A bangwato kaross
Novelette-Aldoni Stewart
The author wrapped in one style of historic Southern African wear, the Kalahari.
For societies without written histories, objects serve in the role of texts, recording cultural norms and achievements. This is particularly important in places where events have been purposefully suppressed. An object can be an aperture through which the truth shines through.
This is one way to look at the kaross, a type of leather cloak made by the Bangwato peoples of Serowe, in present-day Botswana. In the late nineteenth century, the Bangwato were undergoing turbulent times. Like other polities in what was then the Bechuanaland Protectorate, they struggled against their inclusion into Cecil Rhodes’ southern African empire. Intermittent wars between the British and South African Boers were fought over their terrain. Equally, they contended with natural disasters such as the rinderpest virus, or “cattle plague,” which decimated local herds.
This was a time when modernity was actively sought out by many African peoples, and also imposed by foreigners, including traders and missionaries. Thread replaced sinew. Textiles supplanted leather. Today, the once commonplace practice of making a kaross is a rarity, the leatherworking skills involved known by comparatively few. Like the buffalo robes produced by First Nations peoples of the American Midwest, historic Bangwato garments speak to expertise in manufacturing and material science knowledge.
The kaross (or sometimes, kobo), made and worn by indigenous peoples throughout southern Africa, is variable in style and construction. It may be made from single or pieced hides of large animals such as gemsboks and hartebeest (two varieties of large African antelope), cows, and leopards, or with a collection of skins from smaller species such as jackals or honey badgers. It may be further embellished with other animal parts – fur, tails, or flayed and flattened heads – and is sometimes decorated with metal beads. Though flexible, it is sturdy and robust enough to be an effective barrier against inclement weather, and to serve as bedding on a harsh terrain.
Traditionally, after defleshing a skin with an adze or knife, it would be processed with many natural products, which have functional equivalence to those used in industrial leather manufacturing such as fatliquoring (adding oil to a tanned skin). Indigenously-used substances such as natural lipids (like brain matter and milk), botanical tannins, powdered minerals, and dung, amongst others, were used to tan the skin, penetrating its collagen structure, contributing to the leather’s durability and softening the fibres. Many southern African leather objects are still pliable even a century later.
Unknown Bangwato maker, Kaross (or kobo), pre-1899, Botswana, Southern Africa, Hartebeest hide and sinew, Royal Pavilion & Museums Trust, Brighton and Hove Museums, R4007/7.
