. London: International
reign of Mpande, Cetshwayo's predecessor (Webb & Wright
cloth for masquerade costuming, while smiths produce the African Institute.
1976, vol. 1:148).
h w , and yet those are the art~factsthat more than any other Hansford, K., J . Bendor-Samuel and R. Stanford. 1976. 8. Alan Smith pointed out that because of the treacherous
embody the masculinity of the freeborn Eblra male. Studies in Nigerian Languages No. 5, An lndex of Nigerian currents along the Natal coast and the absence of adequate
8. I a m grateful to Theodore Celenko for pointing this Languages. Accra. harbors along the coastline, Delagoa Bay was the southem-
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