Product Description

Sumatran Medicine Container 2

Material: Horn, wood
Style: Batak people, Lake Toba, North Sumatra, Indonesia
Size: Length 43.5 cm, Height 11.5 cm, Diameter 4 cm
Order Number: MHSCON5

Horn medicine container, etched with geometric motifs and a gecko (lizard),  with carved wooden stopper in the form of a singa (lion).

Magician priests keep their magical brews (pupuk) in medicine containers. They often use hollow horns of goats or water buffalos and the open end is stopped with a wooden plug, the top being usually carved in the shape of a squatting human figure. Some of the rarer ones have a powerful singa head and perhaps part of the lion’s upper body, sometimes with people on its back.

The medicine containers were carried by a cord attached to the man’s belt or over his shoulder.