Overview
Earthenware pottery-making skills are practised among the Bakgatla ba Kgafela community in south-eastern Botswana. The women potters use clay soil, weathered sandstone, iron oxide, cow dung, water, wood and grass to make pots of different forms, designs and styles that relate to the traditional practices and beliefs of the community. Pots are used for storing beer, fermenting sorghum meal, fetching water, cooking, ancestral worship and traditional healing rituals. When collecting the soils, the master potter communicates with the ancestors through meditation so that she will be guided to the ideal spot. After collection the weathered sandstone and clay soil are pounded using a mortar and pestle, then sieved and the resulting powders mixed with water to form the clay body. The pots are slab-built, fashioned by hand into round, conical or oval shapes starting from the base and ending...
This record is imported from the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage public dataset as discovery metadata. ARED has not independently verified community authority, access protocols or local naming beyond the source record.
Community and Authority
- Communities
- Botswana
- Languages
- Not specified in UNESCO dataset
- Cultural territories
- Botswana
- Countries
- Botswana
How the System Works
Earthenware pottery-making skills are practised among the Bakgatla ba Kgafela community in south-eastern Botswana. The women potters use clay soil, weathered sandstone, iron oxide, cow dung, water, wood and grass to make pots of different forms, designs and styles that relate to the traditional practices and beliefs of the community....
Sources and Evidence
Imported from UNESCO DataHub dataset ich001. Field-level provenance is retained in the record metadata.
Field-Level Provenance
- title
- UNESCO DataHub field title_en
- preferredTitle
- UNESCO DataHub field title_fr
- summary
- UNESCO DataHub field description_en
- type
- UNESCO DataHub fields type_of_element_en and type_acronym
- countries
- UNESCO DataHub field countries, ISO codes resolved with ISO-3166 regional metadata
- categories
- ARED category inference from UNESCO concepts_primary_names, concepts_secondary_names and title
- relationships
- UNESCO concepts_primary_names, concepts_secondary_names, type fields and World Heritage links
- sourceUrl
- UNESCO DataHub field http_url_en
- rights
- UNESCO DataHub dataset metadata license and license_url
Original Source Metadata
Why This Record Is Credible
This public record is connected to 1 source and has been labelled Source Supported. ARED separates evidence sources from cultural authority so users can see both provenance and review limits.
Cultural Access
Use this as public discovery metadata only. It does not replace community authority or local access protocols.
Relationships
Review and Corrections
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