Object Details
- Label Text
- In Madagascar, hand woven silk and cotton textiles remain potent symbols of authority, wealth, status and identity. Textiles play a prominent role in ceremonies, particularly in rural areas, and serve as a sign of respect for local, ancestral custom. This connection between hand woven cloth and the ancestors is emphasized in the widespread use of textiles in burial and reburial ceremonies throughout Madagascar.
- There is great variety in Malagasy burial ceremonies, but throughout the island cloth plays a major role. Siblings, children, grandchildren and other relations are required to offer cloth to wrap or bury with the body. By dressing the dead, descendants ensure the deceased's continued social existence in the next life. Elaborate funerary rites acknowledge the ancestors and their mystical powers that hold the key to an individual's fortunes and misfortunes. When pleased, ancestors bless the living with prosperity and fertility.
- Eminent symbol of their wealth and dedication to the deceased, individual descendants often conspicuously parade their cloth offerings into the ceremony or display it for the assembled community to judge. Close kin are eager to search out the best, most expensive burial cloth they can afford, preferably silk. The finest cloth a weaver will make in her lifetime, however, is never for sale, for it is the cloth she makes as burial wraps for her own mother and father.
- This particular cloth is used as a shroud especially for woman. It is made from two panels sewn together and is distinguished by its predominantly tan hue. Two sets of white stripes run lengthwise down the cloth and intersect with a border of white, weft-float designs at each end, creating a subtle unity of form and color.
- Description
- Light tan colored two-panel textile embellished with two sets of white stripes, of varying widths, running lengthwise down each of the two panels. There are white cotton weft float diamond and X-shaped designs running horizontally along each edge of the cloth, and the cloth has looped fringe that is hemmed.
- Provenance
- Collected in Mahitsy market, Madagascar, 2000
- Exhibition History
- Gifts and Blessings: The Textile Arts of Madagascar Malagasy, National Museum of African Art, Smithsonian Institution, April 14-September 2, 2002
- Content Statement
- As part of our commitment to accessibility and transparency, the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art is placing its collection records online. Please note that some records are incomplete (missing image or content descriptions) and others reflect out-of-date language or systems of thought regarding how to engage with and discuss cultural heritage and the specifics of individual artworks. If you see content requiring immediate action, we will do our best to address it in a timely manner. Please email nmafacuratorial@si.edu if you have any questions.
- Image Requests
- High resolution digital images are not available for some objects. For publication quality photography and permissions, please contact the Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives at https://africa.si.edu/research/eliot-elisofon-photographic-archives/
- Data Source
- National Museum of African Art
- Maker
- Betsileo artist
- Date
- 1999-2000
- Credit Line
- Museum purchase
- Medium
- Cotton, dye
- Dimensions
- H x W: 195.4 x 144.2 cm (76 15/16 x 56 3/4 in.)
- Type
- Textile and Fiber Arts
