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The MEG has over 700 items – everyday tools, weapons, jewellery and prestigious diplomatic gifts – testifying to the strong links between the southern African kingdoms and the Protestant missionaries who invested that immense territory in the second half of the nineteenth century. In the wake of David Livingstone, these explorers and cartographers, but more importantly men of God, founded numerous mission stations.
In various African cultures, especially in East and Southern Africa, the education of girls for their future role as wives and mothers is materialised by the making and symbolic use of small female figures, often called "dolls". Social artefacts and also a precaution against sterility, such fertility figures are designed by the women during the initiation practices specific to each culture. They are cherished like real children until their owners bear children themselves; they are then often given to another member of the family. Whether realistic or abstract, the aesthetic of these dolls reflects the sophistication of their creators.
© 2021 Musée d'ethnographie, Genève
