A Songye community power figure, created in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), is valued at $1m-1.5m ahead of a sale of African and pre-Columbian art at Sotheby's.
The New York auction features several lots from the collection of Allan Stone, a respected dealer in ethnographic artefacts.
The sheer size of the statue places it among the most significant examples known to have been produced by the Songye people.
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Such guardians were commissioned by local sorcerers with the intention that a spirit would take up residence inside and protect the tribe.
The lot is composed of a variety of materials, including copper, leather and wood. The studs across its face represent smallpox, which periodically ravished the region.
In November last year, a Songye power figure made $2m in the sale of another part of the Allan Stone collection.
A Kongo-Yombe Nail power figure, also from the DRC, is estimated at $700,000-1m.
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The figure is designed to inspire fear and would have once held a spear in its raised right hand. It was important that the figures commanded respect as they served a judicial purpose in the culture of the tribe.
The nails that cover the figure are highly symbolic. They would be hammered in upon the resolution of a dispute, or once the cause of a problem was uncovered - meaning each represents a story in the history of the village.
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