Antique Wooden Opium Scales Box

So excited with this find thinking it was just a nice box - it turns out to be so much more… this is actually over 130 years old and is an original box for holding an opium dealer’s scales and weights - shame these are missing but the interior cut outs were purposefully hand carved to hold these snug. You could source these I am sure with a little effort.

The box itself is handmade of course as you can see from the slightly different designs on the two sides and marks in the wood - probably ebony - and is held together with a crude brass pin dating it to the late Qing dynasty or early colonial era making this an amazing piece of social and cultural south East Asian history. Or of course a really cool little box with some stories to tell. 

21 x10 x 4 cm