Dr Nikolay Tsyrempilov from Buryat State University is currently locating and digitising Buddhist texts as part of EAP813. This is his account of a trip he took to try and find some manuscripts.

Members of the expedition crew

Last month we got information from a reliable source that in the western mountainous part of Buryatia, in a hard-to-reach area, a collection of rare Mongolian and Tibetan manuscripts had been detected. We organised an expedition to that area. Oka district of the Republic of Buryatia in the East Sayan range is home to a small group of people called Soyots who are hunters as well as yak and reindeer breeders.

Our destination was a remote Soyot place named Khonishon which is accessible only in March. There is no road to Khonishon and we had to drive on the icy surface of rivers – Yakshob, Bolshaya Belaya and others. During wintertime the rivers are under thick cover of snow whereas in summertime one has to go for a few days on horseback to reach the place. We were told that the manuscripts were hidden inside a pyramid made of stones on top of Khonishon hill. To reach Oka district we had to cover 700km from Ulan-Ude.

Entering the Oka district

Having reached Orlik settlement, an administrative centre of Oka district, we met Bair Sharastepanov, the principal of a local school, who rendered every kind of assistance to us and joined us in our trip to Khonishon. Our guide was a local Soyot Badma Kharluevich. Next day we took the school’s expedition vehicle and with blessings from the local lama set out to Khonishon.

The abbot of the local Buddhist monastery, a Mongol from Khubsugul aimak wishes the members of the expedition good luck and safe return. The road to Khonishon is considered dangerous not so much because of the landscape peculiarities as due to the might of local spirits.

It took a whole day of dangerous driving before we reached our destination.

During March the rivers in the mountains have no snow on the icy surface. The upper layers of ice are fragile which makes driving very unsafe.

On the way we visited a few Soyot shepherd camps, met a pack of wolves, saw a few yaks killed by them and enjoyed fascinating sceneries. On the top of the Khonishon hill we found the stone pyramid with a few Buddhist religious utensils inside.

Such kind of stone pyramids are usually built by faithful on top of hills to honor local spirits

No Manuscripts! We surveyed the hill, searched every corner and small cave but with no result. As our guide confessed, local Soyots knew about the expedition as rumours somehow leaked out. They could have secretly removed the manuscripts and hidden them in other places. They were anxious and thought our plans had been to take the manuscripts away. This, they believed, would mean that their good fortune would leave them along with the books.

Disappointed and sad

Alas! The expedition turned out to be a failure. But we don’t regret it. This beautiful and austere land is worth visiting. Just look at these pictures.

Turquoise rivers of Easter Sayan

 

Buddhist prayer flags are usually exposed on the mountain passes

One of the many sacred sites of the local Soyots who have an eclectic belief system combining Shamanism with Tibetan Buddhism

According to local customs it is mandatory to perform sacrifice rituals on the passes. Badma Kharluevich, our guide, is pouring milk on fire to propitiate spirits guarding this pass.

Our guide saw the books inside this pyramid a few months ago. As he told us, they were kept here from 1930s

We have found only a Bumpa, or a ritual copper vessel and a mandala, or a ceremonial model of the universe.

The weather is getting worse

Wintry landscape

Next sunny morning

Grazing yaks

A child with a yak calf

A dangerous bridge

The austere land of Oka

 

 

Two collections were made available online in March – EAP630 and EAP613

EAP630: Manuscripts from Kokand Khanate (1710-1876) court library from the museum sources of Kokand and Fergana Valley and private collections

The Khanate of Kokand was founded in 1709 within the territory of modern Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Kazakhstan and was abolished after the Russian annexation of the state in 1876. After the establishment of the Turkestan governorship by the Russian Empire in 1876, many manuscripts of the Kokand court library were taken away to Russian collections or to small collections in the Fergana Valley. This pilot project surveyed some of the thousands of books and manuscripts held by the Kokand Literary Museum in Uzbekistan, as well as other museums and private collections in the Fergana Valley, with the aim to hopefully organise a future project to preserve many of these records. As a result of the pilot project four manuscripts were digitised with various themes including, one manuscript about sexual relationships; commentary on the famous work “Aqaʻid al-Nasafi” which deals with the problems of faith in Islam (aqida); “Ghara`ib al-sighar” (Wonders of Childhood), which is recognised to be the first diwan by Ali Shir Nawa’I; the problems of fiqh (the human understanding of Sharia).

