(This is substantially an "abstract" from the field diary written by the A. during his research in the Southern Sudan's town of Malakal. More exactly the article tries to give the reader the "feeling" and the "taste" of "Routine" and "Adventure" in the course of an interesting aside survey trip made by him with the only way of transportation at his disposal :a well built Shilluk pirogue. On board there were also his two local research assistants. So the party went for one long day upstream, along the waters of the famous White Nile, just looking for any valid pieces of information and historical data connected to the two previous "urban" centres, in existence long before the foundation of Malakal town. And Malakal in 1981 was the chief town of the Southern Province of the White Nile. The article describes to the reader what does it means, to a western scientist, "going to the anthropological field". But the article it is more than that. It is more than a scientific paper: because the river he navigates, the lands he knew and saw, the peoples of the several Nilotic tribes he met there, and elsewhere, in Southern Sudan, are no more reachable from the outside world. This article is moreover one of the last witnesses about a "lost world" that belongs to the deep and distant land of a Thirld World Country. Where, since many and many years, peoples are fighting and struggling hard for their lifes and homes and fields and cattles. And nobody knows about it, or it should be said that mass media, televisions and newspapers, don't give, normally, any news about it. So that land do not exist at all for the world, for us! Because usually nobody speaks about it. That "lost world" gets a new life only in those rare circumstances connected to an emergency aid from the UN. But frankly it is too little! The A. dedicates the document to all the desperate peoples of Southern Sudan, hoping that one day they could again and finally be confident in a peaceful future and in their future).

(COLONIAL OFFICERS, MISSIONARIES AND SCHOLARS IN THE SOUTHERN SUDAN: The A. in this paper, which is part of a wider working out project concerning the ethno-anthropological data gathered in the area of Malakal (Sudan), gives us a quick survey of the field-researches carried out by colonial officers, missionaries and scholars, since the beginning of the XIX century up to today, in the Southern Sudan, often at the risk of losing their lives. This review includes works in the fields of ethnology, and socio-cultural, urban and phisical anthropology, linguistics and geo-history, and it tries to bring to the reader's knowledge all those researchers, who have contributed, in a valuable way, to the scientific understanding of that extremely variegated world of peoples and cultures. Another sound argument, which reinforces the above-mentioned aim of the A., is singling out in the fact that those lands have been compelled, over a very long period lasted almost two centuries, during which raids, slavery, invasions, wars and guerrilla warfares, have pitilessly hit the socio-economic web of those peoples, sometimes crumbling it)

(OFFICIERS COLONIAUX, MISSIONAIRES ET SAVANTS DANS LE SOUDAN MERIDIONAL: L'A. dans cet article, qui fait partie d'un plan d'élaboration plus étendu des données ethno-anthropologiques rassemblées dans l'agglomeration de Malakal (Soudan), compte offrir un rapid coup d'oeil des recherches sur le terrain. Donc des recherches empiriques, ethno-anthropologiques et de l'anthropologie urbaine, de l'anthropologie physique, de la linguistique et de l'histo-géographie, recherches souvent menées, au péril de leur propre intégrité physique, par les offiers coloniaux, les missionaires et le savants, dès le début du XIX siècle jusqu'à nos jours, dans le Soudan méridional. L'ouvrage essaie de faire connaître au lecteur tous ces chercheurs qui, au cours des années, ont apporté une contribution appréciable à la connaissance scientifique de cet univers extrêmement varié des populations et des cultures. Et ceci est encore plus valable si nous pensons que ces terres on dû supporter une très longue période de deux siècles environ, durant laquelle des razzias, l'esclavage, des envahissements, des guerres et des guérrillas ont cruellement frappé, quelquefois en le désintegrant, le tissu socio-économique et culturel de ces populations)

(In this article are analyzed the outcome of a transcultural survey carried out over a sample of high school's students in the multi-ethnic town of Malakal, in the Upper Nile Province, Southern Sudan. A polyvalent questionnaire has been administered to the students in which it has been shown a scale of behaviours and attitudes more or less explicited by the Shilluks in comparison with the "other" student--fellows belonging to different tribes. Besides, a scale of values has been elaborated according to the social prestige granted by each tribe and regarding an occupational and professional fan. The modernization in progress in this marginal area is emphasized by the percentage of the preferences which have been given to particular professions, whose idea of prestige is acquired through innovating cultural models, which infer, therefore, the achievement of new social statuses. A further interesting point is inherent in the medium-high scores attained along this scale by traditional activities, like pastoralism and farming. It is this a traditional cultural answer confirmed, anyhow, by modernizing motivational supports).

(After having outlined the ethnic-cultural situation of the Upper Nile in which it has been recalled, among other things, the recent and interesting hypotesis about a common ethnic identity which would exist between Dinka and Nuer, the A. exposes the historical features concerning the foundation and growth of Malakal, chief town of the Province. Though such historical reconstruction is an integrating part of a more ample and articulate work of urban and applied anthropology, nevertheless it could well form a chapter apart, which doesn't meet necessarily its limits within the urban perimeter, but includes the whole region, too. The events which have been reported, even if apparently fragmentary, have as theme the river Nile and all those who - explorers, ivoy-dealers, slave-traders, colonizers, merchants - in the last 150 years have gone upstream, as well as the riverain groups who populate its banks. It is exaclty the active presence of the Nilotic peoples in the restless history of this region wich succeed in giving a "tribal" feature to the article. They were able to provide a positive "answer", indeed, to the strong, repeated, often violent, culture-clashes coming from the exterior and the north, either arabs - Egyptians, Sudanese, Mahdists -, or Europeans)

(Après avoir esquissé un panorama, même concis, de la situation ethnique-culturelle du Nile Supérieur où, entre autres, on se rappelle à la recente et intéressante hypothèse relative à la commune identité ethnique qui existerait parmi les peuples Dinkas et Nuers, l'A. nous offre les éléments historiques concernants la fondation et le développement de la ville chef-lieu de Malakal. Quoique telle reconstruction historique faisse partie intégrant d'un plus large et articulé travail de anthropologie urbaine et appliquée, néamoins elle peut bien constituer un chapitre indépendent, qui ne trouve pas nécessairement ses limites dans le périmètre urbain, mais comprend la region entière soudanaise du Nile Supérieur. Quand même dans leurs apparent caractère fragmentaire, les événements qui sont mentionnés on comme fil conducteur le fleuve Nil et tous ceux-là qui - explorateurs, chercheurs d'ivoire, esclavagistes, colonisateurs, marchands - pendant les derniers 150 ans l'on remonté, ainsi que le groupes riverains qui peuplent ses bord. C'est exactement la partecipation active des populations nilotiques à la tourmentèe historie de la region qui réussit à donner une connotation "tribale" à l'article. En effet ils ont sû fournir une réponse "positive" aux fortes, nombreuses, soivent violentes, poussés acculturatives provenantes de l'exterieur et du nord, soit arabes - ègyptiennes, soudanaises, mahdistes -, que européennes)