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³ Ibid. 53. On the regalia of the Tio ruler and chiefs, see Sautter, Gilles, ‘Le plateau Congolais de Mbé’, Call. É. Afr., 1 (1960), 35–7;Google Scholar andVansina, Jan, The Tio Kingdom of the Middle Congo, 1880–1892 (London, 1973), 386–8.Google Scholar

⁴ Vansina, Jan, Paths in the Rainforests (Madison, 1990), 100.Google Scholar

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⁶ See, for example, Froment, E., ‘Un voyage dans l'Oubangui’, Bulletin de la Société de Géographie de Lille, xi (1889), 196, 199Google Scholar; and Dybowski, Jean, La route du Tchad: du Loango au Chari (Paris, 1893), 152–5.Google Scholar See also Vassal, Gabrielle M., Life in French Congo (London, 1925), 115–24Google Scholar; Gide, André, Travels in the Congo (Paris, 1927; Berkeley and Los Angeles, reprint 1962), 51–2Google Scholar; Briault, Maurice, Dans le fôret du Gabon (Paris, 1930), 153–6Google Scholar; Bafoutela, Raymond, ‘Étude morphologique et vestimentaire sur le groupe Bondjo de la Likouala’, Cahiers Congolais d'Anthropologic et d'Histoire (hereafter CCAH), IV (1979), 21–38.Google Scholar

⁷ Ravenstein, E. G. (ed. ), The Strange Adventures of Andrew Battell in Angola and Adjoining Regions (London, 1901), 69Google Scholar; Naber, S. P. (ed. ), Sam Brun's Schiffarten (1624) (The Hague, 1913), 9–10Google Scholar; Dapper, Olfert, Naukeurige Beschrijvinge der Afrikaensche Gewesten (2nd ed., Amsterdam, 1676), 149–51, 157–8.Google Scholar For similar descriptions of the dress at the Kongo court, see Bal, Willy (ed. ), Description du royaume de Congo et des contrees environnantes, par Filippo Pigafetta et Duarte Lopes (1591) (Louvain, 1963), 36–7Google Scholar; and Obenga, Théophile, ‘Habillement, cosmetique et parure au royaume de Kongo’, CCAH, iv (1979), 21–38.Google Scholar

⁸ For a fuller discussion of this point, see Martin, Phyllis M., ‘Power, cloth and currency on the Loango coast’, African Economic History, xv (1986), 1–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁹ Owen, W. F. W., Narrative of a Voyage to Explore the Shores of Africa, Arabia and Madagascar (New York, 1833), 173.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Vansina, , Tio Kingdom, 274Google Scholar; Harms, Robert W., River of Wealth, River of Sorrow: The Central Zaire Basin in the Era of the Slave and Ivory Trade, 1500–1891 (New Haven, 1981), 47, 63–4, 89.Google Scholar Raphia cloth did not disappear in the twentieth century, however, since it remained in use for work clothes and for special occasions such as initiation ceremonies. For a recent revival in its use, see, Jean-Michel Delabeau and Ngoulou, Sylvain, ‘Le tissage du raphia en pays Kukua: de l'industrie à l'art’, CCAH, X (1985), 45–51.Google Scholar

¹¹ Roach, Mary Ellen and Eicher, Joanne Bubolz, ‘The language of personal adornment’, in Cordwell, Justine M. and Schwarz, Ronald A. (eds. ), The Fabrics of Culture: The Anthropology of Clothing and Adornment (The Hague, 1979), 9–10.Google Scholar

¹² Coquery-Vidrovitch, Catherine, Brazza et la prise de possession du Congo (Paris, 1969), 401–2.Google Scholar

¹³ Sketches of these tusks can be found in Pechuël-Loesche, E., Volkskunde von Loango (Stuttgart, 1907), 76–7Google Scholar; also see photograph in Vansina, Jan, Art History in Africa (New York, 1984), 131.Google Scholar Also see Mount, Sigrid Docken, ‘African art at the Cincinnati Art Museum’, African Arts, xiii (08, 1980), 40–6, 88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁴ I have come across such sketches and photographs in travellers’ accounts, contemporary journals and archival collections of postcards and photographs.