 
EAP630/1/3 - Ubaydallah b. Masʻud. “Sharh-i viqaya”

EAP630/1/1 - Lazzat al-visal

EAP630/1/1 - Lazzat al-visal

EAP613: Digital preservation and cataloguing of early printed Armenian maps, periodicals and newspapers, and making them accessible online

This project digitised maps and periodicals held in the collections of The National Library of Armenia (NLA), the largest repository of printed Armenian materials in the world. The first Armenian printed book 'Urbatagirk’ (Venice 1512), the first printed periodical 'Azdarar' (Madras 1794), the first printed Bible in Armenian (Amsterdam, 1666) and the first printed map 'Hamatarats Ashkharhatsuyts' (Amsterdam 1695) are some of the treasures preserved in the NLA. However, the storage conditions of NLA’s collections are poor and the material fragile. The fluctuation of temperature, level of humidity and the pollution level in the stacks remain uncontrolled throughout the different seasons and has resulted in paper deterioration and fungal contamination.

The project digitised over 18,000 pages, mainly of Armenian newspapers and journals, but also a small collection of maps dating from the 17^th to 20^th centuries. The newspapers and journals cover some important dates in Armenian and Soviet history and include interesting front page imagery on the dates of the 20^th anniversary of the Russian revolution, and the death of Lenin, as just two examples.

 

EAP613/1/5/1/12/7 - Khorhrdayin Hayastan No.1-74 [1924]

EAP613/1/5/1/12/22 - Khorhrdayin Hayastan No.1-75 [1928]

EAP613/1/5/1/12/11 - Khorhrdayin Hayastan No.1-75 [1925]

EAP613/1/1 - Maps (1695-1800)

EAP613/1/1 - Maps (1695-1800)

 

Three collections have gone online this month – EAP640, EAP726 and EAP729.

EAP640: Digitising the documentary patrimony of Colombia's Caribbean coast: the ecclesiastical documents of the Department of Córdoba.

This project digitised a wide variety of ecclesiastical records dating from the 17th to 20th century that were located in the churches of Santa Cruz de Lorica and San Jerónimo de Buenavista in Montería in the Department of Córdoba in northern Colombia. These records include, amongst others, those associated with the sale of slaves, property and livestock; the records of mortgages, wills, debts, baptisms, deaths and marriage; land disputes; minutes of city council meetings, including those relating to decisions concerning public works, education and health. These records provide insights into one of the most ethnically diverse areas of Córdoba and allow researchers to explore unique information on racial demography, social and kin networks, and economic conditions of the region.

For a fantastic overview of the history of slavery in the region and the related projects (EAP255, EAP503, EAP640, EAP627, and EAP853) the Endangered Archives Programme have funded, I highly recommend reading the open access article: Researching the history of slavery in Colombia and Brazil through ecclesiastical and notarial archives, published in the EAP Anniversary publication From Dust to Digital. The article can also be downloaded as a PDF (809KB).

Parroquia San Geronimo de Monteria LIBRO DE DEFUNCIONES No. 002 [1808-1836]
EAP640/2/1/29

Parroquía San Gerónimo de Montería. LIBRO DE BAUTISMO No. 2 [1808]
EAP640/2/1/1

 

EAP726: Preserving Peruvian newspapers for a regional approach: key 19th-20th century press in Arequipa

This project digitised copies of the ‘El Deber’ newspaper published between 1890 and 1962 in Arequipa, Peru. This paper was one of the most important politically conservative newspapers in the country. This influential Catholic gazette contributed to the national and regional debate on Church-State issues such as legalisation of divorce, secularisation of education, religious intolerance, confiscation of ecclesiastical assets, as well as broader topics such as the economy, social and ethical concerns, political interests and general religious affairs. The newspapers help to provide a portrait of daily life in the city and surrounding area, and are a great resource for researchers looking for information on political, social, cultural, genealogical, intellectual and religious history.

El Deber – 7th August 1945. Front page the day after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima
EAP726/1/1/56/174

El Deber – 4th November 1890
EAP726/1/1/1/2

EAP729: Cataloguing, digitisation, and preservation of ancient palm leaf and paper manuscripts archived in Chinmaya International Foundation (CIF)

The Chinmaya International Foundation (CIF) in Kerala, India holds rare paper and palm leaf manuscripts dating back to the late 16th century. The manuscripts include information on arts, mathematics, religion, spirituality, architecture, science, technology, medicine, Ayurveda, rituals, Sanskrit literature, as well as many other topics and are written in various languages and scripts including Sanskrit, Hindi, Marathi, Malayalam, Tamil and in Devanagari, Grantha and old Malayalam.

Pañcatantram - Ancient collection of stories , probably first composed 300CE. It is an ancient Indian collection of inter related animal fables in verse and prose.
EAP729/1/1/40

Bhagavad Gītā - The Bhagavad Gita copied in 18th century AD
EAP729/1/2/39

Over the past few months we have been working to make publicly available some of the sound collections that the Endangered Archives Programme has funded. Two of the first collections we worked on were EAP088: The Golha radio programmes (Flowers of Persian Song and Poetry), and the three projects that make up the Syliphone record label collection from Guinea (EAP187, EAP327 and EAP608). It is with great pleasure that we can announce that these two collections are now available on BL Sounds for anyone to listen to worldwide.

