Yoruba Bronze Figure Goiter Ogboni Society Nigeria Africa

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Yoruba Bronze Figure Goiter Ogboni Society Nigeria Africa:
$750.00

TitleYoruba Bronze Female Figure with Goiter Ogboni SocietyType of ObjectBronze FigureCountry of Ageunknown 19th-20th centuryDimensions20\" H. x 7.5\" W.Overall Conditionfair. Most ofour pieces have spent decades on at least two continents, and have been treasured by several owners. Small splits, scrapes and cracks are a normal part of their patina attesting to their age and extensive use. We examine each piece carefully when we receive it and report any damage we find in our listings. Please look carefully at the pictures which may also reveal condition and damage.Damage/RepairHoles, dents, scratches, some oxidation, and wear

Additional Information: A bronze statue depicting a standing female holding a scepter. The figure is particularly shown with a goiter
(or gotter) at the side of the neck. Goiter is a pathology, the swelling of the thyroid gland. The age of this figure is unknown. The figure could well be dated to the end of the 19th to mid of the 20th century. This is a well used and important example of bronze casting from the Yoruba of Nigeria.This bronze statue was used by the members of the secret Ogboni Society for the cult of the Earth. The statue was used as a medium to communicate between the living and the dead.

Among the Yoruba who live in the Ijebu region of the southern Yoruba, a cult known as Oshugbo was open to all adult males and females. In the Oyo region the cult was known as Ogboni and spreading to other areas of the Yoruba the cult gained great power and authority serving political and judicial roles. Onile, an earth deity, the âowner of the earthâ (earth mother?) gave authority and sanctioned senior members of Ogboni to act for her. Onile figures also represented the ancestral founders of the kingdom and therefore the ancestors of the king. Onile figures and the members of the Ogboni Society (Oshugbo in the Ijebu region) speak for the ancestors and work to maintain stability within the community. Onile figures are generally shown as a male and female pair, however all that remains of this onetime pair is the seated male figure. Membership in Oshugbo/Ogboni and the level of authority that one held within the secret society was indicated by ownership of bronze figures set into the earth before each member as they sat as a council of elders to settle disputes or deal with political affairs of the town. Cast brass or bronze figures such as this have been identified to Ogboni activities and their use can be dated in early Yoruba history, however their actual use and symbolic meaning is still not fully understood within this secretive cult. However as a symbolic object it is thought that they serve a similar purpose, as do the cast brass Ogboni figures among the Yoruba, indicating that the owner has the right and social obligation to participate in determining the communityâs future and insuring social control. The fact that this figure is holding a scepter or other ritual object (?) identifies her as an elite female with associations to Ogun and a devotee of founding ancestors related to an earth cult or the deity Onile.

Recommended Reading:

R. F. Thompson: Black Gods and Kings: Yoruba Art at UCLA, (Los Angeles, 1971)

W. Fagg and J. Pemberton III: Yoruba Sculpture of West Africa, (New York, 1982)

H. Witte: Earth and the Ancestors: Ogboni Iconography, (Amsterdam,1988)

H. J. Drewal and J. Pemberton III, with R. Abiodun Yoruba: Nine Centuries of African Art and Thought, (New York, 1989)

H. Witte: A Closer Look, Local Styles in the Yoruba Art Collection of the Afrika Museum, Berg en Dal, 2004.

I have examined this piece and agree with the description.
Niangi Batulukisi, PhD.

**65392**

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