Mende and Vai
Sande Society Helmet Mask (Nowo/Sowo/Zoba)
Mende/Vai, 1900-1932
Scroll
Physical Qualities
Wood, fiber, 13 11/16 × 8 7/16 in. (34.8 × 21.5 cm.)
Credit Line
Gift of the Jamosil Foundation, Alexandria, Virginia
Object Number
1989.153
When girls emerge from their period of training with the Sande society, their return to town is celebrated with singing, dancing, and a feast. The girls help each other with their hair and borrow silver jewelry from women in their family to prepare for the party. A girl with such a fashionable coiffure as the one on the mask in front of you would be the envy of all her friends. Sande masks representing older women, however, have more classic hairstyles. Both the five-lobe hairstyle to the left and the four-part hairstyle to the right, called “mouse under a bushel basket,” are classic hairstyles that were already popular in the 19th century.
African Reinstallation
