Native American Fossils Ancient and Modern Art

Lot: 1 - Anasazi Chaco Black-on-White Chocolate Drinking Vessel

Native American, Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi), Chaco Black-on-White. A Chaco black-on-white pitcher built for a drink that traveled some fifteen hundred miles to reach it. The body swells to a low globe and stops at a shoulder folded sharp as a seam; above it the neck rises straight and untapered, with a strap handle arcing from just below the rim down to the break. There is no pouring lip, and none was intended. Archaeologists call the form a pitcher out of long habit, but the proportions are those of a tankard, sized to be gripped in one hand and set down where the company could see who held it. Mineral black over a chalk-white slip carries the ornament: barbed diagonals panelled against fields of fine hatching, pendant ticks stitched around the shoulder, solid chevrons descending the lower body. Vessels with this exact silhouette, vertical-necked and sharp-shouldered, belong to a very short list. At Pueblo Bonito only three ceramic forms have yielded the methylxanthine residues associated with imported stimulant beverages: cylinder jars, shallow bowls, and pitchers of this type. Roughly two in five tested pitchers came back positive. Cacao is the likely ingredient, carried north from the Aztatlan coast of western Mexico along the same route that brought scarlet macaws, copper bells, and conch trumpets into the San Juan Basin while turquoise moved south. Holly imported from the Southeast remains a candidate the chemistry cannot fully exclude. Either way the drink was rare, costly, and consumed in public, and the vessel that held it was doing social work as much as hydraulic. Chacoans appear to have taken theirs hot. Sandstone discs found alongside related forms have been read as lids, and controlled experiments confirm that a tall, narrow profile holds heat far better than an open bowl. The Maya, and later the Aztec, raised the foam on their chocolate by pouring it from a vessel held at chest height into another set on the ground, a performance a handled pot executes rather well, and one Chacoan practice may have echoed. These pitchers ended in ceremony as often as in the midden. Chacoans stacked them across doorways as symbolic barriers, sealing rooms that held things outsiders were not meant to see, and terminated others by fire, killing the object rather than simply discarding it. They also accompanied adults into burial, more often at the great houses than at the outlying farmsteads. Item # 204500

Lot: 2 - Prehistoric Anasazi Tularosa Black-on-White Jar

Native American, Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi), Tularosa Black-on-white. A full-bodied earthenware pitcher whose short cylindrical neck rises from a low, rounded shoulder, joined to the wall by a strap handle built from three side-by-side ropes of clay, their ridges left frankly visible. Over a chalky white slip the painter laid two registers in brown-black pigment: nested rectangular frets encircling the neck, and across the belly a sweep of stepped keys and interlocking scrolls in which solid bands and reserved ground trade places. The result is the disciplined asymmetry Pueblo painters prized, figure and field balanced so that neither wins. Vessels of this class, made in the Cibola white ware tradition of west-central New Mexico and the Mogollon Rim country, likely served to carry and pour water in domestic use. Tularosa Black-on-white belongs to the Cibola White Ware sequence, produced across west-central New Mexico and east-central Arizona during the Pueblo III period. Its signature is the interlocking scroll, a rectilinear or curvilinear hook that repeats and reverses across the vessel body, with solid elements set against finely hatched counterparts so that neither figure nor ground dominates. Potters achieved the palette without glaze, painting a carbon or iron-bearing pigment over a kaolin-rich slip and firing in a reducing atmosphere. The coiled strap handle is a distinctive constructional choice. Rather than pulling a single flattened band of clay, the potter rolled three ropes and pressed them side by side, leaving the ridges standing proud, a technique that both strengthened the join and echoed the coil-and-scrape method by which the vessel body itself was raised. This item may fall under the Safeguard Tribal Objects of Patrimony (STOP) Act or other federal laws protecting Native American, Alaska Native, or Native Hawaiian cultural heritage. As such, it is not eligible for international shipping, and may also be subject to repatriation or tribal consultation within the United States. Buyers are responsible for ensuring their legal right to acquire, possess, or transfer this item under all applicable laws. This lot cannot be shipped outside the United States. Item # 204513

Lot: 3 - Prehistoric Anasazi Tularosa Black-on-White Olla,

Native American, Ancestral Puebloan, Tularosa Black-on-White. A wide-shouldered olla of buff ceramic, its globular body rising to a short cylindrical neck and everted lip, dressed overall in a chalky white slip and painted in dark mineral pigment. The body carries a dense field of interlocking stepped scrolls and sawtooth-edged frets, the negative white lines reading as forcefully as the painted ones, a hallmark of the Tularosa design vocabulary. The neck is banded separately with rectilinear panels and pendant dot clusters, divided from the shoulder by a framing line and a row of tick marks. Vessels of this scale served household storage of water, grain, or seed in the pueblos of the Cibola and Mogollon Rim country, where such painted jars doubled as statements of a potter's command of layout. The rim interior retains traces of the same dark pigment. Tularosa Black-on-White belongs to the Cibola White Ware tradition of west-central New Mexico and east-central Arizona, produced during the Pueblo III horizon. Its diagnostic signature is the interlocking scroll: opposed spirals built from solid and hatched elements, arranged so that the unpainted ground carries equal weight to the pigment. Painters worked with a mineral-based iron paint over a kaolinite slip, firing in a reducing atmosphere to hold the white ground bright. The type is closely allied to Reserve Black-on-White, from which it develops, and the two are often separated by the increasing dominance of scroll layouts and the finer hatching that distinguishes Tularosa work. Item # 204503

Lot: 4 - Kayenta Anasazi Black on White Bowl with Hatched Bands

Native American, Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi), Kayenta Branch. A hemispherical earthenware bowl painted in dense organic black on a chalky white slip, the interior given over to broad panels of fine parallel lines set at opposing diagonals so that the light ground reads as a lattice of negative stripes. A narrow band of ticked dashes runs along the rim, and the lower interior is left plain, a deliberate pause that lets the busy upper register carry the eye. The exterior is unslipped and unpainted, its surface bearing faint traces of coil scraping. Vessels of this scale served as food bowls in Ancestral Puebloan households of the Four Corners, though examples in good condition were also placed as mortuary offerings. The tight, hatched geometry is characteristic of the Kayenta branch potters of northeastern Arizona and southern Utah. Kayenta potters, working the canyon country west of Chinle Wash and north into the Utah strip, developed one of the most disciplined design vocabularies in the Ancestral Puebloan world. Where Chaco and Mesa Verde painters favored broad solids and interlocked scrolls, Kayenta artisans pursued density: fields of hairline hatching, opposed diagonals, and eventually the full negative style of Tusayan Polychrome, in which the white ground rather than the pigment carries the pattern. The paint is a carbon (organic) black, reduced from boiled tansy mustard or Rocky Mountain beeweed, fired in a reducing atmosphere so it sinks into the slip rather than sitting on it, which explains the soft, slightly grey tone rather than the hard iron-mineral black of contemporaneous Cibola wares. Item # 204502

Lot: 5 - Ancestral Puebloan Anasazi Ladle, Eight-Point Star

Native American, Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi). A ceramic ladle of classic Southwestern form, its shallow rounded bowl rising at the end of a long trough-like handle raised from a single mass of coiled and scraped clay. Chalky white slip carries dark mineral paint: pendant solid triangles above fine diagonal hatching march the length of the handle, while the bowl interior holds stacked chevrons that resolve, when read from above, into a radiating eight-point star or sunburst framed by cross-hatched panels. Ladles of this type dipped stews and gruels from larger vessels, their painted interiors visible only as the bowl emptied, an aesthetic pleasure taken in a working utensil. The painter's line is steady and the registration of the motifs crisp, the work of practiced hands within a long black-on-white tradition of the Colorado Plateau. Ancestral Puebloan potters achieved black-on-white ware with two distinct paint technologies: mineral paints ground from iron and manganese ores, sometimes fluxed with lead, and organic paints boiled down from tansy mustard or beeweed. The two behave differently in the firing, the mineral producing a hard, slightly raised, occasionally brownish line, the organic sinking into the slip as a soft grey-black. Regional preference for one or the other remains one of the principal tools archaeologists use to sort wares by production area, alongside temper and slip. Dense diagonal hatching bounded by heavier solid framing lines belongs to a design tradition that flourished across the Four Corners during the Pueblo II and III periods, appearing on ware types including Escavada, Gallup, and Chaco Black-on-white. The radiating star that emerges from the chevrons is a compositional habit rather than a signature: Puebloan painters organized the interiors of round forms around a center point, and quartered or eight-part radial layouts recur on bowls, canteens, and ladles alike, echoing the directional cosmology still legible in later Pueblo iconography. Item # 204655

Lot: 6 - Large Prehistoric Anasazi / Hohokam Stone Mano

Native American, Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi) or Hohokam. A long loaf of dense gray stone, worn smooth by generations of grinding, this is a mano ("hand" in Spanish), the upper stone of the paired mano and metate that fed the ancient Southwest. Its unusual length indicates a two-hand mano, gripped at both ends and driven in a reciprocating stroke across a trough metate to reduce maize, seeds, and wild grains to meal. One face carries the flattened, faintly abraded wear of long use; the opposite curve retains the pecked, granular texture of the original cobble. Utilitarian objects of this kind sat at the center of household life in Pueblo and Hohokam villages, where the grinding room and its bins were as much a social space as a working one. Deceptively plain, and shaped almost entirely by labor rather than design. The shift from one-hand to two-hand manos in the American Southwest tracks the intensification of maize agriculture. Longer manos paired with trough metates increased the working surface and the throughput of the grind, and ethnographic and archaeological evidence alike show women working in sequences of bins holding progressively finer abrasive stones, moving the meal from coarse to fine. Estimates drawn from Puebloan contexts suggest hours of daily grinding per household, a labor cost visible in the skeletal record and in the mano itself: the flattened face here is the sum of thousands of strokes. This item may fall under the Safeguard Tribal Objects of Patrimony (STOP) Act or other federal laws protecting Native American, Alaska Native, or Native Hawaiian cultural heritage. As such, it is not eligible for international shipping, and may also be subject to repatriation or tribal consultation within the United States. Buyers are responsible for ensuring their legal right to acquire, possess, or transfer this item under all applicable laws. This lot cannot be shipped outside the United States. Item # 202171

Lot: 7 - Anasazi Pottery Sherd Group, Southwest, Black-on-White and Black-on-Red

Native American, Southwestern United States, Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi). A collection of pottery sherds from the American Southwest representing a range of wares and decorative techniques. Black-on-white examples carry hatched, solid, and stepped geometric designs. Black-on-red and polychrome sherds show banded and framed motifs in red and dark brown. Several corrugated utility sherds retain coiled and indented exterior surfaces, one with a punctate textured field. Also present are plain buff and redware body sherds, rim sherds with painted lip banding, and a larger fragment retaining a raised lug or handle stump. Sizes range from small body fragments to substantial rim and shoulder sections. Item # 191382

Lot: 8 - Rare Anasazi Mimbres Coral Animal Effigy Carving

Native American / Pre-Columbian, Southwestern United States / Northern Mexico, ca. 1000 to 1500 CE. A carved fossil coral figure depicting a rotund animal form with a compact body and short legs. The creature appears rodent-like, though the abstraction allows for multiple interpretations, such as bison or bear. The head is blocky and forward-facing, with minimal facial detail. The surface retains the natural porous texture of the fossil coral, with small cavities visible throughout. Size: 6" L x 25" W x 3.25" H (15.2 cm x 63.5 cm x 8.3 cm) Item # 201043

Lot: 9 - Mimbres Bichrome Bowl w/ Geometric Motif

Native American, Mogollon, Mimbres. A hemispherical earthenware bowl raised by hand from buff clay, its interior slipped in cream white and painted in iron-red with a broad encircling band. The design divides into panels of hatched parallel strokes, stepped frets, and a rectilinear scroll enclosing a reserved square, the negative white ground carrying as much of the composition as the pigment does. The exterior is left unslipped, fire-clouded gray and tan from an open firing. Bowls of this form served domestic purposes during life and were frequently placed with the dead, inverted over the face of the deceased. The geometric vocabulary here belongs to the Mimbres Boldface (Style I to II) tradition, in which layout and interval govern the eye rather than figural imagery. Mimbres potters of the Mogollon highlands of southwestern New Mexico produced, over roughly three centuries, one of the most disciplined painted ceramic traditions in North America. The earlier bichrome and boldface wares favor bold red geometry on a white slip: hatchure, stepped terraces, scrolls, and interlocking frets whose rhythm derives from basketry and textile layouts. Only later, in the Classic Black-on-white phase, do the celebrated figural scenes of rabbits, fish, bats, and composite beings appear. The tradition is also known for the ritual perforation of mortuary vessels, a small hole punched through the base at the time of interment and commonly described as "killing" the bowl to release its animating essence. The practice is well attested archaeologically in the Mimbres Valley, though not every excavated bowl received one. Item # 204499

Lot: 10 - Native American Woodland Period Carved Stone Face

Native American, Woodland culture. A human face pecked and incised into a waterworn pebble of tan-pink stone, its natural lobed silhouette read as a head with cheeks and a tapering chin. The maker worked with the blank rather than against it: two round drilled pits serve as eyes, a shallow gouged pit forms the nose, and a single deep horizontal groove cuts the mouth, with straight incisions above the eyes standing in for brows. Traces of reddish ochre-toned residue cling in the grooves and across the brow. Handheld effigy faces of this kind are known across eastern North America and are usually interpreted as amulets or personal charms, perhaps carried for protection, though the specific function of any single example remains unrecoverable. The reduction of a face to eyes, nose, and mouth on an unmodified cobble is one of the most persistent visual habits in Native North American art, from Archaic pebble effigies through Woodland and Mississippian portable sculpture. The economy is deliberate: the carver adds only what the stone will not supply on its own, so the identity of the object hovers between found form and made image. Pigment residue in the incisions, where it survives, suggests such pieces were once far more emphatic than their weathered surfaces now imply. Item # 202368

Lot: 11 - Pair of Woodland Stone Tools - Celt & Axe Head

Native American, North America, Woodland period, ca. 1000 BCE to 1000 CE. A well-preserved pair of Woodland period stone tools from Marshall County, Kentucky, comprising a smoothly polished light gray celt and a dark gray full-grooved axe head, each carefully shaped for hafting and reflecting the practical craftsmanship of Native American woodworking traditions. Size of larger: 4.3" L x 1.7" W x 2" H (10.9 cm x 4.3 cm x 5.1 cm) Item # 199614

Lot: 12 - Native American Archaic-Woodlands Bone Tool Collection

Native American, Midwestern to Southeastern United States, Archaic to Woodlands era, ca. 8000 BCE to 1800s CE. A collection of bone and antler tools representing assorted find sites, presented in a rectangular wood and glass display case lined with green felt. The assemblage includes awls, points, wedges, and worked fragments showing varied degrees of polish, tapering, and wear consistent with utilitarian use, with several pieces exhibiting surface patina, minor losses, or natural fissures from age and burial. Size central labeled awl: 6" L x 1" W (15.2 cm x 2.5 cm); case: 18" L x 12" W (45.7 cm x 30.5 cm) Item # 201069

Lot: 13 - Woodland Stone Axe Head - 3/4 Grooved

Native American, Woodland Period, ca. 1000 BCE to 1000 CE. A robust and timeworn Native American Woodlands stone axe head, its broad, tapering form defined by a carefully pecked three-quarter groove for hafting, reflecting both practical ingenuity and the enduring craftsmanship of prehistoric toolmakers. Size: 3.8" L x 1.7" W x 2.9" H (9.7 cm x 4.3 cm x 7.4 cm) Item # 199631

Lot: 14 - Native American Knapped Stone Tools / Projectile Tips

Native American, North America, Eastern Woodland, ca. 200 to 1000 CE. Four hand-knapped tools made from stones of rich smokey hues. The first three are large and perhaps acted as cutting blades or spear tips. The largest has a butt end that perhaps functioned as a handle or grip for holding in the hand, making this one ideal for cutting, scraping, or digging. The other two are made from chert and have narrow necks that may have been tied to a wooden handle or pole. The smallest is also chert and has a triangular blade with two slightly downward fins and notched edges that taper to a pointed tip; this may have been a projectile point. Size (largest): 7.875" L x 2.75" W (20 cm x 7 cm); (smallest): 1.75" L x .75" W (4.4 cm x 1.9 cm) Item # 157181

Lot: 15 - Ancestral Puebloan Black-on-White and Corrugated Sherd Collection, Southwest US

Native American, Southwestern United States, Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi). A collection of pottery sherds from the American Southwest, Ancestral Puebloan and related traditions, representing a range of culturally distinctive wares and surface treatments. The group includes black-on-white and black-on-red painted sherds with geometric banding, hatching, checkerboard, and stepped motifs; corrugated utility ware with coiled and indented surfaces; and plain and slipped body sherds in buff, gray, and red-orange clays. Rim, body, and base fragments are present, several of substantial size. Painted decoration ranges from fine-line to broad-brush execution. Item # 191386

Lot: 16 - Two Native American Woodland Stone Tools - Celt & Axe

Native American, North America, Woodland period, ca. 1000 BCE to 1000 CE. A well preserved pair of Woodland period stone woodworking tools consisting of a polished celt and a full-grooved axe head, both carefully shaped from dense stone through pecking and grinding techniques. The axe head features the characteristic encircling groove that allowed it to be securely hafted to a wooden handle with fiber bindings, while the celt was designed to be mounted directly into a split wooden haft. The celt displays a particularly telling sign of practical use. The sides of its cutting edge have been worn smooth through repeated sharpening and contact with wood, creating a polished contrast against the otherwise rougher pecked surface of the stone body. This smoothing is a clear indication of prolonged use and maintenance by its maker. Size of larger: 5.4" L x 2.3" W x 3.5" H (13.7 cm x 5.8 cm x 8.9 cm) Tools of this type were essential implements for Woodland communities, used in tasks such as woodworking, tree felling, and the construction of dwellings, canoes, and other wooden objects. The pair reflects both the durability of stone tool technology and the skilled craftsmanship that characterized Native American tool production over many centuries. Item # 201544

Lot: 17 - Mississippian Pottery Bowl - Lug Handles

Native American, Mississippian culture, ca. 800 to 1600 CE. A well-balanced pottery bowl with a rounded base and gently flaring rim, accented by opposing ridged lug handles and a softly burnished surface that reflects the refined utility and understated elegance of Mississippian ceramic traditions. Size: 9.2" L x 8.2" W x 5.2" H (23.4 cm x 20.8 cm x 13.2 cm) Item # 202105

Lot: 18 - Mississippian Caddo Jar - Incised Geometric Motif

Native American, Mississippian culture, Caddo, Arkansas, Lafayette County, ca. 800 to 1600 CE. A finely formed pottery jar with a gently flaring rim and rounded body, decorated with repeating incised triangular motifs filled with dense punctation, creating a rhythmic geometric pattern characteristic of Caddo ceramic traditions. Size: 4.5" Diameter x 5.8" H (11.4 cm x 14.7 cm) Item # 202127

Lot: 19 - Mississippian Caddo Pottery Bottle - Large Form

Native American, Southeastern United States, Mississippian Caddo culture, ca. 900 to 1500 CE. A commanding and beautifully preserved pottery bottle of classic Caddo form, defined by its broad globular body and short, upright neck rising with quiet authority. The surface is left largely unadorned, its subtle fire clouds and variegated tones of buff, gray, and deep charcoal bearing witness to the kiln atmosphere and the hand of the maker. This restrained aesthetic reflects a tradition in which form and finish carried as much meaning as applied decoration, emphasizing balance, volume, and tactile presence. Such vessels were integral to daily and ceremonial life, used for the storage and pouring of water or other liquids, and often placed within burial contexts as offerings. The careful burnishing and controlled firing visible here speak to the technical skill of Caddo potters, whose ceramic traditions are among the most refined in the Mississippian world. Size: 11.5" Diameter x 11.8" H (29.2 cm x 30 cm) The vessel's impressive scale and intact condition enhance its presence, offering a direct and unembellished expression of Caddo artistry and cultural continuity. Item # 202287

Lot: 20 - Mississippian Shell-Tempered Loop-Handled Jar, Hiwassee Island

Native American, Mississippian culture, Southeastern Woodlands. A rounded, wide-mouthed jar hand-built from shell-tempered clay, its globular body swelling from a softly convex base to a slightly incurving rim. Two small loop handles rise from the shoulder, opposed across the vessel and pierced for suspension or lifting, with a further pair of low lug projections set between them. The surface is burnished and unslipped, ranging from warm terracotta orange across the upper body to smoky charcoal grays and blacks where reduction firing and hearth use darkened the walls. Coil-building marks and slight asymmetry remain visible, the honest evidence of a domestic pot made for cooking, storing, and serving. Vessels of this class dominate Mississippian household assemblages along the Tennessee River, where shell tempering allowed thin, thermally resilient walls suited to repeated heating. Shell tempering is the technological signature of the Mississippian world (roughly 1000 to 1550 CE): burned and crushed mussel shell mixed into the clay body reduced shrinkage and thermal stress, permitting potters to build thinner, lighter, more durable vessels than the grit- and sand-tempered wares of the preceding Woodland tradition. The loop-handled globular jar is the workhorse of that repertoire, appearing by the thousands in village middens and domestic contexts across the Tennessee, Cumberland, and Mississippi valleys. Hiwassee Island, at the confluence of the Hiwassee and Tennessee rivers in Meigs County, gave its name to the Hiwassee Island phase, defined during the Tennessee Valley Authority excavations of the 1930s directed by Thomas M. N. Lewis and Madeline Kneberg. Their published sequence remains a foundational chronology for the Mississippian occupation of eastern Tennessee, and ceramic types named there are still used to date sites across the region. Item # 202276

Lot: 21 - Mississippian Ranch Incised & Campbell Applique Jars, Pair

Native American, Southeast or Midwest, Mississippian. Native American, Mississippian culture, Mississippi, ca. 980 to 1380 CE. A pair of similarly styled handmade pottery jars in mottled hues of gray and brown with spots of creamy white shell-tempering. Each sits on a round, stable base, with a bulbous body and short neck with a wide, flared rim. The body of the vessel is incised in a technique known as Ranch Incised, comprised of a series of parallel curved lines creating a layered effect resembling freshwater fish scales. The neck features a Campbell Appliqué technique consisting of a pattern of slender vertical embellishments, each with a wavy edge. Size: 7" D x 5.75" H (17.8 cm D x 14.6 cm H) Item # 203026

Lot: 22 - Rare Mississippian Pottery Punctate Jar

Native American, Southeastern United States, Mississippian culture, ca. 1000 to 1500 CE. A boldly textured Mississippian pottery jar distinguished by its dense field of punctate decoration. The vessel presents a rounded body tapering gently toward a flat base, with a thickened rim encircled by diagonal impressions that frame the upper register. The exterior surface is covered in closely spaced tool-made punctations, creating a tactile pattern that animates the clay with shadow and rhythm. This all-over texturing not only provided visual interest but also may have improved grip in daily use. The earthen surface has matured to deep brown tones with areas of darker fire clouding, evidence of traditional open firing methods. Such punctate jars were integral to domestic and ceremonial life in Mississippian communities, used for storage, cooking, or serving. The vessel stands as a compelling example of Southeastern ceramic traditions, where form, surface, and function were unified in a distinctly regional aesthetic. Size: 4.3" Diameter x 4" H (10.9 cm x 10.2 cm) Item # 201267

Lot: 23 - Mississippian Hooded Jar, Gourd Form, Large, ca. 1000-1500 CE

Native American, Mississippian culture, ca. 1000 to 1500 CE. A large hooded jar in the form of a gourd. The vessel's body rises into a hooded neck. The surface is finished in a buff tone, with irregular fire clouds in gray and charcoal hues resulting from open firing conditions. Size: 10" Diameter x 13.8" H (25.4 cm x 35.1 cm) At the rim, two small nodular projections emerge on either side, subtly evoking ear-like forms. Such features are often interpreted as anthropomorphic or effigy elements, suggesting the vessel may reference human or spirit presence. In Mississippian visual culture, the blending of human, animal, and abstract forms was central to cosmological expression, and even restrained details like these nodules can carry symbolic weight. The hooded form itself is a hallmark of Mississippian pottery, particularly associated with ceremonial or high-status contexts. These vessels are thought to have played roles in ritual practice, possibly linked to feasting, offerings, or the storage of special substances. The enclosed neck and restricted opening may have been intentional, controlling access to the contents and reinforcing the vessel's function within structured ceremonial acts. A striking and authentic example of Mississippian ceramic artistry, this jar stands as both a utilitarian object and a quiet monument to a complex and symbolically rich cultural world. Item # 202118

Lot: 24 - Mississippian Bell Plain Jar w/ 4 Nodes, Ex-Seever

Native American, Mississippian culture, Bell Plain type, ca. 1000 to 1500 CE. A quietly powerful Bell Plain pottery jar with a globular body and short flaring neck, distinguished by four subtle applied nodes at the shoulder, its dark, fire-clouded surface and unadorned form emphasizing the refined restraint and functional elegance characteristic of Mississippian ceramic traditions. The vessel is hand-built from tempered clay and finished with a smooth, burnished surface, its softly asymmetrical rim and gentle contours bearing the marks of skilled but intimate craftsmanship. The quartet of nodes encircling the shoulder may have served both as tactile embellishments and as symbolic or clan-related markers, a feature seen across Bell Plain wares associated with domestic and ceremonial use. Size: 6.5" Diameter x 6.8" H (16.5 cm x 17.3 cm) Bell Plain ceramics, widely distributed throughout the Mississippi River Valley and surrounding regions, are often linked to everyday utility yet reveal a sophisticated aesthetic grounded in proportion, balance, and surface treatment. The darkened areas of the body reflect firing conditions within an open or reduced atmosphere kiln, producing the characteristic mottled patina prized by collectors today. This example carries notable provenance, formerly in the collection of William J. Seever (1860-1947), curator of the Missouri Historical Society and an early dealer in Native American artifacts. It is purportedly excavated from Cross County, Arkansas, likely from the Jones, Stanley, or Fortune Mounds, sites associated with the broader Mississippian cultural horizon and its complex mound-building societies. A compelling and honest example, this jar speaks not through ornament, but through form, touch, and history - a vessel shaped by hand and time, carrying the quiet authority of its ancient origins. Item # 202178

Lot: 25 - Caddo / Mississippian Shell Bead Necklace | Whelk Shell Pendant

Native American, Southern United States, Caddo / Mississippian culture, ca. 900 to 1450 CE. A strand of numerous shell fragments, each drilled with a small suspension hole and strung on cotton thread, terminating in a large triangular pendant cut from whelk shell. The shells likely originate from a single archaeological context. Surfaces show natural variation, weathering, and age-consistent wear. Size of strand: 30" L (76.2 cm); shell pendant: 3.5" L x 1.25" W (8.9 cm x 3.2 cm) Item # 200236

Lot: 26 - Caddo Blakely Engraved Bottle

Native American, Arkansas, Caddo. A globular ceramic bottle swelling to a full spherical belly, then drawn up into a tall, slightly flaring neck that finishes in a rolled lip. The coil-built, pebble-burnished wall carries the smoky grays, umbers, and cloudy blooms of a reduced pit firing, speckled throughout with pale temper. Ornament is deliberately spare: sets of fine vertical and gently curving engraved lines, cut into leather-hard clay before firing, drop from the shoulder and quarter the body into broad open panels. Long-necked bottles of this class belong to the Caddo tradition of the Ouachita and Red River drainages, where they served to hold and pour liquids and were commonly interred as grave furniture. The engraved fields are generally read as encoding cosmological divisions rather than functioning as simple decoration. Caddo potters of the Trans-Mississippi South rank among the most technically accomplished ceramicists north of Mexico. Working without the wheel, they coiled and scraped vessels to walls of remarkable thinness, burnished them with a smooth pebble to a soft sheen, then fired them in oxygen-starved conditions to produce the dark gray to black fabric characteristic of the tradition. Engraving, executed after the clay had dried to leather hardness, permits a crispness of line that trailing or incising on wetter clay cannot achieve. Named types such as Blakely Engraved were defined by mid-twentieth-century archaeologists working the Ouachita River valley of southwestern Arkansas, and those designations remain the standard shorthand for chronology and regional interaction in Caddo archaeology. Clark County sits squarely within that research area, and its sites along the Ouachita have long supplied the reference assemblages against which such bottles are typed. Item # 202249

Lot: 27 - Caddo Pottery Jar - Incised Triangle and Brushed Body

Native American, Caddo. A rounded earthenware jar rises from a softly tapering base to an everted, gently flaring rim, its surface a quiet record of the potter's hand. Beneath the lip, encircling bands of punctate and zoned incising frame the neck, a crisp ribbon of ornament set against the burnished collar. Below, the swelling body is given over to brushed and vertically combed striations that pull downward like windswept grass, catching fire-clouds of soot and tan across the buff ground. Built by coiling and pit-fired, the vessel served domestic ends, the storage and serving of food and drink within a Caddo household of the Trans-Mississippi South. Its restrained geometry and textural body speak to a ceramic tradition prized for technical control and an understated, confident sense of design. The Caddo peoples of the Red River valley, spanning present-day eastern Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Oklahoma, produced some of the most accomplished pottery in pre-contact North America. Their workshops are known for fine pastes, lustrous burnishing, and a vocabulary of engraved scrolls, punctations, and brushed surfaces. The combed or brushed treatment seen across this body is characteristic of utilitarian jar forms, where vertical striations both decorated the surface and improved grip and durability, while the neatly incised neck registered the potter's care for proportion and finish. Item # 203167

Lot: 28 - Caddo Blakely Engraved Bottle, Red River Valley, Mississippian Period

Native American, Great Bend region of the Red River, southwestern Arkansas, Caddo. A globular ceramic bottle swelling to a broad equator, then drawing up into a tall cylindrical neck with a lightly everted lip. The burnished surface carries the streaked tan, umber, and smoke-gray mottling of an open pit firing, polished to a soft sheen while leather hard. On one shoulder a nested set of fine engraved lines descends and curls into a tight hooked arm, closed below by a short bracket of parallel strokes: the spare scroll vocabulary that names the Blakely Engraved type. The silhouette borrows from the bottle gourd, a form Caddo potters refined into one of the most recognizable vessels of the Trans-Mississippi South. Bottles of this class held liquids and are most often recovered from Caddo graves, suggesting a life that moved between domestic use and mortuary offering. Blakely Engraved belongs to the named ceramic typology of the Caddo, the westernmost participants in the Mississippian world, whose towns and mound centers clustered along the Red, Ouachita, Sabine, and Arkansas drainages. The type is defined by restraint: a single scroll, ladder, or hooked-arm element engraved into an otherwise plain burnished ground, in deliberate contrast to the dense allover panels of Keno Trailed or Friendship Engraved. The technique rewards attention. Potters built the vessel by coil, thinned and shaped the walls by hand, polished the leather-hard surface with a smooth pebble, then cut the design with a fine point after the clay had stiffened, so the lines bite crisply rather than plowing up a burr. Firing in a reducing or partially reducing pit produced the streaked dark-and-buff clouding across the body. Distribution centers on the Great Bend of the Red River in southwestern Arkansas, extending into adjacent northeastern Texas and northwestern Louisiana. Item # 202350

Lot: 29 - Mississippian Caddo Bailey Engraved Bottle - Trailed

Native American, Mississippian, Caddo culture, ca. 1200 to 1500 CE. A refined and quietly elegant example of Caddo ceramic artistry within the Mississippian world, this Bailey Engraved trailed water bottle pairs a graceful silhouette with disciplined, flowing line work. Hand-built in fine earthenware, the vessel presents a rounded, globular body that narrows into a tall, cylindrical neck with a small, slightly flared mouth. The smooth lower body transitions into an upper field of carefully executed trailed and engraved decoration. Arcing lines sweep across the shoulder in rhythmic, nested curves, intersecting at sharp angles to create a repeating V-shaped pattern that encircles the form. The design is both geometric and fluid, suggesting movement while remaining firmly structured. Size: 7.3" Diameter x 9.2" H (18.5 cm x 23.4 cm) The engraved and trailed lines are cut with confidence and consistency, characteristic of Bailey Engraved ceramics associated with Caddo traditions of the Late Mississippian period. Bottles of this type were likely used for serving or storing liquids, including water or ceremonial beverages, and their elegant proportions made them suitable for both domestic and ritual settings. The tall neck allowed for controlled pouring, while the rounded body provided balance and visual harmony. The surface displays a soft gray-brown tone with subtle firing variation, enhancing the contrast between the smooth lower half and the engraved shoulder. A fine example of the Caddo bottle form, this piece demonstrates the cultural emphasis on symmetry, repetition, and refined surface treatment within the broader ceramic traditions of the Mississippi River Valley. Item # 201257

Lot: 30 - Caddo Engraved Blackware Bottles, Scroll Motifs, Mississippian Culture

Native American, Caddo (Mississippian period). A pair of burnished dark-bodied bottles whose polished skins carry engraved scrollwork of remarkable fluency. Each was coil-built from fine grog-tempered clay, smoothed to a lustrous surface, then reduction-fired to smoky brown and gray before the designs were incised into the hardened wall with a sharp point. The larger vessel swells to a low, globular body beneath a tall cylindrical neck, its shoulder wrapped by broad hatched-edged scrolls that curl into concentric bosses. The smaller, more compact bottle bears a tighter arrangement of nested ovals and rayed circles, the engraved lines still holding traces of white pigment rubbed into the grooves. Bottles of this class carried liquids in life and accompanied the dead in Caddo cemetery mounds, their spiraling motifs perhaps evoking wind, water, and the coiling cosmology of the Mississippian world. The Caddo occupied the Red River drainage and neighboring valleys of what is now Arkansas, Louisiana, east Texas, and Oklahoma, where their engraved fine wares rank among the most technically accomplished ceramics of Native North America. Engraving after firing, rather than incising wet clay, demanded a sure hand: a slip of the stylus could not be smoothed away. Pigment, often white kaolin or ground shell, was rubbed into the lines so the design read pale against the burnished dark ground. The smaller bottle corresponds to the Belcher Engraved type, named for the Belcher Mound site in Caddo Parish, Louisiana, and diagnostic of the late Caddo (Belcher phase) horizon. Per the label on the base, it was found in Clark County, Arkansas, in the Ouachita River country long associated with Caddo settlement. Item # 203163

Lot: 31 - Caddo Mississippian Blackware Bowl with Incised Rim

Native American, Caddo, Mississippian culture. A hemispherical earthenware bowl, hand-built from dark clay and burnished to a smoky, near-black surface. The upper register carries a crisp band of decoration: rows of fine punctate tooling framing a zone of diagonal cross-hatching, the incised lattice catching light against the matte body below. The rounded base and gently everted rim speak to a vessel meant for holding and serving, its walls thin yet sturdy from careful coiling and paddling. Produced by Caddo potters of the Mississippian tradition, whose ceramic craft ranks among the most refined in the ancient Southeast, the bowl unites utility and quiet elegance. The restrained ornament, confined to the shoulder and rim, reflects a decorative grammar in which incision and stippling articulate form without overwhelming it. The Caddo peoples flourished across what is now Arkansas, eastern Texas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma, participating in the broad Mississippian cultural sphere that dominated the Southeast and mid-continent between roughly 800 and 1500 CE. Their potters are celebrated for finely burnished dark wares and inventive incised and engraved motifs, produced without the wheel by coiling and paddle-and-anvil finishing. Bowls of this hemispherical form served domestic and mortuary functions alike, and the banded decoration of punctation and cross-hatching seen here is a hallmark of the tradition's rim treatment. Item # 203159

Lot: 32 - Ancestral Puebloan Heishi Shell Necklace, Scallop Pendant

Native American, Southwestern United States, Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi), ca. 1000 to 1300 CE. A strand composed of very small white shell heishi disc beads, strung on a modern cotton thread and centered by a natural scallop shell pendant. Size of shell pendant: 1.75" L x 1.6" W (4.4 cm x 4.1 cm); strand doubled: 24" L (61 cm) Item # 201074

Lot: 33 - Native American Stone Manos, Group of Three Grinding Handstones

Native American, Southwestern United States. Three stone manos of rounded rectangular form, used with a metate for grinding and processing food, pigments, medicines, and similar materials. The first is a fine-grained tan stone with a smooth worn face and rounded edges. The second is a coarse conglomerate or sandstone in reddish brown with visible inclusions across the surface. The third is a shorter reddish brown stone. The mano (Spanish for "hand") and metate together constitute one of the longest-lived technologies in the Americas, in continuous use from the Archaic period into the historic era and still employed in parts of Mexico and Central America. Wear patterns are diagnostic: a single flat facet suggests a back-and-forth reciprocal stroke on a trough metate, while facets on two or more faces indicate rotation as the grinder turned the stone to expose fresh surface. Skeletal studies of maize-farming populations record the physical cost of this work, with characteristic arthritic changes in the wrists, knees, and lower back of the women who spent hours daily at the grinding slab. Item # 191363

Lot: 34 - Native American Tools and Ornaments, Chert Points, Trade Beads, Scrapers

Native American, United States, Archaic to Woodlands. Collection of Native American artifacts presented in three glass-topped Riker display cases. Various North American cultures and periods. The largest case holds projectile points, drills, and blade fragments worked in chert, jasper, agate, quartzite, and obsidian, with bone or antler points and glass trade beads in red white-heart and blue. A second case contains perforated stone pendants, red ceramic disc beads, shell and abalone disc beads, and a fossil crinoid beads. The third case holds larger flaked stone tools, including end and side scrapers, bifaces, and worked flakes. Item # 203204

Lot: 35 - Salado Roosevelt Black-on-White Olla w/ Spirals

Native American, southeastern Arizona, Salado, Roosevelt Black-on-White. A globular ceramic olla thrown wide at the shoulder and drawn to a short flaring neck, its chalky white slip carried into bold mineral-black painting. Broad encircling bands frame a register of interlocking spirals set between barbed, feathered lines, while a row of short tapering ticks rings the collar like a fringe. The scrolls read as the wind and water imagery common to Salado potters of the Tonto Basin, though the vocabulary is decorative as much as emblematic. Vessels of this squat proportion served for storing water, seed, and grain within the pueblo household, and the burnished interior neck shows the wear of practical use. The painter's line is confident and unhurried, thickening at the turn of each volute in a way that betrays a brush of yucca fiber. Roosevelt Black-on-White is the diagnostic decorated ware of the Salado horizon, produced across the Tonto Basin and adjacent central Arizona drainages during the Pueblo IV period. It descends from the Cibola white ware tradition and is distinguished by a thick white slip, mineral (rather than carbon) paint, and a preference for hachure giving way to broad solid banding and interlocking scrolls. The ware type takes its name from the Roosevelt Lake district, where salvage archaeology preceding and following the construction of Theodore Roosevelt Dam exposed the cliff dwellings and compounds that defined the Salado sequence for early twentieth-century scholarship. Item # 204501

Lot: 36 - 18th-19th C. Arikara Pottery Jar - Twin Handles, Missouri River

Native American, Great Plains, Arikara (Sahnish). A globular earthenware jar built by hand from local Missouri River clay, its smoke-darkened surface ranging from charcoal to dusky gray. The full, rounded body narrows to a constricted neck and an everted, gently scalloped rim. A pair of robust loop handles rises from the shoulder, flanking the vessel symmetrically, while two modest knobs punctuate the shoulder between them, perhaps lugs for suspension or purely decorative accents. The matte, lightly burnished body shows the soot patina of utilitarian cooking and storage. Among the village-dwelling Arikara, sometimes called Sahnish, such jars served the daily rhythms of a maize-growing people settled in earth-lodge towns along the upper Missouri. Sturdy and unadorned, the form prizes function: a workhorse vessel shaped for the hearth and the storage pit. The Arikara, who call themselves Sahnish, were a Caddoan-speaking, semi-sedentary people whose fortified earth-lodge villages lined the upper Missouri River through present-day South Dakota. Skilled horticulturalists, they cultivated maize, beans, squash, and sunflower on the river bottoms and traded surplus crops to nomadic Plains neighbors. Twin-handled jars of this type are a hallmark of historic-era Arikara ceramics; the loop handles and shoulder knobs distinguish their wares from the predominantly handleless pottery of many Plains groups. This example was reportedly recovered near Chamberlain, South Dakota, a stretch of the Missouri long associated with Arikara settlement before the smallpox epidemics and displacement of the nineteenth century scattered the surviving population northward. Item # 203160

Lot: 37 - Large Bell Plain Bowl wi/ Haynes Bluff Rim

Native American, Mississippian culture. A large hemispherical bowl of shell-tempered clay, its walls rising from a rounded base to a sharply everted rim, the dark grey surfaces burnished inside and out to the smooth, slightly lustrous finish that defines Bell Plain ware. The lip is the prize: deeply notched with long slanting grooves that read, at a glance, as a length of twisted cord laid around the mouth, with a beveled interior edge behind it. This treatment is the Haynes Bluff rim mode, considerably scarcer than the plain lips that finish most Bell Plain bowls. Vessels of this scale served communal food preparation and presentation, and comparable examples recur in mortuary deposits, so a funerary role for this piece is possible though not demonstrable. Bell Plain is one of the workhorse ceramic types of the Mississippian world, defined by a fine, finely crushed shell temper and thoroughly smoothed surfaces, usually firing to grey or grey-brown. It appears across the Mississippian sequence but reaches its greatest frequency in the Middle and Late phases, when it dominated household assemblages of the central Mississippi Valley. Bowls are the single most common Bell Plain form, which makes the rim treatment here the distinguishing feature rather than the vessel shape. The Haynes Bluff mode, named for the Mississippi site where it was first isolated, is a decorative grammar rather than a separate ware: the rim flares abruptly from a rounded lip, the interior face is beveled and often terraced or incised, and the lip itself is cut with deep, oblique notches. The visual result, a rope or cable encircling the vessel mouth, translates a cordage motif into clay, and its comparative rarity within the enormous Bell Plain corpus makes rimmed examples of this kind sought after by collectors of Southeastern ceramics. Item # 203158

Lot: 38 - Native American Hafted Stone Knife with Bison Bone Grip

Native American, Western to Southwestern United States, ca. 15th to 18th century CE. A finely knapped chert blade inset into a bison or other large ungulate rib bone handle and secured with a dark natural pine resin adhesive, forming a complete composite cutting tool. The survival of both stone and organic components together is uncommon, making this a rare example. Size: 5.25" L x 1" W (13.3 cm x 2.5 cm) Item # 201046

Lot: 39 - Columbia River Plateau Stone Pestle or Club, Native American

Native American, Northwestern United States, Columbia River / Plateau region, ca. 19th century or earlier CE. A stone pestle or club, carved in a long tapering form with a rounded working end and a knobbed handle. The shaft narrows gradually toward a raised collar and tapered tip. The opposite end is flat, consistent with a tool designed for pounding, grinding, or striking. Stone pestles were used throughout the Columbia River and greater Plateau region for processing roots, seeds, berries, and other staple foods. Forms like this, especially in larger scale, may also overlap with club-like implements. Without excavation context, the exact function cannot be stated with certainty. Size: 14.25" L x 3.2" W (36.2 cm x 8.1 cm) Item # 202182

Lot: 40 - Native American Fossil Coral Quadruped Carving, Missouri

Native American, Midwestern United States, Missouri, ca. 19th century or earlier CE. A small coral carving depicting an abstract quadruped form, possibly intended as a bison or a bear. The body is compact and blocky, with short legs and a slightly raised shoulder mass. Faint inked writing appears on one side, for Boone County, Missouri. Fossilized coral occurs naturally in Missouri and was occasionally used by Native American artists as a workable organic material for small carvings, ornaments, and symbolic objects. Size: 2" L x 1.8" W (5.1 cm x 4.6 cm) Item # 201055

Lot: 41 - Santo Domingo Pueblo) Bowl - Black Cloud-Band Rim, Rain Motifs

Southwestern United States, Kewa (Santo Domingo) Pueblo. A large hand-coiled earthenware serving bowl whose warm red exterior contrasts with a cream-slipped interior animated by a bold black scalloped cloud-band below the rim and a central cruciform rosette of leaf-shaped elements punctuated by dotted rain marks. Expertly formed with rounded walls and a subtly flattened base, the vessel is finished with red and tan slips burnished to a soft sheen, while mineral-black paint delineates the rim and interior motifs; firing clouds and surface wear speak to long use. Kewa potters of the early 20th century favored such powerful, economical designs that echo ancestral Santo Domingo polychrome traditions. Size: 11" D x 6.75" H (27.9 cm D x 17.1 cm H) Item # 202530

Lot: 42 - Zia Pueblo Polychrome Olla with Bird Motif - Early 20th C.

