Globular terracotta pseudo-vessels from the Inland Niger Delta, Mali

Lloyd D. Graham
Abstract Funerary pseudo-vessels are repositories of ancestral souls; they carry not
only messages from the living to the dead, but also provisions both spiritual and
material for the deceased. Jenn (Djenn) globular terracotta pseudo-vessels (1316th centuries CE) are snake-ornamented spheroids which modern Dogon informants
have interpreted as rice and millet granaries. One specimen was indeed found to
contain rice grains and boiled millet, suggesting that the globular pots may have been
grave goods that contained food offerings for use in the afterlife.

Introduction
In traditional African society, potters are female i.e., potential or actual mothers
and they fashion clay, the raw material of the earth from which all life arises.1 When
pure,2 a potter is able to produce ceramics with ritual power: worked pieces of earth
that can bring life to where it is lacking, to the realm of the dead.3 Such artifacts are
calming tokens, dedicated to establishing a soothing connection to the beyond; they
represent what is final, what remains in the other world.4
Ritual terracotta pieces often take the form of vessels that clearly have no utilitarian
purpose, such as hollow pots with sealed lids. These pseudo-vessels may lack
openings entirely,5 or they may have one or two round apertures that allow access to
the hollow interior. A spherical container may also have a figurative aspect, in which
the vessel can be viewed as a head and an equatorial aperture seen as a mouth or

Fig. 1. Four Jenn globular pseudo-vessels, each with apical

snake motifs and a round side-aperture. (a) Similar or identical
to that found by Szumowski at Kami in 1952, 19 cm high. (b)
Estimated as 13-16th century CE. (c) 9 cm high. (b, d) Private
collections, reproduced with permission from the Memoire
dAfrique site; they are objects 2541 and 2591, respectively, at
www.memoiredafrique.com/en/djenne/galerie-amis.php.

ear.6 Alternatively, the anthropomorphism of the container can be made explicit, as in

the case of bottle-shaped earthen vessels topped by human heads. Either way,
funerary pseudo-vessels are repositories of ancestral souls; they contain not only the
desires and hopes communicated to the dead by the living, but also the provisions
both spiritual and material for the long journey of the departed in the afterlife.7
Figurative terracotta pseudo-vessels
Among the Dakakari of north-west Nigeria, pottery is always made by women;
religious pottery is made only by certain families, with the secrets being passed from
mother to daughter.8 Their terracotta grave sculptures take many forms, such as
human and animal figurines, but they also include ornate pseudo-vessels modelled as
honey receptacles with unopenable covers.9 Several such vessels may be arranged on
top of one another in the sculpture, forming a pagoda-like tower (often a metre high)
that imitates a series of gourds hanging in tandem from the roof of a hut.10
Several ethnic groups in north-eastern Nigeria, such as the Jen, bury their dead twice.
In the period between burials, a terracotta soul-vessel or kusson is used to contain
the spirit of the dead person so that it cannot wander and cause mischief. These are
typically anthropomorphic bottles topped with human heads bearing open mouths, the
latter presumably leading to the vessels hollow interior.11 Similar-looking objects are
produced by the Longuda, Cham and Mwana of eastern Nigeria, although for these
groups the objects (kwandalowa or itinate) are not funerary soul-vessels, but rather
tools for divination, healing and protection.12 The Mambila (Nor) of eastern Nigeria,
near the border with Cameroon, make similar vessels whose purpose is uncertain.13 A
hollow Mambila animal figurine with a round hole in its side is thought to be a soul
vessel, inside which magic substances were placed via the lateral aperture.14 The Bura
of Burkina Faso make phallic-shaped terracotta containers that are decorated as
elongated heads. These are filled with clothes and other belongings of the deceased
and buried open end downwards alongside them. Archaeological examples date
from the 3rd-11th centuries CE.15
Globular terracotta pseudo-vessels of the Inland Niger Delta
The focus of this paper is not the patently anthropomorphic figurines from Nigeria or
elsewhere, but rather the mysterious globular containers found in the Inland Niger
Delta (IND) of Mali. In shape, these vessels may be true, flattened or shouldered
spheres. Their lack of everyday utility, along with certain attributes discussed in the
next two sections, suggest that they are ritual items, quite possibly grave goods. Many
of these Jenn-style pieces are embellished with appliqu snakes around the top and
contain a single lateral often equatorial hole that gives access to the hollow
interior (Fig. 1). The presence of at least one hole is required to allow the interior of
the vessel to vent during firing,16 but its conspicuous nature in these pieces suggests
that the opening also served a ritual purpose. We have seen above with the Mambila
figurine that such holes can serve as a mouth, allowing magic substances to be placed
inside the vessel. The aperture can also serve as an ear; modern informants in the IND
have indicated that the type of globe shown in Fig. 1 contains secrets words that are
whispered or recited into its body during ritual.17 With the aperture acting as both
mouth and ear, the vessel can be made to accept material goods for use in the afterlife,
and also to convey communications from the living to the dead.

