Oba Commemorative Head Bronze Ife-beni Edo-benin

Tete commemorative Oba Bronze Ife - Bini Edo - BeninThe art of Ife is the only one in Africa to offer such realistic anthropomorphic representations.
It is of such high artistic quality that it has often been compared to the other great naturalistic cultures of ancient Greece and Rome.
Tradition has it that it was customary in Benin to decapitate defeated kings and offer their heads to the Oba, who passed them on to the bronze craftsmen. Only the heads of those who put up the strongest resistance were cast.
When the son of a defeated sovereign ascended the throne, the Oba would send him a bronze replica of his father's head as a warning.
Scarification on the forehead would be considered the mark of a foreigner.
Coral bead necklaces were of paramount importance as symbols of sovereignty, reserved for the Oba, the Queen Mother and high dignitaries.