Featured Good Morning Everyone! Can You Please Help Me With This Silver Pillbox? Thank you

When I purchase this box I was told it was Victorian and sterling silver, but when tested several times I would get a gray-ish green color. The only part that actually tested sterling silver was this flat circular piece that came with it. I am assuming the silver content must be way lower than 800. One of the images you can see when it is all cleaned up. I am also not sure if it is Victorian and I really need your expert opinion on this. Thank you so much for your help!

 

Hi ezee. Beautiful box.
It looks like an east Asian lime box to me. Lime is used to chew betel leaves, and betel accessories are valued and often very beautifully made.

I'm off for a bite to eat now, but I will look in my betel info to see if I can find one like yours.

 

Thank you so much AJ! Enjoy

 

Off for a bite of betel?

 

Found it, this specific shape box is made by the Shan, in Burma/Myanmar. If you google Shan lime box or Shan betel box you'll see more.

This is a rather fancy one:


https://www.michaelbackmanltd.com/archived_objects/shan-burmese-silver-betel-box-2/

The sides of yours aren't decorated, which means that it probably sat in a travel or presentation box with other betel accessories.

This site has a nice collection of betel accoutrements:

https://www.wjmantiques.com/stock.asp?t=category&search=&c=Betel (paan) accoutrements&offsett=0

 

Not today, only on weekends.

 

Thank you, Thank you So much AJ! I have being sitting on the box for 7 months thinking it was a pillbox and doing search on just that. Now it makes more sense.

 

Understandable, if that was what the seller said. And you have probably never seen betel related items.

The chain is probably a safety measure so the lid doesn't get lost during travel, so I think it was part of a travel set rather than home presentation set.
Betel and lime boxes from Sumatra, Indonesia often have chains because they hang from a shawl, but this one isn't Sumatran.

 

Ok thank you, I appreciate all the help you have given me for the past year.

 

AJ I was wondering do you think my piece is from the late 19th century? I am trying to get a date down. Thank you

 

It could be, but these boxes are difficult to date because styles stayed the same for a long time. It has also been overpolished.
But the fact that it isn't marked means it has age.

 

I found some that is not marked and the date is 1880. here is the link.

https://www.chiswickauctions.co.uk/...e-box-shan-states-circa-1880/?lot=188192&sd=1

 

That doesn't mean yours is.
If I were you I wouldn't pin a date on it. Items like this aren't like western jewellery, where period is very important. With these ethnic items it is all about authenticity, and collectors will buy it for being an authentic Shan lime/betel box.

 

Ok understand. Thank so much you again and enjoy the rest of your evening.

 

You too ezee.