Arched harp

Arched harp, ngombi type. The oblong resonator is of dark wood hollowed out with outward-curving walls and an arched back. The extension to the resonator is carved with a stylised face in relief, and terminates in a finial in the shape of a female head with an elaborate hair-style, decorated with cloth pads sewn with small white buttons and with strings of blue glass beads attached to the sides of the head. Pieces of mirror form the eyes of the finial, which has has blue bead earrings and a necklace. The curved wooden neck with eight pegs is tied to the lower part of the extension to the resonator with a thong. The pegs are baluster-shaped with cylindrical heads. A spotted lizard skin forms the soundtable with a single, circular sound hole. The skin covers the sides of the resonator and is tied in place by twisted fibre string, knotted together along the back of the instrument. A number of the strings are broken. Two round pieces of glass, one silvered, are backed with rosettes of feathers and stuck to the soundtable. Six strings, closely resembling gut violin strings (the instrument was restrung in 1954). At their lower ends the strings are secured to a stringholder beneath the skin, and are tied on the outside of the skin.