Selling Authenticity in the - Am MIT spezialisierte KI-Forschung

Selling Authenticity in the
Bamum Kingdom in 1929–1930

Jonathan Fine

Notiz: Due to a last-minute copy-editing error, this article went
to press with the ethnonym “Bamum” spelled (inconsistently)
“Bamun.” Fine’s preferred spelling is “Bamum,” and we have changed
all electronic versions of the issue of the journal to reflect that. Das
is the version of record.

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

In February 1930, Eugène Pittard, the director of the

ethnological museum in Geneva, sought to expand his
museum’s collections in an unusual manner. Anstatt
sponsoring an expedition to Africa or acquiring objects
from former missionaries, instead of buying from
established dealers in ethnographic specimens or the
newer galleries that specialized in l’art nègre, Pittard wrote to an
African man in Africa, a Bamum man named Mosé Yeyap (Pit-
tard 1930) (Feige. 1).1

Yeyap was the head of the relatively new artisanat in Foum-
ban, a school and artists’ cooperative founded in 1927, and he
was known as a key figure for collectors seeking to acquire works
of art from the Bamum kingdom. Pittard’s letter explained that
he “would like to assemble … as true a picture as possible of the
population of which you are a part, that is to say of the mate-
rial life of this population. I am sending you by the same post
[a list of] the kinds of things that would be the most interesting
to have” (Pittard 1930). Pittard explained pointedly, “I insist on
one point: Our intent is to have the oldest objects; those which
have not been subjected to European influence.” He then listed
for Yeyap the kinds of objects he had in mind: “sculpted wood
masks, statues, sculpted horns, usw. … sculpted drums with
carved animals or other designs. Miss Debarge [a physician
known both to Pittard and Yeyap] showed me drawings on paper
that you made of sculptures. Is it possible to have these sculp-
tures themselves?” (Pittard 1930).

Pittard’s letter, of course, epitomizes how European arro-
gance and fantasy informed the collection of African art in the
first decades of the twentieth century. Pittard condescendingly
and absurdly schooled Yeyap about Yeyap’s own culture and, von
privileging his desire for “the oldest objects,” those supposedly
untouched by “European influence,” Pittard revealed his adher-

ence to the chimerical “ideal” of African cultures as isolated in
time and space.

In a fascinating twist, Jedoch, we also have Yeyap’s response

to Pittard. Yeyap answered back:

I thank you for honoring us by wanting to show our country in the
Geneva Ethnographic Museum. I myself am especially interested in
what characterizes the tribe to which we belong. I try to give back
to our people a taste for all the works of decoration with which our
fathers decorated their houses. I am sending by the same post a num-
ber of drawings done by the students of the artisanal school. Ich werde
endeavor to search for very old objects, but because they are rare and
precious to us, I will wait to send them … (Yeyap 1930).2

Yeyap did not challenge Pittard head on. Stattdessen, his letter
adopted and reflected back some of Pittard’s points of view—
such as the idea that older Bamum objects were particularly
“rare and precious”—while also subtly shifting the discursive
terrain. Instead of making available older objects, Yeyap offered
to provide Pittard with newer works from the artisanat, wie zum Beispiel
drawings.3

The exchange between the two men provides a concrete
example of how African actors, in this case Mosé Yeyap, war
enmeshed as coproducers in the elaborate fantasies about
authenticity and African objects that Europeans and North
Americans were so eager to spin in the first decades of the twen-
tieth century (Osayimwese 2013). These fantasies, Natürlich, have
been a significant factor in shaping art historical scholarship
and the preferences of individual and institutional collections of
African art in Europe and North America. Although art histori-
cal discourse has paid more attention to how and why such fan-
tasies were projected onto Africans and objects from Africa, Das
Artikel, by examining a group of works from the Bamum king-

54 | african arts SUMMER 2016 VOL. 49, NEIN. 2

CHANGING DISCOURSES OF AUTHENTICITY
During the 1910s and 1920s, the quantity of African objects
that became available for collectors in Europe and in the Ameri-
cas increased dramatically. This sparked new concerns and gen-
erated new discourses for distinguishing among African objects
based on criteria of “authenticity” (Monroe 2012:454). Earlier
collectors of African objects largely took for granted that the
objects they collected, purchased, or plundered reflected the cul-
tures and aesthetic sensibilities of the people who made and used
ihnen. daher, Zum Beispiel, the German ethnologist Bernhard
Ankermann, who traveled to western Cameroon in 1908, wor-
ried little about whether the objects he collected and commis-
sioned were “authentic” (Ankermann 1910:305–306).

Shortly thereafter, “authenticity” became a concern, Und
Europeans began distinguishing between more and less desir-
able objects from Africa based on new criteria.4 For instance,
in late 1915 or early 1916, the New York art dealer Marius de
Zayas wrote to Paul Guillaume asking him to guarantee the
authenticity of a number of African objects (Biro 2010:N. 665).
Multiple discourses undergirded the new concern with “authen-
ticity.” Some theorists linked the undesirability of recent African
works to ideas about degeneration (Monroe 2012:454, Coombes
1994:43–62), which had its roots in Lombroso’s medical studies
(Harpham 1976:288). In other circles, the discourse centered on
“disruptive foreign influences” (Monroe 2012:454) as summed
up by Henri Clouzot and André Leval, who succinctly asserted
that “the arrival of Europeans [in Africa] has broken the chain of
traditions and dried up the sources of native art” (Clouzot and
Leval 1919:313, Monroe 2012:454–55).

Regardless of the reasons that were given, dealers, Kuratoren,
and collectors came to desire what they considered to be “authen-
tic” African objects according to new criteria. The most desir-
able objects were older, preferably “precolonial” works. Am meisten

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

VOL. 49, NEIN. 2 SUMMER 2016 afrikanische Kunst | 55

dom from the late 1920s, centers the field of inquiry on the strat-
egies African actors used to shape those fantasies, reinforcing
and confirming them.

