241203 - Rare African funerary post from the Belanda Boor tribe - South Sudan.

Old Tribal used African Ancient funerary post from the Belanda Boor tribe -  South Sudan.

Hand carved from a single piece of wood.

Dimensions: width: 29.5 cm. Height: 109 cm. Depth: 18.5 cm. Weight: 6.4 kilos.

Estimated age: 1910.

This Belanda Boor statue is dated end 19th or begin 20th century and comes with a certificate of Authenticity.

Provenance and history of the piece: collected on 1958 in Maringindo, Sudan, Bahr El Ghazal province, nowadays South Sudan, Western Bahr El Ghazal province, by comboni father Elvio Gostoli.

Overall condition: the statue shows deep erosion due to many years of wind, strong sun, rain, white ants. The wood (mahogany) is very hard, solid and heavy. Minor cracks are located all over the surface, as well as many signs of erosion, but the statue is still well preserved and looks amazing. General wear is evident.

This is an unique museum piece, of inestimable value, not easy to find of this age, and not easy to find of this beauty.

A true, unquestionable masterpiece.

A professional invoice with a picture of the object, as well as the aforementioned description, will be delivered with the lot.

Since the 1970s, wooden Bongo & Belanda Boor funerary sculptures of male figures have been collected in Europe and described as important examples of African tribal art. These sculptures are rare and sporadically offered. 

For shipping outside the Netherlands contact me first.

These large Bongo or Belanda sculptures originate from the Bongo people of southern Sudan. They were noted as early as the nineteenth century when travellers reported large carved grave or memorial stones placed above large stone graves. Carved figures on a plinth or abstracted pole-like sculptures surmounted by a carved head were at best idealized representations of the dead rather than portraits of a specific person. Among the large bongo sculptures, male elites, warriors, leaders or locally important figures were recognized and honored. Within a small enclosed grave, the large figurative sculptures formed part of scenes of smaller figures representing family members, while the abstracted pole-style of burial figures often has a ribbed neck, with each ridge thought to indicate a slain enemy or large animal. Created with a ceremony in which dishes of food were left at the place of grace, the figures and poles were also said to protect against sorcery.The bongo sculptures associated with burial practices were carved from a tree trunk, the base of which was buried sixty to eighty centimetres in the ground. They were placed in front of or in the middle of a burial mound and surrounded by stones, each as much as three metres in diameter.These graves were located near villages and the figures on them were completely exposed to the weather. Because the villages in this region were moved when the ground was no longer suitable for cultivation, the older graves are now largely lost in the savannah, with no paths leading to them. The low density of the bongo population makes it impossible to find many of these graves unless the local population is actively involved. This fact explains why the pole at the base of the sculpture is sometimes cut off with a machete: the bongos, who respect their ancestors and their old graves, do not want to disturb the ground by removing the buried part of the sculpture.We must ask ourselves what factors have influenced these funerary sculptures over the years and what their longevity is. Carved from hard wood, the hardness and natural resistance of the wood have given these sculptures great durability. The greatest damage to the carvings is therefore caused by moisture, especially during the rainy season. Erosion usually starts in the heartwood and many of the sculptures become more or less hollow. Annual forest fires are another cause of destruction, as traces on some pieces show, but because the hard wood is difficult to burn, the sculptures are often only superficially charred.

Collector: Gostoli Elvio (see last photo).

Fr. Elvio Gostoli was born in Furlo di Acqualunga, in the province of Pesaro, on January 1, 1924. He completed his high school studies, up to first year of theology, in the diocesan seminary of Fano. In September 1945 he joined the Comboni Missionaries in the house of Florence, continuing his theological studies in Fiesole. After the novitiate, he took his first vows. He continued his theological studies in Verona and Venegono. He was ordained on June 11, 1949, in the church of his hometown. Soon after, he worked in mission and vocation promotion and for some years he was sent to various Comboni houses: Trent, Pesaro, Rebbio and Sulmona. Then he spent the rest of his long life first in Sudan, where he worked for 8 years, that is until the expulsion of all missionaries, and then in Uganda, where he remained for 45 years, also learning different African languages, in particular Madi, Bari and Karimojong.