Native American, Southwestern United States, Zia Pueblo. A globular polychrome olla painted red-orange and dark brown-black over a buff-gray slip. The exterior carries a stylized roadrunner bird in profile with a curved tail and crest, paired with framing geometric and foliate devices, while a scalloped band encircles the neck. The interior and base show the traditional red slip. The vessel is formed by hand using coiled construction and finished with natural mineral pigments; the base is signed by the artist, though wear and fading have rendered the signature illegible. Item # 203776

Lot: 43 - Walter Howato (Hopi, 1921-2003) Cottonwood Kachina | Woman with Pot & Ladle

Walter Howato (Native American, Hopi Pueblo, 1921-2003), ca. mid-20th century CE. A cottonwood Kachina-style figure standing with a painted pot upon her head and a ladle in her hand. Clad in traditional black manta dress with red, and green lines representing embroidered edges, complemented by a painted sash. Possibly depicting a bystander during Kachina performances. Signed on the foot: "WH." Size: 7.5" W x 18" H (19 cm x 45.7 cm) Item # 192860

Lot: 44 - Mojave Netted Beadwork Collar, Glass Beads

Native American, Southwestern United States, Mojave. Native American, Southwestern United States, Mojave, ca. mid-20th century CE. A netted beadwork collar worked in cobalt-blue and opaque white glass seed beads, fanning from a fitted neckline into a wide capelet. The geometric field alternates blocks, diamonds, and open-loop motifs, finished at the hem with a fringe of dangling beaded strands tipped in white. A line of red beads accents the collar edge. Constructed in the netted, off-loom technique associated with Mojave and broader Lower Colorado River beadwork, the piece would have been worn across the shoulders as personal adornment. Item # 203633

Lot: 45 - Lot of 3 Hopi Polychrome Pottery - Bowl, Jar & Turtle

(1) Rosalie Tewaguma Kaye (Hopi, 20th century). Painted pottery turtle, n.d. Signed "R.T.K. / Hopi / Walpi" on underside; (2) Anonymous (Hopi, 20th century). Painted pottery bowl, n.d. Signed with drawing of insect on underside of base; (3) Anonymous (Hopi, 20th century). Painted pottery jar, n.d. Unsigned. A fine trio of Hopi painted pottery vessels: a turtle, a bowl, and a jar. First, the adorable turtle is enveloped in beige with an upward turned head and tail, as well as a convex shell painted with abstract imagery. Next, the bowl is the largest of the 3 and presents smooth walls that flare out to a broad rounded shoulder and inward curving rim. The exterior is meticulously hand-painted with geometric designs of opposing filled and hatched shapes in black and red pigments. Last, the petite jar showcases an ovoid body and flared spout with the bottom half of the vessel enveloped in lustrous burnt orange slip and the top of black-on-beige undulating bands. Size of largest (bowl): 6" Diameter x 3" H (15.2 cm x 7.6 cm) Please note this item falls under the Safeguard Tribal Objects of Patrimony Act and is not eligible for international shipping. Native American, Alaska Native, & Native Hawaiian objects are only eligible to ship within the United States. Item # 185328

Lot: 46 - Mata Ortiz Polychrome Olla by Jesus Tena, Turkey & Rabbit Medallions

Latin America, Mexico, Chihuahua, Mata Ortiz. A polychrome olla by Jesus Tena of Mata Ortiz, Chihuahua, hand coiled and burnished, painted in black and red on a buff ground. The globular body carries framed medallions enclosing turkeys, a rabbit, and a lizard, set among panels of fine hatched line, stepped devices, and solid triangles, with a sawtooth band below the flared rim. The recessed base is painted with a scrolled pinwheel within a black roundel. Signed "Jesus Tena" on the base. Tena works in the contemporary Mata Ortiz tradition established in the 1970s, which draws on the ceramic vocabulary of the ancient Casas Grandes site of Paquime. Item # 160458

Lot: 47 - Mexican Wool Weavings: Navajo Storm Pattern + Related Design, Saltillo Revival

Latin America, Mexico. A pair of Mexican wool weavings produced in the Saltillo revival tradition, each interpreting Navajo design vocabularies for the mid-century Southwestern market. Woven on treadle looms in handspun and commercially dyed wool, the textiles testify to a long current of cross-border exchange, in which Mexican weavers absorbed and returned the visual language Navajo artisans had themselves once borrowed from the Saltillo sarape a century prior. The first weaving renders the Navajo Storm Pattern, popularized around 1900 through the Crystal Trading Post and read in Navajo cosmology as a meeting of the sacred mountains, the central hogan, and the four winds. A rectangular center anchors the gray field, tethered by stepped lines to four corner squares, with stylized water bugs and lightning arrows populating the interior. A serrated black and ivory border flickers along the edge. Palette of dove gray, ivory, charcoal, and oxidized red. The second departs from Storm Pattern and deploys a Saltillo-descended banded composition: a commanding central serrated diamond, eyed in ivory and ringed in red and brown chevrons, presides over two smaller satellite lozenges on a tan ground. Horizontal registers of madder red, ivory, and umber stripe the field, terminating in plied corner tassels in the Mexican manner. The cadence is that of the sarape, the diamond vocabulary a clear homage to Navajo central-medallion traditions. Together, the lot offers a compact study in the migratory life of design across the United States-Mexico border, where motifs travel faster than the looms that carry them. Item # 201814

Lot: 48 - American Walrus Ivory Scrimshaw Polar Bear on Mammoth Ivory Base

United States. A walrus ivory panel cut from the length of a tusk, polished, and engraved with a polar bear standing on an ice shelf before a low sun and distant mountains, worked in fine line and cross hatch with ink rub. Signed "Nuguruk" below the bear. Nuguruk is a trade name applied to hand engraved ivory produced by a Seattle workshop, rather than the mark of an individual carver. Mounted on two brass posts over a polished fossil mammoth ivory base, identified by the Schreger lines in the cut face. This item is made of or contains Mammoth & Walrus and qualifies for exemption under the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) as an antique. Due to strict federal and state regulations governing the sale and transport of ivory, this item may not be shipped internationally or to residents of the following U.S. jurisdictions: CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OR, VT, and WA. Buyers are solely responsible for ensuring that their purchase complies with all applicable local, state, and federal laws regarding the acquisition, possession, resale, or transfer of ivory. While we guarantee that this item meets the criteria for ESA exemption under federal law, we strongly recommend that prospective buyers consult with local authorities to verify legal eligibility in their jurisdiction. This lot cannot be shipped to CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OR, VT, and WA or outside the United States. Item # 204331

Lot: 49 - Alaskan Scrimshaw Antler Belt Buckle with Walrus Head

United States, Alaska. A belt buckle worked from an antler section, the polished central disc engraved with a walrus head in profile, the tusks, whiskers, and heavy folds of the neck rendered in fine incised line and stipple. The natural porous rim is left uncut, forming an irregular scalloped border around the engraved field. Diameter and cortical structure are consistent with a large cervid such as moose or caribou. Nickeled steel hook and keeper fitted to the reverse with two screws. Item # 204328

Lot: 50 - Inuit Soapstone Seal Hunter with Catch | Ford Motor Co.

Native American, Canadian Arctic, Inuit. A hunter crouches low over his prize, arms folded around the sleek bulk of a seal drawn up against his body. Carved from dense grey-green soapstone with pale veining, the figure conveys the compressed weight of a man bearing his catch, shoulders hunched, hooded head tilted upward, features pared to essential planes. Incised parka seams and boot stitching animate an otherwise smooth, rounded surface, the stone polished to a soft sheen that catches light along each muscular contour. The composition folds man and animal into a single mass, a favored device of Inuit carvers expressing the intimate reciprocity between hunter and hunted. Seal hunting sustained Arctic communities through the long winter, and such sculptures celebrate both the labor of the hunt and the sustaining bounty it delivered. The custom wooden display base bears an engraved plaque reading: "Franklin D. Murphy / Ford Motor Company / Board of Directors / Canadian Meeting / September 11th and 12th, 1968." The presentation records the sculpture's role as a commemorative gift, likely acquired in Canada for the occasion. Franklin D. Murphy (1916-1994) was a physician, chancellor of UCLA, chairman of the Times Mirror Company, and a noted arts patron who served on numerous corporate boards; he sat on the board of Ford Motor Company during this period. The dated dedication provides a firm terminus for the carving and situates it within the postwar flourishing of Inuit stone sculpture, a movement fostered from the late 1940s onward as cooperatives brought Arctic carvers' work to southern and international collectors. This item may fall under the Safeguard Tribal Objects of Patrimony (STOP) Act or other federal laws protecting Native American, Alaska Native, or Native Hawaiian cultural heritage. As such, it is not eligible for international shipping, and may also be subject to repatriation or tribal consultation within the United States. Buyers are responsible for ensuring their legal right to acquire, possess, or transfer this item under all applicable laws. This lot cannot be shipped outside the United States. Item # 203750

Lot: 51 - Thule Whale Bone and Slate Tool Group with Ivory Figure, Four Arctic Artifacts

North America, Arctic, Punuk to Thule culture. A collection of four Arctic implements, Punuk to Thule & Inuit cultures, likely pre-contact with Europeans, comprising of three tools and a effigy figurine. The first tool is a ground slate blade set into a whale bone handle as a knife or scraper. The second is a knapped slate blade seated in a broad whale bone tang, a spear or lance element. The third is a curved tapering length of bone or antler worked to a smoothed point, likely an awl. The effigy is carved in walrus ivory as a standing figure with defined head, shoulders, and separated legs. Presented in a Riker case. Small human figures recur across the Okvik, Punuk, and Thule horizons and remain among the most debated objects in Arctic archaeology. Interpretations range from amulets and hunting charms to shamanic helping spirits, doll-like teaching objects, or representations of ancestors. This item is made of or contains Walrus and qualifies for exemption under the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) as an antique. Due to strict federal and state regulations governing the sale and transport of ivory, this item may not be shipped internationally or to residents of the following U.S. jurisdictions: CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OR, VT, and WA. Buyers are solely responsible for ensuring that their purchase complies with all applicable local, state, and federal laws regarding the acquisition, possession, resale, or transfer of ivory. While we guarantee that this item meets the criteria for ESA exemption under federal law, we strongly recommend that prospective buyers consult with local authorities to verify legal eligibility in their jurisdiction. This item is made of or contains walrus and was lawfully carved by a Native Alaskan artisan. Under the Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) and the Endangered Species Act (ESA), Alaska Natives are federally permitted to harvest marine mammals for subsistence purposes and to create and sell authentic Native handicrafts, including those made from walrus or whale ivory. This piece qualifies as an ESA-exempt and MMPA-authorized item. Due to strict federal and state regulations, this item may not be shipped internationally or to residents of the following U.S. jurisdictions: CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OR, VT, and WA. Buyers bear full responsibility for understanding and complying with all applicable laws concerning the acquisition, possession, resale, or transfer of ivory. While we certify this item as meeting federal exemption standards, we strongly encourage buyers to consult their local authorities to confirm legal eligibility within their state or municipality. This lot cannot be shipped to CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OR, VT, and WA or outside the United States. Item # 204516

Lot: 52 - Native Yupik Walrus Ivory Owl Carving by Malcolm Oozevaseuk

Native American, Alaska, Yupik. A walrus ivory owl by the Yupik artist Malcolm Oozevaseuk, signed "M.O." on the tail, with allover incised feathering, folded wings, and inlaid eyes of black whale baleen, the beak likewise inlaid in baleen. Owl figures are a well established subject in the village of Gambell, and the Oozevaseuk name is associated with several generations of carvers working in bone and ivory from that community. This item is made of or contains walrus and qualifies for exemption under the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) as an antique. Due to strict federal and state regulations governing the sale and transport of ivory, this item may not be shipped internationally or to residents of the following U.S. jurisdictions: CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OR, VT, and WA. Buyers are solely responsible for ensuring that their purchase complies with all applicable local, state, and federal laws regarding the acquisition, possession, resale, or transfer of ivory. While we guarantee that this item meets the criteria for ESA exemption under federal law, we strongly recommend that prospective buyers consult with local authorities to verify legal eligibility in their jurisdiction. This lot cannot be shipped to CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OR, VT, and WA or outside the United States. Item # 204336

Lot: 53 - Alaskan Walrus Ivory Scrimshaw Plaque - Walrus Head

North America, Alaska, Inuit / Yupik tradition. A walrus ivory disc, cut in cross section and polished, engraved with a walrus head in profile with tusks, bristled muzzle, and heavy neck folds rendered in fine incised line and ink rub. The natural outer surface is retained at the perimeter, and the interior core structure shows through the polished face. Mounted on a rectangular walrus ivory base with a brass post. Inscribed with the initials "RP" in ink on the base, artist unidentified. This item is made of or contains Walrus and qualifies for exemption under the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) as an antique. Due to strict federal and state regulations governing the sale and transport of ivory, this item may not be shipped internationally or to residents of the following U.S. jurisdictions: CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OR, VT, and WA. Buyers are solely responsible for ensuring that their purchase complies with all applicable local, state, and federal laws regarding the acquisition, possession, resale, or transfer of ivory. While we guarantee that this item meets the criteria for ESA exemption under federal law, we strongly recommend that prospective buyers consult with local authorities to verify legal eligibility in their jurisdiction. This lot cannot be shipped to CA, CT, DC, HI, IL, MA, MD, MN, NH, NJ, NM, NV, NY, OR, VT, and WA or outside the United States. Item # 204334

Lot: 54 - Teotihuacan Stone Tlaloc Head Effigy Incensario Vessel

Pre-Columbian, Central Mexico, Teotihuacan. A cylindrical vessel carved from a dense gray volcanic stone, its exterior worked in low relief into the frontal visage of Tlaloc, the storm and rain deity of Central Mexico. The god's signature goggle eyes bulge as concentric rings beneath a heavy ridged brow, joined by a broad nasal bar that sweeps into a curling upper lip; below, a row of vertical fangs descends to the tapered base. A zigzag band encircles the flaring rim, perhaps a stylized headdress or lightning motif. The interior is hollowed to a deep well, and burn residue at the mouth suggests use as an incensario, in which copal smoke would have risen through the deity's open crown. Such effigy braziers accompanied petitions for rain and agricultural renewal. Tlaloc governed rain, lightning, mountains, and the standing water of caves, and at Teotihuacan he shares the city's ritual vocabulary with the Feathered Serpent. He is recognized instantly by two conventions visible here: the ringed "goggles," widely read as a pair of intertwined serpents whose bodies loop around the eyes and meet at the nose to form the upper lip, and the fanged mouth beneath. The convention proved remarkably durable, passing from Teotihuacan into Toltec and later Aztec art, where the same face reappears on effigy jars and on the deity's shrine atop the Templo Mayor. Copal, the aromatic resin of Bursera trees, was the standard offering burned in vessels of this kind. Smoke was understood as the visible form of breath and cloud, so a brazier shaped as the rain god converted the offering into the very phenomenon being petitioned. Item # 204535

Lot: 55 - Fine Ancient Colima Spondylus Shell Mask Pendant

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Colima culture, ca. 300 BCE to 300 CE. A carved spondylus shell (spiny oyster) panel formed as a miniature mask pendant, the rounded visage defined by slitted eyes, an open mouth, and shallow bored nostrils. Subtle shaping and incised detailing articulate the brows and nose, while four perforations along the periphery allowed the piece to be suspended or sewn onto a garment. Spondylus shell held powerful symbolic meaning in ancient Mesoamerica, where its vivid color and marine origin linked it to water, fertility, and renewal. Size: 2.4" L x 2.3" W (6.1 cm x 5.8 cm) Item # 201300

Lot: 56 - Ancient Colima Pottery Conch Shell Ritual Vessel

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Colima culture, ca. 300 BCE to 300 CE. A naturalistic pottery conch shell, carefully modeled with rounded whorls and a flared lip, capturing the dynamic spiral form of a marine shell. The apex of the spiral is open, leading into a hollow interior chamber, suggesting use as a ritual storage vessel or ceremonial container. Conch imagery in Colima art is associated with water, fertility, and the life-giving forces of nature. Size: 9.5" L x 8.5" W x 6" H (24.1 cm x 21.6 cm x 15.2 cm) Item # 190426

Lot: 57 - Colima Pottery 'Flats,' Bedded Figure and Whistling Warrior

Pre-Columbian, Colima, West Mexico. Nice pair of Colima pottery "flats" in 2 forms. First is a bedded figure, often associated with the manner inwhich the deceased were lowered into the shaft tombs that dot the west coast of Mexico in Colima, Nayarit and Jalisco. The other represents a warrior with stone ball loaded into his slight that could be hurtled at a speed capable of killing the enemy. He also has a whislte integrated into his headdress. Item # 202548

Lot: 58 - Colima Shell Anthropomorphic Pendants - Pair

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Colima. A pair of small anthropomorphic pendants carved from shell, each depicting a standing figure with a rounded head, drilled eyes, and a simplified body. Both are pierced for suspension and were likely worn as personal ornaments or used in ritual adornment. The pale, mottled surface reflects the natural coloration and age of the worked shell. Item # 203594

Lot: 59 - Colima Redware Smoking Pipe - Burnished Bulbous Bowl

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Colima. A redware pottery pipe with tapering stem flaring to a swelling pear-shaped bowl, the entire surface finished in a lustrous red slip burnished to a soft sheen, with two small nub feet beneath the bowl for resting. Pipes of this type were used for tobacco and other aromatic substances in ritual and shamanic contexts, where smoke served as a medium between the human and spirit worlds. Item # 202643

Lot: 60 - Three Salinar & Colima Pottery Vessels - Whistle

Pre-Columbian, Peru, Salinar, ca. 500 to 300 BCE; West Mexico, Colima, ca. 300 BCE to 300 CE. A compelling trio of Pre-Columbian pottery vessels explores the interplay between sound, ritual, and everyday form across two distinct cultural traditions. United by warm earthen surfaces and elegant simplicity, these works demonstrate how ceramics functioned not only as containers but as animated objects meant to be heard as well as seen. The largest vessel is a Salinar bridge vessel from coastal Peru, distinguished by its rounded body and arched stirrup-like handle connecting two spouts. Originally conceived as a whistle vessel, it would have produced sound when liquid moved through its internal chambers. While it no longer whistles today, its form still speaks to Salinar ingenuity, where vessel engineering and sensory experience were tightly intertwined. Fine surface wear and soft burnishing lend the piece a quiet authority. Size of largest (bridge vessel): 5.9" Diameter x 5" H (15 cm x 12.7 cm) The mid-sized vessel is an incised Colima jar with a compact, rounded profile and a subtly flared rim. Its exterior is decorated with lightly engraved linear motifs that encircle the body, creating a restrained yet tactile surface. Such jars likely served utilitarian or ritual purposes and reflect the Colima preference for balanced proportions and understated ornamentation. Completing the group is a petite Colima multi-chambered whistle pendant, remarkable for its survival as a functioning sound object. Modeled with rounded lobes and pierced chambers, it still produces a clear whistle when blown, offering a rare auditory connection to the ancient past. Objects of this type were often worn or carried, merging personal adornment with ritual sound. Together, these three vessels trace a shared Pre-Columbian fascination with form, function, and sound. From Peru to West Mexico, they reveal how ceramics were animated participants in daily life and ceremony, transforming clay into instruments of presence, rhythm, and meaning. Item # 197064

Lot: 61 - Large Guerrero Mezcala Stone Axe God Figure

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Guerrero, Mezcala. A tall pebble of grey volcanic stone reduced, by patient abrasion, to the essential idea of a human being. The Mezcala lapidary worked with string-saw and abrader rather than metal, incising shallow channels that separate a domed head from a columnar body, laying in a linear brow, a slender nose, and a horizontal mouth, then bracketing the torso with framing grooves and a single vertical arm line. The reverse is left plain, the natural cobble contour intact. Such figures, known to collectors as "axe gods" for their celt-derived silhouette, were likely placed as offerings in caves, springs, and burials across the Balsas River drainage, and were valued enough that the Aztec later gathered them as antiquities. A generous scale for the type, with a matte, weathered surface. The Mezcala tradition takes its name from the Mezcala River, a tributary of the Balsas in the rugged interior of Guerrero, and it remains one of the least excavated of Mesoamerican lapidary cultures: nearly all known examples come from looted or chance finds, so the chronology (broadly ca. 700 BCE to 200 CE, with some scholars extending it later) rests largely on stylistic comparison and on the handful of pieces recovered in controlled contexts. Carl Gay's typology (Mezcala Stone Sculpture: The Human Figure, 1967) remains the standard framework, ranking figures from M-1, essentially an unmodified celt with a hint of a face, through M-22, fully articulated standing figures with separated limbs. This example sits in the middle of that continuum: the celt blank is still legible, but the incisions establish head, neck, torso, and arm as distinct zones. Their afterlife is remarkable. Excavations at the Templo Mayor of Tenochtitlan recovered Mezcala figures among Aztec offering caches, buried more than a millennium after they were made, evidence that the Mexica collected these ancient stones as potent relics of a deep past. Item # 203134

Lot: 62 - Three Mezcala Culture Greenstone Figures, Guerrero

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Guerrero, Mezcala culture, ca. 700 to 200 BCE. A group of three carved greenstone figures in simplified anthropomorphic form, with broad shoulders, tapering bodies, and rounded or slightly domed heads. Surfaces display natural mottling and mineral inclusions characteristic of Mezcala greenstone. All three figures have drilled suspension holes through the torso, though only two remain functional as pendants, the third retaining mineral encrustation partially filling the aperture. Size of largest: 2.8" L x 1.3" W (7.1 cm x 3.3 cm) Item # 200366

Lot: 63 - Pre Columbian Mezcala Stone Axe God Figure

Pre-Columbian, Mesoamerica, Mexico, Guerrero region, Mezcala culture, ca. 300 BCE to 650 CE. A carved stone Mezcala axe god figure rendered in the culture's distinctive abstract style, with a tapered head, simplified torso, bifurcated lower section suggesting legs, and string cut lines for suggesting hands. Size: 6" L x 2.25" W (15.2 cm x 5.7 cm) Item # 200583

Lot: 64 - Guerrero Mezcala Stone Idol - Axe God Form

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Guerrero, Mezcala culture, ca. 700 to 200 BCE. A finely carved stone axe god figure with a flattened, stylized form, broad head, and bifurcated legs, embodying the abstract, geometric aesthetic of Mezcala sculpture and reflecting the symbolic association of such figures with ritual, fertility, and the sacred power of stone tools in ancient Mesoamerican belief systems. Size: 1.5" W x 3.9" H (3.8 cm x 9.9 cm) Item # 200343

Lot: 65 - Mezcala Greenstone Bead Necklace + Five Face Pendants

Pre-Columbian, Southern Mexico, Guerrero region, Mezcala to early Maya culture, ca. 600 BCE to 100 BCE. A greenstone bead necklace accompanied by five carved face pendants. The necklace is strung in modern times and too short for wearing, composed of three graduated strands of small disc beads in varied tones of mottled green, separated at the shoulders by two reddish quartz stone spacer beads. The five pendants are carved in the characteristic Mezcala manner with simplified facial planes and minimal features. Size of necklace strand: 18" L (45.7 cm); largest pendant: 1.8" L x 1.75" W (4.6 cm x 4.4 cm) Item # 199699

Lot: 66 - Mezcala Greenstone Head Pendant, Guerrero, Mexico

Pre-Columbian, Southern Mexico, Guerrero region, Mezcala culture, ca. 600 to 100 BCE. A hand-carved anthropomorphic head pendant carved from speckled greenstone, with rounded ears and lips, a simplified nose, and indented eyes. Drilled perforations appear through the nose and along the top of the head, indicating its intended use as a pendant or suspended ornament. Size: 2.5" L x 2.6" W (6.4 cm x 6.6 cm) Item # 200341

Lot: 67 - Mezcala Greenstone Maskette Pendant

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Mezcala. A small greenstone maskette pendant carved in the classic Mezcala style, the schematic face reduced to essential planar forms with string-cut grooves defining the brow, nose, and mouth, and pierced at the crown for suspension. Worked from a mottled dark green stone with natural veining, this is a fine small example of the geometric abstraction characteristic of Mezcala lapidary work. Item # 202589

Lot: 68 - Pair Jalisco Pottery Female Figures, West Mexico

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Jalisco, ca. 300 BCE to 300 CE. A pair of Jalisco pottery figures depicting standing nude female forms. Their elongated heads, prominent noses, and compact bodies reflect the region's sculptural conventions, with abbreviated arms and strong legs giving the figures a stable, grounded stance. Size of larger: 5.5" W x 8.6" H (14 cm x 21.8 cm) Item # 197188

Lot: 69 - Large Jalisco Pottery Bowl | Net and Woodgrain Motifs

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Jalisco, ca. 300 BCE to 300 CE. A large pottery bowl with a slightly rounded base and sloped walls, decorated in red and brown over a tan ground. The interior base shows an abstract net pattern with brown swirls and circles; the walls are decorated with small dots and five sections of slash-marks arranged in four registers. The exterior is painted in a faux woodgrain pattern. Size: 11.25" D x 3" H (28.6 cm D x 7.6 cm H) Item # 202529

Lot: 70 - Jalisco Greenstone Three Quarter Grooved Axe Head

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Jalisco, ca. 300 BCE to 300 CE. A finely polished greenstone axe head of elongated form, carved with a distinctive three-quarter groove near the butt for hafting. The stone exhibits a deep olive-green tone with natural mineral inclusions and weathered earthen deposits that accentuate its ancient surface. Axes of this type were practical woodworking tools but also held symbolic and ceremonial importance in West Mexican cultures, where greenstone was valued for its durability and luminous color. Size: 3.8" L x 1.5" W x 1.9" H (9.7 cm x 3.8 cm x 4.8 cm) Item # 199427

Lot: 71 - Jalisco Ameca Style Kneeling Female Figure, Protoclassic

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Jalisco, Ameca style, Protoclassic period, ca. 100 BCE to 250 CE. A mesmerizing pottery figure of a bare-chested female, shown kneeling with one arm out-stretched as though gesturing to the viewer, while the other balances a vessel atop her shoulder. Adorned with black and beige slip, her voluptuous breasts are enveloped in tattoos of hypnotic designs as black pigment additionally envelops her skirt and legs, as well as delineates her slightly open mouth and the lids and pupils of her huge, elongated eyes. A fabulous, enticing example! Size: 7.5" L x 9.1" W x 14.3" H (19 cm x 23.1 cm x 36.3 cm) Item # 186935

Lot: 72 - Jalisco Terracotta Seated Hunchback Figure - Ritual Scarification

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Jalisco. A hunched figure modeled in warm buff terracotta draws the body inward: knees propped high, arms folded and crossed atop them, the torso leaning forward as though caught mid-contemplation. The elongated cranium and slit-cut eyes flanking a prominent, sharply ridged nose mark the piece unmistakably as West Mexican work of the Jalisco style. Raised clay pellets stipple the shoulders and back, evoking the ritual scarification or dermal ornament that distinguished status and identity among these communities. The pronounced spinal curvature identifies the subject as a hunchback, a form recurrent in Jalisco funerary sculpture. Such figures, likely interred within shaft tombs, may have served as companions for the dead, embodying individuals accorded special regard for their perceived proximity to the supernatural. The shaft-tomb tradition of West Mexico (Jalisco, Nayarit, and Colima) flourished from roughly the last century BCE into the early centuries CE, producing hollow and solid ceramic figures placed in deep, chambered burials. Hunchbacked and otherwise physically distinctive individuals appear repeatedly in this corpus. Rather than caricature, such depictions likely reflected a belief that those set apart by physical difference held privileged access to spiritual power, a role echoed across many Mesoamerican cultures where dwarves and hunchbacks attended rulers and deities. Item # 203740

Lot: 73 - 4 Narino Miniature Buff-Ware Jars, Punctate Bridge Form

A quartet of miniature buff-ware jars, each thrown by hand into a full, near-spherical body that rises to a short neck and a sharply everted rim. Three carry plain collars; the fourth is the outlier, its shoulder pierced with a row of punctate dots and its mouth spanned by twin strap handles, a bridge form favored for suspension or cordage. The surfaces are burnished to a soft sheen, the pale slip broken by ochre clouding and fire blooms from open, uncontrolled firing. Vessels of this compact scale are typical of highland Narino domestic and mortuary assemblages, where small ollas held coca lime, pigment, chicha, or offerings interred with the dead. Their appeal lies in economy of profile: no painted register, no modeled figure, only volume, stance, and the record of the flame. The Narino (also written Nariño, and shared across the modern Colombia and Ecuador frontier with the closely related Carchi tradition) occupied the high inter-Andean basins of the far southwest. Their ceramic corpus is best known for the negative-resist Capuli and Piartal styles, whose black-on-red spirals and stepped frets have long dominated the market, yet the great bulk of excavated material is undecorated utility ware of exactly this kind: burnished monochrome ollas, cantaros, and cuencos built by coiling, scraped thin, and fired in shallow pits. Shaft tombs in the region regularly yield such plain vessels stacked beside their painted counterparts, a reminder that the same potters produced both registers. The double-handled example warrants separate attention. Bridged and lugged mouths recur in Andean small wares because they allowed a vessel to be slung from a carrying net or a belt, keeping a portion of lime, resin, or pigment mobile. The punctate collar is decoration reduced to its cheapest possible gesture: a fingernail or reed impressed once, repeated around the shoulder before the clay stiffened. Item # 204278

Lot: 74 - Pre-Columbian Bottles, Calabash Form, Tlatilco and Colima Ware

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Tlatilco and Colima. A pair of hand-built earthenware bottles whose swelling bodies imitate the ribbed shell of a bottle gourd, each rising to a tall cylindrical neck and everted lip. The larger vessel carries burnished red slip across neck and shoulder, its lower body divided by broad cream and dark brown vertical bands that follow the modeled lobes, a resist or slip-painted scheme that heightens the botanical illusion. The smaller, more petite bottle is finished in a warm buff-to-russet slip with the same fluted swell but no polychrome banding. Both derive from the everyday calabash containers used throughout ancient Mexico for water and fermented drink, translated into fired clay for household use and, ultimately, for deposit in shaft or pit tombs alongside the dead. The gourd was the first vessel of Mesoamerica, and potters never stopped quoting it. Tlatilco, a Formative period village on the western edge of the Basin of Mexico, produced some of the earliest and most inventive skeuomorphic ceramics in the Americas, translating squash, gourd, fish, and human bodies into burnished, slip-banded clay. Colima potters of West Mexico, working a millennium later, pursued the same botanical vocabulary in their highly burnished redwares, which were placed by the dozen in the deep shaft tombs that define the Comala and related phases. A shared form, separated by centuries and several hundred miles, and answering the same practical question of how to carry liquid. Item # 204266

Lot: 75 - Five Chupicuaro Polychrome Vessels, Ex Arte Primitivo

Pre-Columbian, Central Mexico, Chupicuaro culture, ca. 400 BCE to 200 CE. A lively and visually cohesive group of five Chupicuaro pottery vessels, each animated by the bold graphic language that defines this celebrated Central Mexican tradition. Executed in warm red slips with cream and black-painted decoration, the group includes a tripod bowl, a tall flaring vessel, two globular jars, and a shallow lid or dish, offering a compact survey of Chupicuaro ceramic forms. The vessels are distinguished by zigzag bands, stepped motifs, concentric arcs, and rhythmic linear patterns, designs that pulse with movement and balance. These abstract motifs, so characteristic of Chupicuaro pottery, are thought to reference water, fertility, and cyclical time, themes deeply embedded in the ritual and funerary practices of the culture. The confident geometry and saturated color palette give the group a striking modern presence, despite their ancient origins. Size of largest (tripod): 7" Diameter x 2.8" H (17.8 cm x 7.1 cm) Chupicuaro ceramics were often placed in burials, where their symbolic decoration and carefully considered forms played roles in ceremonies connected to life, death, and renewal. Together, these five vessels form an engaging ensemble that captures the elegance, energy, and enduring visual power of one of Mesoamerica's most distinctive ceramic traditions. Item # 200665

Lot: 76 - Nayarit Bichrome Bowl & Chupicuaro Tripod Vessel,

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Nayarit and Chupicuaro. A pair of hand-built earthenware bowls from western Mexico, each a study in restraint. The larger, attributed to Nayarit, flares from a flat base to an everted rim, its buff exterior banded in iron-red slip and carried around by a stepped-fret meander, that angular scroll motif whose terraced geometry recurs across Mesoamerican ceramic and architectural ornament alike. The interior is left plain save for a red-slipped lip. Its companion, in the Chupicuaro manner, is a shallow tripod dish, wholly coated in burnished red slip and raised on three short conical supports, the profile broken by a crisp exterior ridge below the rim. Both forms served domestic and mortuary purposes, vessels of this class recovered in quantity from West Mexican shaft-tomb and cemetery contexts as offerings accompanying the dead. Chupicuaro takes its name from a village on the Lerma River in Guanajuato, drowned in the 1940s by the Solis reservoir after salvage excavation exposed hundreds of burials. The cemetery yielded the polished red and red-on-buff wares now synonymous with the culture, along with the tripod supports that became one of its signatures. Nayarit belongs to the neighboring shaft-tomb tradition of Mexico's western coast, where chambers cut deep beneath the ground held the dead alongside figures, jars, and bowls. The stepped fret shared between these traditions, sometimes read as a stylized cloud, mountain, or serpent, is among the most durable design elements in Mesoamerica, surviving from Preclassic pottery into the mosaic facades of Mitla more than a millennium later. Item # 204191

Lot: 77 - Tarascan / Michoacan Polychrome Bowls | Serpent Decoration

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Michoacan and Tarascan (Purépecha), ca, 800 to 1520 CE. Two pottery bowls decorated in polychrome pigments. The larger is a Tarascan ware example with white-over-red decoration on the exterior and a deep black band with a thin white rule over red on the interior. The second is a Michoacán bowl decorated in white and orange over red, with four serpents encircling the exterior rim. Size of largest: 7.5" D x 2" H (19.1 cm D x 5.1 cm H) Item # 202542

Lot: 78 - Large Nayarit Hollow Pottery Figure, Scarification Detail

Pre-Columbian, West Mexico, Nayarit, ca. 100 BCE to 250 CE. A large Nayarit pottery figure, hollow-formed in reddish-brown clay, depicting a standing nude female in a frontal stance with thick legs and a broad torso. Her arms extend slightly forward. The tall, cylindrical head has a pronounced nose, parted lips revealing teeth, and deeply set eyes. The shoulders are densely stippled with raised nodules, of a type associated with ceremonial scarification in West Mexican cultures. Size: 11.1" W x 18.3" H (28.2 cm x 46.5 cm) The figure's abbreviated hands and feet, along with its compact proportions - broad torso, short limbs, and simplified anatomy - align closely with the hieratic conventions characteristic of Nayarit sculpture. The surface bears mineral encrustation and areas of wear consistent with long burial, suggesting its original placement within a shaft tomb context, where figures of this scale served as companions or guardians for the deceased. Works of this size are comparatively less common and would have formed part of a more elaborate funerary assemblage, underscoring both the importance of the individual interred and the enduring cultural emphasis on social presence beyond death. Sculptural, imposing, and deeply human, this figure stands as a powerful testament to the artistic and cultural sophistication of ancient Nayarit society. Item # 199665

Lot: 79 - Viru Polychrome Whistling Double Vessel with Duck

Pre-Columbian, northwest coast Peru, Viru culture, ca. 100 BCE to 600 CE. A fabulous pottery double vessel comprised of 2 cylindrical chambers with rounded tops and bases connected via a tubular tunnel at their lower section and a ribbon-form handle at their shoulders. One of the chambers presents a projecting conical spout at its top, while the other exhibits the head of a duck, featuring bulging, annular eyes and a semi-circular beak. Several petite perforations decorate the duck's head, which allows air to escape when one blows through the spout, producing a lovely sound. Black and white pigments adorn the exterior of the double vessel, forming dotted, striated, and maze-like designs. Size: 10.75" L x 4.25" W x 7.875" H (27.3 cm x 10.8 cm x 20 cm) Item # 202922

Lot: 80 - Pre-Columbian Avian Artifacts | Colima, Maya, Chimu, Costa Rica

Pre-Columbian, Mesoamerica, West Mexico, Colima, circa 300 B.C. to 300 A.D.; Mesoamerica, Maya, circa 250 to 900 A.D.; South America, Peru, Chimu, circa 1100 to 1470 A.D.; Central America, Costa Rica, circa 500 to 1500 A.D. A group of four Pre-Columbian artifacts united by avian imagery. Included is a Costa Rican pottery cylindrical whistle with applied nodular elements and a Colima pottery whistle modeled in the form of a bird, both remaining functional; a small Maya pottery bird sculpture in compact form emphasizing the beak and body contours; and a framed fragment of a Chimu textile woven with a bird motif. Size: 4.3" L x 2.5" W x 2.8" H (10.9 cm x 6.4 cm x 7.1 cm) Together these objects highlight the broad geographic range and artistic diversity of Pre-Columbian cultures. Across Mesoamerica and the Andes, birds frequently carried symbolic associations with the sky, transformation, and communication with the spiritual world, making them enduring subjects in pottery, ritual instruments, and woven textiles. Item # 200429

Lot: 81 - Proto-Maya Terracotta Rattle Figure, Standing Female

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Maya. A standing female figure modeled in buff terracotta, hollow-bodied and doubling as a rattle whose clay pellets whisper when shaken. She stands nude save for her ornament: a broad ridged headband crowns her rounded face, rosette earspools flank her cheeks, a small nose ring pierces her septum, and a beaded necklace rings her throat. Her features are gently swollen, with heavy-lidded ovoid eyes, their pupils punched by a drill, above a broad nose and pursed lips. Her arms spread from the shoulders, hands turned outward to rest against her thighs, framing open voids at the waist. The stout legs meet wide feet that taper to two small points, a tripod-like device that lets her stand unaided. Such rattle-figures likely served in ritual sound-making, perhaps tied to fertility or ceremonial performance. Ceramic rattles were widespread across Mesoamerica, where sound itself carried ritual weight. Enclosed within the hollow body, fired clay pellets transformed the figure into an instrument, its voice summoned in dance, procession, or funerary rite. Female figures adorned only with jewelry, headband, earspools, nose ornament, and necklace, recur throughout the Maya lowlands and may allude to fertility, ancestry, or the idealized human form rather than any single named deity. Item # 203702

Lot: 82 - Pair of Maya Chert Ceremonial Blades - Belize

Pre-Columbian, Mesoamerica, Maya, ca. 250 to 900 CE. A finely worked pair of Maya chert blades presents elongated, leaf-shaped forms with carefully flaked edges, one exhibiting a translucent gray body with natural banding and the other a lighter, opaque tone, both likely used as ceremonial blades or uniface knives within ritual or elite contexts. Size of larger: 7.5" L x 1.9" W (19 cm x 4.8 cm) Item # 202041

Lot: 83 - Maya Miniature Pottery Figure of a Seated Dwarf

Pre-Columbian, Mesoamerica, Maya, ca. 600 to 900 CE. A miniature pottery figure of a seated dwarf with compact proportions, wearing a prominent headdress. Size: 1.6" W x 2.9" H (4.1 cm x 7.4 cm) Item # 201951

Lot: 84 - Maya Copador Pottery Jar - Twin Handles & Geometric Bands

Pre-Columbian, Central America, Maya. A round-bodied ceramic jar rising to a flaring collar, its buff surface enlivened with russet slip painted in disciplined registers. Two small loop handles flank the shoulder, functional lugs for suspension or handling. The neck carries stacked bands of stylized ornament: a frieze of scrolling pseudo-glyphic motifs above, a lower zone of hatched triangles and stepped fret patterns, all bounded by broad horizontal lines. Below the shoulder the belly is left largely plain, punctuated by a circular reserved medallion. The bichrome palette, cream ground against iron-red decoration, and the abstracted, calligraphic banding identify this as Copador ware, a distinctive polychrome tradition of the southeastern Maya periphery. Such vessels served domestic and mortuary purposes, prized as trade goods across a wide exchange network in the Late Classic period. Copador ceramics (the name derives from "Copan" plus "Salvador") were produced chiefly in the region around Copan, Honduras, and the Rio Amarillo and Salvadoran highlands between roughly 600 and 900 CE. Their painted "pseudo-glyphs," rows of sign-like marks that imitate Maya writing without spelling legible text, are a hallmark of the type, suggesting the potters emulated the prestige of literate elite ceramics without transcribing actual language. Distributed widely through Late Classic trade, Copador vessels are among the most recognizable diagnostic wares of the southeastern Maya zone. Item # 203734

Lot: 85 - Maya Carved Shell Human Effigy Pendant

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Maya. A carved shell ornament depicting a human figure. The plaque is worked from marine shell, possibly whelk, and shows a frontal face with drilled eyes and mouth beneath an elaborate headdress, with the body rendered in low relief and pierced openwork below. The surface is a creamy white with pale orange hues. Shell carving held profound value in Maya cosmology: the conch and other marine shells were emblems of water, wind, and the watery underworld (Xibalba). Worked shell ornaments were used as pectorals, ear flares, and headdress adornments, and are frequently recovered from Classic-period (ca. 250-900 CE) burials across the Maya lowlands. The pierced perforations here would have allowed the piece to be sewn or strung, integrating it into the layered regalia through which rank and divine association were made visible. Item # 203595

Lot: 86 - Maya Greenstone Anthropomorphic Face Bead

Pre-Columbian, Southern Mexico to Guatemala, Maya, late Classic Period, ca. 550 to 900 CE. A hand-carved greenstone bead of inverted teardrop form bearing an abstract anthropomorphic face along the top. The string-cut facial features are presented in front of a sweeping coiffure, and below is a series of additional string-cut grooves that perhaps create another face when viewed from another direction. A suspension hole is drilled vertically through the bead. Size: 0.58" L x 0.98" W x 2.25" H (1.5 cm x 2.5 cm x 5.7 cm) Item # 182647

Lot: 87 - Four Maya, Aztec & Veracruz Terracotta Heads

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Maya, Aztec, and Veracruz. A quartet of faces parted from figures long since dispersed, each still holding its expression as though the interruption were only temporary. Two are Veracruz, from the Gulf Coast lowlands: the largest wears a tall incised cap and retains the red mineral pigment once flushed across crown and cheek, its eyes shut beneath weighted lids in that inward calm which reads as sleep, or trance, or death, depending on the mood of the person holding it; the second parts its lips over a neat row of teeth, hairline picked out in fine hatching, kin to the caritas sonrientes of the Remojadas region and their vocabulary of festival, pulque, and the flowered rites of Xochipilli. The third is Maya, pressed from a mold in pale marl clay, wide lentoid eyes and drilled pupils beneath a beaded headdress, great disks of ear ornament flanking the jaw, hollow behind and likely broken from a figurine-whistle of the kind interred along the Campeche coast so the tomb might be furnished with both a companion and a voice. The last is Aztec, and it is a skull: sockets bored deep, dentition bared, darkened by centuries underground. Death was not morbid in Tenochtitlan so much as structural. Mictlantecuhtli presided over the ninth and lowest layer of the underworld, skulls were racked on the tzompantli in their hundreds, and the skeletal face served as standard notation in clay, in stone, and across the painted pages of the codices. Rendered small and portable here, it may have belonged to a household shrine or a modest offering. Together the four compass more than a millennium of Mesoamerican modeling, from Classic Veracruz through the Late Classic Maya lowlands to the eve of the Spanish arrival ... four heads, three cultures, one shared conviction that the human face remains the most efficient carrier of meaning ever devised. Item # 203825

Lot: 88 - Maya Copador Polychrome Bowl - Avian & Monkey Frieze

Pre-Columbian, Guatemala/Honduras, Maya. A polychrome earthenware bowl of unusual profile, its lower body drawn into a soft pillow of four gentle corners above a rounded base, then stepped by a circular ridge into broad outflaring walls. The exterior carries a two-tiered procession painted in warm iron reds and cream slips: an upper band of four avian or swimming creatures rendered in fluid dark outline, and below them four long-tailed monkeys, tails coiling into scrolls against the pale ground. The interior floor holds interlaced pseudo-glyphic bands echoing the woven mat, or pop, a Maya emblem of rulership and order. Such calligraphic looseness and abstracted signs are hallmarks of Copador ware, a Late Classic tradition of the southeastern Maya frontier. Bowls like this served in feasting and ceremonial exchange, their painted menageries freighted with cosmological meaning. Copador (a modern name derived from "Copan" plus "dorado") is a Late Classic polychrome produced in the southeastern Maya zone around Copan and the valleys of western Honduras and eastern Guatemala. Its painters favored pseudo-glyphs, sequences that mimic the appearance of hieroglyphic text without conveying legible content, alongside profile figures and dancing personages. The monkey held particular resonance for the Maya: the Howler Monkey Gods were patrons of scribes and artisans, making simian imagery an apt companion to the mat motif's language of authority. Copador was widely traded, appearing in burials and caches far beyond its production centers, a marker of status and interregional connection. Item # 203733

Lot: 89 - Mexican Tlatilco Figure Heads, Buff Clay, Red White Pigment

Pre-Columbian, Central Mexico, Tlatilco. A group of eight ceramic figure fragments comprising six heads and two partial figures with head, shoulders, and arms. Modeled in buff and orange clay with incised and applied detail, the faces with defined brows, narrow eyes, and modeled noses and mouths, several with banded or incised headdresses, applied ear ornaments, and traces of red and white pigment. Item # 203828