1 George Schwab
Our friend, the interpreter, who got us things [Mosé
Yeyap] (1929)
Digital scan of nitrate negative
2004.24.8431, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and
Ethnology at Harvard University

2 George Schwab
View of Brass Effigy and Cultural Objects (1929)
Positive scan of nitrate negative
2004.24.8463, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and
Ethnology at Harvard University

3 George Schwab
Man Posing with Carved Wooden Idols (1929)
Positive scan of nitrate negative
2004.24.8476, Peabody Museum of Archaeol-
ogy and Ethnology at Harvard University

common bases for distinguishing objects that were supposedly
authentic from those that were not were age and use, which sup-
posedly left telltale traces on the surfaces and in the condition of
the objects in question (Monroe 2012). Objects seen to be contem-
porary were disparaged. Crucially, these ideas about authenticity
elided a number of separate issues. They made age synonymous
with use, and use synonymous with ritual. Das ist, old objects were
to be seen as ritual objects, sacred and powerful and hence “real.”
The new criteria of “authenticity” created a paradox for Afri-
can artists. The objects that were most sought by Western collec-
tors were, by definition, the ones that African artists could not
continue to make, regardless of how brilliant, talented, kreativ,
or skilled they were.5 It was simply impossible in the present
to create more old objects. Durch Erweiterung, works that were new
were suspect. If old objects were authentic, new works had to
be in authentic, fake. By establishing criteria that differentiated
between supposedly old works and more recent ones—automat-
ically suspect as souvenirs or fakes in the galleries of Paris—art
dealers were able to charge comparatively high prices for African
Objekte (Monroe 2012:458). Ähnlich, collectors could feel more
at ease paying the amounts demanded.6 Creating an economy of
scarcity was a necessary factor in transforming African objects
into expensive and desirable masterpieces.

African artists, craftspeople, and dealers, such as Yeyap, war
not unaware of the changing preferences of European collectors,
even if they did not necessarily know the reasons behind their
customers’ new desires. In der Tat, as Yeyap’s exchange with Pit-
tard clearly shows, European clients were not shy about voicing
their wishes. They asked for old objects, preferably carved works,
re presenting supposedly “traditional” subjects. In response
to these demands, African artists and dealers—who could not
make or commission more such works—pursued clearly dis-
cernible strategies to meet the changing demands of their cus-
tomers with the objects that they could make.

THE CHRISTMAS FESTIVITIES IN FOUMBAN IN 1929
Two of these strategies can be seen at work during an excep-
tional series of events that took place in the last week of Decem-
ber 1929. Mosé Yeyap organized a number of grand festivities
over three days to celebrate the visit of the French governor,
Théodore Paul Marchand, and to mark Christmas for the promi-
nent minority of Bamum people who had converted to Chris-
tianity. The festivities included a mass baptism, masquerades,
and a grande manifestation in the main market square of the
city across from the royal palace. King (Mfon) Njoya,7 the char-
ismatic Bamum monarch whose relations with French colonial
officials had soured since 1918, also made an appearance, arriv-
ing at the events with a large armed and mounted retinue which
was dressed in vividly colored costumes. Governor Marchand
arrived late. But he took the time after his arrival to tour stall
after stall of work by Bamum artists as well as displays of local
agricultural products.8 The next day, the staged festivities contin-
ued with more “old dances with costumes and jujus” (Huguenin
2006:329).

The festivities organized by Yeyap likely served multiple pur-
poses. They reinforced the presence and power of the Bamum
Christian minority, they entertained the governor and other
guests, and they presented a spectacular display of Bamum cul-
tur. But whatever their other purposes, the events were also an
unparalleled opportunity to sell works by Bamum artists and
artisans. Examining the events therefore provides an excellent
opportunity to scrutinize the strategies Bamum artists employed
to market their works.

STRATEGIC HISTORICISM
One strategy was to fashion new objects for sale in self-con-
sciously antiquated—one could say historicist—styles. A series
of photographs taken in Foumban over Christmas in 1929 von
the American missionary and anthropologist George Schwab

56 | african arts SUMMER 2016 VOL. 49, NEIN. 2

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

vast majority of the pieces were not older objects, but contempo-
rary works. dennoch, they resembled the kinds of objects that
were known as representative of royal art from the kingdoms in
the Cameroon Grassfields during the German colonial period
(grob 1900 Zu 1915). But by 1929 in the Bamum kingdom such
objects had become anachronisms.

Royal taste and patronage had changed noticeably around 1916
Und 1917, about the time that King Njoya first formulated his own
religious system, Nwet Nkwete (which syncretically fused ele-
ments of Bamum religious beliefs and practices with Christi-
anity and Islam), and then abandoned this project to embrace
Islam. Around the same time, a large portion of the Bamum
Bevölkerung, especially the elite, also converted to Islam or Chris-
tianity. Gleichzeitig, and probably partially as a result of the
king’s religious politics, older forms of sculpture, beaded fig-
ures, masks, elaborately dyed fabrics fell from favor. Such objects
largely ceased to be commissioned, made, and circulated.

Although not all areas of the arts were immediately trans-
formed, the shift in the emphasis of royal patronage fostered new
styles, art forms, and approaches to architecture and decoration.
These developments found visual expression in King Njoya’s proj-
ect to build a new brick palace, completed in 1922, at the heart of
the city of Foumban. The construction of the palace employed
the majority of artists and artisans over a period of years, and its
effects on artistic production should not be underestimated (Tar-
dits 1962:256). The palace represented a radical departure from the
immense pillared grass and mud structures that had characterized
the Bamum capital for generations, though King Njoya had been
experimenting for years with new construction techniques (Osay-
imwese 2013:12–14, Labouret 1935).

Just as crucially, during the 1920s the French administration
that replaced the German colonial authorities sidelined King
Njoya, reducing his power, authority, and resources and sup-
pressing much of the visual culture of the Bamum monarchy.

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

VOL. 49, NEIN. 2 SUMMER 2016 afrikanische Kunst | 57

shows the kinds of objects offered for purchase at the time. Der
selection is not markedly different from the what was available
in the late 1950s (vgl. Hirschberg 1962). There was a tremendous
variety on display: figural stools, masks, shields, carved figures,
Schlagzeug, embroidered fabrics, beaded calabashes, ivory, fantasti-
cal cast brass works, and musical instruments (Figs. 2-3). Der

4 Advertisement for the artisanat of Foumban,
Journal officiel des territoires occupés de l’ancien
Cameroun, April 1927 (236):227.

