Container Old Silver Handmade. The Delhi dealer from whom this old Silver container was purchased in the early 1990s gave its provenance as Gujerat but it could as easily have been created in the adjoining state of Rajasthan, which state also has a great tradition of Silver craftsmanship. Indeed, the biggest Silver artefacts in the world are two of three huge Silver jars commissioned by the ruler of Jaipur in the late 1800s, each 160cms high, each weighing 345kgs, which the Maharajah took with him, full of River Ganges water, on his sea trip in 1902 to England for the coronation of Edward V11. The two existing jars are displayed in a Jaipur palace museum.
It was said that in the 1980s, when the Texan Hunt brothers were attempting to control the world’s Silver market, India had more Silver within its borders than all the rest of the world combined, without having had an operating Silver mine for over 200 years.