Mediaeval Sinhalese Art c15.64

c15.64

Boxes are also mentioned by Knox in his list of the King’s treasures; the reference is probably to large chests such as are used for storing cloths, insignia or other ecclesiastical property (e.g., in Mahā Dēvāle, Kandy, and the Pohoya-gē, Malvatte), also in private houses for similar purposes. All the typical examples are of the kind known as Indo-Portuguese, large wooden chests with hinged lids and big locks, the handles, key plates, and hinges with evident Renaissance feeling, and based on Western models; we are thus led to ask whether these chests were used at all before Portuguese times. It is difficult to make an absolute statement on this point, as wooden boxes must have been in use at an earlier period; perhaps this was so, but they had the lid opening on tenons, like a door, of which I have seen one example. However that may be, the Indo-Portuguese chests are recognizable by the character of their metal fittings, and especially by the decorative metal bosses over rivets, as in the little box shown on Pl. XLIIIA., 3. They are more often and more typically found in the north of Ceylon, in Jaffna, where Western influence has been stronger and has acted longer; here we meet the ‘almirah’ (standing cupboard with shelves) in elaborate forms, the hinges, evidently European in form, and the woodwork thoroughly Renaissance in style. A type of box commonly met with in the low-country is the ‘bible-box,’ an evident copy of a Dutch form, usually made in calamander or ebony, with scallopings and flutings.