Zulu Beadwork’Speaks’ Across Time

BY SHARON F. GRIFFIN

DURBAN, South Africa June 1995

Peter Bird MartinExecutive DirectorInstitute of Current World Affairs4 West Wheelock St.Hanover, NH 03755 USA

Dear Peter,

On Sunday mornings I sometimes stroll along the Durban beachfront to a flea market where thousands wander through a maze ofhawkers selling everything imaginable- malachite chess setsfrom Zaire, tribal masks from Central Africa, T-shirts, kitchen-ware, hand-woven baskets, shoes, toilet plungers, stereo equip-ment, potted plants and, best of all, used books, to which I amdrawn like a child to candy. Aside from books, there is one otherthing peddled at the flea market that captures my fancy: It is bead-work crafted by Zulu women. There are colorful beaded medicinebottles, dolls, belts, neckties, headbands, key chains, spear han-dles, cups, salad servers and coasters, not to mention costume jew-elry such as rings, bracelets, necklaces and the ever-popular Zulu"love letters."

Beadwork is a craft of women and an outlet for their feelings,perceptions and attitudes. Older women teach girls, passing skillsfrom one generation to the next. Beads also "speak." Author El-eanor Preston-Whyte wrote in "Speaking With Beads: Zulu Artsfrom Southern Africa" that "they employ a symbolic languagewhich may indicate coded love messages, the age and social statusof the wearer, the home area from which he or she comes orsimply an attraction to color and pattern. They also speak of ethnicidentity or of religion..."

Dozens of women sell beaded designs along the beach front.They are there seven days a week as early as eight o’clock in themorning to as late as midnight.

Beadwork is an important means by which many, particularlytraditionalist Zulu women in rural KwaZulu-Natal, earn money toput food on the table and to secure a roof over their heads. To giveyou an idea of prices, a beaded cup sells for $7 to $9, a necktie for$9 to $12. Headbands for women and girls range from $1.60 to $7,depending on the width of the band.

However much the beach-front hawkers earn each month fromthe sale of beadwork, it is not enough. I say this because numbers

Sharon F. Griffin is an ICWAfellow studying the language, culture andpolitics of the Zulu people, of KwaZulu-Natal.

of the vendors sleep where they work which is tosay curled up on strips of grass or on the pavement.They take turns keeping watch in the night, fendingoff rapists and muggers. Many of the women belongto SEWU, an acronym for Self-Employed Women’sUnion. SEWU is a new trade union for workingwomen who are self-employed or do not have per-manent jobs. I talked with a organizer for SEWUlaunched in Durban a year ago in July and shetold me that one of most urgent needs of its member-ship is affordable housing.

Beadmaking has been an important feature of Zuluculture for generations, and the trade in beads goesback to early South African history. W. Knyff, a crewmember of the Dutch ship Stavenisse wrecked off theNatal coast on February 16, 1685, said in a statement:

"The Natives indeed offered us bread and cattlefor sale, but we had nothing wherewith to purchasethe one or the other. Nothing is esteemed there butbeads and copper rings for the neck or arms... Whenwe were thus reduced to the last necessity, therecame to us two Englishmen, whohad some months previously losttheir ship at Rio de Natal, abouttwenty ’mijlen’ further to the north.

"These men, being acquaintedwith the country and language, in-structed us how’to deal with the Na-tives, and willingly offered us theirassistance towards our mutual pres-ervation, together with a share intheir merchandise consisting of cop-per rings and common beads,enough to find them and us also infor 50 years."1

meat and bread

Without going deep into history, I’ll add that at theheight of the Zulu empire beads had considerable ec-onomic value. Strings of beads were given in ex-change for goods and services.2 Indeed, Durban owesits birth to beads. Lt. Francis Farewell who arrived in1824, earned the right to live on the shores of the Bayof Natal by bartering beads with the Zulu KingShaka.3

Before the middle of the last century, beads weremade of ivory, bone, aromatic wood, shell, animalteeth, seeds, egg-shells, plants and, in some areas, ofclay. Glass beads of European and Venetian manu-facture first entered Southern Africa as trade goodsimported largely through the East Coast of DelagoaBay.4

These days beads are made of plastic and, to alesser extent, glass. And to see Zulu-speaking peopledressed in beaded adornments, you’ll need to attenda special cultural celebration or visit a tourist attrac-tion such as Shakaland or Dumazulu Village in

northern KwaZulu-Natal. Shakaland is sort of theZulu version of Disneyland. Originally, it wascreated for the set of the movie "Shaka Zulu." Duma-zulu is a "living museum," where five traditionalZulu families live and work. Visitors to both places"experience" Zulu traditions such as beer brewing,spear making, hut building, pottery weaving andbeadwork. A highlight of the "traditional experience"is vibrant dancing by Zulu "maidens" and "warriors"dressed in beaded costumes.

