[Anna Xinga and her commanders] [graphic].
Title
[Anna Xinga and her commanders]
Description
Engraving features Anna Xinga or Nzinga (second from left), the daughter and rightful successor of the King of Congo. After the Portuguese prevented her ascension to the throne, she fled the kingdom. As Ogilby explained, "She and her People (for the most part) lead an unsettled life, roving up and down from place to place, like the Jages: Before any enterprize undertaken, though of meanest concern, they ask councel of the Devil; to which end they have an Idol, to whom they sacrifice a living Person, of the wisest and comliest they can pick out." Ogilby then continued, "The Queen against the time of this Sacrifice, Clothes her self in mans appareal, (nor indeed does she at any time go otherwise habited) hanging about her the Skins of beasts, before and behind, with a Sword about her Neck, an Ax at her Girdle, and a Bowe and Arrows in her Hand, leaping according to their Custom, now here, then there, as nimbly, as the most active among her Attendants; all the while striking her Engema, that is, two Iron Bells, which serve her in stead of Drums. When she thinks she has made a show long enough, in a Masculine manner, and thereby hath weary'd her self; then she takes a broad Feather and sticks it through the holes of her boar'd Nose, for a sign of War. She her self in this rage, begins with the first of those appointed to be sacrificed; and cutting off his head, drinks a great draught of his blood. Then follow the Stoutest Commanders, as do as she hath done; and this with a great hurly-burly, tumult, and playing upon Instruments about their Idol. Among all her most pretious things, she bestows no such care on any, as the Bones of one of her Brothers, who Raign'd before her, which lie together in a costly Silver Chest, long before gotten of the Portuguese." (p. 564), Illustration in John Ogilby's Africa: Being an accurate description of the regions of Aegypt, Barbary, Lybia, and Billedulgerid: the Land of Negroes, Guinee, and Aethiopia, and Abyssines, with all the adjacent islands, either in the Mediterranean, Atlantick, Southern, or Oriental Sea, belonging thereunto (London: Printed by Tho. Johnson, for the author, and are to be had at his house in White Fryers, M.DC.LXX [1670]), p. 565., Fels Afro-Americana Image Project, Africa: Images, Maps, and Geography.
Date
[1670]
Location
Library Company of Philadelphia | Books & Other Texts | Rare *Wing O163 14.F p 565, https://digital.librarycompany.org/islandora/object/Islandora%3A2961