The Golha radio programmes were broadcast on Iranian National Radio between 1956 and 1979 and consist of a mixture of musical pieces, poetry and literary commentary. These programmes can be listened to here. You can read more about this project in a previous guest blog by Jane Lewisohn.

To celebrate these collections now being made available we have a guest blog entry from Dr Graeme Counsel whose hard work has enabled these fantastic Syliphone recordings to be shared with a wider audience. The recordings are available here to listen to. There are 7780 tracks in total for you to enjoy!

The end of colonial rule in Africa commenced with Ghana’s declaration of independence from Great Britain in 1956. Faced with a growing independence movement, to gain the ascendancy France presented its colonies with an ultimatum: the choice of autonomy in a confederation of states under French rule or total independence. Guineans were the first to vote on this offer via a national referendum, and in September 1958 the mayor of Conakry, Sékou Touré, addressed a large crowd who had gathered on the eve of the poll. With President Charles de Gaulle standing by his side, Touré implored Guineans to vote no to the offer of autonomy, declaring that “Guineans prefer freedom in poverty to riches in chains”. A few days later Guineans stunned France by voting for independence, and under the Presidency of a young and charismatic Sékou Touré the nation would become one of the major proponents of pan-Africanism and an architect in the formation of the Organisation of African Unity (now the African Union).

President Touré saw the development of national identity as key to the progress of his nation. The development of culture was thus a central policy platform, with the arts sector, for example, largely under government direction. This was not unusual in Guinea, for in the course of his presidency (1958-1984) Touré oversaw the government’s reach extend into virtually all facets of daily life, supported by over 26,000 party cells. To develop culture, Touré’s government launched an official cultural policy called authenticité, whereby artists were encouraged to seek inspiration from the values inherent in traditional African culture as a means of edifying contemporary society. Traditional folklore, for example, would be “revalorised”, with Guinean heroes “re-awakened” through imagery, songs and text in order to serve the needs of a post-colonial Guinean society. The process was most concisely illustrated in a catchphrase of the time – “regard sur le passé”, or “look at the past”. Of the arts, music was the principal focus of the authenticité policy, and one of the first acts by the government was to disband all private orchestras in Guinea as they were deemed to be too European in their musical style. To replace them, new state-sponsored orchestras were created in each of the nation’s 35 prefectures. The government supplied all of the groups with musical instruments, which, in the vein of the Cuban/Jazz style popular at the time, included electric guitars, saxophones and trumpets. The government hand-picked musicians who formed core “national” orchestras, and they were tasked with training the young musicians of the 35 “regional” groups. Through authenticité a new form of African music was being created, one which presented traditional Guinean music in a modern style. All of the orchestras’ musicians were paid a regular wage and all had opportunities to perform at government-sponsored national arts festivals.

In addition to a network of orchestras, the authenticité policy also created theatrical troupes, traditional music ensembles and dance groups in all of Guinea’s prefectures. Together, they formed artistic companies who represented their region in arts festivals. To further embed the authenticité policy all Western music was banned from Guinea’s radio network, and to fill the gap the government broadcast its own recordings. Since at least 1960 the Guinean government had been recording musicians, initially on Nagra III’s in makeshift studios. By the mid-1960s, however, the West German-funded Voix de la Révolution studios had been created in the Radio Télévision Guinée (RTG) offices, and these state of the art facilities would soon be augmented by a government-owned recording label, Syliphone. Originally recorded on ¼” magnetic tape, Syliphone recordings were released both locally and internationally via eighty-three 33.3 rpm and seventy-seven 45rpm vinyl discs. Broadcast by the RTG through one of the largest radio transmitters in West Africa, Syliphone recordings were a sensation, and Sékou Touré sent his orchestras and musicians on tours throughout the region and continent. It was a remarkable period of creativity which saw Guinean musicians as pioneers in the creation of African popular music styles and as the voice of a new Africa.

Dr Graeme Counsel, the project archivist

The British Library’s Endangered Archives Programme (EAP) funded three projects to archive the collection of music contained in the sound archives of the RTG. The Syliphone archive, as it has been named, is now available through the British Library Sounds website.

The first EAP project was to reconstruct the entire Syliphone catalogue of 750 songs released on 160 vinyl discs. The government’s own archive of this collection had been destroyed in the counter-coup of 1985, when artillery bombed the national broadcaster and home of the offices of the RTG. I commenced the project in 2008 and completed it in time for Guinea’s 50th anniversary of independence celebrations. These recordings commence with the reference number “Syliphone1”. The success of the project enabled access to the RTG sound archive, a place I had visited some years earlier. Then I had been shown a hand-written catalogue of perhaps fifty audio reels of recordings. In 2008 I was ushered into a room which contained walls of reels, two or three deep. In the few weeks that remained of my project I digitised and preserved as many reels as possible, and these recordings commence with the reference number “Syliphone2”.