The only other place where I’ve seen large num-bers of Zulu-speaking people wearing beaded regaliais at the headquarters of the Holy Church of Naza-reth Baptists in the township of Inanda. Adherents ofthis independent African church often referred toas the Shembe Church after its founder and prophetIsaya Shembe wear elaborate beaded designs. TheShembe Church has been described as a unique fu-sion of Zulu and orthodox Christian theology. TheProphet Isaya emphasized traditional Zulu valuesand integrated traditional dance and dress into theworship of the Christian God.5 Part of the dance at-

tire for married women at Shembefestivals, for example, is strings ofbeads that hang from head toshoulder. Dance outfits for girls ofmarriageable age include a beadedapron, thick rings of beads wornaround the hips, and anklets.Maiden’s outfits, I’m told, run ashigh as $333.

At the indescribably busy War-wick Avenue market in Durban,where mostly black African traders

sell fruits and vegetables, you’ll also see sangomas(diviners) wearing cascades of beads as headdresses.(The beads are strung in loops because diviners say’the spirits we call up come and sit on these loops ofbeads and speak into our ears." 6

Rickshaw pullers on the Durban beach front alsowear ornate, beaded costumes and headdresses.However, outside of these groups and circumstances,beadwork is not a feature of everyday life. Rarely willyou see people either in the city or in rural areaswearing beadwork, an observation that led me towonder who is buying beadwork designs and forwhat purpose? The answer is tourists. Tourists keepthis art form alive, along with the fashion industry.

Major tourist routes in KwaZulu-Natal passthrough areas where women sell beadwork near andalongside roads. Umgababa is one such place. Umga-baba is about 25 miles south of Durban, and it is a fa-vorite stop for vacationers wishing to purchase notonly beadwork but wood carvings, woven baskets,crocheted table cloths and other indigenous curios. Ibought a beaded bangle there for R4 ($1.10) and anecklace for R18 ($6).

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Zulu beadwork on display at theKwaZulu Cultural Museum in Ulundi.

Ulundi is about 75 miles north of Durban.It was first established as a capital by the

Zulu king Cetshwayo in 1873.

Hip belts in different widths and designs.

Thick rings of beads worn by young women either around the hips or neck.

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Costumed dancers at Duma-zulu Traditional Village innorthern KwaZulu-Natal.Their skirts are made of large,colorful plastic beads.

Tourist attractions such as Shakaland also create ademand for beadwork. There, souvenir shops sellbeadwork similar to that worn by the entertainerswho dance for guests. Museums and art galleries alsocreate interest in the craft. You’ll find beadwork col-lections in virtually all museums that house culturalartifacts from the indigenous peo-ple of Southern Africa. The MashuMuseum of Ethnology at TheCampbell Collections & Center forOral Studies in Durban, for exam-ple, maintains an extensive collec-tion of beadwork worn by men andwomen, boys and girls.

Art galleries do their share tostimulate the demand for bead-work as well. In the 1980s, Zulu-speaking women in the ThousandsHills near Durban started makingbeaded cloth figures of people, ani-mals and objects observed in theirlocal environment. These figuresare creative responses to marketopportunity as well as subtle formsof commentary on the experienceof everyday life. The non-profit Af-rican Art Center in Durban carriesa full complement of beaded clothfigures that sell for $25 on up to$100 and more.

Beadmaking is also kept alive byan international demand for high-fashion beaded jewelry. The Mdu-kutshani Beadwork Project basedat Tugela Ferry in the Msinga areaof KwaZulu-Natal, for example,specializes in fashion jewelry. It

was the first beadwork project to import beads infashion colors and to plan its range to suit the inter-national fashion market.7 In up-market departmentstores and trendy souvenir shops here, you’ll findZulu beadwork sewn on the collar and pockets ofwomen’s blouses.

