A single top shell, flanked on either side by two short horizontal comforters, caps this model. The eyeballs are largely underlined by an arched rib that also crosses the chin. Numerous erosions. br /> The white masks of Gabon, itengi , (pl. bitengi) were associated with the various secret societies of Gabon, including the Bwiti, Bwete, and the Mwiri ("to lead"), the latter being divided into several levels of initiation, to which all Punu men belonged, and whose emblem was the caiman (hence, for some, the saurian scaled pattern). The Punu did not use masks in Bwiti rituals, unlike the Tsogo. This object, evocative of a dead young woman, was displayed during the Okuyi dance. These powerful secret societies, which also had a judicial function, included several dances, among which the Leopard Dance, the Esomba Dance, the Mukuyi Dance or the Okuyi Dance, depending on the place, acrobatic dance on stilts, being the most widespread. In some villages, at dawn or at dusk, the Okuyi was accompanied by songs in an esoteric language that only the initiated could understand. (Punu,L. Perrois and C. Grand-Dufay)
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