Culture

The pensador is the most famous Angolan statuette. It is considered a work of art worthy and value of confidence, this emblematic figure, which appears in filigree of our national currency. In the Angolan cultural tradition, the statuettes are used in rites of the magic - religious, playing the function of amulets which would contain supernatural forces.

One of the practices used in these rites is the riddle, in consultation made by a person interested in an intervention against an evil, that is to say him physical (disease) or social. The priest (nganga) uses several processes of riddle, generally with objects which symbolize anything, for example statuettes.

The riddle in the area of Luanda is made in a simplified way, using only muxakatu, piece out of wooden cut with several grooves, where a post is rubbed. In the North-East of Angola, the ethnos group lunda-tchokwe still uses the basket of riddle, called ngombo in which the priest soothsayer removes small figures carved out of wood and in which will be to determine the chance of the consultant.

It represents one moment of lamentation (carpideira), character illustrated with the hand in the head, is brought back with sorceries xmbimbi, with which the soothsayer prevents the consultant counters insults, advising.