Fig. 2. Three views of the Jenn shouldered globular pseudo-vessel (9 cm high, 365 grams)
introduced in Fig. 1c, where it was shown in reflection. It has only one aperture, the
equatorially-positioned round hole (1.0 cm diameter). Private collection.

Vessels from the IND similar to those of Fig. 1, but more ovoid in shape, can be
found in the collection of the National Museum of Mali and elsewhere; these are
typically 15-20 cm high, and date from the 13-15th centuries CE.18 Rarer specimens
consist of a round or flattened spherical vessel surmounted by a human figure or head
at the apex, sitting atop the snake decorations.19 One such object (28 cm high) was
exhibited at the La Valle del Niger exhibition in 1999 at Caslino dErba, Como,
Italy.20 Such finds raise the possibility that at least some of the objects shown in Fig. 1
did once carry similar ornaments at their apexes, and that these have subsequently
broken off. Clearly Szumowski believed this to be the case for a globular terracotta
that he obtained at Kami (see next section), writing At the location of the neck there
used to be a flowing decoration of large size, now unfortunately destroyed.21 For
other objects, such as that shown in Fig. 1d, the disposition and integrity of the snake
motifs argue against any loss of additional ornamentation at the neck.
Provenance at Kami and elsewhere
In 1952, George Szumowski a Polish archaeologist working for IFAN, the Institut
Franais dAfrique Noir conducted excavations at Kami, a location on the east bank
of the Niger about 7 km north of Mopti.22 During the winter, Kami is an island of 600
x 300 metres. Legend has it that a Bambara demon named Belezy came from Sgou
and brought death, fire and devastation to the original town of Kami, such that it was
abandoned for hundreds of years. Szumowskis visit was prompted by the fact that the
Agricultural Service of Mali had constructed buildings on the island and was planting
a large garden there, and the works had uncovered many finds of archaeological
significance.
During Szumowskis visit two ancient cemeteries were found, which collectively
yielded funerary objects including large jars, urns and small pottery artifacts. Many of
the larger vessels contained human remains. Other objects that had already been
collected during the construction work, and which had come either from the site of the
ancient dwellings or from the cemetery that had yielded the large jars, included two
globular pottery pieces ornamented on the outside with flowing decorations in the

