finger mask

English

Finger mask- Jacobsen Yup'ik collection, 1883 - Ethnological Museum, Berlin

Noun

finger mask (plural finger masks)

1. An ornament worn looped over the fingers during ceremonial dancing by various indigenous people of Alaska.
   • 1993, Dana Stabenow, A Fatal Thaw, →ISBN, page 144:

     She returned the finger mask to the Koniag dancer and held both hands out, palms up and eagle feather lying across them.

   • 2001, Sheridan Blau, Writers Craft: Red, →ISBN, page 454:

     Inuit women traditionally adorned themselves with finger masks during special ceremonies. My mother recently decided to try to make herself a finger mask.

   • 2007, Tribal Art - Volume 12, Issues 1-2, page 108:

     The smallest piece in the show, an Eskimo finger mask only a few centimeters high, was displayed next to a Dogon mask over five meters tall.