Litter (Vehicle)

A litter, also called a sedan chair, palanquin or dooly depending on the region, is a wheelless vehicle for carrying a seated or reclining person, built as anything from a simple sling slung between two poles to an elaborate enclosed cabin, and moved by porters who carry it on their shoulders or by yoke, with the largest imperial versions requiring a dozen or more bearers. Litters were used across a remarkable range of cultures: in China, India, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines in Asia, in Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Portugal in Europe, in the Kingdom of Kongo and Ghana in Africa, and in colonial America and Latin America. Because the vehicle required dedicated bearers and, in its finer forms, silk curtains, lacquer work or bronze fittings, owning one and keeping its staff was widely understood as a marker of wealth and status, a reading confirmed in the Indian case, where even a low-paid clerk could sometimes afford to keep one.