Large memorial head mma. Akan, Ghana, 18th / 19th century. H 20.5cm, made of gray slurry terracotta, probably from Hemang Twifo. With pursed lips and flared nostrils, coffee bean eyes and temple scarification marks. The upturned coiffure with applied beads to the front and back, the back with incised linear decoration, the top originally with superstructure, the back of the neck with handwritten collection number "08391". Although presented as portraits, these heads are no more so in the Western sense than the figures, which, like the heads, were also placed on sacred groves. They merely depict characteristics of the deceased, such as hairstyle, scarring or jewelry, which made him or her recognizable to relatives. According to oral tradition, however, the artist looked into a bowl of water or palm oil in order to guess the facial features of the deceased. Such heads mma were reserved only for the royal families and those who had served them and were usually used in funeral ceremonies 40 days after death (ideally when the deceased had achieved ancestral status) and placed on a special grove, grave or burial site. Fractures on the reverse. Provenance: ex Galerie Sonnenfels, Vienna; ex private collection Australia and UK; ex Woolley & Wallis, auction, Salisbury 8.6.2021, lot 318.