The project embraces three different ways in which humans experience ‘identity’: we craft and perform our own identities, while recognising the identities of others. Archaeological work consists of bridging these gaps between past and present, others and ourselves. Fashioning Sudan will structure research according to these three paradigms, into three Work Packages.
In Work Package 1 - Recognising identities: new paradigm for dress as identity marker – we aim to build the methodological backbone of the project. In the past two years, we have built our theoretical framework, encompassing archaeological theories about material culture, sensorial and body dimensions, and based on African concepts of dress, such as wrapping and knotting. Through collective readings, trainings, discussions, and workshops, we are formulating a new model to study dress practices and identities in the Sudanese context. This reflective exercise has fed the construction of the project database, which, for the first time, merges different sources for the documentation of garments: preserved archaeological specimens (animal skin, textiles, personal ornaments and accessories), detailed archaeological context information, and iconographic sources.
In Work Package 2 - Crafting identities: manufacturing dress in context – we aim to provide new and original knowledge about the natural resources and socio-economic dynamics of garment production. We have been able to carry out 11 study trips in museums and one excavation season, and added many artefacts previously studied in Sudan before the current war precluded any further travel in the country. In collaboration with these institutions, we have also sampled many objects and initiated a vast program of analyses: microscopy (transmitted light and scanning electron), palaeoproteomics, radiocarbon, and strontium isotopes. Thanks to this ongoing work, we are slowly reaching an unprecedented level of documentation on previously unstudied and unpublished artefacts. The results help us in reassessing the plant and animal species used to produce garments, the way the production was organized in the natural and settled environment, and the role of clothing in the changing socio-economic systems of ancient Sudan and Nubia.
In Work Package 3 - Performing identities: dressing the individual and social body – we would like to create a dynamic model articulating dress practices to diverse narratives of identity. From the data archived in our database and our numerous analyses, we are working in recognizing patterns in the use of garments: first, in their last phase of use (around the dead in graves), and second, during life (merging archaeological information and iconography). We are also selecting a list of case studies focusing on i) specific garments, e.g. the loincloth, and ii) specific individuals, e.g. a well preserved archer’s burial. This will lead to a detailed understanding of garments’ functions and answer the following questions: Who was wearing what? What did it mean? How did it change through time and space through ancient Sudanese history?
