beggar's bowl; coco-de-mer with suspension chain of metal links, string with glass beads, stones, button.
Donor:
Herbert Wehrly Estate
Collection place:
Iran (Persia)
Verbatim coll. place:
Persia (Iran) attr.
Collector:
Herbert Wehrly
Collection date:
April 1978
Materials:
Cotton (textile), Glass (material), Metal, and Palm
Object type:
ethnography
Function:
3.1 Status Objects and Insignia of Office
Accession date:
1978
Context of use:
Information supplied by Persian friends of graduate student Janet Koss, January 1979: Used only by dervishes (who are Sufis). Dervishes purposely select unusual materials for their objects. Janet's friends thought that all dervish bowls were of this shape (cut half of coco-de-mer). There are different classes of bowls (chanegah, dervish leaders, might have fancy inlaid or silver bowls). Three essentials to dervishes: a "beggar's bowl", an aba (cloak of skin or cloth) and an axe (tabarzin). Dervishes are humble wandering mendicants who wander in praise of God, recite poetry and hymns, religious tales, use bowl for alms. Also used to hand out candy to kids. Dervishes concentrated to the south of Iran could have had access to coastal Arab traders thus acquiring these palm pods.
Department:
Asia (except western Russia)
Dimensions:
length 21 centimeters
Loans:
S1992-1993 #22: Heffernan Films (March 1, 1993–March 2, 1993)