Spinning Top and Rope

This hand carved wooden spinning top, known as a gasing, is from Sarawak, Malaysia.  It is used in a traditional game of competition, whereby the top is spun on the ground, using the special rope, and the winner of the competition is the person whose gasing spins the longest.  The specially woven rope, used with the gasing, has a unique tapered diameter, thicker at the end that is held in the hand and tapering down to the end that is wrapped around the gasing.  The gasing is thrown, by hand, and the rope is jerked back creating a spin of the top. Another competition using the gasing, is where one competitor tries to knock the other competitors’ gasing out of a ring that is drawn on the ground.  This gasing is made of a very dense, local hardwood.

Another object from Malaysia that has been featured for Artifact of the Month is an Iban textile.