MendeMasks, figures & African art

Overview

The Mende constitute one of the demographically, culturally and politically most dominant population groups in the West African region, whose historical and contemporary development dynamics decisively characterise the fate of the entire region. Their geographical distribution is primarily concentrated in the southern and eastern provinces of the present-day Republic of Sierra Leone, particularly in the districts of Moyamba, Bo, Kenema and Kailahun. In addition, there are significant, historically grown diaspora communities in the neighbouring forest and coastal areas of the Republic of Liberia and occasionally in the Republic of Guinea (Little 1967: 70; UNWPP 2024).

The demographics of the Mende are subject to the statistical fluctuations typical of the region, but can be made more precise through current cohort analyses and census data. Current demographic projections by the United Nations for the years 2024 to 2025 put the total population of Sierra Leone at around 8.6 to 8.8 million people, with an annual growth rate of over 2 per cent (UNWPP 2024). Based on the census data, the proportion of Mende in the total population of Sierra Leone is estimated at a constant 30.5 to 33.2 per cent. In absolute terms, this corresponds to a population of an estimated 2.6 to 2.8 million individuals in Sierra Leone, while the Liberian Mende diaspora is quantified at around 46,000 to 60,000 people (Statistics Sierra Leone 2015; Joshua Project 2024).

Linguistically, the Mende language, whose self-designation is Mɛnde yia, belongs to the south-western branch of the Mande language family. This language family is an essential part of the superordinate Niger-Congo phylum (Migeod 1926). The closest linguistic relatives of Mende are the speakers of Loko in northern Sierra Leone and the Bandi in neighbouring Liberia. The language is internally differentiated into several main dialects, including Kpa-Mende (in the west), Sewa-Mende (in the centre) and Ko-Mende (in the east), whereby these linguistic boundaries often also mark subtle cultural and ritual differences (Little 1951). Historically noteworthy is the development of a separate syllabary, the Mende Kikakui, which was invented by Kisimi Kamara in 1921 and was widely used in the region before it was increasingly marginalised by the Latin alphabet (Aginsky 1935).

The nomenclature of ethnicity is a prime example of the complex dialectic of self-designation and foreign designation in colonial and pre-colonial Africa. While the term "Mende" is universally accepted as an endonym today, early colonial records and ethnographic reports of the 19th century document the exonymous use of terms such as Kossa, Kossi, Kosso, Boumpe or Hulo (Clarke 1863; Migeod 1926). These foreign names were primarily coined by neighbouring coastal peoples such as the Bullom, Sherbro or Temne and often had a pejorative connotation, stigmatising the Mende as aggressive invaders or warlike backwoodsmen. The classification of the Mende as a homogeneous "ethnic group" in the pre-colonial period is the subject of intense controversy in modern historiography. Historians such as Walter Rodney (1967) have worked out in detail that the consolidation of a unified Mende identity could be a relatively recent phenomenon of the 18th and 19th centuries, resulting from the linguistic and cultural assimilation of autochthonous population groups (such as the Crimea and Bullom) by warring elites.

The social structure of the Mende is organised hierarchically and territorially in chiefdoms. The smallest political and administrative unit is the village, which is organised into sections under the leadership of a section chief (sub-chief). Several sections form the territory of a paramount chief (Little 1967). Ethnological research on the kinship organisation of the Mende is characterised by remarkable academic dissonance. The sources are ambiguous and divide the scholarly community. Classical British social anthropology of the mid-20th century, largely characterised by the empirical studies of Kenneth Little (1951), classified the Mende strictly as patrilineal, patrilocal and polygynous. Little emphasised male dominance in land allocation and political succession. However, revisionist work since the 1970s, particularly by anthropologists such as Carol P. MacCormack (1971) and later Lynda Day (2012), has shown that the system is far more flexible and has strong bilateral or ambilineal features. In sharp contrast to many neighbouring patrilineal societies, among the Mende it is institutionally and historically enshrined that women can hold the position of paramount chief and exercise political hegemony. This structural ambivalence is discussed in recent socio-economic studies (cf. La Ferrara 2007; Lowes 2016) as a highly adaptive, hybrid system that minimises conflicts and diversifies access to resources.

