earer to perform a ritual act for the benefit of his community. The Epa festival celebrates the chiefs, farmers, warrior, hunters, priests and women. Since Yoruba society is patrilineal, the role of women is depicted in Yoruba mythology with respect to fertility. Women play "a much more formidable role in Yoruba rituals than they do in political life of traditional society" (Delano 17).
Because of the active role of women in Yoruba rituals, the female is of significant symbolic value in representational art. The role women play in the masking rituals consist of washing off the previous year's paint and dust that accumulated on the headdress. They then decorate the headdress with various patterns. Women also participate as guides to the masquerades. Women, of course, figure prominently in fertility motifs, and the Epa headdress prominently fe
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