Many of the reels had been poorly stored. Some were completely void of identifying information

I returned the following year to complete the archival project. In the interim, Guinea’s long serving President Lansana Conté had died. This heralded a coup, and when I arrived in August 2009 a new military regime was in power. On September 28 an opposition rally was attacked by the Guinean army in an infamous event known as the “stadium massacre”. 187 civilians lost their lives and 2,000 were injured. In the aftermath that followed, with risks of reprisals and civil war, it was clear that working at the centre of the government broadcaster was too dangerous. The project was abandoned, just a few weeks before the government fell. The recordings from this project commence with the reference number “Syliphone3”.

In 2010 Guinea’s first democratically elected government was in office, and I returned to Conakry in 2012 to launch the third EAP project to archive the RTG’s audio recordings. In 2008 I had archived just 69 audio reels of music. In 2009 I archived 229 reels. From September 2012 to January 2013 the remaining 827 reels were archived, and these recordings commence with the reference number “Syliphone4”. The completion of the project drew much media attention in Guinea and had resulted in the preservation and digitisation of a total of 9,410 songs, or more than 50,000 minutes of music. The bulk of the material was recorded during the era of President Sékou Touré, and the archive is thus a testament to his government and to the policy of authenticité. The Syliphone archive captures an important era of African history, that of the independence period, when governments and artists alike looked to Africa’s history and culture for inspiration.

The Ministry of Culture organised a ceremony to celebrate the end of the project. The Minister of Culture & Dr Counsel both made speeches, and the all-female orchestra 'Les Amazones de Guinée' performed, as did 'Keletigui et ses Tambourinis'. The event was broadcast live

 

The Syliphone archive contains many unique and important recordings which document Guinea’s 1^st Republic. It covers the early years (1960-1965), when Cuban music was a strong influence on the new and exuberant modern styles. The years following the Cultural Revolution of 1968 are extensively covered, and here new experimental styles are in evidence as music was being directly channelled by revolutionary policy. The early 1970s, when Guinean music was arguably at its creative zenith, is also comprehensively covered, and there are also numerous recordings from the post-Touré years, too, which permit a comparison.

Authenticité was abandoned in 1984, following the death of Sékou Touré, and the RTG’s sound archive was subject to years of censorship and neglect. Most of its recordings were never broadcast again, which resulted in a generation of Guineans having little exposure to the music of their mothers and fathers. The archive’s emergence is thus emblematic of the new era of Guinean democracy and of the gradual rehabilitation of Sékou Touré into mainstream Guinean politics. It is also a wonderful collection of music which permits us to “regard sur le passé”.

The list of artists and musicians represented in the archive is a who’s who of Guinean musicians. In addition to the complete catalogue of Syliphone vinyl discs, there are numerous examples of unreleased studio recordings by major artists such as Kandia Sory Kouyaté, Bembeya Jazz National, Fodé Conté and Kadé Diawara, in addition to hundreds of unreleased recordings by Guinea’s National and Regional orchestras, troupes and ensembles. There are dozens of concert recordings, too, and a wealth of material by famous Guinean artists who, as they were never commercially recorded, are unheralded outside of the region. Some of these include Farba Tela, Mama Kanté, Binta Laaly Sow, Koubia Jazz and Jeanne Macauley. The archive collection also features thousands of traditional songs from Guinea’s regions and ethnic groups, including recordings in the following languages: Baga, Bassari, Baoulé, Djakanké, Djallonké, Fulfuldé, Guerzé, Jahanka, Kissi, Konianka, Kônô, Kpèlè, Landouma, Lélé, Lokko, Maninkakan, Manon, Onëyan, Sankaran, Susu, Toma, Toma-Manian and Wamey.

Further information on the archival project can be found in the chapter “Music for a revolution: The sound archives of Radio Télévision Guinée", in From dust to digital: Ten years of the Endangered Archives Programme (Maja Kominko ed., Cambridge: Open Book Publishers, 2015) and also at the author’s website – www.radioafrica.com.au.

Dr Graeme Counsel, 2015.

Our final blog to coincide with the British Library's exhibition on West Africa is by Dr Fallou Ngom, grant holder for EAP334, a project that digitised Wolof Ajami manuscripts from Senegal. Dr Ngom gives a fascinating and detailed explanation on how the Arabic script was modified for the Wolof language.

