Thursday, April 18, 2019

Egun Mask Dance

From Wilderness Travel brochure: "The Egungun is a very powerful secret society, and Egun masks are considered to be the reincarnation of deceased people and are known and feared for their aggressiveness and their unpredictable way of moving around. Intensively colored, the masks are covered with a multitude of pieces of cloth in many shades of red. The men wearing the mask costumes emerge from the forest and form a procession through the streets of the village, leaping towards any foolish spectator who dares getting too close. And nobody wants to be touched by the Egun because any contact carries the danger of death. ... When masks arrive, they perform a kind of bull fight designed to scare the crowd, but in truth they are actually greeted with bursts of laughter!"












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