Burmese Pagan Lacquer Tray (Byat) - Circa 1900

Burmese lacquer tray (byat), made in Pagan (Bagan), central Myanmar, and decorated in the traditional yun technique. The design is finely incised into the lacquer surface and filled with red, black, and yellow pigments, a method long associated with Pagan workshops and considered the highest expression of Burmese lacquer craftsmanship.

The central panel depicts elephant-mounted royal figures attended by retainers, arranged within stylised architecture and dense scrolling foliage. Such imagery is closely associated with Burmese courtly-Buddhist visual culture and is consistent with Pagan byat illustrating scenes from Jataka literature, including episodes from the Mahajanaka Jataka, a story concerned with kingship, moral endurance, and righteous rule.

Short inscriptions appear within cartouches on the face, functioning as auspicious or identifying labels rather than narrative captions. The reverse bears a formal Burmese inscription executed in yellow yun lacquer on a black ground. This is a traditional merit-making dedication, which may be translated as:

“[This tray is] made and offered for the accumulation of merit.”

While some Burmese lacquerware produced in the 1920s incorporates overt political or nationalist messages, the present tray does not display those characteristics. Instead, its devotional inscription, conservative iconography, and refined yun workmanship are more consistent with 1900 Pagan production, dating to the early British Colonial Period in Burma (1885 - 1948). 

• Origin: Burma (Myanmar), Pagan (Bagan)
• Date: Circa 1900 (pre-1920)
• Materials: Lacquered wood
• Type: Byat (tray)
• Technique: Yun lacquer (incised decoration with coloured infill)
• Features: Elephant and rider motif; narrative scene; traditional red and black lacquer; Burmese script to the reverse
• Condition: Good antique condition with surface wear consistent with age. Restored in our UK workshops.
• Dimensions: W40 × D4 × H54 cm

References

Isaacs, Ralph, and T. Richard Blurton. Visions from the Golden Land: Burma and the Art of Lacquer. London: British Museum Press, 2000. See fig. 177, illustrated as a Pagan lacquer tray (byat) depicting an incident from the Mahajanaka Jataka.