Lot: 90 - 4 Pre-Columbian Blackware Vessels

Mixed lot: Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Olmec; Native American, Jicarilla Apache; Native American, Southwest. A quartet of smoke-fired blackware vessels spanning three millennia of hand-built ceramic tradition in the Americas. The earliest is a small Olmec bowl of burnished grey-black clay, its exterior wall banded with incised chevrons and zigzag hatching, a geometric vocabulary that ran through Formative Mesoamerican ritual and domestic ware alike. A larger utility jar, likely Jicarilla Apache, carries the micaceous sheen and reduction-fired surface prized for cooking. Two twentieth-century Southwestern Native American vessels round out the group: a deep bowl encircled by a raised band of pinched, beadlike bosses, and a small handled pitcher with pinched pouring lip and swelling body, its polished skin catching light where the burnishing stone passed. Each was coil-built, hand-finished, and darkened in a smothered fire. Blackware owes its color to atmosphere rather than pigment. Near the end of firing, the potter smothers the fire with pulverized dung, manure, or fine ash, choking off oxygen; the reducing atmosphere converts red ferric iron in the clay body to black ferrous compounds and drives carbon into the vessel walls. The technique arose independently across the hemisphere, from Formative Mesoamerica to the Rio Grande pueblos, and reached its most famous modern expression in the San Ildefonso work of Maria and Julian Martinez in the 1920s. Jicarilla Apache potters worked largely in micaceous clays from northern New Mexico, producing thin-walled cooking and storage vessels whose glittering surfaces come from naturally occurring mica in the paste rather than applied slip. The wares were made for use, and their reputation for withstanding direct fire made them objects of trade with neighboring Pueblo and Hispanic communities. Item # 204267

Lot: 91 - Ancient Ecuadorian Pottery Standing Figure with Earrings & Necklace

Pre-Columbian, Colombia or Ecuador. A standing pottery figure, hand modeled in a gray clay, the ovoid head with applied coil ear piercings and modeled brow, nose, and mouth. The body wears a collar with pendent ornament, hands held before the chest, with a banded waist wrap and ridged anklets above splayed feet. Pierced at the crown and at the groin, perhaps once used as a whistle. Item # 203752

Lot: 92 - 3 Chupicuaro Female Figures + Tlatilco Torso

Pre-Columbian, Central Mexico, Chupicuaro and Tlatilco. A group of four Pre-Columbian ceramic figure fragments, Mexico, comprising three Chupicuaro female figures and a small Tlatilco partial torso. The Chupicuaro examples are modeled in buff and red-slipped clay with applied pellet and fillet features, with applied ornaments, and arms folded across the body. Each preserves head and upper torso. The Tlatilco fragment is a smaller torso in unslipped buff clay with applied breast and shoulder detail. Traces of red pigment remain throughout. Item # 203829

Lot: 93 - Michoacan Polychrome Tripodal Rattle Molcajete

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Michoacan, Postclassic period. A fired-clay tripod rattle bowl whose every feature announces its purpose: three hollow conical supports, sealed against the ground, each containing a loose clay pellet that rattles with any movement, elevating the wide shallow basin above the working surface for which it was made. The exterior body is unslipped natural buff clay, warm and even in tone, with a band of red paint defining the rim. The interior is richly coated in a burnished red slip, over which applied cream pigment forms two or three registers around the upper wall, each serving as a ground for painted cartouches of scrolling curves and short parallel bars rendered in red and orange. The iconographic vocabulary is characteristic of Postclassic West Mexican decorative traditions, geometric and rhythmic rather than narrative, likely invoking water, wind, or seasonal forces whose precise meaning the painter did not need to record in words. At the center of the interior floor, a shallow circular field has been incised in a fine crosshatch pattern, the roughened surface functioning as a grater for chiles, seeds, and other foodstuffs reduced to paste for sauces and ritual preparations. Size: 9.3" D x 3.5" H (23.6 cm D x 8.9 cm H) Michoacan in the Postclassic period fell within or at the margins of the Tarascan cultural sphere, a polity centered at Tzintzuntzan on the shores of Lake Patzcuaro and the only major Mesoamerican state to successfully resist Aztec military expansion, repelling multiple Triple Alliance campaigns through the 15th century. The ceramic tradition of this region reflects that independence: technically accomplished, stylistically distinct from the central Mexican mainstream, and unmistakably its own. Tripod rattle vessels appear in both domestic and funerary contexts across the region, and the molcajete form specifically is documented throughout Postclassic Mesoamerica as a prestige household object, its three legs evoking the three-stone hearth that anchored the domestic sphere and carried cosmological resonance across multiple Mesoamerican traditions. Item # 202647

Lot: 94 - Michoacán Burnished Pottery Bowls, Set of 3, Sgraffito

Michoacan. Very fine set of three highly burnished pottery bowls. Each in a shade of red ranging from deep red-brown to a medium-red-orange. Largest is a shallow vessel with elaborate geometric design in added white over the red slip. Next, a deep red bowl with sgraffito design etched into the surface. Finally, the darkest and smallest vessel with fine incised designs. A lovely group! Item # 202578

Lot: 95 - Mixtec & Michoacan Redware Tripod Rattle Vessels - Zoomorphic Legs

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Mixtec and Michoacan. A pair of burnished redware tripod vessels, each raised on three hollow rattle legs that still sound softly when moved, small ceramic pellets sealed within betraying their function as gentle percussion during use or ceremony. The larger, attributed to the Mixtec of Oaxaca, is a broad flaring bowl whose supports are modeled as stylized birds' heads, their beaks and eyes rendered in low relief, while an incised band of hatching and a matte roundel enliven the exterior and interior. The smaller, from the Michoacan region of west Mexico, is a deeper cup-form basin on tapering legs, its lip finished with a subtle molded rim. Both retain the warm iron-oxide slip and hand-polished surfaces characteristic of Postclassic domestic and mortuary wares, objects that married everyday utility with the quiet music of the rattle. Tripod rattle vessels were a distinctive West and Central Mexican innovation: the hollow feet were formed as chambers and loaded with fired clay pellets before the leg was sealed, so that lifting, tilting, or setting the vessel down produced a rhythmic sound. Such wares served in both domestic contexts and funerary offerings across the Postclassic period. The zoomorphic supports of the Mixtec example, modeled as avian heads, follow a wider Mesoamerican convention of animating vessel legs with animal forms, lending the object both symbolic resonance and a tactile, sonic dimension. Item # 203772

Lot: 96 - Huastec Painted Terracotta Olla, Floral Motifs, Mexico

Latin America, Mexico, Hidalgo region, Huasteca culture. Latin America, Mexico, Hidalgo region, Huasteca culture, ca. 1866 - 1933 CE. An olla wheel-formed in red-firing terracotta, the rounded, low-slung body with a cream slip ground interrupted by a broad painted band of dark grey-black at mid-body, rendered with short diagonal hatching. Above and below this register, large stylized blossoms, possibly sunflowers or dahlias, radiate outward with striated petals and concentric-disc centers, connected by sinuous stems and broad ovoid leaves. The everted rim retains traces of painted motifs. Size: 10.5 in. D x 8.3 in. H (26.7 x 21.1 cm) Item # 202552

Lot: 97 - Veracruz Whistle Figure, Buff Clay, Feathered Crest

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Veracruz. Mold-made in buff clay, this whistle figure from ancient Veracruz portrays a standing figure in full regalia: heavy-lidded eyes, a strong nose, and parted lips beneath a banded headdress rising into a fan of feather-like crest elements. Disc earspools flank the head, and a beaded collar with pendant ornaments encircles the throat, marking elevated status. The flaring cape spreads in winglike planes above splayed feet, and the piece retains its hollow mouthpiece, though the whistle no longer functions. Item # 202979

Lot: 98 - Veracruz Remojadas Pottery Head w/ Bitumen

Pre-Columbian, Gulf Coast of Mexico, Veracruz, Remojadas culture, ca. 3rd to 9th century CE. A hand-built pottery head fragment from a larger statue or incense vessel. A strap under the chin suggests that a helmet or elaborate headdress was once attached to the head. The eyes are dotted with black tar as the pupils, and additional black pigment accentuates the lips; the bituminous pigment used is known as chapapote. Size: 5.25" L x 5.5" W (13.3 cm x 14 cm) Item # 192842

Lot: 99 - Casas Grandes Ramos Polychrome Pottery Olla Vessel

Pre-Columbian, Northwestern Mexico, Chihuahua, Casas Grandes (Paquime), ca. 1200 to 1450 CE. A finely hand-built globular olla with a gently flared rim, its cream slip ground covered in a bold polychrome design executed in terracotta red and graphite black - the hallmark palette of the Ramos Polychrome tradition. The composition wraps continuously around the vessel, combining large diagonal band frameworks with nested concentric arcs, step-fret elements, spirals, and dotted crescent motifs in a dynamic interplay of positive and negative space. Size: 7" D x 7" H (17.8 cm D x 17.8 cm H) Item # 202629

Lot: 100 - Casas Grandes Polychrome Olla - Geometric Ramos Design

Pre-Columbian, Mexico, Casas Grandes (Chihuahua). A globular earthenware olla with a short flaring neck and rounded body, painted in the Ramos Polychrome tradition of the Casas Grandes (Paquime) culture. The buff ground carries bold geometric designs in red and black, with interlocking triangles, stepped forms, and parallel banding. Such vessels served domestic storage and food preparation functions and were produced in large quantities at the trade center of Paquime in northern Chihuahua. Item # 203767

Lot: 101 - Costa Rica Carved Volcanic Stone Head

Pre-Columbian, Mesoamerica, Costa Rica. A blunt, boulder-like head worked from a coarse, pale volcanic stone, its features reduced to the barest essentials: a broad wedge of a nose in high relief, shallow lenticular hollows for eyes, and a mouth incised as a single horizontal groove. Deep vertical channels ring the crown and sides, dividing the mass into lobes that likely render a banded coiffure or headwrap, and a rectangular slot is cut into the flattened top. The base is smoothed and slightly convex, wear consistent with a working surface, so the piece may have doubled as a grinding stone or handstone as well as an effigy. The vesicular, granular matrix has taken a soft earthen patina throughout, its high points burnished where handling and use abraded the tuff. Costa Rican lapidary traditions worked overwhelmingly in local volcanic rock, and the boundary between sculpture and ground-stone tool was porous. Metates, manos, and mace heads were routinely given anthropomorphic or zoomorphic terminations, so a functional implement could carry an effigy face without ceasing to be an implement. Effigy manos and pestle-form heads of this compact scale are documented across the Atlantic Watershed and Central Highland zones, where they occur in both domestic middens and burial contexts, a reminder that grinding maize was itself an activity dense with symbolic weight. Item # 203640

Lot: 102 - Costa Rican Greenstone + Maya Obsidian Pendants (pr)

Pre-Columbian, Central America, Costa Rica, ca. 300 to 700 CE; Mesoamerica, Maya culture, ca. 250 to 900 CE. A pair of carved stone pendants. One is a Costa Rican greenstone pendant carved in a symmetrical form with stepped edges and drilled suspension holes flanking a central aperture, one face decorated with incised geometric motifs. The second is a Maya obsidian pendant formed as a circular disk with a central perforation for suspension, the dark volcanic glass retaining a glossy surface with minor edge wear consistent with age. Size of larger: 2.5" L x 2.1" W (6.4 cm x 5.3 cm) Item # 199568

Lot: 103 - Costa Rican Terracotta Zoomorphic Rattle - Turtle Effigy

Pre-Columbian, Costa Rica. A small hollow terracotta rattle modeled as a crouching zoomorph, its rounded chamber swelling into the domed shell of what appears to be a turtle. Above rises a boldly sculpted head with prominent coffee-bean eyes and a blunt, upturned snout, incised details giving the creature an alert, almost quizzical presence. The buff earthenware body retains loose clay pellets within, sounding when shaken, marking it as an instrument rather than mere effigy. Such rattles served in ritual, dance, and healing across the ancient chiefdoms of Costa Rica, where sound and rhythm carried spiritual weight. The turtle, an amphibious being at home in water and on land, likely embodied notions of fertility, transition, and the cosmic order that pervaded Isthmian belief. Ceramic rattles were widespread across the Intermediate Area chiefdoms of Central America, where percussive sound accompanied ceremony, curing rites, and communal dance. Some examples were formed with the sounding chamber integral to the effigy body, the enclosed pellets fired in place; others incorporated the rattle into larger vessels or figural pieces. The turtle recurs frequently in Costa Rican iconography, valued for its dual command of aquatic and terrestrial realms, an amphibious symbolism often linked to fertility and the passage between worlds. Item # 202644

Lot: 104 - Gran Cocle Ceramic Pedestal Bowl - Meander Band

Pre-Columbian, Panama, Gran Cocle culture. A handsomely proportioned pedestal bowl of deep red-slipped earthenware, its shoulder encircled by a painted band of interlocking step-fret meanders rendered in cream and black - a geometric vocabulary as precise and self-assured as anything produced in the ancient Americas. Two lateral lugs, one plain loop and one modeled as a small animal or zoomorphic head, punctuate the rim at opposing sides, lending the vessel a quiet asymmetry that keeps the eye moving. The red-slipped interior and the clean disc foot complete a form that balances utilitarian clarity with the decorative confidence characteristic of the Gran Cocle ceramic tradition. Item # 202579

Lot: 105 - Nicoya Polychrome Turtle Effigy Jar - Zoomorphic Band

Pre-Columbian, Costa Rica, Nicoya. A globular earthenware jar transformed into a turtle by the modeler's hand, its flaring collar rising from a rounded body girdled with red slip. Applied to the shoulder are the creature's features: a protruding snout and forelimbs at one side, a stubby tail and hind limbs opposite, so the vessel itself becomes the shell of the beast. Around the shoulder runs a band of zoomorphic ornament in dark brown-black line on a buff and iron-red ground, an interlaced procession of stylized serpentine or reptilian motifs. The painting is confident and economical, the modeling restrained. Such effigy jars served domestic and likely ceremonial purposes among the peoples of the Greater Nicoya region, where the turtle carried associations with water, fertility, and the enduring rhythms of the natural world. The Greater Nicoya ceramic tradition, spanning the Pacific coast of northwestern Costa Rica and adjacent Nicaragua, is celebrated for polychrome wares that fuse Mesoamerican iconographic currents with distinctly local sensibilities. Turtles recur across this repertoire as emblems of the aquatic realm and of regeneration, animals whose amphibious life bridged earth and water in the regional cosmology. The device seen here, converting a utilitarian jar into a living creature through modest applied appendages, is a hallmark of the effigy vessels produced during the Middle and Late Polychrome periods. Item # 203737

Lot: 106 - Carchi-Narino Incised Effigy Olla - Anthropomorphic Face

Pre-Columbian, Colombia/Ecuador, Carchi-Narino, ca. 800 to 1500 CE. A globular olla whose neck has been given a face and whose shoulders have been given arms, the vessel body thus becoming a torso: the potter's logic is efficient and the result quietly arresting. The anthropomorphic features applied to the short cylindrical neck are rendered with economy, a flat facial plane flanked by small coiled applique elements that suggest ears or ornamental appendages, the whole framed by a collar of applied pellets that encircles the neck like a beaded necklace. Below the neck junction, a pair of applied relief arms extends across the upper shoulder, their terminal elements suggesting simplified hands. The globular body is decorated with incised geometric designs executed with a fine implement into the leather-hard clay: a centrally placed trapezoidal motif densely filled with parallel hatching dominates the primary face, flanked by additional incised registers, while the reverse carries diagonal hatched panels that wrap the lower shoulder. Size: 7" D x 7" H (17.8 cm D x 17.8 cm H) The pale buff and grey-tan surface bears evidence of atmospheric fire-clouding across the lower body, a characteristic of open or semi-open firing conditions common to Carchi-Narino ceramic production. Vessels of this anthropomorphic effigy type are understood to have functioned in both domestic and funerary contexts across the highland communities of the Colombia-Ecuador border region, where the human body rendered in ceramic served as a persistent and resonant vessel for the living and the dead alike. Item # 202666

Lot: 107 - Gran Chiriqui Tripod Rattle Vessel with Shark Legs

Pre-Columbian, Panama / Costa Rica, Gran Chiriqui culture, ca. 1000 to 1500 CE. A hand-built tripod rattle vessel with a widely flared bowl rim resting on three hollow legs modeled as shark or catfish forms - each containing loose clay pellets that produce a rattling sound when the vessel is moved. Size: 7.5" D x 7" H (19.1 cm D x 17.8 cm H) Item # 202668

Lot: 108 - Nazca Painted Pottery Cylinder Bowl

Pre-Columbian, South Coast Peru, Nazca culture, ca. 100 BCE to 600 CE. A beautifully restrained and tactile example of Nazca ceramic artistry, this pottery bowl embodies the quiet sophistication and rhythmic design language that defines the culture at its most refined. The vessel is formed with gently flaring walls and a rounded base, its proportions balanced and confident. The surface is decorated with vertical linear bands painted in dark mineral pigment over a warm buff to reddish ground, creating a visual cadence that wraps the body of the bowl. These repeating lines emphasize the vessel's curvature, drawing the eye around its circumference in a slow, deliberate orbit. The interior retains a soft, worn surface with traces of slip, while the exterior shows areas of mineral accretion and abrasion consistent with age and burial. Size: 7.2" Diameter x 3.1" H (18.3 cm x 7.9 cm) On the underside, the decoration converges into a radial pattern, an elegant structural flourish that reveals the potter's attention to every angle of the form, even those not immediately visible in use. Nazca ceramics are celebrated for their mastery of line, color, and form, and while many examples feature elaborate figural or mythological imagery, bowls such as this demonstrate the power of abstraction within the tradition. The linear motifs may reference textiles, landscape rhythms, or cosmological order, translated into clay through repetition and balance rather than narrative imagery. This bowl would have served a functional role in daily or ritual life, likely used for food, drink, or offerings. Its understated decoration and harmonious proportions suggest an object meant to be handled, viewed, and used, rather than purely displayed, carrying meaning through touch as much as sight. Item # 200388

Lot: 109 - Chancay Bichrome Pottery Dipper - Spotted Feline, TL Tested

Pre-Columbian, Peru, Chancay. A shallow open dipper thrown in buff earthenware, its single flared lug rising from the rim like a stubby handle to be gripped when ladling. The interior carries the vessel's chief pleasure: a profile feline painted in sooty black slip, its lithe body dotted to suggest the pelage of a spotted cat, jaws agape, forelimb raised in a striding pose. A dark band rings the lip, framing the creamy ground against which the animal prowls. The bichrome palette, chalky cream and manganese black, is characteristic of Chancay potters working the coastal valleys north of Lima. Vessels of this scoop-like form served domestic and possibly ceremonial use, dipping liquids or dry offerings, while the feline motif carried the predatory potency that ran through Andean iconography. The Chancay culture flourished along Peru's central coast between roughly 1000 and 1470 CE, before absorption into the expanding Inca empire. Best known today for its lively black-on-white pottery and remarkably preserved textiles, Chancay artisans produced ceramics in large numbers, often mold-made and loosely painted, prizing expressive gesture over fine finish. The feline, whether puma, jaguar, or the spotted pampas cat, recurs across Andean art as an emblem of power and the wild, its spotted coat a shorthand for the untamed forces the coastal peoples both feared and revered. This piece has been tested using thermoluminescence (TL) analysis and has been found to be ancient and of the period stated. A full printed and bound report will accompany the item upon purchase. Item # 204006

Lot: 110 - Chancay Cuchimilco Figure, "Star Gazer," Painted Mask

Pre-Columbian, Peru, Chancay. A broad-shouldered ceramic figure stands with arms flung outward and face tilted skyward, the posture that earned these effigies their nickname as "star gazers." Modeled in buff earthenware and slip-painted in mahogany brown and grey-black over cream, the figure wears a short tunic banded at hem and sleeve, with painted stripes ringing each forearm like bracelets. A zigzag-patterned headband crowns the domed head, and a broad dark mask sweeps across the eyes, the coffee-bean pupils and hollowed mouth set within panels of red pigment that likely record facial paint or tattooing. Known to collectors as Cuchimilcos, such figures were placed in Chancay valley burials, perhaps as guardians or companions for the dead, and are typically pierced at the ears for suspended ornaments. The Chancay flourished on Peru's central coast in the valleys north of Lima during the Late Intermediate Period, in the interval between the collapse of the Wari state and the Inca annexation of the coast. Their potters worked at speed and at scale, using molds and a distinctive cream slip washed with dark brown or purplish black, a palette so consistent that Chancay ware is recognizable across the room. Cuchimilco figures were made in male and female versions and interred in quantity, sometimes several to a single tomb, alongside the gauzy openwork textiles and painted funerary dolls for which the culture is equally admired. The outstretched arms are commonly read as apotropaic, a warding gesture meant to shield the deceased, though the interpretation rests on context and iconography rather than any surviving text. Perforations at the ears and sometimes the crown once carried textile or metal ornaments now lost. Item # 204658

Lot: 111 - Ancient Ica Carinated Pottery Vessel, Negative Resist Motifs

Pre-Columbian, Peru, Ica, ca. 1000 to 1470 CE. A hand-built jug, its body sharply carinated at the equator to create a distinctive angular silhouette, rising to a tall cylindrical neck with a single strap handle joining shoulder to rim. Faint remains of black negative resist linear decoration survive along the upper shoulder, hinting at an original painted program now largely worn through use and age. Size: 5.5" D x 6.5" H (14.0 cm D x 16.5 cm H) Item # 202645

Lot: 112 - Wearable Chimu-Incan Spondylus Shell Necklace

Pre-Columbian, Chimu-Inca, ca. 1000 to 1470 CE. This necklace is composed of ancient Spondylus shell beads, valued in the Andes for their vibrant color and ceremonial associations. Strung in modern times and fully wearable, it is finished with a magnetic clasp for ease of use. Size of strand: 23.5" L (59.7 cm); largest bead: 2" L x 0.5" W (5.1 cm x 1.3 cm) Item # 200244

Lot: 113 - Moche Steatite Effigy Bead — Crouching Feline Form, 1800 years old

Pre-Columbian, South American, Peru, Moche, ca. 200 to 500 CE. A rare carved purple/blue effigy-form bead, modeled as a crouching feline or stylized creature biconically drilled and a side opening that held another amulet or pendant. The stone is an unusual and striking blue, probably steatite, giving the piece a distinctive presence that stands apart from more commonly seen stones. Traces of red pigment have been rubbed into the recessed details, highlighting the carving and suggesting deliberate embellishment for display or ceremony. With its sculptural form and enigmatic function, this piece was likely made for special use - possibly ritual or burial-associated - and is a rare find. Size: 1.75" L x 0.75" W x 1" H (4.4 cm x 1.9 cm x 2.5 cm) Item # 199342

Lot: 114 - Three Inca Bronze / Silvered Copper Implements, ca. 1450–1532 CE

South America, Inca, ca. 1450 to 1532 CE.A lot of three implements in bronze and silvered copper. The first is a crescent-shaped tumi, a ritual knife blade often associated with trepanation. The second is a chisel-shaped tumi of stout construction, showing signs of use. The third is a copper and silver object (80% copper, 20% silver), believed to be a headdress adornment, probably in the form of a feather, with two perforations for attachment. Size of longest: 11.25" L x 1.5" W (28.6 cm x 3.8 cm) Item # 202042

Lot: 115 - T-Rex Tooth Pendant in Silver Setting with Peridots

North America, Western United States, Late Cretaceous Period, ca. 69 to 66 million years ago. A striking pendant featuring a fossilized Tyrannosaurus rex tooth mounted in a custom silver setting. The fossilized tooth, dark brown with natural enamel sheen, is held within a sculpted silver cap of scrolling design, adorned with seven small round peridots in gilt bezels. A wearable relic of one of Earth's most formidable predators! Size: 2.2" L x 0.75" W (5.6 cm x 1.9 cm); silver quality: 77% to 84%; gold quality: 10% to 12% The most iconic dinosaurs of all time are undoubtedly the large, meat-eating members of the Tyrannosauridae family. This formidable group includes species such as Nanotyrannus, Albertosaurus, Gorgosaurus, Daspletosaurus, Tarbosaurus, and the most infamous of them all - Tyrannosaurus rex. Tyrannosaurids had a relatively brief but dramatic reign, emerging during a span of just 15 million years in the Late Cretaceous Period before their extinction around 65 million years ago. The first recognized fossil remains of Tyrannosaurus were unearthed in Colorado in the 1890s, with one of the earliest partial skeletons discovered in 1902 at the Hell Creek Formation - a site that remains one of the richest sources of Late Cretaceous fossils to this day. Item # 197530

Lot: 116 - Large Trilobite Fossil in Matrix, Asaphellus Stubbsi

North Africa, Morrocco, Draa Valley region, Lower Ordovician era, ca. 485 to 443 million years ago. A fossilized Asaphellus stubbsi trilobite preserved in a natural stone matrix, showing the classic three-lobed body plan with a raised central axial lobe and broad pleural lobes. The semicircular cephalon shows the glabella and eye positions, followed by a segmented thorax and a rounded pygidium forming the tail shield. Trilobites were marine arthropods that lived along ancient seafloors, and this example preserves the segmented exoskeleton in strong relief. Size of matrix: 7.5" L x 6" W (19 cm x 15.2 cm); 7.5" H (19 cm) on included custom standl; fossil: 4" L x 4" W (10.2 cm x 10.2 cm) Item # 201501

Lot: 117 - Large Macginitiea Nobilis Fossil Leaf, Fort Union Formation, Paleocene

North America, Western United States, Montana, Fort Union Formation, Paleocene period, ca. 66 to 56 million years ago. A large fossilized leaf attributed A large fossilized leaf attributed to the prehistoric sycamore Macginitiea nobilis (formerly Platanus nobilis), displaying a broad, multi-lobed form with clearly articulated primary and secondary venation. The leaf presents in a reddish-brown hue against the pale cream matrix. The overall symmetry and well-defined lobes are characteristic of Paleocene sycamore leaves from the Fort Union Formation. Specimens of this type date to a period of temperate forests that spread across western North America following the extinction of the dinosaurs. Size: 13" L x 11" W (33 cm x 27.9 cm); 12" H (30.5 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 201491

Lot: 118 - Three Mosasaur Vertebrae, Niobrara Formation, Kansas, Late Cretaceous

North America, United States, Kansas, Western Interior Seaway, Late Cretaceous period, circa 87 to 82 million years ago. A group of three fossilized mosasaur vertebrae in dense mineralized bone, each showing the characteristic spool-shaped form with worn articular faces and remnants of neural arch structures. Mosasaurs were large marine reptiles adapted for life in the sea, distant relatives of modern lizards and snakes rather than dinosaurs. The specimens originate from the Niobrara Formation. Size: 4.6" L x 1.75" W (11.7 cm x 4.4 cm); 5.5" H (14 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 202223

Lot: 119 - French Jurassic Ammonite Cluster, Stacked Stone Matrix

Western Europe, France, Jurassic period, ca. 201 to 143 million years ago. A monumental ammonite cluster presented in a sculptural stone matrix, skillfully cut to create a dynamic vertical composition of three spiral shells rising in a stacked formation. Each ammonite displays tightly coiled chambers with pronounced ribbing and earthy mineral tones ranging from deep brown to warm russet, contrasted against the paler stone ground. Size: 12" L x 4.5" W x 13.5" H (30.5 cm x 11.4 cm x 34.3 cm) Item # 201321

Lot: 120 - Large Fossil Bone Section, Mammoth or Marine Mammal

North America. A large section of mineralized megafauna bone, mammoth or marine mammal. The fragment retains dense cortical surface across one face, transitioning to open cancellous structure at the broken margins, with visible growth striations and a small natural cavity. Surfaces show gray, buff, and tan mineral staining consistent with long burial. Item # 197359

Lot: 121 - Fossil Marine Invertebrate Group, Corals, Bivalves and Knightia Fish Plate, 19 Pcs

North America, United States, Paleozoic to Cenozoic. A collection of marine invertebrate and vertebrate fossils, largely North American with possible additional localities. The group includes an Eocene fish from the Green River Formation, Wyoming, prepared in a shaped limestone plaque; several fossil corals, both colonial and solitary, showing corallite structure; echinoids, brachiopods; an ammonite in gray matrix; a shale plate with small trilobites; and assorted mollusk and reef material. Item # 197744

Lot: 122 - Polished Stone Tabletop - Ammonite Shell Fossils

North Africa, Morocco, Devonian Period, ca. 419.2 to 358.9 million years ago. Polished to a lustrous and smooth surface, this circular stone tabletop slab reveals a cross-section of ancient seafloor life - a dense, naturally occurring mosaic of Orthoceras and ammonite fossils locked in dark limestone matrix. Pale spiral ammonite chambers and the long, tapered cylinders of Orthoceras shells emerge in dramatic contrast against the mottled, gray, brown, and black stone. The slab is finished with a smooth beveled edge that lends the piece a clean architectural profile, making it equally at home as a functional table surface or a standalone sculptural object. Size: 24" Diameter x 0.5" W (61 cm x 1.3 cm) Item # 196482

Lot: 123 - Ammonite Fossil Collection Polished & Natural

North Africa, Devonian Period to Cretaceous period, ca. 419.2 to 66 million years ago. A collection of ammonite fossils including polished examples, cross-sections, and natural shell forms. The group displays characteristic spiral geometry and chambered interiors. Size: 3" L x 2.3" W (7.6 cm x 5.8 cm) Item # 201456

Lot: 124 - Brachiopod Fossil Mortality Plate, Devonian Shell Bed Matrix Slab

North America, United States, Devonian era. A fossiliferous stone slab densely packed with brachiopod shells preserved in both relief and negative impression. The specimens show radiating ribs and rounded to subtriangular outlines, with several larger shells raised above the surface and a patch of gray shell material exposed toward the upper center. The slab is roughly rectangular with irregular natural edges. Devonian marine deposits producing brachiopod coquina of this type occur in New York and Ohio. Brachiopods dominated Paleozoic sea bottoms for some 300 million years, filter feeding from within two unequal valves anchored by a fleshy pedicle. Their near-collapse at the end-Permian extinction cleared the way for bivalve molluscs, which is why a slab like this reads as alien to a modern beachcomber: superficially clam-like, anatomically nothing of the kind. Item # 200547

Lot: 125 - Mosasaur Teeth Fossil Matrix, Morocco, Upper Cretaceous

North Africa, Morocco, Upper Cretaceous Period, ca. 80 to 66 million years ago. A sandstone matrix containing fossilized mosasaur remains, including two conical teeth with well-preserved enamel and partial roots, along with a small fragment likely from a shark tooth and additional shell material and marine debris embedded throughout the surface. Size: 9" L x 5" W x 1.5" H (22.9 cm x 12.7 cm x 3.8 cm) Item # 202025

Lot: 126 - Carboniferous Fossil Plant Slab, Horsetail-Type Flora, North America

North America, United States, Carboniferous Period, ca. 359 to 299 million years ago. A shale matrix slab preserving fossilized horsetail-type plant impressions, the branching, segmented forms characteristic of early vascular flora, displayed against the dark stone surface. Size: 8.5" L x 7.5" W (21.6 cm x 19 cm). Item # 202023

Lot: 127 - Mosasaur Vertebrae Fossil, Articulated Spine Section, Late Cretaceous

Prehistoric Marine, Mosasaur, Late Cretaceous period, ca. 70 to 66 million years ago. A fossilized vertebral series capturing a section of a mosasaur spine preserved within its original sedimentary matrix. The specimen is presented in two adjoining segments, each retaining multiple articulated vertebrae, with rounded centra and projecting processes emerging in relief from the surrounding stone. The bone surfaces display a pale, mineralized tone that contrasts with the sandy matrix. Individual elements vary in preservation, with some exhibiting more pronounced articulation, while others are partially embedded. Size of larger piece: 11.1" L x 5.6" W x 3" H (28.2 cm x 14.2 cm x 7.6 cm); together: 19.3" L x 6.5" W x 3.5" H (49 cm x 16.5 cm x 8.9 cm) Mosasaur vertebrae are distinguished by their spool-shaped centra and robust construction, adapted to support powerful lateral movement through water. These marine reptiles, among the dominant predators of the Late Cretaceous seas, relied on strong, undulating bodies to pursue fish, ammonites, and other marine life. The preserved alignment seen here offers insight into that locomotion, hinting at the fluid, serpentine motion that once propelled the animal through prehistoric oceans. Retained in matrix, the fossil emphasizes both the skeletal structure and the geological context of its discovery, presenting not only the remains of the animal but also a fragment of the ancient seabed in which it was entombed. The division into two sections likely reflects either natural fracturing or careful extraction, allowing for a more complete view of the vertebral sequence. This specimen serves as a tangible record of Cretaceous marine life, combining scientific interest with strong visual presence, ideal for both study and display. Item # 197995

Lot: 128 - Brontotheriidae Fossil Molars & Jawbone, Nebraska, Late Eocene

North America, United States, Nebraska, Late Eocene period, ca. 35 to 34 million years ago. A group of three molar teeth with gray enamel, two still anchored within a section of original jawbone, representing a member of the Brontotheriidae. The teeth show broad, worn chewing surfaces and strong roots, adapted for processing soft vegetation. Brontotheres were large prehistoric ungulates with heavy bodies, stout legs, and paired nasal appendages, resembling rhinoceroses but more closely related to early horses. They browsed in dense, forested environments, but changing climates and the spread of open grasslands contributed to their decline and eventual extinction. Size: 7" L x 2" W x 4" H (17.8 cm x 5.1 cm x 10.2 cm); 5.5" H (14 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 202230

Lot: 129 - Prehistoric Fossil Shark Teeth Otodus & Megalodon

United States, Middle Miocene to late Pliocene, ca. 28 to 1.5 million years ago; North Africa, Morocco, Paleocene to Miocene, ca. 66 to 5 million years ago. A collection of fossil shark teeth including a large megalodon example, additional tooth fragments with preserved enamel, and a smaller tooth set in a natural sandstone matrix. The smaller specimen displays a distinct lateral cusp, suggesting a prehistoric species such as Otodus or a mackerel-type shark, likely from Moroccan deposits. Size of megalodon tooth: 3.5" L x 2.4" W (8.9 cm x 6.1 cm) Item # 200555

Lot: 130 - Ice Age Alaskan Woolly Mammoth Fossilized Vertebrae

North America, Alaska, Pleistocene (Ice Age), ca. 200,000 to 10,000 years ago. A woolly mammoth vertebra presented on a custom display stand, its robust form and broad articular surfaces still clearly defined after millennia in permafrost. The fossil’s earthy patina, porous texture, and natural weathering highlight the powerful anatomy of an Ice Age giant while keeping an honest, untouched look. Sculptural from every angle, it reads as both a scientific specimen and a bold natural-history object for shelf, desk, or cabinet. An evocative reminder of Pleistocene Alaska’s lost megafauna, ready to display and instantly conversation-starting. Size: 7" L x 3.5" W x 9.25" H (17.8 cm x 8.9 cm x 23.5 cm) Item # 199935

Lot: 131 - Crystal Minerals: Calcite, Green / White Apophyllite & Stilbite

India, ca. million of years ago. A group of crystal mineral specimens including apophyllite, stilbite, and calcite. The largest apophyllite piece carries tabular green and colorless crystals over white bladed stilbite. Additional specimens show peach and cream stilbite in botryoidal and bladed habits on matrix, colorless apophyllite clusters, a stepped translucent calcite crystal, and a light green crystal-lined plate. Sizes range from thumbnail to cabinet. Item # 200540

Lot: 132 - Two Sumatran Polished Amber Bangle Bracelets

Southeast Asia, Indonesia, Sumatra, ca. late 20th to early 21st century CE. A pair of Sumatran amber bangle bracelets shaped from warm honey and cognac-toned fossilized resin. Each bracelet is polished to a smooth, high-gloss surface that highlights the internal striations. When exposed to ultraviolet light, the amber exhibits a blueish glow, dramatically illuminating its internal striations and organic inclusions formed over millions of years. Size of largest: 5" Diameter x 1" W x 3" interior diameter (12.7 cm x 2.5 cm x 7.6 cm) Item # 200820

Lot: 133 - Two Amazonite in Feldspar Matrix with Quartz Specimens

North America, ca. millions of years ago. Two large raw amazonite mineral specimens, featuring vivid blue-green crystals emerging from a feldspar matrix with areas of quartz and natural black tourmaline mineral inclusions. The contrasting colors and rugged crystal faces create a striking display, with each piece offering unique formation patterns and texture. Ideal for collectors or decorative use, these specimens bring bold natural color and geological character to any space. Size of largest: 5.5" L x 3" W x 5" H (14 cm x 7.6 cm x 12.7 cm) Item # 200587

Lot: 134 - Quartz Crystal Cluster, Smoky Quartz and Geode Mineral Specimen Group, 9 Pieces

North America. A group of nine mineral specimens. Includes a polished agate slice with blue-grey chalcedony figuring set against a brown matrix; a halved geode lined with drusy quartz; three smoky quartz crystal clusters of varying size; a clear quartz point cluster; a milky quartz fragment; a quartz specimen on tan matrix with green inclusions; and a tabular green chlorite- or fuchsite-bearing rock with quartz and iron-stained matrix. Item # 200722

Lot: 135 - Saharan Pastoral Era Blades, Bifacial Chert, Hide Preparation Tools

North Africa, Sahara, Neolithic period. A pair of bifacially knapped stone blades, each worked to a long ovoid outline with a broad rounded bit and a narrowing butt. Chert ranging from grey through pink and brown, with conchoidal flake scars across both faces and a polished sheen along one working edge. Tools of this form are associated with Saharan foraging and early pastoral populations and are generally attributed to woodworking, hide preparation, and cutting tasks. Item # 200159

Lot: 136 - Paleolithic Acheulean Stone Hand Axe

North Africa, Acheulean culture, Lower Paleolithic, ca. 1.2 million to 500,000 years ago. A knapped stone hand axe formed in a classic teardrop shape, suited for chopping, butchering, and general utility tasks. This form represents one of the longest-lasting tool traditions in human history, reflecting early technological skill and adaptation among prehistoric hominins. Size: 6.2" L x 3.5" W (15.7 cm x 8.9 cm) Item # 201366

Lot: 137 - Mesolithic Stone Tool Group, 52 Chert Blades and Flakes, Rif Mountains, Morocco

North Africa, Morocco, Rif Mountains, Mesolithic period. A group of fifty-two knapped stone tools, from Taounate in the Rif Mountains of northern Morocco. The pieces are worked from chert and quartzite in shades of tan, gray, brown, and reddish brown. Most are blades and flakes struck from prepared cores, retaining sharp working edges and visible flake scars. Tools of this form were used for cutting, scraping, and butchering by hunter-gatherer groups. The Rif has been occupied since at least the Middle Paleolithic, and stone tool industries continued in the region through the Mesolithic. Item # 188930

Lot: 138 - West African Granite Bead Necklace - Mottled Hardstone Strand

West Africa, Mali / Ghana. A strand of hardstone beads worked from mottled granite in shades of gray, green, cream, and brown. The beads are barrel- and cylinder-shaped, graduated toward a larger central bead, their surfaces smooth from polishing and handling. Hardstone beads are uncommon in most of Africa, but were used in West Africa, where the trade centered on Mali and the entrepot of Timbuktu. The strand is presently strung on monofilament wire and can be restrung as desired. Item # 203769

Lot: 139 - Large Bura Asinda Sikka Stone Funerary Idol

West Africa, present day Niger and Burkina Faso, Bura-Asinda-Sikka area, ca. 1300 to 1500 CE. A hand-carved stone funerary idol with a columnar body, wide lateral projections, and a tall head in the shape of a spade. The highly-stylized face is composed of circular eyes with slit-form pupils, pouty lips, concave cheeks, and a tall, crested nose which forks at the top and forms the curved eye brows. A wide band of diagonal diamonds are incised around the neck. Unfortunately, little is known about the culture that lived in this area when this statue was made, because it was only recently discovered and there have been very few scientific excavations. What has been found are large cemeteries with impressive necropoli, which provide evidence that this was a wealthy, complex society. They buried their dead in conical urns, often topped with figures like this one. Size: 5.7" W x 14.3" H (14.5 cm x 36.3 cm); 14.5" H (36.8 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 202948

Lot: 140 - Two 16th C. African Djenne Copper/Bronze Vessels

West Africa, Niger Delta, Mali, Djenne Peoples, Middle Niger Civilization, ca. 16th to 17th century CE. A miniature bronze vessel and copper ornament. One is a globular pot featuring a lug handle at the rim. The second is a tubular, hollow object with openings at both ends and applied nodules decorating its surface. This enigmatic piece contains the preserved remnants of a textile fabric within its hollow interior, leading to the speculation that it functioned as a form of adornment, possibly a large bead, although it also resembles a goblet in shape. Size of larger: 0.8" W x 1.4" H (2 cm x 3.6 cm) Item # 193147

Lot: 141 - African Gabon Kwele Anchor-Form Currency Mandjong Blade

Central Africa, Gabon, Kwele culture. A forged iron currency blade of anchor form known as a mandjong, hand wrought with a broad crescent head drawn to upswept tapering points and a raised central spine descending to a flared, split tang. Attributed to the Kwele peoples of northern Gabon and the adjacent Congo and Cameroon border region. Blades of this type functioned as a store of wealth and were exchanged in bridewealth payments and dispute settlements rather than carried as tools or weapons. Mounted on a removable custom metal display stand. Item # 203567

Lot: 142 - Tuareg Copal Bead Necklace w/ Silver and Nickel-Brass

North Africa, Tuareg / Touareg people, Berber culture, early to mid-20th century CE. A necklace composed of large copal beads in warm yellow and reddish tones, interspersed with four silver spheres (92%–95% silver) and additional nickel-brass elements, strung on a cord and suspended from a nickel-brass chain with a hook clasp. Adornment of this type is associated with Tuareg traditions of status and personal identity. Size: 26.5" L (67.3 cm); central copal bead: 1.25" L x 0.8" W (3.2 cm x 2 cm); silver quality: 92% to 95% Item # 201947

Lot: 143 - African Fante Wood Figure - Seated Queen Mother with Bead Strands

West Africa, Ghana, Fante. A seated female figure carved from a single block of wood, representing a Fante queen mother. The surface is coated in white kaolin, with black pigment marking the coiffure, brows, ringed neck, and facial features. Strands of yellow glass trade beads encircle the waist and both lower legs. The figure rests on a low stool known as a dwa; these stools and their shape can indicate rank, gender, and nobility status. Item # 202932

Lot: 144 - 4 African Iron Currency Blades, Traditional Bridewealth

West Africa, Nigeria, Idoma peoples. A group of four currency blades, each is hand-forged in iron with a flared, spatulate upper section tapering to a long, narrow shaft terminating in a slightly expanded foot. Two retain broad flat heads with defined shoulders; two have wider blade sections with irregular hammered margins. Surfaces show oxidation and hammer texture throughout, with the marks of forging visible along the shafts. Blades of this type functioned as a medium of exchange, bridewealth payment, and store of value. Item # 203587

Lot: 145 - Dan Krahn Wood Kagle Mask with Projecting Snout

West Africa, Liberia and Ivory Coast border region, Dan or Krahn (Wee, Guere, Kran) peoples. A face carved as much for menace as for beauty, this hardwood mask thrusts forward from a domed, ridged brow into a long tubular snout with a rounded, muzzle-like terminus. Two recessed triangular apertures cut beneath the overhanging crest supply the eyes, while flaring triangular cheek planes sweep outward like wings and a thin knife-edged nasal ridge bisects the face. The deep brown surface carries an oiled, handled sheen with encrusted darker passages in the recesses. A heavily weathered metal suspension loop projects from the crown, its corroded shank testifying to long hanging or storage. The projecting muzzle and angular eye openings point to the kagle (kaogle) type, likely evoking a bush creature, monkey or chimpanzee in most readings, whose disruptive energy is summoned into the village. Small perforations along the lower rim once secured a raffia or fiber beard. The political border between the Ivory Coast and Liberia cuts across several related peoples, among them the Dan, Wee, Kran, and Grebo, whose masking traditions overlap and borrow freely. In Dan thought, the dangerous immaterial spirits of the forest take visible form as carved faces; the sculpture is spiritually charged whether or not it is worn. A male performer, gle-zo, receives the mask spirit in a dream, and only that dream authorizes him to dance it. Documented Dan mask personalities number at least a dozen: Deangle, who comes down from the initiation camps to beg food from the women; Tankagle and Bagle, entertainers of skits, mime, and elegant dance; Gunyege, danced by a quarter's champion foot racer; and Bugle, who once led men to war. Kagle belongs to the troublemakers. It arrives to disrupt, moving erratically, behaving aggressively, embodying the brutal and nonhuman force of the bush. The disorder is deliberate and pedagogical: by testing the strength of village institutions and offering a vivid negative example, the masquerade teaches order and discipline. Among the Kran, whose Gla association handles judicial matters, harvest rites, and funerals, the related kaogle is understood to carry a chimpanzee spirit and to lend its strength and cunning, historically to prepare men for war, today largely to instruct and to entertain. Mask identities are not fixed. A masquerade's vitality can pass from one form to another, and a respected mask that has served across generations of dancers may in time be elevated to gunagle, the mask that stands for an entire village quarter, or to gle wa, the judicial mask. Separated from performance, as nearly all collected examples are, these identities become difficult to recover with certainty. Item # 203521

