Openwork Brass Dross Box

By the 18th century, opium use had become as central to Chinese social life as taking tea or smoking tobacco, fostering a subculture rich with its own customs, traditions, and exquisitely crafted accoutrements.

This small brass box is a variation of the dross box, a container used to collect spent opium ash (dross). A waste product of smoking, dross could be added to opium to prolong its use and lessen its purity. Consequently, many smokers would save their dross in containers such as this and sell it to an opium den.

This example dates to the mid-19th century and has a simple, rectangular form with minimal decoration. The lid is perforated with an openwork design of abstract florals enclosed by a geometric meander.