5 George Schwab
Native Cloth in Hand Drawn Designs (1929)
Positive scan of nitrate negative
2004.24.8470, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and
Ethnology at Harvard University

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

6 Unidentified artist
Chief’s seat (ca. 1929)
Holz, pigment; 85 cm x 50 cm x 50 cm
30-2-50/B4950, Peabody Museum of Archaeology
and Ethnology at Harvard University

7 Unidentified artist
Flywhisk (ca. 1929)
Holz, Tuch, glass beads, cowrie shells, horsehair;
56.5 cm x 17.7 cm x 8 cm
30-2-50/B4945, Peabody Museum of Archaeology
and Ethnology at Harvard University

Newer objects that represented royal taste after 1917 were not
prominent among the objects for sale in Foumban in the late
1920s and early 1930s. An advertisement for the artisanat in the
Journal officiel du Cameroun (Feige. 4) listed objects for sale such
as carved stools, batik fabrics (ndap), sculpted tables, beaded
polychromed calabashes, knives, swords, sabers, and cast brass
Objekte. The advertisement also listed numerous Western-style
goods, such as tablecloths and armchairs, which the artisanat
also made available in different styles for purchase at specified
Preise. Although Schwab took a large number of photographs of
the objects for sale in 1929, his images reveal comparatively few
Western-style objects or works of art in the styles that reflected

During this period the festivals of Nguon and Nja9 ceased to take
place and the palace associations that were largely responsible
for administration in the kingdom and which performed their
own dances and masquerades were suppressed or became largely
defunct (Geary 1990:116, Tardits 2004:54, Loumpet-Galitzine
2006:460). By the end of the decade, the king spent most of his
time in reduced circumstances in his summer residence at Man-
toum on the kingdom’s eastern border (Eloundou and Ngapna
2011:32).

These events decisively severed the links between artistic pro-
duction before World War I and after. Objects that had been
made for the royal court before the war to replace objects that
had worn out, to expand the royal collections, to provide objects
for the palace societies, or to furnish objects that King Njoya
could give or sell to German visitors and officials, in large part
lost their purpose and stopped being made. Stattdessen, a grow-
ing number of works in other styles and media, such as panels
carved with reliefs, richly illuminated manuscripts, and increas-
ingly spectacular drawings assumed new importance (Loumpet-
Galitzine 2002, Nicolas and Ncharé 1997, Tardits 1962).

58 | african arts SUMMER 2016 VOL. 49, NEIN. 2

Bamum royal taste after 1917. Where the photographs show
objects in newer styles, Formen, or genres, the works often hew to
a certain historicist logic. Embroidered tablecloths (z.B., Feige. 5),
zum Beispiel, incorporate historical Bamum motifs from before
1917: buffalo masks, double-headed snakes, double gongs, sowie
as familiar patterns, such as the triangular pattern kpatu (vier
heads), which had been worked on many older royal objects.

The objects that Schwab actually purchased, like his photo-
graphs, also illuminate the kinds of things that were for sale. Der
missionary bought a range of works of art and handicrafts. Viele
of them were new. A few were possibly older. But the majority of
the objects to which Schwab gravitated resembled royal objects
from before World War I, such as a small two-figure stool (Feige. 6),
which loosely resembled a miniature replica of the great, beaded
two-figure thrones that were closely associated with Bamum mon-
archs, at least since the reign of King Njoya’s father, King Nsangu,
in the 1880s. Ähnlich, Schwab acquired a flywhisk adorned with a
sculpture of a human figure embroidered with colorful glass beads
and cowrie shells (Feige. 7), which is instantly recognizable as akin
to the royal flywhisks associated with the Nja festival (z.B., Geary
1983A:Feige. 77). Schwab’s flywhisk appears to be new, but by 1929 Die
Nja festival had not been celebrated in years.

The prominence of new objects for sale that resembled older,
well-known works shows the extent to which artists in Foum-
ban by 1929 chose to reach back, passing over the manifestations
of more recent royal and European taste, to create works that
recalled an earlier moment in Bamum art history. The styles of
these objects implicitly affirmed their connection to the past and

therefore helped to satisfy the demands of European and North
American collectors.

STAGING AUTHENTICITY
A second strategy was to use or display objects in contexts that
“authenticated” them. This strategy centered not on the appear-
ance of the objects themselves, but on using them in ways that
suggested their age or presenting them in contexts that appeared
to establish their ritual use. The logic of this strategy, Natürlich,
subverts the equation of supposed age with “authenticity” by
asserting that if an object was used (or seen to be used), then it
must be so embedded in local culture or practices that it could not
have been made primarily to be sold to Europeans or Americans.
In pursuing this strategy, artists and dealers in Foumban went
to considerable lengths to fashion or to take advantage of cir-
cumstances that could be seen to attest to the “authenticity”
of the objects they were selling. Over Christmas in 1929, für
Beispiel, many of the objects for sale were used in the festivities
selbst.

The French missionary Eugène Huguenin described the events
as “ancient dances with old costumes, the public appearance of
certain masks and jujus (secret societies)…. [T]o be complete, Es
would be necessary to record the sharp ululations of the women,
the screaming sounds of the Hausa musicians, and the cheers of
the crowd” (Huguenin 2006). Schwab described the events in
more detail:

Great were the doings planned for the reception & entertainments of
his Excellency [Marchand]. … Several of the secret cults were out &
dressed in their masks & whatnot—[It was the] first time [Die] öffentlich,
d.h., non-members ever saw them. And the big “doctors” of the land.
Also the king’s riders, horsemen, musicians from whose music may
we be delivered … old warriors in their costumes & [enter]tained us
in a fitting mock fighting manner near the administrator in a special
pavilion. … Then there had been planned an exhibition of Bamum
arts & crafts, with old-time pieces in evidence—heirlooms many …
The exhibit of which I sent some 75–80 negatives to Dr. Hooton at
Harvard, was duly held to the boredom of his Excellency (Schwab
1930B).