In terms of subsistence farming, the Mende traditionally operate as peasant farmers. The absolute centre of their agrarian, economic and ritual existence is the cultivation of rice (primarily dry or upland rice), which is cultivated using labour-intensive slash-and-burn techniques (Little 1967). This monoculture is supplemented by the cultivation of manioc, yams, millet and, more recently, the integration of cash crops such as cocoa, coffee and palm oil for the globalised market. The agrarian division of labour is strictly gender-specific: The physically risky and energy-sapping clearing of primary and secondary forests is the responsibility of men, while women are responsible for planting, weeding and the logistically complex processing of the harvest. Documentary holdings from the British Museum, which go back to the early field records of colonial administrators such as T.J. Alldridge (1901), illustrate these historical subsistence patterns and the profound interweaving of agricultural cycles and social rhythmisation in great detail.

The relationship between the Mende and their neighbouring peoples - especially the Temne in the north, the Sherbro on the coast and the Gola and Vai in the east - is historically characterised by a mixture of military expansion, trade alliances and deep ritual symbiosis. Despite language barriers, these groups share an almost identical system of secret societies (sodalities), which facilitates the inter-ethnic mobility of ritual objects and master carvers across language barriers and often makes the ethnological attribution of individual works of art in museum collections more difficult.

Cultural context

The religious system of the Mende is based on a highly structured, hierarchical cosmological order that amalgamates monotheistic principles with a pronounced cult of ancestors and spirits. The creator deity Ngewo (also invoked as Leve in older, archaic manifestations) is enthroned at the absolute head of the pantheon. Ngewo is conceptualised as an omnipotent, omniscient entity who created the universe but subsequently withdrew into transcendence. As a classical Deus otiosus, Ngewo is not directly approachable in people's profane everyday lives and does not require immediate cultic worship through shrines or sculptures (Harris & Sawyerr 1968). Instead, the direct spiritual interaction of the Mende takes place with two intermediate categories of beings: the ancestors (Kekeni) and the nature and spirit beings (Ngafa). These Ngafa are formless energies that reside in distinctive topographical formations such as dense forest patches, caves and especially deep, dark river pools. They have the ability to massively influence the fate of people and materialise physically primarily in the wooden masks of the secret societies.

Religious authority among the Mende is not exercised by an institutionalised, clerical priesthood in the Western Christian sense, but in a decentralised manner by highly specialised ritual functionaries, divinators and above all by the omnipresent secret societies (sodalities). Divinators serve as diagnosticians of physical and metaphysical illnesses, interpret omina and establish communication with the ancestors. By far the most powerful ritual institutions, however, are the Poro covenant, which controls the initiation and socialisation of men, and the Sande covenant (known as Bundu among the neighbouring Temne), which is responsible for women (Little 1965). In addition to these two main pan-social cults, there are specialised medical-ritual cults such as the Humui and the Njayei. These cults monitor specific rules of behaviour - such as strict adherence to sexual taboos and exogamy rules - and have their own mask traditions to heal psychosomatic ailments or madness caused by spiritual contamination.

The central rites of passage in the life cycle of the Mende manifest themselves in the extended initiation phases of puberty. In the Sande covenant, the young girls are sequestered in the so-called "sacred forest" for a period that traditionally lasts several months, but in the modern context often only a few weeks during the school holidays. In this liminal phase of spatial and social isolation, they are subjected to rigorous training that includes ethical behaviour, marital duties, complex dances, chants and herbalism (MacCormack 1981). A constitutive and ritually indispensable act of this initiation is female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM). This practice, which today is the focus of fierce international human rights criticism, is understood in the indigenous context as a physical inscription of group membership, a purification ritual and a necessary physical transition from androgynous child to fertile woman (Grillo 2018).

What fundamentally distinguishes the religious and socio-political structure of the Mende from almost all other African societies is the absolute singularity of the role of women in the mask cult. The Sande confederation is the only known and documented institution on the African continent in which a wooden mask tradition exists that is entirely controlled, performed and choreographed by women (Boone 1986; Phillips 1995). In most neighbouring cultures of the Ivory Coast, Nigeria or the Congo, the wearing of ritual wooden masks is a strict taboo for women; even masks that explicitly represent female ancestors or goddesses are traditionally performed by male dancers.

