19th century. L 156 cm. 'Large wooden drums were played in the chief's orchestra but they served mainly to transmit messages from one village to another. Usually resting on four legs, the drums often depict animal forms.' (Schildkrout, 1990). The thickness of the carved wood is different on each side in order to produce different sounds. To rally the warriors for an attack, or warn against raid these drums were elemental in calling neighbouring allies. Much of our knowledge about the Zande as the most formidable warriors comes from the first anthropologist, Evans Pritchard: 'Nowhere, in any part of Africa have I ever come across a people that in every attitude and every motion

Exhibited
so thorough a mastery over all circumstances of war or of the chase - other nations in comparison seemed to me to fall short in the perfect ease- I might almost say, in dramatic grace - that characterized their every movement.'

Provenance
Baron Alain Guisson. Yale GvR 79041. A few of these large drums, with antelope or buffalo heads, are public collections. They have been collected among the Barambo, a Sudanic people established in the Uele River region that has been subjugated by the Zande i the early 19c. Cfr. Koninklijke Museum voor Centraal-Afrika Nr. 7278 (collected by Armand Hutereau in 1912 in the Barambo village of Chief Biamongo;

Published
in Laurenty, J. S. 'Les tambours à fente de l'Afrique Centrale', 1968, plate 271), American Museum of Natural History Nr. 90.1/3670 (collect by Herbert Lang in Poko in 1913; African Reflections: Art from Northeastern Zaire, 1990, plat 10.17), Detroit Institute of Arts Nr. 1986/26 (

Published
in African Arts, XX-2. p.65).