Pair of ritual staffs "edan oshugbo"

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Description

brass, partly encrusted patina, nearly identical kneeling figures, male/female, mounted on iron spike, min. dam., fissures, traces of corrosion, on wooden base;
“ogboni” is a secret society of the Yoruba, also called “oshugbo”. The best known “oshugbo” object is the “edan oshugbo”, a pair of bronze images male/female mounted on iron spikes, linked by an iron chain. These figures belong to individual “oshugbo” members who - after approval by an “oshugbo” official - the “apena” - take them home afer their initiation into the “oshugbo” cult. They are kept on the family shrine and they are danced on special occasions.

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Comparing literature

Witte, Hans, Earth and the Ancestors: Ogboni Iconography, Amsterdam 1988, p. 56 f., ill. 5

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