Commemorative Head of an Oba

This masterfully cast, commemorative image of a divine king's spiritual head displays the ornate, red coral-bead headdress of Benin kingship. Symbolizing wisdom and achievement, the head originally rested on an altar dedicated to ritual communication with this ancestral ruler. There it would have supported an ivory tusk of sacred white carved with images of royal history and court ritual. In the past, the brass was polished to a high "red" sheen evocative of beauty and fearsome power. The irises and parallel lines between the brows of inlaid, locally forged iron invested this image with iron deity Ogun's mystical, transformative powers of creation and destruction.