Many people that see a bonecarving immediately think of NZ and the Maoris.
Understandable as not many cultures still carve bone. But all have. And over the years I got many remarks which made me reconsider my view on forms, designs and where they came from.
I.e. the Senegalese on the market who saw one of my tikis and was so happy that I carved little warmasks from his area...

Migration of humans was the norm till about 7000 years ago, considering that we have been around for well over 200.000 that is a rather recent change and thus it is just logical that many forms and meanings travelled with those that moved from a to b.

Most typical probably the spiral. NZ has it in its national flag, but we have it here on Gran Canaria in our prehistoric caves, you find it also in burial mounds in ireland, germans used a clasp for their cloak with a spiral on it, all over asia you find the spiral...and if you give a young kid a pen and a paper... voila a spiral

If you are interested in the maori culture and the meaning of their symbols you can look here

On my page you will see that I mix freely symbols and designs, you might find a lotus mandala carved onto a fatimas hand combined with french barock elements, fleur-de-lis in a flower design, dragons and whatnot.

It works for me and I hope it works for you too. I live on an island where cultures mix and though we belog to spain our dirct neighbour is the african continent, plus I travelled extensively and am easily impressed by beauty :-)