Art of Occa11ia, Africa, a11d tl1e A111ericas

fro111 tl1e Mtlsetllll of Pri111itivc Art

368
The Metropolitan Museum of Art

An exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art May Io-August 17, 1969

Art of Oceania, Africa, and the Americas

from the Museum of Primitive Art
The staff members of The Museum of Primitive Art
who have written material for this catalogue are:
Robert Goldwater, Chairman of the Administrative Committee
Douglas Newton, Curator
julie Jones, Associate Curator
Tamara Northern, Associate Curator

Design and format by Norman Ives

Color photography by John T. Hill
Black-and-white photography by Charles Uht
(except Eliot Elisofon, 102, 103, 106, 133,
139, 140, 143; John T. Hill, 85, 183, 184,
185, 455, 465; Lisa Little, 564; Peter Moore,
435; john D. Schiff, go, 91, 93, 95, 96, 97, 98,
100, 123, 125, 127, 128, 135. 136, 137. 138, 142)

Printed in Great Britain at The Curwen Press Ltd.

Library of Congress catalog card number 73-77259

Foreword

Not too many decades ago the art of the Middle Ages was
still called primitive, barbaric, crude, and inexpressive. How
curious that seems today !
Not too many years ago the arts of the peoples who lived
in Africa, the regions of the Pacific, and the ancient Americas
were still looked upon by some as ethnological specimens or
as images of an interesting but lesser nature wedded too closely
to magical practices, fear, and superstition. How very one-
sided and harsh those judgments seem today when we con-
front these works of art of such expressive power, subtlety,
and beauty in this fmc exhibition, Art of Oceania, Africa, and
the Americas !
This exhibition of works of art gathered together for The
Museum of Primitive Art by Nelson A. Rockefeller, a col-
lector of high perception, rare sensitivity, and great en-
thusiasm, is an extraordinarily important event for the
Metropolitan. It marks the first time in the 99-year history
of the Metropolitan that works of art from these civilizations
have ever been shown in a major exhibition. Thus, this
stunning show constitutes a truly significant moment of
coming of age for this Museum, which is in essence a great
encyclopedia of man-created achievements. But, even more
important, Art of Oceania, Africa, and the Americas affords
our public a splendid opportunity to see works of art of in-
comparable quality: sculptures of wood, stone, and terra-
cotta, precious and semiprecious stone, treasures of gold and
silver, of superb textiles and wondrous feathers. And the name
of the Metropolitan is, after all, quality.

THOMAS P. F. HOVING
Director, The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Preface
The founding of The Museum of Primitive Art twelve years
ago was for me both a culmination and a beginning. More
than twenty-five years before, I had begun to collect African,
Oceanic, and pre-Columbian art. I was irresistibly drawn to
these works by their directness, their vitality and their strong
sense of style. The small collection inevitably grew larger.
It seemed to me that here were sculptures that had some-
thing to say to our own time, whose inner strength and
expressiveness had an affinity with the best of twentieth-
century art. Here were works of art that should be known to
a larger public. The private collection therefore became the
founding nucleus of The Museum of Primitive Art.
At the time of its opening, I formulated the Museum's
purpose in these words: 'To integrate primitive art into what
is already known of the arts of man, to select objects of out-
standing beauty and to exhibit them so that they may be
enjoyed in the fullest measure.' In all the Museum's activities,
it has kept this goal uppermost. But it has also remembered
that understanding increases enjoyment. Therefore, the
Museum has documented the works it shows, as far a~
possible, to explain why and how they were made.
Since 1957, the collections of The Museum of Primitive
Art have been greatly enlarged by purchase and gift. Only a
small fraction of the collection can be shown in the restricted
space of our building at r 5 West 54th Street in Manhattan.
And so it was with the greatest of pleasure that I accepted on
behalf ofThe Museum of Primitive Art the invitation ofThe
Metropolitan Museum, through Director Thomas Hoving,
to organize an exhibition in its spacious galleries. I am doubly
pleased because this exhibition is a sure sign that the arts of
the indigenous cultures of Oceania, Africa, and the Americas
are achieving the recognition their beauty deserves.
 I am deeply indebted to theMetropolitanMuseum'sDirector,
Thomas Hoving, and his staff for their diligent and inspired
cooperation with Robert Goldwater, Chairman ofthe Adminis-
trative Committee, and Douglas Newton, Curator, and others
of the staff of The Museum of Primitive Art in preparing the
exhibition and its catalogue.
I only regret that my son Michael and my friend Rene
d'Harnoncourt cannot be present to share this triumph. Each
did much to make this exhibition possible, Michael as a sensi-
tive and dedicated collector of primitive art for the Museum,
Rene for thirty years as colleague and as vice-president· of
The Museum of Primitive Art from its founding. Each
perished tragically. The art endures.

GOVERNOR NELSON A. ROCKEFELLER

President and Founder, The Museum of Primitit'e Art
Contents
INTRODUCTION: ROBERT GOLDWATER

OCEANIA, BY DOUGLAS NEWTON

Polynesia I- 32
Melanesia 33- 74
New Guinea 75-208
Australia 209-219

AFRICA, BY TAMARA NORTHERN

& ROBERT GOLDWATER

The Western Sudan

The Western Guinea Coast 303-360
Nigeria, Cameroon
The Congo

THE AMERICAS, BY JULIE JONES

Pre-Columbian Gold 452-471

Peru 472-536
The Caribbean 537-539
Central America 540-547
Mexico 548-613
Maya Area 614-632
North America 633-664
Introduction
The works in this exhibition come from many places and
differ in many ways: in their materials and techniques, in the
circumstances of their production and use, in their social and
symbolic roles, in their craftsmanship, size, appearance, and
style. In fact, their differences-geographical, temporal, func-
tional, and esthetic-so much outweigh their similarities, that
if one looks at them individually, one doubtless questions how
and why they are related.
They all belong, it is true, to one museum, and represent
the character and quality of its collections. That they come
from The Museum of Primitive Art gives them one kind of
coherence, but it does not explain how they should have been
brought together in a museum, so to speak, of their own, and
given a single label, nor why the arts of Oceania and Africa
(and in part those of the Americas) are only now, for the first
time, being given a major showing in The Metropolitan
Museum of Art.
If these arts have in the past been allotted a special, and in a
sense a secluded place, it is not because they have been un-
familiar. Examples of 'primitive art' have been accessible in
museums of'natural history' for many years. The reasons for
their separation from the body of world art lie in the story of
our own taste, and in the ways in which the related disciplines
of anthropology and archeology approached them.
It is only comparatively recently that the primitive arts
have been examined primarily as works of art. American
artifacts came briefly to Western attention after the Spanish
conquest of the New World, as did, later, Oceanic artifacts
following the voyages of Captain Cook and his successors.
Although occasionally admired for their virtuosity, these
objects were largely examined for what they revealed about
other aspects of their cultures. Often they were seen only as
the obvious evidence of idolatry, and so were destroyed.
The anthropologist of the nineteenth and twentieth cen-
turies had different concerns, but not much more appreciation.
Interested in man's rise from simple beginnings, he saw the
arts as documenting the evolution and elaboration of skills
and techniques. He was thus much interested in their relative
sequence (and where possible their absolute chronology) as
evidence of the gradual development of material culture
(that is, technology and its artifacts) from its primitive
origins toward higher forms. He paid little attention, how-
ever, to inherent character and quality. Since he viewed the
nonliterate cultures to which European expansion had given
him access as survivors of an early evolutionary station on the
road to civilization (hence the term 'primitive'), he judged
their arts in much the same way-as crude attempts toward
the later, more refined achievements of the 'higher' cultures,
particularly his own.
But art was evidence of more than material culture: As the
visible product of ceremony, ritual, and belief, it could also
be used to investigate social organization, magical practice,
and religious custom. The anthropologist was struck by the
way these primitive arts (unlike the arts of his own culture-
or so he thought) always seemed to serve some purpose
beyond themselves, so that if they were not directly practical
(in which case they were called crafts) they were indirectly
so, since they were ' used' toward a further end. He was
impressed with the fact that they were always 'functional,'
and since his own esthetic made much of art's 'uselessness,'
he classified them somewhere below true art.
These preoccupations with art as a source of information
rather than for its expressive reality had their parallel among
the pre-Columbian archeologists. To the art historian arch-
eology implies a primary interest in art, since from the
Renaissance on the study of Mediterranean antiquity has been
a branch of humanistic learning. Not so the study of New
World antiquity, which, beginning about I 850, developed as
a scientific discipline. American archeology, therefore, has
been allied not to humanistic studies but to anthropology,
and so dedicated to the study of primitive culture.
If the compulsions of their disciplines compelled most
anthropologists to look through rather than at works of
primitive art, this tendency was reinforced by their own
esthetic preferences. These were, quite naturally, conser-
vative, as befitted men of scholarly interests and university
connections. With outstanding exceptions their bias was
toward a tradition of classicizing naturalism that judged
artistic skill upon its ability to reproduce the appearance of
nature, and largely forgot that what it accepted as the simu-
lacrum of that appearance was in reality the convention of a
single artistic tradition (a convention often breached even in
Western art). They might admire the firm skills that con-
trolled the forms of an arbitrary stylization, using them to
establish a hierarchy of achievement, but this is about all.
It is thus not surprising that the first wholehearted admira-
tion for the arts of primitive cultures came from outside the
academy. The so-called 'discovery' of African sculpture
about 1905 by Matisse, Picasso, Kirchner, Kandinsky, and
their colleagues was later extended by other artists to encom-
pass the very different qualities of Oceanic and pre-Columbian
art. Their view was subjective, highly partial, in a certain
sense uninformed. It was based on a romantic, individualistic
rebellion against the classicism and naturalism of their own
tradition, and they were entirely ignorant of the social and
religious contexts that were of primary interest to the anthro-
pologists. This history helps to explain why among the public
those interested in modern art were the first to admire primi-
tive art-a link that played a role in the founding and develop-
ment of The Museum of Primitive Art.
Primitive art is of course neither anticlassical nor anti-
naturalistic, being outside the Western tradition that makes
these concepts meaningful (even though it has its own kinds
and degrees of naturalism), and knowledge of its usc and
setting is just as essential to its understanding as it is to the
arts of any other time and culture. Nevertheless the modern
artist made a necessary contribution. By his concentration on
the visual constituents-material, texture, structure, color,
and composition-and by his sensitivity to the affective
impact of the resultant symbolic form, he corrected the
informational bias of the scientist and focused attention on
the expressive power of the primitive arts. Our present
approach to the art of Oceania, Africa, and the Americas-
how we look at it, and what we look for in it-results from
the fusion and the mutual modification of these formerly
separate and conflicting points of view.
What does this change of attitude mean for our under-
standing of this vast, varied, constantly increasing corpus of
the arts? First, perhaps, that the term 'primitive' is no longer
really meaningful. Still handy as a short, conventional term
of reference, it has been drained of its original content. It is
now clear that the 'primitive cultures' arc not what they
were once thought to be-the early, arrested stages of a
generally uniform social evolution leading to 'higher cul-
tures.' They have had their own long evolution, and although
their technologies may be relatively simple, they have deve-
loped their own social complications and subtleties, and their
own psychological sophistications and nuances. They are
different, not only from more industrialized societies, but also
in many basic ways from each other, and nowhere more so
than in their arts.
It is equally evident that the works they created are not
'primitive,' if this implies material coarseness, poorly con-
~rolled craft, or poverty of concept. If certain methods were
lacking, those that were known were brought to their own
kind of perfection. Though the Polynesians had no metal,
their wood carving, produced with blades of shell and bone,
is both rich and delicate; the Olmecs lacked the wheel, but
their immense stone sculptures have impressive power and
detail; the techniques of early Peruvian textiles have never
been surpassed; African figure sculpture fuses rhythmic pre-
cision and vitality. The list of examples is practically endless
and the proof really no longer needed: although a people's
techniques may belong to the Stone or Iron Age, this in-
fluences but does not finally impair the control and sophistica-
tion of their artistic skills. The level of material culture cir-
cumscribes the available techniques, but it limits neither the
quality of their use, nor the quality of the artistic ends they
serve.
Increasing knowledge has changed other long-accepted
notions. The first studies of African and Oceanic arts assumed
them to be immutable. It was supposed that their cultures
having long attained their evolutionary ceiling, had since
existed as upon an unending plateau. The arts, being strictly
functional reflections of the needs of their societies, had done
the same. For each tribe or kingdom there must be a charac-
teristic style, both typical and unchanging; one searched for
prototypical works against which to measure all others.
In part, of course, this search reflected the need to arrange
a large body of unfamiliar material. This could best be done
by differentiating the most easily classifiable descriptive detail.
It repeated a method long familiar to We~tern art history,
based on a belief in necessary correspondence between style
and cultural context. This would be particularly direct and
immediate, it was thought, in a simpler society. In this method
a premium is pnt upon the characteristic, rather than the
exceptional object, and it is understandable that the archeolo-
' the task of working
gist (as well as the anthropologist), given
out a sequence of cultures on the sole basis of their artifacts,
should define those cultures through their most representative
examples-those that contained the largest number of typical
features.
There was another assumption, curiously shared by artists
and scientists alike, despite their different points of view.
If art was the direct emanation of a society, the visible
concretion of its collective myth, then logically it was also a
collective product, somehow created without the determining
intervention of any single individual. Artists' names were
unknown, and this reinforced the preconception of the
'primitive artist' unthinkingly following the traditions of his
ancestors. Though this now appears to be a very romantic
concept, it had an understandable appeal. To the artist,
burdened by an excess of isolation and individual invention,
it explained the coherence, the intensity, the sense of presence
he felt in works that could not be measured on the accustomed
scale of naturalism and stylization. To the scientist it seemed
the obvious accompaniment of a functionalism he associated
more with craft than with creativity. Besides, it was difficult
to make distinctions within styles so different from those he
knew.
As we have learned more about the arts of Oceania, Africa,
and the Americas, we have been forced to revise these assump-
tions. The history of African and Oceanic art is difficult to
establish. There are no written records, and oral traditions,
although they arc quite accurate in certain societies with a
special interest in genealogy, can be accepted only with
caution. Traveler's accounts, useful when they exist (as for
certain parts of Africa), arc few, and rarely precise in their
mention of the arts. Occasionally a collector's date can be
established, as with those South Seas works traceable to
specific voyages-from those of Cook on. Scientific methods
of dating are increasingly helpful, and African and Oceanic
archeology reinforce the evidence that there has been con-
siderable artistic change. In the end it is the objects them-
selves that tell us the most. The more we study them, the
more their stylistic differences become apparent, differences
sometimes due to the coexistence of local traditions but also
clearly due to historical alteration.
Since the position of the artist differs from culture to
culture, and from tribe to tribe, it is difficult to generalize
about his role, though it can be said that he most often is not
exclusively an artist but is also an ordinary economic citizen.
But both field work and the close study of objects now make
it evident that among many peoples his work is not entirely
traditional and he is nqt altogether anonymous. The demands
of function limit the range of iconographic and stylistic inno-
vation. But in their own societies, where their ritual signifi-
cancc subjects them to careful scrutiny, and where at best only
neighboring styles are known, distinctions invisible to the
outsider arc easily perceived. Thus both the Asmat and the
Abelam of New Guinea distinguish the styles of different
villages, and the work of particular artists. The same is true
among theY oruba of Nigeria and elsewhere in Africa. A ware-
ness of this kind generally carries with it judgment of another
sort: the judgment of quality. Outstanding artistic ability is
recognized, the name of the exceptional artist is known even
beyond his own immediate community, and may be remem-
bered for several generations. (Limited as we are to archeolo-
gical information, we can only infer that the same was
probably true in pre-Columbian America.)
What, however, is the nature and basis of this appreciation?
These arts are after all mainly functional, and in their most
important manifestations entirely so. They cannot be vehicles
for the sort of personal expression so important to our own
romantic heritage, still less for protest ~gainst traditional
values. Certainly skill in the handling of tools and materials,
in the inclusion and disposition of accepted motifs, is valued
by artists and public alike; but does this mean that apprecia-
tion is reduced to artisanship and decoration, that is, to those
unessential elements that fall outside the realm of function
and meaning? Is this all that is left to the esthetic sense?
To pose the question in this fashion-as it has often been
posed in the past-is probably to put it wrongly, for it impli-
citly accepts a separation between the esthetic and the func-
tional aspects of the work of art, and it assumes that art is
merely the later illustration of ideas and concepts first elabo-
rated elsewhere. But masks (which, we must remember, were
part of a total costume, seen in motion) and figures do not
simply narrate an iconography of details. They do not so
much represent as embody the powers and spirits they body
forth; they shape at least as much as they follow the traditional
imagination of an audience that then visualizes in the very
concrete formal and expressive terms of the works themselves,
which to them seem natural. All aspects of a work are thus
essential to its effects, and in non literate societies especially,
there is finally no way of separating the esthetic from the
functional.
What docs this mean for our understanding and apprecia-
tion? For the arts of' civilization' we have long accepted both
esthetic and cultural relativism. We know that art has many
backgrounds and uses, and employs many styles. W c know
that a broad understanding of the cultural matrix out of which
it comes can correct our own subjective view and help us
judge it in its own terms and on its own merits, and that this
is the first step toward informed enjoyment. The same is true
for the arts of 'primitive cultures,' but since the social and
religious attitudes of their original setting are much less
familiar, the required understanding is harder to come by. To
put any of the world's art in a museum is to take it out of its
intended environment. But whatever its style, and whatever
its cultural source, it possesses certain inherent qualities that
render it still accessible. These arc the qualities of skill, of
design, of expressive form and concentrated emotion that
make it art. In large measure these qualities can cross cultural
boundaries-as much so in the arts of Oceania, Africa, and
the Americas as in any other art.

