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Ceremonial wood mask with raffia fringe
Object Number 65-8-50/10713
Display Title Ceremonial wood mask with raffia fringe
Descriptions
Indigenous Term "Cikwanga" (name of mask)
Object Description Wooden ceremonial mask - carved and painted head with 8" raffia fringe at the base. This helmet mask has an anthropomorphic face with bulging eyes, long pointed nose, small oval mouth with bared teeth, scarification patterns around the mouth and on the cheeks and small protruding ears. The top of the mask is rounded with a diamond shaped topknot. What appears to be long curved horns or elements of a hairstyle on the either side of at the back of the mask. The eyes and mouth are decorated with red and white pigments and the scarification on the cheeks with white pigment. Black smudging on the interior of the mask is either pigment or carbonized remains from manufacture. Bundles of plant fiber strips (raffia) are tied around the circumference at the bottom of the mask creating a hanging fringe.
Inventory Description Mask, carved wood cylinder head, protruding features, pigmented, fringe
Classification
  • Mask
Department Ethnographic
Culture
  • Baluba
  • Luntu
Geography/Provenience/Site Name
Africa / Congo / <State> / <County> / Oimbelenge
Additional Geographic Terms Africa, central: Republic of Congo
Materials Wood, Vegetable fiber, Pigment, Plant fiber, Raffia
Dimensions Overall: 48.6 x 34 x 36.5 cm (19 1/8 x 13 3/8 x 14 3/8 in.)
Quantity 2
Label on object 65-8-50/10713; L. 46.58
Provenance
Collector Mr. Eliot Elisofon (1947 - 1965)
Donor Mr. Eliot Elisofon (1947 - 1965)

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