The Wild Bull and the Sacred Forest
Form, Meaning, and Change in Senegambian Initiation Masks

This study of the cattle-horned initiation masks of southern Senegal and the Gambia gives a detailed view of Casamance cultures.

Peter Mark (Author)

9780521413466, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 28 February 1992

190 pages
26.4 x 18.8 x 1.7 cm, 0.56 kg

"Mark has done a masterful job of tracking down over sixty such masks on three continents, unraveling the often complex history of particular masks, and supplementing them with his thorough knowledge of early European travellers' accounts which provide, occasionally with illustrations, the earliest evidence of such masks among the Diola. He skillfully interprets the changing iconography of the masks, relating them to Diola thought about manhood, fertility, witchcraft, and clairvoyance as well as the openness of Diola maskmakers to incorporate Muslim gris-gris (or shapes that imitate such talismen), Manjaco cloth, and even such commercial items as cowry shells and buttons into the decoration of the masks." Robert M. Baum, Journal of Religion in Africa

This study of the cattle-horned initiation masks of southern Senegal and the Gambia weaves together art history, history, and cultural anthropology to give a detailed view of Casamance cultures, as they have interacted and changed over the past two centuries. Based on seven field trips to West Africa and fifteen years of research in colonial archives and museum collections from Dakar to Leipzig, Professor Mark's work presents a subtle interpretation of Casamance horned masquerades, their complex ritual symbolism, and the metaphysical concepts to which they allude. In tracing the cultural interaction and changing identity of the peoples of the Casamance, the author convincingly argues for a dynamic approach to art and ethnic identity. Culture should be seen not as a fixed entity but as a continuing process. This dynamic model reflects the history of interaction between Manding and Diola and between Muslim and non-Muslim, that has produced hybrid masks.

Foreword
List of illustrations
Acknowledgements
1. Introduction: method and subject
2. Ethnographic background
3. Bukut initiation
4. History and provenance of the Ejumba mask
5. Iconography of the horned mask
6. Mandinka or Jola? Art and culture as regional processes
7. Islam and Casamance masking traditions
8. Conclusion
Appendix
Bibliography.

Subject Areas: Art of indigenous peoples [ACBK]