¹⁵ Gibson, Gordon D. and McGurk, Cecilia R., ‘High-status caps of the Kongo and Mbundu peoples’, Textile Museum Journal, iv (1977), 73Google Scholar; Vansina, , Tio Kingdom, 154, 453Google Scholar; Hilton, Anne, The Kingdom of Kongo (Oxford, 1985), 37, 96, 118, 138, 205, 224.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Picton, J. and Mack, J., African Textiles: Looms, Weaving and Design (London, 1979), 175.Google Scholar

¹⁷ The point is developed further in the next section for the Brazzaville situation, but it has also been documented for other areas. See, for example, Beidelman, T. O., Colonial Evangelism: A Socio-Historical Study of an East African Mission at the Grassroots (Bloomington, 1982)Google Scholar, and Jean, and Comaroff, John, Of Revelation and Revolution: Christianity, Colonialism and Consciousness in South Africa (Chicago, 1991).Google Scholar For similar encounters elsewhere, see Thomas, Nicholas, Entangled Objects: Exchange, Material Culture and Colonialism in the Pacific (Cambridge MA, 1991).Google Scholar

¹⁸ Mayer, Philip, Townsmen or Tribesmen: Conservation and the Process of Urbanization in a South African City (Cape Town, 1951), 14Google Scholar, quoted in Coplan, David, In Township Tonight! South Africa's Black City Music and Theatre (London, 1987), 232Google Scholar; and Waterman, Christopher Alan, Juju: A Social History and Ethnography of an African Popular Music (Chicago, 1990), 6–7.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Nketia, J. H., ‘The gramophone and contemporary African music in the Gold Coast’, Proceedings of the Fourth Annual Conference of the West African Institute of Economic and Social Research (Ibadan, 1955), 189–200.Google Scholar

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²¹ Norden, Hermann, Auf neuen Pfaden in Kongo: quer durch das dunkelste Afrika (Leipzig, 1926), 262Google Scholar; Chalux, , Un an au Congo Beige (Brussels, 1925), 157–8.Google Scholar

²² Administrator Bonchamps, ‘Rapport sur la région de Brazzaville’, Brazzaville, 1 May 1900. I am grateful to Roger Frey for making his copy of this report available to me. Also Girard, L., ‘Brazzaville’, Bulletin du Comité de I'Afrique Francaise: Renseignements Coloniaux [hereafter BCAF] (March 1916), 38.Google Scholar

²³ d'Uzès, Duchesse, Le voyage de mon fils au Congo (Paris, 1894), 15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

²⁴ Reported in Dybowski, Jean, Le Congo méconnu (Paris, 1912), 161Google Scholar; Castellani, Charles, Vers le Nil français avec la mission Marchand (Paris, 1898), 33Google Scholar; also, Acadeémie des Sciences d'Outre-Mer (ASOM), Paris, Fonds Bruel, B-213–50, photograph, ‘Gabonnaises à Libreville, 1908’.

²⁵ Brunache, Paul, Le centre de I'Afrique: autour du Tchad (Paris, 1894), 13Google Scholar; ASOM, Fonds Bruel, B-5–40, photograph, ‘Congo-Brazzaville-Boy Loango, 1907’.

²⁶ ‘Communauté du Sacre-Coeur de Brazzaville’, Bulletin de la Congrégation des Pères du Saint-Esprit (BCPSE), xxi (1901–1902), 668.Google Scholar

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²⁸ Bouteillier, Gaston, Douze mois sous l'quateur (Toulouse, 1903), 73–4.Google Scholar

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³¹ N'Zala-Backa, Placide, Le tipoye d’oré (Brazzaville, 1968), 93Google Scholar; Svenska Missionsför-bundet (SMF), Stockholm, F1 Brazzaville Mission Journal, 4 April 1915; interview with Mambeke-Boucher, 20 Nov. 1986; interview with Roger Frey, 9 July 1987.