So in 1955 Fr. Elvio was assigned to the Vicariate of the Bar el Jebel, Equatoria Province, Southern Sudan, with the capital Juba. After a short adjustment period in the vicinity of Juba, his first real mission was Loa, among the Madi tribe, 200 km south of Juba, near the border with Uganda. There he found Fr. Umberto Cardani, his first teacher of Madi language. His mission among the Madi, however, was short lived - five months – because he was sent to replace a missionary, who had become ill, to Kadulè among the Mundari, in a territory that extended from the far south to the far north of the Bar el Jebel, a really huge mission. It included, in fact, the territories on the two banks of the Nile and the tribes of Mundari, Nyangwara and Pajulu: 10,000 sq km, with 75,000 inhabitants. There were only two missionaries. To visit all the villages it would take a year and a half and there were several problems to be overcome, like difficulty in finding drinking water and food, the wild animals, mosquitoes and malaria.

After the expulsion from Southern Sudan, Fr. Elvio was for a year in Pesaro, in charge of mission promotion.

In 1965, Mgr. Sisto Mazzoldi, who also had been expelled from Juba, took charge of the Karimojong’s region, becoming Bishop of Moroto, in the north-east of Uganda. Fr. Elvio followed him there. The Bishop asked him to bring aid to the Sudanese refugees in the Acholi region (Gulu diocese) who had been secluded into two refugee camps, 10,000 of them to Agapo and 17,000 to Achol-pi (which means dirty water), and had no shelter, food, water or medical care. The Comboni missionaries were doing their best to assist them and Fr. Elvio daily visited these camps and filled the Land Rover with sick refugees to take them to the hospital in Kalongo, where Fr. Giuseppe Ambrosoli and the Comboni Sisters never refused to take them in. When a group of Sudanese refugees was transferred in an area near the mission of Fr. Elvio, it became easier for him to take care of them, even the spiritual side.

Later, he was one year in Kangole, three years in Nabilatuk, fifteen years in Lorengedwat, eight years in Namalu, nine in Naoi and, finally, in Moroto from 2002 until his death.

Fr. Elvio had been sent to Nabilatuk in 1966 to help a very old missionary. A big problem there was the water, in short supply in the dry season and muddy in the rainy season. Fr. Elvio first dug a well and, when he met the granite, continued with the help of some rather crude but effective chisels he had made himself. Later on he dug a second well, which managed to provide water to the whole mission and the people in the neighbourhood. The years 1971-1973 were very difficult ones in Lorengedwat. After two years of drought, there was a great famine and many people died of starvation and cholera, especially the children who were dying on average 20 per week.

With the fall of Amin Dada and later on of Milton Obote, the situation became chaotic, partly because of the army’s disbandment and the general stampede. Fr. Elvio tried to rescue as many people as possible, transporting them for long distances, often at night. The mission of Namalu, where there occurred armed clashes, was looted and abandoned. Later Fr. Elvio took care of this mission. One day the Pokot, neighbours and rivals of the Karimojong and lived partly in Uganda and partly in Kenya, organized a full-scale revenge against the villages closest to the border, which were somehow used as basis by the Karimojong warriors and raiders. So they roamed the vast area of Namalu district burning all the villages on their path and killing those who had been unable to escape. Once again Fr. Elvio did his utmost to save the injured.

At the end of June 1973, he returned to Italy for a bit of rest and holidays. Just in time to treat a colon haemorrhage. In October he was told he could return to Africa as long as he was stationed in a mission not too far from a hospital. The nearest mission to Matany hospital was Naoi, so Fr. Elvio was sent there. He was now among the Mathenico, the most primitive group of the Karimojong tribe. His parish had about 40,000 people of this ethnic group. He had, once again, to start anew by getting to know the local people, finding catechists, beginning teaching catechism, forming new groups of prayer and building new constructions.

At Easter 1997, Fr. Elvio managed to prepare a hundred boys and girls for baptism. He very much desired to build a small hospital there. When, feeling pretty tired, he returned to Italy for a little rest and medical checkups, he met his cousin, Angelo Candricci from Fano, who offered him at no cost all the material needed for the construction of the hospital and the necessary hospital equipment.

In 2002 Fr. Elvio was sent to Moroto, Karamoja’s capital and seat of the bishop. Here he carried out his ministry until his death, which occurred on October 6, 2011. The Karimojong used to call him Ekasikout, “the elder”, not so much referring to his age as to his authority. After the funeral, presided over by the bishops of Kotido, Mgr. Giuseppe Filippi, and of Moroto, Mgr. Henry Apaloryamam Ssentongo, Fr. Elvio was buried in the cemetery of the mission, as it had been his desire.