 

It has been noted that some of the oldest African Ajami texts kept in some European libraries are mislabeled as arabe indéchiffrable (“undecipherable Arabic”).[i] Though Ajami has a long tradition in Africa, stretching from Senegambia to the Horn of Africa, it has been largely overlooked in teaching and research about the region, partly because Ajami texts are difficult to decipher by outsiders. Like other Ajami users around the world, Wolof Ajami writers enriched the 28 Arabic letters with diacritical dots (Wolof: tomb). These diacritical dots can be placed below or above Arabic letters or below or above Arabic vowel diacritics, as reflected in the excerpt below.[ii]

Exerpt 1: Wolof Ajami text

Romanized transcription Bismi llāhi al-raḥmāni al-raḥimi Wa ṣalla llāhu ʿalā sayyidinā Muḥammadin wa sallama taslīman. Mboolem Muriid yi degluleen ma yee leen Ci mbiri Shaykh Anta buleen nelaw yeen. Li may nelaw-nelaw du tee ma yeete. Li may gëlëm-gëlëm du tee ma woote. Amaana kuy nelaw-nelawlu ngir réer. Waaye bu dee fee yeete doolul yandoor.

 English translation

In the Name of God, The Merciful, The Beneficent.

May blessing and Peace be upon our Master Muḥammad

                        ---o----

Fellow Murid disciples, listen to be awakened

about Shaykh Anta. Do not sleep

No matter how asleep I am, I will wake you up

No matter how confused I am, I will call upon you

Perhaps, some pretend to be asleep because they are confused

But when awakened, they will snore no more.

 

Decrypting Wolof Consonants

The Wolof language has 43 consonants (including geminates). The following eleven consonants do not exist in Arabic: p, mp, mb, c, ñ, nc, nj, and ŋ, g, ng, and nd. Thus, to render them in writing, Ajami users had to modify Arabic letters that represents Arabic sounds closer to them with diacritical dots. An orthographic rule is applied to the following natural classes: bilabial, palatal, velar, and prenasal-alveolar consonants. The bilabial consonants (p and the prenasal mp, and mb) are written with the Arabic bā (ب, b) with three dots placed above or below. Verse 1 and 2 show examples of mb written with the dots above and below the bā. Similarly, the palatal consonants (c, ñ, nc, and nj) are rendered with a jīm (ج, j) with three dots above or below. An example of c (in ci, the proposition at, in, on) written with a jīm with three dots below is shown at the beginning of verse 2. On occasions, the dots are omitted inadvertently.

The velar consonants ŋ, g, and ng are generally written with the Arabic kāf (ک, k) with three dots above or below. An example of g is in verses 1 and 4. The prenasal-alveolar nd forms its own class and is commonly written with the dāl (د, d) with three dots above or below. Verse 6 contains an example of nd written with dāl with the three dots above. While in Romanized texts, the vowel diacritic that typically follows geminates and prenasals in Ajami texts is not represented, in Ajami texts it reflects an articulatory phonetic feature. It refers to the consonantal release at the end of words with geminates or prenasals. Finally, the sukūn (^o placed above a consonant) functions in Ajami texts as it does in Arabic materials. It is used to indicate absence of vowel after a consonant.

Decrypting Wolof Vowels

Three diacritics are used to write the three vowels of the Arabic language: i (kasra, a line below the letter), a (fatḥā, a line above the letter), and u (ḍamma, a superscript د above the letter). Similar to the consonants, Ajami users deploy innovative techniques to represent the vowels of their languages that do not exist in Arabic. For example, Wolof has the following eight vowels: i, e, é, ë, a, o, ó, and u. Five of them (e, é, ë, o, and ó) do not exist in Arabic. As in the case of the consonants, an orthographic rule applies to natural classes to write Wolof vowels that do not exist in Arabic. The classes include: front, central, and back vowels.

The front vowels i, e, and é are typically written with kasra, imāla (a dot below the letter) or their combination, as illustrated in verses 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. The back vowels o, ó, and u are written with ḍamma as seen in verses of the excerpt. In some Wolof Ajami texts, o and ó are further differentiated from u and are written with a ḍamma with a small dot inside.  With respect to the class of central vowels which includes ë and a, both vowels are generally written with the fatḥa, as shown throughout the excerpt.

Additionally, when a word begins with a vowel, there are several possibilities to write the vowel. Because the fatḥa, kasra, and ḍamma diacritics used to write respectively the vowels a, i, and u in Arabic cannot stand alone, the alif (ا) is commonly used as a supporting letter in Wolof Ajami materials. The consonants ḥā (ح, ḥ), hā (ه, h), and ^cayn (ع, ^c) can also serve as supporting letters at word-initial position in Wolof Ajami writing. The vowel a in the word amaana (perhaps), the first word of verse 5, is written with a fatḥa placed on a supporting ḥā.

