The African knives collection started in 1984 and focused on traditional weaponry. The beginning years were, as is often the case, purchasing a vast quantity of material that later revealed often of a secondary quality. But quickly this material was eliminated and the result, 40 years later, is the present collection.
As a consequence of Belgium’s colonial past (the Belgian Congo – 1908 until 1960), Brussels became the turning plate for native art in Europe. Indeed, the former Belgian Congo, now the République Démocratique du Congo (RDC), is the area where original African art reached its peak in diversity of shapes, colors and materials used. This richness of material, of which much is stored in the most important of all Museums on the subject: the Musée Royal de l’Afrique centrale (Tervuren, Belgium) gave rise to a vivid market that lasts until today. Every year, usually in June, the event “Bruneaf” attracts dealers and collectors of primitive art from all over the world to Brussels, where much of the most important pieces are offered for sale over a one week period.
Living for a long time in the heart of Brussels, Guido Poppe took the opportunity to meet on a regular base and to maintain close contacts with many dealers and experts. Several of these became friends and this gave him the possibility to obtain top pieces all over this period.
In African history, weapons were by far the most precious objects, and therefore early visitors were proud to acquire these. In the beginning of the 20th century, displays of weapons were highly prized and collected, as well by official instances such as the church and museums, as by private collectors. Later this interest weakened, especially under the influence of modern artists such as the impressionists looking for new sources of inspiration. Until the 1980’s sculptures in general were very sought after. With the edition of several major books on African weaponry, the public has now again gained interested in African knives. Back to the roots.
The collection contains 424 knives, documented by tribe, age and length. All knives have been expertised and doubtful and/or fake pieces have been removed.
Most knives were obtained from well-known dealers in antique tribal arts. There are also about 50 pieces that were purchased from the descendants of a Belgian officer who died in 1903 in the former Belgian Congo. The family received from this officer two huge metal boxes full of knives and other objects, in 1902. These pieces are important because of the accurate dating.
Metal was rare and hard to get in central Africa at the time of production of these weapons. This has been well documented. Some publications illustrate the rarity of the weapons, and to get a fine documented image of this rarity we can concentrate on the throwing knives. They have the biggest artistic value and are the most prestigious items after what is called “Royal knives”, contained also in this collection.
The Topology of the collection has been base on the following books: Beauté fatale of 1992, Sickleweapons Vol. III of 2000. Bird shaped knives, throwing knives in fact, are usually classified among hatches, but because they evolved from throwing knives they are classified near the latter.
The Dutch scholar Westerdijk made a doctor thesis about throwing knives. He published an interesting document in 1988 about a number of knives that he studied in all major European museums.
These museums contained 1352 knives all together:
1224 were in private collections, including the rare knives from the Wijckaert collection, of which many are in the present collection today.
So, the total of the Westerdijk research resulted in 2576 knives. The present collection contains about 100 throwing knives, which is more than 8 % of the knives in private collections.
About a dozen pieces have been documented in books already, several of the most important ones in the latest Chinese work on African knives by Jan Elsen.
The collection has a high standard of quality in general. The intention at the time of collection was to buy “the best” whenever something became available in these pre-internet times. The result is sensational. The collection gives a nice overview from what has been produced in central Africa. It is a national treasure for each museum interested in ethnographics or ethnographic art.