My First Estate Sale

While I was in Columbia there was a lot of excitement in my sister’s neighborhood because it was rumored that the large house on the corner would be having an estate sale. On the first Saturday I was there we walked in the rain to the house but sadly there was no estate sale. On the second Saturday there was a sale but those who were looking at the estate sale as an opportunity to walk through the house and those who were interested in furnishings were disappointed. One of the neighbors who had heard there was going to be a “Plate Sale” and had insisted he was right when people tried to correct him felt vindicated when he found out that the sale consisted mostly of china and glassware set out on tables in the back of the house. My sister who bought a lot of tableware including several serving plates began referring to the sale as a tag sale and made sure I understood it was not a typical estate sale.

I wasn’t disappointed though as the first thing that caught my eye was a brass elephant with a rider that was very similar to a brass horse with rider that was part of my grandmother’s horse collection. Googling tells me that they are early to mid 20th century temple ornaments or toys from Karnataka or Madhya Pradesh, India. Now they’re facing each other on the ends of my sideboard.

The sale also included several pieces from Africa including a wooden face hanging on a wall that I thought would look great at the top of my dining room suns. It had a lot of blue tape around it so I wondered if it was damaged but at $5.00 or $10.00 I didn’t mind buying it anyway. I was pretty surprised when I took the tape off and found out it was a box that included the original price tag.

Googling led to a similar box for sale on Etsy for $575.00 and to several museums who have similar boxes in their collections. Kuba cosmetic boxes were used to store camwood or tukulo powder which comes from the Mulombwa tree and is mixed with castor oil to make a cosmetic that was applied to the face or chest for a variety of ceremonies and could also be used as a dye. Since the Republic of Congo was only named Zaire between 1971 and 1997 the box must have been originally been purchased from Xanadu between those years.

Since it is a box and not a wall hanging it also ended up on our sideboard not on our sun wall.

Hanging next to the sun was another piece that interested me because it was made from a gourd. I wasn’t sure about it so at first I didn’t buy it.  I went back later in the afternoon when everything was marked down to half price or “make us an offer”. It had no price tag so I asked and was quoted $5.00. I looked in my wallet and found $2.00. “I’ll take it” they said. I am so glad I went back since I found the perfect place for it on our gallery wall.

It also had a tag from Xanadu.

Tanzanian medicine containers are typically made from carved wood and calabash gourds and were used by healers to store oils and powders.

I did get a few items that were more typical of this estate plate sale and will write about them in my next post.