Straits Chinese or Peranakan Silver Spittoon

Silver Spittoon

Peranakan Chinese Community, Straits Settlements or Java, Indonesia

This small, elegant silver spittoon or cuspidor shows plenty of local Chinese influence and almost certainly was made by a local Chinese silversmith either on Java or perhaps in the Straits Settlements. Such a spittoon would have been used in conjunction with the chewing of betel, a mild social stimulant.

It sits on a flat base. The globular body is finely chased with oblong panels that alternate been plain and being chased with Chinese flowers and fruits such as pomegranates, all within fine, leafy borders against tooled backgrounds.

The body leads to a neck that is very finely engraved with an acanthus leaf border, and a wide, open mouth ended with a reinforced rim.

Two spittoons of almost identical form were presented to Holland’s Queen Wilhelmina and Prince Hendrik by Paku Alam VII of Yogyakarta for their silver wedding anniversary in 1926. This pair is illustrated in Wassing-Visser (1995, p. 212).