Koma Terra Cotta Funerary Figure

Cut off at the waist and tilted, with one rounded breast and an arm slung low.

This Koma terra cotta funerary figure is Koma, from Northern Ghana, West Africa. Funerary figures in many African traditions are generally linked with remembrance of the dead and with family ties to ancestors, though meanings differ widely from one community to the next. Narrow, slanting fragment in reddish-brown with a rough, grainy skin. The head is broken away at the top, and a single small rounded breast is visible. One arm runs down the side, and the base is jagged and sheared. It is 2 inches wide, 1.4 deep and 4.25 high.

Incomplete, tilted and still holding its pose.