Art and Oracle: A Scholarly Resource of African and Rituals of Divination | Explore & Learn

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8. Figure
Hungaan, Democratic Republic of the Congo
Wood, horn, seed pod, cord; H. 40 cm (15 3/4 in.)
19th century
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Museum für Völkerkunde
III C 3310a-b

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8. Figure

riginally empowered by a Hungaan ritual expert, this work stands as the most elaborate sculptural form of its kind to have been preserved in the West. It was collected in 1886 by Richard Kund and Hans Tappenback, the first Europeans to cross the Kwilu region; no documentation of its use at that time was recorded, and the larger tradition to which this figure belonged came to an end shortly thereafter. This work's precise ritual function is unknown but, generally, figurative sculpture in Hungaan society is associated with ritual experts (nga) specializing in protection, healing, and divination.

Although there is no extensive contextual data for any Hungaan sculptural artifacts in Western collections today, a diverse range of figurative genres appears to have once existed. Surviving evidence indicates that there was a close relationship between Hungaan leaders and the nga, and that such works were managed by them jointly to promote the fertility, well-being, and longevity of their communities. A family authority (leme) acted as guardian of a series of power-charged lineage symbols, including figurative sculptures, created and activated by specialized experts with the help of the ancestors.1 Likewise, village headmen and chiefs underwent an initiation during which they acquired knowledge from elders and ritual experts and became caretakers of ritually consecrated works on behalf of their constituents.

Ritual specialists were male or female members of the same lineages that produced headmen and chiefs who had undergone the prescribed initiations, enabling them to fulfill a variety of essential needs. Some of these specializations were protective in nature or enhanced the quality of life, while others ensured the successful outcome of activities such as hunting and warfare. Those charged with divination were referred to as nganga ngombo. Nganga kiluba were divination specialists who exposed liars and thieves, using male and female figurines along with a pot of clay as instruments of detection. Miniature figurines, on the intimate scale of those appended to this work, are associated with ritual fertility experts known as nganga bilele.2 Figurines consecrated with kaolin and blood, known as minkonki, helped ordinary individuals in preserving property and were worn as protective amulets by women and children, hung in domestic contexts, or attached to poles in fields. Ritual sculptures were often collectively stored in a shrine structure whose sacredness was indicated by one or more larger figurative works accompanied by a bundle of powerful materials displayed on an exterior platform.

As in related Kongo traditions, works such as the figure shown here were activated according to specific rules and prescriptions.3 In its combination of a large-scale central figure and miniature figurine attachments in the same style, this example appears to have been created for both the public good and the more personal needs of individuals. The use of bold, sweeping lines to define the human form is shared by other regional traditions, such as those of the Mbala, Suku, and Yansi.4

By drawing analogies with neighboring traditions, it has been suggested that the supplementary figurines may have provided a means of conferring the central figure's power on a specialist's individual patients.5 Ten of these figurines are suspended by a cord tied around the main figure's neck, along with an animal horn and a large wooden bell, obscuring the rounded form of its stomach. In a distinctive contemplative gesture, the figures' hands are raised to the mouth, so that they support the chin and are fused with the lips. The hair is dressed in a traditional coiffure composed of a high sagittal crest and two lateral ones that extend down the back, and a columnar vessel is balanced on top of the head.

In its depiction of a central protagonist deeply immersed in thought and acting as an anchor for a multitude of others, this work alludes to an ideal of harmony and balance, toward which members of Hungaan society aspired. Whatever specific needs it may have addressed, its larger subject is the relationship between spiritually enlightened leaders and the specialists who advised and supported them, as well as the dissemination of their expertise to individuals in need.

1. Daniel Biebuyck, The Arts of Zaire, vol. 1: Southwestern Zaire (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985–86), pp. 154–55.

2. Ruth Engwall, cited in ibid., p. 158.

3. Biebuyck, Southwestern Zaire, pp. 153, 155.

4. Ibid., p. 157.

5. Ibid., p. 158.