Daily Use Items Become Artifacts of Another Time

de bene esse: literally, of well-being, morally acceptable but subject to future validation or exception

Self Heating Irons were used by seamstresses before the advent of electric irons. They were called self-heaters because glowing coals were put into them to keep them hot.

 The cauldron was also called ‘kimbo pot’ and is made of cast iron and was used by slaves and later free Jamaicans to prepare meals. No proper home was without one! Legend says that Nanny, Maroon Chieftainess, kept a huge ‘kimbo’ pot at the foot of the steep narrow path to her village that mysteriously boiled without a fire. British soldiers or Redcoats in search of Nanny Town, curious to see how this could happen, would lean over to peep into the cauldron, get dizzy and fall down the steep cliff side to the their death in the surging river below. Today the ‘kimbo’ pot is known as the ‘curry goat pot.’

The Sad or Flat Irons were used by Jamaicans and they became increasingly popular in the Post Emancipation era. They were heated on glowing coals.

  Gigs are toys which became extremely popular in the Post Slavery period when children were permitted to play. These are generally carved from wood and a nail is inserted at the bottom end. A piece of cord is then wound around the nail and upon skilfully releasing the cord, the nail causes the gig to spin in a rather amusing fashion.

The Cassava Sieve is used to sieve cassava after it has been grated,wrung, dried and beaten. The cassava meal is then used to make bammies.

Monkey Jars like these were used to keep water cool before the advent of electricity. Sometimes a thunder ball would be placed in the bottom of the jar because it was thought to help with cooling. They were especially popular in rural areas.

The Yabba is a domestic utensil made from clay. It is traditionally from Africa and is used for mixing,grinding, cooking and eating purposes. Yabbas have been in use in Jamaica since the seventeenth century.

Hand Baskets were handwoven and were especially worn by fashionable Jamaican women who used them to carry cosmetics and other personal items.

The Cutacoo basket originated with our Taino Ancestors. The Cutacoo was placed between a huge stone and a plank and the juice out of the pounded cassava. Today the cutacoo is used in bammy-making.

Typewriters were invented in 1868 and through much of the 20th century, typewriters were indispensable tools for recording the written word. These are mechanical or electro-mechanical devices with keys that when pressed, cause characters to be printed per keypress and the machine prints the characters by making ink impressions of type elements. These became widely used by professional writers and in offices for decades. By the end of the 1980s word processors and personal computers largely displaced typewriters.