50 BULLETIN OF THE LIVERPOOL MUSEUMS. 
had been modelled from a broken pipe which had the stem lashed to it by 
string. On the coils of cord in front is seated a grotesque figure, to which 
Iam unable to give a name. Round the pipe-bowl there are two double 
longitudinal panels, separated by a zig-zagging serpent with its head 
uppermost, in the act of seizing the toes of a long-beaked bird, which is 
flapping its wings in its attempt to escape. This bird may represent a 
turkey, which, according to Burton, the celebrated traveller (who visited the 
city in 1862, and has given in Fraser's Magazine* a most interesting and 
detailed account of what he saw), was one of the household gods of 
the people of Benin. “Like all others it [the abode which Burton was 
assigned during his stay in the city] had its household gods, three rude 
wooden images of turkeys with 
drooping wings, disposed in 
triangle, supported by two short 
truncheons, and placed in a black 
and white striped niche in the 
northern wall.” The main panels 
on the bowl are subdivided by 
unstranded string partitions into 
two smaller panels, on the front 
pair of which is depicted, in high 
relief, on a leopard-spotted field, 
a decapitated bearded human head, 
from whose neck two strands of 
cord hang down to terminate in 
two open spirals, giving origin be- 
tween them to a conventionalised 
serpent. 
II. Our next illustration, Fig. 
2 (Register number: 7.10.97.7) 
represents the solitary plaque 
which the Museum has yet ob- 
tained. It is ornamented with 
three figures in high relief against 
a background, on which a floral 
ornament is chiselled above, and 
a rude conyentionalised leopard 
below, the whole being enclosed 
within a braided border. The 
Fig. 2. Lip or Box, witH REPRESENTATION central figure is attended by two 
or Kine, on Hic OFFICER, arm-bearers, and probably repre- 
ATTENDED BY HIS ARM-BEARERS. rs Cy . 
sents the King, or some other high 
personage ; for, according to Burton, the Captain of War, and perhaps others, 
as well as the King, were so attended as they went about. The chief figure 
wears an elaborate coral and bead-studded head-dress (nearly identical with 
that in Figs. 7, and 8, presently to be described). His neck is encircled with 
a high stiff collar of coral strings reaching to his lips, apparently dis- 
tinctive of Great Officers of State. A netted garment—or perhaps a chain- 
armour suit—covers the upper part of the body, while about his loins he 
wears a much embroidered cloth, ‘ flowered’ or hung all round with mask- 
like faces in relief, his legs being encased in coils of anklets. Both attend- 
ants show their tribal marks on the forehead, and long scar-like stripes down 
the sides and front of the body. 


* Vol. lxvii. 1863, p. 135, et seqq. 
