Ceremonial Chair or Throne (citwamo ca mangu) (1800s): Art, History and Details

Ceremonial Chair or Throne (citwamo ca mangu) (1800s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This citwamo ca mangu chair bears over 40 sculpted figures arranged in complex compositions across the chair’s top rail (back), stretchers (rungs), and legs; all symbolize the power of Chokwe supreme chiefs. Such chairs typically bear a dozen or fewer figures. Scenes of royal life and power wrap around the seat, reinforcing how the chief and his family are at the center of their polity and its business.

Object facts

• Title: Ceremonial Chair or Throne (citwamo ca mangu)
• Date: 1800s
• Culture: Africa, Central Africa, Angola, Chokwe-style carver
• Type: Furniture and woodwork
• Technique: Wood, upholstery studs, leather
• Dimensions: Overall: 107 x 55 x 55 cm (42 1/8 x 21 5/8 x 21 5/8 in.)
• Collection: African Art
• Department: African Art
• Accession number: 2024.140

A detail from the museum

Starting around the 1500s, Chokwe and other African leaders and traders received fine chairs as gifts from Portuguese traders. Chokwe leaders adapted this symbol of power as their own, using it in tandem with stools, an earlier kind of prestige seat.

Collection credit

Severance and Greta Millikin Purchase Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• "New on View.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 66, no. 1 (2026): back cover.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.