< Page:Provincial geographies of India (Volume 4).djvu
This page has been validated.

xv]

OCCUPATIONS OF THE PEOPLE

153

and designs, are among the many lacquered articles produced. For bowls, the framework is of very fine woven bamboo, mingled in the best specimens with horse-hair. On this are imposed successive layers of the exudation of the thitsi tree. On the lacquer surface a pattern is worked by successive incisions filled with colouring matter, orange, yellow, red, black, or green. The process is painfully slow

Fig. 62. Carving Buddhas.

Fig. 62. Carving Buddhas.

and laborious; the effect is admirable. The industry is said to have been brought to Pagan in the middle of the 11th century. A tube of lacquer work dated 1274 A.D. has been found there in a pagoda[1].

Images of the Buddha, of conventional types, are carved

  1. ↑ For an elaborate account of Burmese lacquer work see a paper by Mr A. P. Morris, Journal of the Burma Research Society, ix. i. (1919).
This article is issued from Wikisource. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.