Lot: 146 - Pair of African Dogon Carved Wood Door Locks with Figural Effigies

West Africa, Mali, Dogon peoples. Two carved wood door locks each in the form of a standing figure with a columnar body, extended horizontal crossbar, and a head surmounted by tall paired horns or ears. The larger example stands on two carved legs and carries incised linear decoration across the torso, with a rectangular slot cut through the body to receive the sliding bolt. The interior of the slot is reinforced with an iron panel, and iron pegs sit within the mechanism. The second lock has a rounded body with incised diagonal hatching and a tapered projecting element opposite the crossbar. Both show worn surfaces and a dark patina consistent with age and handling. Among the Dogon, the granary is the household's structural metaphor: its plan, its contents, and its closure are bound to cosmological ideas set out in the Ogotemmeli material recorded by Marcel Griaule. The lock, ta koguru, is a compound of two carved parts, a fixed housing and a sliding bolt, with loose pegs that drop into the bolt and can be lifted only by a matching toothed key. The carved head surmounting the housing is commonly read as an ancestral or tutelary presence, a guardian standing watch over stored millet and family goods. Item # 203813

Lot: 147 - African Luba Carved Wood Standing Female Figure with Scarification

Central Africa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Hemba / Luba peoples. A female figure carved from wood, standing on an integral circular base, the arms drawn in with hands framing the abdomen. Raised keloid scarification patterns to the torso, with a protruding navel and full breasts. The head is carved large in proportion to the body, with a high domed forehead and receding hairline above a coiffure worked in stepped registers of fine incised striation. The eyes are formed as low raised ovals cut with narrow slits beneath arched brows. Deep reddish brown surface with a lustrous patina, consistent with prolonged handling and the application of oils. Item # 203580

Lot: 148 - Five Miniature West African Wood Face Masks - Dan Ma Go

West Africa, Cote d'Ivoire and Liberia, Dan, Bassa, or Mano peoples, ca. early to mid-20th century CE. A compelling group of five miniature wood face masks, each carved in the refined idiom of the Dan and related peoples, where smooth planes, slit eyes, and softly modeled features suggest the deangle type - the graceful, feminine spirit of the forest. These diminutive forms, known as ma go or "small heads," were never intended for wear, but instead served as intimate vessels of spiritual presence, carried on the body, kept among personal belongings, or displayed in ritual contexts as portable embodiments of powerful masquerade spirits. Over time, their surfaces would have been nourished with oil, food, and sacrificial offerings, developing varied patinas that speak to their roles as protective charms, identifiers, oath objects, and enduring links between individuals, ancestors, and the unseen world. Size of largest (one with openwork top): 1.3" W x 2.5" H (3.3 cm x 6.4 cm) Item # 197237

Lot: 149 - Early 20th C. Bamana Wood Figural Granary Door Lock

West Africa, Mali, Bamana/Malinke peoples, ca. early to mid-20th century CE. A hand-carved wooden door lock of an anthropomorphic form with a horizontal slide bar inserted through the central body cavity. Thinly incised striations decorate the front of the vertical lock body, and the abstract head bears an enormous chin beneath a pair of projecting horns. Thick, dark layers of patina have formed across this tool and imbue it with an attractive presentation. Known as ta koguru, such bolt locks are found in both Bamana and Dogon societies in various styles. They were traditionally used to secure wooden granary doors and often served as symbolic bridal gifts. Size: 13.5" W x 18.3" H (34.3 cm x 46.5 cm); 21.4" H (54.4 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 197868

Lot: 150 - 20th C. African Ngbaka Forged Iron Throwing Knife

Central Africa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ngbaka people, ca. early to mid-20th century CE. A forged-iron throwing knife with a crescent-shaped blade head and two protruding blades on the opposite side. The blade heads are integral with the slender handle, and a third protrusion pokes out from the handle's center. A woven fiber handle was at one time attached to the lowest part of the handle for increased grip and control when hurling the knife forward. Size: 12.4" W x 18.375" H (31.5 cm x 46.7 cm) Item # 202951

Lot: 151 - Large African Mali Pottery Bedframe Support Post

Western Africa, Mali, Djenne, ca. 19th to early-20th century CE. A sturdy terracotta conical support post featuring a thick ring-shaped loop at the top used to receive wooden beams forming the structural base of a bedframe. The surface is decorated with bands of incised stippling and impressed textures, adding pattern and visual interest to the utilitarian form. Size: 8.5" W x 12" H (21.6 cm x 30.5 cm) Item # 201528

Lot: 152 - Ancient Nok Terracotta Kneeling Figure, Crested Headdress

West Africa, Nigeria, Nok culture. A kneeling personage of coarse, mica-flecked terracotta, back gently bowed, the proper left arm dropped to the side while the right rises to rest a hand atop a tall crested coiffure or headdress. The face carries the hallmarks of Nok modeling: almond eyes with drilled pupils, arched brows in relief, a broad nose and pursed lips, all reduced to an abstract geometry that reads clearly at small scale. Traces of applied ornament survive across the torso, likely beaded strands and a girdle, the sort of regalia that signals rank in Nok figural sculpture. Fired from a gritty, granite-derived clay, such figures were built in coils and hollow-modeled; their purpose remains debated, though a commemorative or shrine function is generally favored. Presented on a custom display stand. The Nok culture takes its name from a tin-mining village on the Jos Plateau of central Nigeria, where in 1928 a terracotta head surfaced in alluvial gravel and was recognized by the colonial administrator Bernard Fagg as something without precedent in the archaeological record of West Africa. Subsequent excavation revealed a ceramic tradition spanning roughly a millennium, contemporary with early iron smelting in the region and among the oldest figural sculpture known from sub-Saharan Africa. Nok artists worked a coarse clay rich in quartz and mica, weathered from the granites of the plateau, building figures hollow by coil and paddle and finishing the surface with burnishing and incision. The perforated eye, a pierced pupil set within a triangular or almond socket, is the most diagnostic convention of the corpus, and firing vents were often disguised within nostrils, ears, and pupils to prevent bursting in the kiln. Gestures such as hand-to-head, kneeling, and hands clasped at the knees recur across the surviving body of work, but without secure archaeological context for most examples their meaning stays open: mourners, ancestors, ritual specialists, and portraits of the elite have all been proposed. Item # 204515

Lot: 153 - Early 20th C. Mali Dogon Wood Nude Female Figure

West Africa, Mali, Dogon culture, ca. early 20th century CE. A carved Dogon wood figure depicting a standing nude female with legs slightly bent and arms arranged in a modest, inward gesture. One hand rests against her breast while the other is placed along the upper thigh, creating a pose that recalls the classical Venus pudica stance while remaining firmly grounded in Dogon sculptural tradition. The figure is elongated and frontal, with a tall cylindrical torso, softly modeled limbs, and a rounded head topped by a simplified coiffure or headdress. The surface shows signs of age and use, with areas of wear, erosion, and a dry, matte patina consistent with ritual handling. Dogon figures of this type were often associated with fertility, ancestry, and idealized womanhood, serving as objects of veneration rather than purely decorative works. The restrained facial features and calm posture emphasize balance and composure, key qualities in Dogon aesthetics. Size: 4.7" L x 4" W x 29.1" H (11.9 cm x 10.2 cm x 73.9 cm); 31.75" H (80.6 cm) on included custom stand. This figure reflects the Dogon approach to the human form as symbolic and spiritual rather than naturalistic, combining abstraction with subtle references to bodily presence and social meaning. Item # 200209

Lot: 154 - Papua New Guinea Bone Dagger - Cassowary Feathers & Woven Fiber

Melanesia, Papua New Guinea. A bone dagger fashioned from a sharpened animal or bird bone, its blade tapering to a barbed point. The handle is wrapped and mounted with a woven cotton fiber netting collar from which three panels hang, each strung with seed pods and hollow feather quill tubes. Bundled cassowary feathers gather at the base to form dark plumed tassels. Bone daggers of this type were carried by men in the Sepik and highland regions as both weapons and prestige objects; the feathered and beaded ornamentation marks the piece as a display item worn or held during ceremonial and dance contexts rather than a purely utilitarian tool. Item # 203739

Lot: 155 - 7 Papua New Guinea Abelam Yam Masks + Penis Gourd

Oceania, Papua New Guinea, Abelam Culture, ca. mid-20th century CE. A collection of 7 miniature woven yam masks, each hand-crafted from natural basketry fibers and decorated with pigments in red, white, ochre, and black. These spirited creations represent ancestral beings and were traditionally made to adorn large ceremonial yams displayed during annual harvest festivals, symbolizing fertility, prestige, and deep reverence for the ancestral realm. The elongated gourd is a koteka, also known as a horim, penis gourd, or penis sheath, made from a hollowed gourd with a rattan weave around the rim and cord to tie around the wearer. Size of largest mask: 10.3" L x 5.75" W (26.2 cm x 14.6 cm) Item # 198048

Lot: 156 - Papua New Guinea Fiber-Wrapped Stone Adze Blades - Boar Tusk & Fur

Melanesia, Papua New Guinea, Highlands. A pair of ground stone adze blades, each socketed into a sheath of tightly woven cotton and vegetal fiber cord. One is worked with bands of yellow-dyed cane and hung with a tassel of black boar bristle; the other bears a tuft of fluffy red fur and a pair of curved boar tusks. Both retain short braided carrying straps. In the New Guinea Highlands, hafted stone adzes served as everyday woodworking tools for felling trees, hollowing canoes, and shaping timber, but elaborately decorated examples like these also functioned as prestige and ceremonial objects, displayed and exchanged as markers of wealth and status. Item # 203749

Lot: 157 - Vanuatu Ambrym Stone Head, Muyu Ne Bu, Pig Magic Charm

Oceania, Melanesia, Vanuatu, Ambrym Island. A dense volcanic stone worked into an elongated ovoid head, the face emerging in low relief from a naturally tapering cobble. Enormous almond eyes sweep upward at their outer corners until they nearly meet the ears, set beneath incised brows; a thick straight nasal bridge widens into flared nostrils, and the lips hold a faint grin. The surface carries a warm reddish-brown patina, burnished smooth across the cheeks and glossed where generations of handling have polished the raised planes. Stones of this type from Ambrym, known as muyu ne bu, were charged with power and deployed by men in the magic surrounding tusked pigs, the living currency of Vanuatu prestige exchange. Their use extended to charms for weather, wind, and fertility. Mounted on an included custom stand. On Ambrym, stones are anything but inert. The muyu ne bu were understood as reservoirs of power, worked in ritual and economic contexts bound to the acquisition of castrated tusker pigs. Such pigs were never merely animals: they served as markers of rank, instruments of exchange, and indispensable offerings in the maghe grade-taking system, their worth measured by the curvature of the lower tusks, a growth that could take eight years to complete its spiral. At that point the animal functioned as a unit of social measurement, credited with a soul and a language of its own. The stones were thought to sway negotiations, draw favorable opportunities, and secure rare pigs, including the prized hermaphroditic animals with double-coiled tusks, or lure a rival's herd toward one's own enclosure. In an exchange, each party might carry its own charm, converting the transaction into a silent contest between invisible forces rather than an agreement between men. Other charms addressed weather, wind, and fertility. Kept secret for generations, these stones were frequently misread by Christian missions as instruments of malevolence. Within Ambrym practice their power was protective: fertility, prosperity, the health of herds, the success of rites, and social recognition. Certain examples were held to be the material bodies of mythical spirits, carrying oral narratives that anchor each stone in landscape, kinship, and alliance. Here, sculpture was never purely aesthetic; it acted, connected, and transformed. Item # 204514

Lot: 158 - Hawaiian Koa Wood Vessels & Salt Shakers, 6 pcs

North Pacific, Hawaii, ca. early to mid-20th century CE. A collection of turned wood vessels, likely koa, comprising a larger cup, a stemmed shot glass, a pair of salt and pepper shakers, and two small bowls. Each piece displays warm honey-brown tones and subtle grain patterning characteristic of island hardwoods. The larger cup and stemmed glass are decorated with the Kingdom of Hawaii coat of arms and the word "Hawaii," lending the set a distinct souvenir character. Size of larger cup: 2.75" W x 3.25" H (7 cm x 8.3 cm) Item # 201264

Lot: 159 - Egyptian Naqada Banded Agate Mace Head w/ Jasper Veining

North Africa, Egypt, Predynastic period, Naqada culture. A globular mace head worked from banded agate, the stone shot through with rust-red jasper veining that spills across a translucent bluish violet and pale gray ground. The piriform body swells to a broad equator and tapers toward the flattened top, where a biconical shaft hole was patiently bored through the full thickness of the stone. Surfaces are ground and polished to a soft sheen that catches the internal banding, one flank retaining small natural vugs in the chalcedony. Mace heads of this class served as weapons and, increasingly, as emblems of authority in the Nile Valley, the labor invested in an intractable cryptocrystalline quartz signaling status well beyond mere function. Mounted on a custom acrylic display stand. The mace is among the oldest and most durable symbols of Egyptian kingship. Disc-shaped mace heads dominate the earlier Naqada I horizon; the piriform, or pear-shaped, form rises to prominence in Naqada II and III, when the concentration of hard-stone examples in elite graves and temple deposits suggests they had already begun to shift from battlefield tool to insignia. The type culminates in the great ceremonial mace heads of Scorpion and Narmer, and in the pharaonic smiting scene, arm raised, mace poised above a kneeling captive, that endured in Egyptian art for three thousand years. Boring a shaft hole through agate before the age of metal tools required a hollow reed or copper drill fed with abrasive sand, turned for many hours; the choice of a vividly banded stone over readily worked limestone was itself a display of resource. The red veining here is consistent with jasper, an iron-rich variety of the same cryptocrystalline quartz family as the surrounding chalcedony, formed in the same silica-charged fractures. Item # 204392

Lot: 160 - Egyptian Predynastic Alabaster Mace Head, Lotus Bud Form

North Africa, Egypt, Predynastic period. A swelling piriform mace head worked from creamy banded alabaster, its body carved as a closed lotus bud whose broad petals rise in shallow relief from the rounded base toward the flattened crown. The hourglass haft perforation runs the full height, its rims softened by wear, and the stone retains a warm honeyed mottling with drifts of milky calcite. Mace heads of this class began as functional weapons in the late Predynastic Nile Valley but rapidly became emblems of authority, the pharaonic gesture of smiting held in Egyptian art for three millennia. The lotus, opening at dawn and closing at dusk, carried associations of solar renewal and rebirth, making the form as likely ceremonial as martial. Presented on a custom acrylic display mount. The mace was the defining weapon of the late Predynastic elite, and its evolution is unusually legible in the archaeological record: the flat disc heads of Naqada I give way to the heavier pear-shaped (piriform) forms of Naqada II and III, a shape better suited to crushing than cutting. By the threshold of the First Dynasty the object had shed most of its practical function. The great ceremonial mace heads of Scorpion and Narmer, found in the Main Deposit at Hierakonpolis, are carved from limestone and alabaster and covered in relief narrative, objects meant for the temple rather than the battlefield. Alabaster (travertine, or calcite alabaster) was quarried at Hatnub and in the Wadi Gerrawi and prized for the translucency that gives the stone its luminous depth. Working a haft channel through it with copper and stone-tipped drills fed by abrasive sand was slow, exacting labor, which is precisely why the finished object announced status. Item # 204434

Lot: 161 - Egyptian Predynastic Hematite Mace Head

Egypt, Predynastic, Naqada culture. A dense pear-shaped mace head ground from hematite, its dark iron-grey surface still holding the metallic sheen that made this ore so prized. The piriform silhouette swells from a narrow, slightly flared base to a broad rounded crown, pierced axially by a tapering biconical shaft hole for a wooden haft. Faint reddish-brown mineral veining threads the polished skin, and the abraded facets left by the lapidary's grinding remain legible across the body. The piriform mace superseded the earlier disc form during the later Naqada sequence and became the standard weapon of authority in Predynastic Egypt, wielded in the smiting pose that would harden into pharaonic iconography. Hematite examples are markedly scarcer than limestone or breccia ones, and their weight and lustre suggest a prestige function alongside, or in place of, practical use. The mace is the oldest continuously legible symbol of Egyptian kingship. By Naqada II the disc-shaped mace head of earlier centuries had given way to the pear-shaped type seen here, a change generally read as a shift from a slashing implement toward a crushing one, and simultaneously toward pure emblem. The great ceremonial mace heads of Scorpion and Narmer, deposited at Hierakonpolis, are oversized limestone versions of exactly this form, carved with the earliest royal narrative scenes known from the Nile Valley. The gesture they record, the ruler raising a piriform mace above a kneeling captive, was still being carved on temple pylons three thousand years later. Hematite carried its own charge of meaning. The Egyptians associated the blood-red streak the stone leaves when ground with vitality and protection, and later employed it for amulets and headrests. Working it required patience: at roughly 5.5 on the Mohs scale and unusually heavy, hematite had to be pecked, drilled with an abrasive-fed tubular bit, and laboriously polished, an investment of labor no purely utilitarian weapon would justify. Item # 204444

Lot: 162 - Egyptian Limestone Renenutet Statuette with Infant Thutmosis III

Egypt, New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, ca. 1479 to 1425 BCE. A carved limestone statuette depicting Renenutet, the cobra-headed goddess of nourishment, motherhood, harvest, and fertility — a rare subject that at first glance resembles Isis suckling Horus. She holds the pharaoh Thutmosis III as an infant upon her lap, offering her breast for nourishment. Size: 1.8" W x 3.9" H x 2.5" D (4.6 cm W x 9.9 cm H x 6.3 cm D); on included custom stand: 2" W x 6.2" H x 2.6" D (5.1 cm W x 15.7 cm H x 6.6 cm D) The figure is fragmentary, a portion of the mother's cobra face having been lost to time lending the piece an eerie, elemental quality: not the perfected goddess of the temple wall, but something rougher and more urgent, as though devotion itself. The torso, the arms, and the child survive with sufficient clarity to read the composition with confidence. Carved from local limestone, the story is not yet complete. This piece first came to us to TL test, not fully knowing if the piece was limestone or a hardened clay. Samples were taken and placed into our equipment. A clear result emerged - 300 BCE. But, this piece dates 1000 years earlier. How can two such divergent conclusions be reached? Further inspection of the piece shows what seems to be carbon deposits on the exterior. Carbon implies fire; fire (or more accurately heat) is what sets the thermoluminescent clock ticking. And ironically, heated limestone can be tested using TL analysis. Conclusion: this piece is limestone and it was heated to over 900 degrees around 1000 years after it was made! The piece carries a handwritten label reading "Mertseger / Andrew C. Ware / 37, rue Decamps / PARIS-XVI / XIX Dyn / Deir el Medineh / 1978," recording its presence in a Paris private collection by 1978. The Meretseger attribution and 19th Dynasty date are close but Meretseger's known corpus does not include a kourotrophos (nuturing) composition. Where Meretseger represented death, justice and punishment, Renenutet, also a cobra-headed goddess, represents just the opposite - nurturing, lifegiving, and harvest. The label is nonetheless preserved as a historic provenance document, recording the collection of Andrew Cunningham Ware (1945 to 2024), an amateur Egyptologist who studied under the celebrated French Egyptologist Christiane Desroches Noblecourt and assembled his holdings across a lifetime divided between France and South Florida. A similar sculpture can be found in the British Museum under museum number EA802. While composed of limestone, this piece has been successfully tested using thermoluminescence (TL) analysis and has been found to be ancient. A full printed and bound report will accompany the item upon purchase. Item # 202821

Lot: 163 - Egyptian Copper Atef Crown Element, Osiris, Late Dynastic

Egypt, Late Dynastic Period, 26th to 30th Dynasties, ca. 664 to 332 BCE. Egypt, Late Dynastic Period, 26th to 30th Dynasties, ca. 664 to 332 B.C. A copper alloy element from the atef crown of Osiris, composed of a tall vertical feather flanked by a horizontal ram's horn and two uraei crowned by sun disks. This piece would once have adorned the proper left side of a larger statue, likely representing Osiris, ruler of the underworld and guarantor of resurrection. The uraei retain traces of red-colored glass paste inlay on their bodies, while the circular sun disks above their heads were designed to hold additional inlays of colored material, now lost. The back is undecorated; the inner side of the feather preserves two tangs for fixing, which would have secured the element into the statue's crown. Size: 3.3" W x 4.8" H (8.4 cm x 12.2 cm) Cast by the lost-wax technique as a solid form, the piece retains areas of green patina with light encrustation. The statue it once embellished may have been made of either bronze or wood, both materials commonly employed for divine figures during the Late Dynastic period. This surviving crown element speaks to the rich iconography of Osiris, combining solar imagery, serpentine guardianship, and ram symbolism, all bound within the Atef crown as a powerful emblem of kingship and afterlife dominion. Item # 197600

Lot: 164 - Six Egyptian Late Dynastic Faience Bead Strands

Egypt, Late Dynastic to Roman period. A shoal of tiny faience discs, thousands of them, strung into six long strands that ripple between turquoise, celadon, sage, and oxidized plum. Each bead was formed from a quartz-based paste, pierced, and fired with an alkaline glaze whose copper colorant gave ancient Egypt its signature blue-green, here softened and mottled by burial. Beads of this small annular type were produced in enormous quantities for netted mummy shrouds, broad collars, and simple strung ornaments worn in life. The ancient beads have been restrung on modern cord, each strand finished with modern metal beads at both ends rather than a clasp; fitted with clasps, they would be readily wearable as necklaces. Egyptian faience is not clay but a self-glazing siliceous body: ground quartz mixed with natron or plant ash and a copper colorant, shaped, then fired so that soluble salts migrate to the surface and vitrify into a glassy skin. The Egyptians called it tjehenet, "that which is brilliant" or "dazzling", and prized it as an inexpensive substitute for turquoise and lapis, both of which carried strong associations with rebirth and the regenerative power of the sun. From the Third Intermediate Period onward, workshops turned out disc and tube beads by the tens of thousands, most destined for the netted bead shrouds draped over wrapped mummies. Variation in color across a single strand, from bright aqua to brown and buff, generally reflects differing firing atmospheres and centuries of chemical alteration in the ground rather than deliberate design. Item # 203462

Lot: 165 - Six Egyptian Faience Bead Amulets

North Africa, Egypt, Late Dynastic to Roman period. A pocketful of protective magic in glazed silica: six miniature faience amulets, their surfaces ranging from pale blue-green to a mottled, earth-stained celadon. The largest is figural, a squat, big-headed dwarf deity likely representing Pataikos, the apotropaic child-form of Ptah invoked against snakes, scorpions, and misfortune. Two take the form of a hand clenched into a fist with the thumb thrust between the fingers, the fica gesture, an ancient charm against the evil eye that persisted around the Mediterranean for millennia. Another is phallic, a fertility and potency talisman; a fifth is a ribbed, teardrop fruit form with an intact suspension loop; the sixth is abstract and perhaps zoomorphic. Each was pierced or looped for stringing, worn on the body in life and wrapped among the linens in death. Egyptian faience is not clay at all but a self-glazing paste of ground quartz, lime, and alkali; the copper salts within migrate to the surface during firing and bloom into the blue-green skin the Egyptians called tjehenet, "that which is dazzling." Its color deliberately echoed turquoise and lapis, materials associated with rebirth and the gleam of the divine. Pataikos, named by Herodotus after the figureheads he saw on Phoenician ships, is the dwarf manifestation of Ptah the craftsman god. Amulets of this type often show him standing on crocodiles or grasping serpents, a compact bodyguard against venomous things. The fica or "fig" gesture belongs to a different, wider current: attested in Egypt, Etruria, and Rome alike, the obscene thumb-in-fist was thought to deflect the envious gaze, and phallic amulets served the same warding function through frank display rather than concealment. Their presence in a single group suggests the mixed magical vocabulary of the later periods, when Egyptian and Greco-Roman apotropaia circulated side by side. Item # 204576

Lot: 166 - Egyptian Faience Beads + 1 Carnelian Bead (0.28 lb)

North Africa, Egypt, Late Dynastic to Roman period. A dense accumulation of ancient faience beads, hundreds of them, dominated by short tubular segments with a scattering of flat annular discs and irregular barrels, plus a single carnelian discoid bead among them. The glazes survive in a muted spectrum of turquoise, sage, powder blue, and buff, the alkaline surfaces now largely matte and earth-toned from long burial. Faience, a self-glazing paste of ground quartz, natron, and copper colorant, was Egypt's signature synthetic material, prized for a blue-green sheen that echoed turquoise and lapis without their cost. Beads of exactly this type were strung into the lattice nets laid over wrapped mummies, and were also worked into broad collars, bracelets, and amuletic strands for the living. Ideal for study, restringing, or display as an assemblage. The blue-green of faience was never merely decorative. Egyptians called the material tjehenet, "that which is dazzling," and its color was read as the hue of renewal: the sky, the Nile inundation, the sprouting papyrus marsh. Copper oxides in the quartz body migrated to the surface during firing to form a self-generated glassy skin, a technology Egyptian workshops had mastered by the Predynastic period and refined for three millennia afterward. Tubular beads of this scale were mass-produced in the Late and Ptolemaic periods, often by cutting a drawn or rolled paste tube into segments before firing. Strung in grids with faience spacer bars, winged scarabs, and Sons of Horus figures, they formed the beadwork nets draped over the outer wrappings of mummies, an economical substitute for the elaborate cartonnage of earlier centuries. Excavated nets frequently survive only as loose beads once their linen threads perish, which is how lots of this kind reach the market. Carnelian was valued in a complementary register: its red was the color of blood, vitality, and the protective power of Isis, and single hardstone beads were often introduced into otherwise faience strands as accents or amuletic safeguards. Item # 203423

Lot: 167 - Romano-Egyptian Bronze Harpocrates-Eros Figure

Egypt, Romano-Egyptian. A nude child god cast in the round at miniature scale, standing with the weight easing onto one leg, small wings lifting behind the shoulders, and the right hand raised so a finger rests at the lips. The modeling is soft and boyish, rounded belly and thighs beneath a heavy cap of curls, the surface now mottled green and brown from long burial. Two divinities meet in the pose: the winged Eros of Greek and Roman art and Harpocrates, the infant Horus, whose childish finger-sucking Roman viewers read instead as a command for silence. Conceived wholly within the Hellenistic vocabulary rather than the Egyptianizing one, figures of this type served household devotion in Roman Egypt as portable guardians of secrets and wards against harm. Cast in leaded bronze, likely by the lost-wax method. The name Harpocrates is a Greek rendering of the Egyptian Har-pa-khered, "Horus the Child." Egyptian artists showed the infant Horus with a finger in his mouth, a wholly conventional sign of infancy; Greek and Roman viewers misread the gesture as an injunction to silence and recast the god accordingly, making him a patron of secrets, mysteries, and discretion. The misreading proved durable, surviving into Renaissance emblem books and modern usage. In Roman Egypt the child god slid easily into the visual language of Eros, the winged putto already ubiquitous in Hellenistic and Roman art. The result is a hybrid of the sort seen here: the body and wings of Cupid carrying the Egyptian gesture and the Egyptian promise of protection. Figures conceived this way, in Hellenistic rather than Egyptianizing conventions, are nonetheless catalogued with Egyptian material because of the deity they name, a convention observed in older collection catalogues. Item # 204566

Lot: 168 - Romano-Egyptian Alabaster Nude Male Figure w/ Bird

Egypt, Roman period, ca. 1st to 2nd century CE. A remarkable alabaster figurine of a nude male youth standing with legs together and holding a bird to his chest with his left hand as his right arm hangs to his side. Size: 1.4" W x 3.4" H (3.6 cm x 8.6 cm) Item # 192602

Lot: 169 - Phrygian Bronze Bow Fibula

Anatolia, Turkey, Phrygian. A compact cast bronze fibula of the Anatolian arched-bow type, its semicircular bow swelling into a thick, collared arc articulated by fine encircling ribs at either shoulder. One terminal resolves into a tight coiled spring from which the slender pin springs, while the opposite end rises into a small stepped catchplate that once secured the pin's point. Surfaces carry a warm, burnished brown patina with pale earthen deposits caught in the moldings. Fibulae of this class functioned as garment fasteners, pinning the heavy woolen mantles worn across the Phrygian highlands, and their profiles were sufficiently standardized that archaeologists use bow shape and knob spacing as chronological markers. Small in scale but complete in mechanism, the piece preserves the elegant economy of an object designed to be worn daily rather than admired. The fibula is one of the signature artifacts of Iron Age Anatolia. Excavations at Gordion, the Phrygian capital on the Sangarius River, recovered them by the hundreds, including from the great tumulus long associated with the dynasty of Midas, where bronze fibulae were deposited in quantity alongside cauldrons and vessels. Oscar Muscarella's typology of these brooches, built on the Gordion material, remains the standard framework: variations in the bow's curvature, the number and profile of its knobs or moldings, and the form of the catchplate distinguish groups that spread west into Greece and east across the Assyrian frontier. Greek writers later remembered the safety-pin brooch as a foreign fashion, and the Anatolian workshops were among its most inventive producers. Item # 204604

Lot: 170 - Cypriot Hematite Cylinder Seal Bead, Fire Altar, Bird-Headed Deity

Ancient Near East, Cyprus, Middle to Late Bronze Age. A miniature barrel of polished hematite, bored lengthwise for suspension so that it served as bead and seal at once, its dark surface cut with a crowded procession of borrowed gods. A robed figure tends a flame at an altar beneath a bucranium and a cruciform star in a disc; two further robed celebrants raise their arms around a deer suspended in the field, with a second deer below, the pairing likely a sacrifice. Beyond them kneels a winged, bird-headed deity confronting a seated sphinx in profile. The vocabulary is deliberately cosmopolitan, drawing on Syrian, Egyptian, Anatolian, and Mesopotamian repertoires in the manner of Cypriot glyptic, and the engraving survives in fragmentary condition across parts of the frieze. Cyprus in the second millennium BCE sat at the hinge of the eastern Mediterranean, exporting copper and importing, along with everything else, other people's gods. Its seal cutters absorbed the Old Syrian repertoire (robed worshippers, altars, bull's-head bucrania, the star-in-disc), the Egyptianizing winged and composite beings that reached the island through Levantine intermediaries, and the Anatolian taste for filling every empty field with small animals and symbols. The result is glyptic that quotes fluently in four traditions without belonging wholly to any of them. Hematite was the preferred stone for cylinder seals across the Bronze Age Near East: hard enough to hold a crisp engraving under repeated rolling, heavy in the hand, and taking a mirror polish that reads almost metallic. Pierced longitudinally, such seals were worn strung at the wrist or neck, functioning simultaneously as ornament, amulet, and the personal signature that authenticated a sealing in clay. Item # 204616

Lot: 171 - Cypriot Askos & Greek Attic Lekythos, Ancient Pottery Pair

Cyprus, Cypro-Archaic II period, ca. 600 to 475 BCE; Greece, Attic, ca. 5th to 4th century BCE. The larger vessel is a Cypriot askos, formed with a rounded body rising from a low foot and fitted with a high arched handle connecting the shoulder to a small pouring spout. The surface preserves traces of red slip and banded decoration, typical of Cypriot vessels used for pouring liquids such as oil or wine. The smaller is a Greek Attic lekythos, a slender oil flask with a narrow neck, rounded body, and single handle extending from shoulder to rim. The vessel retains areas of dark slip consistent with Attic ceramic production, likely used for storing or pouring perfumed oils, often associated with domestic use or funerary offerings. Size of larger: 5.4" L x 4" W x 5.4" H (13.7 cm x 10.2 cm x 13.7 cm) Together, the vessels illustrate the shared yet regionally distinct pottery traditions of Cyprus and mainland Greece during antiquity, highlighting common vessel forms used throughout the ancient Mediterranean for storing and dispensing valuable liquids. Item # 201504

Lot: 172 - Greek Bronze Phiale Libation Bowl w/ Azurite Patina

Eastern Mediterranean, Greek. A shallow hemispherical bowl raised from sheet metal, its floor rising at the center into a domed omphalos boss: the canonical phiale mesomphalos. The everted rim is thin and faintly irregular where the hammer left its record, and the whole surface has ripened into a mottled skin of malachite green, warm cuprite red, and unusually rich azurite blue that pools in the hollows around the boss. Faint radiating traces of etched floral ornament survive on the interior, wheeling outward from the center. Handleless by design, the vessel was held from below, thumb at the rim and a finger seated behind the omphalos, then tipped forward so wine ran onto altar or earth. Such bowls served sacrifice, symposium, and funerary rite alike, the standard instrument of the poured offering. The phiale is the single most frequently depicted vessel in Greek religious imagery. On vase paintings and grave reliefs, gods and mortals alike hold it level in the outstretched right hand at the moment of the spondai, the poured offering that opened treaties, oaths, departures for war, and meals for the dead. The omphalos, literally "navel", is both a formal flourish and a practical one, since it gives the fingers purchase on a vessel that has no handle and no foot and cannot be set down full. The type was not exclusively Greek. Achaemenid Persian workshops produced closely related mesomphalic bowls, often with lobed or petalled interiors, and the form circulated widely across the Eastern Mediterranean and the Near East through trade, tribute, and plunder. Metal examples were prized and frequently melted down, which is why survivals remain far less common than their ubiquity in ancient art would suggest. The blue in the patina is worth a word. Green malachite is the ordinary end product of buried copper alloy; the blue phases, azurite and related copper carbonates, form only where burial chemistry cooperates, and they are correspondingly less often seen. Their survival here alongside red cuprite gives the surface an unusually broad mineral range. Item # 204538

Lot: 173 - Phoenician Hellenistic Gold Relief Inlay of Tyche

Near East, Levant, likely Phoenician, Hellenistic period. A miniature oval plaque of high-karat gold, its softly rippled surface worked in low relief with the bust of Tyche in profile to the right, veiled and crowned. The goddess of fortune and civic destiny wears the mural or radiate diadem that marked her as guardian of a city's luck, her veil falling behind the nape in shallow, fluid folds. The thin sheet is domed and slightly crumpled, consistent with a bezel detached from the hoop of a finger ring, where such repousse medallions replaced the engraved gemstone. Assayed at roughly 82 percent gold, the alloy sits comfortably within Hellenistic Levantine practice. Small enough to be lost in a palm, the piece is a personal talisman as much as an ornament, worn to keep Fortune close to the hand that made bargains. Tyche (Roman Fortuna) rose to extraordinary prominence after Alexander, when the newly founded and refounded cities of the eastern Mediterranean each claimed a personified Fortune of their own. The Tyche of Antioch, modeled by Eutychides around 300 BCE with her turreted crown and river god at her feet, became the template for civic imagery from Syria to Phoenicia, reproduced on coinage, gems, and jewelry across the Seleucid world. Phoenician workshops at Tyre, Sidon, and Byblos absorbed this Greek visual language while retaining an older Levantine appetite for thin gold sheet worked in repousse rather than solid cast forms, a technique that yields luminous, lightweight ornaments like this one. A veiled Tyche carried a second register of meaning: the veil signaled the bride, the matron, and the concealed workings of fate alike, an apt emblem for a signet worn against the skin. Item # 204543

Lot: 174 - Ancient Roman Stone Mosaic, Amphora Motif, Levant

Roman, Levant, Late Imperial Period, ca. 3rd–5th century CE. A study in balance and symmetry, this stone mosaic depicts an elegant amphora rendered in a palette of wine red, taupe, sienna, jet black, dove grey, and milky white against a creamy beige ground, framed by a russet and slate-grey border. Mosaic only: 25⅛" W x 25⅛" H (63.8 x 63.8 cm); with matrix and metal frame: 26⅝" W x 26⅝" H (67.6 x 67.6 cm). Item # 203127

Lot: 175 - Roman Agate Intaglio Ring, Neoclassical Gold Setting, Bearded Man

Roman, Imperial period, ca. 1st to 3rd century CE.; Europe, Neoclassical period, ca. 19th century CE. A carved Roman agate intaglio, its dark surface engraved with a portrait of a bearded man in a toga, later set within a 19th century European gold ring. The intaglio is ovoid in form, engraved with a left-facing bust of a mature male figure, his beard articulated and his toga falling in controlled folds across the shoulder. Such portraits often represented philosophers, statesmen, or idealized Roman citizens. Size of intaglio: 0.4" L x 0.3" W (1 cm x 0.8 cm); of ring: 1.1" L x 1" W (2.8 cm x 2.5 cm); weight: 6.7 grams; US ring size: 8.25 The agate, banded and polished to a soft sheen, provides tonal contrast that enhances the depth of the engraved lines. In antiquity, intaglios like this served as personal seals as well as markers of identity, pressed into wax to authorize documents and worn as signs of education and rank. Centuries later, during the 19th century revival of Classical taste, ancient gems were avidly collected and remounted, prized as direct physical links to the ancient world. The present example is set within a European gold ring of Neoclassical design, the shoulders enriched with stylized classical ornament that frames the gem without competing with it. The gold mount shows gentle wear consistent with age, its warm tone complementing the cool darkness of the agate. Together, gem and setting form a dialogue across time, uniting Roman portraiture with the 19th century fascination for antiquity, and offering a wearable artifact that has moved seamlessly from empire to salon, from seal to symbol. Item # 200933

Lot: 176 - Gold Solidus of Valentinian I, Antioch Mint

Roman, Imperial period, Antioch mint, reign of Valentinian I. A 4.4 gram gold solidus struck for Valentinian I, the obverse carrying his pearl-diademed, draped and cuirassed bust to the right within the legend D N VALENTINIANVS P F AVG. The reverse, inscribed RESTITVTOR REIPVBLICAE, presents the emperor standing frontally in military dress, head turned right, grasping the labarum in one hand and a globe surmounted by Victory in the other, the small winged figure reaching up to crown him with a wreath. The exergue reads ANT S, marking the Antioch mint and its second officina, with no stars or dots flanking the mark. Reported at 94.32% gold, roughly 22.6 karats, consistent with the deliberately high purity of the late Roman solidus, the coin that underwrote imperial payrolls and diplomacy from Constantine onward. Valentinian I (r. 364-375) was a Pannonian soldier raised to the purple by the army at Nicaea after the sudden death of Jovian. Within a month he elevated his brother Valens as co-Augustus and divided the empire, taking the West for himself and leaving the East, Antioch included, under Valens. Gold in his name therefore continued to issue from eastern mints, a numismatic reminder that the division was administrative rather than dynastic. He spent most of his reign on the Rhine and Danube frontiers, rebuilding fortifications and campaigning against Alamanni, Quadi, and Sarmatians, and died at Brigetio in 375, reportedly of a stroke brought on by rage at an insolent Quadic embassy. Though a Christian, he was notable for a policy of religious toleration unusual in his century. The RESTITVTOR REIPVBLICAE type, "restorer of the state," was a mainstay of fourth-century gold, pairing the labarum (the Christogram standard adopted by Constantine) with Victory on a globe. The message is compact and pointed: military command, divine favor, and universal dominion, all conferred on an emperor whose actual work was the grinding defense of the frontiers. Item # 204544

Lot: 177 - Roman Silver Ring, Green Plasma Intaglio of Mercury

Roman, Imperial period. A silver finger ring set with an oval intaglio of dark green plasma, a chalcedony variety commonly used in Roman glyptic art. The face is incised with Mercury, messenger of the gods, rendered as a nude youth in contrapposto. He holds a caduceus in one hand and a purse in the other, with a winged petasos on his head — emblems of the deity who governed commerce, travel, eloquence, and the passage of souls. The silver hoop swells to a rounded bezel that grips the stone, its form worn soft by age and handling. Such signet rings served as ornament, personal seal, and talisman, pressed into wax to authenticate correspondence and worn to invoke divine favor over the wearer's fortunes and journeys. Mercury (the Roman Hermes) was among the most frequently engraved deities in Roman gem-carving, a natural patron for the merchants, traders, and travelers who formed much of the ring-wearing citizenry. His attributes read as a compact vocabulary: the caduceus, a herald's staff entwined by serpents, marked him as divine messenger and negotiator of peace; the marsupium, or money-purse, tied him to trade and prosperity; and the winged petasos and sandals signaled his swiftness across the boundaries of the mortal and divine worlds. As psychopomp, he also guided the dead to the underworld, lending such an intaglio a protective, apotropaic dimension beyond its everyday use as a sealing device. Plasma, a dense green variety of microcrystalline quartz (chalcedony), was prized by Roman engravers for its even tone and fine grain, which held crisp detail under the drill and wheel. Please note that this ring is of ovoid form and thus may not fully correspond with the US ring size stated in the dimensions. The interior of the ring measures to 19 mm by 20 mm, which more closely corresponds to a US ring size of 9.25 to 10.25. Item # 203602

Lot: 178 - Roman Bead Necklace - Faience, Stone & Glass, Double Strand

Mediterranean, Levant and Roman. A double-stranded necklace assembled from an array of ancient beads, their forms and hues gathered across centuries of Roman craft. Faience beads glazed in turquoise and blue mingle with carved stone and lustrous glass, the palette ranging from amber and ochre to deep cobalt. The variety of shapes rewards close looking: miniature juglets, crisp pyramids, and small animal forms punctuate rounded and cylindrical spacers. Faience, a self-glazing quartz paste, was prized in antiquity for its luminous surface and amuletic associations, while wound and drawn glass beads speak to the sophistication of Mediterranean workshops. The ancient beads have been strung on modern strands, rendering this composite ornament comfortably wearable, a tangible link between the adornment of the ancient world and the collector's hand today. Faience, an ancient non-clay ceramic of ground quartz coated with an alkaline glaze, held deep significance in ancient belief. Its characteristic blue-green sheen evoked the life-giving qualities of the Nile and the heavens, and the material was known as tjehenet, meaning "that which is brilliant" or "dazzling." Beads of this type served as amulets and elements of protective jewelry across millennia. Small figural beads in the shapes of juglets, animals, and geometric solids often carried apotropaic or fertility associations. Roman glassworkers, inheritors and innovators of earlier Near Eastern techniques, produced beads in a spectrum of colors through wound, drawn, and mosaic methods, trading them widely across the empire. Item # 200415

Lot: 179 - Roman Copper Key Ring & Leaded Bronze Ring

Roman, Imperial period. A pair of ancient Roman finger rings preserving contrasting patinas, one deep green and earthen, the other a smooth gray-brown. The more petite example, cast in copper alloy, carries a rectangular bezel worked with a row of raised vertical ribs projecting from the shoulder: the ward of a key, made to be worn on the hand so that lift-lock or tumbler could never be parted from its owner. Such rings opened strongboxes, cupboards, and jewel caskets, and doubled as a public sign that the wearer had property worth locking. Its companion is the larger of the two, a leaded bronze hoop of even section and unadorned surface, the plainest and most enduring form of Roman personal ornament. Together they set utility and adornment side by side in the everyday register of Imperial metalwork. Roman key rings (anuli clavicularii) appear across the Empire from the 1st century CE onward, a direct consequence of a household economy in which valuables lived behind lift-locks and tumbler locks rather than in banks. Ancient authors treat the ring-key as shorthand for the householder's authority: the master of the house carried the means of access on his hand, and the freedman or steward entrusted with one wore a visible promotion. Most surviving examples are copper alloy rather than iron, which corrodes badly, so the copper-alloy survivors are disproportionately represented in collections today. Please note that the larger ring contains up to 11% lead and is not recommended for wear. Item # 204613

Lot: 180 - Ancient Roman & Byzantine Coin Collection, 21 pcs

Roman Imperial to Byzantine era, ca. 1st to 6th century CE. A varied collection of twenty ancient coins ranging from the Roman Republic and Imperial periods through the later Byzantine era, comprising predominantly bronze and copper alloy issues (AE), alongside a single silver denarius (AR). A single bronze coin is presented in a sterling silver keychain mount. The group showcases a variety of emperors, reverse types, and mint styles, with figures and legends still legible on many examples. Size of silver coin: 0.7" Diameter (1.8 cm); silver quality: 73%; weight: 3.1 grams Item # 194550

Lot: 181 - Roman Mercury Statuett w/ Winged Petasos

Roman, Imperial period. A miniature cast figure of Mercury, the Roman god of commerce, eloquence, and travelers, standing nude in easy contrapposto with the weight carried on the right leg. He wears only the petasos, its stub of a wing still rising above the brim, and a chlamys that gathers at the shoulders and once fell in folds over the now-truncated left forearm. The right arm extends forward, likely once cupping the marsupium, the money purse that is his most persistent attribute in provincial workshops. Modeling is compact but assured: a defined torso, softly rounded abdomen, and a small, alert face beneath the hat. Metallurgical analysis indicates a copper alloy with a substantial lead content, a mixture favored for small votive and household castings. Such figures populated domestic lararia across the empire. Mercury was among the most widely worshipped deities of the Roman West, absorbing the functions of Greek Hermes and, in Gaul and Britain, merging with indigenous gods of trade and boundaries. Caesar remarked that the Gauls honored him above all others. His standard kit, the winged petasos, the caduceus, the marsupium, and often a cockerel, ram, or tortoise at his feet, made him instantly legible even at the smallest scale, which is why merchants, freedmen, and travelers kept his image in household shrines and carried versions of it on the road. The alloy is telling. Roman founders regularly loaded small-scale castings with lead, which lowered the pouring temperature and improved the flow of metal into fine molds, at the cost of a softer, more corrosion-prone body. High-lead copper alloys are especially characteristic of provincial workshops producing devotional statuettes in quantity. Item # 204578

