instrumentHnitkwasok
hnitkwasok · Burmese
The two-pronged pricker: two feet long, weighted with a brass figure
| Made of | brass, iron |
|---|---|
| Points | a solid round point about four inches long, split into four by long slits at right angles, which hold the colour |
| Held | right hand on the shaft; the left forefinger and thumb form a rest on the body |
| Length | about two feet, in Shway Yoe's account |
What it is
A brass rod about two feet long, weighted at the top with a cast figure, with a split four-way point at the other end.
The long version
Shway Yoe describes it part by part in 1882 and the design is a solved problem. The yat, the style, is solid with a round sharp point, split into four by long slits at right angles — the slits hold the pigment, so the tool carries its own ink. The style is about four inches and fits into a hollow pipe, which joins it to the weighted end. The weight is at the top and the length is hollow, so the tool has mass where mass helps and none where it would tire the hand.
The weight is cast as a bird, a nat or a bilu, and a good saya's is carved elaborately. The tattooist catches the shaft in his right hand and rests the point in a fork made by the left forefinger and thumb, the left hand flat on the body — the hand becomes the guide rail.
How
Ink is lampblack from burnt sesame oil, mixed with water as it is wanted. The outline goes on first with a camel-hair brush.
Connected to
Named here by
- Htoe kwin The two-foot brass pricker that made it.
Where each claim comes from
| Field | Tier | Source | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| default | cited | The Burman: His Life and Notions — scanned by the Internet Archive | |
| text_th | inference | written in Thai by this project, not machine-translated |
Sources
- The Burman: His Life and Notions — scanned by the Internet Archive
- Tattooing in Myanmar — Wikipedia (en)
cited Cited — a named source, linked · harvested Harvested — fetched from an open dataset, with its licence · tradition Tradition — general knowledge of the tradition, hedged · inference Inference — this project's own reasoning from the above · field Field — someone stood there