In Akan religion, forest spirits (Sasabonsam) played a major role. Many Asafo companies had such a guardian spirit who would threaten their enemies. They spread fear and terror, and took large, supernatural shapes, often with multiple heads. They ambushed their victims in the forest. In 1916, Robert Sutherland Rattray gave a description of a these feared forest spirits: “The Sasabonsam is a monster of human form who lives deep in the woods and which a hunter rarely encounters. It sits in the treetop, its legs hanging down to the ground, and has its feet the shape of the hooks with which he catches anyone who comes within his reach”(Rattray, “Ashanti Proverbs”, Oxford, 1916, p. 48). Seen as the hiding spot for dangerous creatures, trees commonly represented challenges that could be overcome only with courage and strength. Climbing in the tree could be a monkey. The gun underneath could as well identify the figure as a hunter. Such a rifle symbolized supremacy in war in Fante iconography.

In 1977, Doran H. Ross published a very long flag of the Kyirem Company No. 6 from Anomabu, designed in 1952 by the artist Mr. McCarthy, which corresponds in many details to the style of the flag presented here. Therefor we can date this flag as well to early 1950s and place it in the stylistic context of Mr. McCarthy (Cole, Herbert M. & Ross, Doran H., “The Arts of Ghana”, Los Angeles, 1977, p. 197.)