The small antelope horns used by members of the nkisi cult of the peoples of the Lower Congo - Bwende, Sundi, Kongo and Woyo - were usually decorated with carved wooden charms. Besides representations of birds, animals and inanimate objects they included figures at various activities - drummers, lovers, men standing or seated holding staffs - but the present charm may be the only likeness of a smoker of Indian hemp, his cheeks sucked in as he draws ecstatically on the mouthpiece of his calabash pipe.

Söderberg (1974, pp. 25-44) discusses the use of these small carvings and illustrates how they were attached to the horns by short lengths of twisted fibre and hung with a cluster of other charms (p. 27, fig. 1). She relates how they were used in the hunt (probably to whistle signals as well as being efficacious in the chase) and by witchdoctors to assist in healing, but also warns that it is dangerous to designate a specific function to a magical carving unless the context in which it was used was recorded at the time of collection.