Fon Asen Altar Staff
The asen is the commemorative altar staff of the Fon of Benin, a forged iron pole topped with a figurative scene, an ancestor at work, an animal, a scene of daily life, set in a base of clay or iron and placed beside the ancestor altar of the compound. When a family member dies, an asen is raised for the dead, and through it the ancestor receives offerings during the rites of remembrance and is fed and spoken with as if still present. The iron is worked by smiths, who are themselves set apart in Fon society, and the figures are made to be read: a hunter with his gun, a woman at the mortar, the