Azaghvana E-Book 2003 - Flipbook - Page 292
It is difficult to say where the original entrance area of the central house is in Plate 24b, but
we can see the roofs of the lower (e) and the upper (f) rooms behind the roof of thala. There
are additional rooms to the left (g), at about the level of the lower room, while the expansion
of the house connects with the platform of the next house up to the right (2). The control over
the erosive function of floodwater during the rainy season around such steep corner platforms
must have been very important, and the Dghweɗe were masters in moving heavy rocks and
breaking them down if they were in the way.
The next section introduces us to the foyer structure of Buba's house.
'Stomach' and 'bed' of thala between central passageway and front wall
This section shows the architecture of a house shrine (thala), as the centrepiece of a Dghweɗe
foyer at Buba's house in Ghwa'a, mainly from photographs taken in 1998 and 2005. Buba
turned out to have the best maintained 'stomach' and 'bed' of thala among the three houses I
had the opportunity to document in detail. Later, in the section on the lower and upper room
areas, we will use photos I took in Kalakwa's house, and compare Buba's thala with a Chikiɗe
shrine. We already pointed out that they share the same design of a typical front with the
Dghweɗe and Guduf, but the designs of their house shrines are different.
We have already referred to the area with the house shrine and the granaries, plus the pattern
of passageways and the various rooms which could be entered from the foyer of the house.
Figure 19c of the 3D illustration gives a detailed view. The Dghweɗe word for this entire
foyer space was hupala, reportedly meaning 'a complete space'. The central passageway
between the house shrine (thala) and granary was called tab hupala (tab means 'in the
middle'). This current section will document different views of the inner foyer structure, all
resting on a shared foundation platform, which not only carries the front wall with a kitchen
on each side, but also the wooden support structure for the flat roof with the widely visible
roof of thala sitting on top.
We enhanced Plate
25a and 25b with
illustrative
line
drawings,
mainly
because of the poor
quality of the photos.
It shows Buba sitting
on one of the sitting
stones (A), marking
the place where the
three ancestor stones
(kwir
thala)
are
visible at the foot of
the front of the
'stomach' of thala (B).
We see half of the
entrance of the lower
kitchen (C) next to
Buba, and behind him
we see the entrance of
the ritual sauce kitchen (D). Between the ritual sauce kitchen and John, we see his wife's
granary (E). We see a row of wooden posts (F) supporting the flat roof (gaɗike) behind the
sitting stones and along the front of the granaries as part of the structure of tab hupala.
Plate 25a: Buba sitting next to his three ancestor stones
In the left corner of Plate 25a we can see the top end of the 'bed' of thala (G) protruding a
little, and we notice the decorative fish pattern etched on the adobe plaster on the 'bed' of
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