Lot 125
125
A RARE VILI ANIMAL FETISH, the quadruped standing on four short plump legs, the open jaws of the triangular head with two short conical teeth at the front and paired pointed teeth each side clamped about a small roll of cloth-filled bamboo or cane, the eyes coloured white with black pupils behind oval glass inalys, a high mound of fetish material applied to the back with circular mirror in a depression at the top, further fetish material in a pink cloth about the neck, the base of the legs eroded, the tail missing

Details
A RARE VILI ANIMAL FETISH, the quadruped standing on four short plump legs, the open jaws of the triangular head with two short conical teeth at the front and paired pointed teeth each side clamped about a small roll of cloth-filled bamboo or cane, the eyes coloured white with black pupils behind oval glass inalys, a high mound of fetish material applied to the back with circular mirror in a depression at the top, further fetish material in a pink cloth about the neck, the base of the legs eroded, the tail missing
26cm. long

Lot Essay

It is often difficult, if not impossible, to establish exactly what animal is depicted in African carvings of quadrupeds, and indeed Kreiger (1965, p.101, fig.207(a), when describing a very similar carving collected on the Loango Expedition of 1872, is careful to call it Fetisch in Tiergestalt (Massabe) - animal-shaped fetish - rather than the dog it resembles. However Bastin (1994, fig.27) quoting MacGaffey (1993, p.43) describes such animal fetishes as representations of Kozo, the spiritual companion of the powerful "hunter" Nkondi, who helps him hunt down witches at night

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