The “Polly” model stands on his four legs inside a crystal treasury in the “Ki Braranley” museum in Paris, to remind visitors of a dark era that celebrated the transfer of a lot of artifacts and pieces from African countries to the colonial France museums.
“Polly” is a sacred talisman of the “Banbara” and “Al -Malinaki” tribes, and it was brought from the village of Diabou in Mali in 1931.
A painting on the facade of the treasury, which it contains in the exhibition, indicates that it was confiscated from the village despite the objection of its leader, so the museum’s head of the museum, Emmanuel Kasarero, likens to his extremism from his mihrab as a “explicit desecration”.
The skilled urinary talisman of a super animal in the imagination of the financial tribes is among the thousands of pieces that a singer mission (a systematic study of individual cultures) succeeded in bringing about a century ago under the banner of research work, which included 14 countries in sub -Saharan Africa.
This year, “Ki Branley-Jacques ChiracShedding light on this journey by reducing a counterpart on the “Dakar-Djibouti mission (1931-1933)”, in order to understand a broader understanding of the context that accompanied the journey and real goals behind its duties.
The first French ethnographic mission
In 1931, the first French ethnographic mission consisting of 11 researchers, including scientists specializing in music, nature and linguistics, traveled to Africa, to form an archive of societies that were believed to be going to disappear under the influence of modernity.
The mission walked until 1933 led by Marcel Greul, the world of ethnology specializing in the “Black Continent”, 14 countries in sub -Saharan Africa, from Senegal The far west to Djibouti is the far east. All of these countries were under European colonialism, with the exception of Ethiopia.
During the searches and investigation, the mission scientists collected approximately 3,600 artifacts, more than 6000 animal samples, 370 manuscripts, 6000 photographs, documenting documentary tapes with a length of 3600 meters, and edited 15 thousand identification pages.
The pieces were collected in the “Black Africa Hall”, which was shortly opened in the “Trocadero” Museum of Ethnography, which later bore the name “The Human Museum”.
The “Ki Branley” exhibition used about 300 pieces of the groups displayed in the Human Museum as part of his counter-investigation project on the facts of the Dakar-Djibouti mission.
For history, the mission was supported by the colonial rule despite the violations and the robbery that accompanied its research.
In its coverage of the contents of the exhibition, the French newspaper “Lacrawa” conveyed the confessions of the mission secretary, Michelle Leris, whom he wrote in his journey’s record, regarding the heavy mistakes committed by the “whites” under the justifications of the ethnic and cultural superiority of the western colonizer.
Old narration review
At a time when international attempts and endeavors are taking place to restore the looted cultural property to the previous colonies, the institution organizing the exhibition, which continues until September, is seeking to shed light on the conditions and how to restore these pieces by the countries included in the mission’s actions.
For this, the organizers focus on their work, according to what the French newspaper quoted, on the investigation of the conditions of acquisition or confiscation of many masks, paintings, weapons, furniture, and other evidence sent by the researcher Marcel Greul and his team in the mission to France, including the pieces that were withdrawn with violence, theft or extortion.
Through the guide for the “Dakar-Djibouti” exhibition, issued by the “Alsu” house, a collective research in which specialized experts from Africa and Europe participated, the organizers seek to re-provide a contemporary interpretation of what happened.
Nevertheless, the organizers indicate that the idea of the exhibition and those behind it does not involve any intentions for the installation of courts against ethnology at that time, as much as it comes to providing accurate facts about the journey taken by the pieces offered from Africa To France.
The general coordinator of the exhibition, Gayel Boujan, explains that one of the main conditions for the counter -investigation is to unveil forgotten actors, change the angle of narration, and allow new generations in the villages visited by the mission, to express their views and transfer the stories of their grandparents. In addition, the coordinator stresses the importance of the participation of experts from the targeted countries in the investigation, in the exhibition project that started since 2021.
The list of participants in the investigation, especially the Ethiopian historian Cisai Sahili Bei, includes the director of the Cameroon National Museum Hyogyen Channa, the director of the National Financial Museum Daouda Keita, Mami Magat Sin Thiao and Amy Cantusan for the “Black Civilizations Museum” in Dakar, along with the director of the scientific groups of Saxony in Germany.
From the statue of “Polly” to the painting of Christ
Experts’ investigations did not stop at the exposed theft of the “Polly” statue made of a substance mixed between wax, soil, wood and contagious blood, but rather to a long list of valuable pieces.
The painting of Christ and Mary, which dates back to the eighteenth century, leads the expanded list of exciting pieces. The painting has been shipped from the “Qaha Issos” church in Ethiopia After it was cut into pieces. Investigation experts believe that its smuggling occurred without the approval of the Ethiopian clerics during that period.
The story itself also applies to other pieces of cultural symbolism. There is a majestic knife attached to a sculpture in the form of a snake that was brought from “Mora” in Cameroon, and a royal throne made of wood belonging to the “Porto Funo” area in Benin, where a label indicates that obtaining them was carried out in “unknown conditions”.
In her testimony, coordinator Gaeel Boujan admits in the research evidence of the exhibition, that the political situation of the countries that the mission, with the exception of independent Ethiopia, has established an unequal relationship based on domination and intimidation between the colonists and local societies.
And behind this relationship, experts in the counter -investigation discovered another way to obtain precious holdings and pieces, a method that appears on the appearance of donations, but it is not necessarily so.
This applies to a wooden shield made of cow’s skin from the “Vianga” area in Chad. According to the research guide, the representative of the colonial authority handed over this shield to the mission during its visit, and experts in the counter -investigation presented a hypothesis to be part of the spoils confiscated after the security campaign against the anti -colonial movements in 1929.
Regardless of the credibility of this hypothesis, experts believe that the complaint and critical approach followed by the exhibition would enhance in the future the wave of claims in the colonial countries with its cultural heritage smuggled outside the country, which corresponds to calls by the assistant supervisor of the museum, Hugh Homain, the need to return all the sacred pieces, which still play an effective role in those societies and tribes African.
The return of the sacred drum
Many countries want to trace the “Côte d’Ivoire” that succeeded in restoring the “sacred drum”, or what is called locally called “Daji Daji Eukoy”, a drum with a length of more than 3 meters and a weight equivalent to 430 kilograms, used as a communication tool for the “Chamman” tribe, which is the largest ethnic minority in the country.
In addition to its cultural and artistic symbolism, this legendary drum is calculated for its role in popular resistance against French colonialism, as the Ivory used it to transfer political and warning signals via drumming from one tribe to another at a distance of 30 kilometers, which made the movements of the colonial forces open to the resistance, and this helped them effectively defend their villages or hide from forced operating campaigns.
However, in the year 1916, the forces of the French colonizer discovered the “Diji Daji Ikoy” code, and the drum was deported to France amid popular protests and resistance, as it remained displayed in the “Ki Branley” museum in Paris, before it expected France And Cote d’Ivoire on November 28, 2024, an agreement to return the valuable piece to its cradle, and display it at the Museum of Civilizations in the capital Abidjan.
While today the Senate in Côte d’Ivoire is studying a draft law to revive the tradition of “Daji Daji Ikoy”, the question that is raised in parallel with this step is any role that the drum will play today and what is the type of messages that he will launch?
Whatever it is, the Ivorian archaeologist Fabrice Luba says that the return of the Tanbur is the return of hope and it is an important opportunity to unite all the Ivorians around him in order to rebuild the nation.