Additionally, the ḥā (ح, ḥ) and hā (ه, h) have other orthographic functions in Wolof Ajami writing. They can both occur at the end of words. When these two letters (ح and ه) are used at word-final positions in Wolof Ajami texts, they reflect an articulatory phonetic feature: the uninterrupted airflow of final vowels. The hā (ه) can also indicate a dialectal trait in Wolof Ajami. In such cases, hā (ه) indicates a dialectal feature of the rural Bawol-Bawol Wolof variety spoken in the heartland of the Murid areas where h is pronounced before nouns beginning with a vowel, in contrast to urban varieties where it is dropped.

Decrypting the Segmentation System

The segmentation system that Wolof Ajami practitioners utilize to break their words and phrases also differs in some respect from the one commonly used in the standard Latin script texts. The phrases with multiple elements in the Romanized excerpt form single units in the Ajami excerpt. The first phrase in the box in verse 1, ma yee leen (I wake you up), consists of the subject pronoun ma (I), the verb yee (to wake up), and the object pronoun leen (them). The second phrase in the box in verse 2, ci mbiri (about/concerning the business of), consists of the preposition ci (at, in, on), mbir (business/affair), and the plural genitive morpheme –i. The two phrases in the boxes in verses 3 and 4, ma yeete (I wake up people) and ma woote (I call upon people), consists of the subject pronoun ma (I) and the verbs yeete (to wake up people) and woote (to call upon people). While the elements of the structures are isolated in the standard Roman transcription, they are agglutinated in the Ajami excerpt.

Though deciphering Ajami texts is clearly not easy, the benefits are immense. Deciphering such Ajami texts opens up new doors into important written sources of African knowledge that have hitherto eluded most Arabophone and Europhone scholars. Ajami sources are old and extensive and they complement the (1) Arabic, (2) Europhone, (3) indigenous written, and (4) oral traditions of Africa that constitute the “African Library.” Ajami sources equally deal with both religious and secular matters, including arts.[iii]

Bàyyi fen moo gën jàng al-Quraan ak xam-xam te jëfe ko [to stop lying is better than studying the Qurʾān and knowledge [of Islamic sciences] and living by it], a maxim in Ajami calligraphy emphasizing the primacy of ethical excellence over ritual practice in the Muridiyya Sufi order of Senegal. Courtesy of Yelimane Fall, Murid calligrapher.

[i] Mamadou Cissé, “Écrits et Écriture en Afrique de l’Ouest,” Revue Electronique Internationale des Sciences du Language 6 (2007): 84.

[ii] Source: Ka, Muusaa. Nàttoo di Kerkeraani Awliyā-i, copied by Muhammadu Amiin Saaw. Tuubaa, Senegal, 1989. For a recited version by Mama Njaay.

[iii] For more on the information in Ajami materials in general and the Wolof tradition in particular, see: Murid Ajami sources of knowledge: the myth and the reality ; and EAP334.

The African Photography Initiatives has just completed its two years project (EAP542) to partially digitise and conserve the archive collection of the Photographic Information Service in Buea, Cameroon. The collection contains images documenting “all the official ceremonies and things of general interest”(1) taking place in the Anglophone part of Cameroon between 1955 and 1980.

Federal Information staff celebrates Christmas, 1970. © MINCOM Cameroun

During the course of the project approximately 4,000 groundsheet dossiers (14,000 individual pages) and 26,152 negatives covering some 35 years of Anglophone Cameroon’s history were digitised and a database established.

Emmanuel M. Mbwaye, ca. 1980. © MINCOM Cameroun

If we wanted to give a face and a name, which is closely connected to this collection, we would immediately refer to the photographer Emmanuel M. Mbwaye (b. Bokwango 1928), the Photographic Information Service’s first photographer. Even though he retired 30 years ago, he retains very strong links with the collection and supports any initiative which helps to sustain this important visual heritage.

Emmanuel M. Mbwaye on his way to the South West Regional Delegation of Communication, 2013. © Rosario Mazuela

He learned photography from the Colonial Films Unit CDC (Cameroon Development Corporation) in the early 1950s. In 1964, he received a British council scholarship to study photography at Blackpool Technical College Young School of Arts, England. During that period he worked with the Information Service London and the Daily Mirror newspaper. In 1977, he received another scholarship to study in Italy where he did colour photography and television at Naples’ Channel 21. In the course of his professional career he trained many photographers and, as he said, “I’m satisfied that my knowledge has been passed to younger generations” (2). He was Head of the Photographic Section during the first part of his career and later became responsible for the Information Service’s Cinematographic Section.

