Large Pseudo Vessel with Water Buffalo
Dakakari, Nigeria
Terracotta
19th century

The Dakakari are a small ethnic group in the hills of the Zuru Federation in the North-Western State of Nigeria whose principal occupation has been agricultural and military service for centuries. Besides ironwork, it is solely pottery that is carried on as a trade and an art, and then exclusively by women. While everyday pottery is open to all women, religious pottery is only made within certain families, the knowledge and technique being passed from mother to daughter. The Dakakari have become renowned for these religious terracotta grave sculptures, which are placed on the burial sites of important personalities; ordinary citizens get only household crockery on their grave mounds. 

Those who can present important religious sculptures on their grave mounds include village heads, war heroes, great hunters, top members of the mens' secret society Oknuh, and the leading blacksmith.

There are six categories of terracotta grave sculptures. This type is displays animal figures (antelopes, buffaloes, and camels), sometimes atop a vessel, as seen here (Schaedler, Earth and Ore, 1997).  

32 in :: 81 cm

InventoryID #13-1050

SOLD