³² Interview with Papa Albert, 17 June 1989; interview with Mambeke-Boucher, 20 Nov. 1986; Hornet, Marcel, Congo: terre de souffranees (Paris, 1934), 218Google Scholar; Sabatier, Peggy, ‘Did Africans really learn to be French? The francophone élite of the École William Ponty’, in Johnson, G. Wesley (ed. ), Double Impact: France and Africa in the Age of Imperialism (Westport, 1985), 181–2.Google Scholar

³³ Puytorac, Jean de, Makambo: une vie au Congo (Brazzaville-M’ Bondo) (Cadeilhan, 1992), 46Google Scholar; Vassal, Gabrielle, Life in French Congo (London, 1925), 27, 115Google Scholar; Gandoulou, , Dandies à Bacongo, 11.Google Scholar

³⁴ Rouget, Ferdinand, L'Afrique Équatoriale illustrée (Paris, 1913), 70, 73, 77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³⁵ For example, see Maigret, Julien, ‘Nos grandes cités coloniales: Brazzaville’, he Monde Colonial Illustré, xxxii (04 1926), 83Google Scholar; Puytorac, , Makambo, 158–62Google Scholar; Sauvage, Marcel, Sous le feu de I'équateur: les secrets de l'Afrique noire (Paris, 1944), 68–9.Google Scholar Also Martin, Phyllis, ‘Leisure and the making of a ruling class in colonial Brazzaville’, in Galloway, Patricia (ed. ), Proceedings of the Seventeenth Meeting of the French Colonial Historical Society (Chicago, 05 1991) (Lanham, 1993), 99–114.Google Scholar

³⁶ Callan, Hilary, ‘Introduction’, in Callan, Hilary and Ardener, Shirley (eds. ), The Incorporated Wife (London, 1984), 1–5.Google Scholar

³⁷ Vassal, Life in French Congo, 27–9.Google Scholar

³⁸ Andrée Blouin in collaboration with MacKellar, Jean, My Country Africa: Autobiography of the Black Pasionaria (New York, 1983), 62Google Scholar; Vacquier, Raymond, Au temps des factories (1900–1950) (Paris, 1986), 101.Google Scholar

³⁹ Carrie, Monseigneur, Coutumier de l'oeuvre des enfants dans le vicariat apostolique du Congo Français (Loango, 1890), 43–4.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ Andersson, Ephraim, Churches at the Grass Roots: A Study in Congo-Brazzaville (London, 1968), 189.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Archives Nationales du Congo, Brazzaville (ANB), GG481, reports by the Principal of the Urban School to the Mayor of Brazzaville, 31 Dec. 1913, 31 March and 25 June 1914.

⁴² Archives Outre-Mer, Aix-en-Provence (AOM), Governor of Moyen Congo to Governor-General, 17 July 1948.

⁴³ Interview with Clement Massengo, 24 Nov. 1986; interview with MambekeBoucher, 20 Nov. 1986; ANB, IGE 144(1), Report from the Department of Youth, Sport and School Hygiene, 1952–3.

⁴⁴ Comaroff, and Comaroff, , Of Revelation and Revolution, 12.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Carrie, , Coutumier, 43–41Google Scholar; and Organisation de la Mission du Congo Français (Loango, 1898), n. p.Google Scholar; Briault, , ‘La mode chez les noirs’, 95–6.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Quoted in Marthey, J., ‘L'oeuvre missionaire pour la population feminine au Congo’, Revue d'Histoire des Colonies, xliv (1957), 81.Google Scholar Emphasis in the original.