However, one of the most profound research controversies in African art history surrounds this singular position of power of the Mende women. The renowned art historian Sylvia Boone argued in her groundbreaking monograph Radiance from the Waters (1986), for whose research she was given exclusive access to internal Sande knowledge as an initiated woman, that the Sande masquerade was an expression of pure, unadulterated female empowerment. Boone (1986) interpreted the covenant as a primarily protective, aesthetically uplifting and solidary space in which "women themselves are the creative actors" and demonstrate unchallenged political and spiritual dominance through the masquerade. This idealising interpretation has been massively questioned since the late 1990s, particularly in the context of post-2010 feminist revisionist debates. The anthropologist Ruth Phillips (1995) demonstrated in detailed field studies that of 225 sande masks examined, more than a third were named after prominent male ancestors of the female owners. Phillips argues that this reveals a deep patriarchal complicity: The apparent autonomous female power of the Sande ultimately legitimises and sustains male lineages and the hegemony of Poro elites. Laura Grillo (2018) and art historians such as Susan Kart (2020) also criticise Boone's theses as essentialist. They accuse Boone of consistently ignoring the physically violent aspects of initiation (excision) and the politically repressive, often brutal sanctioning mechanisms of the sande ruling class in favour of a romanticised, Western-feminist view of art. Institutions such as the Fowler Museum (UCLA) have analysed and documented these iconographic and sociological areas of tension in exhibitions (e.g. based on Phillips' research).

Aesthetic features

The visual culture of the Mende is absolutely dominated by a specific, canonical object typology: the sowei mask (also called ndoli jowei in ritual performance). Structurally, this is not a face mask, but a helmet mask that is placed over the wearer's head and rests on her shoulders or a thick bast collar. This mask acts as a physical incarnation of the protective spirit of the Sande society - a water spirit (teli) whose occult power (hale) is invoked to protect the community and bless the initiates.

The choice of material for these sculptures necessarily falls on light, fresh and easy-to-carve tropical woods. Botanical forensic analyses have shown that primarily species such as Alstonia boonei or Spondias mombin (often imprecisely subsumed as "cotton tree" or cottonwood in older colonial catalogues) are used (Mizumura et al. 2015). The characteristic, deep black and highly reflective patina of the mask is not an inherent feature of the wood, but the result of an elaborate chemical-organic refinement process. After carving, the light-coloured wood is blackened with special plant extracts and then continuously and ritually rubbed with palm oil. This glossy black patina is highly iconographically charged: On the one hand, it evokes the flawless, well-oiled skin of an idealised Mende woman and cosmologically references the absolute blackness and moisture of the muddy river bottom, which is considered the residence of the spirit.

The canon of proportions of the sowei mask is subject to rigid aesthetic conventions, which also function as a moral textbook for the young women. The size range of the masks usually varies only slightly and is between 35 and 45 centimetres in height to ensure anatomical wearability (Clarke 2016). The design language is characterised by a striking diamond or triangular shape of the face, which is strongly compressed in the lower half of the helmet.

A central iconographic controversy (Boone vs. Hommel) arose in the academic literature over the interpretation of the distinctive neck rings. Sylvia Boone (1986) argued emphatically that these rings do not depict a physical reality, but symbolise the concentric water waves that arise when the water spirit breaks through the smooth water surface from the depths of the river. In sharp methodological contrast to this are authors such as W. L. Hommel and earlier anthropologists who interpret these rings as a mimetic representation of layers of fat on the neck. In many traditional West African agrarian societies, a well-fed body is considered the ultimate sign of economic prosperity, health and fertility; the rings would therefore be a direct reference to the community's success in nourishing the initiates. Another research controversy concerns the elaborate high hairstyles: while Hommel decoded sexual metaphors (phallic and clitoral symbols) in certain ascending hair combs, Boone vehemently rejected this reading, as it contradicted the strict sexual prudery and moral concepts of the Sande (Grillo 2018).

Although the masks are used exclusively by women for ritual purposes, they are necessarily made by male master carvers, as woodworking is considered a male domain. Contrary to the outdated cliché of anonymous African tribal art, distinct master craftsmen and regional workshops can be identified by precisely analysing the style.

