Egungun of Benin:
A Photographic and Textual Documentation
Egungun are a traditional Yoruba society of costumed dancers inhabited by the spirits of ancestors. Each wears a unique, full-body, fantastically, ornately decorated costume. The egungun are veiled and gloved and expose not an inch of skin to the outside world.
This book features 130 Sakete egungun type portraits along with many other photographs taken by Michael Landau at the 2017 Sakete Egungun Festival each accompanied by texts by egungun society elders describing the 130 types' origins and behavior. Costume changes between 2011 and 2017 are documented. Limited photographs from Sakete of unidentified egungun,, officiants, and fetishes are also included.
After an Author's Foreward, the Introduction on throughout the 130 texts, all information strictly derives from the oral traditions held as expressed 2010-2017 by my Yoruba informants, mostly Sakete egungun society elders, limiting sources thus to not only document in photographs these beautiful costumes, but also how they are interpreted by their creators.
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