The name of this item is missing in its original language. If you know the name or have any comments, please use the form to get in touch with the institution that provided the data.
Osun rod

These iron sculptures are called "Osun staffs". They combine the powers of Ogun (the god of metal) and Osun (the god of medicine). Medicinal plants and Osun staffs helped religious specialists transform into animals and track down harmful "witches" at night. Text: Dietmar Neitzke.

Data Provider
Linden-Museum Stuttgart Staatliches Museum für Völkerkunde
Show only fields containing data

Cataloguing data

Cultural attribution
Edo
Object type
Plastik
Dimensions
Breite: 34 cm, Höhe: 170 cm
Material/Technique
Iron
moulded
Current location
Linden-Museum Stuttgart
Inventory number
005360

Provenance and sources

where
Nigeria

when
1899
Provenance
In October 1898, the Hamburg company "H. Bey & Co" offered the Berlin Ethnological Museum a Benin collection that came directly from Africa. However, due to a lack of funds, the entire collection could not be purchased and was therefore to be passed on to other interested parties. Felix von Luschan of the Berlin Museum therefore informed Karl Graf von Linden in November 1898, and offered him a right of first refusal. The Linden Museum then made 15,000 M available for the purchase of objects. The purchase price was paid by the Heilbronn entrepreneur Karl Knorr, which is why the collection became known as "Die Karl Knorr'sche Sammlung von Benin-Altertümern". Von Luschan published a detailed description of the collection under the same title (1901) on behalf of Count Linden and Knorr. Other buyers of the collection included the museums in Vienna and Munich, but also people such as Hans Meyer (Leipzig) and Eugen Rautenstrauch (Cologne). Text: Markus Himmelsbach.

Information about the record

Legal status metadata
This content was machine-translated
2.1 / 7.0