The Cleveland Museum of Art
Collection Online as of April 25, 2024
Ear Spool
c. 400–900
Diameter: 3.1 cm (1 1/4 in.); Overall: 3.2 cm (1 1/4 in.)
Roberta Holden Bole Fund 1958.191
Location: 233 Mesoamerican and Intermediate Region
Description
Harvard archaeologists excavated the eight ornaments in this case from several burials at Sitio Conte, a cemetery famous for its lavish graves of powerful chieftains. The young man buried in Grave 26 was such a chief. His status was stunningly memorialized by 21 human companions and 475 objects, many of them personal ornaments made of gold, including the large chest plaque (no. 2) and the rod-shaped ear ornament (no. 3) shown here. The creature on the chest plaque, found close to the chief’s body, has reptile claws and perhaps the head crest of an iguana. Its meaning is unknown but perhaps, as in later periods, reptilian imagery and the warm gleam of gold linked rulers with the sun’s creative force.- These ear spools were excavated by the Harvard Peabody Museum between 1930 and 1933.
- Cleveland Museum of Art. The CMA Companion: A Guide to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2014. Mentioned and reproduced: P. 336
- {{cite web|title=Ear Spool|url=false|author=|year=c. 400–900|access-date=25 April 2024|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}
Source URL:
https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1958.191