Pot

Museum number:
5-1552
Permalink:
ark:/21549/hm21050001552
Accession number:
Acc.1302
Description:
Divining pot, patched black ware. 3.5 inches diameter, 2 inches height. Location: Suku. The open concave side is rubbed on the ground, while names of “fetishes” or people are called out. When the pot sticks at a name, the letter is responsible for the disease. Used mainly by non-professional diviners. This kind of divination is practiced in unimportant matters, essentially by amateurs. The results of divination are viewed rather as leads than as “truth” and are taken with some skepticism. If a matter is important, then the case is taken to a professional diviner, the best of whom use no divining apparatus but “see things in dreams.” Some professional diviners, however, whose reputation is not solidly established will confirm, for the benefit of their clients, what they dreamt by using a divining pot, or some other such apparatus (e.g. sliding a turtle shell along a string, calling out causes of diseases, and stopping at the name which the shell stops sliding).
Donor:
Igor Kopytoff and University Appropriation
Collection place:
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Verbatim coll. place:
Africa, Suku
Culture or time period:
Suku
Materials:
Ceramic (material)
Object type:
ethnography
Object class:
Fetishes and Pots (containers)
Function:
1.5 Household
Accession date:
1960
Department:
Africa (except Ancient Egypt)
Images:
Hearst Museum object titled Pot, accession number 5-1552, described as Divining pot, patched black ware. 3.5 inches diameter, 2 inches height. Location: Suku. The open concave side is rubbed on the ground, while names of “fetishes” or people are called out. When the pot sticks at a name, the letter is responsible for the disease. Used mainly by non-professional diviners. This kind of divination is practiced in unimportant matters, essentially by amateurs. The results of divination are viewed rather as leads than as “truth” and are taken with some skepticism. If a matter is important, then the case is taken to a professional diviner, the best of whom use no divining apparatus but “see things in dreams.” Some professional diviners, however, whose reputation is not solidly established will confirm, for the benefit of their clients, what they dreamt by using a divining pot, or some other such apparatus (e.g. sliding a turtle shell along a string, calling out causes of diseases, and stopping at the name which the shell stops sliding).
Legacy documentation:
Documentation associated with Hearst Museum object titled Pot, accession number 5-1552, described as Divining pot, patched black ware. 3.5 inches diameter, 2 inches height. Location: Suku. The open concave side is rubbed on the ground, while names of “fetishes” or people are called out. When the pot sticks at a name, the letter is responsible for the disease. Used mainly by non-professional diviners. This kind of divination is practiced in unimportant matters, essentially by amateurs. The results of divination are viewed rather as leads than as “truth” and are taken with some skepticism. If a matter is important, then the case is taken to a professional diviner, the best of whom use no divining apparatus but “see things in dreams.” Some professional diviners, however, whose reputation is not solidly established will confirm, for the benefit of their clients, what they dreamt by using a divining pot, or some other such apparatus (e.g. sliding a turtle shell along a string, calling out causes of diseases, and stopping at the name which the shell stops sliding).Documentation associated with Hearst Museum object titled Pot, accession number 5-1552, described as Divining pot, patched black ware. 3.5 inches diameter, 2 inches height. Location: Suku. The open concave side is rubbed on the ground, while names of “fetishes” or people are called out. When the pot sticks at a name, the letter is responsible for the disease. Used mainly by non-professional diviners. This kind of divination is practiced in unimportant matters, essentially by amateurs. The results of divination are viewed rather as leads than as “truth” and are taken with some skepticism. If a matter is important, then the case is taken to a professional diviner, the best of whom use no divining apparatus but “see things in dreams.” Some professional diviners, however, whose reputation is not solidly established will confirm, for the benefit of their clients, what they dreamt by using a divining pot, or some other such apparatus (e.g. sliding a turtle shell along a string, calling out causes of diseases, and stopping at the name which the shell stops sliding).

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