""Register 1945: Copper ingot with flattish lump at right angles with the shaft." Measures 51cm (H) x 7.5cm (W) x 7cm (D) [Measurements taken from the British Museum online collections database]

"Register 1945:
Ethnographical series from S.Africa, chiefly from the Bavenda of N. Transvaal.; Lerale; This rod-like copper ingot (lerale) comes from the Phalaborwa area of Limpopo province, South Africa. Jan van Schalkwyk asserts that such ingots 'probably date from the 16th century onwards when Sotho-Tswana speaking people had taken over many of the mining centres. From the amount of mining that was carried out in southern African in pre-colonial times, one would expect to find large numbers of ingots, or products derived from them. This is not the case, however, which suggest that many copper and tin ingots were exported via the east coast.' (in Africa: the Art of a Continent, 2004 [1996]: 200)."