In the 16th century, European traders admired and collected ivory sculptures carved by Sapi artists on the coast of Guinea. In the same period, Sapi artists also carved soft soapstone into small figures. Farmers and miners living on the Guinea coast today have found many of these stone sculptures, but their original use is unclear. The Temne, who consider the Sapi their ancestors, use stone to commemorate important citizens. Although the original meaning of these evocative sculptures is unknown, their subjects—the geometric faces of the smiling man and woman holding bowls, and the soft curves of the crocodile holding his snout—spark the imagination.