Burmese Betel Box

Product Description

Burmese Betel Box

Material: Bamboo, lacquer
Style: Bagan, Burma
Size: Height 9 cm, Diameter 11 cm
Order Number: MHSL5

This betel box, called kun it, has 3 separate sections. The upper cartouche has the Burmese date 1282 which is 1920 AD. It also gives the month: Wakhaung, which is the 5th month of the Myanmar lunar calendar and corresponds to August.

Wakhaung falls in the rainy season. It is a combination of two words. Wa means Buddhist Lent and Khaung means middle or peak. Thus, it’s the middle or the peak of the Buddhist Lent which lasts 3 months of the rainy season, namely Waso (July), Wakhaung (August) and Tawthalin (September).

The most traditional lacquer receptacle is the betel box. It is made of woven bamboo and inside are shallow trays to hold items for making the betel chew. The chew is prepared by taking a betel leaf, smearing it with slaked lime and wrapping it around thin slices of areca nut from the areca palm tree.

Other ingredients may be added: tobacco, dried orange peel, cardamom, cloves, cinnamon, cumin and liqorice. Chewing betel has a refreshing, slightly stimulating effect. The items are placed between the cheek and teeth and slowly savoured.

Betel nut was used by men and women of all social standings. Today it tends to be enjoyed mainly by older people.

It stimulates copious saliva, reduces the appetite and increases thirst. Saliva turns bright red, as do the mouth, lips and teeth. Eventually teeth turn black and fall out.

It seems that the art of making lacquer came to Burma from China. China had been making it for 3,000 years, but it may not have come directly.

Bagan was and is largest and most important centre for lacquer production in Burma.

Lacquer is made from the sap of the htanaung and neem trees. It is tapped like rubber. The grey, viscous liquid turns glossy black on exposure to the air. Objects, which are covered in lacquer, are usually of wood or bamboo, which can be made extremely flexible by interweaving horsehair.

It can also be used as a coating on cane, palm leaf, metal and leather. It forms a hard surface when dry and waterproofs the object and is insect resistant.

Numerous coatings of lacquer are applied. After each application the object is left to dry. The process may take 6 months or longer. A fine piece may have 26 applications. Lacquer furniture can take 2 years to make.

Colour can be applied to it. Traditionally red colouring is used for Burmese lacquer. It is the most distinctive and brilliant and is produced by adding powdered mercuric sulphide, cinnabar, to the lacquer sap. Ocher and red paint may also be used. It is added by hand on top of the black lacquer surface. Then dried. Green and yellow are sometimes used, but rarely blue.

In pre-colonial times lacquered boxes stored royal jewels, letters and Buddhist manuscripts. Lacquered trays are still used to give food to the monks.

Ordinary people use lacquer containers for food, clothing, cosmetics and flowers, in preference to the increasingly common metal and plastic.

Map of Bagan.