cast;
sculpture
- Museum number
- CRS.10
- Description
-
Cast; human head made of plaster wearing a crown. Head is about 2/3 life size and has a large circular hole in the top. Face has vertical striations throughout. The lips are not striated. Neck has four horizontal grooves at front and is pierced with three holes placed at regular intervals around the neck. The head wears a crown with a large conical boss over the forehead and the remains of an upright crest. The crown is partly composed of large globular beads, arranged in tiers and with traces of red paint. The bottom of the neck was sawn off the original some time between 1938-1950. Head is painted green to correspond to the patination of the original. Number 2 painted in white inside.
- Production date
-
1938-1950 (cast)
-
14thC-15thC(early) (original)
- Dimensions
-
Height: 24 centimetres
-
Width: 13.50 centimetres
-
Depth: 18 centimetres
- Curator's comments
- In 1938-9 five cast copper and twelve cast brass human heads and one part figure were discovered during building works in Wunmonije Compound close to the Ooni's palace at Ife, Nigeria. Three of the heads are less than life size and are portrayed with crowns; the other fourteen heads are life size and are pierced with holes around the neck.
This cast was taken from the original head (Willett, 2004: M3) which is made of heavily leaded zinc-brass. The head was discovered in the second group at Wunmonije and was purchased in 1938 along with CRS.8 (Willett, 2004: M17) by William R. Bascom, a research student from Northwestern University, Illinois, who was based in Ife at the time. Bascom subsequently returned both of these heads to Nigeria as a gift in 1950.
The original head was in the collections of the National Museum Ife originally numbered Ife 19. It is now in the collections of the National Museum Lagos re-numbered 79.R.11.
- Location
- Not on display
- Condition
- Good.
- Department
- Africa, Oceania and the Americas
- Registration number
- CRS.10