⁴⁷ Carrie, , Coutumier, 17, 37Google Scholar, and Oeuvres des Soeurs de Saint Joseph de Cluny dans la mission du Congo Français (Loango, 1897), 6.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ Briault, Maurice, ‘Le cinquantenaire de la mission du Congo Français: Brazzaville, 1888–1938’, Revue d'Histoire des Missions, xv (1938), 509.Google Scholar Descriptions of these occasions are to be found in the reports from Brazzaville that appeared in the BCPSE and in the Annates Apostoliques. Although many Frenchmen were anti-clerical, some who describe Monseigneur Augouard more sympathetically confirm accounts of these grand occasions. The influence of the Catholic church, especially faced with the weakness of the state is an important theme in the history of Brazzaville.

⁴⁹ Interview with Mambeke-Boucher, 20 Nov. 1986; Vassal, , Life in French Congo, 72Google Scholar; Gabrielle, and Vassal, Joseph, François, beiges et portugais en Afrique Éuatoriale: PointeNoire, Matadi, Lobito (Paris, 1931), 153.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Lastours, Docteur Fougerat de David de, ‘Hygiène, nudité, soleil aux colonies’, communication to the Société de Médicine et d'Hygiène Tropicale (Paris, 1927)Google Scholar; Frey, Roger, ‘Soleil et colonies’, L'Étoile de l'AEF, 6 Aug. 1938.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Weinstein, Brian, Éoué (New York, 1972), 23Google Scholar; Ulrich, Sophie, he Gouverneur Général Félix Ébone' (Paris, 1950), 23–4.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ For more details on this incident, see Martin, Phyllis M., ‘Colonialism, youth and football in French Equatorial Africa’, International Journal of the History of Sport, viii (1991), 56–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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⁵⁴ Douglas, Mary and Isherwood, Baron, The World of Goods: Towards an Anthropology of Consumption (New York, 1979), 5, 10, 59.Google Scholar Other useful discussions of culture and consumerism can be found in Perkins, Elizabeth A., ‘The consumer frontier: household consumption in early Kentucky’, Journal of American History, lxxviii (1991), 486–510CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Culture and History, vii (1990)Google Scholar, special issue on consumerism; and McCracken, Grant, Culture and Consumption: New Approaches to the Symbolic Character of Consumer Goods and Activities (Bloomington, 1988).Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Data from the first reliable census, 1950–1, were published by Marcel Soret; however, other accounts confirm the statement from an earlier period. See Soret, Marcel, Demographie et problèmes urbains en A. E. F.: Poto-Poto, Bacongo, Dolisie (Montpellier, 1954). 9–10, 39–42.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ ‘Communaute du Sacré-Coeur, à Brazzaville’, BCPSE, xxvii (1910–1913), 55Google Scholar; Bonnefont, , ‘Brazzaville: la ville et la mission’, 108–9Google Scholar; Briault, , ‘La mode’, 124–6.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ Vassal, , Français, beiges et portugais, 153.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ AOM, 4(2)D55, Report of Commune of Brazzaville, 3rd trimester 1932; 5D65, Annual Report of Moyen Congo, 1932.

⁵⁹ Balandier, Georges, ‘Évolution de la société et de l'omme’, in Guernier, Eugène (ed. ), Afrique Equatoriale Française (Paris, 1950), 126.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ Soret, , Démographie et problèmes urbains en A. E. F., 91.Google Scholar

⁶¹ Balandier, Georges, Sociologie des Brazzavilles noires (Paris, 1955), 92.Google Scholar

⁶² Althabe, G., Éude du chômage à Brazzaville en 1957-étude psychologique (Paris, 1963), 10, 12Google Scholar; Devauges, R., Étude du chômage à Brazzaville en 1957-étude sociologique (Paris, 1963), 83.Google Scholar

⁶³ Coquery-Vidrovitch, , Brazza et la prise de possession du Congo, 209–10;Google ScholarRabut, Élisabeth, Brazza Commissaire General: le Congo Français, 1886–1887 (Paris, 1989), 364–6.Google Scholar

⁶⁴ Puytorac, , Makambo, 47–50, 56Google Scholar; see, Vacquier, Au temps des factories, for a comprehensive account of the stock carried by stores of the Compagnie Francaise d'Afrique Occidentale, which had an outlet in Brazzaville.

