Bete

The Bete people live in the Southwest of the country of Côte d'lvoire. Their neighbors are the Akan ethnic groups to the east and the Guro people to the north. Although their population is less than 1 million, the Bete have a powerful history of artistic production. Their art is found throughout the world as representatives of the best abstract work from West Africa. They are an agricultural people, growing cocoa and coffee, whose existence is primarily linked to their patrilinear organizational structure. They are not a people with kings, but rather have villages that are termed headless, but that are under the authority of the ancestors' power as interpreted by intense spiritual individuals who are the mediators for the ancestors. It is assumed that ...