carving (art); buildings: components

Carved and painted wooden architectural base for post, sendi, in the shape of a winged lion. The lion is on all fours, its mouth open in a snarl to reveal white-painted fangs, with a prominent carved mane stretching from behind the top of the head and along the sides of the head to the nape of the neck. Carved decorative band from beneath the mane at the sides crosses the upper part of the legs and ends at the rear elbow. The inside of the wings and the back are more or less smooth, with a square aperture in the middle of the back into which an upright pillar would have been set. Wings stretched upwards to either side, and upright tail. Each foot has four toes. The figure is painted red, probably using kencur, with details, for example of feathering, in white and black. Integral square plinth with carved decoration at sides.

Collection Information

These objects are only a part of our collections, of which there are more than 350,000 objects. This information comes from our collections database. Some of this is incomplete and there may be errors. This part of the website is also still under construction, so there may be some fields repeated or incorrectly formatted information.

The database sometimes uses language taken from historical documents to help research, which may now appear outdated and even offensive. The database also includes information on objects that are considered secret or sacred by some communities.

If you have any further information about objects in our collections or can suggest corrections to our information, please contact us: enquiry@horniman.ac.uk