Bateba (Lobi shrine figure)
Carved wooden figure made on a diviner's instruction as the material body for a *thil* spirit; placed on a Lobi shrine and understood as a living, acting being — not a decorative idol.
Bateba (plural bateba or bateba-ba) is a carved wooden figure made at the instruction of a Lobi diviner (buor) as a material vessel for a thil spirit. It is not a decorative or commemorative object — it is commissioned for a specific protective or remedial purpose and placed on a family or village shrine where it receives offerings of food, drink and blood.
Lobi owners understand a bateba as a living being with agency: it can move, fight witches, communicate with other figures, and die from neglect. Bateba are classified by posture and function — phuwe (ordinary, protective), ti puo (dangerous, apotropaic, with raised arms), ti bala (extraordinary, including double-headed and mating-pair figures), yadawora (mourning figures). Correct use of the term replaces the imprecise label "fetish" and signals the functional taxonomy that governs attribution and ethical collecting (Meyer 1981; Bognolo 2007).