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Container for Cosmetic Powder

At the time when this object was dispatched to Stuttgart, in many regions of Namibia, similar cosmetic boxes were used by women, and would often be passed down through the generations along female lines of succession, in some cases to this day. Made from the shell of a small turtle, these private containers for cosmetic, perfumed body powder were sometimes adorned with strings of beads made from various materials (in this case, glass) strung on leather cords. The object may have been attached to a waist belt. Text: Sandra Ferracuti.

Data Provider
Linden-Museum Stuttgart Staatliches Museum für Völkerkunde
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Cataloguing data

Cultural attribution
Bergdama
Object type
Dose
Dimensions
Länge: 10 cm, Breite: 7.5 cm
Material/Technique
Putty, Turtle shell, Leather
pierced
Current location
Linden-Museum Stuttgart
Inventory number
028214

Provenance and sources

when
around 1900 or earlier

where
Namibia

when
1903
Provenance
Dr. Anton Lübbert initially sent the collection to the Ethnological Museum in Berlin on the basis of the so-called Bundesrat resolution of 1889. Before it was forwarded to Stuttgart, Felix von Luschan selected and sorted the material there. In German South-West Africa, Lübbert had objects procured through "his collectors". Only a few months after the outbreak of the Herero-German War, in September 1904, Lübbert wrote to Linden that "it is already almost completely impossible to get Herero items". He had therefore "had the last stocks, which were in the hands of farmers and traders, bought up". Text: Christoph Rippe.

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