form of snakes which were oriented vertically, with heads uppermost, grouped around
the neck.23 One of the pottery globules, Szumowski writes of the 19-cm high piece,
possessed round holes in opposition to one other, a small hole opposite to a larger
one. It is clear from his photograph of this object (cf. Fig. 1a) that the larger hole,
which was ca. 2 cm in diameter, had an equatorial location.24 The other globular pot,
which was 20 cm high and whose upper half carried four equally-spaced vertical
snakes separated by ca. four rows of ca. three raised buttons, did not appear to have a
major opening. Its equator was instead marked by small but deep circular indentations,
with ca. five such piercings evenly placed between each snake.25
Alongside these reddish-coloured globular pots were recovered small dark brown
terracotta vessels shaped like bottles, fully enclosed and completely empty. These too
were decorated on the outside with snake shapes in relief, their heads again being
grouped around the top of each piece. Based on their non-opening nature and exterior
decoration, Szumowski speculates that the bottles had a religious or funerary
purpose.26 The logic of this inference would apply equally well to the globular
pseudo-vessels.
An earthenware vessel (14 cm high) similar to the terracotta globules of Kami was
found at Joal in Sngal;27 it too was decorated in relief on the outside, and carried
two holes (1.4 and 1.1 cm in diameter) aligned from one side to the other.28 Found in
a shell-heap, this grey and pale red-brown object had the shape and size of an ostrich
egg. Embellishments in relief adorned the upper three-quarters of its surface toward
the summit, where were found engraved zigzags, aligned chevrons, and four
cicatrices.29 Inside the vessel was a pottery fragment with a larger diameter than either
of the access holes. Some villagers claimed that the artifact was a musical instrument,
presumably by analogy with the udu of Nigeria, a globular clay pot with a side-hole
that is mainly played as a percussion instrument.30 However, Raymond Mauny
concluded that this vessel could never have produced a useful musical sound, and
instead postulated a ritual function. Mauny also mentions in passing other terracotta
vessels decorated with excrescences that are believed to have served ritual purposes,
namely the millet beer pots found during the third CIAO excavations at the Nok
plateau in Bauchi, Nigeria.31 These pots are topped by a neck in the form of a head
(either human or monkey), a configuration which as discussed above is not
unknown among globular terracottas from the IND.
Symbolism and contents
Bernard de Grunne has consulted modern Dogon and related peoples for their
understanding of the unusual body-postures adopted by Jenn-Jeno terracotta
figurines, as well as for explanations of other excavated earthenware items that lack
practical utility. Importantly, de Grunnes informants identified one of the globular
terracotta pieces discovered by Szumowski at Kami (the one without lateral holes) as
representing a millet or rice granary.32,33 In Dogon mythology, the primordial Granary
of the Master of Pure Earth the celestial vehicle in which the nommo ancestors
descended from heaven and founded Dogon civilization had four stairways coming
down the outside at the cardinal points of the compass.34 Encouraged by the
placement of its appliqu snakes at the four cardinal points, de Grunne further
interprets the Kami globule as a representation of the celestial Granary, in other words
as an imago mundi.35 However, one should be aware that the snake motifs on globular

terracotta pseudo-vessels only occasionally align with the compass points; often more
than four snakes are present (e.g., Fig. 1b,d), and the serpentine ornamentation can be
highly asymmetric (e.g., Fig. 1b,c).36 To Western eyes, the potential identification of
the globular terracottas of Fig. 1 with ancient granaries of the region draws support
less from the snake decorations than from a simple correspondence of forms (Fig.
3a,b). And, of course, the shape of the globule resembles nothing so much as a golden
fruit of the earth (Fig. 3b,c), tempting one to speculate that the globule- and bottleshaped terracotta pieces found together at Kami were ritual representations of food
and drink, respectively.
Bernard de Grunnes informants also identified a conical terracotta fragment (7.5 cm
high) from Jenn-Jeno as a millet or rice granary.37 Ornamented with three (?)
appliqu snakes placed at non-cardinal positions, this piece looks as if it could have
originally formed the neck of a spherical vessel not unlike those shown in Fig. 1.38 In
fairness, though, we should note that even in its found state this specimen
conforms quite well to descriptions of the Granary of the Master of Pure Earth, which
is believed to be shaped like a truncated cone, with the circular bottom symbolizing
the sun and a circle on the square top representing the moon.39

