Info For Yous Baule People: The Artistic Akan Tribe Inwards Ivory Coast
The Baule (Baoule or Bawule) people is 1 of the largest ethnic grouping inward the Côte d'Ivoire. They have got played a fundamental role inward twentieth-century history of the country. They waged the longest state of war of resistance to French colonization of whatsoever West African people, together with maintained their traditional objects together with beliefs longer than many groups inward such constant contact with European administrators, traders, together with missionaries.
The Baule belong to the Akan peoples who inhabit Republic of Ghana together with Côte d'Ivoire. According to a legend, during the eighteenth century, the queen, Abla Poku together with her factions later having a serious disagreement with their Ashanti manful somebody monarch had to atomic number 82 her people westward to the shores of the Comoe, the Blue Planet of Senufo. In monastic tell to cross the river, she sacrificed her ain son. This sacrifice was the rootage of the bring upwards Baule, for baouli agency “the kid has died.”
They displaced together with intermarried with the Senufu of the due north together with Guru people of the west. They came to dominate southern Ivory Coast. Poku died inward 1760 together with was burried inward her capital, the town of Warebo, unopen to Bouake. Queen Akwa Boni, niece of Poku, inherited the throne. Her people became known every bit the Baoule together with took over the golden mines westward of the Bandama River. At the decease of Queen Akwa, the kingdom plunged into dynastic disputes alongside the major employment solid unit of measurement heads. The kingdom never achieved neat unity, every bit the Empire of Asante. It was conquered past times the French inward the latter one-half of the 1800s.
Now virtually 1 1000000 Baule occupy a constituent of the eastern Côte d'Ivoire betwixt the Komoé together with Bandama rivers that is both wood together with savanna land. Baule social club was characterized past times extreme individualism, neat tolerance, a deep aversion toward stiff political structures, together with a lack of historic menstruum classes, initiation, circumcision, priests, surreptitious societies, or associations with hierarchical levels. Each hamlet was independent from the others together with made its ain decisions nether the presiding presence of a council of elders. Everyone participated inward discussions, including slaves. It was an egalitarian society. The Baule compact villages are divided into wards, or quarters, together with subdivided into employment solid unit of measurement compounds of rectangular dwellings arranged some a courtyard; the compounds are usually aligned on either side of the main hamlet street.
The Baule are agriculturists; yams together with maize are the staples, supplemented past times fish together with game; coffee, cocoa together with kola nuts are major cash crops. The importance of the yam is demonstrated inward an annual harvest festival inward which the starting fourth dimension yam is symbolically offered to the ancestors, whose worship is a prominent human face of Baule religion.
Ancestors are the object of worship but are non depicted. The foundation of Baule social together with political institutions is the matrilineal lineage; each lineage has ceremonial stools that embody ancestral spirits. Paternal descent is recognized, however, together with for sure spiritual together with personal qualities are believed to endure inherited through it. The Baule believe inward an intangible together with inaccessible creator god, Nyamien. Asie, the god of the earth, controls humans together with animals. The spirits, or amuen, are endowed with supernatural powers. Religion is founded upon the catch of the immortality of the soul.
Like several other groups with Akan origin, Baoulé children are frequently named according to the twenty-four hours of the calendar week or the circumstances nether which they were born. For example, a manful somebody born on a Mon would endure named Kouassi. However, in that location are slight variations inward the spelling together with pronunciation specific to the Baoulé. It should also endure noted that the Baoulé have got a calendar that is dissimilar from the Akan calendar of other Akan subgroups.
This may endure due to the circumstances of their divergence from Akanland together with the demand for them to grade a separation with the Ashanti Kingdom. For Akan subgroups such every bit the Ashanti, Abron, N'zima, Koffi may endure a bring upwards for a man child kid born on Friday. For the Baoulé, Koffi together with Affoué are names for Saturday, the twenty-four hours beingness Foué. There is, therefore, a audio mutual to the twenty-four hours together with the names.
| Day born | Variants | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Djole (Monday) | Kouadjo, Adjoua | The bring upwards of the twenty-four hours is Djole |
| Mlan(Tuesday) | Konan, Amlan | The bring upwards of the twenty-four hours is Mlan |
| Ouwe (Wednesday) | Kouakou, Ahou | The bring upwards of the twenty-four hours is Ouwe |
| Yah (Thursday) | Yao, Aya | The bring upwards of the twenty-four hours is Yah |
| Foue (Friday) | Koffi, Affoué | The bring upwards of the twenty-four hours is Foue |
| Monnin (Saturday) | Kouame, Amoin | The bring upwards of the twenty-four hours is Monnin |
| Kissie(Sunday) | Kouassi,Akissi | The bring upwards of the twenty-four hours is Kissie |
Baule fine art is sophisticated together with stylistically diverse. Non-inherited, the sculptor’s profession is the final result of a personal choice. The Baule have got types of sculpture that none of the other Akan peoples possess. Wooden sculptures together with masks allow a closer contact with the supernatural world.
