Lot 19 , A Maori carved wood oblong bowl and cover, kumete, c.1880-1910, height 23cm length 31cm

A Maori carved wood oblong bowl and cover, kumete, c.1880-1910, probably carved in totara wood with two wrestlers supporting the bowl and cover, the surface carved in high relief with elaborate rauponga lines and spirals with paua shell inlaid discs,

Cf. a similar kumete, collection no. 442,106 in the Auckland Museum, known as the Two Wrestlers which is said to represent two chiefs fighting over tikitere. A large kumete bowl is in the Field Museum, Chicago which is signed by the artist Anaha Te Rahui, chief of Ngati Tarawhai iwi in Rotorua area and made some time in the late 19th century. Anaha died in 1913 aged over 90. Unlike the waka huia feather boxes which are carved on the bottom and suspended in the air in a chiefs house, a kumete is a type of storage bowl and cover. height 23cm length 31cm
£500-700

Condition:
Provenance - Ken Paul who collected Asian, Oceanic and European antiques from the 1950s to 1980s to hire as props in movies and television, thence by family descent. Believed to have been acquired from the same source as the pair of Maori photograph frames. The cover has been broken and re-glued with some small splinter losses around the area. Most of the paua inlaid discs are missing.

Sold for £6,000