While the evolution of coiffures developed and reinforced group identities, they also refl ected the wealth of individual warriors, since they were also status symbols. “Clan or territorial allegiance, age, gender, ritual condition, even degrees of success in warfare, all are the basis for changing patterns of personal embellishment,” wrote Africanist John Mack.1 As a general rule, young men in this region began to grow out their hair after puberty until it developed into a helmet-like coiffure as they reached warrior’s age. In contrast, the women of Nilotic groups mostly wore their hair short. While some men used no glass beads, most did and many had their hair nearly completely covered with them. Mentions are made of these coiffures in the writings of a variety of early explorers and researchers, and these accounts are valuable as source material. The Nuer and Dinka tribes inhabit the northernmost parts of South Sudan. Since the Nile was easily navigable as far up as the rapids in the Bari area, trade ties with Egypt allowed them earlier contact with European sources than most other peoples of the African interior, and, consequently, they had early access to glass beads. Excavations in South Africa, Zimbabwe, Malawi, and East Africa provide evidence that glass beads from Egypt and the Mediterranean were known south of the Sahara as early as the tenth century AD. Ivory merchant and later British consul to the Sudan John Petherick collected a combination head and neck cover among the Nuer between 1853 and 1859, which is now in the collection of the Pitt Rivers Museum. It is made of large tubular white beads attached to a plant fi ber netting, undoubtedly cotton2 (fi g. 2). Save for the addition of the neck cover, the form and color of this object are reminiscent of the tropical military helmets worn by European-outfi tted soldiers with whom the Nuer may have been in contact, even if only during confl icts. It has also been described as reminiscent of a Circassian chain mail coif, but the resemblance here is purely one of outward appearance. Generally, such external infl uences can only be assumed or guessed at, and they are often controversial. In his book published in 1861, Petherick mentions examples worn by chiefs of the Neanglau, a Dinkaspeaking group. “Chief Angoin and his brother wore caps resembling sailors’ sou’westers composed of white tubular beads sewn in close contact onto a piece of soft hide; the thread was of cotton, and in its manufacture a thorn proved a good substitute for a needle.”3 Writing in 1873, Georg Schweinfurth confi rms that both the Dinka and the Nuer wore such head coverings.4 Two drawings of his survive, one depicting a Dinka Rek man wearing an example with turquoise-colored beads FIG. 2 (below left): Beaded headdress with neck guard. Nuer, South Sudan. Mid 19th century. Vegetal fi ber, string, glass beads. H: 49 cm. Collected by John Petherick between 1853 and 1859. Ex Augustus Henry Lane Fox Pitt Rivers. Pitt Rivers Museum, inv. 1884.32.3. © Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford. FIG. 3 (below): Map of South Sudan and surrounding regions. Cartography by Alex Copeland: polariscartography.com BEADED COIFFURES
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