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I picked this up from the estate of a collector who brought it back after WW2 according to his daughter. She said it sat in his office forever until it eventually went into storage. It's quite large and very heavy for being hollow. Appears to have been carved from a single piece of wood? Not sure what the top was used for.

A fountain?

Your first picture is the front of the stand, while the third is the rear.

The front is decorated with several LingZhi 靈芝 mushrooms (in the stylised form often seen as the 'head' of a RuYi sceptre). Additionally, towards the right hand lower section there is a bat. These are powerful symbols in Chinese culture.

I suggest that this might have been the base for quite a large statue of one of the immortals, and the small cup-like depression at the other end of the base may been the resting place for the bottom of a staff. The immortal who comes to my mind first in this instance would be Li TieGuai 李鐵拐, who was closely involved with the care of the sick and disadvantaged, hence the specific LingZhi mushrooms (famous and very important in Chinese medicine).

indeed it is a stand
in terms of age I would place it somewhere toward mid / late 19thC, based mostly on the heavy proportion of the carving, which is quite common of this period but also the bat that becomes very popular at this time. Wood wise I would say most likely nanmu

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