West Wing 

 COLLECTIONS FROM AFRICA 



Opening to the north from this hall of North American Archaeology is 

 the African Hall. This differs from other halls in containing besides 

 ethnographical specimens a number of characteristic African mammals. 

 The future extension of the Museum will provide room for groups of 

 African mammals, including elephants. The installation is roughly 

 geographical, i. e., as the visitor proceeds through the hall from south to 

 north he meets the tribes that would be found in passing from south to 

 north of Africa, and the west coast is represented along the west wall, 

 the east coast along the east wall. 



There are three aboriginal races in Africa: the Bushmen, the Hotten- 

 tots, and the Negroes. In the north the Negroes have been greatly 

 influenced by Hamitic and Semitic immigrants and become mixed with 

 them . 



At the south end of the Hall the wall is decorated with reproductions 

 of cave-paintings made by the Bushmen, the most ancient and primitive 

 of African natives. These works of art are remarkable for their realism, 

 and should be compared with the reproductions of old European cave- 

 paintings in the tower of the adjoining hall. 



Nothing is more characteristic of the Negro culture, to which the rest 

 of the Hall is devoted, than the art of smelting iron and fashioning iron 

 tools. The process used by the African blacksmith is illustrated in a 

 group near the entrance, on the west side, and the finished products, 

 such as knives, axes and spears, are amply shown throughout the Hall. 

 The knowledge of the iron technique distinguishes the Negro culturally 

 from the American Indian, the Oceanian and the Australian. 



All the Negroes cultivate the soil, the women doing the actual tilling 

 while the men are hunters and, among pastoral tribes, herders. Cloth- 



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