# Headdress

- Date: early 1900s
- Medium: Wood, rawhide, cane, paint, bone, natural fiber, and metal
- Classification: Mask
- Dimensions: Overall: 67.3 x 43.2 x 43.2 cm (26 1/2 x 17 x 17 in.)
- Culture: Africa, West Africa, Nigeria, Ejagham-style maker
- Credit line: Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund
- Museum: [Cleveland Museum of Art](https://clevelandart.org/art/1990.23)
- Rights: [Public domain (CC0)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1990.23/1990.23_web.jpg
- Who can see it: Tweens profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

Headdresses or crest masks made of antelope skin stretched over a carved head are a distinctive art form of the Cross River region in southeastern Nigeria and western Cameroon. Worldwide, this practice is unique. This female evocation of ideal feminine beauty was most probably worn by an Ejagham woman in the context of a female society called Ekpa, which was responsible for girls' education in preparation for marriage. The headdress represents a girl who evokes ideal female beauty and is ready for marriage. The depicted hairstyle was worn during the coming-out ceremony following the girls’ seclusion.