The face of this precious Mbete statue shows a prominent forehead overhanging a hollow receding face with a rectangular mouth and broadly carved features, so that the original tree-trunk form is still visible. The arms are fixed to the body and the hands and feet barely discernible. The shoulders are thrown forward, the arms bent. The hair is composed of horizontal loops, is parted by a central crest. Relics are set inside the statue. In this case the uppe body of the statuette is particularly elongated and the back hollowed out with a box-shaped cavity which holds two seashells.
The Ambete are part of the same group as the Kota and the Punu and share with them a cult surrounding ancestral bones. Their reliquary figures are particulary interesting. They are usually quite large, columnar in shape, and have a hatch at the back. This compartment was used to store small ancestral relics such as finger-bones, teeth and skull fragments, so that reliquary and guardian figure were one.