A widely shared image of an Egúngún masquerader in Ede has a solid archival home, it is preserved in the Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art and catalogued as “Egungun masquerade, Ede, Nigeria.” The archive record places the photograph within Eliot Elisofon’s Africa travels from 17 March 1970 to 17 July 1970. That documented timeframe matters because it ties the moment to a specific historical journey, not to modern captions that often grow more detailed each time the image is reposted.
Ede itself is a historic Yoruba town in present day Osun State, closely associated with royal institutions and long standing ceremonial life. In Yoruba communities, masquerade is not simply a costume tradition, it is a public institution that can speak to identity, morality, memory, and continuity.
What Egúngún means in Yoruba life
Egúngún is widely recognised as a Yoruba ancestral masquerade tradition through which the departed are made present within the community. In this worldview, ancestors are not treated as distant figures who have vanished into the past. They remain morally relevant, socially remembered, and ritually approachable. Egúngún provides a formal path for that approach.
Across museum documentation, Egúngún is described as an institution that connects the living world with the spiritual world through masked, concealed performance. The figure encountered is not approached as an ordinary person. Instead, the community treats the appearance as an ancestral presence operating within established rules.
This is why Egúngún is often spoken of with seriousness. It is not only about celebration, it is also about accountability. Ancestors are remembered as those who shaped the lineage and the town, and their presence is invoked to protect communal wellbeing and reinforce social order.
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“Powers concealed”, the meaning carried inside the cloth
One of the most repeated translations of the word Egúngún is “powers concealed.” Museum sources, including the Art Institute of Chicago and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art, use this translation to describe what the masquerade is and how it functions. The phrase is not just poetic. It explains the principle of concealment at the heart of Egúngún.
Power is not presented by revealing a face or an identity. Power is presented by removing ordinary identity from view. Concealment creates a different kind of authority, one that belongs to the lineage, the ancestors, and the institution rather than to a named individual.
The costume, why full concealment is essential
Egúngún costumes are designed to cover the body completely. Museum learning resources describe ensembles made from decorative cloth with a mesh face screen, often accompanied by gloves and coverings that erase the human form. The aim is transformation. The person inside the costume becomes socially inaccessible as themselves so that the masquerade can be approached as a returned ancestor.
The layered textiles do more than cover. They animate the masquerade. As the figure moves, cloth panels lift, swing, and ripple, turning motion into spectacle without turning it into ordinary entertainment. Cloth becomes a kind of moving architecture, building presence around the performer while keeping the performer hidden.
In many collections, it is also noted that Egúngún ensembles can be added to over time, with new cloth incorporated across years. This means the costume itself can carry a visible history, textiles from different periods, styles, and meanings layered together into a single moving form.
Sound, movement, and the social atmosphere
Egúngún does not appear silently. Drumming, song, and rhythmic movement are central to the experience. The soundscape announces the masquerade’s approach and shapes how the community receives it. Movement is not random, it is disciplined and recognisable, creating a feeling that something ordered and powerful has entered the space.
The public setting matters. Egúngún may be connected to particular lineages and associations, but its appearance often reaches beyond private compounds into broader community life. In these moments, the masquerade becomes a shared civic presence. People gather, respond, and observe rules of conduct that reflect respect and caution.
Festivals and communal blessing
Egúngún masquerades are commonly performed during festivals that honour ancestors and seek blessings for the community. Museum educational materials describe yearly festival contexts where the masquerade functions as part of ancestral remembrance and communal wellbeing.
In this setting, Egúngún is both spiritual and practical. It expresses gratitude to those who came before, and it reinforces the idea that the living community is accountable to inherited standards. Blessing is not only a spiritual request, it is also a communal hope for stability, health, protection, and moral balance.
Ede’s Egúngún, what the 1970 image helps us understand
The 1970 photograph associated with Ede captures a single moment, but it is a valuable one. It shows Egúngún as a public institution, visually commanding, fully concealed, and recognised as more than a performance. The image does not need extra storytelling to be significant. Its power comes from what it already documents, an Egúngún presence moving through community space during a historically dated journey.
What readers can take from this is clear, Egúngún is a living expression of Yoruba continuity. It is a way of keeping ancestors present without turning them into simple memories. Through cloth, sound, and ceremony, the community affirms that the past remains active, and that identity is not only personal, it is inherited, shared, and protected.
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Why Egúngún remains relevant today
Egúngún endures because it carries meaning on multiple levels at once. It is religious, social, historical, and artistic. It can be beautiful in form, but it is also structured in function. It preserves memory through embodied practice rather than written record alone.
In a world that often treats tradition as something frozen, Egúngún shows the opposite. Tradition can move. Tradition can speak. Tradition can return, concealed, respected, and powerful.
Author’s Note
Egúngún in Ede, and across Yoruba communities, is a reminder that heritage is not only something you read about, it is something people live, protect, and renew through ceremony, discipline, and shared memory, and the cloth that conceals the masquerader also reveals the deeper truth, that ancestry remains a public force shaping identity, morality, and continuity.
References
Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of African Art, Eliot Elisofon Photographic Archives, “Egungun masquerade, Ede, Nigeria”, dated within Elisofon’s Africa travels, 17 March 1970 to 17 July 1970.
North Carolina Museum of Art, NCMA Learn, “Egungun Masquerade Costume”, educational entry describing meaning, costume structure, and yearly festival context.
Art Institute of Chicago, Arts of Africa collection, “Mask for Egungun (Ere Egungun)”, collection entry using the translation “powers concealed.”
Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of African Art, “Masquerade costume”, collection entry describing egungun as “powers concealed” and as embodiment of the masquerade.
