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Divination bowl, woman with chicken
Nigeria, Efon-Alaiye; Yoruba
Collected by William R. Bascom, from carver's mother, 1938.
Loan from the estate of Berta Bascom (B-1946ab)
Ifa divination, central to Yoruba life, was a special interest of Bascom's. A form of fortune-telling, it is used by its clients to help understand the cause of misfortune or to secure blessings and advice on significant undertakings. Among the diviner's principal ritual tools is a set of sixteen palm nuts, which he may keep in a carved wooden bowl. This example bears one of the more popular designs. In a motif of submission and greeting, a kneeling female worshiper offers a sacrificial cock. This fine bowl was old when Bascom collected it during his doctoral fieldwork.
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