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The word "Mmanwu" in Igbo means "spirits of the dead". [1] It is the combination of two Igbo words "mmuo" or "maa" which means spirit and "onwu" which means death. [2] This refers to the purpose behind Mmanwu which is to create physical representations of spirits and ancestors through the adornment of the masks.
The performances showcase an ideal image of an Igbo maiden. This ideal is made up by the smallness of a young girl's features and the whiteness of her complexion, which is an indication that the mask is a spirit. This whiteness is created using a chalk substance used for ritually marking the body in both West Africa and the African Diaspora.
Ijele is the largest mask system ever to enter the history of the world masking tradition. It comprises two segments: the upper and the lower segments, divided at the centre by a big python. The upper segment is called Mkpu Ijele while the lower segment is called Akpakwuru Ijele or Ogbanibe and the centre is called Eke - Ogba (Python).
People frequently question whether the man wearing the mask is indeed a man because she constantly looks stunning in colorful attire and dances so smoothly. Mkpamkpanku [6] There are many masculine aspects in this masquerade, which is quite stern. They are typically well-known in their own right, swift, aggressive, and nimble.
Masks have been used for a variety of purposes within Igbo culture in both historic and modern times. For specific segments of the Igbo population, some mask pairs have been traditionally interpreted as representing the duality of beauty and ugliness. The former being depicted as the maiden spirit and the latter as the elephant spirit. [4]
The earth spirit, Ana, is 'Odinana', as is the sacred role of yam in the Igbo world, the right of inheritance, and the place of the elder. 'Odinana', as the immutable customary rites and traditions of the Igbo world, is enduring and cuts across indigenous Igbo people, while 'Omenana' is rather relative from one section of the Igbo to the other ...
An Igbo man with facial marks of nobility known as Ichi [1]. Ichi was a form of facial ritual scarification worn by mainly men of the Igbo people of Nigeria.The scarification indicated that the wearer had passed through initial initiation into the aristocratic Nze na Ozo society, [2] thus marking the wearer as nobility.
An intentionally "ugly" mask of the Ekpo society with an articulated jaw. The masks and accoutrements of the Ekpo society make up the greatest works of art in Ibibio society. Ibibio often purposefully play with proportions in their masks to distort the face. [23] A component that appears often in Ibibio masks is an articulated lower jaw. [23]