Lot: 182 - Six Roman to Byzantine Bronze Bracelets

Mediterranean, Roman to Byzantine Empire. A group of six hand-formed bracelets, each a slender hoop of leaded bronze drawn from a single rod and bent into a near-circle. Most are penannular, their tapered terminals stopping just short of meeting so the band could be sprung open across the wrist; others close in a lapped or abutting join. Sections vary from round to slightly flattened or faceted, and the shafts carry gentle undulations and irregular ovals from long wear and burial compression. Surfaces have oxidized to mottled green and brown cuprite, with earthen deposits still lodged in the crevices. Plain personal ornaments of this kind were the everyday jewelry of the Roman and early Byzantine provinces, worn singly or stacked, and produced in enormous quantity by provincial workshops for both women and children. Leaded bronze was the workhorse alloy of Roman provincial metalworking. Adding lead to the copper-tin mix lowered the melting point and improved flow in the mold, which mattered less for a simple drawn rod than for cast work, but the alloy was cheap and abundant, and scrap-recycling workshops turned it out by the ton. The penannular form endured for centuries with almost no change: an open hoop needs no clasp, no hinge, and no fitting to a particular wrist, which is precisely why it survives from Britain to Syria across the Roman Imperial and early Byzantine horizons. Dating a plain example on typology alone is notoriously difficult, and grouped lots such as this one often span several hundred years. Please note that these bracelets contain about 5 to 21% lead and are not recommended for wear. Item # 204594

Lot: 183 - 10 Ancient Roman Glass Spindle Whorl Beads, Trailed & Combed Patterns

Roman Empire, Imperial era. A group of ten glass spindle whorl beads of annular and biconical form, each made by winding a trail of glass in a spiral around a rod. Colors include cobalt and pale blue, translucent green and olive, opaque black, yellow, gray, and white. Several carry a contrasting trail applied to the upper surface in a spiral running from the perforation to the outer edge. One black bead has a white trail tooled with seven unevenly spaced downward strokes to form a feather pattern. Another combines black glass with red, and a further example pairs black with turquoise. Each is pierced through the center for mounting on a spindle shaft or for stringing. The spindle whorl is one of the most persistent tools in human material culture: a weighted disc that converts a spinning stick into a flywheel, allowing a spinner to draw fiber into thread continuously and with even tension. Glass examples flourished in the Roman Empire, Islamic Near East , and Central Asia, where glassworkers wound hot gathers around a mandrel and decorated them with trails of contrasting metal-oxide-colored glass, then rolled the object on a flat marver so the trails sank level with the surface. Dragging a point through those trails while still hot produced the feathered or festooned patterns seen here. Item # 204548

Lot: 184 - Roman Bronze Lion Lock with Red Resin Inlay

Roman, Imperial period. A cast leaded bronze lock bolt from a Roman padlock, its upper edge crowned by a recumbent lion modeled in the round, forelegs extended and mane rendered in short chased strokes. The shank runs forward to a rounded terminal, while a perforated lug drops below the body to receive the shackle or key ward of the mechanism. A circular red inlay set into the crest above the animal replaces the lost original filling, added by a later collector's hand rather than a Roman one, and elemental analysis of its silicon and magnesium rich composition confirms the substitution. Locks of this type secured chests, doors, and strongboxes across the empire, and the lion, guardian and emblem of vigilance, was the favored beast for hardware whose whole purpose was to keep watch. Roman locksmithing was a mature industrial craft by the first century CE. Bolts, hasps, and barb-spring padlocks were produced in standardized forms across provincial workshops, and the wealthier grades were dressed with cast animal finials: lions, hounds, horses, and panthers. The lion carried a double charge of meaning here, at once apotropaic guardian and a boast of the owner's means, since ornamental hardware cost several times what a plain bolt did. Leaded bronze was the alloy of choice for such fittings. Lead contents approaching a fifth of the mass lowered the melting point and improved the flow of metal into fine detail, making crisply cast manes and muzzles possible in a workaday object. The trade-off was a softer, more brittle metal, which is why so many surviving Roman lock elements are recovered detached from their mechanisms. Please note that this piece contains up to 22% lead. Item # 204579

Lot: 185 - 4 Roman Bronze Implements | Cochlear Spoon, Probe, Miniature Axe

Roman, Imperial period. A group of four ancient copper-alloy implements, Roman, comprising a cochlear spoon with elongated tapering handle and leaf-shaped bowl worked with radiating ribs; a slender probe or hairpin with rounded finial above a curved neck; a shaft with turned collar banding terminating in a small hooked or spatulate end, likely a cosmetic or medical instrument; and a miniature hafted axe, possibly a votive or amuletic object. Item # 204612

Lot: 186 - Roman Bronze Statuette of a Man with Bird

Roman, Provincial. A diminutive cast figure of a bearded man standing frontally on an integral rectangular plinth, his weight settled evenly, his proper right arm extended to support a small bird perched upon the open hand. He wears a short belted tunic with a mantle drawn diagonally across the torso, its folds rendered in swift incised grooves, and heavy footwear modeled to the ankle. The leaded bronze surface carries a mottled olive and earthen patina. The gesture recalls Jupiter with his eagle, yet the civilian dress argues against a formal cult image: the figure may instead represent a falconer, a votary presenting an offering bird, or a provincial deity absorbed into Roman visual habit. Small-scale bronzes of this kind served household shrines and personal devotion, portable enough to travel with their owners. Leaded bronze, an alloy deliberately enriched with lead, was the workhorse medium of provincial Roman foundries. The lead lowered the melting point and improved the flow of metal into fine molds, letting a caster capture drapery folds and a bird's compact body at a scale barely larger than a thumb. The trade-off was a softer, less resonant metal, unsuitable for vessels or bells but ideal for the small votive and domestic figures produced in quantity across Gaul, Britain, and the Danubian provinces. Birds carried a dense symbolic charge in Roman religion. The eagle belonged to Jupiter, the dove to Venus, the raven to Apollo and to Mithras, and the cockerel to Mercury. A bird held rather than accompanying its bearer, however, shifts the reading toward offering or toward the practical world of fowling and falconry, both attested in the later Empire. Without an attribute such as a thunderbolt, caduceus, or petasos, the identification stays open. Item # 204580

Lot: 187 - Late Roman Oil Lamp Filler w/ Ring-and-Dot Decor

Eastern Mediterranean, Late Roman to Early Byzantine. A miniature cast implement of leaded bronze, its shallow oval bowl pierced at center and drawn out at one end into a short flaring spout, at the other into a flat openwork terminal. The rim and terminal carry punched ring-and-dot motifs, a decorative shorthand common to Late Roman and Early Byzantine small metalwork, worked with a compass-tipped punch after casting. The surface has taken a mottled green and earthen patina. Such small spouted implements are generally identified as fillers, used to decant oil into the narrow fill-holes of terracotta and bronze lamps without waste, though the form also overlaps with cosmetic and pharmaceutical spoons and the function should be treated as probable rather than proven. The scale is diminutive, a handheld accessory rather than a display object. The ring-and-dot (or "oculus") motif seen on the rim is one of the longest-lived ornaments in the ancient metalworker's repertoire, cut with a rotating center-punch and found from Iron Age Europe to the workshops of the Late Antique Levant. Its persistence owes less to symbolism than to economy: a single tool, a single turn, and a plain flange becomes a decorated one. Lighting in the fourth to sixth centuries still meant olive oil burning in a wick lamp, and the fill-holes of mold-made lamps of the period are frequently no wider than a fingertip. Small bronze fillers, funnels, and spouted spoons answered that practical bottleneck, and they turn up in domestic assemblages as well as in ecclesiastical contexts, where the tending of hanging lamps was a daily liturgical duty. Item # 204610

Lot: 188 - Three Roman Glass Jewelry Pieces - Bangle, Finial & Mosaic Ring

Eastern Mediterranean, Late Roman to Byzantine. A trio of opaque black glass ornaments, each a different exercise in the glassworker's art. The largest is a smoothly drawn bangle of circular section, its diameter suited to a child's wrist, the surface still carrying a wet gloss where the metal cooled. Beside it sits a finger ring built of mosaic glass, its black body flecked with yellow and red canes fused into the matrix. The third and most delicate piece is a stamped disc-shaped finial, janiform, bearing a bearded male head on either face, perhaps a deity or, if the later end of the range holds, a saint. Together they sketch the long afterlife of Roman glassworking in the eastern Mediterranean, where opaque black glass remained a cheap and handsome substitute for jet and stone. Black glass bangles were among the most widely produced personal ornaments of the late antique and early Byzantine Levant, drawn from a single hot rod, looped, and welded at the join, a technique fast enough to make them affordable across the social spectrum and durable enough that they survive in quantity from Syria, Palestine, and Egypt. The addition of yellow and red mosaic canes, as on the ring here, was the workshop's way of imitating far costlier polychrome inlay in gold and hardstone. Janiform imagery, two faces set back to back, carried protective force in the Roman world through the god Janus, guardian of thresholds and beginnings. Its persistence into Christian centuries is well documented in minor arts, where the bearded type could be read equally as a pagan divinity or an apostolic saint depending on the eye of the wearer, a productive ambiguity in a period when both readings coexisted in the same marketplace. Item # 204550

Lot: 189 - Roman Miniature Amulets | Glass and Metal Oinochoe

Roman, Late Roman to Early Byzantine period. A pair of diminutive jugs rendered at charm scale, each an oinochoe reduced to the size of a fingertip. The larger is cast in a heavily leaded alloy, its ovoid body swelling above a narrow foot and rising to a flaring mouth, with a single loop handle arching from lip to shoulder. Its companion, more petite still, is worked in glass, the body ribbed and softly iridescent from long burial, the handle drawn out in a thin ropelike loop. Both retain the profile of full-size table wares in miniature, and the generous apertures of their handles suggest they were strung and worn, perhaps as pendants or amulets rather than used as vessels. Miniature vessel charms of this kind circulated widely across the late antique Mediterranean. The oinochoe, a wine jug with a trefoil or flaring mouth, was among the most persistent shapes in ancient Mediterranean craft, surviving from Archaic Greece through the Roman Imperial table and into the early Byzantine world. Reduced to pendant scale, the form loses its function and keeps its meaning: a vessel charm evokes plenty, libation, and hospitality in portable shorthand. Such miniatures appear in late antique burials, particularly those of children and women, where small suspended objects were assembled into strands with beads, bells, and pierced coins. Please note that the larger vessel contains up to 72.2% lead. Item # 204595

Lot: 190 - 7 Holy Land Pottery Discoid Oil Lamps - Roman to Byzantine

Near East, Southern Levant, Holy Land, Roman to Byzantine period. A group of seven terracotta oil lamps, each a squat discoid reservoir drawn to a short nozzle, the buff to pale ochre fabric powdered with earthen encrustation and pale burial salts. Several shoulders carry traces of mold-made relief, worn ridging and faint floral or figural motifs, with concentric rings framing the filling and wick holes. Two examples rise to a small pointed lug handle at the rear, and one bears a planta pedis stamp, a footprint-shaped cartouche whose letters have abraded past reading, likely a maker's mark in Latin or Greek. Burning left only light traces at the nozzles. Lamps of this class lit domestic rooms, shops, and tombs throughout the Levant, made in local workshops by the thousand and carried into daily life at every social level. The planta pedis, a stamp cut in the outline of a human foot, was borrowed by lampmakers and potters from the wider Roman workshop repertoire, where it enclosed the maker's name on terra sigillata and on mold-made lamps alike. On lamp bases it identified the workshop that owned the mold, and where such names survive legibly they have allowed scholars to map distribution networks running from Italian and North African production centers out to the eastern provinces. Worn or partially struck examples like this one are common, since the stamp sat on the underside and abraded through use and burial. Lamps of this squat discoid class persisted with little change from the later Roman centuries into the Byzantine period in Palestine and Transjordan, produced in local workshops in enormous numbers. Their ubiquity in tombs is not necessarily a sign of ritual manufacture: an ordinary household lamp was simply the object most naturally placed beside the dead to light the way. Item # 204572

Lot: 191 - Large Ancient Roman-Islamic Colorful Glass Beads

Near East, Roman Imperial period to early Islamic era. Three strands of substantially large ancient glass beads in a wide range of decorative techniques. Patterns include marvered feather and festoon designs in yellow, white, and red on dark grounds, spiral and swirling trail work, applied wavy trails, millefiori, and mosaic cane inlays. Forms are barrel, oblate, and rounded cylindrical, most with large central perforations. Colors range across yellow, white, red, turquoise, green, gray, and opaque black, with weathering and iridescence across many surfaces. Presently strung on monofilament for display and suitable for restringing. Item # 204592

Lot: 192 - Roman / Early Islamic Glass Beads | Millefiori, Mosaic Cane

Near East, Roman Imperial period to early Islamic era. A pair of strands of ancient glass beads, comprising several dozen beads. Decoration includes marvered feather and festoon patterns in yellow, white, and red on dark grounds, spiraling and applied wavy trails, millefiori, and mosaic cane inlay. Forms include barrel, oblate, and rounded cylindrical, most with wide central perforations. Palette runs through yellow, white, red, turquoise, green, grey, and opaque black. Surfaces show burial weathering and iridescence. Beads of this type were used as personal adornment and in trade across the Near East. Presently strung on monofilament and readily restrung. Item # 204591

Lot: 193 - 4 Byzantine Copper Alloy Cross Pendants

Eastern Mediterranean, Byzantine Empire. A quartet of cast cross pendants, each pierced or looped at the crown for suspension from a cord worn against the chest. Two are copper alloy, one leaded bronze, and one leaded brass, their surfaces carried from olive to pale ochre by long burial. The largest takes the double-barred patriarchal form, its arms terminating in raised bosses arranged in trefoil clusters; the remaining three are Latin crosses with flaring terminals, punched with ring-and-dot motifs down the shaft and across the transverse arm. Such pendants were the ordinary devotional wear of Byzantine Christians across Anatolia, the Levant, and the Balkans, worn as apotropaia against sickness and misfortune as much as declarations of faith. Simple sand-cast production made them affordable to every rank, which is why they survive in quantity. The ring-and-dot punch seen on three of these crosses is one of the most persistent ornamental marks in the ancient Mediterranean, cut with a simple hollow bit rotated against the metal. On Byzantine pectorals it is usually read as a solar or all-seeing motif, a compact charm against the evil eye layered onto an explicitly Christian form. The double-barred type, with its short upper bar for the titulus board of the Crucifixion, is the ancestor of the patriarchal cross later adopted as an emblem by the Eastern churches and, through Hungarian and Slovak heraldry, by medieval Europe. Please note that these pendants contain up to 23% lead and are not recommended for wear. Item # 204584

Lot: 194 - Byzantine Hanging Censer w/ Suspension Chains & Hook

Eastern Mediterranean, Byzantine Empire. A hemispherical bowl of leaded bronze, set on a low ring foot and turned true on the lathe, its upper wall girdled by five crisp wheel-cut bands beneath an inward-turning lip, with a further pair encircling the foot. Three raised lugs stand at intervals around the rim, each receiving a light brass chain of looped links that rises to a central brass distribution hook of scrolled form. The inturned lip helped keep smouldering charcoal and incense grains in place as the vessel swung. Censers of this compact, undecorated type served the liturgies of the Eastern church and, in humbler settings, domestic devotion, filling the air with fragrant smoke understood in Byzantine sacramental thought as prayer made visible. Incense was central to Byzantine worship. The thymiaterion, swung before the altar, the Gospel book, and the congregation, enacted Psalm 141 ("Let my prayer be set forth as incense before thee"), and the rising smoke was read as a visible figure of intercession. Surviving censers range from elaborately figural silver examples tied to imperial and episcopal patronage down to plain cast bowls of this kind, produced in quantity for parish churches, monastic chapels, and pilgrimage sites across Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and Asia Minor. The construction repays attention. The body was cast, then trued and decorated on a lathe, the shallow grooves catching light as the vessel turned. A three-point suspension gathered to a single hook is the standard solution of the period: it keeps the bowl level in motion and lets the censer hang from a bracket or a hand-held ring between swings. The differing alloys of bowl and suspension are typical, the harder, more ductile chain metal drawn and looped rather than cast. Item # 204541

Lot: 195 - Byzantine to Islamic Leaded-Bronze Scale Measuring Weights

Near East and Eastern Mediterranean. Twenty-eight leaded bronze scale weights, Byzantine to early Islamic, circa 4th–10th century. Forms include square and rectangular tablets, flat and octagonal discs, barrel and dome shapes, and faceted polyhedral examples, graduated in size from the large domed spherical weight to small cube and bipyramidal forms. Several retain incised or stamped marks, including circles, crosses, rosettes, and letter forms. Cast in copper alloy of the type used with balance scales for weighing coin and commodities across the eastern Mediterranean and Near East. Item # 204586

Lot: 196 - Three Byzantine Glass Ornaments - Bracelet & 2 Amulets

Eastern Mediterranean, Byzantine Empire. A trio of glass ornaments led by a deep blue-green bangle, drawn as a single continuous hoop of D-shaped section and decorated with painted motifs in white to pale silver, now softened by burial film. Accompanying it are two diminutive amulets: one a stamped boss whose surface has bloomed into rich silvery iridescence, the other an ovoid pellet whose swelling back and tapering underside faintly recall the scarab form long borrowed from Egypt by later Mediterranean workshops. Glass bangles of this type circulated widely across Byzantine and adjacent Islamic markets, worn stacked on the wrist as everyday adornment and, in the case of the small amulets, likely carried for protection. The scale of the two amulets is miniature; they are pieces meant for the palm, not the display shelf. Monochrome glass bangles were among the most abundant personal ornaments of the medieval eastern Mediterranean, produced in enormous quantity from the Levantine coast to Anatolia and the Balkans between roughly the sixth and thirteenth centuries. They were formed by winding hot glass around a mandrel or by opening a gathered ring, then finishing the join so cleanly that seamless examples are common. Painted and enamelled decoration, applied in white or opaque pale pigment over a dark translucent body, marks the more ambitious end of the range and is the same decorative logic that produced the celebrated enamelled and gilded glass vessels of the later Islamic workshops. The silvery sheen on the stamped amulet is not a manufacturing effect but weathering: alkali leaches from the surface during centuries of burial, leaving microscopically thin laminae that refract light into the iridescence collectors prize. Item # 204575

Lot: 197 - Pair of Byzantine Glass Bracelets w/ Trailing & Stripes

A pair of hand-formed bangles drawn from translucent blue green glass, each closed into a slightly irregular circle that betrays the working of a hot rod around a former. One carries a trailed thread wound along its exterior in a continuous looping rhythm, catching light along the raised ridge. The other is dressed with applied patches of white and black striated glass, small polychrome accents fused into the body while still soft. Iridescence and earthen encrustation cling to both surfaces. Bangles of this kind were produced in enormous numbers across the Byzantine east, worn stacked on the wrist by women and often buried with them, an inexpensive luxury that put the glassmaker's art within reach of ordinary households. Glass bangles are among the most abundant small finds on Byzantine and early Islamic sites in the Levant, Anatolia, and the Balkans, recovered by the thousands from domestic contexts, workshop dumps, and graves. They were made by winding a gather of hot glass around a mandrel or by bending a drawn rod and welding the ends, a rapid technique that leaves the characteristic seam and slightly oval profile. Decoration was applied in the same heat: threads trailed and then marvered flush or left proud, and blobs of contrasting opaque glass pressed on and combed into stripes. Because the forms and colors changed slowly over centuries and crossed political frontiers freely, close dating of any individual bangle remains difficult without an excavated context. Item # 204552

Lot: 198 - 6th C. Byzantine Eulogia, Saint Symeon Stylites Token

Eastern Mediterranean, Byzantine Empire. A mold-made pilgrim token, or eulogia, in fired red clay. The face is stamped in low relief with a column supporting the bust of Saint Symeon Stylites, flanked by winged attendants with smaller figures below, all within a beaded border. Tokens of this kind were pressed from earth gathered at the base of the saint's column and carried away by pilgrims as healing and protective objects. Symeon the Elder (died 459) spent roughly thirty-seven years atop a pillar in the limestone hills northeast of Antioch, and the vast cruciform church of Qalat Siman rose around the stump of his column after his death. Pilgrims who reached it were given tokens of the holy earth trodden by the saint, and the Syrian clay itself was understood to carry his intercessory power: the miracle collections describe the tokens curing fevers, blindness, and infertility. A second stylite, Symeon the Younger (died 592), attracted an equally busy token industry on the Wondrous Mountain west of Antioch, and his workshops produced very similar stamped discs. Distinguishing the two cults on a single worn impression is rarely possible without a legible inscription, and both possibilities remain open here. Item # 204620

Lot: 199 - Byzantine Bronze Ring | Engraved Disc Bezel

Eastern Mediterranean, Byzantine Empire. A cast leaded bronze finger ring whose broad round bezel still carries liberal remains of an engraved geometric design, its shallow lines softened by burial and long wear. The hoop rises from a narrow, gently tapering band to flared shoulders that meet the disc bezel in a single unbroken sweep, a profile favored by Byzantine metalsmiths working in copper alloy for a clientele well below the gold-wearing elite. Rings of this type served as personal seals and identity markers, the incised device pressed into wax or clay to authenticate a letter or secure a container. Surface tones range across olive, chocolate, and dark earth where cuprous corrosion has stabilized. The engraving is abstract rather than figural or monogrammatic, perhaps a stylized cruciform or radiating motif, though the wear resists confident reading. Metallurgical analysis reports a composition of approximately 76.8% copper, 11.4% lead, 6.9% tin, and 3.5% zinc, a heavily leaded bronze typical of mass-cast Byzantine personal ornament. Lead lowered the melting point and improved the flow of molten metal into small, detailed molds, which made intricate bezels achievable at low cost, but it also produced a softer, more brittle alloy than tin bronze alone. Please note that this ring contains 11.4% lead and is not recommended for wear. Copper-alloy signet rings circulated widely across the Byzantine world from Late Antiquity onward, worn by soldiers, merchants, clerics, and administrators. Their engraved devices ranged from monograms and crosses to invocations, saints, and, as here, purely geometric ornament, a vocabulary that outlived several centuries of stylistic change precisely because it needed only to be recognizable, not legible. Item # 204618

Lot: 200 - Byzantine Cross Pendant with Flared Arms

Eastern Mediterranean, Byzantine Empire. A cast cross of equal-armed, flaring form, each arm swelling outward to a squared terminal flanked by a pair of rounded knobs, so that the silhouette reads as a crux pattee edged in beading. The metal is a heavily leaded copper-tin alloy, poured in a single piece and left largely unfinished, its surface now carrying a mottled green patina with earthen deposits caught in the recesses. A thick loop rises from the reverse for suspension, indicating the cross was worn or hung rather than fixed flat. Crosses of this weight and simplicity served as personal devotional emblems across the Byzantine world, worn at the breast as declarations of faith and as apotropaic guards against harm, the sign itself understood as protective long before it was ornamental. The crux pattee, with arms narrow at the crossing and flaring toward their ends, became one of the dominant cross forms of the Byzantine East from the sixth century onward, appearing on coinage, seals, reliquaries, and the humblest cast pendants alike. Knobbed or beaded terminals of the kind seen here echo the jeweled crosses (crux gemmata) of imperial and ecclesiastical art, where each terminal boss stood in for a mounted gem, translating an expensive metropolitan form into an affordable cast one for ordinary believers. The alloy is notable: roughly half lead, with copper and tin making up the remainder. Such high lead content lowers the melting point and improves the flow of metal into a mold, which suited the mass production of small devotional castings, though it produces a soft, dense object with little tensile strength. Please note that this piece contains a substantial proportion of lead and is not recommended for wear. Item # 204583

Lot: 201 - Two Byzantine to Medieval Copper & Bronze Rings

Eastern Mediterranean, Byzantine to Medieval period. A pair of cast finger rings, each carrying a broad circular bezel above a slender hoop that tapers toward the back of the band. The larger, of copper alloy, presents a rosette of eight radiating petals around a raised central boss, the design cut in low relief and softened by long burial. Its companion, of leaded bronze, bears a densely worked bezel of interlacing bands in a basketweave or knot pattern, the striations still crisp within a beaded rim. Both belong to a broad Byzantine and medieval tradition of modest personal jewelry in base metal, worn as everyday adornment and, in the case of the interlace bezel, perhaps pressed into wax or clay as a simple seal. Surfaces retain green and earthen patination consistent with age. Base-metal rings of this type circulated widely across the Byzantine world and its medieval successors, where copper-alloy jewelry served a population far broader than the gold-wearing elite. Geometric interlace, rosettes, and knotwork were the common decorative vocabulary, motifs read as apotropaic as often as ornamental: the endless line of an interlace was thought to entangle misfortune, the rosette to invoke light and vegetal renewal. Rings with flat, patterned bezels frequently doubled as personal seals for merchants, clerics, and household stewards who needed to close a letter or mark a jar of goods. The ring with the striated bezel contains up to 15% lead and is not recommended for wear. Item # 204617

Lot: 202 - Danish Neolithic Flint Axe, Northern Europe

Northern Europe, Denmark, Neolithic period, ca. 3900 to 1700 BCE. A solid flint stone axe shaped from a thick flake and worked to produce a broad cutting edge and a tapering butt, showing classic Neolithic toolmaking traditions of northern Europe. Size: 5" L x 2.25" W (12.7 cm x 5.7 cm) Item # 200198

Lot: 203 - Three European Carved Bone Sewing Tools

Europe, England or France. A trio of hand-worked animal bone implements assembled from the contents of a lady's sewing etui. The longest is a slender turned rod finished with a knopped, baluster-turned terminal above finely incised ring courses, serving as a bodkin, crochet hook, or knitting pin. The thinnest tapers to a fine point from a collared shoulder: a stiletto or piercer, used to open eyelets in cloth without cutting the weave. The smallest and stoutest is a socketed needle case body, now lacking its screw cap, its surface dense with banded chevrons, hatching, and a central lattice of crosshatched diapering. Warm honeyed patina throughout. Etui fittings were routinely separated and recombined by their owners, which explains why the carved cylinder speaks a decorative dialect distinct from its turned companions. The etui, a small fitted case worn suspended from a chatelaine or tucked into a workbox, was the essential accessory of nineteenth-century needlework. Bone, cheap, close-grained, and kind to the lathe, was the workhorse alternative to ivory for its fittings, and prisoner-of-war and cottage-industry turners in England and France produced them in quantity. The stiletto earns its keep in whitework and broderie anglaise: pressed through a woven ground, it parts the threads rather than severing them, so the resulting eyelet can be overcast into a permanent opening. Needle cases of this socketed form typically took a threaded or friction-fit cap, and it is the cap, small and easily pocketed, that almost always goes missing first. Item # 204551

Lot: 204 - Hallstatt Bronze Torc Necklace w/ Incised Decoration

Central Europe, Hallstatt culture. A slender open neck ring bent from a single rod of cast copper alloy, its ends drawn out and curled back into tight spiral loops. The band is round in section and thickens gently toward the center of the arc, its outer face worked with dense transverse incisions that catch the light as a fine ribbed texture. A deep green cuprous patina, granular in places, covers the surface. Torcs of this type were the signature ornament of Early Iron Age Central Europe, worn open at the throat by both women and men and functioning as much as a marker of rank and wealth as adornment. Many survive from cemetery contexts, deposited with the dead, and the looped terminals allowed the ring to be sprung open and closed around the neck without a separate clasp. The Hallstatt culture takes its name from the salt-mining site above Hallstatt in Upper Austria, where a cemetery of well over a thousand graves, excavated from 1846 by Johann Georg Ramsauer, produced the type-assemblage for the Early Iron Age of Central Europe. Salt preserved the mines and made the community rich: the trade in it drew amber, coral, and Mediterranean bronzes north across the Alps, and neck rings, arm rings, and fibulae accumulated in the burials of those who profited. Torcs remained the emblem of status among Celtic-speaking peoples for centuries afterward, familiar enough by the time of Roman contact that Classical authors described Gaulish warriors going into battle wearing little else. Item # 204585

Lot: 205 - Antique Judaica Silver Torah Crown, Lions & Star of David, 18"H

Eastern Europe or Ottoman Jewish communities, late 19th–early 20th century. A substantial and beautifully crafted silver Torah crown, formed of two openwork tiers surmounted by a Magen David finial upheld by a pair of confronting lions — a heraldic motif emblematic of the Tribe of Judah. The domed upper register is worked with repoussé floral panels framed by scalloped arches, each hung with a small bell, evoking the bells of the High Priest's robe in biblical tradition. The lower tier mirrors this decorative program, its elaborately chased floral cartouches and pierced arches lending a sense of lightness despite the crown's impressive mass. Measuring 12.5" W x 18" H (31.8 x 45.7 cm) and weighing 6 pounds (96 oz; 2,985.6 g), the crown is silver of approximately 92–93% fineness. The crown is further embellished with finely beaded edging and a donor inscription engraved around the base, typical of synagogue presentation pieces offered in honor or memory of community members. Its architectural form, repoussé ornamentation, and symbolic lion-and-star finial reflect stylistic traditions found in both Eastern European Jewish silversmithing and the broader Jewish communities of the Ottoman Empire in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. A commanding and ceremonially significant object, displaying excellent craftsmanship and a notably heavy silver weight. Item # 200776

Lot: 206 - Ten Strands of Ancient Mesopotamian Shell & Stone Beads

Near East, Mesopotamia, Sumer, ca. 3000 to 1000 BCE. A group of ten strands of ancient steatite and shell beads in tones of white, charcoal, and soft gray. The beads are small and evenly shaped, are presently loosely strung on modern monofilament for organization and display, offering a substantial quantity suitable for restringing into one or more wearable pieces of jewelry. Size of strands: 20" L (50.8 cm); beads: 0.15" W (0.4 cm) Item # 202381

Lot: 207 - Mesopotamian Stone Seal Beads - Zoomorph & Figures

Near East, Mesopotamia. A pair of small hardstone seal beads, each laterally drilled so it could be strung and worn against the body, the mark of ownership never far from the owner's hand. The larger is a rectangular block of mottled grey speckled stone, its face cut with deep angular grooves that resolve, perhaps, into an abstracted zoomorph: a spine, splayed limbs, a crossed motif above. Its companion is a domed conical bead in a dark, near-black polished stone, the underside engraved with two standing figures rendered in the spare linear shorthand typical of early Near Eastern glyptic. Both were likely pressed into damp clay to authenticate goods, containers, or documents, and both would have carried apotropaic weight as amulets alongside their administrative purpose. The stamp seal precedes the cylinder seal in Mesopotamia and outlives it in the peripheries, surviving as the workaday sealing device of herders, householders, and provincial officials long after Uruk scribes had adopted the rolling cylinder. Its logic is simple and durable: a personal design, incised in reverse into a hard stone, becomes a signature the moment it meets wet clay on a jar stopper, a door lock, or a bulla sealing a bundle of goods. Because the images are cut for impression rather than display, they read best as negatives, which is why the linear economy of figures and animals on such seals can appear abstract on the stone itself and legible only in the clay. Item # 204615

Lot: 208 - Mesopotamian Stone Ram Amulet Evaluated by W. Lambert

Near East, Mesopotamia / Western Iran, ca. 3000 to 2500 BCE. A limestone or shell amulet carved in the form of a standing ram or possibly a bull, with curved horns on either side of the head. Pierced through the sides for suspension. Accompanying the piece is a typewritten description signed in blue ink by "W. G. Lambert," indicating that it was examined by Professor Wilfred George Lambert FBA (1926–2011), a renowned Assyriologist and Fellow of the British Academy specializing in Near Eastern archaeology. Size: 0.6" L x 0.4" W (1.5 cm x 1 cm) Item # 191778

Lot: 209 - One Pound of Sumerian Steatite, Shell & Faience Tubular Beads

Near East, Mesopotamia, Sumerian. A full pound of ancient beads, hundreds of them, each a short cylinder or barrel pierced along its length and softened by burial to a chalky bloom. Creams and bone-whites of shell and weathered faience sit against the smoky grays, olive greens, and scattered rust reds of steatite, a stone soft enough to be cut with a copper point and then fired to hardness. Beads of this gauge were strung into dense multi-strand collars, wristlets, and anklets, stitched onto garments, and poured into graves as portable wealth; the Early Dynastic cemeteries of southern Mesopotamia produced them in tens of thousands. Consistent in size yet endlessly varied in tone, they record the patient arithmetic of workshops turning out adornment on something close to an industrial scale. Bead-making in third-millennium BCE Sumer was a specialized trade sustained by long-distance exchange: steatite travelled west from the Persian plateau and beyond, marine shell came up from the Persian Gulf, and faience, a self-glazing quartz paste, was an entirely synthetic material that allowed artisans to approximate the blue-green of costly turquoise and lapis lazuli at a fraction of the cost. The tubular bead was the workhorse of the repertoire, produced in volume to fill the long strands recovered from graves at Ur, Kish, and Nippur, where the dead were equipped with ornament both as a marker of rank and as provision for the world to come. Item # 203209

Lot: 210 - Anatolian Yortan Culture Blackware Beak-Spout Pitcher

Ancient West Asia, Anatolia, Early Bronze Age II, Yortan Culture. A burnished blackware pitcher, its near-spherical body rising into a tall, obliquely cut beak spout, with a single strap handle arching from shoulder to rim. The carbon-rich surface, characteristic of the Yortan ceramic tradition, was achieved through reduction firing and polished while leather-hard, yielding a metallic sheen with some mineral encrustation. Three low relief medallions sit on the shoulder at regular intervals, raised bosses that may serve an ornamental or apotropaic function, possibly echoing breast or solar disk imagery found across Early Bronze Age Anatolian funerary wares. The Yortan culture, named for the cemetery site near Balıkesir in northwestern Anatolia, flourished during the third millennium B.C. and is known largely through grave goods: cist and pithos burials accompanied by small dark vessels such as this one, intended to carry oil, wine, or unguents into the next world. The asymmetric beak spout, a form that later influenced Trojan and Hittite ceramic traditions, gives the piece its distinctive profile. Item # 202928

Lot: 211 - Three Syro-Hittite Pottery Figure Fragments

Near East, Anatolia and Northern Levant, Syro-Hittite culture. A trio of hand-modeled terracotta figures reduced to their most abstract essentials, all of diminutive scale. The largest preserves a bust whose surviving arm bends sharply at the elbow to rest against the chest, the opposite limb now lost; applied pellets form the wide staring eyes, a pinched ridge the beaked nose, and incised bands describe a necklace and crossed garment straps. The two accompanying heads repeat the formula, one in buff clay with enormous perforated eyes beneath a browline ridge, the other in red-brown clay with a smaller, more compressed face. Such figures, worked quickly from pinched and applied clay, were likely votive or apotropaic, deposited in domestic shrines or graves as tokens of fertility and protection rather than as portraits of any named deity. "Syro-Hittite" is a collector's umbrella for the small clay idols produced across Anatolia, northern Syria, and the upper Levant during the second millennium BCE, a zone where Hittite, Hurrian, and Amorite populations shared a visual shorthand for the human figure. The type owes nothing to naturalism: the body is a tapering column, the head a flattened disc or beak, and identity resides almost entirely in the applied eyes, which are exaggerated to the point of dominating the face. That emphasis on the gaze is deliberate and widespread in Near Eastern votive art, from the alabaster worshippers of Tell Asmar onward, where the wide open eye signals perpetual attention before the divine. Gendered examples typically distinguish females by applied breasts and cradled infants and males by weapons or headgear, while the crossed bands seen across the chest of the larger figure here recur on both. Item # 204549

Lot: 212 - Ancient Near Eastern Carnelian & Agate Bead Collection

Near East and Eastern Mediterranean. A group of hardstone beads in carnelian, banded agate, and related chalcedony, ranging in color from bright orange and brick red through honey, cream, gray, and dark brownish red. The largest is a lentoid banded agate with concentric gray and white layering. A second large bead is a faceted biconical form in gray-brown chalcedony. The balance includes barrel, tabular, cylindrical, teardrop, and irregular tumbled forms in varying sizes, most drilled lengthwise for stringing. Item # 203183

Lot: 213 - Near Eastern Greenstone Celts, Miniature Pair

Near East. A pair of miniature celts, ground and polished green hardstone. Each tapers from a narrow butt to a broad convex bit. The larger is pale green with mineral deposit along one edge; the smaller is darker and mottled, the flanks retaining faint facets from abrasion during shaping. Both are polished to a low sheen with worked planes still visible on the surfaces. Celts at this scale are not generally interpreted as working woodworking blades. Item # 204587

Lot: 214 - Miniature Canaanite Bronze Smiting Figure

Near East, Levant, Canaanite culture. A diminutive bronze figure stands with legs apart and arms flung wide, elbows bent so that closed fists rise level with the shoulders beneath a tall conical cap tapering to a point. The modeling is summary: flattened torso, tubular limbs, pinched tapering feet, and only the barest suggestion of eyes and nose under a green and earthen surface. The raised arms recall the vocabulary of the Levantine "smiting god," a deity brandishing mace or axe, though no weapon or socket survives here and the gesture reads equally as blessing or acclamation. Votive images of this scale were dedicated in temples and household shrines across Bronze Age Syria-Palestine, small enough to carry, cheap enough to give, and potent enough to stand for the worshipper before the god. The smiting god type is among the most durable images in Levantine religion, attested in metal figurines from Ugarit, Byblos, Megiddo, and Hazor across the second millennium BCE. Its canonical form shows a striding male, one arm raised to strike with mace or axe, the other extended with shield, spear, or offering, wearing the tall conical or white crown that scholars associate with Baal, Reshef, and related storm and war deities. Many surviving examples preserve pin holes or tangs where a separate weapon was fitted, and gilding traces on the finer castings indicate the type circulated at a wide range of price points, from temple dedications sheathed in gold leaf to plain, quickly finished pieces made for ordinary petitioners. Worth noting is how the type resists a single reading. The upraised arm is the strike of the warrior god, but the same posture, doubled and symmetrical as it is here, belongs also to the gesture of adoration and to the "orant" figures of worshippers found in Near Eastern sanctuaries. Where the fists are empty and no attachment point survives, the figure hovers between god and devotee, and the ambiguity may well have been useful to whoever dedicated it. Item # 204582

Lot: 215 - Two Holy Land Pottery Vessels

Near East, Southern Levant, Holy Land. A pair of hand-thrown earthenware vessels from the southern Levant, contrasted in scale and surface. The larger is a shallow carinated bowl on a low disc foot, its wall rising to a heavy everted rim above a pronounced ridge, with two rounded loop handles springing from the shoulder; a chalky pale slip and heavy calcareous encrustation veil the buff fabric beneath. Its companion is a diminutive handled juglet of ruddy micaceous clay, the globular body pressed inward with soft dimples, a single strap handle looping from a flaring collared mouth to the shoulder, and a small ring base beneath. Both belong to the utilitarian repertoire of the region, likely used for serving, decanting, or storing oils and unguents in a domestic setting. Dimpled or "pinched" juglets recur across Levantine ceramic assemblages from the Iron Age into the Roman period, the indentations pressed into the leather-hard body while it still turned on the wheel. The device is practical as much as decorative: it improves grip on a vessel meant to be tipped one-handed while pouring precious liquids, and it gave potters an efficient way to individualize otherwise standardized wares. Two-handled carinated bowls of the larger type served at table and were common grave inclusions, the pale surface deposit typical of vessels long buried in the calcium-rich soils of the region. Item # 204555

Lot: 216 - Three Ancient Anatolian Bronze Bovine Votive Figures

Near East, Anatolia, Iron Age to Early Islamic era. A trio of diminutive cast copper-alloy quadrupeds, Anatolian, each pared down to the essentials of a bovine body: short neck, horns, and stumpy legs. One is pierced through the body and retains an integral loop, suggesting suspension. Modeled in the round with summary surface detail. Cast animals of this kind circulated across the Anatolian plateau over a long span, serving as votive deposits at shrines, as amuletic pendants, and as harness or furniture fittings. Item # 204614

Lot: 217 - Neo-Assyrian Steatite Lion Libation Bowl, Iron Age

Near East, Levant / Mesopotamia region, Neo Assyrian Empire, Iron Age II, 9th to 8th century BCE. Carved from dark steatite, this sculptural libation or censer bowl is formed as a lion grasping the rim of a shallow basin, with its head projecting forward over the edge. The lion's open mouth is pierced with a drilled channel that leads to a short cylindrical spout, suggesting it was intended to direct liquid into or out of the vessel during ritual use. Discernable facial features and large eyes are paired with a mane rendered in layered, geometric carving, giving the piece strong presence from every angle. A rare and striking object that combines symbolic animal imagery with functional design, reflecting the luxury arts of Neo-Assyrian culture. Size: 4.25" L x 3" W x 1.5" H (10.8 cm x 7.6 cm x 3.8 cm) Item # 200905

Lot: 218 - Luristan Bronze Shaft-Hole Axe Head, Western Iran

Ancient Near East, Western Iran, Luristan. A cast bronze shaft-hole axe head from the Luristan region of western Iran. The head combines a downswept, curved cutting blade with a ribbed cylindrical socket and a second elongated blade. Weapons of this type served both as functional arms and as markers of status among the pastoral communities of the Zagros highlands, where distinctive cast-bronze metalwork was produced in quantity during the early first millennium BC. The piece is mounted on a modern custom display stand. Item # 202929

Lot: 219 - Luristan Bronze Ceremonial Mace Head w/ Collared Socket

Ancient Near East, Persia, Luristan. A miniature globular mace head cast in bronze, its spherical body rising from a short collared neck and pierced by a central shaft hole. The interior is hollowed, so at this small scale the head carries very little mass: a solid casting of the same diameter would strike with far greater force, and the lightened form suggests procession, presentation, or display rather than combat. A fine incised lip encircles the lower edge of the neck, a refinement that would have steadied the binding where haft met head. Dense mottled green and earthen cuprite corrosion sheathes the surface, granular across the shoulders and pooling darker in the hollows. The mace ranks among the oldest emblems of authority in the region, and an example lightened in this way belongs squarely to that symbolic register. By the first millennium BCE the mace had long outlived its usefulness on the battlefield, displaced by the axe and the sword, yet it endured as one of the most legible signs of sovereignty in the ancient Near East. Assyrian palace reliefs place it in the hands of kings and attendant officials; Mesopotamian temple inventories record maces dedicated to deities, and the weapon appears as a divine attribute in cylinder-seal iconography. The bronzeworkers of the Luristan valleys, prolific casters of horse gear, finials, and votive weaponry, produced hollow and lightweight heads of exactly this kind, objects whose authority derived from what they signified rather than from what they could break. Item # 204540

Lot: 220 - Luristan Bronze Cloak Pin, Cruciform Finial, Zagros

Near East, Western Persia, Iron Age, Luristan. A long tapering shaft of cast bronze rises to an abstract sculptural head: a domed central knob crowning a short cruciform block from which three blunt horizontal projections radiate, giving the finial the compact geometry of a miniature hammer or standard. Below the head, a small transverse drill hole pierces the shaft, the anchor point for a securing cord or chain that kept the pin from slipping free of the cloth. The surface carries a mottled green and brown patina typical of long burial. Pins of this class fastened heavy woolen garments at the shoulder and doubled as personal ornament and status marker among the pastoral communities of the Zagros highlands; many were later deposited in graves and sanctuary hoards alongside horse gear, weapons, and votive bronzes. The bronzes of Luristan, produced in the mountain valleys of the western Zagros between roughly the twelfth and seventh centuries BCE, constitute one of the most inventive metalworking traditions of the ancient Near East. Lacking monumental architecture, their makers poured their ambition into portable cast objects: cheekpieces, standards, whetstone handles, votive figures, and pins. The pin was among the most common and most varied of these forms, ranging from plain shafts to elaborate disc heads engraved with masters of animals and confronted beasts. The drilled shaft is a recurring practical feature, allowing a retaining cord to secure the pin to the garment, and it also encouraged reuse as a suspended pendant. Because so much Luristan material entered collections through the antiquities market of the early twentieth century rather than controlled excavation, typological comparison rather than stratigraphy remains the principal dating tool for pieces of this kind. Item # 204607

Lot: 221 - 4 Luristan Bronze Garment Pins, Ornamented Heads

Near East, Iran, Luristan. This is a group of four Luristan bronze dress pins, each with long tapering shafts and a distinct ornamented head: one with a clustered, budded finial, one with a bulbous knob, and two rising through ribbed collars to globular crowns. Burial has left the metal with mottled green malachite patina, red cuprite, and earthen ochre encrustation. Pins of this type fastened woolen garments and served as personal adornment among the pastoral communities of the Zagros, and they are frequently recovered from graves and sanctuary deposits, where some may have been left as votive offerings. Item # 203703