ROBERT GOLDWATER

Chairman of the Administrative Committee,

The Museum of Primitive Art
199
 ceding cultures, and leading to the occupation of Melanesia.
Oceania New Caledonia and Fiji, for instance, were inhabited by
about I ooo B.c. Later still, a new series of migrations by
Mongoloid people from Asia brought a new style into the
Pacific. This, at first partly Melanesian in character, began
Many clusters of islands fan out from the coast of Asia into to appear about 500 B.c. in the western part of Polynesia;
the Pacific Ocean. Those nearest the Indonesian archipelago the settlement of eastern Polynesia possibly began in the
arc of great size: New Guinea, New Zealand, and the Marqucsas about 200 B.c. Hawaii was settled in the second
continent-sized Australia. Eastward, the islands decrease in century A.D. and Easter Island in the fourth century. New
size and the groups become more widely separated. Apart Zealand was occupied in at least two stages: the first about
from Australia, geographcrs.divide them into three areas: the tenth century, the second about 1350 by the 'Great Fleet"
that just north and east of Australia is Melanesia, with from the Society Islands, from which the modern Maori
Micronesia north of it; Polynesia extends further east. trace their descent.
In spite of the vast expanses of ocean between them, During the long intervals· following each of these move-
these islands have been inhabited for a very long time. ments the Oceanic cultures, in their relative isolation, deve-
Attempts to trace the early history of Oceania have so far loped individual characteristics. Often they abandoned old
been extremely speculative, based as they are on the evidence crafts-pottery in most of Polynesia, for example-or re-
of tradition, physical anthropology, linguistics, and the im- fined others. Local conditions and materials partly governed
plications of Asian archeology. Recent archeological work such changes. In all cases the teclmology was extremely
in Polynesia and Melanesia, though still sporadic, has neces- simple, being based on tools of stone, bone, and animal
sitated important revisions of theories about dating and teeth. Although a few small areas produced nothing in the
distribution; thus, statements about Oceanic history must way of visual art (some highland regions of New Guinea)
be, in a sense, more provisional now than before. and others comparatively little (parts of Micronesia), these
The original homes of the Oceanic populations arc not only throw into more vivid contrast the extraordinary pro-
definitely known, but almost certainly their paths brought ductivity of the others, which is all the more amazing since,
them through southeast Asia in successive migrations. The during pre-European times, the population of Oceania was
earliest immigrants were the ancestors of the Australian probably never more than about nine million.
aborigines. They must have traveled largely on foot across In much of Oceania the expansion of European influence,
land bridges that have since subsided under the sea; the from the eighteenth century onward, led immediately to
continent was inhabited by these nomads at least twenty the decay of the cultures. The process was in some cases
thousand years ago. Further migrations populated New symbiotic, not merely a function of colonialism: Polyne-
Guinea with people of a different ethnic type with Negroid sian conceptions of the religious superiority of technical
traits, the Papuans. New archeological evidence from the achievement, and New Guinean fascination with material
New Guinea highlands shows that they were already in- equipment, made these people eager to abandon their own
habited eleven thousand years ago by groups who were cultures. The introduction of alcohol, firearms, and new
also probably nomadic hunters, and that the technical diseases proved as fatal to Melanesians as to the American
equipment for extensive agricultural operations which Indian. Also definitive was the depopulation of Australia
could have supported large populations was in use by New and Tasmania by outright murder. Generally speaking, the
Guinea highlanders at least twenty-f1vc hundred years Oceanic cultures are now at an end, and the area is a pro-
ago. Parts of Micronesia were colonized before 2000 B.c., vince of world civilization.
probably from the Philippines. Further migrations of dark-
skinned peoples followed, causing modif1cations of the pre-
Polynesia
Although the European discovery of Polynesia began when
Alvero de Mendana, sailing westward from Peru in I 595,
encountered the Marquesas Islands, the crucial period began
only with Wallis's discovery, in 1767, ofTahiti, in central
Polynesia. This was followed by the great voyages ofJames
Cook (I769-70, 1772-75, 1777-79), which resulted in a syn-
thesis of previous and minor geographic knowledge of the
islands.
Few other episodes in the history of exploration have had
such an impact on the intellectual history of the West. The
culture of the Polynesians was profoundly sympathetic in
a number of ways to eighteenth-century Europe: among
other aspects, their carving was greatly admired for its
technical brilliance and elegant taste. The appreciation of
Polynesian arts and crafts, accordingly, preceded that of any
other primitive civilization's: In I 774, Sir Ashton Lever
opened a museum in London devoted to works from the
Pacific, and it was considered one of the most remarkable
sights of the city.
The view of Polynesia as the home of'the noble savage,'
the 'good child of nature,' was enlarged upon by Rousseau
and Diderot; their work formed a picture of innocent
charm that persists to this day in the debased terms of the
film and the travel brochure. But the reports of nineteenth-
century missionaries, stressing such barbarities as human
sacrifice, infanticide, and cannibalism, darkened the earlier
picture and reduced Polynesian artifacts (quantities of which
missionaries destroyed) to consideration as incompetent
grotesques. This denigration did not begin to lighten until
Gauguin awakened interest in Marquesan and Easter
Island art at the very end of the century.
The Polynesian islands share many physical features,
including their small size (few are as much as fifty miles
across) and their volcanic or reef origins. Their economies
were based rather on fishing than agriculture, except in
New Zealand, with its wide expanses of land. The Poly-
nesians, furthermore, shared a language and many of the
most important elements of culture, including hierarchical
societies ranked from royal or chiefly families to slaves, and
state religions celebrated on stone-built temple platforms.
China

POLYNESIA

'
I Au stra lia i ',,,
!- -~ -L.I Easter Island ·)
-- ~

I i-

OCEANIA

3
 The Polynesians believed in two great spiritual forces,
tabu and mana. Tabu was negative, to be avoided, and was
determined by priests. Mana, supernatural power, pervaded
both human beings and material objects. It was inherited
from generation to generation; increasing by accretion, it
brought priests and chiefs to the point of near divinity.
Since it derived partly from excellence and skill, it was an
attribute of both the carver (who, as among the Maori,
could have priestly status) and his work. -,
A very high proportion of surviving Polynesian carving
consists of elaborate utilitarian objects; figure sculpture is
relatively rare. Painting seems to have barely existed be-
yond overall monochrome coats on some sculpture; color
appears as an important clement only in the magnificent
feather cloaks, helmets, and images of the Hawaiians,
printed designs on tapa, and the abstract designs of Maori
woven flax cloaks.
M·ost Polynesian sculpture makes simultaneous use of
two nearly antithetic techniques: extremely simplified
form and repetitive small-scale geometric surface design. In
the basic style of figure sculpture the body is simplified,
stocky, with a disproportionately large head. It is found in
its most austere form in Fiji and Tonga. A congruous
simplicity appears in the bowls and other utensils from the
area, but the elaborate clubs from Fiji arc often covered
with geometric patterns. The figure sculpture of Tahiti is in
the same tradition, judging by the meager remains of a
style that once encompassed architectural figures of men
and animals, towering canoe prows, and other large-scale
work. Related to the figures of this area were those of
Mangareva in the Tuamotus: divine images in which sim-
plicity only enhances an extraordinary degree of vital
naturalism.
In Hawaiian figure carving the planes of the body are
emphasized to an almost prismatic degree; the heads, with
dramatically contorted features, are often transformed into

10 I II, 12
ferocious masks. The small figures of Easter Island are even I PENDANT, FEMALE FIGURE

more astonishing, for they include emaciated male ancestors Hawaii

Bone, 2i" high. 61.35
and beings combining lizard and human features. Even
here, however, the underlying simplicity of Polynesian art
2 FIGURE OF HOUSEHOLD GODDESS
appears in the refined abstraction of the dance paddles Hawaii
(themselves extreme stylizations of the hu~an figure), and Wood, 12!" high. 61.265
in the famous stone colossi on the slopes of the island's
central volcano.
Small geometric abstractions from the human head and
body are fundamental elements of Cook Islands sculpture;
the tendency is carried to an extreme in the Austral Islands,
where figures, drums, scoops, and paddles arc covered with
rows of minute triangular incisions, stars made up of them,
and rows of X-shaped forms.
The tendency to surface decoration is even more marked
in the Marquesas Islands. The typical human face (possibly
owing to Melanesian antecedents) has enormous round
eyes; on wood, stone, ivory, and bone figures the head is
disproportionately enlarged. Expanded, this face is one of
the innumerable units used in allover low relief to decorate
other figures, and such objects as bowls and ornaments. The
bodies of the Marquesans themselves were the ground for
similar total treatment by means of tattooing.
The richest of all Polynesian art areas, both in decorative
quality and surviving quantity, is that of the New Zealand
Maori. Totally nonnaturalistic in its early, fmest phases, its
imagery includes wildly stylized human figures (their eyes
inlaid with glowing haliotis shell) overlaid with and set
against backgrounds of dense scrollwork. Maori wood
carving elaborated the architectural members of their great
houses, huge canoes, and most weapons, tools, and house-
hold equipment. The Maori were equally fmc workers in
bone and stone (the jade-like nephrite) for weapons and
amulets.

3 STAFF-CLUB
Marquesas Islands
Wood, 6ol'' long. 57.112

4 HEADDRESS
Marquesas Islands
Tridacna shell, turtle shell, sennit
17~" long. 58.3
I5. 16 1 I7
5 FAN HANDLE 9 FAN
Marquesas Islands Marquesas Islands
Wood, I4" high. 61.79 Ivory, wood, cane, IS!" high. 66.4I

6 PAIR OF EAR ORNAMENTS IO DANCE PADDLE

Marquesas Islands Easter Island
Ivory, 2t and 2!'' high. 62.30 Wood, 32!" high. 56.309

7 FIGURE
Marquesas Islands
Bone, 4i" high. 63.59

8 HEADDRESS
Marquesas Islands
Shell, turtle shell, fiber, IS" wide. 64.I I

20 1 23, 24
II FEMALE FIGURE
Easter Island
Wood, bone, obsidian, 23!" high. 57.244

12 MALE FIGURE
Easter Island
Wood, bone, obsidian, 17!" high. 58.98

13 GORGET
Easter Island
Wood, 17!': long. 59.76

14 MAN-LIZARD FIGURE
Easter Island
Wood, bone, obsidian, 20!'' long. 63.29
15 FIGURE OF THE GOD RONGO
Mangareva, Gambier Islands
Wood, 38!" high. 57.9I

I6 FIGURE OF THE GOD ORO

Tahiti
Wood, sennit, I8l-" high. 57.258

17 SACRED FLY WHISK

Tahiti
Wood, fiber, scnnit, 32" high. 58.57

I8 SACRED FJ.Y WHISK HANDLE

Tahiti
Ivory, scnnit, I If" high. 65.80

I9 fiGURE
Tahiti
Stone, 23" high. 66.76
Gift of The Wunderman Foundation

20 CHIEF'S STOOL
Atiu, Cook Islands
Wood, I6i" long. 56.24

21 CEREMONIAL PADDLE
Austral Islands
Wood, 55i" long. 56.I

22 CEREMONIAL SCOOP
Austral Islands
Wood, 54!" long. 56.23

23 SACRED DRUM
Austral Islands
Wood, sharkskin, sennit, Sii" high. 57.251

24 FEMALE FIGURE
Haapai, Tonga Islands
Ivory, s!" high. 57.Io8

25 CLUB
Fiji Islands
Wood, 46" long. s6.3I
26 FIGURE FROM HOUSE POST
Maori, New Zealand
Wood, 43" high. 58.240

27 MODEL OF WAR CANOE PROW

Maori, New Zealand
Wood, shell inlay, 13!" high. 60.63

28 FEATHER BOX
Maori, New Zealand
Wood, shell mlay, 173" long. 60.126

29 FLUTE
Maori, New Zealand
Wood, cane, 17!" long. 61.77

30 WEAVER'S PEG
Maori, East Cape, New Zealand
Wood, 14~" long. 61.78

31 BIRD SNARE
Maori, New Zealand
Wood, shell inlay, 9i" long. 62.72

Micronesia

32 DISH
Matty Islands
Wood, 12~ long. 56.91
11

26 1 ~~31
 Melanesia
While early Melanesian contacts with Europeans were often
disastrous, they were limited in scope. As a result, many
elements of the cultures, including religion and the arts,
persisted here much longer than in Polynesia. Although
some pottery and stone carving was done, the main medium
of the artists was wood. Since this is subject to rapid decay
in the tropical climate, nearly all the extant Melanesian
work dates from no earlier than the late nineteenth century,
and most is much more recent.
Melanesian societies were generally classless; men
achieved power, which was not hereditary, by force of
personality and wealth. Religious life, largely confined to
men, centered around special houses in or near which cere-
monial activities took place and in which sacred objects
were stored. Men entered into religious life by way of
initiatory ceremonies at puberty, and participated thereafter
in ceremonies that took place at regular intervals. These
generally involved cults of ancestors and of spirits embody-
ing natural forces, both of which often included head-
hunting and cannibalism. In nearly all cases the ceremonies
entailed making a wealth of masks, figures, and objects for
display. Besides these, houses and household objects were
frequently richly decorated with carving and painting.
Melanesian artists were quite unawed by the problems of
scale; a good deal of their sculpture was of colossal size.
The basic theme of Melanesian art is the human figure,
with special emphasis on the· head. The figure is often
associated with those of animals and birds. Color was used
on sculpture and ceramics; the basic palette consisted of
red, black, and white. Little painting on flat surfaces-bark
or other-was done. A striking aspect was the use of a
constructive technique in wood. New Ireland carvers, for
instance, built up large figures, or groups of figures, from a
number of independently carved pieces. Elsewhere-for
example, in the New Hebrides and New Britain-figures
were constructed of bark cloth or clay o~er cane armatures.
These had additions of boar tusks, shells, fiber, feathers,
flowers, and other materials even more ephemeral than
their supports.
34. 35 The people of the New Hebrides were among the most
productive of Melanesian artists. Here, male society was Sculpture in the Admiralty Islands, largely the work of
organized in ascending grades, to which men gained ad- the Matankol on the coast of Manus Island, was widely
mittance by the sacriftce of pigs; for the ceremonies com- traded through the group. Most of it consisted of architec-
memorative figures were made in wood and tree fern. tural features, furniture, and especially bowls. Here the
Puppets and masks were also used in these ceremonies, and human figures, often associated with crocodile heads, were
by hierarchical secret societies. Huge standing slit-gongs, mostly carved in a blocklike convention and painted red,
carved with ancestral heads, were beaten for balletic per- with surface decoration of incised narrow lines of triangular
formances which the islanders themselves considered their patterns or small crosses in black and white.
greatest artistic achievements. All the carvings and masks
were brilliantly painted in a wide range of colors.
By contrast, the sculpture of New Caledonia is basically
painted black with accents of red. It is largely confined to
architectural clements-doorjambs, lintels, sills, and finials
of chiefs' houses-all of these incorporating huge human
faces in a ferocious, somewhat geometricized style. Masks
representing water spirits were made in the same style.
Few masks were made in the Solomon Islands, beyond
some of palm spathe, nor was there much large sculpture.
Small figures, some for attachment to the prows of war
canoes, were painted black, the predominant color in these
islands. Figures, clubs, and ceremonial shields were inlaid
with shell. Marine shell and turtle shell were also used, here
as in New Zealand, to make delicate pectoral ornaments.
The large island of New Britain has several distinct style
areas. Masks made of wood were infrequent here except for
flat masks with simple features from the offshore Duke of
York Islands. Some masks from the Gazelle Peninsula were
made from the face bones of human skulls, over-modeled
and painted, and the Baining tribes of the interior made
masks in bark cloth, painted with geometrical patterns in
black, brown, and the artist's own blood. The most re-
markable New Britain works are the Baining tribes' slim
cylindrical figures, some of them thirty feet high, with
enormous heads .
. In northwestern New Ireland, a great range of masks and
other carvings (collectively called malanggan) was made for
initiation and fllil:erary festivals, then abandoned to decay
when the ceremonies were over. These works are complex:
large areas are carved in openwork, with the main figures
surrounded by vertical rods or crossing bands. They were
always completely covered with fmely detailed painting
in red, yellow, black, and white.
 New Hebrides

33 GRADE SOCIETY FIGURE

Ambrym Island, New Hebrides
Fernwood, paint, 41!" high. 56.242

34 GRADE SOCIETY FIGURE

Probably Ambrym Island, New Hebrides
Fernwood, paint, So" high. 57.252

35 GRADE SOCIETY FIGURE

Ambrym Island, New Hebrides
Fernwood, paint, 109" high. 59.280

36 HEAD FROM SLIT-GONG

Fanla village, Ambrym Island
New Hebrides
Wood, 61!'' high. 59.281

37 DISH
Ambrym Island, New Hebrides
Wood, 33!" long. 58·33 I
38 1
7I
38 MASK
Malekula Island, New Hebrides
Clay, bark, cane, paint, 62!" high. 56.268

39 OVER-MODELED SKULl.
Probably southern Malekula Island
New Hebrides
Skull with painted compost, 51" high. 58.333

40 HELMET MASK
Malekula Island, Hew Hebrides
Wood, straw, compost, paint, tusks, glass
26" high. 65.103

41 HNIAL HEAD FROM HOUSE

Big Nambas tribe, Noro village
Northwest Malekula Island, New Hebrides
Fernwood, 41" high. 60.107

42 SPEAR SHAFT WITH JUGATED HEADS

Big Nambas tribe
Northwest Malekula Island, New Hebrides
Wood, reed, 19t" high. 56.69

43 DISH
Espiritu Santo Island, New Hebrides
Wood, 30!" long. 68.49
44 GRADE SOCIETY fiGURE
Banks Islands, New Hebrides
Fernwood, sd" high. 59.285

45 GRADE SOCIETY FIGURE

Banks Islands, New Hebrides
Fernwood, 104" high. 56.393

New Calcdollia

46 DOOR JAMB
Northern New Caledonia
Wood, paint, 76" high. 66.42

47 DOOR JAMB
Northern New Caledonia
Wood, paint, 7Sl" high. 66.43

48 FINIAL FIGURE OF HOUSE

Canala area, New Caledonia
Wood, paint, 721" high. 56.302

New Britai11

49 HEADDRESS
Chacchat-Baining tribe
Gazelle Peninsula, New Britain
Bamboo, barkcloth, paint, Is' high. 66.45

50 HEADDRESS
Sulka tribe, New Britain
Wood, bamboo, fiber, paint, I 10" high. 65.6

51 HEAD
New Britain
Stone, 9" high. 65.125
Gift of Dr. Marion A. Radcliffe-Taylor
52 MASK
Gunantuna tribe
Gazelle Peninsula, New Britain
Wood, paint, 12-h-" high. 67.130

53 MASK
Baining tribe, New Britain
Skull, clay, paint, hair, 9r high. 60.155

New Ireland

54 SKULL USED IN RAIN-MAKING MAGIC

New Ireland
Skull, lime, shell, burrs, 71" high. 68.45

55 FUNERARY FESTIV AI. CARVING

WITH HUMAN HEAD AND FIGURES
New Ireland
Wood, paint, other materials, 97" high. 55.4

56 FUNERARY FESTIVAL CARVING

WITH BIRD AND SNAKE
New Ireland
Wood, paint, other materials, 34" long.
57.205

57 FUNERARY FESTIVAL CARVING

WITH DOUBLE HUMAN FIGURE
New Ireland
Wood, paint, other materials, 42Al/ high.
57-90

58 FUNERARY FESTIVAL CARVING

WITH HUMAN FIGURE AND FISH
New Ireland
Wood, paint, other materials, Ioo!'' high.
56.296

53 54
59 FUNERARY FESTIVAL CARVING
WITH BIRDS' AND PIGS' HEADS
New Ireland
Wood, paint, 84~-" long. s8.23 I

60 FUNERARY FESTIVAL CAR V IN G

WITH HUMAN i'IGURES
New Ireland
Wood, paint, other materials, 109" long.
66.44

61 MASK
Duke of York Islands, New Ireland
Wood, paint, fiber, 26" high. 67.62
 SoloiiiOil lsla11ds 63 MASK
Nissan Island, Solomon Islands
Barkcloth, paint, wood, bamboo
62 HELMET MASK
34i" high. 67.107
Bougainville Island, Solomon Islands
Barkcloth, paint, wood, bamboo
64 FUNERARY ORNAMENT
29l" high. 67.108
Solomon Islands
Tridacna shell, 6~" wide. 56.82

65 FUNERARY ORNAMENT
Vella Lavella Island, Solomon Islands
Tridacna shell, 71" wide. 56.90

66 FUNERARY ORNAMENT
55 Choiscul, Solomon Islands
Tridacna shell, 9-r' wide. 6o.roo
59
67 PECTORAL
Santa Cruz Island, Solomon Islands
Tridacna shell, turtle shell, cord
7ii' wide. 58.338