⁶⁵ Frey, Roger, ‘Brazzaville, capitale de l'Afrique Équatoriale’, Encyclopédie mensuelle d'outre-mer, xlvii–xlix (08. -09. 1954), 37.Google Scholar

⁶⁶ AOM, 4(2)D1 Brazzaville Administrator to Commissioner-General of French Congo in Libreville, 13 July 1901.

⁶⁷ Girard, , ‘Brazzaville’, 30–3.Google Scholar

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⁶⁹ Blouin, , My Country Africa, 66.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ Courrier d'Afrique, 8 Nov. 1951; ‘L'expansion japonaise en Afrique’, BCAF (1934), 496–7.Google Scholar

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⁷⁵ AOM, 5D88, Camille Diata to Paul Mayoukou, Brazzaville, 19 March 1930. Bacongo and Poto-Poto were referred to as ‘villages’ in contrast to the European ‘town’. The style ‘Popo’ was most likely influenced by men from Dahomey. By way of assessing the cost of being fashionable, the wage of a writer-interpreter-typist at the government hospital was 12 francs per day (ANB, GG 444[2], Report of the General Hospital, Brazzaville 1930). Camille Diata who was jailed by the French as a supporter of Andre Matswa was 19 at the time that he wrote this letter. See Sinda, Marcel, Le messianisme congolais et ses incidences politiques (Paris, 1972), 254Google Scholar n. 1. The letter was confiscated with other papers during a police raid and is preserved in the colonial archives. Letter-writing was a popular hobby among literate young men and Diata was no exception.

⁷⁶ Interview with Antoine Mangoyo, 29 Dec. 1986; interview with Honoré Monabeka, 27 Dec. 1986.

⁷⁷ Interview with Philippe Mokwami, 10 Jan. 1987; interview with Antoine Mangoyo, 29 Dec. 1987; interview with Louis Lingouala, 22 Dec. 1986; Gandoulou, , Dandies à Bacongo, 30Google Scholar; Bemba, Sylvain, 50 ans de la musique du Congo-Zaire (Paris, 1984), 76, 82–3Google Scholar; Balandier, , ‘Évolution de la société et de l'homme’, 126.Google Scholar

⁷⁸ Interview with Mère Emilie, 13 June 1989; interview with Sidone Ngole, 12 May 1988; interview with Albertine Mowango, 26 Dec. 1987; Vincent, Jeanne-Françoise, Femmes africaines en tnilieu urbain (Paris, 1966), 201–3.Google Scholar The older perceptions of value in cloth live on in the present when, for example, cloth changes hands at the conclusion of a marriage contract.

⁷⁸ Interview with M. Moustapha, 15 June 1989; interview with Mère Emilie, 12 June 1989; interview with Anne Ngondjo, 15 June 1989; interview with Sidone Ngole, 12 May 1988.

⁸⁰ Raoul-Matingou, Emilienne, Activités des femmes en milieu urbain: le cas de Brazzaville (These de 3e Cycle, Université des Sciences et Techniques de Lille, 1982), 238Google Scholar; interview with Augustine Massalo, 23 Dec. 1986; interview with Mère Emilie, 12 June 1989; interview with Sidone Ngole, 12 May 1988; Blouin, , My Country Africa, 90Google Scholar; Audibert, Jacques, Une compagnie commerciale en République Populaire du Congo: le CFAO (Travail d'études et de recherches, Université de Bordeaux III, 1973), 38–9.Google Scholar

⁸¹ Blouin, , My Country Africa, 29–30Google Scholar; interview with M. Moustapha, 15 June 1989; interview with Mere Emilie, 13 June 1989.

⁸² Jhimmy, ‘Marie Thérèse’, La voix de son maître (KIP 23).

