Au coeur de l'Afrique : trois ans de voyages et d'aventures dans les régions inexplorées de l'Afrique centrale / par M. le docteur George Schweinfurth ; [translated and excerpted by Henriette Loreau]
Smithsonian Libraries African Art Index Project DSI Search this
Subject:
Schweinfurth, Georg August 1836-1925 Travel Search this
Type:
Articles
Place:
Africa, Central
Sudan
Kordofan
Date:
1874
Notes:
Illustrations, map.
Illustrations (pages 209-256) show Zande ["Niam-Niam"] and Mangbetu architecture, hairstyles, clothing, tools, weapons, and utensils and include views of King Mounza's palace and residence, exterior and interior; the enforced arrival of the Aka man in camp; and a portrait of Nsévoué, the Aka man.
Illustrations (page 257-288) include views of Golo granaries; a portrait of a Golo woman; Abd-es-Sâmate addressing his enemies; Kredi huts, interior and exterior; a view of Schweinfurth's camp showing structures and people at work; a slave woman grinding grain; Bongo musicians and a village; slave merchants at Kordofan; and Bongos hunting cane rats.
Schweinfurth, still traveling in the Nile basin of Central Africa with the Arab trader Abd-es-Sâmate and his retinue, visits the scattered settlements of the Zande and reports many details of their appearance and way of life. He argues that cannibalism is indeed practiced, citing especially the eating of old people when they die. The economy is based on ivory, elephant meat, and crops (including Virginia tobacco) tended by slaves or wives. The Zande receive young people from other tribes as tribute and resell them to the Darfurians, returning a portion of the sales price to the slaves' parents.
Leaving the Nile watershed, Schweinfurth enters the lands of the Mangbetu and describes in detail the admirable architecture, handwork, and other aspects of this highly organized society, whose chief's name is Mounza. Here Schweinfurth trades a dog for an Aka pygmy man, whom he intends to take back to Germany. He also collects the heads of Mounza's enemies killed in battle and prepares the skulls to add to his anthropological collection. Finally, he retraces his steps back to Khartoum, a journey filled with hardship, danger, and loss.
This final part of the article includes details of the return journey and cultural notes on various tribes, but it focuses on the slave trade, which, in the winter of 1870-1871, is at its height. Some 2,700 north African slavers have arrived with their human cargo in the Kordofan district from starting points in central Africa, where they have agents in all the local trading centers. Three categories of traders range from a single man with one donkey and a few bolts of calico to enterprises trafficking on the largest scale. Slaves, divided into four categories, are bought with copper and cotton cloth and sold in Khartoum for up to six times the purchase price. Seven regions in the Nile basin are identified as sources of slaves. To appease the British temporarily, caravans are being stopped and inventoried before being allowed to proceed down the Nile. Schweinfurth asserts that slavery has a pernicious effect on the economy and society of Arabic Africa.
Also of interest: the running account of the adventures of the trader Mohammed Abd-es-Sâmate. A letter from him to Schweinfurth describing his further adventures follows the article.