68 PECTORAL
Solomon Islands
Tridacna shell, 21" high. 61.50

69 CEREMONIAL SHIELD
Solomon Islands
Basketry, clay, shell inlay, 33!" high. 59.111

70 CANOE PROW FIGURE

New Georgia, Solomon Islands
Wood, shell inlay, 9i" high. 56.86

71 PADDLE
Buka, Solomon Islands
Wood, paint, 67" long. 66.20

Admiralty Islands

72 PECTORAL
Admiralty Islands
Turtle shell, tridacna shell, 3!" wide. 60.49
Gift of Mr. and Mrs.JohnJ. Klcjman

73 WAR CHARM
Matankor tribe, Pak Island
Admiralty Islands
Wood, feathers, beads, cloth, paint
I6f" high. 62.71

74 BOWL
· Matankor tribe, Admiralty Islands
Wood, 51" wide. 56.321

64
61. 62 1
67
72
69
I
 minor shifts of population with accompanying broken or
New Guinea
renewed contacts. Although the historical picture is still
Through the center of New Guinea, an island of over vague, waiting upon further archeological work, attempts
300,000 square miles, runs a mountain range, falling have been made to trace elements• in New Guinea art to
sharply, north and south, to flat scrub and grassland areas. sources in the early cultures of Indonesia. It can be said, at
The New Guineans, numbering fewer than J,ooo,ooo, speak least, that both stone-carving and rock-painting traditions
over 700 languages. The people of the highland areas-at of considerable antiquity existed in the central mountains.
least a third of the population-have little visual art beyond A number of major style areas have now been established,
fantastic and elaborate personal decoration. The people of and substyles among them arc being increasingly recognized.
the coasts, part of the lowlands, and some of the river areas, Among the most important is that of the Asmat tribe,
have created sculptures and paintings with almost bewilder- along and inland from a sector of the southwest coast. The
ing energy and invention. As elsewhere in Oceania, the lofty poles (bisj), mounted vertically or diagonally at
indigenous cultures have changed profoundly as the result funerary ceremonies, and depicting ancestors killed in head-
of contacts with Western civilization. The process has not hunting raids, are spectacular; hardly less impressive are
been uniform. In some cases traditional ways have continued their immense 'soul ships' -canoes with ancestral figures.
till quite recently, so that the arts, long extinct in some The Asmat carved no masks; their masks, instead, were
areas, arc only now disappearing in others. extraordinary creations of netted string.
Social organization took many forms here, from tiny Along the north coast and the western end of the island,
bands of seminomads in mountain areas to the more com- with its offshore archipelagoes, arc a number of small style
mon patterns of life in villages, most of which had far areas. Here arc found the openwork canoe prows of
fewer than a thousand inhabitants. The most densely Geelvink Bay,lcast like other New Guinea styles and most
peopled areas were in the mountains, where the main food associable with the styles of Indonesia. Eastward, at Lake
supplies came from the cultivation of sweet potatoes and Scntani, are large-scale carvings: great posts and decorative
yams and the raising of pigs. The people of the lowlands figures from chiefs' houses. The area around the Sepik
tended to cluster along the rivers, with their supplies of River is the most prolific of all New Guinea. Along the
f1sh, and close to swamps, thick with the sago palm, which courses of the river and its tributaries, and along a stretch of
yields a coarse flour. Everywhere the tribes engaged in the coast as well, there are many styles, ranging from ab-
intermittent warfare, mainly over land rights, but also straction to a high degree of naturalism. Among the best-
because raiding and headhunting were, in many areas, known objects arc the long-nosed masks of the latmul tribe
important aspects of religious life. These activities were the of the middle Sepik, the 'hook' figures and colossal croco-
principal stimuli for painting, carving, and the arts of music dile carvings of the Karawari River, the pottery heads of
and dance. Masks and figures were the most spectacular the Washkuk, and the ancestral figures of the Abelam.
cult objects, though the most sacred were often the musical Further east, Astrolabe Bay, with its ancestral figures,
instruments-particularly flutes-the sounds of which were and the Huon Gulf, with its bowls and head rests, form
held to be the voices of ancestors or earth and water spirits. two distinct areas. The Massim area, at the eastern tip of
The ceremonial houses, cult centers that also functioned as New Guinea, is remarkable for the elegance of its small
clubhouses for the men, were often huge structures with objects, such as spatulas, often produced as trade items.
lavish ornamentation (especially in the Sepik district) in- An area almost as important as the Sepik district was the
cluding carved posts and finials, and ceilings and gables Gulf of Papua, on the south coast, with its multitude of
sheathed in bark paintings. sacred boards carved in relief and its wealth of bark-cloth
The great diversity of New Guinea art styles is one result masks. From the islands of the Torres Strait, between New
of a complex history of major immigration and constant Guinea and Australia, come unique masks in turtle shell.
 0

()

.
Uehn

SEPIK AREA, NEW GUINEA

 Coastal Areas

75 LIME SPATULA FOR

YAM HARVEST CEREMONY
Tagula Island, Massim area
Turtle shell, I I t" high. 57.87

76 CANOE PROW SPLASIIBOARD

Bwebwaija village, Normanby Island
Massim area
Collected by Geza R6heim about 1928
Wood, paint, 1 rl" high. 61.114
Gift ofDr. and Mrs. Warner Muensterberger

77 CANOE PROW ORNAMENT

Murua Island, Massim area
Wood, paint, r8f' high. 66.26

78 CANOE PROW ORNAMENT

Suau Island, Massim area
Wood, paint, 42!" high. 56.84

79 BOWl.
~amiIsland, Huon Gulf
Wood, lime, r8t" long. 67.2

80 HEADREST
Tami Island, Huon Gulf
Wood, lime, 4~" high. 59.92

81 MAI.E FIGURE
Bogadjim tribe, Astrolabe Bay
Wood, 37t" high. 56.92

77
8I
79
82 MASK
Astrolabe Bay
Wood, I8i'' high. s8.s3

83 DOUBLE fiGURE FROM HOUSE POST

Lake Sentani
Wood, 271" high. 56.244

84 MOTHER AND CHILD

Kabitcrau village, Lake Scntani
Wood, 36!" high. 56.225

85 CANOE PROW DECORATION

Sarmi area
Wood, paint, uf" high. 67.40

86 CANOE PROW DECORATION

Numfoor tribe, Geelvinck Bay
Wood, paint, feathers, 41!'' long. 67.43
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. William J.
Strawbridge, Jr.

87 CANOE PROW DECORATION

Numfoor tribe, Geelvinck Bay
Wood, paint, 37~" high. 63.90

82
85
!52
 Asmat: The Michael C. Rockefeller
Collection

88 CANOE PROW
Asmat tribe, Erma village, Pomatsj River
Carved by Chiskok
Wood, traces of paint, 53" long. MR 418

89 CANOE PROW
Asmat tribe, Komor village, Undir River
Carved by Amo
Wood, traces of paint, 86" long. MR 210

90 PADDLE
Asmat tribe, Komor village, Undir River
Carved by Vaman
Wood, 161·!" long. MR 306

91 PADDLE
Asmat tribe, Ewer village, Pek River
Wood, 160" long. MR 180

92 PADDLE
Asmat tribe, Sjuru village, Asewetsj River
Carved by Chief Warsekomen
Wood, 156!" long. MR 174

93 PADDLE
Asmat tribe, Biwar village
Betsj River estuary
Carved by Ambek
Wood, 129" long. MR 73A

94 PADDLE
Asmat tribe, Biwar village
Betsj River estuary
Carved by Ambek
Wood, 131" long. MR 73B

88 I 90, 91, 93
89
95 SPEAR
Asmat tribe, probably Jufri village
Undir River
Wood, 103" long. UN 22

96 SPEAR
Asmat tribe, Ewer village, Pek River
Wood, cassowary-claw nail, 109;}" long
MR 184-1/2

97 SPEAR
Asmat tribe, Per village, on coast between
Asewetsj and Siretsj rivers
Carved by Aurotus
Wood, cassowary-claw nail, 101" long
MR 121

98 SPEAR
Asmat tribe, Amanamkai village, As River
Carved by Jendu
Wood, cassowary-claw nail, 108" long
MR 151

99 SPEAR
Asmat tribe, Amanamkai village, As River
Wood, cassowary-claw nail, 109}" long
MR 147

100 SPEAR
Asmat tribe, Amanamkai village, As River
Wood, cassowary-claw nail, ro6r' long
MR 145

IOI CARVED LOG FOR CEREMONIAL

FOOD CONTAINER
Asmat tribe, Biwar village, Sor River
Wood, paint, fiber, seeds, 87l" long
MR 158

95. 96, 97. 98 99

102
ro6, 107, 108
103
I02 CARVED LOG FOR CEREMONIAL I05 ANCESTOR POLE
FOOD CONTAINER Asmat tribe, Omadesep village
Asmat tribe, Biwar village, Sor River Faretsj River
Wood, paint, fiber, seeds, 86!'' long Carved by Ajowmien
MR I57 Wood, paint, fiber, I9' I" high. MR 54

IOJ CARVED LOG FOR CEREMONIAL I06 ANCESTOR POLE

FOOD CONTAINER Asmat tribe, Omadesep village
Asmat tribe, Betjew village Faretsj River
Upper Utumbuwe River tributary Carved by Jewer
Carved by Chief Epue Wood, paint, fiber, I7' 3" high. MR 51
Wood, paint, fiber, 94!" long. MR I67

I04 CARVED LOG FOR CEREMONIAL I 07 A N C EST 0 R P 0 L E

FOOD CONTAINER Asmat tribe, Omadesep village
Asmat tribe, Betjew village Faretsj River
Upper Utumbuwe River tributary Carved by Ten~pos
Carved by Chief Cheritepitsj Wood, paint, fiber, 17' II" high. MR 53
Wood, paint, fiber, 94" long. MR 168
I08 ANCESTOR POLE
Asmat tribe, Omadesep village
Faretsj River
Carved by Fanipdas
Wood, paint, fiber, I7' 9!" high. MR 52

III, II2 114

123 125
109 ANCESTOR POLE
Asmat tribe, probably Per village
on coast between Asewetsj and Siretsj rivers
1
Wood, paint, 19 high. UN 5

110 ANCESTOR POLE

Asmat tribe, Otsjanep village, Ewta River
Carved by Chief Bifarq
1
Wood, paint, fiber, 14 3" high. Otsjancp 2

III ANCESTOR POLE

Asmat tribe, Otsjanep village, Ewta River
Carved by Jiem
Wood, paint, fiber, I I 5!" high. Otsjanep 3
I

I I2 ANCESTOR POLE
Asmat tribe, Otsjanep village, Ewta River
Carved by Jiem
Wood, paint, fiber, I 5 6" high. Otsjanep 4
I

I I3 ANCESTOR POLE IN FORM OF

CROCODILE
Asmat tribe, Casuarincn Coast
Wood, paint, I I I!" long. P 280

I I4 ANCESTOR POLE IN FORM Of

CROCODILE
Asmat tribe, Casuarinen Coast
Wood, paint, I2I" long. P 405

115 ANCESTOR POLE IN FORM Of

CROCODILE
Asmat tribe, Casuarinen Coast
Wood, paint, 8o" long. P 404

116 MASK
Asmat tribe, Pupis village
Upper Pomatsj River tributary
Rattan, sennit, other materials, 76" high
MR 338A

127, 128 132

I I7 MASK I I9 MASK
Asmat tribe, Pupis village Asmat tribe, Pupis village
Upper Pomatsj River tributary Upper Pomatsj River tributary
Rattan, sennit, other materials, 75" high Rattan, sennit, other materials, 83" high
MR 338B MR 338D

I I8 MASK 120 MASK

Asmat tribe, Pupis village Asmat tribe, Pupis village(?)
Upper Pomatsj River tributary Upper Pomatsj River tributary
Rattan, sennit, other materials, 78" high Rattan, sennit, other materials, 72" high
MR 338C p 365
121 MASK
Asmat tribe, Pupis village(?)
Upper Pomatsj River tributary
Rattan, sennit, other materials, 8o" high
p 376

122 MASK
Asmat tribe, Pupis village(?)
Upper Pomatsj River tributary
Rattan, sennit, other materials, 8o" high
p 377

123 MASK
Asmat tribe, Pupis village(?)
Upper Pomatsj River tributary
Rattan, sennit, other materials, 8o" high
p 375

124 MASK
Asmat tribe, Momogo village(?)
Upper Pomatsj River
Wood, rattan, other materials, 65" high
p 356

125 MASK
Asmat tribe, Biwar village, Sor River
Made by Jakapit, repainted by Minan
Rattan, sennit, other materials, 67'' high
MR 155

126 MASK
Asmat tribe, Biwar village, Sor River
Made by Aihaur, repainted by Minan
Wood, rattan, 65!" high. MR 156

127 MASK
Asmat tribe, Ambisu village, Ajip River
Rattan, other materials, 73" high. MR 154

133, 135, 136, 137 138

128 MASK 130 SHIELD

Asmat tribe, Sjuru village, Asewetsj River Asmat tribe, Erma village, Pomatsj River
Rattan, other materials, 72" high. MR I I 5 Carved by Pirokus
Wood, paint, 68" high. MR 4 I I
129 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Sauwa village, Pomatsj River I3I SHIELD

Wood, paint, 70" high. MR 345 Asmat tribe, probably Pupis village
Upper Pomatsj River tributary
Wood, paint, 70!'' high. UN I 8
139. 140, 141, 142 143
132 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Wejo village
Upper Pomatsj River tributary
Carved by Jor
Wood, paint, 74!" high. MR 334

133 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Agani village
Upper Pomatsj River
Carved by Pose
Wood, paint, 58!" high. MR 406

134 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, probably Agani village
Upper Pomatsj River
Wood, paint, 73!" high. P 42

135 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Monu village
Upper Undir River
Wood, paint, 61!" high. MR 279

136 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Monu village
Upper Undir River
Carved by Sok
Wood, paint, 61" high. MR 274

137 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Monu village
Upper Undir River
Carved by Aman
Wood, paint, 711'' high. MR 282

138 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Tjemor village
Upper Undir River
Carved by Mbifan
Wood, paint, 59!" high. MR 236

145. 146 1 149

\
139 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Betjew village
Upper Utumbuwe River tributary
Wood, paint, 66" high. MR I 70

140 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Betjew village
Upper Utumbuwe River tributary
Wood, paint, 54" high. MR 172

141 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, probably Betjew village
Upper Utumbuwe River tributary
Wood, paint, 68" high. MR IOI

142 SHIELD
Asmat tribe, Per village, on coast between
Ascwetsj and Siretsj rivers
Wood, paint, 67'' high. MR 126

I43 FIGURE
Asmat tribe, Otsjancp village, Ewta River
Wood, paint, fiber, bamboo, 76r' high
p 401

Sepik District

144 MASK
Anggoram tribe, lower Sepik River
Wood, paint, other materials, 18f' high
56.65

145 ANCESTRAL FIGURF.

Anggoram tribe, Singrin village
Lower Scpik River
Wood, 71" high. 58.330

I50, I5I, 154 I 153

I46 ANCESTRAL FIGURE
Anggoram tribe, Singrin village
Lower Sepik River
Collected before I 9 I o
Wood, 77!" high. 59.I2

I47 MALE FIGURE

Anggoram tribe, Moim village
Lower Sepik River
Carved before I9I4
Wood, paint, 68" high. 64.77

I48 SHIELD
Anggoram tribe, Kanduanum village
Lower Sepik River
Wood, paint, raffia, 65~" high. 56.269

I49 MASK
Anggoram tribe, Kanduanum village
Lower Sepik River
11
Wood, shell, other materials, I9l high
61.268

ISO FIGURE
Anggoram tribe, lower Sepik River
Wood, paint, JO!" high. s8.79

151 MASK
Kambot tribe, Keram River area
Wood, shell, other materials, I It" high
57.296

I 52 PAINTING
Kambot tribe, Keram River area
Sago spathe, bamboo, paint, 63!" high
56.264
153 fiGURE FROM CEREMONIAL
HOUSE POST
Kambot tribe, Keram River area
Wood, paint, fiber, 96" high. 63.26

154 ORNAMENT
Biwat tribe, Yuat River
Wood, paint, other materials, 15~" high
57.6

155 MASK
Biwat tribe, Yuat River
Wood, paint, other materials, 121" high
61.281

156 FIGURE FOR SACRED FLUTE

Biwat tribe, Yuat River
Wood, paint, 1 8i" high. 68.62

157 ANCESTRAL FIGURE

Western Sawos tribe
Middle Sepik River area
Wood, paint, fiber, 72" high. 59.202

158 CEREMONIAL BOARD

Western Sawos tribe
Middle Sepik River area
Wood, 74!" high. 56.320

159 FLUTE ORNAMF.NT

Eastern Sawos tribe, K woiwut village
Middle Sepik River area
Wood, shell, other materials, 62!" high
61.266

160
166, 170
161
160 DEBATING STOOL
Western Iatmul tribe
Middle Sepik River
Wood, shell, paint, 31" high. 63.52

161 SKULL
Iatmul tribe, middle Sepik River
Skull, paint, other materials, 9i" high. 62.41
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. John J. Klcjman

162 DANCE OBJECT

Western latmul tribe
Yentshamanggua village
Middle Sepik River
Wood, paint, other materials, 69" long. 65.8

163 SHIELD
Western Iatmul tribe
Middle Scpik River
Wood, paint, 54" high. 56.322

164 MASK
Western Iatmul tribe
Middle Sepik River
Wood, paint, shell, reed, 28!'' high. 57.253
165 MASK 167 PAIR OF SUT-GONGS
Eastern Iatmul tribe Eastern Iatmul tribe, Kamindimbit village
Middle Sepik River Middle Sepik River
Wood, shell, other materials, 23-k" high Wood, I53! and I3I" long. 68.54-.55
65.44
I68 PAIR 01' PERCUSSION PLANKS
I 66 SUSPENSION II 0 0 K Eastern Iatmul tribe, Kamindimbit village
Iatmul tribe, Eibom village Middle Sepik River
Middle Sepik River Wood, 94 and 88!" long. 68.56-.57
Collected I934-1935 by La Korrigane
expedition
Wood, 40k" high. 61.278

169 SUSPENSION HOOK

Central Iatmul tribe, Kangganamun village
Middle Sepik River
Wood, 25~" high. 68.46

170 DANCE CO STU ME REPRESENTING

FEMALE ANCESTOR
Iatmul tribe, middle Sepik River
Wood, rattan, other materials, 58" high
67.70

I71 LIME CONTAINER

Eastern Iatmul tribe
Middle Sepik River
172, 173 I74 Wood, paint, reed, 22!" high. 57·5
172 RITUAL OBJECT
Eastern Iatmul tribe
Middle Sepik River
Wood, paint, r6!" high. 60.55

173 CEREMONIAL Ff:NCE ELEMENT

Eastern Iatmul tribe, Kararau village
Middle Sepik River
Wood, paint, shell, 6o!" high. 56.410

174 CANOE PROW

Iatmul tribe, middle Sepik River
Wood, 7It" long. 55.1

175 MASK
Bahinemo tribe, Hunstein Mountains
Wood, paint, 33!" high. 65.34

176 I'IGURE
Inyai village, upper Karawari River
Wood, paint, 46r' high. 67.45

177 HG URE
Inyai village, upper Karawari River
Wood, paint, 43" high. 67.46

178 HMALE FIGURE

Inyai village, upper Karawari River
Wood, 66r' high. 65.40

176, 177 1 178

179 I'IG URE
Karawari River
Wood, 86" high. 65.37

180 MALE fiGURE

Karawari River
Wood, paint traces, 18!'' high. 65.79

181 SLIT-GONG LUG

Karawari River
Wood, 351" long. 59.201

182 CROCODILE
Ambanoli village, Karawari River
Wood, paint, 25' long. 65.16

180, 181
179
182
183 MASK
Blackwater River
Cane, clay, feathers, 22!" high. 63.8

184 FIGURE
Yaungget tribe, Mburr village
Wood, paint, 54" high. 65.30

185 HEAD
Kwoma tribe, Tongwindjamb village
Ambunti Range
Clay, paint, 15!" high. 65.43

Iil6 VESSEL WITH FACES

K woma tribe, Honggwam:t village
Ainbunti Range
Clay, paint, 16" high. 66.4X

187 CEREMONIAL HOUSE I'ACADE

DECORATION, HORN Bll . I.
Northern Abelam tribe
Prince Alexander Mountains
Wood, paint, 44t" high. 63.7

188 ANCESTRAL I'IGURE

Eastern Abclam tribe, probably
Wingei village
Prince Alexander Mountains
Wood, paint, 122" high. 65 .65

188
186
189 FEMALE FIGURE
Southern Abelam tribe
Prince Alexander Mountains
Wood, paint, 42!" high. 62.158

I90 ANCESTRAL FIGURE

Southern Abelam tribe
Prince Alexander Mountains
Wood, paint, 71!" high. 62.81

The Highlands

191 BOARD
Siane tribe, Highlands
Wood, paint, feathers, 551" high. 6o.88

I92 BIRD HEAD

Highlands
Stone, paint traces, 4!" high. 66.75

Gulf of Papua Area

I93 HELMET MASK

Elema tribe
Collected by F. E. Williams before 1940
Barkcloth, paint, raffia, 37!" high. 58.309
189 1 193, 194
194 SHIELD
Elema tribe
Wood, paint, 32" high. 66.19

195 ANCESTRAL BOARD

Gope tribe, Wapo Creek
Wood, paint, sol" high. 62.82

196 FIGURE
Gope tribe, Wapo Creek
Wood, paint, 22i" high. 62.86

197 ANCESTRAL BOARD

Kerewa tribe, Goaribari Island
Collected by Bradley Patten, 1912
Wood, paint, 66f' high. 56.266

198 ANCESTRAL BOARD

Kerewa tribe, Goaribari Island
Collected by Bradley Patten, 1912
Wood, paint, 641" high. 64.16

I 99 S K U L L RACK
Kerewa tribe, Paia'a village, Omati River
Wood, rattan, paint, 55!" high. 62.88

200 ANCESTRAl. BOARD

Gibu village, Turama River
Wood, paint, 65!" high. 61.113

201 ANCESTOR FIGURE

Gibu village, Turama River
Wood, paint, shell, 52" high. 61.1 II

202 MODEL OF CEREMONIAL CANOE PROW

Gogodara tribe, Aketa village, Aramia River
Collected by Paul Wirz about 1933
Wood, paint, 45!" long. 60.92

195 197, 200, 201

203 DUGONG-HUNTING CHARM 205 MASK
Kiwai tribe, Fly River Saibai Island, Torres Strait
Wood, 24i" long. 61.95 Wood, paint, string, I9t" high. 56.67

204 CANOE SPLASHBOARD 206 MASK

Kiwai tribe, Fly River Mabuiag Island, Torres Strait
Wood, paint, 32!"-high. 61.64 Turtle shell, other materials, 25" wide. 67.48
Gift of Allan Frumkin
 207 MASK
Erub Island, Torres Strait
Turtle shell, hair, 16i'' high. 59.106

208 RAIN CHARM

Mabuiag Island, Torres Strait
205, 207 206 Stone, 5!" high. 59.211
Australia
Living in a country which is often arid, and a third of which
is actual desert, the Australian aborigines remained through-
out their history nomadic hunters and food-gatherers. As
such, their equipment had to be of the simplest. Clothing
of any kind existed only on the south coast, where people
used skin cloaks. Shelter, at its most elaborate, consisted of
bark lcan-tos and windbreaks. The principal materials avail-
able were wood and stone; everything made of them had to
be easily portable and, if possible, multipurpose. Men had
spears, spear-throwers, clubs, boomerangs, and shields;
women had wood and bark bowls, baskets, digging sticks,
and grinding stones. This list gives no clue to the riclmess
of aboriginal religious and social life. The latter, based
on intricate kinship systems and marriage regulations, pro-
vided the framework for the operation of the former.
Religion, largely concerned with creation and increase,
was expressed through a vast body of myth, song, and
ritual.
The visual arts, though simple, arc of considerable range
and often of great sensitivity. Possibly the oldest remaining
works-though so far they cannot be dated-are rock
engravings, outlined or pecked, usually representing animal
and human forms, often in enormous scale. Paintings on
the. walls and ceilings of rock shelters exist throughout
Australia, an ancient art tradition that lasted until recent
times. Those of western Arnhcm Land, like the paintings
made on bark sheets, often usc the 'X-ray' style, in which
the internal organs of human beings and animals arc shown.
Large sculpture appears only in geometric designs en-
graved on tree trunks in New South Wales, and in huge
grave posts and log coffins from Bathhurst and the Melville
Islands. Most of the small portable equipment is painted and
engraved. There are not only a number of different forms
of some of the objects, shields and spear-throwers, for in-

209 1 213
stance, but of style areas. Amhem Land also produces small
wooden figures of human beings and animals covered with
the fme crosshatch painting typical of the area. Painted
shields with abstract designs come from Queensland, and
shields painted with snakes or fish from Central Australia.
In New South Wales abstract designs, often very delicate,
are incised on weapons. Western Australian designs tend to
be geometric engravings, covering with subtle textures the
surfaces of flat objects such as spear-throwers, shields, and
sacred boards.

