Memory board – Wood – Luba – DR Congo

Divination tablets are used by Luba diviners. Good condition with clear traces of tribal use.

Old Luba memory board from DR Congo.
Lukasa, “the long hand” (or claw), is a memory device that was created, manipulated and protected by the Bambudye, a once powerful secret society of the Luba. Lukasa are examples of Luba art.

Court historians known as bana balute (“men of memory”) run their fingertips across the surface of a lukasa or point to its features while reciting genealogies, king lists, maps of protocol, migration stories, and the great Luba Epic, a preeminent oral narrative that records how the culture heroes, Mbidi Kiluwe and his son Kalala Ilunga, introduced royal political practices and etiquette.

Provenance: former private collection from Germany.