Challenging an account by Leo Frobenius from the turn of the century, which suggested that the owner of such a work carved it him- or herself, Christine Mullen Kreamer determined that it was invariably made by a specialist.1, 2. Although in Moba society, wood carving is a skill that all may acquire, tchitcheri may be fashioned only by individuals whose fathers are diviners. Carving tchitcheri is considered a delicate and highly dangerous operation, and diviners give their sons special protection needed for the creation of such ritually charged objects. Those who transgress this sanction are thought to risk blindness or insanity.3
Three different genres of tchitcheri may be distinguished by their patronage, contextual placement, scale, and degree of abstraction. The smallest of these, yendu tchitcheri, are placed in personal shrines, which all adults possess. They do not represent any particular person or ancestor but are considered an individual’s direct link with God. Middle-size bawoong tchitcheri (between 25 and 90 centimeters high) are designed for household shrines situated prominently in the vestibule of a family compound. These figures represent recent ancestors, such as the parents or grandparents of current compound leaders (no more than three or four generations removed), whom the diviner advises the family to petition. Because the figures correspond to known ancestors, they are more detailed in representing bodily and facial features.
The work shown here falls into the category of tchitcheri sakwa, which evoke and are named after a clan’s founding member. The Moba are subsistence agriculturalists, and rituals are conducted before planting and harvest by the family’s eldest male member, who applies libations to its sakwa commemorating the founding ancestor.4 Stylistically, sakwa fall between the extremely abbreviated, faceless, anonymous yendu and the more specifically identifiable bawoong portraits. These monumental works are prominently placed outside, in the household yard. Although the features of a family’s sakwa become abraded by the elements, it stands from one generation to the next as an indelible marker of its spiritual life. No contemporary works of this kind have been commissioned, and oral history and the condition of some surviving works suggest that they may be several centuries old.
The highly standardized design of tchitcheri reduces the human figure to an elemental form. Attenuated arms may either form a single unit with the torso or be detached at chest level. Minimal attention is given to facial features, details such as hands and feet are generally omitted, and only occasionally is gender suggested. This extremely reductive polelike figure is crowned by a rounded knoblike head with a blank expression. The upper body forms a unified, continuous surface, with its arms held at its sides along the length of the torso. The trunk is represented as a recessed rectangle with raised nipples and umbilicus; at its base, it narrows and then flares outward slightly to suggest hips. Below, clothespinlike legs are carved as two separate prongs that taper off into narrowed stems. Despite an emphasis on bilateral symmetry, the figure leans very gently to one side. Throughout the weathered surface, abrasion and splits reveal the effects wrought upon the work over time.
1. Moba sculptural forms have been classified as belonging to a substyle related to peoples of Gur-speaking heritage who have settled from the western Sudan through the Benue River basin; Sieber and Rubin 1968 and Roy 1978, both cited in Christine Mullen Kreamer, “Moba Shrine Figures,” African Arts 20, no. 2. p. 53. This suggests that a common cultural legacy underlies the formal affinity between the work shown here and the Mumuye figure in cat. no. 6.
2. Frobenius 1913, p. 430, quoted in Kreamer, “Moba Shrine Figures,” p. 53.
3. Kreamer, “Moba Shrine Figures,” p. 53.
4. Ibid., p. 54, ref from The Horstmann Collection, Zug, Switzerland
