mask", anthropomorphic; full length flat figure with legs, knotless netting mask decorated w/ nassa shells; boars tusks & double-shell eyes; long curving nose suspended over face; round ears in blue & red; red & blue dyed on upper; two cowries at bottom; l. 30 cm. max. w. 11 cm.
Donor:
Joan Wescott
Collection place:
Papua New Guinea
Verbatim coll. place:
Melanesia, Papua New Guinea, Sepik River Basin, Abelam attr.
Culture or time period:
Abelam
Collector:
Joan Wescott
Materials:
Bark (plant material) and Shell (animal material)
Object type:
ethnography
Object class:
Masks (costume)
Function:
1.7 Fighting, Warfare, and Social Control
Accession date:
July 25, 1989
Context of use:
worn from the mouth mainly as dance ornament. supposedly carried in mouth when on way to fight. represents an ancestral spirit.