| History: |
Some of the earliest examples of sophisticated sculpture in
sub-Saharan Africa come from the Nok culture. We do not know what the
people called themselves, so the culture was named after the town of Nok
where the first object was found. The fired clay or terracotta sculptures
range in size from small pendant to life-size figures. Nok is an iron age
culture that has been dated between 900 B.C. and 200 A.D. Archaelogical
artifacts have been found in Nigeria, primarily to the north of the
Niger-Benue River confluence and below the Jos escarpment. According to
some accounts, based on artistic similarities between early Yoruba art
forms and Nok forms, there may be connections between Nok culture and
contemporary Yoruba peoples. |
