Enquiry about object: 9913
Colonial Burmese Silver Cheroot Box
Burma early 20th century
height: 13cm, width: 8.1cm, depth: approximately 4.5cm, weight: 202g
Provenance
UK art market
This silver box with a hinged lid is decorated on both sides in unusually high relief with two sets of a man and wife in traditional Burmese dress surrounded by fine chasing and engraving. The cover is decorated, again in high relief, with a figure with wings – perhaps an angel, suggestive of colonial influence.
The box is likely to have served as a cheroot box, though with the repousse work in high relief, the effective width of the box is considerably greater than suggested by the main body of the box, and it is not something that easily would have slipped into a pocket.
Colonial Burmese silver cheroot boxes are surprisingly scarce. One other that we have had is now illustrated in Green (2022, p. 223-224).
The example here is in excellent condition.
References
Fraser-Lu, S., Silverware of South-East Asia, Oxford University Press, 1989.
Fraser-Lu, S., Burmese Crafts: Past and Present, Oxford University Press, 1994.
Green, A., Burmese Silver from the Colonial Period, Ad Illisvm, 2022.
Owens, D.C., Burmese Silver Art: Masterpieces Illuminating Buddhist, Hindu and Mythological Stories of Purpose and Wisdom, Marshall Cavendish Editions, 2020.
Tilly, H.L., The Silverwork of Burma (with Photographs by P. Klier), The Superintendent, Government Printing, 1902.
Tilly, H.L., Modern Burmese Silverwork (with Photographs by P. Klier), The Superintendent, Government Printing, 1904.
