Congolese crucifix with praying figure

Brass crucifix with a typical Kongo Christian workmanship, developed after the contact with the Portuguese people. With the conversion of King Nzinga (and formally of the whole kingdom) Christianity merged with elements of the local cult.
The symbolism of the crucifix, for example, predates the Christian cult in Congo: in local cosmology it symbolized the border between the world of the living and the dead, with the king as the point of intersection, and referred to reincarnation.
This crucifix shows in the lower part of the vertical arm a second figure now almost illegible: it is a praying figure, perhaps a head attributable to the Kongo funerary sculpture.