Lot: 222 - Near Eastern Hematite Stone Seals, Abstract Quadruped

Near East, Mesopotamia or Levant. This lot comprises two carved stone stamp seals. The first has a conical body that is pierced laterally near the apex for suspension, and its circular face is cut with a linear abstract quadruped whose raised head and angled projections read as a horned animal standing above a hatched groundline. The second is a rounded bead-form seal that is pierced laterally through the body, and its flat face is incised with abstract linear motifs. Both are carved from a dark grey-black hematite stone, and each has a matte surface with scattered lighter mineral inclusions. Stamp seals preceded the cylinder seal in Mesopotamia and outlived it, returning to dominance in the first millennium BCE, when Neo-Assyrian, Neo-Babylonian, and Levantine workshops produced conoid and domed forms in hematite, chalcedony, and carnelian. Mesopotamian lapidary texts as a stone of protective and medicinal virtue. Item # 204619

Lot: 223 - Luristan Bronze Cloak Pin - Double Bird Head Finial

Ancient Central Asia, Luristan, Western Iran, Iron Age III, ca. 8th to 7th century BCE. A refined bronze cloak pin distinguished by a sculptural finial formed as two outward-facing bird heads, their mirrored profiles creating a compact emblem of balance and vigilance. The elongated shaft tapers elegantly below the finial, designed to pierce and secure layered garments while lending visual emphasis to the shoulder or chest. Rendered with simplified beaks and rounded heads, the avian forms reflect the symbolic language of Luristan metalwork, where birds often conveyed protection, liminality, and divine watchfulness. The surface displays a deep green and brown patina, the accumulated evidence of age, enhancing the pins sculptural clarity and quiet authority as both ornament and utilitarian object. Size: 1.2" W x 6.5" H (3 cm x 16.5 cm); 6.8" H (17.3 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 200691

Lot: 224 - Achaemenid Silver Bracelet w/ Incised Banded Terminals

Near East, Persia, Achaemenid Empire. A penannular bracelet hammered and worked from a high-grade silver alloy (assayed at 82.7% silver), its round-sectioned hoop swelling gently toward a pair of open terminals. Each end is dressed with tight bands of incised ribbing, a collar of parallel grooves that breaks the smooth run of the metal and catches the light where the wrist turns. Further single incised lines mark the lower shoulders, dividing the hoop into measured registers. The open form allowed the cuff to be sprung onto the arm and worn snug, a construction favored across the Achaemenid world for personal ornament that doubled as portable wealth. Faint green mineral staining across the surface points to burial and to trace copper in the alloy. A small-scale ornament, likely made for a child or for a slender adult wrist. Silver held a particular administrative weight in the Achaemenid Empire. Under Darius I the imperial economy ran on a bimetallic standard, the gold daric paired with the silver siglos, and satrapal tribute was reckoned in talents of silver melted into ingots for the treasury. Personal ornament sat comfortably inside that logic: bracelets, torques, and armlets were simultaneously adornment, rank marker, and stored bullion, which is why so much Achaemenid metalwork survives with alloy contents that fall short of pure silver. The Apadana reliefs at Persepolis show delegation after delegation bearing exactly this kind of open-ended hoop, carried in the hands as tribute rather than worn, a reminder that the line between jewelry and currency was deliberately thin. Item # 204545

Lot: 225 - Achaemenid Silver Bangle w/ Incised Bands

Near East, Persia, Achaemenid Empire. A generously scaled penannular bangle of high-purity silver (assayed at 96.8 percent), its rounded hoop tapering toward a pair of blunt, slightly flared terminals left open for flexing onto the wrist. The upper register carries dense incised ornament: crosshatched lozenge fields near the terminals, ropework collars, and repeating rows of stippled dots and ring-punched circlets that catch light along the curve, while the underside remains plain where it rested against the arm. Personal ornament of this weight functioned as portable wealth as much as adornment across the Achaemenid world, where bullion jewelry circulated alongside coinage and carried rank. The form, hollow-worked and finished by hand with a graver and punch, belongs to a long Persian tradition of open-ended bracelets worn singly or in pairs. Open-ended bracelets and armlets are among the most recognizable status markers of Achaemenid Persia. The Apadana reliefs at Persepolis show delegation after delegation presenting exactly this class of object, penannular hoops with worked terminals, as tribute to the Great King, and Xenophon records the gift of gold bracelets as a royal honor. The Oxus Treasure preserves the courtly extreme of the type, with terminals modeled as confronted griffins or ibexes; simpler banded and punch-decorated examples such as this one represent the broader provincial and personal register of the same tradition, valued for metal content as much as for ornament. Item # 204560

Lot: 226 - Group of 4 Luristan Dress Pins, Varied Finials

Near East, Turkey / Iran, Luristan. Four bronze and copper dress pins with long tapering shafts, that carry varied decorative heads: one has a bulbous poppy-pod finial, one a flattened disc, and two have knopped baluster heads of stacked collars and beaded swellings. All four show mottled green malachite patina. Pins of this type fastened garments or hair, and the variety of finial forms within a single group reflects their everyday abundance. Item # 203738

Lot: 227 - 4 Medieval Islamic Textile Tools, Spindle Whorls and Bead

Near East, Islamic Medieval era. A group of three spindle whorls, and a pottery bead. Two of pale limestone, domed above and flat below, the flat faces incised with petaloid motifs and stylized birds, the sides cut with looping arcs. A third, carved from bone, low and domed with a ring of compass-drawn ring-and-dot motifs around the perforation. The bead, in coarse buff earthenware, is near spherical with faint incised ribs and circular motifs. Spinning was the most widely distributed manufacturing activity in the medieval Islamic world, and the whorl is its most durable survivor. Textile production drove the economies of Fustat, Nishapur, and Rayy, and excavation at each has yielded whorls by the hundreds, in limestone, steatite, bone, glass, and reused potsherds. Weight, not material, was the functional variable: a heavier whorl produced a thicker, more tightly plied yarn, a lighter one the fine thread required for muslin and gauze. Because whorls were personal, and made at home as often as in a workshop, their decoration is unusually free, and the incised arcs and ring-and-dot roundels seen here belong to a repertoire that changed remarkably little between Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Item # 204588

Lot: 228 - Five Turko-Slavic Bronze Thimbles

Eastern Europe, Turko-Slavic culture. A group of five cast thimbles in bronze or leaded bronze, each a heavy dome pitted with hundreds of hand-punched indentations set in tight ranks, the surfaces darkened to olive and ochre where the earth long held them. Four rise to smooth uninterrupted crowns above their dimpled registers, several finished with a shallow turned groove circling the lower body. The fifth carries the group's flourish: its apex opens into a rosette of vents around a central hole, framed by a seven-pointed star incised freehand into the metal. Seven sits oddly in an ornamental vocabulary that runs on sixes and eights, and the figure is likely a finisher's embellishment dressed over a casting vent rather than a fixed emblem. These were tools first, decorated only in passing. Thick-walled pushers of this class, cast by the lost-wax method and dimpled by hand, are known in the collecting literature as Turko-Slavic, a working term for the bulbous thimbles found from Anatolia and the eastern Mediterranean northwest into Bulgaria, Romania, and Hungary, their spread likely helped along by Ottoman expansion into Europe. Their heft suits leather, felt, and sailcloth rather than silk: the daily labor of saddlers, cobblers, tentmakers, and quilters. The Arabic word for thimble, kustuban, descends from a Persian term for the archer's finger guard, and the object traveled the same road west out of Han China alongside the hardened steel needle it existed to serve. A twelfth-century Andalusian poet, reaching for a comparison, settled on a battered helmet stripped of its crest. Hold one, and the simile lands. Item # 204565

Lot: 229 - 19th C. Ottoman Brass Firearm Accessory Boxes, Engraved

Near East, Ottoman Empire. A pair of Ottoman cast and engraved brass firearm accessory boxes, of a type variously identified as grease containers, percussion cap holders, or cartridge cases. The first is of rounded shield form with a flat upper edge, and its surfaces are engraved with foliate scrollwork, with lateral loops at either side and a further loop below for suspension from a belt. The second is rectangular with an articulated hinged lid and two thick loops on the verso for belt suspension. Its face is cast with a raised central boss within a beaded roundel, framed by crosshatched panels above a row of projecting loops along the lower edge for the attachment of tassels and charms. Personal firearms accoutrements were among the most visible markers of status across the Ottoman provinces. A rider or irregular soldier wore his priming flask, cartridge case, and flint pouch openly on a chest bandolier, where their engraved faces were as much display as equipment. Item # 204563

Lot: 230 - 19th C. Ottoman Brass Divit Portable Pen Cases + Inkwells

Near East, Ottoman Empire. A group of three brass traveling pen cases, two with attached inkwells, known as divits. Ottoman. Each has a long faceted shaft to house reed qalams, with capped terminals and incised banding and decorative borders running the length. Two carry a squared inkwell chamber set crosswise at one end; both would originally have had lids. The third has no inkwell and retains a hinged lid. The well held a wad of raw silk, the lika, soaked in soot-based ink so the qalam could be charged without spillage. Worn through the belt, the divit marked its owner as a member of the kalemiye, the Ottoman scribal class. Item # 204574

Lot: 231 - Two 19th C. Ottoman Brass & Iron Balance Pan Scales

Near East, Ottoman Empire. A pair of hand-held merchant's balances, each built from a forged iron beam with a central pivot and suspension loop, from which chains of iron and iron-copper alloy carry two shallow brass pans. The beams taper to hooked terminals, the pans are hammered thin and now bear a mottled patina of olive and umber, and one shows faint incised marks along its rim, perhaps a weight designation or an owner's tally. Scales of this type served in bazaars and workshops across the Ottoman world, weighing spices, coffee, precious metal, coin, and pharmaceutical measures against small graduated weights. Portable and endlessly repairable, they were the arithmetic of the marketplace, a technology so conservative in form that examples separated by centuries are nearly indistinguishable. Ottoman commercial life was governed by the kantar and the dirhem, units administered through the guild system and periodically checked by the muhtesib, the market inspector charged with verifying weights and measures. Hand balances like these were the instrument of that verification at street level: a merchant carried his own, the inspector carried his, and disputes were settled by comparison. The equal-arm balance, unchanged in principle since Pharaonic Egypt, remained standard in Anatolia and the Levant well into the twentieth century, long after European trade had adopted the steelyard and the spring scale. Their persistence had less to do with conservatism than with accuracy: a well-made equal-arm balance requires no calibration, only honest weights. Item # 204557

Lot: 232 - 19th C. Ottoman Double Camel Bell

Near East, Turkey, Ottoman Empire. A pair of conjoined bell chambers cast as a single body, suspended from a heavy forged iron ring, made to hang at the neck of a camel and announce a caravan long before it came into view. The metal is deep and warm-toned beneath a mottled patina, the walls thick enough to give the double voice its carrying power: two chambers of slightly unequal pitch striking together produce a beating, insistent clangor rather than a single clean note. Suspension loops and the wear at the ring's bearing points record long service. Such bells regulated the pace of transport trains across Anatolia and the Levant, allowed drovers to count their animals in darkness or dust, and, in popular belief, warded off the evil eye from valuable stock. Caravan bells of this doubled form belong to a wide Near Eastern and Central Asian tradition in which the size and voice of a bell signalled the rank of the animal within the train. The lead camel carried the largest and deepest-sounding bell, and the animals behind it were tuned in descending register, so that an experienced drover could hear the shape and order of his caravan without seeing it. The deliberate mistuning of paired chambers, producing an acoustic beat rather than a pure tone, made the sound travel further and remain distinguishable against wind and the general noise of the road. Item # 204537

Lot: 233 - 19th C. Ottoman Brass Gunpowder Pouch w/ Leather Strap

Near East, Ottoman Empire, likely Balkan provinces. A pear-shaped miniature flask of hammered yellow metal, its swelling body tapering to a flat rectangular collar fitted with a hinged spring cover and a pair of lateral suspension loops. Incised ornament covers the visible face: a band of chevrons across the neck, a fan of pendant lobes below, and a looser foliate spray sweeping across the belly, all cut freehand with a fine graver. Twisted cord and a worn leather shoulder strap remain attached through the side lugs. Flasks of this diminutive size held priming powder for the pan of a flintlock or miqahlet rifle, worn at the chest alongside the larger main charge container, and formed part of the standard accoutrement of an armed Ottoman provincial horseman or hunter. Powder equipment in the Ottoman world was rarely a single object. A shooter carried a large flask or horn for the propellant charge and a much smaller companion, like this one, for the fine priming powder tipped into the flintlock pan, where grain size and dryness decided whether the gun fired at all. Balkan and Anatolian workshops produced these small flasks in cast and sheet copper alloys, sometimes with silver overlay for wealthier owners, more often, as here, with quickly incised chevron and vegetal motifs whose looseness suggests a village metalworker rather than a court atelier. The spring-loaded lid, snapped open with the thumb and closed by the same motion, allowed the shooter to charge the pan one-handed on horseback. Item # 204547

Lot: 234 - Ottoman Carved Wood Gunpowder Flask w/ Shell Inlay

Near East, Ottoman Empire. A gunpowder flask carved from mocha-hued wood, its body swelling into a broad crescent that tapers to an upswept spout pierced for the charge. The exterior is worked in relief with incised bands framing a row of ring-and-dot rosettes, a motif repeated on the curved neck, and the underside retains inlaid elements, likely shell, set flush into shaped recesses. The open mouth once carried a fitted lid or stopper, now absent, and a rectangular seat cut at the shoulder shows where a suspension mount was attached. Flasks of this profile were slung at the belt of Ottoman irregular and infantry troops for charging muzzle-loading firearms; a janissary association has been suggested for this example, though nothing on the object confirms a specific unit. The ring-and-dot rosette, cut with a centering bit and a compass point, is one of the oldest and most widely diffused ornaments in Anatolian and Balkan woodwork, appearing on spoons, cradles, saddle furniture, and arms alike. Its persistence into the nineteenth century owes as much to its apotropaic reading, the eye that turns away the evil eye, as to the ease of cutting it. Powder containers in the Ottoman world were made in a wide range of materials: engraved brass and silver for court and officer use, cow horn and leather for the levies, and turned or carved wood for the great mass of provincial and irregular soldiery. The janissary corps, abolished by Mahmud II in 1826, was supplied through a mixture of state issue and private purchase, and surviving equipment of the rank and file is far more often plain hardwood of this kind than the presentation metalwork that fills museum cases. Item # 204567

Lot: 235 - Ottoman Muskalik Triangular Prayer Amulet Pendant Necklace

Near East, Ottoman Empire. An amulet necklace known as a muskalik, with silver and brass elements. The triangular box pendant carries a repoussé foliate motif on the front, with a beaded border. A narrow sliding lid on the upper long edge opens the interior, where paper prayers and protective incantations could be inserted. Thin brass teardrop charms hang from the lower edges on wire loops. A brass coin suspended beneath a silver crescent moon hangs from the point. The suspension chain combines flat silver bar links with mixed silver and brass ring links. The necklace is wearable. The muskalik (from Arabic 'hirz' / Turkish 'muska', a written charm) belongs to a family of amulet containers found from Morocco to Central Asia. Its power was held to reside not in the metal but in the folded paper within: a Qur'anic verse, most often the Throne Verse (Ayat al-Kursi) or the two protective suras al-Falaq and al-Nas, copied by a scribe or hoca and sealed inside. The triangle itself was read as a protective sign against the evil eye, and the form persisted in Anatolian and Balkan village jewelry long after the Ottoman court had turned to European fashions. Dangling coins served a double role, sounding as the wearer moved and advertising a portable dowry. Item # 204546

Lot: 236 - Ancient Bead Necklace | Egyptian, Roman & Islamic

Central Asian / Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Roman, and Islamic cultures, ca. 1200 BCE to 1300 CE. A wearable necklace assembled in modern times from an assorted group of ancient stone beads, paired with modern glass spacer beads and finished with a magnetic clasp. The ancient elements represent a broad range of classical-era traditions and include primarily quartzite and other hardstones in semi-opaque white tones, along with creamy agate, pinkish-orange agate, and warm beige stones. The modern spacers are small spherical beads in metallic red and green hues, creating a strong contrast with the natural coloration of the ancient beads. Size of strand: 21" L (53.3 cm); largest bead: 0.8" L x 0.3" W (2 cm x 0.8 cm) Item # 200239

Lot: 237 - Ancient Carnelian, Agate & Jade Beas, Near East / Bactrian

Near East, Eastern Mediterranean, & Pre-Columbian cultures. A large group of hardstone beads, predominantly carnelian and related chalcedony in orange, salmon, brick red, and dark brownish red, together with banded agate, opaque tan and gray stones, several black beads, a cream chalcedony tabular piece with natural cortex, and a few green jade beads. Forms include barrel, teardrop, tabular, conical, biconical, and irregular tumbled shapes, along with one flared bifurcated element. Sizes range from small rounded beads under a centimeter to larger tabular and teardrop forms. Most are drilled for stringing, with holes placed lengthwise or transversely depending on form. Item # 203179

Lot: 238 - Gupta Stone Head, Gandharan Schist Fragment + 2 Indian Portrait Pendants

A mixed lot of four South Asian works. A small buff sandstone head, likely Gupta period, the hair arranged in tight curls beneath a diadem or turban band, remnants of an incised inscription across the crown; [H. __ in.]. Together with a grey schist relief fragment carved in high relief with the head and shoulders of a bearded, mustached figure wearing a beaded torque, the reverse retaining an old collection label inscribed "Taxila / Gandhara / 2nd-3rd A.D." The lot further includes two Indian silver-mounted miniature portrait pendants, each painted and glazed within a plain silver bezel with suspension loop: the first depicting a mounted nobleman attended by a retainer against an orange ground; the second depicting two figures seated in a howdah atop a caparisoned elephant against a green ground Item # 193788

Lot: 239 - Islamic Khorassan Bronze Tripod Cauldron w/ Handles

Central Asia, Persia, Khorassan, ca. 11th to 12th century CE. A monumental leaded bronze cauldron of impressive scale, resting on three short conical feet and surmounted by a wide flaring rim with four angular projections. Rising from two opposing rim flanges are tall arching handles, their apexes capped by squared knobs for secure suspension. The deep hemispherical body demonstrates superb casting, with a smooth interior surface and a coarsely grained exterior that speaks to its robust utilitarian purpose. Cauldrons of this type held great importance in medieval Islamic society, functioning not only as practical vessels for communal feasting and preparation of food in palatial or military settings, but also as potent symbols of wealth and hospitality. In the metalworking traditions of Khorassan, such large-scale bronzes embodied the technical mastery of regional foundries, where high-tin alloys and refined casting techniques allowed for objects of both durability and prestige. Size: 18.5" Diameter x 10" H (47 cm x 25.4 cm) This piece, with its bold form and functional elegance, exemplifies the fusion of artistry and practicality characteristic of Islamic metalwork during the Seljuk period. Its impressive proportions suggest use in grand banquets or ceremonial gatherings, where cauldrons were central to the ritual of shared dining, a cornerstone of Islamic courtly life. Item # 195734

Lot: 240 - BMAC Bronze Age Banded Alabaster Vessel, Bactria-Margiana

Central Asia, Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex (BMAC). Finely carved from a single block of banded alabaster, this vessel shows the proportions and sculptural weight typical of Bactrian stonework. The broad, flat rim rises above a sharply recessed collar, tapering into a rounded, swollen body. The interior is deeply drilled with thick, well-defined walls, reflecting the lapidary technique of the early Bronze Age Oxus civilization. The stone shows warm tones of honey, cream, and translucent beige, with natural veining and crystallization throughout. Vessels of this type are associated with ritual and cosmetic use, with examples excavated at sites in northern Afghanistan and Turkmenistan dating to the height of BMAC cultural development. Size: 6" W x 3" H (15.2 cm x 7.6 cm) Item # 199920

Lot: 241 - Rare Gandharan Copper Figure Bare-Breasted Goddess

Ancient Central Asia, Pakistan, Gandhara, ca. 1st century CE. A remarkably rare copper lead alloy figure of a voluptuous, bare-breasted goddess adorned in drapery, bangles, and anklets as she holds billowing folds of drapery before her full hips. Size: 0.9" W x 2.1" H (2.3 cm x 5.3 cm) Cf. Ashmolean Museum Oxford, EA1993.25. Item # 186148

Lot: 242 - 3rd C. Gandharan Plaster Bust of a Male Figure

Gandhara, circa 3rd to 5th century A.D. A carved plaster bust of a bearded male figure, the broad-shouldered torso in a forward-leaning stance, with large, expressive eyes and deeply incised hair falling in locks over the shoulders. Originally likely part of a larger narrative frieze or sculptural ensemble from a Buddhist monastery or shrine, reflecting the hybrid Greco-Buddhist tradition of the region.Size: 2.9" L x 4" W x 6.8" H (7.4 cm x 10.2 cm x 17.3 cm); 8.8" H (22.4 cm) on included custom stand. Though time has worn away much of the surface detail, traces of modeling and proportion remain, offering a glimpse into the artistic richness of this ancient cultural crossroads. Mounted on a custom display stand, the fragment stands as both an archaeological relic and a testament to the syncretic art of Gandhara. Item # 196836

Lot: 243 - 18th C. Indian Tamil Nadu Brass Murti, Possibly Shiva

South Asia, India, Tamil Nadu region, ca. 18th to 19th century CE. A cast brass murti depicting a Hindu deity, likely Shiva, though the absence of defining attributes leaves the exact identification open to interpretation. The figure is seated in lalitasana (the "royal ease" pose), with one leg bent and the other resting downward in a relaxed yet dignified posture. The upper two arms once held attributes, while the lower hands may have also carried objects or formed mudras (symbolic hand gestures). Atop the head is a tall, conical headdress or crown known as a kiritam / kireetam mukut - a style commonly associated with the Tamil Nadu region. In Hinduism, a murti is a sacred image or statue of a deity central to worship and devotional practices. The surface of this figure bears signs of significant weathering, indicative of extensive ritual use over time. Size: 1.75" W x 2.75" H (4.4 cm x 7 cm) Item # 192433

Lot: 244 - Mid-Century Indian Marble Sculpture of Shirdi Sai Baba

South Asia, India, ca. mid-20th century CE. South Asia, India, circa mid-20th century A.D. A marble sculpture of Shirdi Sai Baba, depicted seated in half-lotus position, wearing a robe folded at the chest and a bandana on the head. Size: 5.4" L x 3" W x 9.5" H (13.7 cm x 7.6 cm x 24.1 cm) Item # 191554

Lot: 245 - Indian Sandstone Soldier Relief, Colonial-Era Architecture

South Asia, India, ca. 19th to early-20th century CE. A sandstone sculpture, likely once part of a building facade, possibly from a royal monument, temple, or governmental structure. The figure depicts a soldier with modern influences, likely European colonial in origin, featuring knee-high boots, a button-down tunic or coat, a turban headdress, and a rifle held against the shoulder. Soldiers with firearms were a common subject in architectural decoration of this type. This piece can be compared to similar soldier carvings found at the Chhatri at Maheshwar in Madhya Pradesh. Size: 11" L x 8" W x 40" H (27.9 cm x 20.3 cm x 101.6 cm) Please note that this item is heavy/oversized. Please inquire about shipping prior to bidding. Item # 192442

Lot: 246 - Tibetan Buddhist Mala, Bone Beads with Coral & Turquoise

Central Asia, Tibet, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE.A Buddhist ritual mala or prayer bead necklace strung with thick discoidal bone beads. The beads are arranged on a cotton cord, accented with brass rings, and terminate in leather tassel cords with silver beads of approximately 90% purity. Each end is finished with a rosette bead set with inset coral and turquoise cabochons. Size strand length doubled: 20" L (50.8 cm); tassels are 6.5" L (16.5 cm); bone beads: 0.5" L x 0.2" W (1.3 cm x 0.5 cm); silver quality: 89% to 91% This item cannot be shipped to Georgia, Louisiana, or Tennessee. Please be advised that international shipping may have additional restrictions on some material. It is the customer's responsibility to be aware of their own local laws. Item # 197518

Lot: 247 - 19th C. Tibetan Yamantaka Thangka, Silk Brocade Mount

Central Asia, Tibet, ca. 19th century CE. A large and vibrantly painted thangka depicting Yamantaka, the wrathful manifestation of Manjushri, surrounded by a halo of flames and encircled by numerous deities and attendants. The central figure is rendered with multiple heads, arms, and legs, trampling upon prostrate figures symbolic of vanquished ignorance, while adorned in elaborate jewelry and crowned with a garland of skulls. Painted in rich tones of orange, blue, green, and gold highlights - the composition radiates dynamic energy and spiritual potency, with carefully detailed smaller figures of lamas and deities in registers above and around the scene. Set within a modern silk brocade mount of yellow and purple floral-patterned fabric, the thangka displays auspicious Buddhist motifs that reinforce its ritual function as an object of meditation and protection. Size of textile: 59" L x 36" W (149.9 cm x 91.4 cm); painting: 43.5" L x 28" W (110.5 cm x 71.1 cm); gold quality: 23% On the verso of this thangka are ritual inscriptions and seals applied during its consecration ceremony. At the four cardinal points are protective seed-syllables, while at the center appears the classic three-syllable formula "Om Ah Hum" rendered in a blocky, stylized Tibetan script with circular marks. This mantra embodies the enlightened body (Om), speech (Ah), and mind (Hum) of the Buddha and is the standard empowerment formula used to ritually "animate" sacred images. Beneath the central mantra are circular seal impressions in red and black ink, representing monastic or workshop insignia used to sanctify the thangka. Together, the inscriptions and seals mark the work as ritually empowered, ensuring it could serve not only as a painting but also as a living object of devotion and meditation. Item # 197519

Lot: 248 - Tibetan 19th C. White Tara All Seeing Thangka Painting

Central Asia, Tibet, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE. A canvas thangka painting of White Tara in a serene frontal pose, seated in full lotus position on a lotus throne and encircled by halo, with jewelry and a ornate coiffure. Her face has the third eye on her brow, and the iconography continues with additional eyes painted on her palms and the soles of her feet, emphasizing her all-seeing compassion and protection. The deity's right hand lowers in a gift-bestowing gesture while her left hand holds a flowering lotus stem beside her shoulder. The painted canvas is set within a dark floral cotton or silk border and retains a woven upper sleeve that once housed a suspension dowel for hanging. Mounted in a clear modern acrylic case. Size of textile: 38" L x 20" W (96.5 cm x 50.8 cm); acrylic frame: 22.5" L x 1.75" W x 40" H (57.2 cm x 4.4 cm x 101.6 cm) Item # 199973

Lot: 249 - 19th C. Nepalese Wood Devotional Hindu-Buddhist Statue

Central Asia, Nepal, ca. 19th century CE. A petite wooden statue of a seated figure on a pedestal, possibly representing a Hindu-Buddhist deity or a donor figure. Donor figures are depictions of individuals who made offerings to Buddhist temples or institutions, often shown in formal attire with gestures of devotion, symbolizing their piety. The statue is heavily coated with a blackened patina, likely a mixture of animal fat or butter rubbed into the surface as an offering, combined with years of smoke. Size: 3" L x 1.5" W x 4.5" H (7.6 cm x 3.8 cm x 11.4 cm); 5.5" H (14 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 192595

Lot: 250 - Warring States Bronze Socketed Spearhead - Openwork Panels, Incised Scrolls

East Asia, China, Warring States Period (Eastern Zhou Dynasty). An impressive Chinese bronze socketed spearhead of elongated, leaf-shaped form, cast with a prominent medial ridge and a tubular socket for hafting. The blade is flanked by finely executed openwork panels, creating a striking combination of strength and visual refinement. The socket is further embellished with incised geometric and scroll motifs characteristic of late Eastern Zhou decorative traditions, and retains lateral loops and apertures for secure attachment to a wooden shaft. One of the finest examples we have ever seen! Size of spear itself: 3.25" W x 11.5" H x 1.125" D (8.3 cm W x 29.2 cm H x 2.9 cm D) This piece has been tested for the presence or absence of particular elements via XRF elemental analysis and is consistent with metals of this period. Item # 202597

Lot: 251 - Qijia Culture Nephrite Jade Tube Core, Neolithic China

East Asia, China, Neolithic period, Qijia culture, ca. 2100 to 1600 BCE. A nephrite jade tube core, carved from dark, variegated nephrite with olive and brown tonal shifts, in the form of a tapered cylinder with a circumferential ridge marking the point where drilling was advanced from opposing ends. This feature identifies the piece as a tube core, the cylindrical remnant left behind after hollowing jade to create ritual tubes, beads, or other prestige objects. Such remnants were typically discarded, making surviving examples uncommon. The surface shows fine abrasion marks, softened edges, and areas of mineral encrustation, evidence of the grinding and drilling required to work nephrite, one of the hardest materials known to Neolithic craftspeople. Size: 7" L x 2" Diameter (17.8 cm x 5.1 cm) The stone retains a muted polish in places, suggesting repeated contact with abrasive tools and slurry over extended periods. Qijia jade production represents an important transitional moment in Chinese material culture, bridging earlier Neolithic traditions with the increasingly complex jade industries of the Bronze Age. Objects fashioned from jade were closely associated with ritual practice, social hierarchy, and cosmological belief, and even a byproduct such as this core reflects the cultural value placed on precision, endurance, and controlled transformation of natural materials. Today, this jade tube core stands not as a finished ornament, but as an eloquent trace of process. It preserves the negative space of an object once intended for symbolic use, offering a direct and tangible connection to the hands, tools, and time invested by Neolithic artisans over four millennia ago. Item # 200325

Lot: 252 - Shang Dynasty Jade Ceremonial Axe - Erlitou Period

East Asia, China, Shang Dynasty, Erlitou Period, ca. 1900 to 1500 BCE. A rare nephrite jade ceremonial axe dating to the Erlitou period of the early Shang Dynasty, its surface marked by mottled hues of green, brown, and cream that testify to millennia of burial. The elongated, rectangular blade is thinly worked, its edges finely ground, and it bears four drilled perforations near the top for hafting or suspension. A small notch is cut at the side, characteristic of ritual implements intended for display rather than practical use. Ceremonial jade axes, or yue, were powerful symbols of authority and ritual power in early Bronze Age China. Unlike utilitarian bronze weapons, jade examples were associated with elite status, used in ritual contexts to represent divine mandate and military command. The labor-intensive carving of nephrite - one of the hardest stones - underscores both the value of the material and the prestige of the individual to whom it belonged. Size: 6" L x 3" W (15.2 cm x 7.6 cm) This example, with its softly polished surface and enduring heft, embodies the profound role of jade in Shang culture as a bridge between human and spiritual realms. Item # 195443

Lot: 253 - Chinese Stone Zoomorphic Pendant, Late Shang/Early Zhou

East Asia, China, Late Shang to early Zhou period, circa 12th to 8th century B.C. A carved stone pendant in the form of an abstract zoomorph, the compact body animated by scrolling relief and stylized contours, the profile reduced to bold planes and curving lines with a squared snout, stepped jaw, and rounded elements suggesting eye and limb in condensed form. A small perforation at center allowed the piece to be suspended. The surface with a soft, worn patina and light encrustation throughout. Size: 3.1" L x 2.1" W (7.9 cm x 5.3 cm) Both ornamental and symbolic, this pendant embodies the early Chinese fascination with the animal realm as mediator between human and ancestral worlds, distilled here into a compact and enduring form. Item # 200336

Lot: 254 - Han Dynasty High-Tin Bronze Mirror, Grapevine & Beasts

East Asia, China, Han Dynasty. A high-tin bronze mirror, the reverse cast in relief with dog-like creatures encircling the central suspension loop and an outer register of grapevine scrollwork. High-tin bronze was favored for mirrors of this type for the lustrous, reflective surface it allowed when polished. The flat face retains traces of this original silvery polish beneath an overall encrustation of green patina accumulated over centuries of burial. Beyond their cosmetic use, mirrors carried potent symbolism: the polished disc evoked the sun and the principle of yang, and was believed to reveal truth and repel evil, which is why so many accompanied the dead into the grave. Item # 202654

Lot: 255 - Han Dynasty Pottery Ding Tripod Vessel | Traces of Pigment

East Asia, China, Han Dynasty, ca. 206 BCE to 220 CE. A pottery tripod ding vessel with a low, rounded bowl set on three legs and a broad, outward-flanged rim surrounding a short, upright neck. The surface has faded to a soft gray through age and burial, with traces of red and orange pigment remaining in places, suggesting the vessel was originally painted or slipped. Size: 9.8" Diameter x 6.4" H (24.9 cm x 16.3 cm) Item # 201129

Lot: 256 - Northern Wei-Tang Terracotta Tomb Guardian, Armored

East Asia, China, Northern Wei to early Tang Dynasty, ca. 5th to 7th century CE. A commanding terracotta guardian figure, this imposing sculpture once stood sentinel within a Chinese tomb, its stern gaze and armored presence intended to repel malevolent forces in the afterlife. Modeled in earthenware and now presenting in buffware, the figure was originally vividly painted, its polychrome surface animating the armor, garments, and facial features within the dim interior of a burial chamber. Constructed in sections, it stands upright on sturdy, booted feet, its proportions elongated in keeping with sculptural conventions of the Northern Wei and early Tang periods. The torso is clad in stylized armor, marked by circular breast medallions and pronounced shoulder guards, while the arms bend forward at the elbows, hands clenched as if once grasping now-lost attributes or weapons. The garment falls in simple, columnar folds below the waist, terminating above firmly planted feet that anchor the figure with quiet authority. Size: 8.2" W x 22.1" H (20.8 cm x 56.1 cm) The face is expressive and forceful. Heavy-lidded eyes, arched brows, and a tightly set mouth convey vigilance and restrained power. The figure wears a cap or helmet rising to a subtle peak, reinforcing its martial identity. Though surface pigments have largely faded, traces would once have heightened the figure's lifelike presence and intensified its protective function. Guardian figures of this type formed part of mingqi, or spirit goods, placed in elite tombs to serve and protect the deceased in the afterlife. During the Northern Wei and into the Tang dynasty, funerary sculpture evolved toward greater naturalism and dynamism, reflecting both Central Asian influences and the cosmopolitan culture of early medieval China. Martial guardians, along with civil officials, attendants, and mythical beasts, populated tomb ensembles that mirrored earthly hierarchies. Large-scale examples such as this underscore the status of the tomb occupant and the importance placed on spiritual protection. With its solid stance, stylized armor, and vigilant expression, the figure embodies the transitional aesthetic between the linear elongation of the Wei period and the growing volumetric strength that would define Tang sculpture. Item # 201015

Lot: 257 - Chinese Ming Dynasty Gilt Wood Seated Guanyin

East Asia, China, Ming Dynasty,. Ca. 1368 to 1644 CE. A splendid wooden sculpture of the bodhisattva Guanyin seated in dhyanasana atop a lotus throne and tri-tiered pedestal. Draped in a long, cascading robe and dhoti, the deity's hands are placed in the dhyana mudra of meditation, while the face presents a benevolent expression detailed with downcast eyes beneath high arched brows, flanked by long pendulous ears and surmounted by a piled top bun with 2 ribbons falling to the shoulders. Size: 5" L x 5.8" W x 14.3" H (12.7 cm x 14.7 cm x 36.3 cm) The goddess Guanyin, also known as the bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, was one of the most popular figures around the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, a period in which the sculptural style of images of Guanyin was expanded. Avalokiteshvara became popular as the deity of mercy and compassion, answering prayers and protecting the faithful from catastrophe. In contrast to images of the Buddha, who had already attained enlightenment, bodhisattvas have vowed to remain in the world to ensure the ultimate salvation of all sentient beings. The portrayal of bodhisattvas in the Ming dynasty largely continued from the sculptural traditions established in the preceding dynasties, with similar poise, expression of the face and overall countenance. Item # 192290

Lot: 258 - Chinese Ming Dynasty Green-Glazed Pottery Tomb Attendant Figure

East Asia, China, Ming Dynasty. A standing attendant modeled in earthenware and cloaked in a flowing green lead-glazed robe that pools in deep vertical folds about the feet. The figure stands at attention upon a stepped plinth, hands clasped before the chest in a gesture of deferential service, the long sash and overlapping lapels rendered with crisp, confident modeling. The face and hands retain their warm unglazed terracotta tone, the features picked out in white slip and pigment, while the cap and footwear are touched with black. Such mingqi were crafted expressly for burial, populating the tomb with a retinue of servants, guards, and courtiers intended to attend the deceased in the afterlife. The cool copper-green glaze, a hallmark of Ming funerary ceramics, lends this silent steward an enduring dignity. Tomb figures of this type belong to a long Chinese tradition of mingqi, "spirit goods," produced from at least the Han period and revived in lead-glazed earthenware during the Ming. Arranged in processional groups within the tomb chamber, attendants like this one embodied the household and officialdom that a person of rank expected to command beyond death. The characteristic green derives from a copper-fluxed lead glaze fired at comparatively low temperatures, leaving the flesh areas deliberately unglazed so that facial features could be finished in cold pigment, much of which is typically lost to burial. Item # 194626

Lot: 259 - Chinese Ming Era Guanyin Shrine Figure + Sealed Niche

East Asia, China, Ming to Qing Dynasty, ca. 16th to 19th century CE. A Chinese wood figure seated in meditation, likely depicting the bodhisattva Guanyin, shown with hands in the dhyana mudra - palms up, resting in the lap - a gesture of inner stillness and contemplation. The surface is weathered but has remains of gilding and cinnabar-red lacquer, emphasizing the pleated robes and crown, while the posture and frontal gaze convey a commanding sense of serenity. On the verso, a rectangular niche is sealed with a wood panel, intended to house prayers, consecration offerings, or spiritual relics, underscoring the figure's role in ritual practice. Likely used in an altar or shrine context, the figure is seated on an integral plinth. Size: 5.5" W x 12.5" H (14 cm x 31.8 cm) Item # 192346

Lot: 260 - Ming Zhangzhou Blue & White Dish, Phoenix and Peony

East Asia, China, Ming Dynasty. A broad, shallow porcelain dish painted in cobalt beneath a thick, greyish glaze, its interior given over to a spirited bird among flowering peony and slender bamboo. The plumage sweeps into a fanned tail that identifies the creature as a phoenix, or fenghuang, emblem of virtue, renewal, and auspicious fortune. Around the cavetto, radiating panels enclose stylized rosettes and dash motifs, a rhythmic border characteristic of the wares shipped from the kilns of Zhangzhou in southern Fujian. The freely brushed decoration, sandy foot, and gritty glaze pooling are hallmarks of this rapidly potted export ceramic. Made in vast quantities for maritime trade to Southeast Asia and Japan, such dishes carried both the visual language of Chinese blessing and the loose, confident hand prized by their overseas buyers. "Swatow" (Shantou) is a trade-port misnomer: these wares were not made at Swatow but at the folk kilns of Zhangzhou in coastal Fujian, from which they were exported through southern harbors from the mid-16th through the 17th century. Prized in Japan, where they were called gosu or Shonzui-adjacent krak wares, and in the markets of insular Southeast Asia, Swatow porcelain is defined by its bold, unhesitating brushwork, coarse body, and the tell-tale grit of kiln sand adhering to the unglazed foot. The phoenix paired with peony forms a classic rebus of prosperity and feminine grace, a motif repeated across the export repertoire with endless improvisational variation. Item # 202669

Lot: 261 - Ming / Qing Lohan Statue, Glass Eyes, Shunya Mudra

East Asia, China, late Ming to early Qing Dynasty, ca. 17th to 18th century CE. A solemn and sensitively rendered wooden sculpture of a lohan (also known as arhat), a venerable disciple of the Buddha, seated in dignified repose upon a red-lacquered chair. Carved with a commanding yet peaceful expression, the lohan holds his left hand in the shunya mudra - the "seal of patience" - a symbolic gesture associated with cultivating inner calm and transcending the ego. His right hand rests gently on his knee in a naturalistic pose. The figure is draped in a monastic robe that flows in sinuous folds, its surface retaining traces of black, blue, and ochre pigments that contrast beautifully with the bold red of the chair. The figure's glass eyes, set within finely carved sockets, lend a lifelike sense of presence, intensifying the contemplative realism of his gaze. His shaved head, full cheeks, and slightly parted lips reflect the serene self-mastery of a spiritual elder. Size: 11.5" L x 14.4" W x 26" H (29.2 cm x 36.6 cm x 66 cm) During the Ming and Qing periods, such figures were frequently installed in temple halls, either individually or as part of a set of sixteen or eighteen arhats. Their expressive naturalism reflects a broader trend in late imperial Buddhist art toward intimate, accessible portrayals that encouraged personal engagement and reverence. The shunya (or shuni) mudra, formed by touching the tip of the middle finger to the thumb while extending the other fingers, is traditionally believed to dispel inner noise and enhance spiritual discipline. In Buddhist iconography, it is often interpreted as a sign of deep introspection and mental focus - virtues befitting a lohan, who is revered for having attained enlightenment through unwavering devotion. Lohans were highly esteemed in Chinese Buddhism during the Ming and Qing periods, often represented in temple halls in groups of sixteen or eighteen. Sculptures such as this would have served both didactic and devotional functions, embodying the continuity of the Buddha’s teachings through his enlightened followers. The use of realistic elements - like glass eyes and detailed hand gestures - underscores the Ming-Qing period's increasing emphasis on lifelike expression and humanized portrayals in religious art. Item # 193609

Lot: 262 - Chinese Wood Official Figure, Possibly Wenchang Wang, Ming / Qing

East Asia, China, Ming to Qing Dynasty, ca. 17th to 18th century CE A finely carved and painted wooden figure depicting either a high-ranking civilian official or possibly the Taoist deity Wenchang Wang, both of whom are traditionally portrayed with a hand resting on the girdle belt of office - a symbol of status and wisdom. Shown seated on a backless throne atop a plinth, the figure's pose

Lot: 263 - Large Chinese Qing Champleve Enamel Brass Brazier Bowl

East Asia, China, Qing Dynasty, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE. A brass champleve leaded-enamel censer or brazier bowl with a broad flaring rim and rounded body, wrapped by a vivid frieze of archaistic taotie masks, scrolling chilong forms, and stylized cloud motifs in turquoise, red, green, cream, and deep blue. The enamel panels are set flush within their brass partitions, while the upper and lower bronze registers are molded with concentric diamond patterns and the lower body is accented with low-relief taotie mask appliques. Includes a custom iron display stand for stable presentation. Size: 17.5" W x 14" H (44.4 cm x 35.6 cm); 27" H (68.6 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 199075

Lot: 264 - Kangxi Blue and White Porcelain Bowl, Fruiting Branch Roundel

Far East, China, early Qing dynasty. The interior is centered with a fruiting branch—likely pomegranate or peach, symbols of abundance and longevity—enclosed within a roundel and surrounded by a meticulously rendered diaper ground. Four lobed cartouches interrupt the lattice, each containing stylized floral sprays, while the rim is encircled by a continuous band of blossoms and foliage. The exterior is painted with elegant scrolling foliage interspersed with shaped cartouches enclosing stylized blossoms, the decoration executed in fluid brushwork with subtle tonal variation in the cobalt. The balanced composition and crisp delineation of both geometric and naturalistic elements are characteristic of Kangxi-period porcelain production. Size: 10.75" D x 4" H (27.3 cm D x 10.2 cm H) Item # 202525

Lot: 265 - Chinese Carved Wood Figure of Zhou Cang, Qing Dynasty

East Asia, China, Qing Dynasty, ca. 18th to 19th century CE. A carved wood sculpture of Zhou Cang, the sword-bearing attendant to Guan Yu (Guan Di), the deified God of War, carved from a single block of wood with red and gilt lacquer. The figure is shown mid-stride with the left leg forward and head turned sharply left, the left hand raised to hold a now-missing sword, the right curled at the

Lot: 266 - 18th C. Chinese Carved Wood Guanyin Figure, Qing Dynasty

East Asia, China, Qing Dynasty, ca. 18th century CE. A carved wood figure of Guanyin, the Bodhisattva of Compassion, seated cross-legged upon a lotus throne, hands resting in meditation (dhyana mudra). The robes bear remains of original red cinnabar and black pigment, with a five-lobed crown. The reverse reveals a hollowed niche cavity, a feature traditionally used to hold consecrated deposits such as scrolls, sutras, or offerings intended to spiritually "activate" the statue. Size: 5.75" W x 12.5" H (14.6 cm x 31.8 cm) Item # 192348

Lot: 267 - Qing Nephrite Jade Girdle, Archaistic Zhou-Style Plaques

East Asia, China, Qing Dynasty. A stunning girdle of pale celadon nephrite, composed of alternating circular and rectangular plaques joined by carved interlocking links. Each plaque is worked in low relief and openwork: rosette medallions radiate from central perforations, while squared panels carry stylized scroll and zoomorphic motifs that consciously echo the taotie masks and coiled dragons of the archaic Zhou era. The stone ranges from soft grey-green to semi-translucent amber hues, its surface polished to a waxen sheen. The craftsmanship speaks to a workshop of considerable skill! The 19th-century Qing fascination with fanggu ("imitating the ancient") drove lapidaries to borrow the motifs of Shang and Zhou ritual bronzes, chiefly the taotie mask and interlaced dragon (kui) scrolls, rendering in jade forms that had originated a millennium earlier in cast metal. This revival was fueled by imperial taste and the era's growing scholarship on ancient inscriptions. Nephrite, the traditional jade of China (as distinct from later Burmese jadeite), carried Confucian associations with virtue and integrity, making a jade belt both a status object and a mark of character for its wearer. Item # 203608

