Salampasu Warriors

East of the Kasai River, a long snakeline of Salampasu warriors, with their skin blackened by charcoal and oil, emerge from the forest wearing warlike costumes of fiber skirts and headdresses topped with feathers. They wield swords and stamp their feet to sound their ankle rattles. Clenching sharp iron knives between their teeth, they lurch forward menacingly, displaying methods of attack that climax with throat-slitting gestures. The pounding rhythms of Ngoma drums and xylophones agitate them into a frenzy, and then with stalking movements they simulate hunting enemies. Chanting gutturally, they advance with widened eyes and pointed teeth exaggeratedly displayed.

Chief Clement Muvumba explained that this ceremonial warrior display was always performed before an attack to excite and energize the warriors. Once the battle was over, it was performed again to rid them of evil spirits associated with killing. The last Salampasu tribal warfare was fought in 1969 with their enemies, the Lunda, who to this day maintain an uninhabited thirty-mile buffer zone between themselves and the Salampasu.

Salampasu boys are initiated into a warrior society at a young age, between five and ten years old. As they progress through life from boyhood to elderhood, they must earn the right to wear the mask of each successive stage and learn its esoteric knowledge. The masks worn by the warriors symbolize the three levels of society: hunter, warrior, and chief. Some masks evoke such terror that people will flee the village at the mention of a mask’s name.

Salampasu Warriors

ANCESTRAL MIGHT

Salampasu Warriors

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