The harnessed bushbuck or kéwel (Tragelaphus scriptus) is a small to medium-sized antelope widespread in west and central Africa. Formerly and alongside the Cape bushbuck it was generically known as the bushbuck, however, it has since been found to be a species in its own right, with a separate geographic distribution. Of all the other tragelaphine antelopes, the harnessed bushbuck is most closely related to the nyala (Tragelaphus angasi).
The harnessed bushbuck is distributed from Senegal and southern Mauritania across the Sahel, east to Ethiopia, and south to Angola and the southern Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is common across this broad geographic distribution and is found in wooded savannas, forest-savanna mosaics; penetrating into some of the rain forest zones of the southern Central African Republic, Gabon, Democratic Republic of the Congo and the Republic of Congo; in montane forests of the Bamenda Highlands and Mount Cameroon; and in the semi-arid zones of the Ethiopian lowlands. It does not occur in the deep rain forests of the central Congo Basin.
The harnessed bushbuck is in general smaller than other tragelaphines, with a mainly red or yellow-brown ground color. It is conspicuously striped with several vertical and at least one horizontal stripe and there is little to no sexual dimorphism with respect to patterning and ground coloration. It has been referred to as the harnessed antelope or guib harnaché. The conspicuousness of its patterning tends to attenuate slightly in a west to east cline along the species range, being least striking in the decula population of Ethiopia. Seven other genetically-based population groupings exist, some do not
As the first of the bushbucks to be described by Pallas in 1766 as Antilope scripta from Senegal, it retains the original species name for the bushbuck. Its alternative common name, kéwel, is taken from the Wolof language spoken in Senegal. As most studies of the bushbucks have focused on the Cape bushbuck (Tragelaphus sylvaticus), very little is known about the biology of the harnessed bushbuck, except for what can be gleaned from museum specimens and hunting trophies.