132-B11-5
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4
| Catalog # | Name | Description | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1990.21.0008 | Plate, communion | Communion plate. Concave side is engraved with cat-like heads and geometric patterns. The rim is scalloped. |
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| 2 | 1990.21.0073 | Bowl | Bowl with leaves, vies, and musical instruments painted on the interior. Outside has 2 sets of 2 rings carved into it. |
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| 3 | 2017-26-24 | Bamileke MU'po Figure | The Bamileke mu'po figure depicts a genderless prestige figure, presumed to be a female squatting atop a circular shape attached to a tapering plinth. Carved out of dark wood and covered with a black layer of pigment, the figure has a high brow, elongated facial features, broad nose, and deep-set round eyes, and an expectant protruding belly that is adorned with a circle at its apex, perhaps symbolic of a magical charge. |
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| 4 | 2017-26-7A | Drum | The cylindrical kyondo (slit drum or gong) in the form of a female from Luba in the Republic of Congo is carved from wood. The slit drum is an idiophone drum, made from a hollowed piece of wood in which a narrow groove serves as a sound opening. These rare and important figures are used in divination rituals, when their bowl shaped cavities are filled with magic materials. Slit drums of wood are not used by tribes in south-west Congo as musical instruments for entertainment and dancing, but instead exclusively for rythmic accompaniment during sacred rites (initiation, burial, healing the sick, etc.). The slit drum is struck with a stick along both sides of the narrow groove, which produces two different pitches. The possibility of combining rhythm with pitch enables the slit drum to act as a means of communication for tone language of the tribes. |
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