Lot: 268 - Qing Porcelain Hu Vase - Sang de Boeuf w/ Stag Handles

East Asia, China, Qing Dynasty, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE. A refined porcelain hu vase enveloped in a deep sang de boeuf (ox blood) glaze, its surface shimmering with a rich, variegated crimson that pools darker around the base and rim. The form is elegantly swollen at the body, tapering gracefully to a short foot ring. Two handles, modeled as the heads of stags with alert eyes and branching antlers, emerge from the shoulders, their naturalistic forms providing a striking contrast to the smooth planes of the vessel. The ox blood glaze, also known as sang de boeuf, became a hallmark of Qing ceramic artistry, admired for its lustrous depth and subtle tonal variations achieved through copper-red glazing techniques. Symbolically, the stag was associated with longevity and prosperity in Chinese culture, a fitting motif for a vessel of this type. Size: 5.5" Diameter x 6.5" H (14 cm x 16.5 cm) This vase exemplifies the technical mastery and aesthetic sophistication of Qing porcelain, marrying symbolic form and vibrant glaze in a piece that resonates with both elegance and auspicious meaning. Item # 196649

Lot: 269 - Qing Dynasty Blue & White Porcelain Tureen with Platter

China, Qing Dynasty, ca. 19th century CE. This blue and white porcelain tureen with cover and matching platter features a well balanced oval body on a flaring foot, its sides fitted with intertwining handles and its lid topped with a floral shaped finial. The decoration is executed in rich cobalt blue, with chrysanthemum flowers arranged in orderly reserves and bordered by patterned bands that unify the composition, giving the ensemble a refined and cohesive presence. Item # 196347

Lot: 270 - Late Qing/Republic Snuff Bottle Trio, Bone and Greenstone

East Asia, China, Late Qing Dynasty to Republic era, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE. A charming trio of Chinese snuff bottles, including a carved bone example with ink-style landscape decoration, a celadon-toned greenstone bottle with softly veined translucency and faceted sides, and a petite mold-made pottery bottle glazed in warm yellow with raised dragon and phoenix in green relief. Size of largest: 1.5" W x 2.75" H (3.8 cm x 7 cm) Item # 200010

Lot: 271 - 19th C. Qing Dynasty Black Glaze Stoneware Jar, Henan Style

East Asia, China, Qing Dynasty, ca. 19th century CE. A stoneware jar with a rounded shoulder and short, flaring mouth, coated at the upper body in a black glaze in the Henan blackware tradition. The glaze descends in an uneven boundary, giving way to a dark brown matte slip below. The base is finished with an unglazed, ring-form foot. Size: 7.6" Diameter x 8.4" H (19.3 cm x 21.3 cm) Item # 201130

Lot: 272 - 19th C. Japanese Meiji Era Ranma Transom with Eagle

East Asia, Japan, Meiji Period, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE. A carved wood architectural transom (ranma) rendered in openwork with an eagle poised among the gnarled branches of a windswept pine. Using traditional Japanese carpentry techniques - secured at the corners without nails through interlocking joinery. Intended for placement above sliding doors or between interior rooms, ranma panels allowed light and air to pass through while adding a dramatic focal point of sculptural detail. Crafted using traditional Japanese carpentry techniques, it is secured at the corners without nails through interlocking joinery, and carved and finished on both sides to be admired from multiple viewpoints within a refined interior setting. Size: 73" L x 13.5" W (185.4 cm x 34.3 cm) Item # 192673

Lot: 273 - Qing Famille Rose Porcelain Basin, Tongzhi Mark

East Asia, China, Qing Dynasty, ca. late 19th century CE. A large porcelain basin lavishly decorated in famille rose enamels, featuring low-relief textural grounds enlivened with flowering branches, scrolling cloud bands, and lively birds including pheasants, all framed by bold cobalt-blue borders and gilt accents around the rim. The underside bears a red character mark associated with the Tongzhi era, and the impressive scale and colorful surface make it a striking display piece for collectors of late Qing export porcelain. Size: 15.75" Diameter x 5" H (40 cm x 12.7 cm); gold quality: 22% to 37% (equivalent to 5K+ to 8K+) Item # 199996

Lot: 274 - Early 19th C. Chinese Qing Dynasty Bannerman Helmet

East Asia, China, Qing Dynasty, ca. early 19th century CE. A steel bannerman battle helmet of conical form, assembled from multiple plates secured with rivets and finished with a polished surface. The crown is fitted with a tubular finial intended to hold rank tassels, a feature associated with military dress and identification. A flared brim and projecting visor frame the lower edge, with a line of small rivet holes around the rim for attaching cloth neck flaps. This helmet reflects a style used from the late Ming period onward, with proportions and construction consistent with Qing-era examples. Bannerman status was hereditary within the Eight Banners system. S Size: 8.25" W x 9.5" H (21 cm x 24.1 cm) Item # 151045

Lot: 275 - Large Chinese Archaistic Bi Disc, Late Qing / Republic Period

East Asia, China, late Qing dynasty to Republic period, ca. early to mid-20th century CE. A large Chinese archaistic bi disc carved from dense gray stone, modeled after ancient ritual jades. The disc has a central aperture and is finished on both faces with an evenly spaced cross-hatched lattice pattern, recalling Neolithic and Han dynasty prototypes. Archaistic stone carvings of this type were produced during the late Qing and early Republic periods as scholarly objects, display pieces, or architectural and interior elements. Size: 9.9" Diameter (25.1 cm) Well-proportioned and visually balanced, this bi disc exemplifies the continued cultural value of ancient forms reinterpreted through later craftsmanship and historical awareness. Item # 200329

Lot: 276 - Chinese White Glass Snuff Bottles, Set of 3, Coral Stoppers

East Asia, China, late Qing to Republic era, ca. early to mid-20th century CE. A set of three matching opaque white glass snuff bottles of rounded form, each fitted with a coral-colored stopper mounted in a brass collar and attached spoon. Size: 1.6" W x 3.25" H (4.1 cm x 8.3 cm) Item # 199994

Lot: 277 - Chinese & Japanese Hair Ornament Pins, Combs, Beads & Stone Seal

East Asia, Japan & China. A group of Asian personal accessories, led by a matched pair of 19th century gilt silver hairpins with blue kingfisher feather inlay, known as tian-tsui, set with jade, coral, seed beads, and red stones, with a gold and silver washed pin etched with floral motifs. Also included are bone and celluloid hairpins mounted with carved nacre finials, one a phoenix among iris, another a crane; celluloid pins with drum, tassel, and lantern-form glass bead mounts, several sprung to allow movement; a lacquered and gilt pin; a wood pin with folding paper fan; two long-toothed combs; carved wood boat trinkets; wood and bone inlaid xiangqi pieces; a stone seal; and celluloid red beads. Item # 198112

Lot: 278 - Taniguchi Kutani Porcelain Vase, Wisteria and Swallows, Meiji Period

East Asia, Japan, Meiji period, ca. 1900s. A porcelain bottle vase of Taniguchi Kutani manufacture, hand-painted with wisteria blossoms cascading from the neck, rendered in polychrome enamels and gold (aka-e kinsai). The body features swallows in flight, detailed in gilt and colored enamels. The rim and foot are adorned with gilt, and the base bears the Taniguchi Kutani mark. Size: 4.5" W x 8.5" H (11.4 cm x 21.6 cm); gold quality: 1% Item # 195162

Lot: 279 - Japanese Eiraku-Style Gilt Iron-Red Tea Cups, Meiji Era (pr)

East Asia, Japan, Meiji era, ca. early 20th century CE. A matched pair of Japanese porcelain tea cups, decorated in the Eiraku style with gold gilt over an iron-red ground. The exterior features gilt auspicious cloud scrolls and symbols of good fortune; the interiors are finished in white glaze with a cobalt underglaze scalloped roundel at center depicting a phoenix, the rims accented with gilt and double blue-line decoration. Both cups bear a hand-painted mark on the base reading Zengoro (Eiraku family). Size: 3.5" Diameter x 2.25" H (8.9 cm x 5.7 cm) Item # 195163

Lot: 280 - Lao Bronze Buddha, Bhumisparsha Mudra, Fragmentary

Southeast Asia, Laos,. A serene cast-bronze Buddha seated in meditation, the right hand lowered to touch the earth in the bhumisparsha mudra, the gesture by which Sakyamuni called the earth to witness his enlightenment and repelled the demon Mara. The oval face, downcast eyes, and gentle smile carry the flame-like ushnisha (rasmi) and tightly coiled snail-shell curls of Lao Buddhist convention, the diagonal sanghati folding across the left shoulder. Now fragmentary, lacking the left knee and the separately cast pedestal it once crowned, the figure retains a quiet devotional presence, likely produced for a temple or elite household shrine. Item # 203549

Lot: 281 - Rattanakosin Triad Buddha and Monks Divine Parasol

Southeast Asia, Thailand, Rattanakosin period, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE. A remarkable group of three statues featuring a central Buddha figure shaded by an umbrella, and accompanied by two monks. The Buddha stands atop a large, tiered octagonal pedestal - cast separately and attached via a large pin. He is adorned in raised rosette-patterned robes, with one hand raised in the abhaya mudra, dispelling fear. The parasol is removable, consisting of a iron pole supporting three wooden discs with brass openwork panels inlaid with mirrored glass shards, and topped with a wooden finial. The two monks, dressed in similarly lavish kasaya robes, stand on their own pedestals with hands clasped in the anjali mudra, a sign of prayer and reverence. Unlike the Buddha, they lack an ushnisha protuberance, signifying their unenlightened status. All three figures are detailed with glass-enamel eyes, adding depth to their serene countenances. Size of buddha + parasol: 15" W x 67" H (38.1 cm x 170.2 cm); monks: 10" W x 35.5" H (25.4 cm x 90.2 cm); gold quality: 4% to 5.7% Please note that this item is heavy/oversized. Please inquire about shipping prior to bidding. Item # 192439

Lot: 282 - 19th C. Thai Teak Architectural Naga Crest w/ Inlays

Southeast Asia, Thailand, ca. 19th century CE. A hand-carved wooden architectural element that was once the flaming frontal crest of a Naga serpent which was likely atop a roof or guarding an entrance. The surfaces are incised into a grid pattern and painted with vibrant colors, and the obverse face bears evidence that it was at one time entirely inlaid with petite glass panels that would have reflected light in the sun. Size: 3" L x 11.75" W x 48.25" H (7.6 cm x 29.8 cm x 122.6 cm); 55" H (139.7 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 163748

Lot: 283 - Thai Cast Brass Buddha Statue, Lopburi Style

Southeast Asia, Thailand, ca. 19th to mid-20th century CE. A Lopburi style cast brass statue of the meditative Buddha seated on a pedestal, with hands clasped and palms facing upward in his lap. The simplicity of the piece suggests it was likely intended for placement in a home shrine, viewed primarily from the front. The flat verso and hollow underside, filled with pottery from the firing process, reflect the typical mold-making technique used for such statues. This serene figure embodies tranquility and spiritual presence. Size: 2.75" W x 4.5" H (7 cm x 11.4 cm) Item # 193374

Lot: 284 - Antique Thai / Khmer Lacquered Ceremonial Hat, Gilt Gesso

Southeast Asia, Thailand / Cambodia, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE. A ceremonial conical hat composed of woven palm-leaf cane fronds coated with a thick lacquered surface - black covered with red oxide pigments. The exterior is richly ornamented with applied low-relief motifs in gesso - beaded scrolls, loops, and spirals - arranged in concentric registers that encircle the brim and ascend the tapering crown. A copper wash has been applied overall, lending a golden shimmering hue. Inside, a pair of wooden tabs with pierced holes remain for the attachment of a chin strap, attesting to the hat's intended wear in ceremonial or dance use. Despite similar classifications in museums as a "war hat," the lightweight nature and decorative lacquered surface indicate ritual rather than martial function. Such headpieces were associated with Buddhist courtly display, embodying cosmological symbolism through their stupa-like silhouette and radiant finish. Size: 16" Diameter x 6" H (40.6 cm x 15.2 cm) Item # 196833

Lot: 285 - Thai Nariphon and Makkaliphon Fruit-Paste Figures, ex-Coe

Southeast Asia, Thailand, ca. late 20th century CE. A pair of Thai figures modeled from dried fruit and flower paste, representing the mythical Nariphon (female) and Makkaliphon (male) beings from Buddhist legend, said to grow as fruit of enchanted trees in the Himaphan forest of Buddhist cosmology. Each figure stands in an elongated, columnar pose with arms held close to the body, the surfaces retaining the textured organic quality of the natural materials; each features a small topknot recalling the stem attachment to its originating branch. The female figure shows subtle anatomical detail with rounded breasts and curving hips, the male more angular with a narrower chest and defined torso. Size of larger (male): 1.6" W x 6.1" H (4.1 cm x 15.5 cm) According to the Vessantara Jataka, the god Indra created twelve Nariphon trees to protect the Bodhisattva Vessantara's wife from the lustful attentions of forest-dwelling ascetics. The trees bore fruits in the form of beautiful human-like beings to distract and incapacitate those who might harm her, causing them to fall into months-long slumber after consorting with the fruits. These rare folk representations echo the enduring Thai fascination with the Nariphon and Makkaliphon, which remain potent symbols in local lore - beings that possess human-like features and internal organs, yet lack bones, and are said to have the power to sing and dance. Traditionally, such representations are made to be both devotional and protective, embodying the intertwined themes of beauty, temptation, and spiritual safeguarding that the myth conveys. Item # 196207

Lot: 286 - Early Thai / Lao Carved Wood Chofa, Temple Roof Finial

Southeast Asia, Thailand / Laos, ca. 18th to 19th century CE. A carved wooden chofa with a long rising curve that tapers to a pointed tip. The form flows upward from a thicker base, with a projecting element at the midsection that contributes to the distinctive silhouette associated with temple roof finials. A chofa is a traditional architectural element mounted at the ends of roof gables on Thai and Lao wats (Buddhist temple buildings) and occasionally on palaces. Its upward sweeping form resembles a horn or serpentine tendril and functions as a sacred and protective symbol crowning the structure. The shape is often interpreted as deriving from the Hindu mythological gajasimha, a lion-elephant hybrid. Installed as the final component of construction, the chofa marks the completion of the building and is traditionally consecrated in a ceremonial ritual before being mounted to the roof. Size: 66.5" H (168.9 cm); 73" H (185.4 cm) on included custom stand. Size: 10" W x 66.5" H (25.4 cm x 168.9 cm); 73" H (185.4 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 200100

Lot: 287 - Thai Bronze Buddha Head, Ayutthaya-Rattanakosin, Gilt

Southeast Asia, Thailand, late Ayutthaya to Rattanakosin (Bangkok) period, ca. 18th to 19th century CE. A leaded bronze Buddha head fragment with traces of light gold gilt remaining on the surface. The serene face features downcast eyes, elongated ears, and a textured coiffure crowned with a flaming ushnisha. Mounted on a custom wooden base. Size: 2.5" W x 5" H (6.4 cm x 12.7 cm); 9.25" H (23.5 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 191904

Lot: 288 - 19th C. Burmese Gilt Wood Buddha Throne - Back Panel

Southeast Asia, Burma, ca. 19th century CE. An ornate and masterfully crafted gilt wood throne back panel, once forming the radiant backdrop to a seated Buddha image. Fashioned in the traditional Burmese style, the piece is richly adorned with intricate high-relief carving, applied gilding, and elaborate openwork tracery. The central panel is dominated by a large, circular medallion of scrolling floral and foliate motifs, each tendril and curl defined with meticulous punchwork and beading. Vertical columns flank the medallion, their surfaces carved with tiered petal patterns and encircled with scrolling designs. The arching upper section rises in dramatic, flame-like peaks terminating in scrolling vegetal forms and crowned by a pointed finial. Size: 12" W x 18.3" H (30.5 cm x 46.5 cm) At each upper corner stand stylized peacocks, one of the national animals of Burma and regarded as a symbol of the descendance of the sun. The densely carved side panels, pierced with curling tendrils, frame the central niche, allowing light to pass through and enhancing the play of shadows across the gilded surface. This type of throne back, or throne frame, served not only as an architectural embellishment but as a visual halo, magnifying the sanctity of the Buddha image it framed. The profuse gilding reflects the Burmese devotion to honoring the Buddha with the most precious materials, a merit-making act believed to bring spiritual benefit. The carving style and composition are consistent with 19th century Burmese monastic and temple furnishings, blending floral ornament with symbolic guardianship. Item # 196604

Lot: 289 - 20th C. Burmese Brass Seated Buddha Statue

Southeast Asia, Burma (Myanmar or Thailand, ca. early to mid-20th century CE. A cast brass statue of a seated Buddha in the full lotus position, with his hands forming the bhumisparsha mudra, or "earth witness" gesture. The interior is hollow, though encrusted remains of pottery or plaster partially fill the cavity. Size: 6" L x 3.25" W x 7.5" H (15.2 cm x 8.3 cm x 19 cm) Item # 191884

Lot: 290 - Majapahit Style Brass Vishnu, Indonesia

Southeast Asia, Indonesia, ca. mid-20th century CE. This brass standing Vishnu figure would add a serene, devotional accent to a garden, patio, or entryway, with a soft verdigris tone that blends nicely into outdoor settings. The four-armed Majapahit style deity stands on a lotus base, holding traditional attributes and framed by a circular halo that gives the piece a clear silhouette from a distance. Size: 7.5" W x 15.5" H (19 cm x 39.4 cm) Item # 199998

Lot: 291 - 19th C. Filipino Barong Short Sword w/ Silver Ferrule

Southeast Asia, Philippines, Moro culture, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE. A traditional Filipino short sword known as a barong, fitted with a broad, leaf-shaped steel blade and a carved hardwood hilt. The handle features a sculpted pommel with flowing contours and is mounted with a sterling silver ferrule securing the blade at the neck. The single-edged blade has a thick spine and wide profile, tapering to a strong point. Designed for powerful chopping strikes, the barong is both a functional weapon and a distinctive example of regional martial craftsmanship. Size: 24.5" L x 3" W (62.2 cm x 7.6 cm) Item # 200206

Lot: 292 - Two Southeast Asian Wooden Puppet Heads

Southeast Asia, possibly Indonesia (Java) or Myanmar (Burma), ca. late 19th to mid-20th century CE. A rare and expressive pair of carved wooden heads, once animated by voice and gesture, now preserved as sculptural remnants of Southeast Asian theatrical tradition. Carved in the round and intended for attachment to puppet bodies, these heads were almost certainly created for performance rather than static display. The truncated necks suggest mounting on rods or marionette frameworks, and the surviving red textile collar on one example offers a tangible trace of costume, grounding the pair firmly in the world of staged storytelling. The head on the left is notably restrained and symbolic in its design. With elongated facial proportions, gently closed eyes, and hands carved deliberately over the ears, the figure appears to embody a stock character defined by refusal, ritual silence, or comic obstinacy. Size of larger (hands on ears): 3.5" L x 3" W x 4.1" H (8.9 cm x 7.6 cm x 10.4 cm); 5.5" H (14 cm) on included custom stand. Such exaggerated gestures are characteristic of Southeast Asian puppet traditions, where visual shorthand allowed audiences to immediately recognize a figure's role or temperament. The surface shows age cracks and wear consistent with long use and handling, lending the head a quiet authority and timeworn dignity. In contrast, the head on the right is more animated and naturalistic. Rounded cheeks, alert eyes, and a slightly open mouth suggest speech or song caught mid-performance. The dark, glossy surface, likely built up through layers of pigment or lacquer, reveals warmer tones beneath areas of wear, creating a rich, mottled patina. The retained textile collar reinforces its theatrical function and hints at a once elaborate costume ensemble. Together, these heads reflect the artistry of Southeast Asian puppet traditions such as Indonesian wayang or Burmese yoke the, where carving, color, and gesture worked in concert to convey character, morality, and narrative to an audience. Removed from their original bodies, they retain a powerful presence, reading today as sculptural studies in expression and as evocative survivors of performance culture. Item # 200217

Lot: 293 - 19th C. Indonesian Wood Figure, Elongated Form

Southeast Asia, Indonesia, ca. 19th century CE. A carved wooden standing figure rendered in a frontal pose, with elongated proportions, a rounded torso, and simplified facial features framed by vertical side elements. The surface shows age-related wear, natural fissures, and areas of loss, contributing to a strong sculptural presence and a sense of long use or display. Size: 7" W x 15.75" H (17.8 cm x 40 cm) Item # 200174

Lot: 294 - Indonesian Kris with Gold and Sapphire Adornments

A forged-steel executioner's kris bearing a blade that is much longer and much straighter than typical kris examples. The long thin blade was designed to be thrust through the collarbone of the intended victim and ultimately piercing the heart. This motion was also used by Roman gladiators as the coup de gras with the fallen (but not yet dead) contestant in the arena. What sets this example off is the adornments of high-karat gold on the blade flange and white sapphires on the base of the grip. Additionally, the handle has a lovely abstract Garuda. A nice older example! Item # 203780

Lot: 295 - Indonesian Ikat Sash & Papua New Guinea Bilum Bag - Textile Pair

Southeast Asia, Indonesia; and Melanesia, Papua New Guinea. Two textiles comprising an Indonesian ikat sash and a Papua New Guinea bilum bag. The cotton sash is warp ikat, resist-dyed in red, cream, and charcoal with lozenge and hooked motifs, and finished with a fringe. The bilum is vegetal fibers using the looped string technique typical of Papua New Guinea, where such bags serve as everyday carriers and markers of clan and regional identity. Item # 203716

Lot: 296 - Indonesian Bone Naga Dagger, Carved Serpent Hilt

Southeast Asia, Indonesia, decorative workshop production. A carved bone dagger and its matching bone sheath, the exposed iron blade set into a hilt worked as a stylized naga, or serpent deity, its jaws gaping wide over the mouth of the scabbard. The hilt and sheath are cut from dense animal bone and darkened with pyrographic and pigment-filled linework: banded chevrons, plaited lattice, ladder motifs, and a scale field that runs the length of the scabbard toward a second serpentine head at the tip. The bone has taken a warm honey patina against the blackened incising. Pieces of this type were produced by tourist- and export-oriented workshops in the Indonesian archipelago through the 20th century, drawing freely on the older Javanese and Balinese repertoire of naga hilts and keris furniture. The naga is among the most durable motifs in Indonesian art, absorbed from Indic cosmology and naturalized across Java and Bali as a serpent of the waters and the underworld, guardian of thresholds and of the treasure buried beneath them. On weapons it is functional symbolism as much as ornament: naga heads and undulating naga bodies appear on keris blades (the luk, or waves, of a serpentine blade are read as the creature's coils), on hilt terminals, and on scabbard mouths, where the open jaws are understood to swallow and so contain the blade's power. The doubled treatment here, a devouring head at the hilt and a second at the tip of the scabbard, is a decorative elaboration of that convention rather than a canonical form. Item # 160449

Lot: 297 - Sri Lankan Wood Police Constable Kolam Mask

South Asia, Sri Lanka. A kolam mask carved in wood as a male face with bulging eyes, broad nose, and open grin exposing rows of squared teeth, a mustache worked in dark pigment above the mouth. Surmounted by a tall cylindrical cap bearing the incised badge number 9827, identifying the wearer as a police constable. Large flared ears applied at either side and secured with nails. Painted overall in ochre with black and red detailing, the surface stained and faded from use. Kolam is a masked folk theater of southern Sri Lanka in which stock characters drawn from the colonial administration, among them the police constable and the court official, are played for satire. Item # 203676

Lot: 298 - Burmese Pyinsarupa Guardian Heads, Pair, with Antlers

Southeast Asia, Burma (Myanmar), ca. 19th century CE. A pair of wooden Pyinsarupa guardian heads with attached deer antlers, originally crafted to decorate and protect a temple or other sacred structure. The Pyinsarupa (also spelled Binasarupa or Pyinsa Rupa) is a chimera-like creature in Burmese mythology and traditional art, featuring a curved, trunk-like nose, pointed ears, bulging eyes, fangs, and mane-like protrusions. The composite beast is traditionally formed from the attributes of multiple animals, symbolizing strength, courage, and protection, and is believed to ward off evil spirits and safeguard sacred spaces. The antlers, likely from a Sambar or Eld's deer, are not original to the carvings but were added at a later date. Size: 27" W x 24" H (68.6 cm x 61 cm); 35" H (88.9 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 193634

Lot: 299 - Rare Dayak Wood Hampatong Wearing Western Clothing

Southeast Asia, Indonesia, Borneo, Dayak culture, ca. A remarkable and unusual hampatong (also known as hempatong, tempatong, kepatong, or epatung) guardian figure, carved from a single hardwood trunk and retaining a strong, upright presence. Unlike most traditional examples that portray ancestors or protective spirits in stylized indigenous dress, this figure strikingly wears Western-style clothing - a collared short-sleeve shirt with a breast pocket, a belted waistband, and cuffed trousers - acknowledging changing identities and external contact while retaining traditional protective functions. The figure stands on an integral stump base, its surface displaying a natural gray patina, age cracks, and weathering consistent with long outdoor exposure. Size: 5" W x 41.75" H (12.7 cm x 106 cm); 42" H (106.7 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 197872

Lot: 300 - 19th C. Javanese Polearm Spear with Carved Wood Shaft

Southeast Asia, Indonesia, Java, ca. 19th century CE or earlier. A slender spear with a narrow steel blade and an ornate nickel-brass collar worked in repousse and etched with scrolling foliate motifs. The long wooden shaft is carved with evenly spaced vertical grooves that create a textured surface. Decorative metalwork and careful finishing suggest this was valued as a prestige weapon as much as a functional one, possibly associated with ceremonial display or guard use. Size: 80.5" L x 1" W (204.5 cm x 2.5 cm); 81" H (205.7 cm) on included custom stand. Item # 185932

Lot: 301 - Javanese / Balinese Kelewang with Wood Scabbard and Garuda Handle

Indonesian. Slightly curved single-edged blade tapering to an acute point; the hilt of characteristic recurved form, the grip fitted with surmounted by an elaborately carved pommel in the form of a garuda (revered divine creature and the eagle-mount (vahana) of the Hindu god Vishnu), the three-part scabbard with copper/nickel upper section over a wood body with copper/nickel mounts. Item # 203784

Lot: 302 - 18th C. Bornean Iron Spear Heads (group of 3)

Southeast Asia, Indonesia, Borneo, ca. late 18th to early 19th century CE. A fine set of three forged-iron spear blades that are likely of British origin. Each weapon bears a petaloid blade with a shallow midrib, sharpened edges, and a thick shoulder that rests above a narrow, protruding tang. One spear head has a pair of shallow fullers running along roughly the first half of the body. Each piece is enveloped with lustrous gray-brown patina that makes for an appealing presentation. Size of largest: 16.6" L x 1.5" W (42.2 cm x 3.8 cm) Item # 202952

Lot: 303 - Fine Javanese / Balanese Kelewang with Wood and Metal Scabbard

Indonesian. The straight single-edged blade with three fullers running the majority of its length, tapering to an acute point; the hilt of characteristic recurved form, the grip fitted with a finely engraved silver ferrule, surmounted by an elaborately carved pommel in the form of a naga (mythological serpent), the open jaws and scaled body rendered with fine detail; the two-part scabbard with engraved copper/nickel upper section over a wood body with copper/nickle mounts. Item # 203783

Lot: 304 - Sumatran Batak Bone Vessel & Magician's Divination Calendar

Southeast Asia, Indonesia, Sumatra, Toba Batak. A divination porhalaan calendar of buffalo bone incised with a serpent, geometric bands, and symbolic devices, the surface ruled into thirty vertical columns for days and twelve horizontal divisions for months. Fitted with a carved hardwood stopper in the form of a seated figure astride an abstract quadruped, a bird surmounting the head, with openwork scroll supports. The hollow form and stopper indicate use as a container as well. Reading a porhalaan was the province of the datu, the ritual specialist who consulted it to determine auspicious timing for hunting, ceremonies, and other undertakings rather than to record the passage of time. Item # 160417

Lot: 305 - Three Peruvian Wool Ponchos & Aguayo Textiles

South America, Peru / Bolivia, Aymara & Quechua cultures, ca. mid-20th century CE. A collection of three woven textiles including ponchos and an aguayo (manta) rectangular cloth. The group features bold geometric patterning and vibrant aniline dyes arranged in traditional banded and geometric compositions. Woven in wool, likely sheep rather than camelid fiber, the textiles reflect continued regional weaving traditions adapted for the modern market. Size: 47" L x 40" W (119.4 cm x 101.6 cm) Item # 196473

Lot: 306 - Early 20th C. Kauer Ceremonial Jacket - Shell & Mirror Embroidery

Southeast Asia, Indonesia, South Sumatra, Kauer people. A petite woman's baju jacket: handwoven exterior with stripes in indigo, ochre, red, and purple, with metallic thread highlights, and a printed red cotton interior lining. The front bib is densely embroidered and set with cermuk, small mica micro-mirrors, whose reflective shimmer was believed to deflect misfortune. Borders of stitched shells frame the neckline and hem, marking status and prosperity. The back panel is a fine supplementary-weft brocade known as songket, with shimmering metallic threads. Such jackets formed part of a bride's ceremonial dress, signaling her rank during marriage and communal rites Item # 203652

Lot: 307 - 17th C. Spanish Colonial Pottery Handled Cooking Jar

Spain or Spanish Americas, Spanish Colonial period, ca. 17th to 18th century CE. A robust Spanish Colonial pottery cooking jar that carries the quiet authority of daily use across centuries. The vessel is formed with a rounded body and gently constricted waist, rising to a thickened rim and fitted with a single loop handle for steady lifting and pouring. Its proportions are practical and well balanced, clearly intended for hearth-side cooking and repeated handling. The surface displays bands of earthen red, warm buff, and darkened firing tones, the result of open kiln firing and prolonged exposure to heat. These tonal shifts give the jar a layered, painterly presence, while the coarse ceramic fabric speaks to durability and function rather than ornament. The handle is firmly pulled and integrated, reinforcing its utilitarian purpose. Size: 7.8" L x 6.9" W x 7.3" H (19.8 cm x 17.5 cm x 18.5 cm) Cooking jars of this type were essential fixtures in Spanish Colonial kitchens, used for preparing stews, grains, and sauces over open fires. Produced in both Iberian workshops and colonial centers throughout the Americas, such vessels reflect the transfer of Old World ceramic traditions into new environments and cuisines. Honest, tactile, and visually compelling, this cooking jar offers a strong example of Spanish Colonial domestic pottery, valued today for its sculptural form, historical resonance, and unmistakable sense of use. Item # 199903

Lot: 308 - 1683 Armorial Chest, Stuart Royal Arms, Iron-Mounted Hide

Western Europe, ca. 17th century CE. armorial chest, its wooden body covered in hide and mounted with wrought-iron strap hinges, side ring handles, and corner reinforcements. The arched lid and front are bordered with rows of domed brass tacks forming the date "1683." The slanted body profile was designed to display the interior painting when opened. Inside, the lid retains its original painted canvas lining: a heraldic tableau with figures holding banners and shields, including a double-headed eagle, an imperial and Holy Roman emblem, flanking a crowned shield bearing the Stuart royal arms encircled by the Order of the Garter motto, "Honi soit qui mal y pense." Size: 21" L x 8.5" W x 10" H (53.3 cm x 21.6 cm x 25.4 cm) Item # 197987

Lot: 309 - Engraved Antler Powder Cup, Neoclassical, 18th Century

Europe, Neoclassical period, ca. 18th century CE. An elegant engraved antler cup, possibly intended as a hunter's powder cup, featuring meticulous incised and inked decoration. The conical vessel is adorned with two rectangular panels depicting armed soldiers in profile - one standing with spear and shield, the other seated in repose, both wearing classical helmets and breastplates inspired by Greco-Roman antiquity. Between these scenes rise stylized palmettes and fan motifs, framed by neat beaded borders that give the composition a rhythmic balance. The handle, carved from the same piece of antler, twists gracefully into a circular form, while the base displays a crisscross pattern of etched lines stained in a darker hue. Such engraved antler work was popular across northern and central Europe in the 18th century, often crafted by huntsmen or soldiers as personal luxuries or mementos. Size: 4.2" L x 2.3" W x 4.6" H (10.7 cm x 5.8 cm x 11.7 cm) The handle, carved from the same piece of antler, twists gracefully into a circular form, while the base displays a crisscross pattern of etched lines stained in a darker hue. Such engraved antler work was popular across northern and central Europe in the 18th century, often crafted by huntsmen or soldiers as personal luxuries or mementos. The choice of martial imagery and hunting material reflects the intertwined values of strength, skill, and discipline in early modern European noble culture. Whether used to store gunpowder or as a decorative drinking vessel, this cup captures the fusion of artistry and utility characteristic of the period - a fine testament to craftsmanship drawn from nature and inspired by the heroic ideal. Item # 199015

Lot: 310 - 1920s Egyptian Revival Patchwork Tapestry, Egyptomania

Untied States, ca. 1920s CE. An Egyptian Revival patchwork tapestry, hand-stitched from a mix of cotton pieces over a thicker-weave cotton ground, detailed with black embroidery. The composition centers on a striding Egyptian figure holding a papyrus stalk, framed by registers of stylized hieroglyphs, birds, reeds, and architectural motifs. The appliqué elements are cut from various neutral-toned fabrics — tan, ochre, brown, beige, and denim blue. The textile is fashioned much like a small quilt, with layered fabrics hand-sewn onto a backing cloth; the verso shows the outlines of the original stitching. This piece belongs to the wave of Egyptomania that swept Europe and America in the early 20th century, peaking around the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922. Size: 34.5" L x 17.5" W (87.6 cm x 44.4 cm) Item # 198107

Lot: 311 - Western Leather Batwing Chaps - Purported John Wayne

North America, United States, ca. mid-20th century CE. A commanding pair of mid-20th century leather batwing chaps, richly worn and boldly decorated, purportedly once worn by John Wayne. Broad in cut and dramatic in silhouette, these chaps embody the visual language of the American West as it galloped from working ranches onto the silver screen. Crafted from heavy brown leather with scalloped outer edges, the batwing form flares generously from thigh to calf, designed to protect the rider while creating a sweeping profile in the saddle. The surface bears the honest patina of use - creasing, surface wear, and tonal variation that speak to age and experience. Each leg is adorned with metal studs arranged into graphic motifs: a 5-pointed star, a crescent moon, and a shield. These emblems, repeated symmetrically, evoke classic Western iconography - symbols of frontier identity, state pride, and cinematic heroism. Size: 37.2" W x 38" H (94.5 cm x 96.5 cm) Large conchos anchor leather ties that hang in narrow strands, while studded borders trace the contours of the leather in rhythmic lines. The waist yoke remains intact, with strap and buckle closures at the beltline and adjustable fittings along the legs. The overall construction reflects traditional Western saddlery techniques, built for durability as much as display. Purportedly worn by John Wayne, the archetypal cowboy of American film, these chaps carry an added aura of Hollywood legend. Whether considered as functional ranch wear, costume history, or a relic of Western cinema mythology, they stand as a striking artifact of mid-century American cowboy culture. Item # 200829

Lot: 312 - Fixed Blade Hunting Knives, Horn & Wood Handles with Leather Sheaths

United States. A group of five artisan-made fixed-blade hunting knives, each with a blade showing a damascus-style layered pattern. The handles include dyed and laminated hardwood in red, gray, and brown tones; natural hardwood with painted banding; and horn with green and red spacers, all mounted with brass bolsters, guards, and pommel fittings. Each knife is fitted with a brown leather sheath with contrast stitching and a snap retention strap. Item # 200646

Lot: 313 - WWI Era Royal Northumberland Fusiliers Swagger Stick, St George & Dragon Mount

Western Europe, United Kingdom. A slender, gently bowed wooden rod fitted at one tip with a spent cartridge casing and capped at the opposite end with a white-metal or brass mount cast in relief. The mount carries the badge of the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers: St George astride his horse, lance driven into the writhing dragon beneath, encircled by the regimental motto "Quo Fata Vocant" ("Whither the Fates Call"). A "V" below the device may denote a fifth battalion or the regiment's older numbering as the 5th Foot. Such sticks, carried by officers and NCOs as marks of rank and bearing rather than as working crops, were often assembled in the field from salvaged ammunition components, placing this example in the broad tradition of soldier-made trench art. Item # 154834

Lot: 314 - Supreme Mini Bike Box Logo Red Coleman CT200U SS17 Gas-Powered Collectible

North America, United States, Supreme (streetwear brand); manufactured China, Chongqing Huansong. A gas-powered mini bike finished in Supreme's signature red, a collaborative object that drags the box-logo grammar of skate-culture streetwear into the realm of the internal-combustion engine. Built on the stock Coleman CT200U platform, it carries white box logos on the seat and fenders and a "Ride

Lot: 315 - 17th C. French Book Safe - St. Augustine Commentary

Western Europe, France, Early Modern period, ca. late 17th to 18th century CE. A learned book with impeccable posture and a mischievous afterlife, this late 17th century Parisian theological volume has enjoyed at least three distinct careers - first as a serious work of Augustinian exegesis, then as a carefully regulated convent book, and finally as a master of concealment with a sense of timing

Lot: 316 - Scott International Postage Stamp Album Part III, Nicaragua to Zanzibar, 19th-20th C.

North America, United States. International Postage Stamp Album, Part III, published by Scott Publications, New York, circa late 1950s. Blue leatherette boards with silver-lettered spine. Covers countries alphabetically from Nicaragua through Zanzibar, with printed pages ruled into framed spaces captioned by country, denomination, and series. Many spaces hold hinged stamps; others remain unfilled. Material spans the late nineteenth century into the mid twentieth, including definitives, commemoratives, and colonial issues from republics, protectorates, and former administrations. Item # 199502

Lot: 317 - Stamp Album French Offices to New Zealand - 1841 to 1950s

North America, United States, New York. A deep blue cloth folio, gilt-lettered on the spine "International Postage Stamp Album, Part II" and stamped on the front board with the collector's name, John G. Williams. The binding and title page come from Scott Publications, Inc., New York, copyright 1947, designed and written by Theresa M. Clark. The leaves inside tell a different story: an incomplete run of Part I pages, roughly the F through N countries, from the French Offices in China through New Zealand, bound behind a title page belonging to another volume. The mounted stamps likewise overrun the publisher's stated window, spanning issues from 1841 into the 1950s: engraved sovereigns, colonial overprints, definitives, and wartime provisionals, gathered and hinged by a single patient hand. Scott Publications began issuing its International albums in the 1870s, and by the mid-twentieth century the series had become the standard armature of the general worldwide collection: pre-printed, illustrated pages that told the collector exactly what existed and, more pointedly, what was missing. The 1947 printing carried cross-references to the 1947 Standard Postage Stamp Catalogue, the numbering system that still governs the American philatelic market. A word on the mismatch, since a specialist will find it in minutes. Scott's Part I covered the world through 1940; Part II picked up from mid-1940 to August 1946. The title page here advertises the Part II coverage, but the pages actually present are Part I stock for the alphabetical middle of the world, and the run is incomplete. That mismatch is worth stating plainly rather than leaving to discovery: the album is a collector's assemblage, not a factory-intact volume, and its value rests on the mounted material rather than on the completeness of the binding. Theresa M. Clark, credited on the title page as designer and author, was among the small circle of women whose editorial labor shaped American album publishing in the 1930s and 1940s, a contribution rarely acknowledged on the spine. Item # 199501

Lot: 318 - Philatelic Album of Unused Austria Stamps, Scott Nos. 1-718

Central Europe, Austria. A black pebble-grain post binder housing an accumulation of unused Austrian postage stamps, its spine labeled by hand "AUSTRIA UNUSED #1-718". Inside, printed album leaves lay out a space for every Scott catalog number from 1 through 718, a sequence that begins with the imperforate arms issues of the Habsburg empire and runs forward through the Franz Josef definitives, the First Republic, and the interwar commemoratives. The run is partial: many spaces remain vacant, so the album records both what was gathered and what the collector still hoped to find. Assembled to a catalog rather than to taste, it is the working document of a systematic philatelist, hinged and annotated in the manner standard to mid-century collecting practice. Scott 1 through 718 spans nearly a century of upheaval compressed into perforated paper. Scott 1 is the 1850 issue of the Austrian Empire, printed on hand-made paper with the imperial coat of arms, one of the earliest adhesive postage issues in continental Europe. The middle of the range carries the long reign of Franz Josef I, whose profile appears in successive redesigns, and includes the 1908 jubilee series marking his sixtieth year on the throne. After 1918 the numbering passes into the First Republic, where inflation-era surcharges, the Renner and Seipel charity issues, and the architecture and costume sets of the 1920s and early 1930s appear, ending shortly before the 1938 Anschluss suspended independent Austrian philately altogether. A country-run album of this kind is valued for its completeness against the catalog rather than for individual rarities, and the empty spaces are as informative as the filled ones. Item # 199549

Lot: 319 - 1851 to 1979 Minkus Stamp Album - US, Aden to Biafra

Worldwide, United States and Foreign Postal Issues. A single-volume worldwide collection containing the postage of the United States followed by the alphabet from Aden to Biafra, the stamps dating from 1851 to 1979, mint and used together, mounted across the printed leaves of Volume I of the Supreme Global Stamp Album. The album is the 1966 edition edited by George A. Tlamsa and published by

Lot: 320 - Two Scott Albums w/ Penny Black & British Commonwealth Stamp Collection, 1840-1964

North America, United States, Scott Publications, New York. A pair of green cloth Scott Specialty Series albums, gilt-lettered at the spine, housing a working collection of Great Britain, British Europe, and Oceania issues. Printed by Scott Publications of New York (copyright 1962 and 1964), the leaves provide illustrated spaces for every major variety listed in Scott's Standard Postage Stamp Catalogue. Volume one runs from Great Britain to Tonga and opens with the 1840 Penny Black, the world's first adhesive postage stamp, tied by a red Maltese cross cancel; volume two continues from Nauru to Western Australia. Queen Victoria, Edward VII, George V, George VI, and Elizabeth II succeed one another across the pages, joined by the overprinted New Zealand issues of Niue, the Brooke Rajah portraits of Sarawak, and the Gaelic harps and Celtic crosses of Ireland. Stamps are hinged, most cancelled, the spaces partially filled. The 1840 Penny Black is philately's founding document. Rowland Hill's uniform penny post swept away a byzantine system in which the recipient paid according to distance and sheet count, and the engraved profile of the young Victoria (no country name, then or since, Britain alone being exempt) became the template every postal administration on these pages would follow. The red Maltese cross was the original obliterator, abandoned within a year because red ink washed off too easily and let a shrewd correspondent reuse the stamp. What the two volumes chart is a single design idea travelling outward: the sovereign's head, the engraved frame, the denomination in the corners, carried by packet boat to Sarawak, Niue, Nauru, and Tonga, where local administrations overprinted, surcharged, and eventually replaced it with kiwis, wakatipu lake views, and the harps of an independent Ireland. The collection closes in 1964, the year Scott issued the second album, the year Nyasaland became Malawi and Northern Rhodesia became Zambia... and, for readers who prefer their history in three chords, the year four musicians from Liverpool landed at Kennedy and gave Britain its most durable export since the penny post. Item # 204450

Lot: 321 - Philatelic Collection - Thousands of Stamps: Canada, Belgium, Spain & UK

Europe & Canada. A large accumulation of postage stamps, mostly Canadian, sorted into paper bags and glassine and wax paper envelopes by an earlier collector. The bags are inscribed by country and count, including Canada, England, Nederland, Belgium, Spain, Germany, France, Italy, and Hungary, with several thousand stamps per bag. The stamps observed include mid-20th century Canadian and British Commonwealth definitives, Spanish and Spanish Sahara issues, and other worldwide material, both used and unused. The accumulation is far too numerous to examine individually and is offered as received, unsorted and unchecked, with strong potential for further discovery. Item # 199373

Lot: 322 - 1822 Capped Bust Half Dollar, Philadelphia Mint, US Silver Coin

North America, United States, Federal period. An 1822 Capped Bust half dollar, United States, Philadelphia Mint. Obverse with Liberty facing left wearing a cap inscribed LIBERTY, thirteen stars flanking, date below. Reverse with eagle displayed holding olive branch and arrows, shield at breast, E PLURIBUS UNUM on scroll above, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA around, denomination 50 C. below. Lettered edge reading FIFTY CENTS OR HALF A DOLLAR. Item # 200140

