Massive Borneo Cast Brass Heirloom Kettle

This spectacular, massive cast brass or bronze kettle is from the interior peoples of Borneo, an island that today is shared between the Malaysian states of Sarawak and Sabah, Brunei and the Indonesia’s five Kalimantan provinces.

Cast using the lost wax process, it comprises a high foot;  a wide body, decorated over several tiers with three-dimensional, cast figures of dragons, horses and riders and mythical aso dogs; a spout cast as a dragon’s head; a lid that slides on and which has a horse-and-rider finial; and a swing handle, the top of which is cast with two crocodiles separated by a flower.

Several of the riders have hats – possibly pith helmets – suggesting they are colonial figures, and at each base of the handle rest large native-like figures holding a parrying shield.

The flared foot has been elegantly cast with scrolling water plant motifs, as has the body beneath the swirl of cast figures.

Ostensibly, this is a bronze kettle for holding water for hand washing or drinking. In practice it is too heavy to be used for such a purpose.  In reality, such a large, costly item served as a visible display of wealth and power; an heirloom item to be owned and put on display by a local headman and his descendants.

The supports for the high handle comprise two elongated, standing human-type figures on each side. The handle itself has been cast with serrations to both sides and with two crocodiles to the top.

The kettle has a dark-grey patina over its entirety.

A similar kettle almost certainly by the same maker is illustrated in Chin (1980, p. 46) and is described as ‘a rare brass kettle decorated with moulded animals’. This kettle is in the Sarawak Museum.

Kettles of this size and type are indeed rare, and can be ascribed to the eighteenth century or earlier. (Nineteenth century examples are smaller, more domed in form and with only a modest number of moulded animals and other figures applied.) Few are known in public collections. Overall, it is a superb, and highly sculptural example.