- Kiffa beads
Kiffa beads are rare
powder glass beads named after theMauritania n city ofKiffa , where French ethnologist R.Mauny documented them first in 1949.cite journal| last = Mauny| first = R| title = Fabrication de perles de verre en Mauritanie| journal = Notes Africaines| volume = 44 |pages = 116–118| date = 1949]Kiffa
bead s represent one of the highest levels of artistic skill and ingenuity in beadmaking, being manufactured with the simplest materials and tools available - pulverized Europeanglass beads or fragments of them,bottle glass,pottery shards,tin can s,twig s, steel needles, somegum arabic , and openfire s. The term Kiffa bead, named after the one of the old bead making centres of Kiffa in Mauritania, was coined byUnited States bead collectors during the 1980s.According to Peter Francis, Jr., the making of powder glass beads in
West Africa may date back a few hundred years, and to possibly 1200 CE in Mauritania.Maure powder glass beads are believed to copy older,Islam ic beads, of the type made inFustat and elsewhere. Although the making of Mauritanian powder glass beads appears to be an ancient tradition, no archaeological evidence to establish their age has been found to date.Production
Glass which is finely crushed to a powder is mixed with a binder such as
saliva or gum arabic diluted in water. Decorations are made from the glassslurry i.e. crushed glass mixed with a binder and applied with a pointed tool, usually asteel needle. The beads are placed in small containers, often sardine cans and heated to fuse the glass on open fires without moulds. cite journal| last = Delaroziere| first = M-F| title = Les Perles Mauritaniennes| journal = Ornament| volume = 8 | issue = 3| pages = 24–27| date = 1984]Kiffa beads were made in various shapes: blue, red, and
polychromatic triangles with yellow, black, white, red and blue chevron-type and decorations that resemble eyes; blue, red and polychromatic diamond shaped beads; cigar shaped and conical beads as well as a variety of small spherical andoblate beads. Colour sequences observed on traditional beads with polychromatic decorations are always the same, i.e. red-yellow-black (dark brown)-yellow-red-white-blue-white. Often theobverse is decorated as well, and it is believed that different bead making families had their own distinct styles. For their wearers, all these beads heldamulet ic properties. The colours, shapes and the many different intricate decorative patterns all having specific meanings, most of them forgotten today.cite journal| last = Opper & Opper| first = H&MJ| title = Powdered Glass Beads and Bead Trade in Mauritania| journal = Beads| issue = 5| pages = 37–44| date = 1993]Uses
Diamond-shaped beads were traditionally worn on
bracelet s, sewn onto strips ofleather and arranged in traditional sets composed of a specific ratio of blue to red to polychromatic specimens. cite journal| last = Busch| first = J| title = From Powder to Magic| journal = Newsletter of the Bead Society of Great Britain| issue = 25| pages = 3–6| date = 1994 ] Their patterns are believed to protect and to increase thefertility of their wearers and it has been proposed that some might imitatecowrie shell s. Triangular-shaped and spherical beads were worn as hair ornaments and traditional assemblages could be composed of two complementary sets of three triangulars each, one blue, one red and one polychromatic, worn at temple height. Many of the small spherical or oblate-shaped beads were hair ornaments or worn in necklaces in various combinations with other glass and stone beads and were made by decorating a red, blue or white preformed glass bead "core". Glass slurry s were applied to moulded 19th century beads possibly of Czech origin. Smaller, cigar shaped or cylindrical beads are often also found to have been constructed from two or even three of the moulded beads. These are fragile and tend to break apart easily.Modern beads
With the passing of the last of the remaining traditional bead makers during the 1970s, the craft became extinct. Since the early 1990s, organized groups of women bead makers are again making Kiffa beads, using basically the same traditional methods. The craftsmanship of the new beads, however, has never reached the high standards and the quality that can be observed in the old beads. cite journal| last = Simak| first = E| title = Mauritanian Powder-Glass Kiffa Beads| journal = Ornament| issue = 29| volume = 5| pages = 60–63| date = 2006] Western artists have made their own versions in polymer clay or lampworked glass, but none of the modern creations come close to resembling the beauty of traditional specimens. The same applies to modern imitations made elsewhere, for instance in Indonesia.
References
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