Fig. 3. (a) A mud-coil Toloy granary in large open cave overlooking the Tule valley, near to
Sangha, east of Bandiagara. Dated to the 2nd-3rd centuries BCE, the Toloy granaries are
contemporaneous with the oldest phase of settlement at the nearby site of Jenn-Jeno.40 (b)
The shouldered globular terracotta of Fig. 1c and Fig. 2. (c) Fruit shapes. Image credits:
Panel a: Huib Blom, author of Dogon Images and Traditions (www.dogon-lobi.ch).
Panel c: composite panel from www.FreeDigitalPhotos.net (tomato) and Master isolated
images / FreeDigitalPhotos.net (apples). All images are reproduced here with permission.

Whether or not the globular pseudo-vessels are imitations of the celestial Granary,
and therefore microcosmic representations of the macrocosm, is uncertain. What is
certain is that physical evidence supports their identification by de Grunnes 20thcentury informants as miniature repositories for millet or rice grains, because
Szumowskis microscopic analysis of material inside the Kami globule with the two
equatorial openings (which presumably dates from the 13-16th centuries) found earth
mixed with plants and the remains of food at the bottom of the pot, in which we noted
the presence of rice grains and boiled millet.41 It is encouraging to find this much
agreement between physical evidence from an archaeological specimen and
conclusions drawn independently from an art-historical method in which current

ethnographic meaning is projected back in time.42 While we cannot be sure of the

circumstances in which the sustenance was placed inside the pseudo-vessel,43 a ritual
context seems most likely. For example, the preliminaries of a Dogon fertility
ceremony involve sequential libations of rice gruel and millet gruel on family altars
and religious statuary, followed by ritual offerings of millet cake and millet mush.44
Conclusions
In traditional African societies, ritual terracotta pieces are calming tokens that
establish a soothing connection to the eternal. As the fruit of womens labour in the
clay from which all life arises, such vessels can bring life even into the realm of the
dead. On the basis of physical and ethnographic evidence, it seems likely that globular
terracotta pseudo-vessels of the Inland Niger Delta especially those of the type
shown in Fig. 1 served as ritual depots for rice and millet grains, or foodstuffs
prepared from them. If used as grave goods, it is likely that their purpose was to carry
food offerings for use by the deceased in the afterlife.
L.D.Graham; v02_09.04.16.
Online material was retrieved 24-26 April, 2011.
1

Schaedler, K-F. (1997) Earth and Ore: 2500 Years of African Art in Terra-cotta and Metal, trans.
Burwell, G.P. Panterra/Minerva, Munich, p.13. In contrast to pottery, metalworking is traditionally
a male preserve.
2
i.e., free from her menstrual period. See Schaedler, N. (1997) Potters are not born: A portrait of the
Bariba potter Blgui Seydou. In Schaedler, Earth and Ore, p.148.
3
Schaedler, Earth and Ore, p.13.
4
Ibid. In contrast, the blacksmiths focus is more dynamic; his metal creations ritual figures, amulets,
cult objects, weapons constitute a living dialogue with gods and ancestors.
5
A hole is necessary for successful firing (note 16), but this can easily be sealed afterwards.
6
Schaedler, Earth and Ore, p.13.
7
Ibid.
8
Schaedler, Earth and Ore, p.258-60.
9
Ibid.
10
e.g., Schaedler, Earth and Ore, Fig. 505 (p.259).
11
Schaedler, Earth and Ore, p.270.
12
Schaedler, Earth and Ore, p.271-3.
13
Schaedler, Earth and Ore, p.279-80.
14
Schaedler, Earth and Ore, Fig. 543 (p.279).
15
Schaedler, Earth and Ore, p.70-71.
16
Karina Zarnon, www.Kazaart.com, Paris, personal communication.
17
Ibid.
18
See objects 2309, 2310 and 2580 at www.memoiredafrique.com/en/djenne/galerie-amis.php . The
second item has one large circular hole in the side near the top, while the last item has at least two
small and circular equatorial holes separated by 90 degrees.
19
See objects 2392 and 2540 at www.memoiredafrique.com/en/djenne/galerie-amis.php
20
Ibid., object 2392; private collection, Italy.
21
Szumowski, G. (1955) Fouilles a Kami et decouvertes dans la rgion de Mopti (Soudan), Notes
Africaines, n 67, 65-69, at 68. Translation by LDG.
22
Szumowski, Fouilles a Kami, 65-69, at 67-8. Translation by LDG.
23
Szumowski, Fouilles a Kami, 68. Translation by LDG.
24
Szumowski, Fouilles a Kami, Fig. 2-6.
25
Szumowski, Fouilles a Kami, Fig. 2-4A. The same vessel, now in the National Museum of Mali,
Bamako, has been re-published in a much clearer photograph as Fig. 3A in McIntosh, R.J. (1989)
Middle Niger terracottas before the Symplegades Gateway, African Arts 22 (2), 74-83.
26
Szumowski, Fouilles a Kami, 68 and Fig. 2-4B,C.

