Lip plate

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Lip plate of the Surma

The lip plate is an aid for shaping plate lips , the ideal of beauty for various African and American ethnic groups .

Africa

With the Ethiopian people of the Mursi , the lower lip is cut open and slowly stretched by inserting ever larger clay plates, and the earlobes are often decorated in the same way. A particularly large lip plate is highly regarded. Therefore, from the age of 20, women are knocked out some teeth, the lower lips are pierced and expanded for a year until they are their final size.

Today, wearing the lip plate is both a cultural tradition for Mursi and a source of money for tourists. Due to the influence of tourism in Ethiopia, the Mursi women understood the sensational character of the lip plate on predominantly western travelers. Their field work became increasingly less important and was replaced by a more rewarding activity than objects of memory photography. The Mursi women quickly put on their lip plates as soon as tourists come to their area. They rarely wear the lip plate in everyday life. Some researchers believe that this tradition originally served to make it unattractive to Arab slave hunters.

For a Mursi man, beauty lies in the size of his wife's plate lip. The larger, preferably 15 centimeters in diameter, the more respect the woman can expect.

America

The Zo'é Indians in the Amazon region wear lower lip stakes made of white wood. This custom presumably developed in response to the threat posed by hostile tribes. Because it led to the fact that the women thus disfigured became unattractive to enemies. For the Zo'é themselves, however, they became a sign of beauty and a sign of their tribal affiliation.

Ethnic groups with cup lips

The races known for having their loved ones use lip plates include the

  • Botocuden woman with lip stake

  • Makonde woman with decorative scars and lip plates in her upper lip

  • Mursi woman without lip and earlobe plates

  • Clay figure of the Mochica culture with lip plate

Known people with lip plates

See also

Web links

Commons : Labret  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Rüdiger Nehberg : Survival: The art of surviving. Ullstein, Frankfurt am Main 1982, p. 49.
  2. ↑ Marc Vorsatz: When eco-tourists pounce on Mursi warriors. World, June 21, 2012