Schwab’s photographs document that many of the objects that
were used in the festivities could also be bought. Masqueraders
danced or progressed with masks that were later offered for sale
(Figs. 8–9). Musical instruments were played, and then they (oder
others like them) were available for purchase, und so weiter.

8 George Schwab
Cult Members in Phase of Stunts. Seen for First Time
by an Outsider (1929)
Positive scan of nitrate negative
2004.24.8446, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and
Ethnology at Harvard University

VOL. 49, NEIN. 2 SUMMER 2016 afrikanische Kunst | 59

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

One can conclude that the use of the objects in the festivities
War, at least in part, a sales strategy. Although it is impossible to
be entirely certain, it is unlikely that the supposed rituals, mas-
querades, and dances were in fact Bamum court masquerades,
secret society dances, or festivals from earlier periods. Close
scrutiny of the descriptions of the festivities in 1929, Jedoch,
reveals few of the features that characterized Nguon or Nja, nor
is there much evidence to suggest that they reproduced palace
society rituals.10 By 1929, the grand festivals had already ceased
to take place for a number of years and the palace societies also
appear to have ceased to function. Tardits, zum Beispiel, Ansprüche
that the mutngu society ceased to exist around 1921 oder 1922
(Tardits 1980:849). It is more probable that the Christmas per-
formances drew on and mixed together disparate elements of
earlier masquerades and dances, creating something new that
seemed to appear like established ritual. Based on the extant
sources, Jedoch, it is not possible to ascertain firmly what the
Bamum people who participated in the events or observed them
really thought about what was taking place. dennoch, eins
can rule out that what was staged in 1929 was an intact revival of
dormant Bamum palace rituals.

The objects that were being used in 1929 were not the same
objects that had been used in earlier palace masquerades. Der

60 | african arts SUMMER 2016 VOL. 49, NEIN. 2

9 George Schwab
Cult Masks on Exhibition (1929)
Positive scan of nitrate negative
2004.24.8482, Peabody Museum
of Archaeology and Ethnology at
Harvard Universität

masks used in 1929 lack many of the characteristics of Bamum
palace masks, such as the lavish use of glass beadwork and
copper sheeting (Feige. 10). A number of the palace objects had
already been sold or given to German collectors, while others
still form the core of the Bamum palace collection today (Geary
1983A). Darüber hinaus, many palace objects and the public rituals that
pertained to them were photographed extensively by German
researchers, missionaries, and traders. In der Tat, these objects and
images have become crucial sources for interpreting the art his-
tory and history of the Bamum kingdom in the German colo-
nial period (z.B., Geary 1990, Geary and Ndam Njoya 1985). Der
masks, Instrumente, and costumes that Schwab photographed
In 1929 were plainly not the same objects still in the royal collec-

tion or that Germans had collected or photographed a decade
or more earlier. It is more likely that the masks from 1929 war
related to village—not court—masquerades or were entirely new.
How the objects were presented in 1929 was key to establishing
their authenticity and status for the foreign visitors and observ-
ers. It was the use of the masks and other objects in the festivi-
ties that gave them their status as “authentic,” transforming them
from recent works into things that were desireable to Western
collectors, or “upgrading” them from village objects into objects
that could be construed to belong to the royal court. This can be
easily grasped by closely examining one example in particular.
Der 1929 festivities mark the first recorded appearance of a large,
newly carved two-figure seat and footrest (Feige. 11). The seat, Aber
not the footrest, is in the collection of the Musée des arts et tra-
ditions in Foumban today (Feige. 12).11 Schwab photographed the
seat and footrest extensively. In one image, they stand alone at
the edge of the market where the stalls displaying goods for sale
were arranged. But in others, they are the center of an elaborate
tableau (Feige. 13): An unidentified man,12 sits grandly atop the
seat, his feet on the footrest. He holds a beaded figural flywhisk
and is wearing a loincloth and an elaborate headdress. In front
of the man on the seat are two trophy calabashes adorned with
human bones. To the man’s left are bare-chested women, while
on his right is a man holding a skull and a person in a masking
costume. The captions to Schwab’s photographs of the tableau
describe the scene as a Bamum “chief and his supporters.”13 The
seat is “the king’s seat and footstool.” The women are “the king’s
favorite wives,” and the man holding the skull is a “witch doctor.”
At first glance, the seat and footrest appear similar to the ear-
lier grand two-figure thrones of the Bamum monarchs (Feige. 14).
The seat, like the thrones, consists of a carved openwork hollow
wooden cylinder that serves as a seat and is surmounted by two
figures, male and female, wearing carved loincloths and head-
dresses. Ähnlich, the people Schwab photographed in connection
with the seat appear to conform to what a Bamum notable or king
might have looked like in a bygone era, with a loincloth and elabo-
rate festival headdress, surrounded by people associated with him.
But such first appearances are also deceptive. The seat differs
in a number of crucial ways from royal two-figure thrones in the
Bamum kingdom. Zum einen, there is no indication it was meant to
be beaded, and the cylinder of the seat is composed of alternat-
ing rows of carved human heads rather than interlocking dou-
ble-headed serpents. The form and iconography of the seat and
footrest are a simultaneous avowal and disavowal of its similarity
to the two-figure thrones that are symbols of Bamum monarchy.
The appearance of the people surrounding the throne is also a
fantasy. The costumes mix what appear to be older elements with
newer styles—the seated man is wearing trousers under his loin-
cloth and his headdress is only an approximation of the king’s
dancing costume headdress (Feige. 15). The men immediately
flanking the seated figure are wearing modern robes in a style
that had become popular since the German colonial period, Und
it would have been unthinkable for women from the royal fam-
ily, queens or princesses, to allow themselves to be photographed
bare-chested, especially after King Njoya had converted to Islam.
The photographs of members of the Bamum royal family, von

10 Unidentified artists
Helmet mask, 19th or 20th century
Holz, copper, glass beads, raffia, cowrie shells; 66
cm x 35.6 cm x 27.3 cm
Metropolitan Museum of Art 1978.412.560
The Michael C. Rockefeller Memorial Collection, Pur-
chase, Nelson A. Rockefeller Gift, 1967
Foto: www.metmuesum.org

nobles, and of ritual figures taken during the German colonial
Zeitraum, as well as contemporary descriptions of fashion in the
kingdom (e.g, Rein-Wuhrmann 1925:38–45), establish clearly
that dress of the people Schwab photographed in 1929 was highly
unusual.

