This ceremonial cloth or ‘tampan’ depicts a rich iconography of a ship carrying creatures with spiral patterned tails of various sizes, against a background of key and spiral motifs. The ancestor or deity figures riding on the central large creature are sheltered by a house-like structure, which probably represent an ancestral shrine. It has been suggested that the image of mythical animals with ancestor or deity riders is a symbol of ancestor or deity transition when an individual moves to another social or spiritual state. This interpretation is not only consistent with the symbolism of ship imagery in Lampung textiles, but also explains the importance of such ceremonial cloths at rites of passage. Ceremonial cloths could be used as gifts, covers for ritual offerings or pillows for the deceased. It is normally woven using the supplementary weft technique, where additional horizontal threads create patterns over the top of the ground weave.
