Figure

Female figure commemorating the dead. Such figures, carved from soft limestone, served as a memory of a deceased and as a passing abode of his or her soul. After completion of the death rituals, the figures were destroyed. The figurines were very popular with Western merchants and collectors and therefore were already being produced for sale by the New Irelanders at the turn of the 20th century. These examples have been fashioned in a less expressive, more basic way. The object originates from the transfer of the University Collection as a permanent loan to the Municipal Collections in 1904.