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Ifa Divination Instruments |
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 atalogue
numbers 12 through 16—all instruments used in
the Yoruba divination system known as Ifa—enabled diviners to invoke
the Yoruba deity of wisdom, Orunmila, and transcribe his insights, while
at the same time providing him with offerings of great beauty. In these
works, through a rich language of visual metaphors, Yoruba artists conveyed
their concept of the cosmos and the forces that animate it. They include
an ordinary gourd inscribed with a diagram of the two hemispheres of Yoruba
existence, and a costly ivory vessel supported by a graceful female caryatid,
designed to hold the sixteen sacred palm nuts cast by Ifa diviners during
consultations. Ifa rites provide an avenue of communication between the
spirit world and that of the living, initiated when the diviner strikes
a tapper (iroke Ifa) on the flat wooden surface of a divination tray (opon
Ifa). This tray, adorned with carved images and dusted with powder, serves
as the template on which sacred signs (odu) related to the personal concerns
of a diviner's client are traced as the point of departure for analysis.
In contrast to those transitory signs, the more permanent backdrop of the
carved motifs on the tapper and tray constitutes an artistic exegesis of
the forces that shape human experience and the universal needs fulfilled
by such quests for enlightenment. |
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12. Carved Calabash Yoruba, Oyo, Nigeria Calabash; Diam. 25 cm (9 7/8 in.) 19th century Staatliches Museum für Völkerkunde, Munich 18-22-15 |
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13. Ifa Divination Tray (Opon Ifa) Fon, Allada, Republic of Benin Wood; 34.4 x 55.7 cm (13 1/2 x 21 7/8 in.) 16th–17th century Ulmer Museum, Ulm, Exoticophylacium Weickmannianum |
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14. Ifa Divination Tapper (Iroke Ifa) Yoruba, Nigeria Ivory; H. 42 cm (16 1/2 in.) 18th century Laboratoire d'Ethnologie, Musée de l'Homme, Paris 97.4.1 |
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15. Ifa Divination Vessel: Female Caryatid (Agere Ifa) Yoruba, Owo, Nigeria Ivory with wood or coconut-shell inlay; H. 16.2 cm (6 7/8 in.), Diam. 11.4 cm (4 1/2 in.) 17th–19th century The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Klaus G. Perls, 1991 (1991.17.127) |
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