ZULU, SOUTH AFRICA

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These two spherical containers are made from small gourds and are expertly decorated with inlaid strips of wire. A wide band of copper strands, and one of brass, are used to create concentric circles and chevron-like shapes. The metallic shine and faceted, raised surface of the wire contrasts with the smooth, dark, and glossy surface of the gourd body and must have given much pleasure when touched and handled.

Some gourds were left plain, others engraved, hatched, or decorated using a pyrogravure technique that saw patterns burnt into the surface. Still others were embellished with beadwork and, like in this example, neat strands of copper and brass wire inlay, creating geometric or botanical motifs. This decoration was achieved by first cutting the wire to the desired lengths. Each end was then inserted into small holes that had been pre-bored into the gourd shell with an iron point. The ends were left unfinished inside the gourd as the opening is too small to be able to fasten them in any other way.

This particular form of snuff container, with and without its wire embellishments, is found throughout the KwaZulu-Natal region with museum curator Margaret Shaw placing many at the Natal-Pondoland border and others in Zululand. There are a few photographs of these gourds in the Van Warmelo archive at the University of Johannesburg which he provenanced to Natal in the area below the Thukela River (which was the British Colony of Natal from 1843 to 1910). A similar calabash snuff container found in the Zambezi River region by Müller and Snelleman is decorated with engraved and hatched triangles and squares and suggests a wide-spread use for this type of container.