216

I 217, 2I8
215
209 PAINTING, TWO KANGAROOS
Oenpelli, Northern Territory
Bark, paint, 40fX 25"· 58-3II

2IO PUBIC ORNAMENT

Western Australia
Shell, paint, 6!" high. 60.99

2II PUBIC ORNAMENT

Roebourne, Kimberly area
Western Australia
Shell, hair, paint, 7l" high. 59.134

2I2 BASKET
Queensland
Cane, paint, 21i" high. 61.102

213 SHIELD
Western Australia
Wood, paint, 25" long. 59.126

2I4 SHIELD
New South Wales
Wood, paint, 29" high. 61.120

2I5 BOOMERANG
Kimberly area, Western Australia
Wood, paint, 21" long. 6r.u8

216 SACRED Pl-AQUE

Pidgentara tribe, Central Australia
Stone, 12" long. 56.73

217 SACRED BOARD

Central Australia
Wood, paint, 26k" long. 59. I 28

2I8 SACRED BOARD

Central Australia
Wood, paint, 29i" long. 59.127

219 SACRED BOARD

Mulga Downs, Western Australia
Wood, 46~" long. 59. 1 29
Africa signature was his skill and style alone, given expression
within the strict limits of the tribal style. His work would
gradually be replaced by other variations, when it was not
destroyed by the ravages of a climate unsuited to the sur-
Various mottoes about Africa that early explorers felt com- vival of wood. These same factors account for the difficulty
pelled to pronounce still have validity; Herodotus' 'Always in determining the absolute age of a wood object; by its
something new out of Africa' continues to be applicable to inflection of the traditional artistic norms it can be assigned
political and social movements on the African continent as a relative age within the slowly evolving tribal style.
it is to its art forms, old and contemporary. The diversity African art is primarily religious. As objects of ritual and
of the continent's morphological-geographical features (it cult, sculpture contributed in a direct manner to the fulfill-
contains some of the world's largest deserts, greatest rivers, ment of man's earthly needs. Masks and figures were the
and highest mountains) is matched by the many different embodiment of spirits that could placate natural forces,
tribal cultures of agriculturalists, pastoralists, and hunters, channel or avoid ill fortune, establish a link with genera-
who inhabit the continent south of the Sahara and consti- tions before and after, and uphold and reinforce social
tute what has come to be known as Black Africa. obligations and values. Their importance thus lay in their
It is among the farming communities of the rain forest function rather than their form.
and adjacent savanna country (such as that along the Guinea Incidentally, we must remember that a mask was only
Coast and in the Congo Basin) that sculpture-both masks one part of a total costume, and that as the dancer bowed
and figures-is made as an important element in the tribal and turned (often in the near dark) new and striking aspects
African's daily life and life cycle. Most masks and figures of its formal structure were expressively displayed. Music
arc carved of wood, the artist making usc of simple but and movement, the missing components when one views
effective tools. Contrary to the case in other preliterate a mask today, should be kept in mind.
cultures, iron has been part of the African cultural complex During the past twenty years our knowledge of African
for some two thousand years. The iron-bladed adz roughly art has increased to the point where works that once had
fashions the object from the fresh soft wood of a young to be described simply as 'West African' or 'Sudanese' can
tree, the knife cuts the finishing touches, and abrasive now be assigned to a specific people, and collectors specialize
natural substances·, such as leaves and sand, smooth the sur- in the variations of a given tribal style or theme. A start has
face. Figural sculpture is generally monochrome, with a thus been made in establishing a true history of this tradi-
fmc dark patina obtained by oils, smoke, and frequent tional art, an art which, except in a few areas, is very largely
handling. Masks arc often polychrome. Before they arc of the past. T. N.

used in a ritual they receive a 'redressing'; a fresh applica-

tion of their colors.
The artists who created these works have remained
unknown to us. With a few exceptions it is possible only
to establish broad stylistic differentiations within any one
tribal area. African sculptors were for the most part also
farmers, except in those cultures where the artists working
in wood, metal, and leather were organized in guilds under
royal patronage. This did not make them anonymous in
their own day; a sculptor's fame might be great, and people
within a wide radius would commission him to carve a
mask or figure. But unlike the artist of a literate society, his
AFRICA

~ The Westetn Sudan

~ The Westcm Gu.nea Coas.t

• Ntgena. Cameroon

~ TheConJO
 ture is somewhat less compact and -rigid. These sometimes
The Western Sudan
hermaphroditic figures contain the kind of multiple
The region of the western Sudan extends from the bend of reference often found in African art. They are at once
the Niger River in the north to the rain forest belt along mythical heroes of creation, ancestors, and the living sym-
the Guinea Coast in the south. This savanna area was once bols of the constructive order of the universe. Kept on
the home of the old Ghana empire and the Gao and Mossi family altars, they were rarely seen by outsiders.
kingdoms. Today its relatively poor land is cultivated by Unlike most Sudanese art, Dogon masks were made by
agricultural peoples who live in small village groupings. the young men who wore them, future initiates into their
The Dogon and the Bambara of Mali and the Senufo of the secret society. Some are human, most are zoomorphic,
northern Ivory Coast, each totaling some one million souls, commemorating the mythic alliance of man with animals,
are the most numerous. Masks and figure sculpture play an birds, and reptiles. They were used in quantity in the dances
important role in the initiation rites of the men's secret that marked the end of the mourning period, when the
societies, sowing and harvest festivals, and funeral cere- souls of the deceased were 'encouraged' to leave the world
monies. The free-standing sculpture, with few exceptions, of the living. The Dogon also carve impressive ritual stools
represents the human figure. A great many of the masks and containers, and granary and house doors, all incorpora-
combine animal and human features. Common to the area ting the human figure with raised arms, said to be praying
is the caste of blacksmiths, who occupy a special place as for rain.
makers of tools and weapons, and masters of the arts of fire, The stylized antelopes of the Bambara are among the
and who also carve the wooden masks and figures. best known of all African sculptures. These openwork ·
Although the various styles of the region (which some- representations, vertical or horizontal according to the sub-
times influence each other) arc clearly recognizable, they style of a given area, were worn as headdresses. Related to
share some distinctive characteristics. As a group, these set the success of the crops, and so to fertility and the water
them off from the styles of the adjacent culture areas. They spirit, they danced in pairs at the rites of sowing and the
include a starkness and tautness in the handling of shapes, harvest. The Bambara also made a great variety of masks.
an accentuation of the vertical in the figures, and a geome- They functioned in the ceremonies of the six initiation
tric, straight-line treatment of detail. It is also typical that (grade) societies that every Bambara man successively
most of these works as we know them have a clean, entered as he grew older and learned more of the spiritual
weathered, light surface (which was in many cases once and practical knowledge of his people. Only one mask is
painted in bright colors), different from the dark, oiled human, the others again combine animal and human ele-
woods of the more southerly regions. The magical human ments, each having a moral significance.
figures of the Senufo and the animal figures and masks of Little is known of the meaning of the many Bambara
the Bambara, which are covered with the accumulated in- female figures, although again they are symbolically related
crustation of many sacrifices, are an exceptional contrast. to the fertility of nature and the continuity of the people.
Throughout the area there is also iron sculpture of various Angular in style and with considerable variation, they are
types. fuller and more modeled than their Dogon counterparts.
Dogon sculpture has only really been known in the last The smaller seated or standing figures have long been
decade. Its most mysterious facet is the figures-tightly known, the larger ones, including the impressive maternity
vertical, often with upraised arms, and heavily encrusted- groups, -only more recently.
found in shelters in the Bandiagara cliffs. These works are Sculpture of many kinds has great importance for
attributed by the Dogon to an earlier people, the Tcllem. Senufo religious ritual and magic. As a result, the black-
Tellem sculpture has been considered simply an early phase smith caste (in which the carver must submit to a special
of Dogon art, but there are indications that it is indeed a initiation to become more than an artisan) creates an abun-
separate style. Predominantly vertical, Dogon figure sculp- dance of masks and figures. They are kept in the sacred
 220 MASK
Dagon tribe, Mali
Wood, coloring, 6of' high. 60.20

221 MASK
Dagon tribe, Mali
Wood, coloring, 43§" high. 61.5

222 MASK
Dagon tribe, Mali
Wood, coloring, J2t" high. 59.288

223 MASK
Dagon tribe, Mali
Wood, coloring, 28!" high. 55.8
Gift of Rene d'Harnoncourt

224 MASK
Dagon tribe, Mali
Wood, coloring, 14~" high. 58.339

225 MASK
Dagon tribe, Mali
THE WESTERN SUDAN Wood, coloring, other materials, 20~" high
• Locales
56.374

grove of the secret society and arc essential to initiation and 226 MASK
funeral ceremonies and to the agricultural festivals. Senufo Dagon tribe, Mali
masks are composite in character, the animal masks, usually Wood, coloring, 35" high. 56.363
of helmet form, bringing together features drawn from
various creatures to produce a symbolically powerful 227 EQUESTRIAN FIGURE
whole, matched by a forceful, blocked-out style. Even the Dagon tribe, Mali
one face mask they carve, small and gracefully carved, is Wood, 27!" high. s8.I76
surrounded with imaginative clements.
228 STANDING HERMAPHRODITIC FIGURE
The Senufo also carve many seated and standing figures
Dogan tribe, Mali
of varying sizes. Two types arc exceptionally striking:
Wood, 82!'' high. 58.97
those that, armless and with baluster-like bodies, stand
above one type of helmet mask; and the elongated female 229 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE AND CHILD
figures that rise from short legs sunk directly into a heavy Dagon tribe, Mali
round base. The latter invoke the spirits of the earth when Wood, 21 t" high. 57.222
they are pounded in a rhythmic dirge during funeral rites.
Great colored birds of increase with long beaks and swollen 230 SEATED FEMALE FIGURE
bellies, immense openwork headdresses, and relief doors Dagon tribe, Mali
also attest to the abundance of the Scnufo sculptural Wood, 22!" high. 58.67
imagination.
R. G.
2JI STANDING fEMALE fiGURE 242 VESSEL WITH LID SURMOUNTED
Tellem tribe, Mali BY EQUESTRIAN FIGUnE
Wood, 17" high. 6o.I8 Dogon tribe, Mali
Wood, 33.i" high. 60.39
232 STANDING COUPLE
Tellem tribe, Mali 243 STANDING FEMALE fiGURE AND CHILD
Wood, 244" high. 65.I3 Dogon or Lobi tribe, Mali or Upper Volta
Wood, JOf" high. 59.283
233 STANDING fEMALE f'IGURE
Tellem tribe, Mali 244 MASK
Wood, 17~" high. 57.221 Mossi tribe, Upper Volta
Wood, coloring, JOj" high. 58.)22
234 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE
Tellem tribe, Mali
245 MASK
Wood, I I r high. 58.68 Hobo tribe, Upper Volta
Wood, coloring, J61'' high. 511.230
235 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE
SURMOUNTED BY HERMAPHRODITIC 246 MASK
fiGURE Uobo tribe, Upper Volta
Dogon tribe, Mali Wood, 28" high. 61.20
Wood, 29l" high. 56.54
247 MASK
236 HMALE ZOOMORPHIC I'IGURE ON STOOL Bambara tribe, Mali
Dogon tribe, Mali Wood, other materials, 29" high. 59.286
Wood, 20~-" high. 63.32
248 MASK
237 DOG Bambara tribe, Mali
Dogon tribe, Mali Wood, cowrie shells, 23g" high. 59.31 I
Wood, 9!" high. 59.284 Gift of the Carlebach Gallery

238 RITUAL COFFER

249 MASK
Dogan tribe, Mali Uambara tribe, Marka style, Mali
Wood, 93" long. 63.91 Wood, brass, 1 I~" high. 59.I86

239 RITUAL OBJECT

250 MASK
Dagon tribe, Mali Banibara tribe, Mali
Wood, 11" high. 59.I7 Wood, seeds, 22-i" h.igh. 59.309

240 GRANARY DOOR

Dogon tribe, Mali
Wood, 36r' high. 58.65

241 HOUSE POST WITH FEMALE FIGURE

Dogon tribe, Mali
Wood, 74!" high. 58.328
332
1 221
25I HEADPIECE
Bambara tribe, Mali
Cotton cloth, cowrie shells, I I i" high
60.I03

252 MASK
Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 20!" high. 60.5

253 MASK
Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, I7!" high. 60.3

254 MASK
Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, IOk" high. 59.290

255 MASK
Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, other materials, 331" long. 59.30I

256 MASK
Malinke tribe, Mali
Wood, I3!" high. 56.226

257 ANTELOPE HEADPIECE (with basketry cap)

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 22i" high. 59.3I4

258 ANTELOPE HEADPIECE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, I8i'' high. 62.37

259 ANTELOPE HEADPIECE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 27!" high. 59·3 I 5

260 ANTELOPE HEADPIECE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 28" high. 6I .249

222, 227 228

261 SEATED FEMALE FIGURE
Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 40!" high. 58.334

262 SEATED MOTHER AND CHILD FIGURE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 48i" high. 59.1 10

263 SEATED MALE FIGURE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 38!'' high. 59.279

264 SEATED FEMALE FIGURE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 44!" high. 61.66

265 STANDING MALE FIGURE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 43" high. 59.182

266 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 21!'' high. 59.22

267 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 24!" high. 56.223

268 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, r5i" high. 62.50

269 I'ETISII
Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, sacrificial encrustation, 14l" high
6o.56

270 DOUBLE FEMALE FIG UUE, MARIONETTE

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 38~" high. 62.153

232, 2JJ, 234 236

27I FEMALE HEAD, MARIONETTE
Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 8f' high. 59.319

272 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE, DOOR LOCK

Bambara tribe, Mali
Wood, 17f' high. 62.109

273 STAFF WITH FEMALE FIGURE

llambara tribe, Mali
Iron, 25" high. 59.308

274 STANDING MALE fiGURE

RHYTHM POUNDER
Scnufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 42!" high. 58.7

275 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 341" high. 60.171

276 SEATED FEMALE FIGURE

Scnufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 12!" high. 66.29

277 STANDING MALE FIGURE

Senufo tribe'; Ivory Coast
Wood, 23~" high. 60.163

278 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE

Scnufo, Ivory Coast
Wood, 23i" high. 60.164
Partner to 277

279 STANDING l'EMALE FIGURE

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, coloring, 19!" high. 57.234
237
1 238
239
280 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE
Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, IO·i " high. 56.224

281 FIGURE WITH REVOLVING HELMET MASK

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 12g" high. 59.123

282 FIGURE OF MALEVOLENT l'ETISH

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, cloth, other materials, 32!'' high
64·3
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wielgus

283 FIGURE OF MALEVOLENT FETISH

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, cloth, other materials, 37r' high
59.183

284 !' LUTE

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 36" high. 62.129

285 BIRD
Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 47i" high. 6o.6o

286 BfRD
Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, coloring, 59i" high. 60.57

287 LAMP
Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Iron, 47" high. 65.77

288 HELMET MASK

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 411" high. 65.78
289 HELMET MASK ('firespitter')
Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 351" long. 57.248

290 DOUBLE HELMET MASK ('firespitter')

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, coloring, 25~-" long. 57.266

291 MASK
Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, IIt" high. 59.6

292 HELMET MASK

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 27!" high. 56.373

293 HEADDRESS
Scnufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, coloring, 5of' high. 60.17

294 MAsK (in style of' firespitter ')

Senufo tribe, lv~ry Coast
Wood, coloring, 34!" long. 64.13
Gift of Mrs. Gertrud A. Mellon

29 5 FA C E MASK
Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 12}" high. 59.295

296 l:ACE MASK

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 15!" high. 61.183

297 DOUBLE FACE MASK

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 9i" high. 60.2
298 FACE MASK
Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, other materials, 14§" high. 64.10

299 FACE MASK

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 15i" high. 60.169

300 I' A C E MAS K

Senufo tnbc, Ivory Coast

Wood, 16" high. 59.293

301 FACE MASK

Senufo tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 12!-'' higl1. 56.258

302 FIGURE WITH HUNTING EQUIPMENT

Scnufo or neighboring tribe, Ivory Coast
Brass, 4" high. 65.101
297
300
428
The Western Guinea Coast extraordinary degree of craftsmanship and artistry- in their
thin surfaces, ·~nhanced by a smooth, dark, translucent
Several culture areas lie within the rain-forest belt called the patina. The Poro society, which structures the Dan political
Guinea Coast, at about the latitude of the equator. In the and religious life, has been considered almost the proto-
northwest, within the boundaries of present-day Guinea, type for West African secret societies. Membership is
the Baga tribe live close to the sea. Their monumental obligatory; the organization thus reaches into all phases
sculpture, including figures, drums, and ritual impleinents of life. Certain of the Dan masks act as social arbiters by
is best illustrated by their nitnba shoulder masks and sinu- enforcing the tribal values upheld by the Poro.
ously erect polychrome serpents. It centers around the Further east, in the heart of the Ivory Coast, the Baule
Bag a's Simo society, an organization for the cultic pro- tribe offers some of the most delicately executed of African
motion of the ubiquitous African principle of increase- works. Baule masks and figures were among the first to
fertility of man, beast, and soil. attract the attention of French artists during the first two
In the adjacent culture area of Sierra Leone and Liberia decades of this century. Baule figures at their best combine
stone sculpture-rare in Africa-is found. Human figurines a controlled serenity with bold sculptural forms expressed
of steatite (nomoli and pomdo) ·have been tentatively dated in heavy limbs and a sparse, sexless torso. They are com-
to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries on the basis of monly called ancestor figures, but the term is inappropriate
their costume details taken from Portuguese mariners, if it is taken .to mean the portrayal of a specific individual.
explorers, and traders of the time. Large heads and figures An African in a tribal society sees himself as a link in the
of another type have been given an equivalent dating. The chain of generations that lived before him and that will
heads are outstanding among African stone sculpture for follow after, both of which require active consideration
their detailed facial features and hair styles. The Mende during his own lifetime. It is thus only in a general sense
and Kissi tribes in whose fields these objects have been that the Baule figures might be called ancestral.
found claim to have no knowledge of their origin, and The principal people of adjacent Ghana, the former Gold
their own wood sculpture is very different in style and Coast, arc the Ashanti. A military federation in the seven-
concept. teenth century brought great power to the Ashanti,
Liberia offers a variety of styles, notably those of the augmented in the following two centuries through ex-
Dan and Ngere tribes, which inhabit neighboring territories tensive trading in gold and slaves with Europeans. Ashanti
and share the same culture pattern. Both are known for culture centered around gold; it was found in abundance
their wood face masks. The older examples testify to an in the shallow rivers and on the coastal shore, and it gave rise
to a lively and witty miniature art of gold and brass objects.
Small masks, heads, and animals cast in gold by the lost
wax method were emblems used to adorn the king and
court notables. Gold dust was the medium of exchange
among the Ashanti, and their small storage boxes and
measuring weights (known as gold weights) were cast in
brass. These objects depict human, animal, and plant life
in detail as well as a full roster of inanimate objects used in
daily life.
Fairly recent discoveries of terra-cotta funerary sculpture
promise to bring to light a new branch of Ashanti art.
Ashanti wood sculpture is rare and more or less limited to
fertility figures whose main attribute is a large 'moon-
428 1
shaped' head.
T.N.
 THE WESTERN GUINEA COAST

