Headrest "musamo" - Luba - DR Congo

Headrest “musamo” Luba
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Max height: 13.5 cm
Period: early 20th century (1900–1920)
Materials: wood (Chlorophora excelsa)
Provenance: tribal art dealer Jos Humblet - Belgium

As Mary Nooter Roberts notes, “wooden headrests were commonly used by the Luba of previous generations to protect their elegant hairstyles during sleep. Headrests were objects of extreme intimacy and carried great personal value for their owners, who regarded them as sacred and were sometimes buried with them. (Body Politics: The Female Image in Luba Art and Alison Saar’s Sculpture, UCLA Fowler Museum of Art, Los Angeles, 2000, p. 35, fig. 35)

Photos 8 and 9: Luba chief with his headrest and cascading hairstyle.
One can better understand why they were needed when one knows that Shankadi hairstyles required about 50 hours of work to create.

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