Abstract
O the second number of Bulletins et Mémoires de la Société d'Anthropologie de Paris (ser. 5, T. vii., 1906) Lieut. Desplagnes contributes an interesting paper on a little-known region of Central Nigeria, lying at the base of the plateau of Bandiagara (Banjagara), in the Massina district. This lake region seems to have been inhabited from the earliest antiquity, and in the Polished Stone period to have supported a dense population at a high grade of civilisation, to which numerous Megalithic monuments and a quantity of stone weapons and implements bear testimony; and long before our era examples of metal working, weaving, pottery, &c., show the industrial stage to which the inhabitants had attained. The character of the remains, physical and cultural, seem to suggest an Eastern origin for these early occupants, who were probably related to the ancestors of the Galla-Somali peoples. Later on, the nomad and pastoral peoples of the Sahara, attracted by the well-watered pastures, poured down from the north, and the tribes from the forests pressed up from the south; but all of these, though attaining right by might, had no aptitude for organised industry, and the primitive inhabitants were utilised as a sort of caste of workers, superior to slaves, but yet not mixing with the conquering clans. In the smiths, weavers, fishers, and potters, are found the descendants of the earlier owners of the land, while others maintained their independence by taking refuge in the islands in the river, the Sorkos, or in the surrounding mountains, the Habbès. The paper deals chiefly with the Habbès, describing their traditions, customs, habits, dwellings, industries, religious ideas, and sociology, in all of which they differ from their neighbours. The illustrations give an idea of the character of the country and the people, and the photographs of the masked figures in the religious dances, supposed to represent the Spirit of the Ancestors, are of particular interest.
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References
Roy. Soc. Proc., vol. lxxiv. p. 53.
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Anthropological Notes . Nature 75, 114–115 (1906). https://doi.org/10.1038/075114a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/075114a0