• Locales
Atlantic Ocean

303 SERPENT
llaga tribe, Guinea
Wood, coloring, 68!" high. 58.335

304 SERPENT
Baga tribe, Guinea
Wood, coloring, 54!" high. 58.336

305 SHOULDER MASK

llaga tribe, Guinea
Wood, 46!" high. 56.261

306 SHOULDER MASK

Baga tribe, Guinea
Wood, 30!" high. 62.23

307 ANTHROPOMORPHIC FIGURE

Uaga tribe, Guinea
Wood, 30i'' high. 57.268
308 SEATED FEMALE FIGURE WITH DRUM
Baga tribe, Guinea
Wood, 39!" high. 68.72

309 ZOOMORPHIC HEAD

Baga tribe, Guinea
Wood, 23!" high. 57.78

310 MASK
Baga or Landuma tribe, Guinea
Wood, coloring, 52!" high. 57.181

311 MASK
Landuma tribe, Guinea
Wood, 30f' high. 61.76

312 SEATED FEMALE FIGURE

llijogo tribe, llissagos Islands
Portuguese Guinea
Wood, coloring, 16" high. 66.6o

313 HELMET MASK

Temne tribe, Sierra Leone
Wood, 25" high. 60.129

314 MASK
Toma tribe, Liberia
Wood, 19!" high. 58.51

315 HEAD
Guinea, tentatively dated to
16th or 17th century
Steatite, w!'' high. 60.35

316 SEATED MALE FIGURE

Guinea, tentatively dated to
17th or 18th century
Stone, 19!" high. 64.31

307, 308 305

317 FACE MASK
Dan tribe, Liberia
Wood, 8g'' high. 57.109

318 FACE MASK

Dan tribe, Liberia
Wood, other materials, 8f' high. 59.200

319 FACE MASK WITH HELMET

Dan tribe, Liberia
Wood, 12i'' high. 63.35

320 CEREMONIAl_ SPOON

Dan tribe, Liberia
Wood, 23" high. 03.60

l21 FACE MASK

Ngere tribe, Liberia
Wood, other materials, 15" high. 06.73

322 FACE MASK

Dan or Ngere tribe, Liberia
Wood, sr high. 6!.180

323 MASK
Guro tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, coloring, r8f' high. 58.348

324 STANDING FEMALE Fl G URE

Baule tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 18A'' high. 56.365

325 STANDING MALE l'IGURE

l3aule tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, traces of coloring, 2rr' high. 60.84

326 STANDING FEMALE I'IGURE

Baule tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, traces of coloring, 20~'' high. 0o.Ss
Partner to 325

327 STANDING MALE I'IG URE

13aule tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, r6~" high. 56.385
315 I 318, 319, 32I
316
328 SEATED MALE FIGURE
Baule tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 20" high. 61.36

329 STANDING MONKEY FIGURE

Baule tribe, lv0ry Coast
Wood, other materials, 29!" high. 58.I82
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. John J. Klejman

330 STANDING MONKEY FIGURE

Baule tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, other materials, 32!" high. 58.321

33 I FACE MASK
Baule tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 18!" high. 59.20

332 DOUBLE FACE MASK

Battle tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, coloring, 13!" high. 65.128

333 ELEPHANT MASK

Baule tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, coloring, II!'' high. 56·337

334 FACE MASK

Baule tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, coloring, 22!" high. 62.170
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. John J. Klejman

335 MASKED FIGURE

Baule tribe, Ivory Coast
Brass, 3i" high. 60.132

336 PENDANT IN FORM OF MASK

Baule tribe, Ivory Coast
Gold, 2!" high. 58.314

323, 324. 327 1 329

337 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE
Alangoa tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, coloring, 14i" high. 63.63

338 HANDLE OF FLY WHISK

Agni tribe, Ivory Coast
Wood, 13i" high. 60.158

339 FUNERARY FIGURE

Agni tribe, Krinjabo kingdom, Ivory Coast
Clay, roi" high. 60.106

340 FUNERARY HEAD

Ashanti tribe, Fomena-style region, Ghana
Clay, 8" high. 67.126

341 TWO FUNERARY HEADS

Ashanti tribe, Ghan:t
Clay, 12 and 12i" high. 59.240-.241

342 COVERED VESSEL

Ashanti tribe, Ghana
Brass, wi" high. 60.69

343 COVERED VESSEL'

Ashanti tribe, Ghana
Brass, 6r high. 60.70

344 COVERED VESSEL

Ashanti tribe, Ghana
Brass, 7~" high. 60.71

345 COVERED VESSEL

Ashanti tribe, Ghana
Brass, 6f' high. 60.72

346 FERTILITY DOLL

Ashanti tribe, Ghana
Wood, rof' high. 57.294

347 ROUND BOX, GOLD-DUST CONTAINER

Ashanti tribe, Ghana
Brass, r' high. 60.73
333

337
1341
348 OBI.ONG BOX, GOLD-DUST CONTAINER 355 EMBLEM IN FORM OF COILED SNAKE
Ashanti tribe, Gh~na Ashanti tribe, Ghana
Urass, 2" high. 60.75 Gold, Ii'' wide. 55.11
Gift of Rene d'Harnoncourt
349 CROSS-SHAPED BOX
GOLD-DUST CONTAINER 356 WATER BUFFALO HEAD
Ashanti tribe, Ghana Ewe tribe(?), Togo
Brass, ri" high. 60.78 Clay, 9" high. 56.36

350 fiSH, GOLD WEIGHT 357 BIRD STAFF

Ashanti tribe, Ghana Court of Abomey, Fon tribe, Dahomey
Brass, 3l" high. 68.16 Late 19th century
Brass, copper, tin, 34i" high. 58.95
351 BIRD CLAW, GOLD WEIGHT
Ashanti tribe, Ghana 358 SCEPTER
Brass, 3t" high. 60.79 Court of Abomey, Fon tribe, Dahomey
Late 19th century
352 PAIR OF LIONS, ROY AI. EMBLEMS Silver over wood, 24A" high. 57.257
Ashanti tribe, Ghana
Gold, 21" high. 61.272-.273 359 ROYAL MEMORIAL STAFF
Court of Abomey, Fon tribe, Dahomey
353 EMBLEM IN FORM Of TURTLE Late 19th century
Ashanti tribe, Ghana Iron, wood, 56!'' high. 58.245
Gold, 4" high. 60.36
360 HEADDRESS, FIGURE OF
354 EMBI.EM IN FORM OF DOUBI.E LIZARD SWEET-WATER GODDESS
Ashanti tribe, Ghana Y oruba tribe, Dahomey
Gold, 3t" high. 59.303 Wood, coloring, 66" high. 68.70

350

352
349
353. 354
 Nigeria, Cameroon so-called classical period) has been estimated to have lasted
about two centuries, somewhere between the mid-tenth
Nigeria occupies a special position in the art of Africa. It is and the mid-fifteenth century.
the only African region with whose art history-in the The large body of brass and bronze sculpture from the
sense of a truly evolving chronology of works and styles- city-state of Benin has so far offered the only opportunity
we are acquainted. The objects include the earliest dated in all of Africa for systematic art-historical studies. This
African sculptures: terra-cotta heads and fragments from wealth of works, classified into three periods, has also al-
Nok, a village in northern Nigeria, which arc dated from lowed for the differentiation of substylcs and even the
about 500 B.C. to A.D. 200. On the other hand Nigeria is recognition of the works of individual artists. According
also the African country where sculpture in its traditional to oral tradition the art of brass casting was introduced to
form is now still being made and used. One of the largest Benin by its neighbor, Ife, in the late thirteenth or early
of African tribes, the Y aruba, numbering about ten million fourteenth century. At the request of the then reigning king
people, inhabit the western part of the country and the of Benin, an artist was sent from Ife to teach the art of
eastern and north-central part of adjacent Dahomey. Many casting by the lost wax method; this master is still formally
Yoruba still worship the traditional deities of an impressive honored by the guild ofbrass casters in Benin.
pantheon, each with its own ritual paraphernalia of masks, The early period of Benin art dates from the fourteenth
figures, clothing, and emblems. The most frequent repre- to the mid-sixteenth century, and the early brass works,
sentations are of the thunder god, Shango, characterized by such as the tall-capped heads of queen mothers, show a
the emblem of a double ax, and the small figures (ibcji) that stylistic affinity with Ife. Technically, these heads, as well as
commemorate a dead twin. The number of Yoruba artists the quite prognathous Benin heads with short bead collar
working in wood, metal (brass and iron), bead embroidery, and strands of beads adorning the flat cap on either side,
and as weavers-not to mention musicians, dancers, and arc related to Ifc in the extraoroinary thinness of their
architects-has been and still is enormous. casting. Small ivory masks, a king' s royal insignia, also date
More than any other African tribe, the Yoruba are an from Benin's early period.
urban people; they are organized in city-states with a ruling Benin's second or middle period, often called 'classical,'
priest-king, considered divine, at the head of a hierarchical extends from about I 550 to I68o. In 1668 the Dutch
pyramidal social order. Y aruba culture is heir to the traveler Dapper visited Benin; his description of the royal
. traditions of Ifc, an ancient Y oruban city, where the second palace, approached by broad avenues lined with houses and
cornerstone in Nigerian art history, the Ife terra-cotta and courtyards in which rows of wood pillars displayed bronze
brass heads, was discovered between I9IO and 1912 by the plaques, accounts for much of our historical knowledge of
German culture historian Leo Frobenius. Of a remarkably Benin. These plaques, which have survived in quantity,
sensitive naturalism, these classically proportioned heads, form the single most detailed SQurcc of information about
whose striated faces probably indicate the beaded veil life at the court of Benin. Other sculptures of the middle
protecting the divine king from the gaze of his subjects, period include heads with high bead collars, used as tusk
were only later recognized to be the antecedents of the brass holders for royal ancestor shrines, and free-standing figures.
and bronze art of Benin. Ifc's most active artistic phase (the Benin's third period extends from about I 700 to I 897.
A temporary collapse of the empire in the early eighteenth
century is perhaps reflected in the waning quality of the
craft and style of its later bronze works. But there are cer-
tain types of objects, such as the leopards and free-standing
royal figures, which in their splendor equal the earlier
objects.
360 1
 The formalization of court life was mirrored in the
hieratic art of Benin, created by guild artists who worked
and moved within the established canons of taste under
royal patronage. Certain phases of their production have
been deplored for their empty formalism and lack of the
vitality found in peasant religious art, but the art as a whole
must still be granted its absolute mastery of medium and
its formal magnificence.
The tribal art of northern Nigeria (the Afo, Tiv, Chamba,
and Mambila tribes) and that of the important Niger delta
Grasslands and Cross River tribes in the southeast extends into
Bamum
Bangwa Cameroon, which adjoins Nigeria at its eastern border.
Bamile ke
Ca meroon
Although the Cameroon grasslands have had a prolific
artistic production in wood, brass, clay, and bead em-
Gulf of Guinea
broidery, this art is at present probably the least familiar of
all African arts. The political structure of the grassland
tribes (Kom, Nsaw, Barnum, Bangwa, Bamileke) is that of
small independent states within the larger context of a
fairly homogeneous culture area. Accordingly, much of
Cameroon art has focused around the person of the king,
the divine ruler. Royal ancestor and effigy ftgures, portals
with high-relief sculpture, carved and beaded thrones and
NIGE RIA, CAMEROON vessels, drinking horns, brass and clay pipes: and oliphants
have been created by guild artists as ceremonial symbols of
the ruler's authority. The royal ancestor figures of the
Bangwa and Bamileke are outstanding among African
Ever since the disclosure of these treasures by the British figural sculpture for their dynamic and dramatic poses, and
pnnitive expedition to Benin in I 897, there has been con- expressions of radiant vitality. In sharp contrast arc the
siderable speculation as to the origin of African brass and figures of the Kom, whose placid serenity is heightened by
bronze casting. At first Mediterranean or Egyptian in- a rigidly static pose; these figures are frequently totally
fluences were postulated; at present it is widely believed covered with red, black, and blue glass beads.
that it is indigenous to Black Africa, though the origin of From Gabon, the coastal republic between Cameroon
the component parts of the alloys remains problematic. and the Congo, come the much-admired Fang reliquary
Court art by its very nature differs from the religious figures and heart-shaped, often white-faced masks. The
sculpture of African farming communities; it serves the Fang, as well as the neighboring Kota, retain some bodily
state by proclaiming its prosperity and endurance, fur- remains oftheir deceased in baskets, upon which the guardian
nishing liturgical objects for the religious cults, and royal or reliquary figure is placed.
T. N.
and aristocratic i.nsignia as symbols of power. In Benin, as in
other African states, the king was considered to rule by
divine right. He was the vessel through which divine forces
were made available to his subjects. In his person he thus
ensured the state's well-being.
361 PLAQUE WITH ROYAL DIGNITARY
Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1550-I68o
Bronze, 151" high. 58.70

362 PLAQUE WITH SERPENT

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1550-1680
Bronze, 18&" high. s8.254

363 PLAQUE WITH WARRIOR

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1550-168o
Bronze, 18f' high. s8.2S6

364 PLAQUE WITH KING

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1550-I68o
Bronze, 16r' high. 62.171
Gift of Samuel Hubin

36.5 PLAQUE WITH KING AND ATTENDANTS

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1550-168o
Bronze, 19~" high. 57.23 I

366 PLAQUE WITH WARRIOR

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1550-168o
Bronze, 18" high. 58.255

367 HEAD
Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About I55D-I68o
Bronze, wf' high. 58.218

368 HEAD
Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1550
Bronze, 9t" high. s8.I8I
369 HEAD
Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1550
Bronze, 8f' high. 58.r8o

370 BELT MASK

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
Shortly after 1550
Ivory, 9i" high . 58 .100

371 ALTAR STAND

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
19th century
Bronze, ro!" high. 6r.r85

372 STAFF WITH IBIS, IDIOPIIONE

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
Early 19th century
Bronze, 14" high. 56.338

373 HEAD OF A RAM

Lower Niger Valley, Nigeria
About 1750
Bronze, 7t" high. 58.219

374 LEOPARD
Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1750
Bronze, 15!" high. 58.90

375 LEOPARD HEAD

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
17th century
Bronze, 8~" high. 57.118

376 STANDING FIGURE OF HORN-BLOWER

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1550-168o
Bronze, 24!" high. 57.255

374
370, 373
375
377 BRACELET
Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
17th or 18th century
Ivory, 4" high. 56.352

378 BRACELET
Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeri<i.
17th or 18th century
Ivory, copper, 5-l'' high. 58.341

379 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
About 1800
Ivory, 13" high. 57.80

380 CARVED TUSK

Court of Benin, Bini tribe, Nigeria
19th century
Ivory, 74" high. 63.166

381 HEAD
Town of Esie, Borin province, Nigeria
Soapstone, 111'' high. 66.30

382 STANDING MOTHER AND CHILD FIGURE

Yoruba tribe, Nigeria
Wood, coloring, 28!" high. 56.220

383 MASK
Y oruba tribe, Nigeria
Wood, coloring, 16" high. 60.145

384 HEADDRESS
Yoruba tribe, Nigeria
Wood, coloring, IOk" high. 6o.86

385 STANDING MALE TWIN FIGURE

WITH COAT
Yoruba tribe, Nigeria
Wood, cotton cloth, cowrie shells, 12" high
61.68

376 1 379
386 STAFF
Yoruba tribe, Nigeria
Bronze, 7t" high. 59.296

387 MASK
Ibibio tribe, Nigeria
Wood, coloring, 22i" high. 59.32

388 MASK
Ibibio ttibe, Nigeria
Wood, 23" high. 55·5
Gift of Mrs. Margaret Plass

389 MASK
Ibo tribe, Nigeria
Wood, 19" high. 66.50
390 HEADPIECE
Ekoi tribe, Nigeria
Wood, skin, other materials, I I" high. 64.7

391 MASK
Ibo tribe, Nigeria
Wood, coloring, I7r' high. 56.346

392 MASK
Ijo tribe, Nigeria
Wood, 35l" long. 67.114

393 ELEPHANT MASK

Bamileke tribe, Cameroon
Raffia, glass beads, other materials
46" high. 336.68
On loan from Ernst Anspach

394 DRINKING l}ORN

Barnum tribe, Cameroon
Horn, glass beads, 16!" high. 56.358

395 MASK
Barnum tribe, Cameroon
Wood, copper, other materials
26" high. 67.I I5

396 STANDING MALE FIGURE

PART OF HOUSE POST
Barnum tribe, Cameroon
Wood, 35!" high. 61.255
397 STANDIN-G FEMALE FIGURE
PART 01' HOUSE POST
Barnum tribe, Cameroon
Wood, 34" high. 61.256

398 HEAD
Cameroon
Wood, 7!" high. 66.31

399 HEAD
Barnum tribe(?), Cameroon(?)
Wood, 22*" high. 57.301
Gift of Mrs. Gertrud A. Mellon

400 STANDING MALE FIGURE

ROYAL ANCESTOR
Bangwa tribe, Cameroon
Wood, 40!" high. 68.31

401 MASK
Mambila tribe, Cameroon
Wood, 17!" high. 68.77

402 HEAD FOR RELIQUARY

Fang tribe, Gabon
Wood, 18!" high. 61.283

403 HEAD FOR RELIQUARY

Fang tribe, Gabon
Wood, 12!'' high. 65.129

404 SEATED MAtE FIGURE FOR RELIQUARY

Fang tribe, Gabon
Wood, 22!" high. 56.259

405 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE FOR

RELIQUARY
Fang tribe, Gabon
Wood, 25l" high. 61.284

394
395
406 SEATED MALE FIGURE FOR RELIQUARY
Fang tribe, Gabon
Wood, 27" high. 66.39
Gift of IBM Corporation

