Khmer Empire, 12th century. Heavily cast, the domed bell with a flared rim, surmounted by a vajra-form handle terminating in proms issuing from makara heads centered to either side by Hevajra dancing and a standing female multi-headed and multi-armed deity standing atop a beast mask within a flaming mandrala, above a smaller figure of a devotee with hands clasped together in worship.

Provenance: The collection of The Zelnik Istvan Southeast Asian Gold Museum. Institutional art collection in Belgium, acquired from the above. Dr. Istvan Zelnik, President of the Hungarian South and Southeast Asian Research Institute, is a former high-ranking Hungarian diplomat who spent several decades in Southeast Asia, building the largest known private collection of Asian art in Europe.
Condition: Very good condition, commensurate with age. Wear, signs of weathering and erosion, casting flaws, encrustations, nicks, scratches. The bronze with a rich, naturally grown patina with vibrant malachite encrustations.

Weight: 3,667 g
Dimensions: Height 40 cm

Hevajra is the personification of enlightenment, the dance pose symbolizing the process of enlightenment as liberation from worldly constraints.

Literature comparison:
Compare a closely related Khmer bronze altar bell cast with Ganesha on the finial, 19.4 cm long, dated to the 12th century, in the Minneapolis Institute of Art, accession number 91.22.2.