For at least 20,000 years, masking has been a mark of cultural evolution and an indication of magical-religious sophistication in society. This book provides an understanding of the mask as a powerful cultural pheomenon--a means by which individual communities attempted to communicate their dignity and sense of purpose, as well as to establish a continuum between the natural and supernatural worlds. The book addresses the distinctive environments within which masks flourished, and the mask is analyzed as a manifestation of art, ethnology and anthropology.