In April I signed up for a bead-work class through a local mu-seum. Nine of us turned out for thecourse five Americans and fourSouth Africans, all women exceptfor one American man. I spent sixhours making one bracelet and,truth told, the bangle doesn’t com-pare to the intricately delicate de-signs crafted by Zulu women. I’mnot giving up, however. An elderlySouth African woman who satacross from me in the class said:"Don’t get discouraged. The first10 years are the hardest."

Besides being pretty to look at,beaded designs also possess specialmeaning, in some cases. That mean-ing is conveyed through color, styleand pattern. A white bead, for in-stance, represents love and purity,while a black bead symbolizesdarkness, loneliness and disap-pointment. Pink beads signify pov-erty; red beads, tears and longing.Blue represents faithfulness, whileyellow stands for wealth. So a sin-gle string of white and pink beadsmight read, "my heart is full of love(white), but you have no cattle tomarry me with (pink)."

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A narried woman at Shakaland sipping traditional beer.She is wearing a decorated pregnancy apron made ofanimal hide sacrificed to her husband’s ancestors for

the protection of the unborn child.

There is a poetry to the "bead language," and in re-cent years more and more scholars have devotedthemselves to better understanding the complexitiesof "bead literacy." Traditionally, beaded "love let-ters" were given by a girl to her fianc6e. The messagewoven into each article was very personal. The mean-ing associated with the colors could only be fully un-derstood by a few close friends of the maker. That’sbecause color alone does not signify meaning. Thesize of the beads, their placement in relation to adja-cent beads, the material from which the beads are

made, the length and size of the finished piece, andthe fact that each color, except for white, has a posi-tive and negative connotation all influence themessage.

Scholar B.N. Mthethwa described beadwork as an"oral tradition." He wrote in "Decoding Zulu Bead-work" that "the theory of Zulu beadwork codes isembedded in the idomatic expressions of language.The vocabulary and the grammar of the code iscreated by different colors and shapes. The colors aregrouped into ’families,’ with each member of thegroup suggesting a certain idiomatic expression. Onthe whole, the latitude of the meaning depends onthe context of the bead arrangement. However, sincethe beads are works of art, creative demands mightbe foregrounded so that the basic function, which isthe message, becomes secondary. Hence the mean-ings of colors and shapes are not rigid. The bead mes-sage, being deliberately coded, are meant to be puz-zles, sometimes taking days and months tounravel."8

While it’s true that "love letters" defy precise inter-pretation, Princess Magogo Constance (Ka Dinu-zulu) Buthelezi the late mother of Chief Mango-suthu Buthelezi, Minister of Home Affairs in theGovernment of National Unity- interpreted mes-sages for a range of colors. For example, a rubybead is called unlitwane and its meaning is "when-ever see you nay heart goes on fire through love"or "my heart leaps from flames of love." Today,Zulu "love letters" are anaong the most popularitems snatched up by tourists. They generally sellfor between $1.50 to $3.

Beadwork is a dynamic art form; it is by no meansstatic. Colors, patterns and styles are constantlychanging in response to new ideas, as well as social,economic and even political pressures. It is as Zuluculture itself, intricate and in a state oftransformation.

Sincerely yours,

Sharon F. Griffin

Foreground:Necklace Lovetetter.Mid-2Oth Century.KwaZulu CulturalMuseum

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BOTSWANA

Gaborone 0

ZIMBABWE

Northern Transvaal

PWM Eastern Transvaal

NAMIBIA North-West Johan

Northern Cape

Western Cape

Cape Town

Orange Free State

SOUTH ’RICA

Eastern Cape

KwaZulu/Natal

Ulundi

Works Cited:

1. Zulu Beadwork (Durban: The Campbell Collections, University of Natal), n.d.

2. Morris, Jean and Eleanor Preston-Whyte. "Speaking With Beads: Zulu Arts from Southern Africa" London: Thames andHudson, 1994: 15-16.

3. Know the Past. Wear the Future. Durban: Local History Museum Education Pamphlet, 1989.

4. Morris, 9.

5. Morris, 61.

6. Elliot, Aubrey. "Zulu: Heritage of a Nations Cape Town: Struik Publishers, 1991: 18.

7. Morris, 83.

8. Mthethwa, B.N. "Decoding Zulu Beadwork," in Sienaert, E and Bell, N (eds): Oral Tradition and Education; NatalUniversity Oral Documentation & Research Centre: Durban; 1988.

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