For the private collector's market, the distinction between a profane object and an activated ritual object is highly explosive. A newly carved mask is merely a piece of wood. It only acquires its metaphysical charge through the ritual acts of consecration, the application of medicine (Hale) and its use in dance. Traces of wear are therefore essential for forensics and authenticity testing (forgery criteria). Original masks have a dark, encrusted patina on the inside of the helmet, which is the result of the dancer's sweat mixed with body oils and dust over decades. Real signs of age are manifested in oxidised cracks in the heartwood and specific, non-linear feeding galleries caused by termites. As the market value for "danced" (authentically used) masks has risen massively, forgers try to simulate these criteria. The wooden surface is artificially aged with potassium permanganate to imitate deep oxidation, or the masks are buried in sandy soil to artificially induce termite infestation (Steiner 2014; Basu 2011). Institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met) and the British Museum use state-of-the-art C14 analyses and wood type determinations to expose such forgeries.

Ritual practice

The ritual performance of the Sowei masquerade is a highly orchestrated, synaesthetic event that temporarily transcends the otherwise strictly drawn boundaries between the hidden, esoteric sphere of the secret society and the profane village public. The activation of the mask is a multi-stage process. When a new helmet mask is handed over by the male carvers to the high-ranking female leaders of the Sande (the Soweisia), it is profane. Its transformation into the Ndoli jowei (the dancing Sowei) requires the application of secret medicine (Hale), the invocation of the teli water spirit and, indispensably, the donning of the ritual costume. The mask is never seen in isolation, but rests on a massive, pitch-black costume made of dense raffia fibres that hermetically covers the dancer's entire body from shoulders to ankles. The dancer's identity is completely erased; she loses her human physique and becomes an avatar of the ancestors and metaphysical power.

The appearance of the mask follows a precise calendar and ritual cycle, which is primarily linked to the initiation phases of the young girls. The literature documents three central public manifestations of the Ndoli jowei: First, she appears to mark the beginning of detention when the girls are physically escorted from the village to the "sacred forest" (panguma). Secondly, she appears during the dangerous liminal phase to inform the community about the successful progress of the (often life-threatening) excision wounds and the spiritual well-being of the initiates. The third and most spectacular performance takes place during the ceremonial "release" of the now adult women, painted with white kaolin (hojo) and oiled with palm oil, into the village community (Phillips 1978; Boone 1986). Paradoxically, the performance of the sowei is silent. Since the spirits of the Mende do not speak human language, the mask communicates exclusively through an elaborate, choreographed language of majestic, gliding dance steps, turns and gestures, framed by the hypnotic percussion and choral singing of the female Sande members.

In addition to initiation, the mask is also activated during high-ranking social crises or transitions, for example at the funerals of important local chiefs or to ritually legitimise court decisions by the Sande. Offerings to the mask and the spirit resting in it usually consist of ritually cleansed "red rice" (mixed with palm oil), kola nuts or small coins, which are placed on bast mats in front of the dancing figure.

The Mende's repertoire of masks includes fascinating regional variations and typologies. The best-known counterpart to the perfect, flawless sowei is the gonde masquerade. The Gonde functions as a satirical, comedic alter ego. The gonde masks are often old, termite-eaten, asymmetrical or broken sowei masks, which are decorated with rusty nails, tin cans or tattered raffia. While the sowei dances majestically and with dignity, the gonde behaves erratically, uncouthly, begs the audience for money and caricatures human weaknesses, which fulfils a cathartic function within the strict social norms (Phillips 1995). Another striking variation is the helmet mask of humui society. These cults for men and women use masks that resemble the sowei, but often have four animal horns protruding upwards at the base. These horns reference amulets filled with powerful medicine to cure mental illnesses or ritually atone for serious taboo offences (such as incest) (Metropolitan Museum of Art 2016).

The lifecycle of such a ritual object illustrates the pragmatic African view of materiality. The metaphysical presence in the mask is not permanent, but tied to the act of ritual. Between the ceremonies, the masks rest covered in the shrine houses of the high-ranking women and are temporarily "deactivated". Disposal is osmotic: when a mask loses its structural integrity through inevitable climatic degradation - cracking due to extreme fluctuations in humidity or massive termite infestation - its ability to serve as a vessel for the spirit (ngafa) ceases. Historically, such unusable objects were left to nature, left to rot in the forest or even profaned and recycled as gonde. From the late 19th century, a new disposal method became popular: the sale of "dead" masks to Western colonial officials and ethnographers. This deactivation and re-contextualisation of the powerful hale into a passive museum art object is a theme that is reflected upon critically in contemporary curatorial concepts, for example in installations at the Musée du quai Branly or the British Museum (Basu 2011).

