A fragmentary Adamawa Kwandalha healing sculpture, Estern Nigeria, close to the Benue river; minor age-related chippings. Certificate of origin and provenance

"After a ritual specialist determined the cause of a disease, the patient was given a newly modeled vessel, into which the disease was transferred. Such pots, which tend to embody the symptoms described, are remarkable for their highly expressive and imaginative forms." Source Brooklyn Museum, Vessel for Kwandalha Divination.

"The art of manufacturing and the knowledge of its use are reserved for only a few old people today; the young generation, brought up by missionaries, often no longer even know of their existence", Karl-Ferdinand Schaedler, Erde und Erz, S. 271.

Lit.: Karl-Ferdinand Schaedler, Erde und Erz. 2500 Jahre Afrikanische Kunst aus Terrakotta und Metall, 1979.

Adamawa terracotta sculpture The Adamawa province is located in northeastern Nigeria; the "Adamawa" terracottas are similar to those of the Bata and it can be assumed that they have the same cultural value: the anthropomorphic terracottas were the main support of the cult reserved by the Bata for the ancestors of their village chief; only the village chief and chief-maker (njubare) could own and commission them to women specialized in this art. Kept in a public building, they were used to propitiate crops and fishing; due to Islamization these cults were no longer practiced in the late fifties..

Drawing of a Adamawa vessel, first published in Siegfried Passarge, "Adamaua", Dietrich Reimer, Verlag, Berlin; 1895, page 20. From 1904–1905 Passarge held the post of Associate Professor of Geography in Berlin and in 1905 he became Professor of Geography in Breslau. In 1908 he joined the Colonial Institute in Hamburg, where he worked until 1936. Adamaua: Famous his "Bericht über die Expedition des Deutschen Kamerun-Komitees in den Jahren 1893/94", where he became contact with the Adamaua ans was one of the first who desribed this ezhnic group an its culture. photo of a Adamawa Kwandalha healing vessel at the end of this photosequence.

sold

Height: 38 cm
Weight: 2,5 kg