Darüber hinaus, there is also evidence that suggests that Schwab
must have known that what he was photographing could not be
as he described it, and that the tableau of the supposed “chief ”
on the “king’s” seat, surrounded by his “favorite wives” and a
“witch doctor” was a fantasy. Schwab’s letters about his time in
Foumban show that he had a reasonable grasp of the political
situation in the kingdom, the tense relations between Yeyap and

VOL. 49, NEIN. 2 SUMMER 2016 afrikanische Kunst | 61

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

King Njoya, and he actually photographed King Njoya, wearing
a turban and richly embroidered robes.14 He must have known
that the man on the two-figure seat was not the king.

Using the seat as though it were a royal throne, placing it
in the center of an elaborate but false tableau, and dressing in
ways that seemed to evoke the distant Bamum past were actions
that created a visual context for the new seat and for the other
objects in the photographs. The supposed scientific objectivity
and objective truth that photography as a medium often was
thought to enjoy imparted to the objects an an aura of “authen-
ticity.” The photographs also created lasting visual evidence that
evinced that reality. The presentation, the staging of the seat and
the people around it, obscured the clear distinction between past
and present, allowing things that were made in the present to be
understood and seen as belonging to the past.

The staged festivities provided further visual proof of the
authenticity of the objects being used in them. If the festivities
were “real,” then the objects that were used in them and dis-
played for sale were “real” as well. The festivities furnished evi-
dence that the objects for sale, even if new, were also organically
connected to historical Bamum culture and art and thus could
be safely acquired by collectors seeking “authentic” African art.

ART AND ARTIFICE
The staging of festivities and the presentation of objects in
historical styles appears to have largely convinced the Europe-
ans and Americans. Although the foreign observers understood
that the events had been contrived for the reception of Gov-
ernor Marchand, this did not prevent them also from believ-
ing that what they saw conformed to (earlier) Bamum rituals.
Huguenin, zum Beispiel, wrote that the events were “demonstra-
tionen,” suggesting simultaneously their artifice and their authen-
ticity (Huguenin 2006). Schwab reported back to his mentor in
the Presbyterian missionary organization in Philadelphia that he
was witnessing the doings of “secret cults” and “[witch] doctors”

11 George Schwab
The King’s Seat and Footstool (1929)
Positive scan of nitrate negative
2004.24.8472, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and
Ethnology at Harvard University

12. Unidentified artists
Two-figure seat (ca. 1929)
Musée des arts et traditions, Foumban, Cameroon
Foto: Mark D. DeLancey, 2013

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

62 | african arts SUMMER 2016 VOL. 49, NEIN. 2

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

13 George Schwab
Bamum Chief, on Sculpted Throne, with Supporters (1929)
Positive scan of nitrate negative
2004.24.8451, Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Eth-
nology at Harvard University

(Schwab 1930b). Both men clearly seem to have subscribed to
the belief that, although the context in which they were witness-
ing the events was artificial, nonetheless many of the things they
were seeing represented the revelation of previously secret rituals
and objects. As Huguenin explained, “When the natives dance,
even just as a demonstration, one feels that their old nature takes
über, and it quickly becomes a frenzy. If Mosé Yeyap organized
this demonstration, it was to reveal certain jujus which, durch
this act [being revealed], lost their significance.” Yeyap’s actions,
according to the missionary, aimed to “deracinate … old super-
stitions that retard the development of the tribe” (Huguenin
2006:330).

The investment in the belief that the festivities were demysti-
fying older supersititions was crucial. The foreign visitors, espe-
cially these missionaries, were confronted by a dilemma. An
the one hand, they were witnessing festivities, dances, and mas-
querades that they knew to be staged with many objects that had
been recently made and were for sale. After all, the festivities had
been organized to celebrate the governor’s visit and the Christ-
mas holiday, not because it was the usual time and place for
Bamum festivals. Andererseits, the visitors wanted deeply
for the events to be more than mere staged performances and
the objects to be something other than fantasy things created to
sell to them. By believing that they were witnessing the public
revelation and demystification of important Bamum pagan rit-
uals and objects, foreigners from Europe and the United States
were able to resolve their dilemma: for the demystification of
Bamum rituals to be effective, the dances, Objekte, and jujus,
had to be “real.”15 In their zeal, the foreign missionaries chose to
believe that the audience for the events was Bamum people who
had not yet converted to Christianity or who could be wrenched
away from Islam. Despite the fact that they knew that the festivi-
ties were being staged for the governor and for them, the visitors
chose at crucial moments to suspend their awareness that they

VOL. 49, NEIN. 2 SUMMER 2016 afrikanische Kunst | 63

dom was also limited. Tatsächlich, none of the foreigners in Foumban
von 1929 had been in the Bamum kingdom for more than a few
Jahre, and those years corresponded with the period in which
Bamum festivals and masquerades, as they had been performed
zwischen 1902 Und 1920, had not taken place. The foreigners sim-
ply were not in a position to know whether what they were see-
ing were old dances, old ceremonies, old rituals, or not. None of
them had actually witnessed Nja or Nguon, let alone the dances,
Lieder, and rituals associated with the palace societies. Darüber hinaus,
it is extremely unlikely that they were familiar with the photo-
graphs that German visitors had taken of festivals and masquer-
ades before World War I. Ähnlich, the Western observers in
1929 also could not have known whether the masks and “jujus”
they were presented with were in fact secret objects. How could
Sie? Their epistemological horizon was limited. How Huguenin,
Schwab, and the other Americans and Europeans present inter-
preted the events unfolding around them depended on what they
must have been told or on their own imaginations, Stereotypen,
and preconceptions. They could hardly have have verified their
interpretations.

