African Arts Gallery

Various fraternities 'mungongo' trained the initiates in the salampasu society. The prestige of a man depended on the number and cost of his initiations. To top off the period of ciconcision, the boys received a sword mpuku they then wore during the masked ceremonies.
Shunting and farming, warrior people, the Salampasu form a tribe of the Lulua group and are settled between the Democratic Republic of Congo and Angola, east of the Kasai River. They are surrounded to the west and south of the Tschokwe and Lunda, and to the north and east of Kete and Lwalwa. A hierarchy of masks, simple wooden masks kasangu and copper-covered masks mukinka , was associated with the society of warriors mungongo (pl. bangongo). The wearing of these masks depended on a large contribution of livestock, beverages, or other material goods on the part of the aspirant who was introduced to esoteric knowledge on the part of other mask carriers. ( Africa , Prestel)