491167 Mother-and-Child Figure, late 1800s-early 1900s (wood, metal, beads) by Congolese; h:53.40 w:13.10 d:14.60 cm; Cleveland Museum of Art, OH, USA; (add.info.: Wearing an elaborate lobed headdress and a beaded waistbelt, and having filed teeth and red-powdered skin, this maternity figure seems to have once carried an ax and a cup, wooden imitations of the two most important chiefly attributes. Perhaps together with a male counterpart, it was secretly kept inside the ritual house, serving as a guardian of the chief??? treasure. Its style places it in the westernmost corner of Pendeland, between the Lutshima and Kwilu rivers. ); Gift of the African Art Sponsors of Karamu House; African, out of copyright.