The festivities were a prominent constituent of an economy of
authenticity that mobilized a version of the past that was sharply
at odds with the reality of the present. Royal art and patron-
age had changed, the king had been stripped of power, und das
Bamum elite had embraced versions of Islam and Christianity.
Bamum art and history over the period of German, then French
colonial rule was characterized by rupture and change, not con-
tinuity. Noch, the strategies that Bamum artists and art dealers pur-
sued to accommodate the changing demands of their foreign
clients and customers depended on creating an illusion of unbro-
ken continuity. This approach to authenticity made possible a
sleight of hand, a way of resolving the paradox created by the fan-
tasies of Westerners about African art that simultaneously valued
objects made by African artists and artisans, but only if they had
not been made by contemporary Africans. It made it possible for
the artists of the Foumban artisanat to accommodate the new
demands of Western purchasers and to market their work within
the new system of values.

The economy of authenticity and the strategies pursued by
Bamum artists to promote their works functioned well. George
Schwab did not buy merely a few works of art in Foumban in
1929, he acquired an entire truckload:

I bo[ugh]t all I could pile on … our truck. In fact our boy and myself
had to hunch & fit in our feet dangling outside from that place [Foum-
ban] to Kribi! If you get to Harvard some time you might ask to see
the stuff which was of about three cubic tons of ship space if it had no
other wei[gh]T (Schwab 1930b).

Schwab bought an immense slit-drum topped by a carved
human figure, shields, stools, masks, carved panels, a doorframe,
ornate brass castings, a carved figure representing a captive or
slave, as well as other objects. These objects made their way into
the collections of Harvard’s Peabody Museum. Aber, as Yeyap’s
correspondence with Pittard makes clear, the American mission-
ary was not alone in turning to Yeyap and his artists to assemble
a collection of art from the Bamum kingdom. Careful observa-
tion of the photographs Schwab took in Foumban in 1929 reveals

14 Unidentified artists
Two-figure throne and footrest (mandu yenu), zweite
half of the 19th century
Holz, glass beads, cowrie shells, Tuch; 174 cm x 126
cm x 155 cm
III C 33341 A, B, Ethnologisches Museum, Staatliche
Museen zu Berlin
Foto: Ethnlogisches Museum zu Berlin, Martin Franken

themselves were an intended audience. They chose to ignore the
strong probability that the “natives” were managing them, shap-
ing their beliefs about the events and the objects in circulation
around them. The artifice of the festivities, for the foreign visi-
tors, lay in reenacting rituals to convince Bamum audiences that
the masquerades and dances (and the objects associated with
ihnen) were powerless and ineffective, not in making the foreign-
ers believe that the rituals and objects were “real.”

Huguenin and the other visitors were driven by their own fan-
tasies, illusions, and prejudices. Neither Huguenin nor the other
Western observers in 1929, such as Schwab, actually could have
known whether the dances they saw were “ancient” or the cos-
tumes “old.” Schwab visited Foumban for only a brief period at
the end of 1929, and Huguenin’s experience in the Bamum king-

64 | african arts SUMMER 2016 VOL. 49, NEIN. 2

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

a number of objects that were subsequently sold to or acquired
by Europeans and North Americans that have found their way
into other public collections. Zum Beispiel, the Musée du Quai
Branly holds two such objects, a statue (71.1934.171.8) and a mask
(71.1934.171.29). At least one other object, an anthropomor-
phic pillar (71.1962.59.2), quite possibly also appears in one of
Schwab’s pictures, though it is not possible to be certain. Addi-
tional research would probably reveal other objects in other col-
lections as well.

15 Bernhard Ankermann
Tanzkleid des Königs, rechte Hälfte (1908)
Black and white positive
VIII A 5331, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin–
Ethnologisches Museum

EXTENDING THE PARADIGM
The strategies for authenticating objects that were on dis-
play over Christmas in 1929 reflect an interpretation by Bamum
people of what Westerners wanted and expected, a reprojection
back onto European and North American audiences of their
own projections onto Africans in an endless feedback loop. Das
loop also empowered certain African agents, enabling them to
capitalize on their talents, find employment, and sell the objects
they made. The logic of this feedback loop, Jedoch, required
Bamum artists and agents aware to be aware not only of the his-
torical styles within the kingdom itself, but also of the expecta-
tions of their new Western clients and customers. Nor was the
logic of this feedback loop limited to objects from the Bamum
kingdom or Cameroon Grassfields. There was, in principle,
nothing to prevent Bamum artists from also making “authentic”
objects associated with other areas in Africa.16

In der Tat, today the artisanat of Foumban is known not only
for making contemporary objects that resemble older Bamum
works of art but for its astonishing range of objects that appear
like art from other parts of Africa. Cast brass heads in the style
of works from the Benin kingdom, masks that resemble works
from Igboland, figures covered with nails, like those from Congo,
and new inventions, such as huge brass figures called “Tikar” are
all made in workshops in and around the Bamum capital. Solch
production, one may contend, represents a logical extension

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

VOL. 49, NEIN. 2 SUMMER 2016 afrikanische Kunst | 65

of the strategies that were so prominent in 1929. Perhaps some
of the first concrete steps of this extension, when Bamum art-
ists began making objects that appeared to be from other parts
of Africa, also can be discerned in a curious exchange between
Schwab and Yeyap. After his return from Foumban, Schwab
wrote to Earnest Hooton, his mentor at Harvard, that in order
to purchase the objects it was not enough to pay in cash: “I had
to promise him [Yeyap] a book with plenty pictures in English,
French, or German—all of which he reads and talks, on African
Kunst, ‘with plenty, plenty, pictures’” (Schwab 1930a). Yeyap appar-
ently wanted to see what other objects from Africa Europeans
and North Americans also found desirable. Despite the mocking

tone Schwab’s letter conveys, he was perhaps able to make good
on his promise. When Donald Scott, the assistant director of the
Peabody Museum, wrote back to Schwab on Hooton’s behalf in
1930, he included photographs, presumably of African objects:
“You will find enclosed also twenty-five prints of subjects, … as
possibly being of interest to your native friend” (Scott 1930).

