African Shield for Identification & Comment
 

A reader sent the following text and images and requests identification and comment of this shield.

Very similar to a Beja shield

but no semi-circular cut outs on the rim as per my example

Nice item though

Regards,

ken

Here is my example. It has both characteristics, hide and cutouts, but with snakeskin (and even fragile tassles), but I noticed that the cut-outs on mine are smaller than usual.
Perhaps some overlap and changes with time and area? My example comes from an older collection but apart from drying a bit it seems unused and I assume it is from mid 20th century.

Looking at the picture I posted it seems like this is a bit oval in shape, but it is in fact almost perfectly circular at 55cm x 54.5cm.

It might be from the South Sudan ... the Nuer had similar, smaller type shields, but without the cutouts.