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Staff Finial:Kneeling Figure with Feline Head
Not on view
Some Kongo chiefly staff finials fantastically fuse human physiognomy with zoomorphic attributes. In this example, a kneeling female human body is crowned by the head of a fierce feline with open jaws that expose sharp pointed teeth. These halves are spanned by a necklace of cowries associated with wealth and prosperity. While Kongo leaders generally adopted the leopard as emblematic of leadership, the stylized mane depicted may refer to that of a lion, an animal not indigenous to the Lower Congo but introduced instead by way of European heraldic imagery.
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