Gluta usitata
English: Burmese Varnish Tree.
Region: southeast Asia, Myanmar, Thailand.
Habitat: open forests, rare in dry forests.
Use: bark resin for lacquer, varnish; wood for quality timber, preserving woodwork; resin, thickened by sawdust, cow-dung ashes, or bone-ashes to a plastic condition as a cement and body material or moulding substance, coloured with lamp-black, gold-leaf, vermilion (not red lead), orpiment, indigo to objects revolving on the turning-lathe, in Burmese glass mosaics, Burmese lacquer ware, Manipur leather varnish; resin, thinned, for painting on cloth or paper; wood for tool handles, anchor stocks, construction, railway ties, gun stocks.
Botany
Large, deciduous tree.
Stem: wood is dark red, with yellowish streaks, turning very dark after long exposure, very hard, handsome.
Taxonomy
Some authorities place Gluta under Melanorrhoea. Others have combined Melanorrhoea with Gluta.