Period Photos of People with Ethnographic Arms

[Rumpel]

1,2,3,4,5. Nuer mock combat/dancing. This sort of war play was a common feature of such dance gatherings where initiated youths of differing villages faced each other in mock running battles as a show of group prowess. Dances were also significant occasions for courtship.
Photographer:
Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard
Date of Photo:
1936 October - November
Region:
[Southern Sudan] Wahda
Group:
Nuer Western Jikany Jikul

6,7. A group of youths in dance gear with spears, clubs, shields and small flags, apparently engaged in warplay with another group out of frame to the left. Judging by their body language, some crouching, others standing just behind them, they are readying themselves to respond to the aggressive advances of this opposing group, which may be from a nearby village. Dances were frequent events, which provided the main opportunity for youths and girls to socialise together.
Photographer:
Jean Carlile Buxton
Date of Photo:
1950 - 1952
Region:
[Southern Sudan] Bahr el Jebel ?Tali

8,9 Two men standing in a homestead demonstrating the use of clubs with spears in their left hands. One of the men is wearing thiau armrings which would have meant that the left hand was practically useless for brandishing a weapon. They are described as western Nuer men, possibly either Leek Karlual amongst whom Evans-Pritchard spent most time in 1936 or else Western Jikany.
Photographer:
Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard
Date of Photo:
1936 October - November
Region:
[Southern Sudan] Wahda
Group:
Nuer ?Leek ?Western Jikany

10. A relatively young Nuer prophet holding a spear aloft in his right hand, his face uplifted, showing the characteristic unkemptness of a prophet's beard and hair. In his left hand by his side he holds a spear with a very large blade and another with a smaller blade, and a curved baton called dang with metal and attachments. The dang was an instrument commonly used in wedding invocations, but was also associated with the prophet Ngundeng and thus became a symbol of spiritual power for subsequent prophets. He also wears ivory arm ornaments and leg ornaments of large strung beads. The prophet (guk) was a possessor of an air spirit (gwan kwoth) whom the Nuer greatly revered, but was a relatively unknown character before the mid 19th century, probably a result of the assimilation of Dinka people and their religious ideas. Such men were considered to have spiritual powers such as healing. Prophets were considered tirbal agitators by the government and were frequently persecuted.
Photographer:
Charles William Gwynn
Date of Photo:
?1900
Region:
[Southern Sudan] Upper Nile
Group:
Nuer ?Eastern Jikany

11. A group of four uninitiated youths carrying spears and clubs jumping in the air. They do not seem to be at a dance, and the possibility may exist that they were performing for Evans-Pritchard to photograph them.
Photographer:
Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard
Date of Photo:
1935 - 1936
Region:
[Southern Sudan]
Group:
Nuer

12. Two men perform a leaping movement (rau) holding spears and ambatch logs, and beyond them a group of men are also dancing, with Evans-Pritchard's tent visible to the right edge. The location is Yakwach cattle camp on the Sobat which Evans-Pritchard revisited in July 1935. Dances were more a feature of village life than cattle camps since people had more ready access to other social groups, and often accompanied ceremonies such as marriages. Such events were the main arena for courtship among Nuer youth, and often took the form of mock battles between village groups. The proximity of the tent suggests that this dance was held at the end of the day (see shadows) at the instigation of Evans-Pritchard.
Photographer:
Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard
Date of Photo:
1935 July
Region:
[Southern Sudan] Upper Nile Sobat River Yakwach
Group:
Nuer Lou

[Rumpel]

Last one

1. Just out of frame is King Aguaa-war-Akuon of Obuodhi village, sitting in his compound. The subject of the photograph however is a royal stool standing on a skin beside him, as well as the royal spear-rest, a leopard-skin and four spears lying on the ground. These objects comprised the Anuak royal amblems held by the king, which after 1921 rotated annually.
Photographer:
Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard
Date of Photo:
1935 March - May
Region:
[Southern Sudan] Jonglei Obuodhi
Group:
Anuak

2. A smith's assistant sitting on his haunches polishing metal spear-heads on a stone. Although no smelting took place in the Tabi hills, the working of metal was common and apprentices were taken on for several years to learn the craft.
Photographer:
Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard
Date of Photo:
1926 November - December
Region:
Blue Nile Tabi Hills Soda
Group:
Ingessana (Gaam)

3.A full length studio portrait of a young Shilluk warrior, holding hide shield, spear and club, wearing a fringed hair ornament.
Photographer:
Richard Buchta
Date of Photo:
1877 - 1879
Region:
[Southern Sudan]
Group:
Shilluk

4. A full length portrait of an Acholi warrior holding two spears and a hide shield. He is wearing metal arm and neck rings with some animal fur around the shoulders. The image seems to have been taken sometime in January 1879 when Buchta travelled through Acholi country en route to Bunyoro [nb I think we'd now consider this part of Uganda's western border region.]
Photographer:
Richard Buchta
Date of Photo:
1879 January
Region:
Northern
Group:
Acholi

5. A group of men brandishing spears and ambatch shields, with small flags on long sticks, rush towards a lone opponent to left of frame, apparently as part of the warplay associated with a large dance gathering between different groups.
Photographer:
Jean Carlile Buxton
Date of Photo:
1950 - 1952
Region:
[Southern Sudan] Bahr el Jebel ?Tali
Group:
Mandari

[Kubur]

Greeks and yataghans...It's always better to talk...

