DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.49271#0396
302
O. Bates
as another. Fig. 14, a represents equally well a simple zigzag stitch between two edges,
as in fig. 12, or a turned over binding edge, as in fig. 13, a. The one uncertain element is
the wavy line, fig. 14, p, presumably a careless derivative of the lozenge chain, fig. 14, m.
It is with a consciousness of their origins and significance that I have arranged these
sixteen decorative elements in the form of a sort of “family-tree”.
The simplicity and directness of Siwan pottery designs contrast strikingly with the
more elaborate ornamentation of many Berber wares of Africa Minor. We are here in
the presence of a decorative art which is so primitive in character as to be closer to its
starting point than, let us say, the Cypriote white slip ware of 1500-1200 B. C. In
the case of this particular ancient fabric the geometric ornamentation which it bears is
to be referred to the same humble origins as is the decoration of the Siwan vessels.2 The
closer approach, on the part of the Siwan designs, to their original source suggests that at
no very remote period the forefathers of the Berbers now settled in Siwah may have made
a greater use of skin vessels than of pottery ones. This suspicion is somewhat heightened
by the fact that all the ancient pottery of the Oasis, as far as one can infer from the
shards3 found on the surface, was wheel-made. There has therefore been a break in the
technical traditions of pot-making comparable to that observable in Lower Nubia, where,
even in Coptic times, the wheel was in use in districts which now make their pottery in
a very primitive fashion by hand. I have on another occasion pointed out that the
Siwan custom of tying a child’s navel cord to a palm tree which thereafter becomes the
child’s property has its pastoral parallel among the Arabo-Berbers of Marsa Matruh;4
and it would not be surprising if it should eventuate that this transference of a custom,
and the close relationship between the Siwan pottery ornamentation and the sewing of
leather vessels, were to be accounted for on the same grounds — viz., on the score of a
recent change from a pastoral-nomadic to an agricultural-sedentary habit. The actual
forms of the vessels suggest a derivation from leather or, in the case of the braziers with
feet (figs. 4, 5 and 13) from wooden, originals. I hasten to say that I believe that within
historic times the Libyan or, more recently, the Berber, element has always been large,
not to say dominant, in the Oasis; but this does not exclude the possibility that the
ancestors of the present Berber stock may have abandoned a nomadic career within the
last 2,000 years.
*
* *
2 Cf. W. M. F. Petrie, Tell el Hesy (Lachish), London, 1891, p. 45. J. L. Myres, Handbook of the Cesnola
collection of antiquities from Cyprus, New York, 1914, p. 32.
3 These shards appear to be of the Ptolemaic and Roman periods.
4Cf. O. Bates, ‘Ethnographic notes from Marsa Matrtih’ (Journ. Royal Asiatic Soc., Oct. 1915, p. 724); M.
M. 'Abd Allah, ‘Siwan Customs’ (Harv. Afr. Stud., vol. 1, Cambridge, 1917, p. 6 and n. 23).
O. Bates
as another. Fig. 14, a represents equally well a simple zigzag stitch between two edges,
as in fig. 12, or a turned over binding edge, as in fig. 13, a. The one uncertain element is
the wavy line, fig. 14, p, presumably a careless derivative of the lozenge chain, fig. 14, m.
It is with a consciousness of their origins and significance that I have arranged these
sixteen decorative elements in the form of a sort of “family-tree”.
The simplicity and directness of Siwan pottery designs contrast strikingly with the
more elaborate ornamentation of many Berber wares of Africa Minor. We are here in
the presence of a decorative art which is so primitive in character as to be closer to its
starting point than, let us say, the Cypriote white slip ware of 1500-1200 B. C. In
the case of this particular ancient fabric the geometric ornamentation which it bears is
to be referred to the same humble origins as is the decoration of the Siwan vessels.2 The
closer approach, on the part of the Siwan designs, to their original source suggests that at
no very remote period the forefathers of the Berbers now settled in Siwah may have made
a greater use of skin vessels than of pottery ones. This suspicion is somewhat heightened
by the fact that all the ancient pottery of the Oasis, as far as one can infer from the
shards3 found on the surface, was wheel-made. There has therefore been a break in the
technical traditions of pot-making comparable to that observable in Lower Nubia, where,
even in Coptic times, the wheel was in use in districts which now make their pottery in
a very primitive fashion by hand. I have on another occasion pointed out that the
Siwan custom of tying a child’s navel cord to a palm tree which thereafter becomes the
child’s property has its pastoral parallel among the Arabo-Berbers of Marsa Matruh;4
and it would not be surprising if it should eventuate that this transference of a custom,
and the close relationship between the Siwan pottery ornamentation and the sewing of
leather vessels, were to be accounted for on the same grounds — viz., on the score of a
recent change from a pastoral-nomadic to an agricultural-sedentary habit. The actual
forms of the vessels suggest a derivation from leather or, in the case of the braziers with
feet (figs. 4, 5 and 13) from wooden, originals. I hasten to say that I believe that within
historic times the Libyan or, more recently, the Berber, element has always been large,
not to say dominant, in the Oasis; but this does not exclude the possibility that the
ancestors of the present Berber stock may have abandoned a nomadic career within the
last 2,000 years.
*
* *
2 Cf. W. M. F. Petrie, Tell el Hesy (Lachish), London, 1891, p. 45. J. L. Myres, Handbook of the Cesnola
collection of antiquities from Cyprus, New York, 1914, p. 32.
3 These shards appear to be of the Ptolemaic and Roman periods.
4Cf. O. Bates, ‘Ethnographic notes from Marsa Matrtih’ (Journ. Royal Asiatic Soc., Oct. 1915, p. 724); M.
M. 'Abd Allah, ‘Siwan Customs’ (Harv. Afr. Stud., vol. 1, Cambridge, 1917, p. 6 and n. 23).