In northern New Ireland, wood drums known as lunet were formerly played to accompany malagan rituals, elaborate memorial ceremonies that honor the dead. In contrast to the intricate and colorful funerary carvings (malagan) displayed during these ceremonies, lunet drums were neither painted nor adorned with complex designs. Instead, they were characterized by their spare, elegant form and high polish. Their decoration was limited to a series of carved, lozenge-shaped eyes inset with irises made from opercula, the calcified "doors" that originally covered the openings to the shells of certain species of marine snails.

Lunet are "friction drums" carved with three sound-producing wedges (or "tongues") on the upper surface. The musician played the drum by moistening one of his hands with water and rubbing it across the wedges, creating a unique blend of tones reminiscent of the cry of a local species of bird, from which the instrument takes its name.

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