Historical context

The historical genesis of the Mende as a coherent socio-cultural entity on the soil of present-day Sierra Leone is the subject of one of the most fascinating and intense debates in West African historiography. The most consensual scientific working hypothesis states that the Mende and their language did not originate autochthonously in the coastal forests, but are the result of massive migratory movements from the northern savannah hinterland. These migrations are in the direct historical context of the slow but inexorable disintegration of the great Mali empire (Massing 1985). These waves of invasion, documented in the historical and Portuguese sources of the 16th century as the "Mane invasions", brought warlike elites to the coast, who subjugated or assimilated the resident groups (Bullom, Baga, Krim).

However, the dating controversies are significant. The historian Andreas Massing (1985) postulates a single, massive and targeted Mandinka invasion in the 16th century, which was militarily superior because it utilised new types of short bows, rattan shields and advanced metallurgical knowledge (iron weapons). Walter Rodney (1967), on the other hand, argued in favour of a much more complex chronology, which assumes staggered, smaller waves of invasion over several decades. An even more radical position was taken by A. P. Kup, who argued that the real demographic and cultural consolidation of the Mende as we know it today only took place through massive population shifts at the end of the 18th century. The source situation here - heavily dependent on linguistic glottochronology and often contradictory oral traditions - ultimately remains ambiguous.

The colonial encounter of the Mende with the European powers, specifically the British Empire, marked a dramatic turning point. The declared establishment of the British protectorate over the hinterland of Sierra Leone in 1895 led to massive political and economic friction. The introduction of direct taxation of indigenous households culminated in 1898 in the so-called Hut Tax War, one of the bloodiest and best organised anti-colonial rebellions in West Africa, in which Mende warriors temporarily crushed large sections of British authority before being crushed by technologically superior expeditionary corps. This colonial subjugation had an immediate impact on art production and circulation. The Poro and Sande societies were temporarily forced underground, their power structures monitored by the British or co-opted by Native Courts.

At the same time, this era marked the beginning of the market history for Mende art in the West. Early colonial administrators and photographers such as T. J. Alldridge recognised the exotic appeal of masks. Alldridge began collecting ritual artefacts and sowei masks on a large scale, buying up "dead" or confiscated objects. As early as 1886, he sold several of these masks, which he had previously presented at the "Colonial and Indian Exhibition" in London, to the British Museum for a few pounds sterling (Alldridge 1901). In doing so, he laid the foundation for what anthropologist Paul Basu (2011) aptly describes as the "object diaspora" of Sierra Leonean cultural artefacts - a global network of collections in which artefacts circulate, alienated from their ritual origins.

The real commercial breakthrough on the international art market took place in the second half of the 20th century. With the change in Western perception - away from ethnographic "fetishes" towards high-priced, sculptural masterpieces of African modernism - market prices exploded. This price development manifests itself drastically in the results of the major auction houses. While average, barely profiled pieces are often traded for mid four-figure sums, masterpieces by documented carvers achieve record sums. A significant example from recent market history was provided by the auction house Sotheby's: in November 2014, an immaculately preserved Sowei mask, attributed to the famous "Nguabu Master" from the historic Myron Kunin Collection, was auctioned for USD 35,000. A year earlier, a comparable piece realised USD 15,000 at Bonhams in New York.

This astronomical price development has massively exacerbated the problem of counterfeiting. The Western demand for "authentically danced" pieces not only drives counterfeiters, but also restorers. The anthropologist Paul Stoller (2014) documented the work of African "art doctors" in Western warehouses - such as the tragic case of the restorer Ousmane Zongo, who was shot dead in New York in 2003 and specialised in repairing Mende sculptures damaged in transit with traditional tools in such a way that the Western illusion of untouched authenticity was preserved. Today, genuine authenticity criteria are based on strict forensics: in addition to analysing termite feeding (which leaves natural, chaotic passages as opposed to machine-drilled holes) and deep heartwood cracks, the examination of the inner patina is essential. The crusts of body oils, sweat, old bast and offerings inside the helmet are almost impossible to chemically falsify convincingly. Institutions such as the Museum Rietberg in Zurich are playing a pioneering role by making their holdings from the early colonial period - whose date of acquisition is a reliable terminus ante quem for production - available for comparative material analyses.