Baule motherwood statue
Baule statues are usually standing on a base of operations with legs slightly bent, with their hands resting on their abdomen inward a gesture of peace, together with their elongated necks supporting a confront with typically raised scarification together with bulging eyes. The coiffure is e'er really detailed together with is usually divided into plaits. Baule figures answer to ii types of devotion: 1 depicts the “spiritual” husband who, inward monastic tell to endure appeased, requires the creation of a shrine inward the personal hut of the individual. Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 homo volition ain his spouse, the blolo bian, together with a adult woman her spouse, the blolo bla.
Male Baule tribe figure seated on an Akan type chair wearing an elaborate hat. One paw on the knee, the other with the palm above. This type of Baule statues is frequently called asie usu representing a spirit of the Forest reincarnated inward a beautiful manful somebody figure inward this illustration in all probability a hamlet chief.
The Baule believe that earlier they were born into the world they existed inward a spirit world, where each 1 had a mate. Sometimes that spirit mate becomes jealous of their earthly mate together with causes marital discord. When this happens, a figure depicting the other world husband is carved together with placated with earthly signs of attention.
Gyaman Adekye (chiefs) from Baule tribe of Ivory Coast
Baule Gyaman girls inward exquisite golden jewelry with horsetail switches
Sources differ on its role or function: some state it intervenes inward the ritual of divination, others that it is a protection against sorcerers, or a protective divinity of agrarian rites, or a bush spirit. The figures together with human masks are elegant -- good polished, with elaborate hairdressings together with scarification.
Blolo Bla Female Figure, Baule Culture (wood)
Masks tally to several types of dances: the gba gba, the bonu amuen, the mblo together with the goli. They never stand upwards for the ancestors together with are e'er worn past times men. The gba gba is used at the funerals of women during the harvest season. It celebrates beauty together with age, hence its refined features. The double mask represents the wedlock of the Sun together with the satelite or twins, whose nativity is e'er a practiced sign. The bonu amuen protects the hamlet from external threats; it obliges the adult woman to a for sure discipline; together with it appears at the commemorations of decease of notables. When they intervene inward the life of the community, they have got the shape of a wooden helmet that represents a buffalo or antelope together with which is worn with a raffia costume together with metallic talocrural articulation bracelets; the muzzle has teeth, which incarnate the trigger-happy fauna that is to defend the group.
There is also a Kple Kple mask from the Baoule community inward Ivory Coast.The confront refers to the sun, together with the sunbeams are represented past times polychromed triangles.This type of mask is usually used inward commemorative, agricultural together with burial ceremonies. The mask would to a greater extent than frequently than non endure worn with a raffia (grass) costume attached to the lower department of the mask reaching to below the waist with a grass skirt together with other grasses roofing the trunk together with legs.
Mblo is the bring upwards of a performance category that uses confront masks inward skits together with solo dances. Mblo masks, used inward amusement dances are 1 of the oldest of Baule fine art forms. These refined human confront masks are usually portraits of especial known individuals. Mblo masks embody the center Baule sculpture vogue manifested inward figures together with decorated objects – spoons, combs, pulleys together with the like.
Mblo Twin Mask. Côte d'Ivoire; Baule people
Lustrous curving surfaces, suggesting clean, healthy, well-fed skin, are laid off past times delicately textured zones representing coiffures, scarifications, together with other ornaments. The idealized faces are introspective, with the high foreheads together with the large downcast eyes. Ornaments higher upwards the confront – birds, combs, horns, faces, together with other decorative motifs – are chosen for their beauty, together with have got no iconographic significance. Fine scarifications together with coiffures announce personal beauty, refinement together with a want to give pleasance to others.
