Beaded Palm Wine Vessel Topped With Animal Figure - Tribal Art
This piece features a long-necked calabash topped with a beautiful carved animal wood stopper. The entire assemblage is covered with cloth embroidered with strands of translucent and opaque red and blue glass beads that form an intricate spiral pattern along the neck. Of the many ritual items in a Grassfields kingdom’s royal treasury, bead-embroidered calabashes are among the most important. These containers were used exclusively by the Fon (chief) to store palm wine served on ceremonial occasions. The ritual consumption of palm wine was considered a sacred activity and reinforced the Fon’s spiritual and political power. Palm wine was also an essential component of sacrificial libations to the ancestors.
Dimensions approx. 83 x 27 x 27 cm
Beaded art from the Cameroon Grasslands collected between 1985 and 2005. Rulers throughout the many Kingdoms in the Cameroon Grassland region (Bamileke –Bamum -Tikar) employed a range of Regalia to assert their political, economic and religious power. Presented publicly in lavish displays of wealth and power, many court objects were distinguished by their elaborate bead embroidery. Imported from Venice, Bohemia or Amsterdam, glass beads were considered a luxury material whose use and distribution were controlled by the King. The decoration of objects with vast quantities of brilliantly colored beads transformed utilitarian objects into symbols of royal status and prestige.
All lots are in the state the collector acquire them. No restorations or cleaning has been performed.
249