Brass Ornaments of the Dyoor.
Their women, too, in hardly any respect differ from the Dinka women; like them burdening the wrists and ankles with a cluster of rings. Very frequently one great iron ring is thrust through the nose, the hole to admit it being bored indifferently through the base, the bridge, or the nostrils. The rims of the ears also are pierced to carry an indefinite number of rings. These deformities are especially characteristic of the Bellanda, who sometimes attach to their nose a dozen rings at once.
Portrait of a Dyoor.
GLASS BEADS.
One of the iron decorations which is most admired, and which is found far away right into the heart of Africa, I first saw here amongst the Dyoor; I mean the iron beads or perforated little cylinders of iron, strung together. These have some historical interest attached to them in connection with the development of trade in Africa, arising from the fact that they were earlier in use than glass beads, to which they must be compared. Glass beads, obviously, were only brought into the market after it had been proved that the natives would be willing to wear ornaments like in form but of a lighter material than the hard metal which they were wont to forge into shape piece by piece. The Japanese and other inhabitants of Eastern Asia are known to trick themselves out in steel beads, thus evidencing their long exclusion from all intercourse with Europe. In the Soudan these strings of beads were principally made at Wandala, and Barth has specially noticed them at Marghi. Every tribe which I visited in proceeding inland from the Gazelle I found to retain the preference for beads made of iron.
The derivation of the stock from a negro race of the nobler kind, and one which has a small development of jaw, such as the Shillook, may be fairly understood from the accompanying portrait. The sitting figure is a likeness which I took at my leisure of one of my bearers. I thought it would illustrate the graceful slimness of the limbs, which nevertheless are all in due proportion. It may serve, too, in a degree to exemplify the appropriateness of the expression “swamp-man,” which I have several times employed, and moreover may help to justify the comparison which has likened them to a bird.