[Rick]

Originally Posted by Kubur

Greeks and yataghans...It's always better to talk...

Fellow on the left has a Gasser revolver in his pocket; I wonder why he didn't just shoot the other fellow.

[fernando]

Ngungunhane, Mdungazwe Ngungunyane, Nxumalo, N'gungunhana, known as GUNGUNHANA, the last king of the empire of Gaza (Mozambique) and last of the Jamine monarchy, born 1850 died 1906 in Angra do Heroismo (Azores), to where he was sent to exile in 1898, in the company of his six wifes
... and a picture of some of his Landis, taken in 1890.


.

[VANDOO]

STAGED PICTURES OF SHAM BATTLE, HEAD TAKING ECT. ILOILO PHILIPPINES, IGORROTES

[kronckew]

Originally Posted by Rick

Fellow on the left has a Gasser revolver in his pocket; I wonder why he didn't just shoot the other fellow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3I_Ds2ytz4o

if you look at him at the start of the scene he looks all tuckered out, hot and sweaty - that's not from running, he had a bad case of the trots and he ad libbed the scene, which was supposed to carry on a lot longer with him interacting with the swordsman, but he wasn't in any condition to do all that, so he improvised. it turned out so well they kept it in, and a legend was born.

[estcrh]

Originally Posted by Rick

Fellow on the left has a Gasser revolver in his pocket; I wonder why he didn't just shoot the other fellow.

That is exactly what happened here.

The Illustrated London News, Volume 76, Illustrated London News & Sketch Limited, 1880

[kahnjar1]

Not sure if this one has been posted before. It appears in Elgood's Arms and Armour of Arabia, and is worthy of showing here.
Stu

[Andreas]

Originally Posted by Kubur

Greeks and yataghans...It's always better to talk...

More likely Albanians or Montenegrins, because of the style of the skull cup, the Gasser revolver and the toka breastplate.

[estcrh]

Originally Posted by Kubur

Greeks and yataghans...It's always better to talk...

The title on the full sized image is "Settling a Frontier Dispute". Illustration for The Illustrated London News, 9 October 1880, Artist R C Woodville. I also have seen this described as "Albanian and a Montenegrin in combat".

Here is the full sized image.

[kahnjar1]

Originally Posted by estcrh

The title on the full sized image is "Settling a Frontier Dispute". Illustration for The Illustrated London News, 9 October 1880, Artist R C Woodville. I also have seen this described as "Albanian and a Montenegrin in combat".

Here is the full sized image.

Very nice pic, but raising a question......The 2 guys coming up the hill appear to be wearing Arab head dress, so if the "frontier" is being defended, which frontier is it??
Stu

[estcrh]

Mr. Nichan, an Armenian, born at Savaz, Armenia, about 500 miles from Constantinople. He was one of the life guards of the late Sultan Abdul Aziz (he died 1876). The Ottoman kilij sword he wears, sheathed in a beautiful scabbard set with jewels and richly ornamented, was presented to him by the Sultan for meritorious services. From the book "Portrait types of the Midway Plaisance", 1894, a collection of photographs taken at the 6 months of the Worlds Columbian exposition.

[Battara]

This kilij looks to be one of those examples covered in corals and turquoise.

Great to have background info.

[estcrh]

Originally Posted by kahnjar1

Very nice pic, but raising a question......The 2 guys coming up the hill appear to be wearing Arab head dress, so if the "frontier" is being defended, which frontier is it??
Stu

There were so many "frontiers" being fought over during that time period it would be hard to pick one, it is possible that the backround figures represent Afghans.

[Victrix]

Originally Posted by estcrh

There were so many "frontiers" being fought over during that time period it would be hard to pick one, it is possible that the backround figures represent Afghans.

With all due respect, the figures in the foreground hardly look Afghan. It seems to me that this illustration shows two residents of the Balkans locked in mortal combat. It could very well be a Montenegrin and an Albanian, and the frontier in question would then be Ottoman. The mountain people of the Balkans have a reputation of being particularly fierce. In Northern Albania they also have the nasty custom from medieval times of blood feuds (vendettas -avenge blood for blood) which can continue for generations.