In Mali live the Bozo fishing people, who use puppets to tell stories and sometimes satirize conventional custioms or important persons. The Bozo apply metal decoration to their sculptures, such as this elaborate marionette. This Bozo wooden marionette is skillfully decorated with thin metal, providing intricate patterns and design on the surface of the face. It wears an elaborate headdress resembling a form of helmet which is enhanced with metal disks. Four vertical rods hang down from the crown of the headdress, complimenting the graceful elongation of the face. The headdress, the intricate nose ring, and red-thread decorations on the ears hint to the viewers that perhaps the marionette represented an important, high ranking person of Bozo society. Moreover, the glaring glass eyes of this special person reflect small images of the outer world, perhaps suggestive of the marionette's spiritual comment on the world it views. Suitably attached to a long wooden stick to function as a dance ritual piece, the marionette's intrinsic beauty and signifiance as a meanignful sculptural piece would last throughout the times to come.