Goli is the day-long spectacle that unremarkably involves the whole hamlet together with includes the appearance of iv pairs of masks, music played on special instruments, and, ideally, the joyous consumption of a neat bargain of palm wine. Goli tin endure performed both every bit an amusement together with for the funeral of of import men. The really characteristic, round-shaped “lunar” goli is surmounted past times ii horns. It was borrowed from the Wan for a celebration adopted past times the Baule later 1900.
circa 1889
Celebrating peace together with joy, they would sing, dance, together with potable palm wine. In the procession, the goli preceded the iv groups of dancers, representing immature adolescents. The goli would endure used on the occasion of the novel harvest, the see of dignitaries, or at the funerals of notables. Boxes for the mouse oracle (in which sticks are disturbed past times a alive mouse, to give the augury) are unique to the Baule, whose carvers also make heddle pulleys, combs, hairpins, together with gong mallets.
Baules are also really sociable similar their Ghanaian Akan brethrens. They welcome all blacks from the diaspora into their Blue Planet without slightest mistrust. As a final result dark celebrities similar the slow manful somebody monarch of Pop music Michael Jackson together with rapper cum moving painting star LL Cool J have got all been welcomed in that location together with were installed every bit chiefs.
After a concert inward the metropolis of Abidjan Ivory Coast, the twenty-year-old LL Cool J travelled to the coastal hamlet of Grand-Bassam where the local folks anointed his caput with crude together with dubbed him Chief Kwasi Achi-Bru. Upon his provide to America, Chief Kwasi recorded “Def Jam In The Motherland.”
Baule chiefs
Origin: Baule- Ivory Coast- Africa
Circa: 1800 AD to 1900 AD
Baule portrait mask details the physical facial features namely eyes, eyebrows, nose, oral cavity together with eyes. In addition, the coiffure, beard, together with facial scarification compliment the physical beauty. The scars constitute some the eyes together with oral cavity indicates human scarification during rites of passage into adulthood. The beard Indicates that the somebody is an elder, someone who has created a family, lived a total life together with 1 who deserves abide by that comes with historic menstruum together with wisdom.This lost wax cast of a copper alloy mask (bronze or brass) comes from the Baule people of the Cote d'Ivoire inward West Africa. Though masks are non unremarkably used past times the greater number of Akan peoples including the Asante or Fante, they are frequently constitute attached to various chiefly regalia prominent on sword sheaths or chiefly stools. They are said to stand upwards for the heads of defeated enemies together with are shown with some evidence of local scarification which is rare alongside the Akan but frequently shown on terra cotta sculptures. - (DA.462)
Baule chiefs, Bebakoi,Cote d`Ivoire
Akan (Baule) knife together with sheath
(Repro ID: © National Maritime Museum)
Akan knife together with sheath. The sheath has a rhythm together with a atomic number 82 model of human teeth attached to it. The red-dyed rhythm is characteristic of Baule civilization (from the Ivory Coast), piece the human jaw is to a greater extent than typical of the Akan people (from present-day Ghana) together with suggests a trophy attached to the knife to betoken the ability of its owner. Before European contact, Akan peoples had migrated into Baule territory together with in that location were extensive merchandise connections betwixt the Akan together with the Baule. It is probable that this knife together with sheath are the final result of cultural interactions: either the knife was purchased past times Akan traders from the Baule who so added the jaw, or the Akan had influenced the Baule inward the making of this artefact.
Gyamanhene of Cote d'Ivoire (Baule chief) with exquisite crown of gold
Elephant Mask, Baule Culture, from Ivory Coast, slow 19th-early 20th century (wood with pigment)
Baule Dancers
Ivory Coast museum mourns loss of looted artifacts
Bullet holes pock the vault door together with empty display boxes litter the showroom flooring of Abidjan’s Museum of Civilization, robbed of 100 ancient artifacts nether the embrace of deadly conflict inward April.
“A slice of our history has been wiped out,” museum managing director Silvie Memel Kassi said of the collection’s lost crown jewels, some dating dorsum to the 17th century, that may at in 1 trial endure melted for the gold.
“It is a huge loss,” she said.
Worth an estimated 3 billion CFA francs (US$6.5 million), but irreplaceable, the looters made off with masks, sabers, crowns together with gold-handled wing swatters — objects described past times the museum every bit “authentic, unique together with rare.”
“I had dreamed of leaving a museum of reference for hereafter generations,” Zoko Djowa, the museum’s curator for the past times xxx years together with only months from retirement, said bitterly every bit he walked some the devastation.
Opened past times the then-French direction inward a white, colonial-style edifice inward 1942, the museum could non have got been worse placed during the conflict that engulfed Ivory Coast’s economical upper-case alphabetic lineament later a disputed election inward Nov final year.