27

IFAN, Laboratoire de Prhistoire-Protohistoire, catalogue number SE:51-195-2.

Mauny, R. (1952) Poterie nigmatique de Joal, Sngal, Notes Africaines, n 55, 71-72.
29
Ibid., also Thiam, M. (2007) La cramique dans lespace Sngambien. Online at
http://www.histoire-afrique.org/printarticle.php3?id_article=160#nh29.
30
Online at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Udu. The udu can also be played as a horn; see Hall, B. (1999)
Globular horns, Experimental Musical Instruments, Summer issue, online at
http://www.ninestones.com/burntearth/articles/globarticle/index.html
31
Mauny, R., endnote 5 to Szumowski, Fouilles a Kami (p.69).
32
de Grunne, B. (1987) Divine gestures and earthly gods. A study of the ancient terracotta statuary
from the Inland Niger Delta in Mali. PhD dissertation, Yale University, New Haven, USA, p.112-3.
33
Cited by McIntosh, Middle Niger terracottas, 77. Presumably Szumowskis other Kami globule was
not offered to the informants, or else elicited a similar interpretation.
34
This approximated a cross (with arms of equal length) within a circle, an arrangement reflected by
the four partitions within a conventional Dogon granary. Prior to the descent of this celestial
Granary from heaven, the nommo ancestors gathered into it everything needed to establish society
on earth [Griaule, M. (1965) Conversations with Ogotemmli, Oxford University Press, London,
p.32-48.] In the Granary were references to seeds, the cardinal points, planets and constellations,
all animal life, and the anatomy of man. Nesmith, F.H. Jr. (1979) Dogon Bronzes, African Arts 12
(2), 20-26.
35
McIntosh, Middle Niger terracottas, 77.
36
While the snakes are quite often arranged with their heads at the top (e.g., Fig. 1a,d), this too is far
from universal (e.g., Fig. 1b,c).
37
McIntosh, Middle Niger terracottas, 77.
38
McIntosh, Middle Niger terracottas, Fig. 4 (p.75).
39
Nesmith, Dogon Bronzes, 21.
40
Bedaux, R.M.A. (1988) Tellem and Dogon material culture, African Arts 21 (4), 38-45.
41
Szumowski, Fouilles a Kami, 68.
42
de Grunne, B. (1995) An art historical approach to the terracotta figures of the Inland Niger Delta,
African Arts 28 (4), 70-79.
43
It is unclear whether any completely sealed globular vessels have been recovered. If such forms exist,
they may always have been empty, serving as granaries or food stores in a purely symbolic manner;
alternatively, food may have been placed inside them before or after firing, after which the venthole (note 5) would have been sealed.
44
van Beek, W.E.A. (1988) Functions of sculpture in Dogon religion, African Arts 21 (4), 58-65.
28