Made from terracotta clay, this is an excellent example of medieval West African sculpture. It shows a majestic and dignified figure, probably representing a warrior king, decked out in elaborately detailed jewelry and armed with a quiver of arrows and a distinctive type of dagger on his upper left arm. These daggers are still worn by the nomadic Tuareg people, who dominate the caravan routes crossing the Sahara desert. It is quite possible that the warrior was originally mounted on a horse, destroyed over the years. While representational--the sculpture is realistic in that there is a recongizable human form--elements have been exaggerated, such as the jutting, bearded chin, to emphasize the power and dignity of this ruler.