PI: Olivier Gosselain | Collaborators: Lucie Smolderen, Barpougouni Mardjoua, and Florian Vallée
Project ID: 2019LG08 | Location of Research: Dendi and Borgou, Benin | Host Institution: Université libre de Bruxelles
This project documents various aspects of textile production and use in northern Benin, in the departments of Alibori (which includes the historical region of Dendi), Borgou and Donga. The project arose from local requests from people formerly involved in textile production, who wanted to preserve the memory of their work. The project team had known many of these people since 2011 (when involved in the ERC project ‘Crossroads of Empires’, carried on mainly in Dendi under the supervision of Prof. Anne Haour), and they remained very involved supportive throughout the execution of the project. Altogether, the documentation concerns 27 people in 20 villages or urban districts. In alphabetical order, these were: Bagou, Barei, Gando Bembereke, Guene, Guerra ‘n’ Kali, Kandi Eboumé district, Kandi Gando district, Kantakpara, Karimama, Koubou, Louci, Mamasi Gurma, Nikki Maro district, Niori, Ouro Karambare, Sinende, Sori, Témé, Tomboubou, Torozougou. People observed and interviewed were either active artisans, former artisans (spinners, weavers, dyers), or resource persons able to discuss certain aspects of textile production and its secular or religious use.
Endangerment
Until the 1950s, hundreds of people were involved in growing, processing, weaving and dyeing cotton, producing garments for local and outside demands. The production of fabric contributed significantly to the economic growth of northern Benin. It is also one of the few craft sectors in West Africa that has involved both female and male workers, as well as free and captive people (depending on the production segment).
Socio-economic and political changes have increasingly slowed down this sector of activity and contributed to its virtual disappearance in the 1990s. Today, cotton is widely grown in the departments of Alibori and Borgou, but the species cultivated differ from the pre-colonial Gossypium that was grown in the region, and the methods of cultivation, harvesting and processing of cotton are completely different from those of the past. A few old women still spin cotton gleaned from roadsides or storage areas to ‘pass the time’ or to supply marabouts with yarn for making amulets. Men’s weaving on horizontal looms is now practised in only a handful of localities, and weavers are generally forced to use industrially manufactured yarns, so that the material and visual qualities of the fabrics they produce are different from those of the past. As for dyeing, whether by men in vats or women in jars, it has virtually disappeared. It survives only in the more or less well-preserved remains of old workshops or in the memories of former practitioners.
Methodology
Activities in the field were of three types: (1) preparatory visits to artisans; (2) data collection through interviews and demonstrations; and (3) translation into French of interviews conducted in Dendicine, Baatonum, Gulmance and Yum. Given the small number of people involved in textile production activities, the team chose to film all those they met at work, striving to document all the technical stages. For logistical reasons, however, it was not always possible to amend or film the entire process carried out by a single person, especially when these processes took place over several days or weeks (as is the case with the preparation of indigo dye baths). However, taken as a whole, the collection of assets exhaustively documents the processes involved in the production of cotton yarns, weaving on a horizontal loom, and dyeing in vats or jars.
The interviews aimed, on the one hand, to obtain detailed descriptions of technical processes, especially when these were no longer practised locally, and, on the other hand, to document the social, economic and religious dimensions of textile production and use.
All footage filmed during the 2020 and 2022 missions was shot by Florian Vallée. Footage from 2023 was shot by Aledji Ramanou and Klobo Thomas. The filming equipment included a Panasonic GH5 camera in 2020 and 2023 and a Sony A7S3 camera in 2022. Both were equipped with a zoom lens and mounted on tripods for interviews and certain technical sequences. A Rode Video Mic Pro microphone was used to record the sound for the technical sequences and a Rode wireless microphone for interviews and certain technical sequences.
Selected Assets
The following provide an overview of the topics documented.
Interview
Moucharaf, a 10 years old boy, recounts how he learned how to weave with his grand-father, Adamou Idi.
The former dyer Sidi Mohamadou describes the stages of indigo dyeing: sowing indigo seeds; harvesting; decomposing leaves; preparing ash (zaata) and potash; preparing dye; dyeing yarn; dyeing loincloths; folding and calendaring loincloths. To support his description, he uses nearby objects to demonstrate each stage in the process.
Spinning
Assortment of spindles, terracotta spindle whorls, a sample of unginned cotton and a small block of calcined bone powder used to improve finger friction on cotton fibres. The spindle is spun on a piece of inner tube sprinkled with burnt bone powder.
Gnaki Yo is a old woman who still spins and practices dyeing on a very small scale. She shows the whole technical sequence of spinning: ginning with her hands, carding with a bow, and spinning. Hand-spun cotton yarns are sold on the bobbin.
Dyeing
To show the colouring properties of fresh Philenoptera cyanescens leaves, Adam Idi’s grandson chews one and sticks out his tongue. Idi explains that the leaves do not contain any harmful substances and are used for pharmaceutical purposes.
Gnaki Yo puts the crushed and dried philenoptera leaves in a clay pot. After tasting the ash lye to make sure it is not too concentrated, she adds 1½ jerry cans. She stirs the mixture with a piece of wood and leaves the preparation to ferment for at least 5 days.
Cotton cultivation and management
Plant of an old variety of cotton in the courtyard of a house in the Bawe neighbourhood of Bouyerou. It is probably a variety of Gossypium arboreum. After the pod opens, the fibres surrounding the seeds stretch and hang down
At the entrance to the cotton ginning factory in Parakou, an old woman picks up cotton fibres that have fallen from the trucks, choosing the least dirty ones. Gleaning is a common practice among old women who still spin.
Weaving
Sabi Sika Boukari weaves a strip of fabric with a black and white check pattern on his horizontal loom. During the process, the weft yarn or a warp yarn may break: he ties them back together by moistening them with saliva and re-twisting them.
Metal reed of the horizontal loom used by Sabi Sika Boukari. To achieve the check pattern, he has assembled a warp of white and black yarns and alternates between black and white weft yarns, using two shuttles.
Use of textiles
Tako costume worn by a man during an inauguration ceremony in Morawonkourou. This ceremonial costume, once worn by Baatombu nobility, is now worn by many young people. It has become a must-have for men attending the annual gaani festival.
Garba Godje Sani pours water on the rooster’s head and observes its reaction to determine whether the spirit accepts it or not as a sacrifice. In this case, the rooster has not shaken its head, which means that the spirit does not accept the sacrifice.
Acknowledgements
The project was set up and carried out in partnership with the Département d’Histoire et d’Archéologie at the Université d’Abomey-Calavi. The team would like to express their special thanks to their colleague and friend Prof Didier Ndah for his ongoing support.
This project would not have been possible without the generosity of its community contributors in Bagou, Barei, Gando Bembereke, Guene, Guerra ‘n’ Kali, Kandi Eboumé district, Kandi Gando district, Kantakpara, Karimama, Koubou, Louci, Mamasi Gurma, Nikki Maro district, Niori, Ouro Karambare, Sinende, Sori, Témé, Tomboubou, and Torozougou. It is moreover indebted to its collaborators, Lucie Smolderen and Barpougouni Mardjoua, as well as Florian Vallée and Aledji Ramanou for filmography and Oumarou Alfari for interpretation.