Bozo Female Yellow Figural Bust Mali

Overall Condition: Fair to good. Most of our pieces have spent decades on at least two continents, and have been treasured by several owners.   Small splits, scrapes and cracks are a normal part of their patina attesting to their age and extensive use.  We examine each piece carefully when we receive it and report any damage we find in our listings.  Please look carefully at the pictures which may also reveal condition and damage.

Damage/Repair: Cracks, bug damage, missing nipple, dirt, missing hair piece in back, see photos for details

The Bozo are a Mande ethnic group located predominantly along the Niger River in Mali. The name Bozo is thought to derive from Bambara bo-so "straw house"; the people accept it as referring to the whole of the ethnic group but use more specific clan names such as Sorogoye, Hain, and Tieye themselves. They are famous for their fishing and are occasionally referred to as the "masters of the river". The Bozo language, which belongs to the Soninke-Bozo subgroup of Northwestern Mande, have traditionally been considered dialects of one language though there are at least four distinct varieties. From DBPedia (https://dbpedia.org/)

Bozo comes from the Bambara term for straw house; it's a reference to dwellings in temporary fishing camps. People use this term for an entire ethnic group. "Bozo" is really three distinct people groups speaking four varieties of the so called Bozo language. One of these is Jenaama, the language of the Sorogoye Bozo people. The Bozo tribes live mostly in the Mopti region in the interior delta but also live in other parts of Mali and other West-African countries where there are rivers and dams. These people are migrating to Bamako in significant numbers. From The Joshua Project (https://joshuaproject.net/)

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