ZOMBO SCULPTURE with beads (indicated by dots). The fact that her upper incisors are absent may imply that she is of Zombo origin. Analogous panels exist among the Nkanu, though they generally are of larger dimensions. Such panels are attached with liana to the inner walls of a three-walled hut known as kikaku (pl. bikaku), which is erected near crossroads. The kikaku serves as a sort of symbolic border: Its location near the crossroads is chosen because the Kongo peoples believe that the intersection forms an entrance to the surrounding “worlds,” in a horizontal manner in this world, but also in a vertical manner with the ancestral world below and the residence of the deity Nzambi above. The kikaku is built as the initiation ritual approaches its end phase. The same specialists who have been busy fabricating masks and other sculptures are responsible for creating its panels in what can be referred to as a nkanda or 125 FIG. 12: Nlongo mask. Zombo, Kibokolo, Uíge Province, Angola. Before 1903. Wood, fiber, pigment. Collected by the Rev. Thomas Lewis. Purchased from Edward Gerrard & Sons. Collection of the British Museum, London, Af1905,0609.8. © The Trustees of the British Museum. FIG. 13: Nlongo mask. Zombo, Kibokolo, Uíge Province, Angola. Before 1903. Wood, fiber, pigment. H: 63 cm. Collected by the Rev. Thomas Lewis. Purchased from Edward Gerrard & Sons. Collection of the British Museum, London, Af1905,0609.10. © The Trustees of the British Museum.
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