407 FIGURE F0 R REliQUARY

Shake or neighboring tribe, Gabon
Wood, copper, brass, 2oi" high. 61.247

408 FIGURE FOR RELIQUARY

Kota tribe, Gabon
Wood, copper, brass, 21!" high. 57.230

409 FIGURE FOR RELIQUARY

Kota tribe, Gabon
Wood, brass, I6t'' high. 59.II

410 MASK
K wele tribe, Congo-Brazzaville
Wood, coloring, 17!" high. 57.236

411 MASK
Kwele tribe, Congo-Brazzaville
Wood, coloring, 20!" high. 56.218

412 MASK
Ogowc River area, Gabon
Wood, coloring, 1 I i'' high. 56.403
Gift of Eliot Elisofon

4I3 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE

Lumbo tribe, Gabon
Wood, coloring, 15!" high. 56.369
400 1 401
402 1 406
407, 408 I :4-II, 4!3
The Congo linear system of descent. Although some well-known
Congo works, the Kuba royal effigy figures, are part of a
The northern half of the vast land mass of Central Africa court art, the large body of Kuba carving, which includes
traversed by the Congo, Kasai, and Ubangi river systems is masks, animals, cups, and other utensils, functioned in a
equatorial rain forest; its southern part is wooded savanna, more general social context. The Kuba also fashion fmely
stretching cast from the mouth of the Congo River. Apart worked ceremonial weapons of iron and copper (as do the
from a few nomadic Pygmy groups, the many tribes that Songe), and they and the Kongo weave geometrically
inhabit the area practice forest agriculture supplemented by ornamented raffia pile cloths.
hunting and fishing. Although each tribe has evolved a characteristic style,
The forest region has produced comparatively little art. Congolese sculpture as a whole has unifying traits of style
Its most characteristic expression is perhaps the masks and and function. Masks arc often highly stylized or combine
the stylized figurines in ivory, bone, or wood of the Lega unrealistic clements with human and animal features. As is
tribe. general throughout Africa, they embody supernatural
The great wealth of Congo art is found in the savanna forces on whose performance the all-important ritual life-
belt. Here cultures of considerabl.c homogeneity developed cycle of birth, puberty, marriage, and death depends.
centralized tribal structures ruled by a king. Although these Congolese figure sculpture, on the other hand, is rather
did not always control a large area, they arc referred to as naturalistic, with rounded body forms and detailed elabora-
empires. From west to cast they arc the Kongo, Tcke, tion of surface decoration. Many of these figures (among the
Mbala, Y aka, Pen de,. Lelc, Kuba, Songe, Luba, and Kongo, Tckc, Yaka, and Songe) are considered to be
Chokwe-Lunda, and these names arc synonymous with the fetishes. Fixed to their bodies arc magical substances which,
main style centers. when properly activated, are said to release spirits that
Since it functioned in the context of the farming village, exercise their powers of protection or prevention, or else
Congo art is largely a 'peasant art.' However, the organized do harm. The so-called nail fetish of the Kongo is only the
structure of the savanna kingdoms fostered the general de- best known of several different kinds.
velopment of material culture and so helped the arts to T. N.
flourish. It made possible extensive trading, which in the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries extended from coast
to coast, thus enriching the repertory of materials and skills,
and it assigned segments of the population to specific
occupations, including carving and weaving.
From the village level to that of the paramount chief, the
arts served as signs of rank and power. Staffs and scepters
indicate the authority of the state; elaborately carved neck
rests, stools, cups, pipes, and combs point to the chief's
social standing. The female figure that supports the fine
stools of the Luba, Songc, and Chokwe is reminiscent of a
time when chiefs were carried by slaves. Among the
Kongo (inhabitants of the first Central African state the
exploring Portuguese encountered in 1482), a family's
social standing is also symbolized through the theme of the
mother and child. Throughout Central Africa the represen-
tation of the female figure is expressive of fecundity and
life force and is also perhaps associated with the matri-
 Central African Repu blic

Atlointic ()(~an

CONGO

- Borders of countnes
414, 415 1 416
414 STANDING FIGURE
MALEVOLENT FETISH
Sundi tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, other materials, 11" high. 65.98

415 KNEELING MALE FIGURE, FETISH

Kongo tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, other materials, IIj" high. 66.33

416 STANDING I'IGURE

MALEVOLENT FETISH
Kongo tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, other materials, 23!" high. 59· 154

417 MASK
Kongo tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 14f' high. 56.347

418 SEATED FEMALE FIGURE WITH CHILD

Yom be tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 13r' high. ?.6.351

419 STANDING FIGURE, FETISH

Teke tribe, Congo-Urazzaville
Wood, other materials, IIi'' high. 65.12

426 l 424
427
429 1 430
420 STANDING DOUBLE FIGURE,
MALE AND FEMALE, FETISH
Yaka tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, coloring, 18A" high. 57.28

421 MASK
Yaka tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, coloring, other materials, 19" high
64·34

422 AMULET
Pende tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Ivory, 2;f" high. 67.II7

423 AMULET
Pendc tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Ivory, 2!" high. 68.26

424 S T 0 0 L WITH CARYATID

Chokwe tribe, Angola
Wood, brass studs, 9t" high. 67.53

425 STAFf SURMOUNTED BY

EQUESTRIAN FIGURE
Chokwe tribe, Angola
Wood, 19k" high. 59.212

426 MASK
Luba tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, coloring, I4i" high. 56.56

427 FEMALE FIGURE SEATED ON STOOL

Luba tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 9" high. 57.26

428 FEMALE HALF FIGURE, FETISH

Luba tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, other materials, 5!" high. 67.116

435 432
429 S T 0 0 L WITH CARY AT 10
Luba tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 23!" high. sS.ss

430 BOWSTAND WITH STANDING

FEMALE FIGURE
Luba tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 38!'' high. 63.112
Partial gift of The Wunderman Foundation

431 STAFF SURMOUNTED BY STANDING

MALE FIGURE
Bemba tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, iron, 27" high. 64.32

432 STANDING MALf FIGURE, ANCESTOR

Buye tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 31!" high. 61.27

433 STANDING MOTHER AND CHILD FIGURE

Lulua tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 9!" high. 65.85

434 STANDING MALE FIGURE, FETISH

Songe tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, other materials, 14" high. 64.60

435 STOOL
Songe tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 19" high. 69.4

436 MASK
Songe tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, coloring, I7t" high. s8.I71

433 I 436
434
437 FEMALE FIGURE, PROBABLY FOR
DIVINATION
Songc tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Ivory, 41-" high. 57.83

438 DOUBLE FIGURE, MALE AND FEMALE,

FOR DIVINATION
Songe tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Ivory, 5" high. 66.86

439 HELMET MASK

Kuba tribes, Congo-Kinshasa
Raffia cloth, cowrie shells, other materials
2o!" high. 58.71

440 GABLED BOX

Kuba tribes, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 4l" high. 67.56

441 MASK
Kuba or Lele tribes, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, other materials, 20!" high. 67.42
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Gustave Schindler

442 SEATED MALE FIGURE

Dengese tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, 21!" high. 66.32

443 STANDING MALE FIGURE

Mbole tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, coloring, 13" high. 66.28
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wielgus

444 STANDING MALE FIGURE

Mbole tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Wood, coloring, 33" high. 68.21

439 1 440
445 ZOOMORPHIC FIGURE
Zande tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Stone, 6" high. 65.97

446 MASK
Lega tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Ivory, 71" high. 62.51

447 MASK
Lega tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Ivory, 8!" high. 61.285

448 MASK
Lega tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Ivory, 8!'' high. 65.4

449 HEAD
Lega tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Ivory, 8i" high. 61.65

450 STANDING MALE FIGURE

Lega tribe, Congo-Kinshasa
Ivory, 10!" high. 67.58
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wielgus

451 SLIT-DRUM
Yangere tribe, Central African Republic
Wood, 8i" high. 60.149

443 1 w. 444
445. 448 1 451
The Americas
The Indian art of the Americas had a rich and complex
history. It began in the second millennium B.C. and con-
tinued until the late second millennium A.D.-well over
three thousand years of development and change. During
this span, many kinds and varieties of buildings, sculpture,
and objects were produced. Their purposes were also many:
ceremonial, funerary, personal ornament, daily use.
Man was present in the Americas long before he had the
time and the talent to embellish his life, or his death, with
luxury goods. Initially he was a big-game hunter, tracking
down and killing the giant animals that lived on the grass-
lands of North America. Subsequently he was forced to
supplement his diet with wild plants, which he then learned
to cultivate. With the cultivation of plants, settled village
life began.
It was upon this village life that the great civilizations of
the New World developed. Two areas in particular-Mexi-
co and Peru-achieved a greatness of which the art and
architecture still give ample testimony: pyramids, temples,
fortresses, irrigation systems, palaces are the visible re-
mains of ancient splendor. To learn their story one must
tum to archeology, for the written records of the times are
few and largely undeciphered, and native traditions were
almost totally destroyed during the years of conquest and
colonization by the Europeans. Archeology is slowly
piecing together the record. It now tells us that large-scale
ceremonial structures, sculpture, and luxury goods were
all created much earlier than had previously been believed
possible. All these manifestations of a major cultural advance
over simple village life were present among the Olmec of
Mexico and the Chavin of Peru, whose cultural origins
go back to the end of the second millennium B.C. Intellec-
tually complex and artistically inventive, the Olmec and
Chavin mark the beginnings ofhigh civilization in the New
World.
THE AMERICAS
Pre-Columbian Gold greatest degree of naturalism, and used human features most
consistently. The Panama-Costa Rica area preferred cast
In the history of the discovery and conquest of the New
objects of the most 'grotesque' outline-animals, birds,
World there is no more meaningful a factor than the search
and a combination of animal, bird, and human elements in
for gold. Columbus set the scene when he announced the
heavier, more massively volumed castings. Mexico, too,
discovery of America; he spoke of the incalculable wealth of
cast by preference, although hammering was also done,
the new lands, the many mines, the rivers full of precious
producing many-detailed, finely scaled pieces of icono-
metals. On his last voyage, begun in 1502, he saw the gold
graphic complexity tied to the involved symbolism of the
'eagles' of Veraguas and spent much time searching for the
late period.
gold from which they were made. The same obsessive
The Museum of Primitive Art collection includes all of
search motivated the Europeans who came after him. So
the areas of pre-Col~mbian gold. Mexico is the least well
single-minded was the hunt that less than fifty years after
represented, simply because the total number of Mexican
Colu~bus set foot on the island of San Salvador, all of the
objects extant is very small. Examples of all the styles from
areas of great native wealth had been conquered and
Costa Rica and Panama are present, coming from Linea
thoroughly looted of their precious metals. The search con-
Vieja, the Diquis Delta, and the Chiriqui, Veraguas, and
tinued for centuries after the Conquest, and whenever
Code areas. Typically they are the eagle, frog, double
ancient tombs were discovered their golden contents were
figure pendant, and elaborate pieces with quartz, ivory,
melted down into neat bars. Only of late years have the
or pyrite inlay. The Colombian styles range from the early
gold relics of the first Americans finally come to be more
through the late period: the big hammered pectorals of
desirable in their original form than as bullion. Accordingly,
Calima style with their close-eyed faces, the Tolima 'knife-
the pre-Columbian gold that is today in museums and
shaped' winged figures, the great Sim1 bird finials, and the
private collections is largely of recent discovery. Most of
late Tairona pieces of constricted form and careful work-
it has been found in burials and consists of personal orna-
manship. The objects from Peru, larger in scale and made
ments. The temple and palace decorations, the enormous
primarily for burial, include a group of late silver vessels,
ceremonial pieces, the imperial treasures, and the entire
reported to be the contents of a single sumptuous tomb in
gardens of gold and silver that were reported by the early
the area of the great city of Chan Chan.
chroniclers of the Conquest are all gone. Of the objects
that survive, the largest were made specifically for burials:
big funerary masks, vessels and containers, ornaments too
large or too awkward to have been worn in life. The rest
is fmery, luxury objects of a very human sort.
In the New World, gold was first worked in Peru. Deli-
cate, hammered ornaments of gold date back to Chavin
times, early in the first millennium B.c. From Peru, gold
working is believed to have spread northward through
Colombia into Panama and Costa Rica, eventually arriving
in Mexico almost two thousand years later. The four impor-
tant areas of gold work are Peru, Colombia, Panama-Costa
Rica, and Mexico, and each has its own stylistic personality.
Peru, from early through late times, showed a distinct pre-
ference for hammered metals, with smooth, broad surfaces
and patterned detail. Colombia produced both hammered
and cast forms of considerable refinement, achieved the
452 LIP PLUG
Mexico, Mixteca-Puebla, I25Q-1500 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 1!" long. 68.69

453 PAIR OF EAR ORNAMENTS

Mexico, Mixteca-Puebla, 125Q-1500 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 2i" high. 67. I 20

454 EAGLE PENDANT

Costa Rica, looo-1500 A.D.
From Diquis Delta(?)
Gold, 4!" high. 61.181

455 PENDANT, FIGURE WITH

CROCODILE HEAD
Costa Rica, rooo-Isoo A.D.
From Puerto Gonzalez Viquez
Gold, pyrite, 6" high. 63.4

456 EAGLE PENDANT

Panama, Chiriqui, I I oo- I 500 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, sf' high. 59.217

457 TWO FROG PENDANTS

Panama, Veraguas, I roa-r soo A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 2} and 3" long. 59.222-.223

458 PENDANT, ANTHROPOMORPHIC FIGURE

Panama, Veraguas, uoo-rsoo A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 4i" high. 58.283

459 PENDANT, PAIR OF CROCODILES

Panama, Code, uoo-rsoo A.D.
From Sitio Conte area(?)
Gold, quartz, r!" high. 58.186

460 PENDANT, PAIR OF BIRDS

Panama, Code, uoo-rsoo A.D.
From Sitio Conte area(?)
Gold, quartz, r!" high. 57.32
461 PENDANT, ANTHROPOMORPHIC FIGURE
Panama, Code, uoo-1500 A.D.
From Parita, Azuero Peninsula
Gold, tooth (restored), 4!" long. 65.140

462 BOTTLE
Colombia, Quimbaya, 400-700 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 5!" high. 58.282

463 PENDANT, FANTASTIC WINGED FIGURE

Colombia, Tolima, 600-1200 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 7!" high. 57.46

464 FINIAL, BIRD

Colombia, Sinu, 6oo-1200 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 4" high. 58.281

465 FINIAL, OWL

Colombia, Sinu, 6oo-12oo A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, d" high. 59.243

466 PENDANT, FANTASTIC FIGURE

Colombia, Sinu, 6oo-12oo A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 2i" high. 57.153

467 TWO PENDANTS, MASKED FIGURES

Colombia, Calima(?), 400-700 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 2! and 2l" high. 57.151-.152

468 PENDANT, STANDING FIGURE

Colombia, Tairona, 1200-1500 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 3!" high. 61.30

454. 455
469 PENDANT
Colombia, Chibcha, 12oo-1500 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Gold, 4!" high. 57.105

470 FUNERARY MASK

Peru, Chimu, 1200-1470 A.D.
North Coast, from Batan Grande
Lambayequc valley
Gold, traces of paint, 28!" wide. 57.161

471 GROUP OF SILVER OBJECTS

Peru, Chimu, 1ooo-I450 A.D.
North Coast, area of Chan Chan
Believed to be the contents of one tomb
Silver, vessel sizes from 5 to 12 ~-" high
65.110, 67.6-.39. 68.73-·74
 471
471
471
Peru great care of execution and attention to detail. The medium
primarily identified with them is pottery, for although gold
Except for its narrow, very dry sea coast, Peru is a moun- and wood objects as well as textiles were produced, works
tainous country, difficult of access. In pre-Columbian times of fired clay exist in by far the greatest quantity. The
this small area, tiny in comparison to the rest of South ancient Peruvians had a particular talent for producing
America, produced advanced and organized cultures and what is truly small sculpture in clay, sculpture made with
built the temples, fortresses, and irrigations systems that the dual purpose of being useful, functional vessels.
mark their greatness. The next major stylistic changes occurred with the rise
The first inhabitants of Peru arc believed to have been of the first 'empires' in Peru. By A.D. 6oo the Tiahuanaco
hunters and plant-gatherers. By the beginning of the second and Wari empires were developing, the Tiahuanaco in
millennium B.c. life patterns were established here that Bolivia and the W ari in the south central highlands of
were to be characteristically Peruvian, and once pottery Peru. Although they were separate political entities, it is
was produced-probably by I 8oo B.c. and undoubtedly believed that they shared a common religion-Tiahuanaco
by I 500 B. c.-the stage was set for the great developments. in origin-and one result of this was a very similar icono-
One of the unusual features of the ancient civilizations of graphy. Stylistically the art of Tiahuanaco and Wari,
both Peru and Mexico is the grandeur and esthetic great- and that of the areas which they individually dominated,
ness of the earliest important cultures. The Chavin of Peru can be distinguished one from the other, but to do so icono-
and the Olmec of Mexico were the cultural 'trend-setters' graphically is difficult. This is one reason why many objects
out of which much later culture came, but they also pro- previously labeled Coast Tiahuanaco, coming from the
duced works of art that were seldom equaled and, in the south coast of Peru, are today known as W ari; it is now
minds of some, hever surpassed in later times. Chavin art is realized that they were produced under the sway of the
bold and voluminpus, symmetrically balanced, and ex- Wari empire. The artistic features common to the two in-
tremely well made. It appears today as stone sculpture, clude rectilinear, hieratic images, squareness or straightness
mostly in the form of architectural decoration, ceramic
vessels, gold ornaments, and textiles. Its iconography centers
around jaguars, and elements of jaguars combined with
human or bird features.
The Chavin heartland was the Maranon River valley in the
north central Andes. At one end the river meets the Amazon
in the jungles of the Andes' eastern slope (in areas that may
have been the source of the Chavin jaguar); at the other
end the river reaches almost to the dry valleys of the Pacific
coast. From this long highland valley, Chavin influence
spread throughout Peru. From north to south the represen-
tation of the fanged jaguar indicates Chavin presence.
With the waning of Chavin influence by the mid-first
millennium B.c., regional distinctions become pronounced.
Paracas and later Nazca in the south coast regions, Mochica
in the north, Rccuay in the central highlands, arc, among
others, all stylistically as well as regionally distinct. They
do, however, have certain qualities in common-scale
(which is moderate), volume (less massive than that of
Chavin times), surface decoration (unusually elaborate), and
 II<WI

• CMv.n de Huantar

I
Pa<:tht Qeean

PERU

• Atchaeo'Oi''~' !1\ et
• Motjern tt\te$.
..- Rrven
of form, strongly outlined, and somber colors. The Coast
Tiahuanaco styles show their Nazca heritage in being more
brightly colored and less rectilinear in outline.
At the disruption of Wari-Tiahuanaco power Peru
settled into another period of regionalism, in art styles as in
political structures. It was a period of gradual consolidation
and growth that culminated in the total domination of
Peru by the Inca empire. Artistically it was a period of
inattentiveness. Lack of invention and repetition charac-
terize much of the work, although some of it is so inatten-
tive that it achieves spontaneity. This is true, for instance,
of many Chancay ceramics and textiles, the latter surviving
only because of the extreme dryness of the coastal cemeteries.
The textiles are particularly appreciated for their bright
colors, simple, large pa~,tems, and seemingly lighthearted
subject matter.
The span of the last civilization, the Inca, was short;
barely a century before the Spanish conquest had the Inca
conquered all of civilized South America. Little Inca. art
exists today. Following the Conquest the visible Inca
objects were disregarded if not destroyed. Those that have
survived show a sense of order and balance that is some-
times restrictive, but at best is of classic dimension.
1 476, 477
 Early Period

472 STIRRUP SPOUT VESSEL

Early Chavin, 1200-1000 B.C.
Provenience unknown
Clay, 9l" high. 58.195

473 STIRRUP SPOUT VESSEL

Early Chavin, 1200-IOOO B.c~
Provenience unknown
Clay, 9R" high. 59·4

474 BOTTLE, FELINE HEAD

Late Chavin, 700-500 B.c.
North Coast, from Tembladera
Jequetepeque valley
Clay, resin paint, 12!'' high. 67.122

475 STIRRUP SPOUT VESSEL

Late Chavin, 700-500 B.c.
North Coast, from Tembladera
Jequetepeque valley
Clay, IIi" high. 68.2

476 BOTTLE, FELINE HEAD

Late Chavin, 7oo-5oo B.c.
North Coast, from Tembladera
Jequetepeque valley
Clay, paint, 8" high. 68.33

477 STIRRUP SPOUT VESSEL IN FORM OF CAT

Late Chavin, 700-500 B.c.
North Coast, from Tembladera
Jequetepeque valley
Clay, traces of paint, 9!" high. 68.68

478 CUP
Late Chavin, 700-500 B.c.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 3!" high. 64.9

479
479 BRIDGE AND SPOUT VESSEL
Chavinoid-Paracas, 90o-700 B.C.
South Coast, from Juan Pablo, lea valley
Clay, 8!'' high. 62.I2I
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wielgus

480 BRIDGE AND SPOUT VESSEL IN

FORM OF CAT
Early Paracas, 70o-500 B.c.
South Coast, from Callango, lea valley
Clay, resin paint, 8!'' long. 65.114

481 DRUM (figure is sounding chamber)

Middle Paracas, 50o-300 B.C.
South Coast
Clay, resin paint, 15" high. 63.87

482 PAINTED TEXTILE

Middle Paracas, 50o-300 B.C.
South Coast, possibly from Ocucaje
lea valley
Cotton, paint, 21 X 70". 60.I23

