Ci Wara

Tyi wara, ty or ti wara, chy, ci or cy wara: many names are used for the best-known crest mask of the Bambara.

This is the mythical antelope, born from the union of the old mother Mousso Koroni and the snake, one of the five primordial animals, which taught humans to cultivate the land. Its stylised representation of the Hippotragus, or horse antelope, is the emblem of the Fla-n-kuru, a brotherhood of the Tyi Wara society belonging to the age groups that bring boys and girls together in a single seven-year age group. The social purpose of these youth associations is to clear land or help the most disadvantaged with field work such as sowing and harvesting. This assistance forms part of initiation. On these occasions, a pair of dancers wearing male and female Tyi Wara masks, animals that protect the crops, would appear, preceded by a sacrificer carrying a fetish and accompanied by a jester mask. The masks moved through the fields, imitating the movements of the Hippotragus antelope, to drive out nyama, negative emanations, detect danger or discover evil spirits capable of tearing the soul from cultivated plants or the vital force from their grains.

Bambara mythology recounts that the Hippotragus antelope, sent by Faro, gave humans their first grain and then taught them to work the land. The masks always appear in pairs, male and female, their wearers’ bodies covered with plant fibres and the mask fixed to a kind of cap on the head or secured by plant fibres.

The female antelope carries a small antelope on her back as a symbol of motherhood and fertility.

The male couple symbolizes the union, strength and wisdom the farmer needs to fertilize and cultivate the land that will give him and his family food. It also evokes for the Bambara the analogy between the sexual act and the work of the earth, the analogy between the fertility of the woman and the work of the fields.

The Bougouni style is characterised by several superimposed animals, usually a pangolin and antelopes. The crest is topped with a representation of Hippotragus horns. The pangolin has its legs slightly bent, and above it is the representation of an anteater that seems to be an aardvark, upon which rest the horns of the Hippotragus, horse antelope or sable antelope.