Fetish figure - Sakalava - Madagascar - Amulet, Magic Horn

Magic Horn No. 1, length 17 cm x 5 cm, 340 g.
This original, very rare object comes from a healingist (Ombiasa) of the Sakalava people in southern Madagascar. The Ombiasa have a variety of roles in Malagasy beliefs; he can craft love spells, prepare herbal potions for all sensible and nonsensical purposes, influence people through trance, or even kill. These practices echo the African Voodoo cult in their own way.
To protect against dangers, to preserve health, and to defend against the spirit world, amulets (Ody) are worn and handmade in southern Madagascar to this day. Our shown “Magic Horn” (Mohara) gathers different fetishes, which, however, have acquired strong “powers” through the Ombiasa. The horn itself already has a special aura across Madagascar because it comes from the sacred zebu, a symbol of wealth, prestige, and the seat of the ancestors. In the south there is a rite of the youth cult through cattle theft, where the Mohara are supposed to render one invisible. Mohara can serve individual purposes, but when used by the Ombiasa, also serve collective rites. Diseases in the traditional Malagasy setting are never caused solely by physiological factors; they are always caused by sorcery, transgression of prohibitions (fady), or simply by human witchcraft. Therefore esoteric remedies by healers or astrologers (Mpskidy) are used to expel these afflictions again.
It consists of a roughly carved zebra horn, the interior of which houses fixed objects such as coins, medicine vials, seeds, bones, etc., with clay paste, eggs, and blood. On the outside and on the cords are beads fixed with cotton thread—the “vakana gasy.” This magic horn was not worn at the hip, probably hung on a cloth around the neck. Made around 1955, acquired in 1996 in Tulear.