483 BOWL
Late Paracas, 30o-2oo B.C.
South Coast
Clay, resin paint, 3-l" high. 58.213

484 WHISTLE IN FORM OF MONKEY

Late Paracas, 30o-2oo B.C.
South Coast
Clay, 2" high. 63.15

485 DOUBLE SPOUT BOTTLE, TWO FIGURES

Necropolis, 2oo-Ioo B.c.
South Coast
Clay, resin paint, 5" high. 64.36
486 DOUBLE SPOUT BOTTLE, TROPHY HEAD
Necropolis, 20o-Ioo B.c.
South Coast
Clay, slip, 7!" high. 62.166

487 DOUBLE SPOUT BOTTLE

Necropolis, 20o-1oo B.c.
South Coast
Clay, 6j" high. 60.125

488 VESSEL IN FORM OF SEATED FIGURE

Early Nazca, 100 n.c.-200 A.D.
South Coast
Clay, polychrome slip, 8!" high. 60.67
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wielgus

489 DRuM (figure is sounding chamber)

Early Nazca, 100 B.C.-2oo A.D.
South Coast
Clay, polychrome slip, I7t" high. 64.4
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wielgus

490 SAMPLER
Early Nazca, 100 B.C.-200 A.D.
South Coast
Wool, cotton, 27l X 411". 59.161

491 PAINTED TEXTILE FRAGMENT

Middle Nazca, 20o-300 A.D.
South Coast, said to be from Nazca valley
Cotton, paint, I8 X 68 -~". 65.112

492 SLEEVELESS SHIRT

Nazca-Wari, 6oo-700 A.D.
South Coast
Wool, 21 X 26!". 58.204

493 MANTLE
Nazca-Wari, 600-700 A.D.
South Coast
Wool, cotton, 128 X 69i". 57.262

497
490
494 HANGING
Nazca-Wari, 600-700 A.D.
South Coast
Wool, cotton, IIO!X 52}". 62.45

495 STIRRUP SPOUT VESSEL

RITUAL SCliNE(?)
Mochica I, 200-50 B.C.
North Coast
Clay, 4§" high. 56.247

496 VESSEL IN FORM OF

BIRD-HEADED FIG UR.E
Mochica IV, 200-500 A.D.
North Coast
Clay, slip, II!" high. s8.212

497 STIRRUP SPOUT VESSEL

Mochica IV, 200-500 A.D.
North Coast
Clay, slip, 121-" high. 61.17

498 EFFIGY HEAD JAR

Mochica V, 500-700 A.D.
North Coast
Clay, slip, 4~" high. 61.19

499 THROWING STICK

Mochica, 200 B.C.-700 A.D.
North Coast, possibly from Trujillo area
Bone, stone, shell, 13!" high. 67.77

500 VESSEL IN FORM OF MAN AND LLAMA

Recuay, 300 B.C.-700 A.D.
Central Highlands
Clay, slip, negative decoration, 61'' high
65.113

501 VESSEL, RITUAL SCENE(?)

Recuay, 300 n.c.-700 A.D.
Central Highlands
Clay, slip, negative decoration, 81" high
66.14

502

505
502 VESSEL IN FORM OF HOUSE
Recuay, 300 B.C.-700 A.D.
Central Highlands
Clay, slip, negative decoration, 91" high
68.1

503 SEATED FIGURE

Huaylas, about 700 A.D.
Central Highlands
Stone, 25" high. 60.102

Middle Period

504 STANDING FIGURE

Tiahuanaco, 300-700 A.D.
Bolivia, Tiahuanaco area
Stone, 18!'' high. 59.8

505 VESSEL, STYLIZED PUMA

Tiahuanaco, 300-700 A.D.
Bolivia, Tiahuanaco area
Clay, polychrome slip, wf' high. 63.3

506 BOWL
Coast Tiahuanaco (Wari), 6oo-10oo A.D.
South Coast
Clay, polychrome slip, 3!" high. 56.185

507 BOTTLE
Coast Tiahuanaco (Wari), 6oo-1ooo A.D.
South Coast
Clay, polychrome slip, 6" high. 64.37

508 FRAGMENT OF HEAD VESSEL

Coast Tiahuanaco (Wari), 6oo-10oo A.D.
South or Central Coast
Clay, slip, 9" high. 61.14

509 LIME CONTAINER

Coast Tiahuanaco (Wari), 6oo-1ooo A.D.
South Coast, from Coyungo, Nazca valley
Wood, 4!" high. 65.86

506
510
507
5I3 I SIB
520 1
616
491
SIO KERO
Coast Tiahuanaco (Wari), 6oo-rooo A.D.
South Coast, from Cahuachi, Nazca valley
Wood, 4!" high. 68.66

51 I PAIR OF EAR SPOOLS

Coast Tiahuanaco (Wari), 6oo-Iooo A.D.
South Coast, from Cahuachi, Nazca valley
Bone, shell, stone, I~" diameter. 68.67

5I2 MANTLE
Coast Tiahuanaco (Wari), 6oo-Iooo A.D.
South or Central Coast
Wool, cotton, 70X 70". s6.43 I

5I3 SLEEVELESS SHIRT

Coast Tiahuanaco (Wari), 6oo-Iooo A.D.
Provenience unknown
Wool, cotton, 4I!X 42!"· 56.430

5I4 WALL HANGINGS

Coast Tiahuanaco (Wari), about 700 A.D.
South Coast, from Hacienda Hispana
Churunga valley
Feathers on cotton fabric, sizes from
26! X So!" to 29t X 88i"
56·433-·442, 56.444. 57·I I9, 57.288-.289
s8.82-.84, s8.86, s9.I95-.I96

5I5 PAINTED HANGING

Coastal Wari, 700-Iooo A.D.
Central Coast
Cotton, paint, 33!X 147". 59.278

Late Period

516 TWO SLEEVELESS SHIRTS

Chancay, woo-1450 A.D.
Central Coast, from Chancay valley(?)
Wool, cotton, 22!X 40" and 22X 391"
57.212-.213

523
517 SHIRT (opened at side seams) 519 SHIRT
Chancay, 1ooo-1450 A.D. lea, IOOG-1450 A.D.
Central Coast, from Chancay valley(?) South Coast, from Nazca area(?)
Wool, cotton, 49tX 7o''. 61.75 Wool, cotton, 25!X 59". 56.432

518 HANGING 520 SHIRT

Chancay, IOOG-1450 A.D. lea, IOOG-1450 A.D.
Central Coast, from Chancay valley(?) South Coast
Wool, cotton, 101 X 76J'. 58.327 Wool, cotton, 23tX 30!". 57.211
521 PAINTED HANGING
Chimu, 1000-1450 A.D.
North Central Coast
Cotton, paint, 47iX 78!''. 59.239

522 MONKEY EATING FRUIT

Chimu, 1000-1470 A.D.
North Coast, area of Chan Chan(?)
Wood, 14§'' high. 56.114

523 STANDING FIGURE

Chimu, 1000-1470 A.D.
North Coast
Wood, 28!'' high. 58.257

524 SHIRT
Central Coast, 1450-1530 A.D.
Wool, cotton, 18!X 46!". 57.215

525 COSTUME, SHIRT AND I.OINCI.OTH

Central Coast, 1450-1530 A.D.
Wool, cotton, 19!X 43!" and 158X 45"
57.216

526 COSTUME, LOINC.LOTH AND SASH

Central Coast
11
Wool, cotton, I46X 44f and 5"X 15'
57.217

527 ARYBALLUS
Inca, 1438-1532 A.D.
South Highlands, Cuzco area(?)
Clay, slip, 8i·" high. 61.15

528 ARYBALLUS
Coastal Inca, 1470-1532 A.D.
North Coast, Piura valley
Clay, slip, 7t" high. 63.81
529 DOUBLE BOWL
Inca, 1438-1532 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Clay, slip, 7'' long. 65.II5

530 KERO
Inca, 1438-1532 A.D.
South Highlands, Cuzco area(?)
Wood, 6!" high. 63.38

53 I PACCHA IN FORM OF
SEATED HUNCHBACK
Inca, 1438-1532 A.D.
Provenience· unknown
Wood, 7l" high. 68.35

532 SLEEVELESS SHIRT

Coastal Inca, 1470-1532 A.D.
South ·coast, lea valley
Wool, cotton, 41tX 31". 65.3

533 SHIRT (opened at side seams)

Coastal Inca, 1470-1532 A.D.
South Coast
Feathe~:s on cotton fabric, 88!X 49". 56.412
Gift of John Wise

534 MINIATURE SHIRTS

Coastal Inca, 1470-1532 A.D.
South Coast, from Ullujaya, lea valley
Feathers on cotton fabric
Sizes from 6! X 6i" to 12X 12". 57.290-.293

535 PAIR OF TOMB POSTS

Coastal Inca, 1470-1532 A.D.
South Coast
Wood, silver sheathing, 431'' high. 68.88
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Frederick E. Landmann

536 TOMB POSTS

Coastal Inca, 1470-1532 A.D.
South Coast, lea valley
Wood, resin paint, silver
74! to Sol" high. 62.4-.6

532 536
The Caribbean
The natives of the Caribbean islands, when Columbus
encountered them, were not culturally advanced. Their
occupation of the islands is believed to have started shortly
before the beginning of the first millennium A.D. when
migrations from South America began. They initially came
without the knowledge of pottery-making, and much
later, in the last few centuries before the Spanish conquest,
their greatest achievements both culturally and artistically
were made under influences from Mexico. Ceremonial
structures and objects then appear. One of the most impor-
tant of the surviving ceremonial types, an emaciated
hunched figure with enormous eyes, is possibly related to
the Old Fire God of Mexico.
537 FIGURE OF A GOD OR SPIRIT
Jamaica, about 1500 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Wood, shell inlay, 27 11 high. s6.I8o

538 FIGURE OF A GOD OR SPIRIT

Santo Domingo, date uncertain
From Las Yayas de Viajama, Azua province
Stone, 23" high. 68.86

539 OBJECT WITH HUMAN FACE

Puerto Rico, Taino, I30G-I400 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 5!" high. 57.272

537 538
 540 LIDDED VESSEL WITH FANTASTIC
Central Atncrica CROCODILE
The isthmus area that connects the two large continents of Costa Rica, about 300 A.D.
North and South America includes Panama, Costa Rica, Guanacaste province
Clay, 32" high. s6.I78
and Nicaragua. They are considered a basic cultural unit,
one that was influenced by the greater cultures of Peru to
541 STANDING FIGURE HOLDING
the south and Mexico to the north. The archeology of TROPHY HEAD
Nicaragua is little known, while that of Panama and Costa Costa Rica, about 1000 A.D.
Rica has received considerable attention. Much of this has Central Plateau, Reventaz6n area
been occasioned by the gold found in the Panama-Costa Stone, 34!" high. 56.279
Rica area, and by Costa Rica's notable stone sculpture. The
small ornamental objects of jade from the Nicoya and 542 CEREMONIAL METATE
Linea Vieja areas, and the large, elaborately carved cere- Costa Rica, about 1000 A.D.
monial stone pieces from the Highland and Diquis areas, arc Central Plateau, Reventazon area
outstanding. The Highland sculpture in particular is well Stone, 29" long. 56.290
designed and executed. The subject matter and decorative
543 OFFERING TABLE
elements of the larger pieces arc rather straightforward
Costa Rica, about 1000 A.D.
human and animal figures, while that of the jades is a more
Atlantic watershed area
complex mixture. Stone, 9" high. 62.103

544 GROUP OF BLUE JADE OBJECTS

Costa Rica, soo-I200 A.D. .
Nicoya and Linea Vieja
Jade, from rt to 5!" high
59-41, 59-46, 59-52, 59-58
59.6o, 59-62, 65.25, 65.64

545 STYLIZED FIGURE

Costa Rica, 50D-1200 A.D.
Linea Vieja, said to be from La Union area
Stone, 4i" high. 66.13

546 STYLIZED TOUCAN

Costa Rica, SOD-1200 A.D.
Said to be from Guanacaste province
Stone, 6!" long. 65.63

547 CEREMONIAL METATE

Honduras, 8oo-12oo A.D.
Said to be from the Aguan valley
Stone, 39i" long. 59.120

541
543 1 542
 Mexico
Ancient Mexican culture is not, strictly speaking, confmed
to Mexico. The important areas of indigenous civilization
were central-to-south Mexico (the arid north was relatively
isolated from the cultural mainstream), Guatemala, British
Honduras, and parts of El Salvador and Honduras. So
geographically untidy is this spilling over of Mexican cul-
ture into different modern countries that the name Meso-
america has been devised to incorporate them all. This
cultural area is divided into two parts-central Mexico,
which produced the civilization properly known as Mexi-
can, and the Maya area, extending from southern Mexico
south to the limits of Mesoamerica. The Mexican and Maya
areas are artistically even more distinct than they are cul-
turally.
Although their remains are meager compared to those
of North America proper, big-game hunters were certainly
present in central Mexico before 7000 B.c. The vital cul-
tural contribution was made by the hunter-gatherers of the
subsequent period, when Mexico played an important role
in the domestication of food plants, the most important of
which was corn. Corn, originally a highland grass, was the
staple food upon which all civilized Indian life in the New
World developed. It appeared in domesticated form in the
highlands of south-central Mexico by 4000 B.c. and is
known to have spread as far south as Peru by 1soo B.c.
The cultural phases of ancient Mexico are defined as
preclassic, classic, and postclassic. In the early preclassic
period, or between 2000 and 1000 B.c., the Olmecs made
their spectacular appearance on the Gulf Coast in the states
ofTabasco and Veracruz. With them, ceremonial centers,
large stone monuments, and luxury goods entered Mexican
culture.
Olmec art exists today in very large-scale to very small-
scale stone sculpture, and in ceramic sculpture and vessels.
It is fundamentally realistic in form, has solidity and mass,
and exhibits considerable refinement of finish. Central to
its iconography is an anthropomorphic jaguar, believed to
be the earliest form of rain god in Mexico. Olmec remains
are found in areas far from the Gulf Coast, but the nature
of the contact these remains indicate is unresolved. Olmec
544. 544. 544, 545 influence on both contemporary and later peoples, however,
is acknowledged to be extensive. symbolism that allowed for the assimilation of gods and
In the late phases of Olmec art, two major stylistic trends their attributes from earlier, neighboring, and conquered
began. Into the Maya area to the south went a trend toward peoples. The intellectual bias of the militarily oriented
low-relief representational sculpture, with involved, societies produced an art of extraordinary austerity and
voluted shapes. Into central Mexico, particularly to the power in which ideas of death were frequently present. Such
Valley of Mexico area, went the solidity, balanced volume, was Aztec art when it was first seen by Europeans in the
and monumental scale of three-dimensional sculpture. It early sixteenth century.
is the Valley of Mexico and these last artistic characteristics
that dominate the subsequent classic period. The great city
of Teotihuacan, located not far outside modern Mexico
City, was the leading cultural force, and its art had rugged
grace and strong angularity. Another important art area
during the classic period was central Veracruz, in and
around the site ofTajin. It is noted for its elaborately orna-
mented stone ball-game paraphernalia. The ritual ball
game was played from early through late times and was of
grave importance. Stone representations of equipment used
for the game include objects known as yokes, palmas, and
hachas. Those of classic-period Veracruz arc richly decorated
with volutes and include human and animal figures and
motifs. During both the preclassic and classic periods central
Veracruz als~ produced an important amount of clay sculp-
ture, some of which reached amazingly large size.
The classic period ended at different times in different
parts of Mexico. Teotihuacan was the first center to
succumb, the city destroyed by invaders about A.D. 6so. In
other areas the period lasted until A.D. 900, at which time
the postclassic is considered to begin. The postclassic was a
period of great change. Ancient patterns were altered, new
ideologies evolved. The most outwardly meaningful change
was a new aggressiveness, manifest in highly developed
military states.
The art of the postclassic period is elegant, varied, and
technically excellent. All available materials and possible
techniques were employed to produce a wide range of
luxury goods and ceremonial objects. Gold (which appears
only now-late-in Mexico), jade, bone, shell, feathers-
all can be found in delicately wrought yet highly dramatic
personal ornaments. Unusually thin, colorfully surfaced
pottery of functional shape was used, at least by the Aztec
nobility. Ceremonial objects of stone attained great size.
The complex iconography of the period is part of a religious
 • Tampico

.i Chupecuaro

• Ttollhuaun Gulf of Mt.rico

C:O.ima

Mltho.ca n
.
6 Tiahlco

Mh.to C•ty • Cho4ula

More5os C.mpodlo

Pacific Oc:t•n .
lguotla
Vt rikruz

Guefft ro • La Venta
• San Lcwenzo
.
V1llaherl'r'JOU

Monte Alban
•
MEXICO

• Ard•HOk>&K~I siles
• MOdern Cities
St~tes--bofd fac:e
 Pre-Classic Paiod

548 ALTAR IN FORM OF JAGUAR

Olmec, 8oo-400 B.c.
Possibly from highland
Chiapas-Guatemala area
Stone, 32!" long. 57·7

549 CROUCHING FIGURE

Olmcc, I20o-400 n.c.
Provenience unknown
Stone, wf' high. 57.295

550 STANDING FIGURE

Olmec, 1200-400 B.c.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 5!" high. 58.3 r8

551 FIGURE SEATED ON BENCH

Olmcc, 1200-400 B.c.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 4!" high. 60.151

552 FIGURE SEATED ON BENCH

Olmec, 800-400 B.C.
Chiapas, said to be from Villa Flores area
Stone, 61" high. 64.19

553 ORNAMENTAL MASK

Olmec, 1200-400 B.C.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 31" high. 57.260

554 ORNAMENTAL MASK FRAGMENT

Olmec, 1200-400 B.c.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 2i" high. 57.168
551 I 555
553
555 INCISED CELT
Olmec, I200-40o B.C.
Provenience unknown
Jade, I4i" high. 56.52

556 PECTORAL
Olmec, 1200-400 B.C.
Provenience unknown
Jade, 4t" wide. 6o. 152

557 CEREMONIAL OBJECT ('spoon')

Olmec, 1200-400 B.c.
Guerrero
Jade, 6g'' long. 65.107

558 SEATED FIGURE

Olmec, 1200-400 B.c.
From Las Bocas, Pucbla
Clay, red pigment, 13~" high. 65.28

559 BOTTLE
Olmec, 1200-400 B.C.
From Las Bocas, Puebla
Clay, red pigment, 7!" high. 63.48

560 BOWL
Olmec, 1200-400 B.C.
From San Martin Texmelucan, Puebla
Clay, traces of pigment, 4!" high. 56. I 57

561 SMALL YOKE

Olmec, 800-400 B.C.
Said to be from Guerrero
Stone, 7!" high. 58.2oo

562 SMALL YOKE

Olmec, 800-400 B.c.
Tlatilco, Valley of Mexico
Stone, 5i" high. 64.35

558
563 MASK
Tlatilco, 90o-3oo B.C.
Valley of Mexico
Clay, pigment, 5!'' high. 63.3 I

564 GROUP OF FIGURES

Tlatilco, 90o-300 B.c.
Valley of Mexico
Clay, pigments, from 2j- to 5l" high. 61.15I
61.153, 61.155-.157, 61.163

565 GROUP OF FIGURES

Chupicuaro, 30o-1oo B.c.
Guanc\.iuato
Clay, pigments, from I! to d" high
59.78, 61.129, 61.131-.132
61.143-.144, 61.147.:...148

566 VESSEL, FIGURE SEATED ON STOOL

Central Highlands, 90o-300 B.C.
Possibly from Tlatilco
Clay, 13!" high. 65.142

567 MONKEY HEAD JAR

Monte Alban 1(?), 8oo-300 B.c.
Oaxaca
Clay, 8!" high. 57.199

568 VESSEL WITH EFFIGY FIGURE

Monte Alban II, JOo-IOo B.c.
Oaxaca
Clay, 7i" high. 61.32

569 STAND I NG F1 GURE

Mezcala, 300 B.C.-300 A.D.
Guerrero
Stone, 6~" high. 69.10

572
564, 564, 564
I 573
570 STANDING FIGURE
Mezcala, 300 B.C.-300 A.D.
Guerrero
Stone, 13!" high. 59.266
Gift of Luis de Hoyos