Photographers covering the visit of President Tubman of Liberia to West Cameroon, 1962. © MINCOM Cameroun

A fervent advocate of the rights of the Bakweri people, Buea’s autochthon population, he tenaciously initiated and supported a great number of projects for the welfare of his community. Promoting health and education was most important to him. Together with Mrs. Ann Cross he created the first Buea Health Centre at Bokwango, organized baby shows (to reduce infant mortality), literacy campaigns, and, last but not least, acted as a referee for the Fako (the region of which Buea is the centre) wrestling competitions. “He not only loved development”, said Chief Litumbe George about Pa Mbwaye, “he was also very clear about human rights”. Against this backdrop, the creation of the Fako Division Tourism Board in the 1960s, which focused on the touristic development of Limbe and Foumban as well as the function of Chairman he exercised for many years, was only the next logical step.

Grand wrestling contest in Buea. Pa Mbwaye (as a referee) participating in the libation ceremony, 1980. © MINCOM Cameroun

In this post we want to present some pictures from the EAP542 collection which show the wide spectrum of Pa Mbwaye’s interests and activities. As much as he loved to be the man behind the camera he enjoyed his role in the limelight of social recognition, which he well deserved. Often, he, himself, was the “event to cover”.

Photographers' seminar in Yaoundé, 1977. © MINCOM Cameroun

Visit of the International Women Club Douala and presentation of gifts to the Ann Cross Health Centre Bokwango, 1983. © MINCOM Cameroun

Fako Wrestlers Association contest in Douala during the "Ngondo" ceremony,  1972. © MINCOM Cameroun

These images are only a few examples of many more which the South West Regional Delegation of Communication keeps in its treasure chest, the Buea Press Photo Archives.

(1, 2) Statements from Emmanuel M. Mbwaye in the program “Emmanuel Moanga Mbwaye. Photography Icon. Beacons of Time. CRTV. 2013” (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yr2Vd0IrrRg)

Rosario Mazuela

African Photography Initiatives

It is hoped that EAP will receive the appropriate permissions so that we can make this material available online.

EAP has funded three projects at the Sierra Leone Public Archives (EAP284, EAP443, EAP782) and we are lucky to have a joint blog post written by the grant holders of these projects; Professor Paul Lovejoy (York University) and Professor Suzanne Schwarz (University of Worcester).

Over the past five years, several British Library Endangered Archives projects have focused on preserving documents in the Sierra Leone Public Archives at Freetown which are of enormous importance for an understanding of the transatlantic slave trade and the African diaspora. A long-running programme of digitisation has contributed to the preservation of rare and invaluable sources which are perishing in woefully deficient storage conditions characterised by extremely high humidity. The oldest document held in Freetown is a treaty dated 1788, in which British officials claimed that the land on which the original settlement was built had been granted to ‘the said ffree community to be theirs, their Heirs and successors for ever...’. The treaty, now encased in Perspex, recorded how the land had been secured for a bundle of goods including a ‘Crimson Sattin Embroidered waistcoat, a Lead Coloured Sattin Coat, a Waistcoat and Breeches, a mock Diamond Ring, two pair of Pistols, one Tellascope, Two pair of Gold Ear Rings with Necklasses...’.

 
EAP284/4/1: Treaty from 1788

Among the most important sources held in the Public Archives is a long series of Registers of Liberated Africans (c. 1808-1848), which document the African names and physical characteristics of tens of thousands of Africans, labelled 'recaptives,' released at Freetown from illegal slave-ships by Royal Navy patrols in the aftermath of British abolition of the slave trade. These registers include rare biographical information on the African names and physical appearance of individuals released from slaving voyages originating from all the main provenance zones of the Atlantic slave trade from Senegambia to West-Central Africa.

EAP284/1/1: "Liberated African Department; Register 1814-1815; Nos 4,684 - 7,507"

EAP443/1/17/6 Pt 2: Liberated African Department; Register 8529 - 9758 [1816-1817]

As such, the evidence documents the characteristics of Africans who were part of the forced intercontinental migration by sea in the first half of the nineteenth century. Importantly, a number of the registers and letter books from the Liberated African Department include information which makes it possible to reconstruct the subsequent life histories of individuals following their disembarkation at Freetown. This includes details of the enlistment of men and boys in the Royal Navy and Royal African Corps, as well as the ‘disposal’ of men, women and children as apprentices in the colony for periods of up to fourteen years. The role of colonial officials in the dispersion of recaptive children to settlers was modelled to some extent on the example of parish officials in distributing pauper and orphan children in England to reduce the immediate and long-term burden on the rates during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. As such, the ‘disposal’ of Liberated Africans in Sierra Leone emerged as an important test case in the development of prototype systems of apprenticeship for the management of peoples uprooted and displaced by the transatlantic slave trade. This test case had wider ramifications, as principles and systems developed in Freetown were subsequently applied to other national jurisdictions for recaptive Africans in South Africa, Cuba and Brazil as well as in the British colonies of the West Indies and elsewhere following the emancipation of the enslaved population after 1834.