Jonathan Fine is Curator for West Africa, Cameroon and Gabon at the
Ethnologisches Museum, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. His research centers
on art in Western Cameroon from the nineteenth century to the present.
j.fine@smb.spk-berlin.de.

Notes

I would like to thank Tobias Wendl for inviting me to
present an earlier version of this article at his colloquium
on African art at the Free University of Berlin. Hubertus
Büschel, Dorothea Deterts, Dagmar Herzog, and Paola
Ivanov all generously shared their thoughts on different
Versionen. I am especially grateful to Mark DeLancey for
his feedback. Natürlich, all errors of fact and interpreta-
tion are my own.

Today Yeyap (ca. 1895–1941) is primarily remem-

bered as a convert to Christianity and a political and
cultural opponent (and cousin) of the Bamum monarch
King (Mfon) Njoya (z.B., Nelson 2007, Dell 2013).

2 Yeyap’s letter presents an interesting puzzle.
Written in an assured and flowing hand, it is possible
that it was not composed by Yeyap alone, but in com-
bination with someone else, possibly a native French
speaker, whose identity is not known.

3 Drawings by Bamum artists from this period

have consistently drawn the attention of scholars
(Savary 1977, 1979; Nicolas and Ncharé 1997; Loumpet-
Galitzine 2002). Despite the attention, other than
Loumpet-Galitzine’s work, little progress has been made
toward a history of the genre.

Sidney L. Kasfir (1992) admirably addressed the
historical lability of the idea of authenticity and its logi-
cal incoherence.

5 A corollary of this epistemological regime of
“authenticity” is that, as Joseph Nemadovsky noted, viele
of the works that are “nearest to us in time” are “farthest
away in art historical documentation” (2005:69).

6 The prices of New York collector John Quinn’s
African objects, zum Beispiel, which can be gleaned from
his acquisition ledgers from the first decades of the
twentieth century in the New York Public Library, ranged
aus $875.00 Zu $60.00 or less. Als solche, the prices are
similar to those of many works by modern artists, wie zum Beispiel
Picasso, available in New York at the time.

7 King (later Sultan) Njoya lived from ca. 1879 Zu

1933 (Jeffreys 1962).

ary Anna Rein-Wuhrmann published a description of
the Nguon festival as she remembered it from her time
in Foumban before World War I (Rein-Wuhrmann
1925:64). Less evidence is available about palace societ-
ies, but the Berlin ethnologist and curator Bernhard
Ankermann was able to photograph rituals associated
with the mbansié palace society: Bernhard Ankermann,
Männer mit Trommeln und Rasseln? Bansie—Tanz—
Begleitung, 1908, Photograph. VIII A 6766, Staatliche
Museen zu Berlin–Ethnologisches Museum.

11 Steven Nelson has analyzed the circumstances
surrounding the creation of the Musée des arts et tradi-
tionen (Nelson 2007).

12 The man conceivably could be one of the
regional “chiefs” installed by the French regime in
the 1920s. Jedoch, my efforts to identify him using
Schwab’s photographs during a research trip to Foum-
ban in 2013 were not successful.

13 One of the images from Schwab’s series was
published in Christraud Geary’s important reevaluation
of the history of Bamum thrones (Geary 1983b:Feige. 12).

14 The photograph is held in the Peabody Museum
of Archaeology and Ethnology: George Schwab, Bamum
King Njoya, 1929, positive scan of nitrate negative,
2004.24.8416.

15 Subsequent scholars sometimes have made
similar leaps of faith. Zum Beispiel, Simon Dell argues
that the events in 1929 represented a display of previ-
ously secret instruments pertaining to Bamum palace
societies, especially mbansié and ngurri, and that the
festivities themselves were to be understood by Bamum
audiences as a new Nguon festival. He concludes that
this display showed the powerlessness of the palace
societies at that time and, like Huguenin and Schwab,
that the display of the objects reduced them from ritu-
ally effective objects to mere things (Dell 2013:42–43).
16 Christopher Steiner has analyzed this issue in
relation to art from West Africa later in the twentieth
Jahrhundert (Steiner 1994).

Such displays of objects for sale did not begin in

References cited

1929, but also took place at earlier times. Zum Beispiel,
an unknown photographer, possibly the Basel mission-
ary Eugen Schwarz, photographed a similar display
of beaded calabashes and other objects in 1913 (Geary
2008:Feige. 22).

9 Nguon and Nja were the two main annual royal

public festivals in the Bamum kingdom in the last
decades of the nineteenth and first decades of the twen-
tieth century. They featured elaborate public displays of
masks, dancing, and costumes. Claude Tardits provides
an extended description of Nja (Tardits 1980:790–93)
and Nguon (Tardits 1980:783–87)

10 Christraud Geary’s careful analysis of photo-
graphs has provided crucial evidence for understanding
the Nja festival (Geary 1990). In the 1920s, the mission-

Ankermann, Bernhard. 1910. “Bericht über eine ethnog-
raphische Forschungsreise ins Grasland von Kamerun.”
Zeitschrift für Ethnologie 42:288–310.

Biro, Yaëlle. 2010. Transformation de l’object eth-
nographique africain en objet d’art. Circulation, com-
merce et diffusion des oeuvres africains en Europe
Occidentale et aux États Unis, des années 1900 aux annés
1920. Ph. D. diss. Université Paris I—La Sorbonne.

Clouzot, Henri, and André Leval. 1919. “L’art Nègre.” La
Gazette Des Beaux-Arts 61 (700):311–24.

Coombes, Annie E. 1994. Reinventing Africa: Museums,
Material Culture, and Popular Imagination in Late
Victorian and Edwardian England. New Haven, CT: Yale

Universitätsverlag.

Dell, Simon. 2013. “Yeyap’s Resouces: Representation
and the Arts of the Bamum in Cameroon and France,
1902–1935.” In World Art and the Legacies of Colonial
Gewalt, Hrsg. Daniel J. Rycroft, S. 31–58. Farnham, Sur-
rey: Ashgate.

