The Blacksmith's Taboos From the Man of Iron To the Man of Blood

Abstract

The status of the blacksmith in tribal societies poses one of the most puzzling problems of anthropology. By a strange paradox, this noted craftsman, whose bold and meritorious services are indispensable to his community, has been relegated to a position outside the pale of society, almost as an “untouchable.” Regarded as the possessor of great magical powers, held at the same time in veneration and contempt, entrusted with duties unrelated to his craft or to his inferior social status, that make of him performer of circumcision rites, healer, exorcist, peace-maker, arbiter, counsellor, or head of a cult, his figure in what may be called the “blacksmith complex,” presents a mass of contradictions. These contradictions are to be met with wherever, as in the case of barbarian societies and archaic civilisations, iron ore is smelted and iron is worked, even though it is in black Africa that the enigmatic character of the blacksmith is most clearly delineated.