571 STANDING FIGURE

Mczcala, 300 s.c.-300 A.D.
Guerrero
Stone, 4" high. 68.47

572 MASK
Mezcala, 300 n.c.-300 A.D.
Guerrero
Stone, s!" high. 57.137

573 TEMPLE, WITH RECLINING FIGURE

Mezcala, 300 n.c.-300 A.D.
Guerrero
Stone, 7-!" high. 57.104

Classic Period

574 STANDING FIGURE

Teotihuacan, 200-600 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 16!'' high. 57.201

575 MASK
Teotihuacan, 2oo-6oo A.D.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 9i" high. 57. I 17

576 MASK
Teotihuacan, 2oo-6oo A.D.
Guerrero
Onyx, 7!" high. 67.118

574 1 575
 577 SEATED FIGURE
Teotihuacan, 2oo-6oo A.D.
Provenience unknown
Stone, I!" high. 58.48

578 · TRIPOD BOWL

Teotihuacan, 2oo-6oo A.D.
Valley of Mexico
Clay, 91" high. 56.154

579 YOKE
Classic Veracruz, 30o-900 A.D.
Veracruz, said to be from Papantla area
Stone, I 51" long. 56.280

580 YOKE
Classic Veracruz, 300-900 A .D.
Veracruz, said to be from Papantla area
Stone, I7i" long. 56.281

581 CLOS1ED YOKE

Classic'Veracruz, 30o-900 A·. D •.
Veracruz
Stone, I8l" long. 56.336

582 PALMA
Classic Veracruz, 30o-900 A.D.
Veracruz, said to be from Nautla area
Stone, I8i" high. 56.283

583 PALMA
Classic Veracruz, 300-90D A.D.
Veracruz, said to be from Nautla area
Stone, 201" high. 56 .284

584 HACHA IN FORM OF FISH

Classic Vera cruz, 30o-900 A .D.
Veracruz, Ignacio de la Llavc(?)
Stone, shell inlays, paint, I 41" high. 66. I 2
579 J sso
585 HACHA, HEAD IN JAGUAR MASK
Classic Vera cruz, 30<>-900 A.D.
Veracruz
Stone, 8!" high. 56.163

586 HACHA, HANDS

Classic Veracruz, 30<>-900 A.D.
Veracruz
Stone, 7" _high. 62.48

587 WHISTLE, STANDING FIGURE

WITH BIRD HEAD
Classic Vera cruz, 300--900 A.D.
Veracruz
Clay, 20!" high. 61.73

588 HOWLING COYOTE

Remojadas, 300--900 A.D.
Veracruz
Cia y, paint, 20" high. 60. I 8 5

589 SEATED FEMALE FIGURE

Remojadas, 30<>-900 A.D.
Veracruz
Clay, 3ll" high. 61.23

590 HALF FIGURE OF EHECATL (God of wind)

Remojadas(?), 30<>--900 A.D.
Veracruz, said to be from San Andres Tuxtla
Clay, 33!" high. 57.132

591 VESSEL IN FORM OF BOUND PRISONER

Colima, 30o-6oo A.D.
State of Colima
Clay, 21" high. 57·3

592 VESSEL IN FORM OF WARRIOR

Colima, 30o-<'ioo A.D.
State of Colima
Clay, 14i" high. 57·9
593 VESSEL-IN FORM OF CRA YFISII
Colima, 3oo-6oo A.D.
State of Colima
Clay, I3!" long. 68.6r

594 PAIR OF SEATED FIGURES

Nayarit, 30o-6oo A.D.
State of Nayarit
Clay, slip, I6t" high. 66.47

595 KNEELING FEMALE FIGURE

Nayarit (Chinesco), 30o-6oo A.D.
State of Nayarit
Clay, slip, I r" high. 63.65

596 VESSEL, FIGURE WITH HEAD ,ON ARMS

Nayarit, 30o-6oo A.D.
State of Nayarit
Clay, slip, 7§" high. 63.88

Post-Classic Period

597 TLALOC MASK (God of rain)

Mixteca-Puebla, 1250-1500 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 5!" high. 62.169

598 PENDANT FIGURE

Mixteca-Puebla, 1250-1500 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Stone, 2i" high. 62.21

599 PLAQUE
Mixteca-Puebla, 1250-1500 A.D.
Said to have been found in Guerrero
Stone, 5!'' long. 64.38

6oo PART OF THROWING STICK(?)

Mixteca-Puebla, 1250-1500 A.D.
Oaxaca
Antler, 5" high. 57.89
601 COLLAR-BASE BOWL
Mixteca-Puebla, 1250-1500 A.D.
Puebla, possibly from Cholula
Clay, polychrbme slip, d" high. 56.155

602 MACUILXOCHITL (God offlowers

music, and dance)
Mixteca-Puebla, 1250-1500 A.D.
Oaxaca, said to come from Tcotitlan
del Camino
Clay, paint, 22i" high. s6.160

603 MACUILXOCHITL HEAD (God offlowcrs

Music, and dance)
Mixteca-Pucbla, 125o-1 500 A.D.
Oaxaca
Clay, paint, 7!" high. 56.158

604 EFFIGY VESSEL, POSSIBLY EIIECATL

(God of wind)
Mixteca-Puebla(?), 125o-1500 A.D.
Provenience unknown
Onyx, 9!" high. 61.33

605 EFFIGY VESSEL, MONKEY

HOLDING ITS TAIL
Mixtcca-Puebla(?), 1250-1500 A.D.
Said to have been found in Michoacan
Onyx, inlays, 7t'' high. 66.1

606 FIG UR E 0 F MAN LEAN IN G 0 N ST AH

Huastec, 90o-12oo A.D.
Northern Veracruz.
Stone, 34~" high. 56.291

607 HEAD (from a figure)

Huastcc, 900-I200 A.D.
Northern Veracruz
Stone, 8" high. 58.46

597
594
598, 599
6oo, 6or 602
608 VESSEL IN FORM OF SEA TED FIGURE
Huastec, J40D-1500 A.D.
N orthem Vera cruz
Clay, paint, 13!" high. 65.75

609 BOWL, VULTURE WITH MOVABLE HEAD

Isla de Sacrificios, J40D-I sao A.D.
Central Veracruz, from Boca del Rio
Clay, slip, 12!" long. 61.105

610 RATTLESNAKE
Aztec, 130D-1520 A.D.
Valley of Mexico(?)
Stone, 14" high. 57.2

611 QUETZALCOATL
Aztec, 130D-1520 A.D.
Valley of Mexico(?)
Stone, 22!" high. 57.242

612 XIPE TOTEC (God of growth

and rejuvenation)
Aztec, 130D-1520 A.D.
Said to have been found in Puebla
Clay, 56!" high. 63.162

613 TRIPOD VESSEL

Aztec, 1327-1481 A.D.
Valley of Mexico(?)
Clay, 141" high. s6.150

604, 6os / 6o6

6o8 \ 610
6II I 6!2
Maya Area the lintels attain a depth of seven feet. Some of the few
wood lintels that have survived, as well as some of the
Maya art is one of the great American contributions to the many carved in stone, have retained enough trace of paint
art of the world. Its diversity of form and variety of style, to recall their original bright polychrome surface.
its individuality and sophistication of image make it unique N otablc among the Maya ceramics arc the hollow figur-
in the New W odd. Mexican art, by contrast, is solid, ines found in burials on the island of Jaina off the Campeche
strong, and traditional; Maya art is fluid, graceful, and coast. These figures, many of which were painted, usually
spontaneous. It could be called the most beautiful that represent a warrior, priest, or ball player.
ancient America produced. The most important period in The bright polychrome ceramic vessels of the Maya are
this art is the classic, from A.D. 300 to 900, -corresponding to particularly interesting in that the spontaneous brushwork
the same period in Mexican culture. The Maya of preclassic on their surfaces is perhaps the principal surviving instance
times are imperfectly known, and by the postclassic period of Maya painting. Only a small number of wall paintings
warrior peoples from central Mexico dominated Yucatan, are known, but on vessel as on wall the painting of the
the last focus of Maya culture. Maya is twe-dimehsional, space-filling, linear work of
Maya art divides into three distinct style areas: the much sureness and subtlety.
southern, located in the highlands of the Pacific coast; the
central, in the rain forests of northern Guatemala; and the
northern, in the Mexican states at the top of the Yucatan
peninsula. It was the central area that produced the might-
iest of classic-period centers and the art that is most fre-
quently taken to exemplify the Maya style.
The Maya are known for their sculpture, architecture,
painting, and a multitude of minor arts-personal luxury
objects ofjade and shell, ritual and burial pieces of obsidian
and flint, ceramic forms in great variety. Free-standing
sculpture, the commemorative stones known as steles and
their associated altars, and the architecture of the great
ceremonial centers are the most spectacular of Maya forms.
Since there is rather little organization of interior or ex-
terior space, this architecture may perhaps be considered
as enormously large-scale sculpture. It is characterized by
its mass, by the formal relationships of one structure to
another, and by its ornate exterior decoration of fa<;:ades,
walls, roof combs, staircases, and courtyards. Within the
main ceremonial areas, among the pyramids, temples, and
palaces, were set the sculptured altars and steles. The steles,
large rectangular stones, are carved, usually in low relief,
on from one to four sides. They were erected to record im-
portant events or to mark important calendar days, time
calculations being a principal Maya interest.
Another, more unusual, place for low-relief commemora-
tive panels was on the lintels of temple or palace doorways.
The walls of these structures were so massive that some of
 Campeche

Uaxactun •

.
• KamtnaiJuyu

Guatemala Ctt y Honduru

Pxit ic Ou~n
THE MAYA AREA

• ArchHOk>CJCII lites
• Modern cities
- Boundaries between MtJCiean states
- Boundtnes between count rtn
6I4 KNEELING FIGURE OF DIGNITARY
OR PRIEST
Early Classic Maya, about 500 A.D.
Mexico, said to have been found near
Tabasco-Guatemala border
Wood, I4" high. 62.172

615 DOUBLE-CHAMBERED VESSEL

Early Classic Maya, 30o-6oo A.D.
Mexico or possibly the Peten area
Clay, ut" high. 62.46

616 CYLINDRICAL JAR, MYTHOLOGICAL

SCENE
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Mexico
Clay, slip, 5!" high. 68.7

617 CYLINDRICAL VESSEL, TWO

DIGNITARIES
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Mexico
Clay, polychrome slip, 6!" high. 67.I21

618 CYLINDRICAL JAR, ENTHRONED

FIGURES
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Guatemala, said to be from Nebaj area
Clay, polychrome slip, 8i" high. 67.1
Gift of Mrs. Gertrud A. Mellon

619 CYLINDRICAL VESSEL, BIRD-HEADED

FIGURES
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Guatemala
Clay, polychrome slip, 7!" high. 64.I5

620 BOWL
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Mexico, Yucatan
Clay, 4!" high. 62.I05

617
615
6I8
621 TRIPOD PLATE, DANCING FIGURE
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Mexico, Campeche
Clay, polychrome slip, IIi" diameter. 64.33

622 WHISTLE IN FORM OF THE FAT GOD

Late Classic Maya, 6oo-900 A.D.
Mexico, said to be from Uaymil Island
Campeche
Clay, paint, ut" high. 61.72

623 FIGURE WITH REMOVABLE HELMET MASK

Late Classic Maya, 6oo-9oo A.D.
Mexico, from Jaina Island, Campeche
Clay, 6§-" high. 65.I I6

624 URN, FIGURE STANDING ON TURTLE

Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Mexico, Chiapas
Clay, traces of paint, 2Il~' high. 63.I
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wielgus

625 LINTEL, PRESENTATION SCENE

Late Classic Maya, 6oo-900 A.D.
Mexico, Yaxchilan-Bonampak area
Chi apas
Stone, paint, 35" high. 62.102

626 COLUMN
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Mexico, Campeche(?)
Stone, 68!-'' high. 62.3.

627 STEI.A
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Guatemala, from Piedras Negras
Stone, 96" high. 63.I63
621 1 622
628 ORNAMENTS
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 )\.D.
Provenience unknown
Shell, 2~ and 31" high. 63.18, 6r.69
Gift of Mrs. Gertrud A. Mellon: 63.18

629 0 RNA MEN T

Pre-Classic Maya, 300 B.C.-300 A.D.
Guatemala, from Kaminaljuyu
Jade, 3!" long. 60.153
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Julius Carlebach

630 CROSS-LEGGED FIGURE

Early Classic Maya, 300-600 A.D.
Honduras, from Copan area
Jade, 4!" high. 63.21

631 SCEPTER, HEADDRESSED FIGURE

WITH SMALLER FIGURE ON BACK
Late Classic Maya, 600-900 A.D.
Guatemala, Peten area
Eccentric flint, I3i" high. 67.63

632 HEAD OF CHAC (God of rain)

Maya-Toltec, 900-1000 A.D.
Mexico, from Chichen Itza, Yucatan
Stone, 13!" high. 57.66

624 625
North America The basic medium of Northwest Coast art is wood, and
it was the increased availability of metal tools and income
North America never attained the cultural importance of from the fur trade that accounted for much of its dynamic
its southern neighbors. Much impetus came from Mexico, development in the first half of the. nineteenth century. Tlus
as in the Souti1west-the only North American area in is an art of formal precision, symbolic design, and strong
which a cultural tradition can be traced continuously from color. It appears in totem poles, house posts, and mural
its remote beginnings into historic times. Here com cultiva- paintings, all of monumental character, and in household
tion and pottery making-the two vital components of utensils, fishing implements, personal ornaments, ceremonial
New World civilization-originated under Mexican in- costumes, masks, and dance accessories.
fluence. Much later, in the Mississippian tradition of the The culture of the Plains Indians, which so appeals to the
Southeast, specific formal and iconographic similarities to romantic imagination, was totally dependent upon the
Mesoamerican art can be found. horse, an animal introduced to the New World by the
Arctic North America was inhabited by a people racially Spanish. The art of these Indians, particularly painting in
and linguistically different from the American Indian, the its later forms, is perhaps the most acculturated to be found
Eskimo, who developed a hunting culture specifically on the continent. Their pictorial tradition for recounting
adapted to the conditions of the northern climate. Eskimo heroic exploits in the life of a warrior or chief was trans-
art, produced in its most characteristic and continuous form formed, for a very brief period, into the glorification of
in northern Alaska, appeared about 300 B.C., with ivory Plains Indian life and values. Simple outline drawings
hunting implements and tools (now beautifully patined), (many made with stencils), bright flat colors, and tradi-
and lasted, with considerable changes, until the early tional symbols were put down on animal hides, fabric, and
twentieth century. paper, with Indian, white man, and horse presented in an
The Indian of North America, because of his great idiom clearly influenced by white imagery and taste.
cultural diversity and lack of a centralized civilization such These drawings are pictorially unsophisticated and 'charm-
as existed in Mexico and Peru, maintained himself longer ingly' naive, yet they are beautiful and vital statements
in the face of the European onslaught. From the sixteenth about a way of life that was dying even as the works of art
century on he was gradually pushed from his lands, and were being produced.
in the I 88os, when there was no further place for him to go,
he was fmally isolated onto reservations. During this period
of increasing confinement at least two vigorous artistic
traditions flourished, reaching their peak in the nineteenth
century: the art of the Northwest Coast Indians and that
of the Plains Indians, the latter the redskin par excellence
of movie and television.
633 GROUP OF IVORY OBJECTS
Eskimo, 100 B.C.-700 A.D.
Alaska
Ivory, from 31- to 7-k" long
57.273. s8.s. 61.241, 64.54-·57
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond
Wielgus: 61.241

634 MASK
Eskimo, late 19th century
Alaska, Kuskokwim River
Wood, paint, feathers, string, 45!" high
61.39

635 MASK
Eskimo, late 19th century
Alaska, Kuskokwim River
Wood, paint, 193" high. 61.40

636 MASK
Eskimo, 19th century(?)
Alaska
Wood, paint, feathers, rawhide, 24" high
63.167

637 CLUB
British Columbia, date uncertain
Area of Skeena River
Stone, 14!" long. 64.81

638 STANDING FEMALE FIGURE

Kwakiutl, 19th century(?)
British Columbia
Wood, so" higb.. 56.205

639 HEADDRESS ORNAMENT

Tsimshian(?), 19th century
British Columbia
Wood, paint, shell inlays, 7i" high. 56.333
640 HEADDRESS ORNAMENT
Style undetermined, late 19th century
Alaska or British Columbia
Wood, paint, shell inlays, 7i" high. 57.277

641 RATTLE IN FORM OF CRANE

Style undetermined, late 19th century
Alaska or British Columbia
Wood, ivory, 8!" high. 56.334

642 RATTLE
Tsimshian, late 19th century
British Columbia
Wood, leather, 12g'' high
62.152

643 CEREMONIAL COPPER

Tlingit, late 19th century
Alaska
Copper, 34i" high. 65.104

644 fiGHTING KNIFE

Tlingit, late 19th century
Alaska
Ivory, iron, shell inlays, leather, 14i" high
59.103

645 DEAD-MAN MASK

Tlingit, 19th century(?)
Alaska
Wood, paint, hide, metal, 13~" high. 56.330

646 SEA-BEAR MASK

Haida or Tlingit, late 19th century
British Columbia or Alaska
Copper, fur, shell inlays, 12" high. 58.329
64 7 PAIR 0 r PADDLES 649 'SLAVE-KILLER'
ffaida, late 19th century California, date uncertain
British Columbia Provenience unknown
Wood, paint, 56" long. 66.58 Stone, IJi" long. 59.214

648 'SLAVE-KILLER' 650 THREE FIGURES

Columbia River, date uncertain Columbia River, mid-18th century
Oregon, found ncar Sauvies Island Oregon, area of the Dalles
Stone, 141" long. 58.229 Bone, 61 to 7" high. 68.82-.84
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Robert W. Campbell
651 ARROW SHAFT STRAIGHTENER
Columbia River, 14th century
Oregon, area of the Dalles
Stone, si" long. 68.85
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Robert W. Campbell

652 PIPE OR SMOKE BLOWER IN

FORM OF WHALE
Cafialino, about 1000 A.D.
California, from Arroyo Sequit Canyon(?)
Los Angeles County
Stone, shell inlays, 16!" long. 57.I34

653 'PELICAN STONE'

Cafialino, about 1000 A.D.
California, Los Angeles County(?)
Stone, shell and pearl inlays, 4!" high
58.216

654 TWO WHISTLES AND FLUTE

Cafialino, about 1000 A.D.
California, from Arroyo Sequit
Canyon(?), Los Angeles County
Bone, shell and quartz inlay in asphalt
9! to I3" high. 56.2oi-.203

655 KNEELING FIGURE

Mississippian (Temple Mound II period)
120G-I600 A.D.
Tennessee, from the Duck River
Stone, 26!'' high. 57.1

656 HEAD {from a figure)

Mississippian (Temple Mound II period)
120o-I6oo A.D.
Tennessee, found near Clarksville
Stone, 7r' high. 65.68

657 PENDANT WITH RATTLESNAKE DESIGN

Mississippian (Temple Mound II period)
I20G-I600 A.D.
Tennessee, from Chickamuaga Creek
Shell, 4!" high. 56.389
6so, 6so
658 MASKS
Mississippian (Temple Mound II period)
1200-1600 A.D.
Tennessee, from Williams Island
Shell, 6~ and 6£'' high. 58.77-.78

659 BOTTLE
Caddoan, 120o-16oo A.D.
Arkansas, from Yell County
Clay, 8!" high. 61.244
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wielgus

660 SKETCHBOOK (88 drawings)

Cheyenne and Arapaho, dated I 884
Oklahoma, made on Darlington
Agency reservation
Watercolor, ink, colored and lead
pencil on paper
Page size IIlX 5!''. 68.12

661 BUFFALO ROBE WITH WOMAN'S DESIGN

Arapaho, 19th century
Wyoming
Hide, paint, 73 X So". 64.50

662 WAR GOD

Pueblo, 19th-2oth century
New Mexico, Zuni
Wood, traces of paint, 29!" high. 64.8
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Raymond Wielgus

663 KACHINA MASK

Pueblo, zoth century
New Mexico, Zuni
Hide, paint, feathers, cotton, 9f' high. 64.2

664 KACHINA MASK

Pueblo, 2oth century
New Mexico, Santo Domingo or Cochiti
Hide, wood, paint, feathers, gourd
13t" high. 64.1