Eloundou, Eugène Désiré, and Arouna Ngapna. 2011.
Un souverain bamoun en exil: le roi Njoya Ibrahima à
Yaoundé, 1931–1933. Paris: L’Harmattan.

Geary, Christraud M. 1983A. Things of the Palace: A
Catalogue of the Bamum Palace Museum in Foumban
(Cameroon). Wiesbaden: F. Steiner Verlag.

_______. 1983B. “Bamum Two-Figure Thrones: Addi-
tional Evidence.” African Arts 16 (4):46–87.

_______. 1990. “Photographie als kunsthistorische
Quelle. Das Nja-Fest der Bamum (Kamerun) im
späten 19. und frühen 20. Jahrhundert.” In Der Sinn des
Schönen: Ästhetik, Soziologie, und Geschichte der Afri-
kanischen Kunst, Hrsg. Miklós Szalay, S. 113–77. München:
Trickster.

_______. 2008. “Bamum und Tikar: Inspiration und
Innovation.” In Kamerun: Kunst der Könige, S. 25–67.
Zürich: Museum Rietberg.

Geary, Christraud M., and Adamou Ndam Njoya. 1985.
Mandu Yenu: Bilder aus Bamum, einem westafri-
kanischen Königreich, 1902—1915. München: Trickster.

Harpham, Geoffrey. 1976. “Time Running Out: Der
Edwardian Sense of Cultural Degeneration.” Clio 5
(3):283–301.

Hirschberg, Walter. 1962. Die Künstlerstrasse: auf Studi-
enreise durch Kamerun. Vienna: Wollzeilen Verlag.

Huguenin, Eugène. 2006. “Cameroun: fin d’année
à Foumban.” In Njoya et le royaume bamoun: les
archives de la Société des missions évangéliques de Paris,
1917–1937, by Alexandra Loumpet-Galitzine, S. 329–30.
Paris: Karthala. Originally published 1930.

Jeffreys, M.D.W. 1962. “The Date of the Bamum-Banso
War.” Man, Mai:70–71.

Kasfir, Sidney Littlefield. 1992. “African Art and Authen-
ticity: A Text with a Shadow.” African Arts 25 (2):40.

Labouret, Henri. 1935. “L’ancien palais royal de Foum-
ban.” Togo-Cameroun, Juli:121–26.

Loumpet-Galitzine, Alexandra. 2002. “Ibrahim Njoya:
Master of Bamoun Drawing.” In An Anthology of Afri-
can Art: The Twentieth Century, Hrsg. N’goné Fall and Jean
Loup Pivin, S. 102–105. New York: Distributed Art
Publishers.

_______. 2006. Njoya et le royaume bamoun: les
archives de la Société des missions évangéliques de Paris,
1917–1937. Paris: Karthala.

66 | african arts SUMMER 2016 VOL. 49, NEIN. 2

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D

F
/

4
9
2
5
4
1
7
3
6
8
7
5
A
A
R
_
A
_
0
0
2
8
6
P
D

B
j
G
u
e
S
T

Ö
N
0
8
S
e
P
e
M
B
e
R
2
0
2
3

Monroe, John Warne. 2012. “Surface Tensions: Empire,
Parisian Modernism, and ‘Authenticity’ in African
Sculpture, 1917–1939.” The American Historical Review
117 (2):445–75.

Nelson, Steven. 2007. “Collection and Context in a Cam-
eroonian Village.” Museum International 59 (3):22–30.

Nevadomsky, Joseph. 2005. “Casting in Contemporary
Benin Art.” African Arts 38 (2):66–77, 95–96.

Nicolas, Alain, and Oumarou Ncharé, Hrsg. 1997. Les des-
sins bamum: Marseille-Foumban (Cameroun). Marseille:
Musée d’arts africains, océaniens, amérindiens; Skira.

Osayimwese, Itohan. 2013. “Architecture and the Myth of
Authenticity during the German Colonial Period.” Tradi-
tional Dwellings and Settlements Review 24 (2):11–22.

Pittard, Eugène. 1930. Letter to Mosé Yeyap. Februar
22. 350.A.1.1.2.2/2. Archives de la ville de Genève.

Rein-Wuhrmann, Anna. 1925. Mein Bamumvolk im
Grasland von Kamerun. Stuttgart: Evang. Missionsverlag.

Und 1. RG 142-4, Folder 22. National Archives of the
Presbyterian Church (USA).

Savary, Claude. 1977. “Situation et histoire des Bamum:
notes à propos de la collection des dessins bamum
du Musée d’ethnographie de Genève.” Bulletin annuel
/ Musée d’ethnographie de la ville de Genève Bulletin
annuel / Musée d’ethnographie de la ville de Genève
20:117–38.

_______. 1979. “Situation et histoire des Bamum (II).”
Bulletin annuel / Musée d’ethnographie de la ville de
Genève Bulletin annuel / Musée d’ethnographie de la ville
de Genève 21/22:121–61.

Schwab, George. 1930A. Letter to Earnest Hooton. Janu-
Und 5. Folder 30-2, Collection from Africa, Cameroon,
George Schwab. Peabody Museum of Archaeology &
Ethnology at Harvard University.

_______. 1930B. Letter to W. Reginald Wheeler. Februar-

Scott, Donald. 1930. Letter to George Schwab. Marsch 15.
Folder 30-2, Collection from Africa, Cameroon, George
Schwab. Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology
at Harvard University.

Steiner, Christoper B. 1994. African Art in Transit. Nocken-
Brücke: Cambridge University Press.

Tardits, Claude. 1962. “Panneaux sculptés Bamoun.”
Objets et mondes 2:249–60.

_______. 1980. Le royaume bamoum. Paris: A. Colin.

_______. 2004. L’histoire singulière de l’art Bamoum.
Paris: Maisonneuve & Larose.

Yeyap, Mosé. 1930. Letter to Eugène Pittard. Mai 2.
350.A.1.1.14/9. Archives de la ville de Genève.

D
Ö
w
N
Ö
A
D
e
D

F
R
Ö
M
H

T
T

:
/
/

D
ich
R
e
C
T
.

ich
T
.

e
D
u
A
A
R
/
A
R
T
ich
C
e
–
P
D