DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49271#0144
Drawings of Hottentot women
89
(pouces) or 222 mm. (inches). This gives a proportion to stature of 15.4%. The abso-
lute lengths of the feet of the four Hottentot women measured by Deniker15 ranged from
210 mm. to 226 mm., the mean proportion to the stature being 14.2. Martin16 gives
14.4 as the mean index for female Bushmen. His table shows that higher indices are
found among the negroid peoples of Africa; e. g. Fan 14.7; Lobi 15.0; Ba-Tua 14.8;
Ba-Binga 15.2; M’Baka 15.0; Mawambi pygmies 15.5. In six Hottentot males the
mean index was 15.6 according to Deniker.15
I am inclined to regard the long leg and large foot of the woman drawn by Thibault
as a variation due to admixture of Bantu blood such as might be expected to occur occa-
sionally among Hottentots. It is assumed that our artist represented the feet of his
subject in their correct proportions.
Head. The heads of the subjects of both drawings show characteristic Hottentot
features. The marginal note on the 1803 drawings says: “A. triangular face, high cheek
bones, tapering to a point in the chin,— broad over the eyes,— thick lips, projecting,
features very small and flat.”
The subject of the 1801 drawing has a bulging forehead and the malars jut forward
in such a way as to conceal the root of the nose in profile. The lips are very protrusive
without appearing swollen or everted as they are in the 1803 drawing, and the chin is
retreating. Thibault’s subject had the characteristic “Bushman ear,” whereas the ear
of the woman represented by the later artist has a well developed lobule and lacks the
broad roll of the helix.
The marginal note on the 1803 drawing states that the hair is “long around the edges,
about 2 or 3 inches, like negro’s wool, except rather more knotty.” The drawing indicates
that the hair was of the “pepper-corn” variety and about the same length as that usually
shown in modern photographs of Hottentots and Bushmen. With this may be compared
the reproduction of an unpublished photograph of a Hottentot woman in the collection
of the Peabody Museum of Harvard University (pl. 4, fig. 2). Apparently the subject
of the Thibault drawing also had the usual “pepper-corn” hair, but the manner in which
the hair is dressed is quite different from that represented in any drawing or photograph
of a Hottentot or Bushman that I have been able to consult. Drawings of Hottentots
in old books usually represent the women wearing skin caps or with a mop-like arrange-
ment of the hair. In modern photographs the cap is usually replaced by a kerchief or
the hair is short. The roll around the edges of the hair, as shown in this drawing, may
possibly have been a tribal style of hair-dressing now extinct.
16 Op. cit., p. 20, 26, 27.
16 Op. cit., p. 319.
89
(pouces) or 222 mm. (inches). This gives a proportion to stature of 15.4%. The abso-
lute lengths of the feet of the four Hottentot women measured by Deniker15 ranged from
210 mm. to 226 mm., the mean proportion to the stature being 14.2. Martin16 gives
14.4 as the mean index for female Bushmen. His table shows that higher indices are
found among the negroid peoples of Africa; e. g. Fan 14.7; Lobi 15.0; Ba-Tua 14.8;
Ba-Binga 15.2; M’Baka 15.0; Mawambi pygmies 15.5. In six Hottentot males the
mean index was 15.6 according to Deniker.15
I am inclined to regard the long leg and large foot of the woman drawn by Thibault
as a variation due to admixture of Bantu blood such as might be expected to occur occa-
sionally among Hottentots. It is assumed that our artist represented the feet of his
subject in their correct proportions.
Head. The heads of the subjects of both drawings show characteristic Hottentot
features. The marginal note on the 1803 drawings says: “A. triangular face, high cheek
bones, tapering to a point in the chin,— broad over the eyes,— thick lips, projecting,
features very small and flat.”
The subject of the 1801 drawing has a bulging forehead and the malars jut forward
in such a way as to conceal the root of the nose in profile. The lips are very protrusive
without appearing swollen or everted as they are in the 1803 drawing, and the chin is
retreating. Thibault’s subject had the characteristic “Bushman ear,” whereas the ear
of the woman represented by the later artist has a well developed lobule and lacks the
broad roll of the helix.
The marginal note on the 1803 drawing states that the hair is “long around the edges,
about 2 or 3 inches, like negro’s wool, except rather more knotty.” The drawing indicates
that the hair was of the “pepper-corn” variety and about the same length as that usually
shown in modern photographs of Hottentots and Bushmen. With this may be compared
the reproduction of an unpublished photograph of a Hottentot woman in the collection
of the Peabody Museum of Harvard University (pl. 4, fig. 2). Apparently the subject
of the Thibault drawing also had the usual “pepper-corn” hair, but the manner in which
the hair is dressed is quite different from that represented in any drawing or photograph
of a Hottentot or Bushman that I have been able to consult. Drawings of Hottentots
in old books usually represent the women wearing skin caps or with a mop-like arrange-
ment of the hair. In modern photographs the cap is usually replaced by a kerchief or
the hair is short. The roll around the edges of the hair, as shown in this drawing, may
possibly have been a tribal style of hair-dressing now extinct.
16 Op. cit., p. 20, 26, 27.
16 Op. cit., p. 319.