Songye power figures known as minkishi range from small, privately owned images to such large community guardians such as this expressive work. They are periodically brought forth and consecrated by the nganga (ritual specialist), who charges the potency of the medicinal-sacrosanct substances packed inside or appended to them. This massive elevated figure is festooned with metal facial attachments, necklaces of beads and skins, a wooden truncheon like pestle, and metal edging of the navel and cranial cavities. The work was brought to Belgium before 1918 by M. Reisdorf, envoy to Belgian Congo, and retained in the family collection.

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