Pendant mask; hip-ornament; lost-wax cast in brass. In form of human face with openwork beaded headdress and beaded udaeha band across forehead. Flat semi-circular flange below chin with stylised mudfish in relief. Large suspension loop at top on reverse. Casting cup and channels in place. Part of lost-wax casting series showing manufacture of pendant mask.
Major Percy Powell-Cotton travelled to Benin City at the start of his second expeditionto Cameroon in January 1931. While there he visited the brass casters and filmed the process of lost-wax casting. It appears that Major Powell-Cotton subsequently commissioned two series of lost-wax castings via the shipping agents Holt's (possibly through Holt's agent, Harry Maddocks, who was based in Benin City). This set Af1932,1205.1-7 was donated to the Museum in 1932; the other set (acc.nos. ETH CAM2.955-971) remains at the Powell-Cotton Museum in Birchington-on-Sea, Kent.
Exhibited: 1970-1973, London, Museum of Mankind, Divine Kingship in Africa 1991 Feb-Apr, Norwich, Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, Man and Metal in Ancient Nigeria