A homo touches a statue of a Baule dancer at the Museum of Civilization inward Abidjan on Aug. 12.
Photo: AFP
In Plateau, the neighborhood housing the presidential palace, the edifice also borders Camp Gallieni basis forces headquarters together with came nether burn downwards from both sides to the four-month conflict.
Fighting ended on Apr eleven with the arrest of one-time Ivorian president Laurent Gbagbo, who sparked the conflict past times refusing to concede defeat to now-President Alassane Ouattara.
Shelling left a large hole inward the museum facade.
Inside, the shattered province of the exhibition hall would interruption the pump of whatsoever fine art lover hoping to meet the in 1 trial rich collection of artifacts telling the story of the peoples of Ivory Coast.
Bullet marks have got been left on the double drinking glass that used to enclose sabers used past times the royal Agni people from the eastward of the country.
Baule gbagba dancers
Glass display boxes prevarication strewn on the floor, empty.
In the middle of the room; the massive, hundred-year-old skeleton of an elephant — the national emblem — towers over the few masks together with statuettes left of the in 1 trial proud collection.
Among the items lost: pendants worn past times the fundamental Baule people inward the seventeenth century, statuettes of the western We together with northern Senufo tribes, crowns together with wing swatters with solid golden handles from the fundamental together with coastal regions, together with sacred masks from the Dan people inward the west.
While the pillagers failed to make most of the estimated 11,000 items locked upwards inward vaults, they did brand off with the museum’s flagship collection.
“All of Ivory Coast” was exhibited there, Memel Kassi said inward her small-scale office, surrounded past times traditional masks.
Each of the stolen objects “taught us something virtually its culture, its civilization, its beliefs,” she said.
Without belongings out much hope, the museum has issued a search uncovering for the plundered items through the cross-border policing organization Interpol together with urged the world to help.
However, chances of recovering the items are slim, said Jules-Evariste Toa, a communication professor at the University of Abidjan.
“One tin melt the golden or start a private collection. We fearfulness never to meet the items again,” the once-regular museum visitor said.
Now closed to the public, the museum — which has seen its visitor numbers dwindle inward recent years — volition have got to stretch its meager 76,000 euro (US$109,000) budget to embrace vital refurbishment together with safety improvements.
“We demand an alert scheme together with weapons,” museum safety guard Jean-Claude Agniman said.
However, past times far the worst effect of the looting, Ivorians say, is the loss of patrimony invaluable to helping forge a mutual national identity every bit the acre embarks on reconstruction later a decade of crises together with tensions.
“Ivory Coast is losing its points of reference with the disappearance of these pieces,” said Ivorian poet together with author Paul Ahizi, describing the theft every bit “a desecration of the spirit of [our] ancestors.”
“The Blue Planet volition have got a employment defining its ain identity together with spirituality,” he said.
Ripley’s Believe It or Not! – the global authorization on the weird, foreign together with bizarre – is taking the Fertility Statues out on tour again. Two authentic African fertility statues, which 2,500 women believe may have got helped them go pregnant, volition endure inward display inward the antechamber of our Orlando Believe It or Not! museum, FREE OF CHARGE!
THE STATUES WILL REMAIN IN ORLANDO UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE SO THE NEXT TIME YOU ARE IN THE SUNSHINE STATE STOP BY AND SEE WHAT ALL THE FUSS IS ABOUT.
A LITTLE HISTORY
Male Fertility Statue
The statues, representing a manful somebody monarch together with queen, came from the Cote d'Ivoire of Africa, where they were carved inward the 1930s past times Baule tribesmen. The manful somebody monarch holds a sword together with a mango, together with the queen holds an infant. The is considered a fertility symbol inward parts of Africa. According to legend, the statues are to endure placed exterior a sleeping accommodation door, together with couples wishing to conceive should touching on them every bit they instruct inward the room.
Following a three-year world tour inward the slow 90s, the fellowship received to a greater extent than than 2,000 letters from women who had go important before long later touching the statues – fifty-fifty though many had been told past times doctors they would never conceive.
Female Fertility Statue
“We are non making whatsoever claims for the statues, but it is amazing only how many women have got told us they became important later touching them, fifty-fifty though some of them had been told they would never give birth.”
Anyone who fancies what could endure the cheapest fertility handling inward the world is welcome to come upwards together with endeavour their luck at Ripley’s Believe It or Not!
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