EAP284/1/2: Liberated African Department; Letterbook; 1820-1826; Vol. 1

Letter books in the Liberated African series also record the distribution of 'recaptives' to colony villages, including the settlement of Wilberforce outside Freetown, and their patterns of employment, education and accommodation. The correspondence of colonial governors and letter books that record exchanges with local citizens, missionaries, and merchants have also been digitised.

EAP443/1/3/2: Births; District Freetown [13 Apr 1857-12 Apr 1860]

Series of birth and death registers for Freetown and outlying districts provide evidence that charts the composition of the colony’s population in the second half of the nineteenth century. Subsequent phases of digitisation in the British Library Endangered Archives Programme will include police and court records from the nineteenth century, which include testimonies by Liberated Africans and their descendants. Other materials include Arabic letterbooks involving correspondence with indigenous rulers and officials in the interior of the Colony, records of fugitives who escaped slavery from the hinterland, and registers of children whose status in the Colony was sometimes uncertain, if not dubious.

These projects have received additional support from the University of Worcester and the Harriet Tubman Institute for Research on Africa and its Diasporas at York University, Canada.

To start 2016, we have another guest blog related to the British Library's current exhibition on West Africa.  This time we have Dr Mohammed Salau writing about the National Archives Kaduna, a major repository for Northern Nigeria.

As a result of the efforts of late Professor Kenneth Onwuka Dike, who was committed to ensuring the proper custody, storage and preservation of Nigerian government records, the Nigerian government established the Nigerian Record Office in 1954. Soon after establishing this organisation, the Nigerian government authorized the establishment of three National Archives in Ibadan, Enugu and Kaduna.

EAP535/1/2/2/28 Infaqul maisuri vol. I (translated in Hausa) by Major Edgar, 1911. Original file description/cover 

The National Archives Kaduna was opened in June 1957. By 1963, it had acquired a permanent building at what is now known as 6 Yakubu Gowon Way from the Federal Government of Nigeria. The holdings of the National Archive Kaduna include newspapers, Arabic manuscripts, maps, pictures, government publications, parliamentary papers and written records from the colonial period. The Arabic documents largely deal with the nineteenth century. Many of them were written by Uthman dan Fodio and other jihad leaders who established and or ruled the Sokoto Caliphate (1804-1903), the largest Muslim state in West Africa during the nineteenth century. The colonial records include files from Secretariat Northern Provinces, provincial files, records from Divisional and District offices, court records, early colonial assessment and re-assessment reports, anthropological and special reports, official correspondence, agricultural reports, and reports on chieftaincy and religious matters. Overall, materials related to all states in what is today known as Northern Nigeria (Kaduna, Kano, Plateau, Katsina, Kebbi, Kogi, and Kwara, just to mention a few)can be found in National Archives Kaduna.

EAP535/1/2/2/28 Infaqul maisuri vol. I (translated in Hausa) by Major Edgar, 1911. Handwritten Hausa document 

The importance of the collection at the National Archives Kaduna in the study of northern Nigerian history needs no stressing. The collection has received increasing recognition since 1957, and no serious scholar today can speak or write about any part of northern Nigeria without reference to this indispensable collection. Yet, a considerable part of the collection has simply been dumped on the floor; and most of the materials are in a bad state due partly to wear and tear of repeated use/deterioration.

EAP535/1/2/16/4 Kitab arla'u-na hadi-than by B. Ulama-I, date unknown. Handwritten Arabic document 

EAP535 targeted endangered Arabic and Hausa manuscripts from the nineteenth century, as well as early colonial reports. The targeted materials deal with diverse topics including colonial policies, slavery, religion, labour, agriculture, and culture. The project yielded a number of positive results. First, it succeeded in creating an updated catalogue of 2,376 materials that focus on the pre-colonial and early colonial history of Northern Nigeria and on the aforementioned topics. Second, it digitised 62,177 items and deposited copies of all the digitised materials at the National Archives Kaduna and at the British Library. Third, as part of the project, I have a published book chapter based mainly on materials digitised in the course of EAP535. In the article, I introduced and analysed digitised colonial records dealing with convict labour in Northern Nigeria to draw more attention to the history of the prison system in Nigeria. In it, I also argue that there are clear connections between convict labour and the construction of European hegemony. Although I included some images I digitised in the course of EAP535 in my published article, the images included in this short piece are different from those in the article in question.

EAP535/2/2/1/1 Cocoa cultivation-requesting encouragement to in N. Nigeria, 1902 

Mohammed Bashir Salau

Grant-holder for EAP535

Further reading

Salau, Mohammed Bashir, 2015. "Convict labour in early colonial Northern Nigeria: a preliminary study." In From Dust to Digital: Ten Years of the Endangered Archives, 293-329. Cambridge: Open Book Publishers.

doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0052.16