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⁸⁶ Ayouné, J. -R., ‘Notre but’, L'Éducation de la Jeunesse Africaine, 11 (1942).Google Scholar Ayoune, himself, was an elegant and fastidious dresser.

⁸⁷ Brazzaville (supplement de la Vie Catholique Illustrée), vii (04 1951).Google Scholar

⁸⁸ Interview with Mère Emilie, 13 June 1989; interview with Mambeke-Boucher, 1 Dec. 1986; ‘Soirées de Poto-Poto’, France-Éuateur (13 Sept. 1954)Google Scholar; Balandier, , Sociologie des Brazzavilles noires, 146–8Google Scholar, and Ambiguous Africa (New York, 1966), 192–3.Google Scholar Some of these women were called by Balandier ‘high-class prostitutes’; however, no systematic study of prostitution in Brazzaville comparable to that of Luise White (The Comforts of Home [Chicago, 1990])Google Scholar for Nairobi has yet been undertaken. See Phyllis M. Martin, Leisure and Society in Colonial Brazzaville (forthcoming).

⁸⁹ Mosingue, François, ‘Un des grands problémes sociaux de l'Afrique contemporaine: la corruption des moeurs des femmes dites évoluées’, Liaison, Lviii (1957), 30–4Google Scholar; Pouabou, Joseph, ‘L’évolutionde la femme africaine’, Liaison, xv (1951), 13–14Google Scholar; Bandila, Jéröme, ‘Le zig-zag de la jeunesse’, Liaison, xxxv (1953), 18–19Google Scholar; Kaya, Paul, ‘La fille noire, cette ‘victime”, Tam-Tam, v (1956), 10–13Google Scholar; Pika, , ‘Lamode féminine: l'habit fait-il le moine?’ La semaine de l'A. E. F. (31 01. 1953)Google Scholar; Boubala, Raphaël, ‘Les jeunes filles et la mode’, Liaison, xx I–xxII (1952), 11–12Google Scholar; M'Bombo, Madelaine, ‘La voix d’une femme courageuse’, Liaison, xxxix (1953), 16–17.Google Scholar

⁹⁰ Mosingue, François, ‘Un des grands problèmes’, 33.Google Scholar

⁹¹ ‘L'élection de Miss Poto-Poto’, France-Equateur, 4 May 1957; ‘L'élection de la Miss Africaine’, France-Éuateur, 6 05 1957.Google Scholar

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⁹³ In its history from 1950 to 1959, the journal, Liaison, published many articles and letters on these topics.

⁹⁴ Wipper, Audrey, ‘African women, fashion, and scapegoating’, Can. J. Afr. Studies, vi (1972), 329–49.Google Scholar

⁹⁵ Gandoulou, Justin-Daniel, Entre Paris et Bacongo (Paris, 1984)Google Scholar, and Dandies a Bacongo. See also Friedman, Jonathan, ‘The political economy of elegance: an African cult of beauty’, Culture and History, vii (1990), 101–25Google Scholar; Duteil, Mireille, ‘Congo: travail de “sape”’, Le Monde (13 03 1989)Google Scholar; Rouch, Jane, ‘Les dandys de Brazzaville’, Le Matin Weekend (6 04 1984).Google Scholar

⁹⁶ ‘La sape’ is a French slang word meaning clothing with the added connotation of elegance and high fashion. The ‘sapeurs’ took the word and made it an acronym for their ‘society’.

⁹⁷ Quoted in Mireille Duteil, ‘Congo: travail de “sape”’. The two books by Gandoulou which are based on interviews with ‘sapeurs’ give a good sense of this ‘way of life and state of mind’.

⁹⁸ Etho, Jean, ‘L'habit ne fait pas le moine’, Liaison, xxxviii (1953), 26Google Scholar; also see the discussion of Bemba, Sylvain, ‘Face à son destin, la jeunesse du Moyen Congo est-elle prête à assurer la relève?’ Liaison, lix (1957), 127–14.Google Scholar

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