IDNO

P.71394.GIJ

Description

The head or top of a carved wooden staff. The carving depicts a squat figure perched on a wooden plinth, with a rounded head accentuated by an incised brow line, slit eyes, nose, mouth and protruding ears. On top of the figure is a large carved cylindrical pot with incised markings around the lip of the pot.

Object documentation photograph; figure photographed in front of a plain backdrop.

Place

W Africa; Nigeria; Eastern Nigeria; ?Ikot Ekpene

Cultural Affliation

Ibibio

Named Person

Photographer

Jones, Gwilliam Iwan (known as G.I.)

Collector / Expedition

Date

circa 1930 - 1939

Collection Name

Jones collection

Source

Jones, Gwilliam Iwan (known as G.I.)

Format

Print Black & White

Primary Documentation

Other Information

P.71320.GIJ to P.71399.GIJ were kept in box 3, now numbered C303/.

Publication; For similar wooden staffs see plate 113 in Aniakor and Cole, 1984, p. 68.

Context: Jones discusses the various types of woodcarving found in Eastern Nigeria. Some staffs were used for ritual purposes or associated with particular cults tended to belong to this superior category. Some implements were thought to have special innate supernatural power, for instance the iron belled iron staffs carried by Northern Ibo (Jones, 1984, p. 54). In reference to woodcarving he notes that most of the objects were purely functional and left plain and undecorated. Some, however, were intended as works of art and valued as such by their proud owners, as were the masks and other objects carved out of softer wood for their masquerades and for the embellishment of their shrines and meeting houses (Jones, 1989, p. 27).

Aniakor and Cole describe the various types of objects often found in shrines and note that, “ The shrines and appurtenances of various obi naturally differed with the resources and tastes of the occupants. One may see title-stools, leopard skins, an elephant tusk or two, and perhaps staffs (Cole and Aniakor, 1984, p.68)

Bibliographical Reference: Jones, G.I., 1984. The Art of Eastern Nigeria (Cambridge University Press)
Jones, G.I. 1989. Ibo Art, (Shire).
Cole, H. & C. Aniakor, 1984. Igbo Arts: Community and Cosmos (Museum of Cultural History, University of California)

This catalogue record has been updated with the support of the Getty Grant Program Two. [Alicia Fentiman 7/11/2007]