Hi super smart people. I have another mystery piece. It's a cup. However, I really only read English, Spanish and German letters. :-) I love the cup. It's design looks like a young man standing at a crossroads directing "traffic". He's stopping a woman carrying jugs so a woman carrying large sacks may pass through. Your insight is appreciated!
The only signature or marking consistent with being a hallmark is the mark between the two ferns along the road in the first picture. Would more pictures of the decoration help?
My husband took a better picture of the mark, which I assume is Arabic. I would suspect if this were Peruvian I'd see something marked plata and numerals that I'd recognize. :-)
Of course, there are jokes about assumptions, that I dare not repeat on the message board.
I am sure it would help, you need to take a series of pictures with vertical orientation. That way someone could actually see the scene, the way it is now one would have to guess.
The quality of answers depends on the quality of photos.
I apologize for any orientation problems. Taking pictures with the phone and uploading is "different" for me. :-) It's flipping them sideways, even though I'm taking them the correct way. Here's a series of pictures.
However, the picture of the close up of the signature shared earlier is in the correct orientation.
It is not Peruvian. I think it is Indonesian, but I am not sure. I would try to find and Indonesian in your area and hope they can read the mark. Or leave the posting and hope for the best.
Maurice
BTW I am sending you a bill for my sore neck
I don't know what prize is being offering for a correct answer, but now that we finally have some better photos, I will throw my hat in the ring with Tibet.
I don't know that what follows will be viewable in all browsers, but it is the word for "silver" (dngul) in Tibetan, which I believe is etched on the cup (tho the orientation is still wrong): དངུལ
Maurice, please PM me if you'd like to start a class action suit to recoup chiropractors' bills.
There is a so-called Tibetan sugar palm (arenga micantha) and the temperate Nyingchi region reportedly boasts banana trees, palm trees, snow lotus, tree ferns, and cypress. As I haven't been there myself, I leave it to others to provide first-hand reports on the local trees.
My neck thanks you, Trev, for giving us an image of the mark in a cropped form, and in the proper orientation as well! It is amazing how seeing things right side up can make all the difference.
Here is "silver" in Nepali:
चादी
I only know English, French, Japanese, certain forms of Chinese, and a smattering of Korean, so will happily defer to those fluent in the 2,000 other languages of Asia, as well as the national dress and flora and fauna of each region, to make some final determination about the origin of the cup. Hopefully our SE Asian and Indonesian contributors will also provide fresh insights.
Gee everybody is having such a good time. If you look at the sarong the women are wearing is common in many parts of South East Asia. The hat he is wearing as he dances is from Bali. Can be just a scarf tied around the head to a formal hat.
The script is most likely Hanacaraka or Aksara Indonesian, a precolonial written and spoken language.