A medieval English bronze jug, its trans-Saharan journey, and the afterlives of empire—from fourteenth-century England to the royal court of Asantehene Prempeh I
The Asante Ewer, c. 1340–1405. England. Leaded bronze. H. 62 cm. British Museum, 1896,0727.1. © 2025 The Trustees of the British Museum, courtesy the Department of Photography and Imaging.
The Asante Ewer is the ‘story’ of an exciting object with a mysterious history, currently in the British Museum’s collection. The medieval bronze-cast lidded jug was made in England around 1340 and is thought to have travelled along trans-Saharan trade routes to the African subcontinent at some point after 1400. Lloyd de Beer, Julie Hudson and Ivor Agyeman-Duah’s book brings together a detailed reading of the object, its triangular spout, fluted lid and handle, which has a circular, wheel-like finish. The ewer is also decorated with textual inscriptions and embossed decoration, including the English royal coat of arms surmounted by a crown, English lions, the French fleur-de-lis, and medallions featuring heraldic falcons. These unusual decorations, however, made it easy to identify in a historic photograph of the royal courtyard of Asantehene Prempeh I, ruler of the Asante Kingdom in Kumasi, Africa, in 1884. This jug featured in the acclaimed exhibition and book by Hew Locke, ‘what have we here’, at the British Museum last year, which explored uncomfortable colonial narratives through the museum’s collection and was commented on through Locke’s own art.
The book is a slim, academic investigation into the object’s possible purpose, with an array of other jugs, metalwork, seals, coins, vessels, manuscripts, and engravings offering rich stylistic and practical comparisons. The writers suggest how and why the jug was transported to Africa and ended up in the royal courtyard, though the evidence is pretty inconclusive. For example, how or why did the ewer ever leave England? They agree that the jug would have made an unusual diplomatic gift considering its moralistic three lines of inscription (“He that wyl not spare whan he may he schal not spend whan he wold deme the best in every dowt til the throwthe be tryid owte”) which urge the reader to save money and exercise good judgement. Additionally, the symbolic stamps and crests lend the object an iconography that would have been understood in England but may not have been as apparent to an international or African audience.
Jug, 1400–1500. England, Germany, or the Netherlands (?). Leaded brass. H. 37.5 cm, W. 26 cm. British Museum, Af1933,-.2. © 2025 The Trustees of the British Museum, courtesy the Department of Photography and Imaging.
Additionally, the jug’s size would have made it very heavy to transport. When empty, the jug weighs 19 kilogrammes, meaning it can carry 38 kilogrammes of water. “…the Asante Ewer is certainly the largest known English medieval bronze vessel…” and this meant that it would probably have had to be carried around by two attendants. Was it used for ablutions before meals? The authors suggest that the ewer’s detailed decoration and inscriptions around its waist mean that it was probably made to adorn a sideboard in a medieval dining hall, to be admired by guests during a royal dinner, if it was indeed in circulation in Britain during the medieval period. But why transport such a cumbersome and weighty object to Africa?
A highlight in the book is the fascinating first-hand accounts collected by the authors. In 1896, Senior Officer Robert Baden-Powell, who would later become the founder of the worldwide Scouting movement, wrote of the looting of the palace of Asantehene Prempeh I by British soldiers. Accounts such as this place the strategic importance and brutality of early European campaigns in Africa in the 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries into sharper perspective.
The book also provides evidence of the trans-Saharan trade in historic metal objects, initially transported for trade or as diplomatic gifts on missions to faraway nations and kingdoms. Photographic evidence of the Kumasi courtyard, in which the jug can be seen among a pile of paraphernalia or offerings, alongside another photograph documenting the auction of ‘King Prempeh’s Possessions’ in 1896, possibly taken in the same courtyard after the palace was sacked, offers stark evidence of authorised looting by British colonial forces. Such practices appear to have been structurally embedded within military campaigns, even as they were frequently disguised as diplomatic expeditions.
Punch bowl, 1764. England, hallmark London. Silver. H. 22.5 cm, W. 30.3 cm. British Museum, Af1933,-.3.a-b. © 2025 The Trustees of the British Museum, courtesy the Department of Photography and Imaging.
The selling off of looted objects at auctions provides further proof of the illegality and abuse of power exercised in the name of the British Empire. Artefacts and curiosities were syphoned from conquered or colonised territories and gradually absorbed into the private collections of officials and wealthy travellers, before ultimately entering institutions such as the British Museum. That the ‘Asante Ewer’ was made in England and bears so many recognisable heraldic symbols only deepens the sense of historical dissonance and unresolved mystery surrounding its journey.
Object in Focus: The Asante Ewer, by Lloyd de Beer, Julie Hudson and Ivor Agyeman-Duah (British Museum, £6), is published by the British Museum and available online.
Sophie Kazan Makhlouf, PhD, is an Honorary Fellow of the School of Museum Studies at Leicester University. She is an Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Notre Dame (USA) in London and an Associate Lecturer in the Department of Architecture at the University of Falmouth. Sophie’s research and focus have been on art and culture from countries in the Global South. She writes for various art magazines and journals in the UK and the Middle East. Her book The Development of an Art History in the UAE: An Art Not Made To Be Understood was published by Anthem Press in 2024. She is a member of the Association for Art History and hosts 60 second Art Minute documentaries on YouTube to promote accessibility and education in the visual arts.