Lot: 323 - William Spratling Silver Scroll Earrings | Sucesores de Spratling

William Spratling (American/expatriate in Mexico, 1900-1967). Produced by Sucesores de William Spratling. A pair of silver earrings formed as curling scroll motifs reminiscent of stylized Maya glyph forms, circa 1979 or later. One earring bears the Spratling workshop hallmark, and both are marked "TS-24" on the versos, a Mexican silver mark indicating manufacture by Sucesores de William Spratling. Size (both the same): 0.8" W x 1.3" H (2 cm x 3.3 cm); silver quality: 93.5%; total weight: 9.8 grams Item # 201199

Lot: 324 - Sucesores de William Spratling Silver Bangles, Set of 3, Taxco

William Spratling (American/expatriate in Mexico, 1900–1967). Produced by Sucesores de William Spratling. A group of three sterling silver bangle bracelets, including two silver and ebony inlaid bangles and one twisted sterling silver bracelet. The ebony-inlaid pair display rounded profiles with diagonal bands of dark wood set into polished silver. Size of largest: 3.3" Diameter x 0.3" W

Lot: 325 - Portuguese Silver Muffineer by Mergulhao Joalheiro

Western Europe, Portugal, Lisbon, mark of Mergulhao Joalheiro. A slender silver muffineer of classical urn form, its ovoid body rising from a knopped stem and stepped oval foot finished with reeded banding. The domed, detachable cover is pierced with a radiating arrangement of circular holes and short slots, throwing a fine scatter of sugar or ground spice across a plate. A matching band of reeding girdles the rim where cover meets body, the only ornament on an otherwise plain, high-polish surface that lets the metal itself carry the design. The rim bears the mark of Mergulhao Joalheiro, the Lisbon silversmith and jewelry house. Casters of this shape descend from Georgian and Neoclassical prototypes, revived across Europe for the well-appointed table, where muffineers dusted cinnamon, nutmeg, or caster sugar over muffins and pastries. Mergulhao Joalheiro was a noted 20th-century Portuguese silversmith and jewelry house working in Lisbon, producing fine tableware, serving pieces, and decorative silver that circulate today through international salerooms and vintage design collections. Portuguese assay practice diverged from the British sterling standard: the national marks recognized 833 and 916 fineness, and Lisbon workshops habitually produced wares testing in the mid to high 800s rather than at 925. The recorded fineness here sits comfortably within that tradition, and reads as characteristically Portuguese rather than as a deficiency against an English benchmark. Item # 202736

Lot: 326 - Antique American Silver Muffineer Pair, Splayed Tripod, Pierced Covers

North America, United States, New Hampshire, Concord, William B. Durgin Co.; Connecticut, Meriden, Ellmore Silver Co. A pair of American silver muffineers, both raised on splayed tripod feet with shell-capped returns. The larger is a baluster caster of generous pear form, its shoulder wrapped in a band of gadrooned squares and scrolled cartouches, the domed cover pierced with a constellation of dots and stylized fleurs and crowned by a turned finial. Its smaller companion takes an urn body over a spreading foot, plain but for a reeded collar, the shorter dome perforated in simple rows beneath a bud finial. Both descend from the English Georgian caster, the table vessel that dispensed sugar over muffins and dusted spice across sweets. The larger bears a D within a shield for William B. Durgin Co. of Concord, New Hampshire; the smaller a lion with E on a shield for Ellmore Silver Co. of Meriden, Connecticut. William B. Durgin founded his Concord workshop in 1853, and by the last quarter of the century the firm ranked among New England's most productive silversmiths, absorbed by Gorham in 1905 while retaining its own D-in-shield mark and flatware patterns. Ellmore Silver Co. of Meriden belongs to a later chapter: organized in the 1930s in the Connecticut town that was then the acknowledged capital of American silver manufacture, it produced hollowware in colonial-revival taste until closing about 1960. The muffineer takes its name from the English habit of dusting sugar, cinnamon, or nutmeg over hot muffins, though the form is functionally identical to the sugar caster of the early eighteenth century. Both examples here quote that Georgian prototype: the pear-shaped body, the pierced dome, the tripod support. The reported fineness of each, above the .925 sterling standard, is worth verifying by assay, as it exceeds what either firm would ordinarily have used. Item # 202763

Lot: 327 - Pair of American Sterling Silver Muffineers, Meriden Whiting

North America, United States, Connecticut, Meriden, Meriden Britannia Company; Massachusetts, Attleboro, Frank M. Whiting &. A pair of American sterling silver muffineers, each a cylindrical body rising from a stepped, molded foot to a pierced domed cover. The taller example, by the Meriden Britannia Company, follows the English lighthouse caster tradition: a reeded collar, a low dome punched with a rosette of holes, a ball finial, and a slender double-scroll handle with a scrolled thumbpiece. Its assay reads 92.1% silver, and the body carries the engraved monogram "FJH". The more petite shaker, by Frank M. Whiting & Company, tapers gently to a high pierced cap crowned by an urn finial, tests at 92.6% silver, and bears the monogram "JPC". Both were table wares for dusting sugar, cinnamon, or nutmeg across muffins and puddings, the small ceremony of a Victorian breakfast rendered in metal. The Meriden Britannia Company, founded in Meriden, Connecticut in 1852, grew into the largest silverware manufacturer in the world before merging into the International Silver Company in 1898, a consolidation that gave Meriden its enduring nickname, the Silver City. Frank M. Whiting & Company of North Attleboro, Massachusetts, operated under that name from 1878 (successor to the earlier Holbrook, Whiting & Albee partnership) until it was absorbed by the Ellmore Silver Company in 1940, and is distinct from the better-known Whiting Manufacturing Company of New York. "Muffineer" is the older English term for a small caster used to dust sugar or spice over hot muffins and toast, a form derived from the 18th-century lighthouse caster. American firms revived the shape wholesale during the Colonial Revival of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when Georgian silhouettes and monogrammed presentation pieces returned to the fashionable table. Item # 202754

Lot: 328 - Abraham Gerritze Forbes Coin Silver Beaker, Marked A G F, ca. 1790s

Abraham Gerritze Forbes (American, 1763-1833). Coin Silver Beaker, ca. late 18th to early 19th century CE. Marked with initials on underside of base. A coin silver beaker attributed to Abraham Gerritze Forbes, its tapering cylindrical form rising from a slightly domed base to an unadorned rim. The surface shows hammering and finishing marks consistent with hand-wrought construction. The underside is struck with the maker's hallmark "A G F." Size: 3" Diameter x 3.5" H (7.6 cm x 8.9 cm); silver quality: 87.8%; weight: 98.4 grams Composed of approximately 87.8% silver, this vessel falls within the tradition of American coin silver, an alloy typically created by melting down circulating silver coins. In the colonial and early Federal periods, access to raw silver was limited, as British regulations restricted the flow of precious metals to the colonies. As a result, silversmiths relied heavily on coinage, as well as recycled domestic silver, transforming these materials into functional objects such as cups, spoons, and tankards. The establishment of the Boston mint in 1652 marked a turning point, symbolizing both economic independence and the growing availability of silver for local craftsmanship. Abraham Gerritze Forbes emerged from a lineage that would become central to New York silversmithing. Descended from William Forbes, who emigrated from Scotland in the early 18th century, Abraham was among the generation that helped establish the Forbes family as prolific producers of coin silver wares beginning around 1785. Trained through the traditional apprenticeship system, he was active in New York City from approximately 1785 to 1805, later working in partnership with his brother William Garret Forbes and other family members. His career extended beyond the workshop - he was made a freeman of New York City in 1789 and served as City Marshall from 1789 to 1802, reflecting both his professional standing and civic involvement This beaker exemplifies the practical luxury of early American silver, an object that would have been both utilitarian and symbolic, signaling refinement, stability, and participation in a growing national identity. Its restrained form and honest materiality place it firmly within the aesthetic of the Federal period, where clarity of line and proportion took precedence over elaborate ornament, allowing the quality of craftsmanship to speak with quiet authority. Item # 201965

Lot: 329 - 1890s French Silver Muffineer Sugar Caster - Baluster Form

Western Europe, France. A slender baluster caster, or muffineer, rising from a domed, gadrooned foot to a pierced bell cover crowned by a cast artichoke finial. The body is worked in repousse and chased relief: fluted panels alternate with foliate straps, acanthus rises from the lower belly, and a swagged garland of full-blown roses loops around the shoulder in the Louis XVI revival taste that dominated Parisian silver at the close of the 19th century. The domed lid is drilled with a rosette of small apertures for dispensing powdered sugar over cakes and muffins, the duty from which the English name derives. Struck on both lid and rim with the weevil mark used on imported silver, the piece was assayed in France at a fineness comfortably above the .800 minimum the mark required. The weevil (charancon) struck within a rectangular punch was introduced by the French administration in 1893 and remained in use until 1984. It was applied not to domestic French production but to silver of foreign manufacture presented for import, certifying only that the metal met a minimum standard of .800 fineness. Its presence therefore places the object in France after 1893 while leaving its country of origin open: German, Austrian, and Dutch workshops all supplied the Parisian trade with wares in the neo-Louis XVI manner, and the alloy recorded here, at 87.3 percent, sits close to the 830 to 875 standards common in Central European silver rather than the French 950 first standard. The muffineer itself is a survival of the 18th-century caster set, in which sugar, pepper, and dry mustard each had a pierced-top vessel. By the Belle Epoque it had contracted to a single tall shaker for powdered sugar, a fixture of the tea table and one of the last pieces of domestic silver to keep an unabashedly rococo silhouette. Item # 202743

Lot: 330 - French Chambly Arlequin Sterling Silver Flatware 69 pcs

Western Europe, France, ca. late 20th to 21st century CE. This collection features 69 pieces of sterling silver-plated flatware and cutlery from the renowned French Chambly Arlequin Silver Tableware, a perfect addition for collectors and those seeking quality craftsmanship. The plating is 33 microns, a relatively thick and durable coating designed to ensure a long-lasting finish that resists wear and tarnish over time. This level of plating is considered high-quality, especially compared to thinner coatings, and is commonly found in premium cutlery. There are 12 place settings, each consisting of 5 pieces (2 table forks, 1 tablespoon, 1 dessert spoon, and 1 butter knife), plus 9 serving utensils. The total number of each piece is as follows: 24 table forks, 12 dessert spoons, 12 tablespoons, 12 butter knives, 1 carving knife, 4 large serving spoons, 1 carving fork, 1 pastry or fish fork, 1 salad serving fork, and 1 pie knife. The total number of each piece is as follows: 24 table forks, 12 dessert spoons, 12 tablespoons, 12 butter knives, 1 carving knife, 4 large serving spoons, 1 carving fork, 1 pastry or fish fork, 1 salad serving fork, and 1 pie knife. Size of table forks : 8" L x 1" W (20.3 cm x 2.5 cm); tablespoons: 6" L x 1.2" W (15.2 cm x 3 cm); dessert spoons: 7.5" L x 1.5" W (19 cm x 3.8 cm); butter knives: 9" L x 0.75" W (22.9 cm x 1.9 cm); carving knife: 11" L x 1" W (27.9 cm x 2.5 cm); large serving spoons: 9.5" L x 2" W (24.1 cm x 5.1 cm); total weight: 13.2 pounds (5.99 kilograms) Item # 191594

Lot: 331 - Antique lag Glass Panel Lamp, Filigree Overlay, Early 20th Century

North America, United States. A panel lamp whose octagonal shade cages caramel, green, and lavender slag glass behind a lacy cast filigree of copper alloy, its surface carrying a soft verdigris tone. The sixteen panels rise from a stepped, angular skirt to a peaked crown capped by a turned finial, the openwork filled with grapevine tendrils, geometric trellis bays, and small birds perched within circular medallions. Marbled swirls run through the glass so that light reads as color and silhouette at once. Twin sockets sit beneath the shade, throwing illumination evenly across all eight faces. The bronzed cast iron standard swells and tapers in baluster form above a broad domed foot with a lightly textured surface. Made for the American parlor and library during the vogue for overlay-shade electric lamps in the early twentieth century. Slag glass, an opalescent glass streaked by the deliberate incomplete mixing of differently colored batches, entered American lighting on the coattails of Tiffany and Handel leaded shades. Where leaded lamps required hundreds of individually foiled pieces, overlay lamps of this type set a handful of large panels behind a single cast metal filigree, delivering comparable richness at a fraction of the labor. Firms such as Bradley and Hubbard, Miller, and a crowded field of Chicago and Meriden competitors turned out thousands of these lamps between roughly 1905 and 1930. Bird and vine motifs were among the most popular overlay patterns, translating the naturalism of Arts and Crafts design into an idiom that could be sand-cast and repeated indefinitely. Item # 161225

Lot: 332 - Mexican Painted Wood Jaguar Mask - Tlacololeros Dance, Guerrero

Mexico, Guerrero, Nahua. A carved wooden jaguar face bares its snarling maw beneath a coat of feline markings. The pelt is rendered in scaled crescents and stippled dots of yellow, over which a wash of black has been laid to darken the muzzle, brow, and crown, lending the beast a shadowed ferocity. Ringed eyes stare outward, upright ears flare with rose-red interiors, and pale carved fangs curve down from the upper jaw. A supple leather tongue lolls from the open, red-rimmed mouth, painted to lively effect. Worn in the danza de los Tlacololeros, a Guerrero dance-drama in which highland corn farmers pursue and subdue a marauding jaguar, the mask animates the tigre at the story's heart, transforming its wearer into the quarry of the hunt. Attributed to Olinala, Guerrero, a town long celebrated for its lacquered and painted woodwork. The mask belongs to the danza de los Tlacololeros, among the oldest folk dances of Guerrero, with roots that predate the Spanish conquest. Performed at Easter, the Day of the Holy Cross (May 3), patron-saint feasts, and Christmas Eve, the dance dramatizes the efforts of tlacololeros, farmers of the state's rugged mountain slopes, to protect their crops and livestock from a predatory jaguar. Eight to fourteen dancers perform to flute and drum, aided by the perra maravilla, the "wonder dog" that helps track and capture the beast. The farmers then discipline the jaguar with braided whips (chirriones), stopping short of killing it. Related jaguar-masking traditions extend along the Costa Chica and into Chiapas and Guatemala, spanning Nahua, Amuzgo, Mixtec, Tlapanec, and Maya communities, including the noted Tigres de Zitlala. Item # 203690

Lot: 333 - Mexican Danza del Tigre Jaguar Mask, Guerrero, w/ Stand

Mexico, Guerrero. Latin America, Mexico, Guerrero, ca. mid-20th century CE. A carved and polychrome wood and plaster mask fashioned as the face of a jaguar, its muzzle and cheeks scattered with black markings. Bristles sprout from the snout as whiskers, mirrored eyes catch the light, and jagged boar's teeth line the gaping mouth. Made for the Danza del Tigre, a Guerrero performance descended from ancient Mesoamerican rites in which the jaguar, revered symbol of power and the wild, is hunted and subdued. Worn over the face and mounted here on a custom stand. Item # 203653

Lot: 334 - 3 Vintage Mexican Cojo Masks, Danza Correr del Pocho

Latin America, Mexico, Veracruz, ca. mid-20th century CE. A rare grouping of three similar wooden festival masks known as Cojo, used in the Danza Correr del Pocho. Unlike most masks of this type found on the market, these masks are vintage and actually danced in festivals - not made for the tourist markets. The masks are simple with elongated faces, pronounced sloping noses, and eye slits. All are painted with a pigment that creates a smooth, metallic sheen. La Danza Correr del Pocho is a traditional Mayan ritual performed during Carnival and the saints holiday of Tenosique, centered on the defeat of the pre-Christian god Pocho, later characterized as evil by missionaries. The dance includes three main characters, cojoes, pochoveras, and tigres, who perform to flute and drum music, with the cojoes wearing wooden masks and leaf-adorned costumes to avoid recognition by Pocho, and in the narrative they ultimately defeat him by extinguishing his fire. Size of largest: 8.5" L x 6" W (21.6 cm x 15.2 cm) Item # 201707

Lot: 335 - 1980s Guinea-Bissau Carnival Mask, Papier-Mâché Grotesque

West Africa, Guinea-Bissau, circa 1980s A.D. A large papier-mâché carnival mask, created for pre-Lenten parades, painted in pastel hues and depicting a grotesque creature with a skeletal nose, fang-like teeth, and bulging eyes. Such masks were typically shaped over clay molds, each design unique to its maker; examples were often discarded after the celebration, making surviving pieces of this scale and condition uncommon. Size: 13" W x 19" H (33 cm x 48.3 cm) Item # 193689

Lot: 336 - Large Mexican Folk Art Ceramic Scene of Noah's Ark with individual Animals

Latin America, Mexico. A hand-modeled polychrome ceramic Noah's Ark with a wooden hull painted in tan above and blue below, the lower band decorated with red fish, seaweed, and rocks. A bearded figure of Noah in white robes and a green sash sits at the bow with doves at his shoulders. A turquoise and red cabin stands at the stern, topped by a toucan, a dove, and other birds. A tall flowering cactus with red blossoms rises at one end, a white dove perched at its summit. Numerous small animals accompany the group, including a giraffe, elephant, fox, cow, sheep, goat, horse, deer, and serpent. Attributed to the Medrano family of Ocumicho, Michoacán, Mexico. The animals, Noah, and the cabin are separate elements. Item # 204313

Lot: 337 - Antonio Fuentes Melchor | Oaxacan Alebrije, Painted Deer with Antlers

Mexico, Oaxaca. A wood carving (alebrije) of a deer, painted in green with pink, white, and blue detailing, with elaborate branching antlers and large spoon-form ears. Signed in paint on the underside by Antonio Fuentes Melchor of San Martin Tilcajete, Ocotlan, Oaxaca, Mexico. Item # 203668

Lot: 338 - Josefina Aguilar Oaxacan Folk Art Figural Group - Seated Couple with Baby

Margarita Josefina Aguilar Alcantara (Mexican, 1945-2026) Couple with baby. Painted pottery sculpture, n.d. Signed on verso. A young family in red Oaxacan clay: a mustachioed man in a violet shirt and rose trousers holds a naked infant out at arm's length before him, while his companion leans in from the right, her right arm propped behind his head and shoulders, her left hand resting on her lap. She wears a white blouse embroidered at the neckline with scattered flowers, a full green skirt, and long yellow earrings; both sit barefoot on a plain cream-glazed bench. Modeled by hand from local clay, burnished, and painted in flat acrylic color, the group belongs to the figural tradition Josefina Aguilar built at Ocotlan de Morelos, where whole villages of brides, vendors, and saints were reduced to squat, wide-eyed clay bodies. Signed on the reverse. About the artist: Josefina Aguilar (1945-2026) spent her life turning red clay into a record of village existence. Working from Ocotlan de Morelos in Oaxaca, she shaped small figures that stood in for whole communities: brides and mourners, butchers and street vendors, saints and skeletons sharing space on the same shelf. She learned the trade as a child, watching her mother work clay that had, until then, been credited to her father's hands. Her figures resist prettiness on purpose. A gallery owner who knew her for four decades put it plainly: the work endured because it was unvarnished, not because it flattered. Aguilar's Adam and Eve, her Last Supper, her grinning Day of the Dead musicians all carried the same unsentimental humor about mortality that she voiced herself: her people joked about death because the alternative was bitterness. Nelson Rockefeller's visit to her family's roadside stand in 1978 changed the scale of her recognition, though not her method. The proceeds let the family buy the very land their clay came from, ending years of paying by the week for it. Diabetes took her eyesight in 2014; she kept sculpting anyway, working entirely by touch while her children handled the paint. "It's not the eyes," she said, "it's the hands and the brain that matter." She died in Oaxaca City on February 13, 2026, at 80, survived by eight children (several of them artists in their own right, including her son Demetrio), thirty-six grandchildren, and three sisters who built their own reputations in clay alongside her. Item # 204308

Lot: 339 - Mexican Folk Art Sculpture of Tourist Couple on Bench, Signed Josefina Aguilar

Latin America, Mexico, Oaxaca, Ocotlan de Morelos. Polychrome ceramic sculpture by Josefina Aguilar, depicting a pair of tourists seated on a green bench with speckled decoration. The woman wears a pink dress and holds a black bag in her lap. The man wears white eyeglasses, a blue plaid shirt, and a black camera lettered KODAK. Both figures are hand modeled in fired clay and painted in acrylic. Josefina Aguilar (1945-2026) of Ocotlán de Morelos, Oaxaca, is among Mexico's most celebrated folk artists, continuing the red-clay figural tradition of her mother, Isaura Alcántara Díaz, and her muñecas are held in museum collections internationally. Item # 204307

Lot: 340 - Mexican Carved Wood Alebrije Gray Fox by Efrain Fuentes

Mexico, Oaxaca. A delightful carved wood alebrije of a gray-black animal, possibly a fox or skunk, by Efrain Fuentes of San Martin Tilcajete, Oaxaca. The elongated body is painted in gray with fine repeating feather-like patterning, with a sweeping upturned tail striped in black and white, and details in red, pink, and green at the ears, muzzle, and claws. Signed on the underside "Autor: Efrain Fuentes, Sn. Martin Tilcajete, Ocotlan, Oaxaca, Mexico." Fuentes is a member of the well-known Fuentes family of carvers active in San Martin Tilcajete. Item # 203682

Lot: 341 - Roman A. Clef 1978 Abstract Lucite Green Sculpture

Henry Guerriero, also known as Roman A. Clef (American, b. 1929) Untitled, 1978. A luminous abstract Lucite sculpture rendered in a pale, sea-glass green hue that captures and transforms light as it passes through. The polished, semi-translucent surface magnifies and distorts reflections, creating shifting optical effects within the smooth, organic form. A lateral tunnel pierces the sculpture, intersected by two deep, conical depressions that nearly meet at right angles - a composition that invites both visual and spatial contemplation. The piece rests on a solid Lucite cube base, its underside inscribed: "1978 H. Guerriero M. Leopold / 159 (UCC2) 4/9 / 159/78." This signature marks the collaboration between Henry Guerriero (who legally changed his name to Roman A. Clef in 1978) and Michael Leopold, his long-time critic and collaborator. Size: 7" W x 15.6" H (17.8 cm x 39.6 cm) Item # 199019

Lot: 342 - Patrick Amiot Mixed Media American Flag Sculpture, 33 Stars

Patrick Amiot (Canadian, b. 1959). Tattered American Flag with Thirty-three Stars. Mixed media sculpture, n.d. Unsigned. A weathered American flag rendered in relief in this mixed media wall sculpture by Patrick Amiot. Constructed from layered materials and textured surfaces, the flag appears worn and frayed. The composition retains the traditional structure of the American flag with its thirteen stripes, with the canton containing thirty-three stars rather than the modern fifty. This star count corresponds to an earlier period in U.S. history, during the era of westward expansion. Size of sculpture: 10.1" W x 6.5" H (25.7 cm x 16.5 cm); of frame: 19.5" W x 15.5" H (49.5 cm x 39.4 cm) Item # 201353

Lot: 343 - 18th C. Mexican Colonial Oil Portrait, St. Francis of Paola

Mexico, Spanish Colonial tradition. An oil-on-canvas devotional portrait of St. Francis of Paola, the Calabrian hermit who founded the Order of Minims. The saint appears aged and gaunt, bearded, and cowled in the black hooded habit of his order. He grasps a hermit's staff and cradles a crucifix with its curling INRI titulus, with a penitential prayer cord looped over one finger. In the upper corner is the word CHARITAS within a flaming sun, the Minim emblem attributed to the saint. A skull rests below as memento mori. The picture descends from Iberian prototypes by Murillo and Ribera that circulated as prints and were copied in colonial workshops. St. Francis of Paola (1416 to 1507) founded the Order of Minims, whose name derives from the Latin for "the least," announcing a program of radical humility. He lived to ninety-one and is conventionally shown old and worn, having declined every dignity the Church offered him. The CHARITAS sunburst is his defining attribute and belongs to no other saint; it functions as a visual signature wherever his image travels. He is most easily confused with Francis of Assisi, but Assisi wears brown, bears the stigmata, and carries no sunburst emblem. Here the black habit and the flaming CHARITAS settle the identification decisively. Widely venerated across New Spain and the Andes, his image traveled the Spanish-speaking world through engravings that local painters adapted freely, the flat, linear handling of the face here pointing to a Mexican provincial hand. Please note that pigments on this painting contain levels of lead, mercury, and arsenic. Item # 203651

Lot: 344 - Peter Max Mixed Media Lithograph, "Zoople," Hand-Painted, Signed

Peter Max (American, b. Germany 1937). "Lady & Zoople" mixed media painting over a color lithograph on Arches paper, hand-colored in 1993. Hand-signed below lithograph. A miniature profile head floats against a wash of cerulean, her brow crowned in yellow and shadowed by a small orange sun, a serpentine line trailing down the left margin like a stray thought. The work begins as a color lithograph on Arches paper, then departs from the edition entirely: Max has painted over the sheet in watercolor, acrylic, and colored pencil, extending the imagery past the printed plate onto the bare paper with tick marks, feathered strokes, and a looping signature-like flourish below the figure. Hand-signed beneath the lithograph. The subject belongs to the artist's long-running cast of cosmic profiles, dreamers rendered in Fauvist color, here paired with the whimsical creature-name "Zoople". Presented in a black wood frame with gilt fillet and double mat. About the artist: Born in Berlin in 1937, Peter Max spent a peripatetic childhood in Shanghai, Israel, and Europe before his family settled in the United States. He trained in New York at the Art Students League, the Pratt Institute, and the School of Visual Arts. By the late 1960s he was the defining graphic voice of the American counterculture, his "Cosmic '60s" idiom of prismatic color and floating profiles reaching a mass audience through posters, album art, and a 1969 Life magazine cover. His mature work turned looser and more painterly, moving from hard-edged Pop toward a Neo-Expressionist handling of pigment while keeping the Fauvist palette intact. Works of this kind occupy a particular niche in the Max market: a printed matrix that the artist then reworks by hand, so that no two impressions resolve the same way. The overpainting here runs beyond the plate edge onto the raw Arches sheet, a deliberate erasure of the boundary between print and painting. Item # 202108

Lot: 345 - Emka 'Baicoli' Colussi Venetian Biscuit Advertising Poster, 1949

Artist: Emka (Italian, 20th C). Printer: Bonetti, Milan, Italy. "Baicoli, I Famosi Biscotti Veneziani A. Colussi Venezia" lithographic poster, 1949. Artist signature in the plate at lower left. Printer and date identified below lower border of image. An original advertising poster for Baicoli, the Colussi brand's Venetian biscuits, featuring artwork by Emka, a mid-20th century Italian graphic artist. The composition depicts a woman in traditional Venetian dress with a voluminous scarlet bodice, offered a Baicoli biscuit by a man also dressed in red, set against dark blue architectural elements suggesting Venice and a cream background. Late Art Deco style with Venetian motifs. Size: 39.5" L x 27.5" W (100.3 cm x 69.8 cm) Item # 200895

Lot: 346 - August Haerning Painting - Sunlit Street

August Haerning (Danish, 1874-1961). Sunlit Street. Oil on canvas, late 19th to early 20th c. Signed lower left. A beautiful painting of a sunlit street by August Haerning rendered in the manner of the French Impressionists, replete with wonderful light effects and vibrant hues. Note how the natural light dapples across the facades on this charming residential street and also illuminates the leafy tree canopies which cast marvelous shadows to further embellish the walls of the homes. A stunning painting by Haerning rendered in his signature Impressionist style and mounted in an attractive custom frame that complements it perfectly. Size (sight view): 16.5" L x 24.5" W (41.9 cm x 62.2 cm) Size (frame): 24.125" L x 32.5" W (61.3 cm x 82.6 cm) About the artist: August Haerning (also Harning) was born in Denmark in 1874 and studied at the Royal Academy in 1899. During the late nineteenth century, he worked in Sweden as well as most of Scandinavia, and during the 1920s, he traveled and painted in Germany. Haerning's honors included the Royal Academy medallion which he earned in 1903 as well as the Raben-Leveetzau prize in 1900 and 1902. Haerning first showed at the Royal Charlottenborg exhibition in 1898 and continued to exhibit there through 1920. Item # 189220

Lot: 347 - George Thompson Pritchard Painting - Cityscape

George Thompson Pritchard (New Zealand-American, 1878-1962). Autumn Cityscape. Oil on canvas, n.d. Signed at lower right. A luminous stillness settles over this riverbank cityscape, where delicate autumn trees and pale church spires dissolve into mist. Painted in soft tonal washes and warm earthen hues, the scene radiates a quiet lyricism that recalls the atmosphere-driven works of the

Lot: 348 - Mid 20th C. Abstract Expressionist Oil Painting

Anonymous (probably American, active XX century). Untitled (Abstract Expressionist Composition). Oil on board, n.d. Unsigned. A storm of line and shadow surges across the surface, where arcs, scaffolding strokes, and fractured planes collide in a dark, theatrical space. This mid-20th century abstract expressionist composition is built from sweeping curves and forceful linear accents that appear to both construct and dismantle a central form. The eye catches fragments - circular masses, rib-like arcs, laddered verticals - yet no single image resolves fully. Instead, the painting pulses with tension between structure and improvisation. The palette is predominantly black and umber, punctuated by flashes of ochre, muted green, and abrupt slashes of red that flicker like embers within the composition. Size of painting: 15.75" W x 23.75" H (40 cm x 60.3 cm); of frame: 21.5" W x 31" H (54.6 cm x 78.7 cm) These restrained but strategic color interventions energize the otherwise shadowed field, recalling the dramatic tonal contrasts associated with Franz Kline, while the layered, calligraphic complexity evokes the gestural density of Gene Charlton. At the same time, the emotive, almost symbolic interplay of curved forms and angular grids anticipates qualities later seen in Carlos Alfonzo, where abstraction feels charged with psychological or spiritual undertones. The paint handling varies from scraped, incised passages to thicker, impasto-like deposits, suggesting a process-driven approach. Lines appear etched into wet pigment, as if the artist drew directly into the surface to carve out rhythm and structure. The composition feels architectonic yet unstable, a framework in flux. Vertical striations along the right side resemble window bars or a scaffold, while the central mass curves inward like a coiled instrument or mechanical torso, hovering between figuration and abstraction. Executed on board, the work possesses a certain physical immediacy. The rigid support amplifies the sharpness of the incised lines and reinforces the painting's graphic authority. Though unsigned, the piece confidently inhabits the vocabulary of mid-century American abstraction - bold, gestural, and uncompromising in its embrace of ambiguity. Item # 200752

Lot: 349 - Pair of Hiroshige Woodlblock Prints from "Thirty-Six Views of Mt. Fuji" (1891 Memorial Edition)

Utagawa Hiroshige (Japanese, 1797-1858). "In the Mountains of Izu Province" and "Ichikokubashi Bridge in Edo" two woodblock prints from "Fugaku sanjurokkei" (1891 Memorial Edition). A pair of color woodblock prints from Hiroshige's late masterwork "Fugaku sanjurokkei" (Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji), issued in the 1891 memorial edition. "In the Mountains of Izu Province" sets a milky cascade tumbling between forested ridges of grey and jade, the snow-capped cone rising pale beyond. Its companion, "Ichikokubashi Bridge in Edo", carries travelers in blue and ochre across a timber span while a rose-flushed horizon frames a distant Fuji, weeping willows spilling over the right margin. Both retain the vertical cartouche at upper right, the artist's red seal, and the delicate bokashi gradations that made the series a summation of Hiroshige's landscape idiom. Printed in oban tate-e format on thin washi, matted and framed under glass. Utagawa Hiroshige designed "Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji" in 1852, publishing it through Tsutaya Kichizo in the year of his death, 1858. Conceived in vertical oban format, it answered Katsushika Hokusai's celebrated horizontal series of the same name and became Hiroshige's valedictory statement on the mountain that had shadowed his entire career. Where Hokusai treated Fuji as a geometric protagonist, Hiroshige folded it into weather, distance, and human traffic: a pale silhouette glimpsed past willows, ferrymen, and gorges. The blocks were reissued in 1891 as a memorial edition. Meiji reissues of this kind were pulled from recut or surviving blocks with aniline-tinged pigments then newly available, and they are collected on their own terms as documents of the late-nineteenth-century revival of interest in ukiyo-e, a revival driven in no small part by Western japonisme. Item # 204531

Lot: 350 - Two 17th C. Engravings by Joachim von Sandrart - Centaur & Satyr

Designed by Joachim von Sandrart (German, 1606-1688). Engraved by Richard Collin (Luxemburg, 1626-1698). "Centaurus" and "Satyrus" engraved plates on laid paper from "Sculpturae Vetris Admiranda..." Nuremberg and Frankfurt, 1680. A pair of copperplate engravings on laid paper, lettered "CENTAVRVS" and "SATYRVS" at the upper left of each plate, presented as book leaves with integral Latin

Lot: 351 - Edith Kramer Painting "Exposed Exterior" (1960)

Edith Kramer (Austrian born American, 1916-2014). "Exposed Exterior" oil on linen, 1960. Signed and dated in black pigment at lower right. "Exposed Exterior" is a powerful painting by Edith Kramer, an accomplished Austrian-born artist as well as an important pioneer of the art therapy profession. The composition captures the effects of Robert Moses's massive demolition of entire neighborhoods in

Lot: 352 - Edith Kramer Painting - NYC Derelict House (1968)

Edith Kramer (Austrian born American, 1916-2014). "Derelict House" oil on linen, 1968. Signed and dated at lower right and again with title and artist's address on verso. A fractured building looms out of a dim, smoke-softened night, its walls broken into planes of shadow and muted color. In "Derelict House," Edith Kramer turns her attention to the quiet aftermath of demolition, capturing a

Lot: 353 - Edith Kramer Painting - "Rocks & Sea at Night" (1951)

Edith Kramer (Austrian born American, 1916-2014). "Rocks and Sea" oil on linen, 1968. Signed at lower right, and again with artist's address on verso. Faint remains of title, location, and date on verso. Painted on Cranberry Island, this seascape carries the raw temperament of a coast that refuses to sit still. Kramer presses the Atlantic into motion with strokes that churn and drag across the

Lot: 354 - Edith Kramer Woodcut - Vermont Woods (1972)

Edith Kramer (Austrian born American, 1916-2014). Vermont Woods. Woodcut print on paper, 1972. Hand-signed and dated at lower right. A dense stand of Vermont woods rises in rhythmic silence, where trunks press close and branches interlace like a private language spoken by trees. In this woodblock print, Edith Kramer pares the landscape down to its essential architecture - verticals, diagonals, and

Lot: 355 - Hank Underhill 'Two Native American Children Playing,' 1973

Hank (Harry) J. Underhill (American, b. 1949). Two Native American Children Playing in the Sand. Oil on canvas, 1973. Signed and dated at lower right. Two Native American children are depicted crouched together in the sand, their attention fixed on a game. The children's patterned garments contrast against the earth-toned ground. Size of painting: 23.5" W x 19.75" H (59.7 cm x 50.2 cm); of frame: 29" W x 25" H (73.7 cm x 63.5 cm) Item # 201952

Lot: 356 - Edith Kramer Painting "Jersey Landscape w/ Moon" (1988)

Edith Kramer (Austrian born American, 1916-2014). "Jersey Landscape with Moon" oil on linen, 1988. Signed and dated at lower right. A quiet band of marsh grasses stretches across the foreground, dense and untamed, before giving way to water, infrastructure, and a softened skyline beyond. In "Jersey Landscape with Moon," Edith Kramer fixes her gaze from the New Jersey side of the Hudson River

Lot: 357 - Evocative Abstract Painting by Joro Petkov

Joro Petkov (Bulgarian, b. 1960). Abstract Painting, Acrylic on Paper, n.d. Signed lower right. An evocative abstract painting by Joro Petkov, a Bulgarian artist who is known for both abstract compositions and landscapes. This piece is rendered with loose brushwork, strategic layering, extensive blending, expressive drips, splatters, and gestural passages as well as vibrant shades of russet red,

Lot: 358 - Alena Vavilina Mixed Media "Butterflies Series #8"

Alena Vavilina (b. Russia, b. 1986). Butterflies Series: #8. Mixed media: gold leaf. Silver leaf, and watercolor on paper, n.d. Signed "AV" at lower right. A dazzling composition by award winning contemporary artist Alena Vavilina from Vavilina's Butterflies Series. Nature is Vavilina's greatest muse, and this piece features five butterflies delineated in gold and silver leaf as well as black

Lot: 359 - Alena Vavilina Mixed Media Sculpture "Jazz #2" (2019)

Alena Vavilina (b. Russia, b. 1986). "Jazz #2" copper wire on wood, 2019. Signed and dated on underside of base. An elegant sculpture by award-winning contemporary artist Alena Vavilina, "Jazz #2" presents Vavilina's interpretation of this popular genre of music that is rooted in African-American musical traditions. The abstract figural composition is comprised of patinated copper - both openwork

Lot: 360 - Alena Vavilina Copper Wire Sculpture - Ballerina

Alena Vavilina (b. Russia, b. 1986). Ballerina with a Butterfly. Copper wire sculpture on silver-plated concrete base, n.d. Signed "AV" on side of base. An elegant sculpture by award-winning contemporary artist Alena Vavilina featuring a ballerina reaching up to grasp a butterfly, created from copper wire and copper sheets atop a silver-plated cement base. The composition shows the dancer with

Lot: 361 - Alena Vavilina Sculpture - "Jazz"

Alena Vavilina (b. Russia, b. 1986). "Jazz" - Mixed media: iron wire and burnt wood, n.d. An energetic sculpture from the "Jazz Series" of award-winning contemporary artist Alena Vavilina, presenting Vavilina's interpretation of this popular genre of music that is rooted in African-American musical traditions. The abstract figural composition is comprised of openwork, iron wire depicting a pair of

Lot: 362 - 19th C. Neoclassical Brass Statue of Nude Woman

Europe, Neoclassical Revival. A slender female nude caught mid-step, cast in brass and poised on the ball of one bare foot atop a domed circular plinth. Her left arm sweeps overhead, fingers closed around a small rectangular object, while the right hangs loose and open at her side, the torsion of shoulders against hips lending the figure its dancing momentum. The head turns sharply upward, the coiffure rendered as tight incised waves gathered close to the skull in a manner drawn from Archaic Greek and Etruscan prototypes. Modeling is deliberately spare: long tapering limbs, softly indicated breasts and navel, a face reduced to almond eyes and an archaic half-smile. The mottled green and umber surface is a patinated finish typical of Neoclassical Revival bronzework, made for the drawing room rather than the altar. The nineteenth-century revival of antiquity was rarely a literal copy. Foundries and sculptors across Italy, France, and Germany, feeding a Grand Tour market hungry for the classical past, produced figures that blended sources freely: the elongated proportions and archaizing coiffure here recall Etruscan votive bronzes of the sixth and fifth centuries BCE, while the dancing contrapposto and unabashed nudity belong to a later Hellenistic vocabulary. Such deliberate hybrids allowed a collector to own the idea of the ancient world without pretending to own an excavation. The raised hand holding a small rectangular object may be intended as a tablet, a mirror, or a set of castanets, all attributes given to dancing figures in classical art, though the attribute is too abbreviated here for confident identification. Item # 204536

Lot: 363 - 'Bronco Buster' Brass Sculpture After Frederic Remington, 23/100

After Frederic Remington (American, 1861 to 1909). "Broncho Buster" brass, late 20th century. Edition 23 of 100. Signed and numbered on integral base. A cowboy fights to master a rearing bronco, his body pitched forward against the animal's violent surge, one arm flung skyward with a coiled quirt as the horse throws its head and paws the air. Cast in patinated brass after Frederic Remington's celebrated model, this piece captures the taut kinetic drama that made the original an emblem of the American West: the strain of muscle, the flap of chaps and saddlebags, the split-second balance of a rider on the edge of being thrown. Textured groundwork animates the naturalistic base, and the figure rests on a shaped gray marble plinth bearing an engraved plaque reading "Bronco Buster by Frederic Remington." The cast base carries a molded "Frederic Remington" signature and the number 23/100. ** This is an after-cast in brass, not a lifetime or estate bronze.** Frederic Remington modeled "The Broncho Buster" in 1895, copyrighting it that October. It was his first venture into sculpture and, by tradition, the first bronze cast of an American cowboy. He drew the subject, a rider subduing a plunging horse, from his earlier illustration "Pitching Broncho," which ran in Harper's Weekly on April 30, 1892. The rugged immediacy of his paintings translated directly into the round, and the statuette was quickly embraced as a defining image of the frontier cowboy. The lifetime edition was initially sand-cast at the Henry-Bonnard Bronze Company, then produced by the lost-wax method at Roman Bronze Works after 1900. Following Remington's death in 1909, his widow Eva Remington (1859-1918) authorized further casts from the foundry molds; lacking the artist's exacting oversight of casting and coloring, these estate bronzes are generally considered less refined than the lifetime examples. The present work is neither: it is a much later commercial reproduction, cast in brass rather than bronze, bearing a molded facsimile signature and a decorative edition number that carry no connection to Remington's authorized casting. Item # 194210

Lot: 364 - Cowboy on Horseback Brass Sculpture After Frederic Remington, 17/100

After Frederic Remington (American, 1861-1909). "Cowboy" brass, late 20th century. Edition 17 of 100. Signed and numbered on integral base. A mounted cowboy checks his horse at the brink of a rocky ledge, the animal's forelegs braced and mane thrown forward as it recoils from the drop. Cast in brass with a rich dark patina, the composition captures the taut instant of controlled danger that defined Frederic Remington's vision of the American West: the rider leaning back in the saddle, hat brim shadowing his face, one hand gripping the reins. The modeling relishes texture, the horse's flying tail, the folds of the rider's coat, the strain in the beast's haunches, all rendered with vigorous naturalism. Issued in a limited edition (17 of 100), signed and numbered on the integral base, this later reproduction descends from Remington's celebrated monument and rests upon a fitted stepped plinth. Frederic Remington drew his enduring subject from the rough riders of the American frontier, fascinated above all by the partnership of the cowboy and his horse. After years living in the West and building a reputation as an illustrator, he returned to New York in 1886 and turned to oils and to modeling in clay. In March 1905 the president of the Fairmount Park Art Association (now the Association for Public Art) proposed a cowboy statue for the Philadelphia park. Remington, who had worked only at small scale until then, was drawn to the challenge. He rode through Fairmount Park and chose a rock ledge jutting over East River Drive (now Kelly Drive), the site selected only after he had a horseman pose in that exact spot. He modeled the figure on Charlie Trego, a Chester County, Pennsylvania native and a friend from his cowboy days in Montana. Installed in 1908, "Cowboy" ranks among the earliest American examples of site-specific sculpture, and it proved to be Remington's only large-scale bronze; he died the year after its unveiling. Item # 194212

Lot: 365 - William Norton "The Rich Rule the Poor" Mixed Media Painting

William Wallace "Bill" Norton, Jr. (American, 1925-2010). "The Rich Rule the Poor" mixed media painting on paper, n.d. Signed at lower right. A crowd of flattened, cubist-adjacent faces jostles across this mixed media composition on paper, each profile built from wedges of gold, silver, cream, and deep ultramarine, several wearing top hats. Six hand-lettered speech balloons carry scriptural condemnations of avarice, attributed in the artist's own hand to Moses, Ecclesiastes, Isaiah, Solomon, and King David, so that the painted mouths seem to argue theology at one another. The metallic pigments are no accident: silver and gold saturate the picture in direct answer to the money the texts indict. Signed at lower right. The frame itself is painted a matching gold by the artist, extending the composition past its own edge and making the surround part of the argument rather than a container for it. Transcription of the lettered balloons, clockwise from upper left: "'YOU SHALL NOT DEAL DECEITFULLY OR FALSELY.' MOSES"; "'A LOVER OF MONEY NEVER HAS HIS FILL.' ECCLESIASTES"; "'FOR THEIR SINFUL GREED I WAS ANGRY.' ISAIAH"; "'THE RICH RULE THE POOR, AND THE BORROWER IS SLAVE TO THE LENDER.' SOLOMON"; "'I KNOW THAT THE LORD WILL CHAMPION THE CAUSE OF THE POOR, THE RIGHT OF THE NEEDY.' KING DAVID". The Solomon line, from Proverbs 22:7, supplies the work's title. William Wallace "Bill" Norton, Jr. (1925-2010) was an American screenwriter whose script credits include "The Scalphunters" (1968), "White Lightning," "Gator," "Big Bad Mama," and John Wayne's "Brannigan." Raised in Depression-era California and decorated as an infantry officer in Patton's Third Army, he joined the Communist Party in his youth and testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1958. In 1986, living in Ireland and enraged by the violence in the North, he attempted to run a cache of weapons to the Irish National Liberation Army; the scheme ended in arrest in France and a prison term, followed by asylum in Nicaragua and a disillusioning year in Cuba. He settled finally in Santa Barbara, California, and drew on the episode for a screenplay, "Exiled in America." A lifelong quarrel with wealth and power runs straight through that biography and into this sheet. Item # 203974

Lot: 366 - William Norton "The People are Starving" Mixed Media Outsider Painting

William Wallace "Bill" Norton, Jr. (American, 1925-2010). "The People are Starving" mixed media painting on paper and glass, n.d. A blue-ground allegory of hunger and hypocrisy, painted in mixed media on paper with additional passages worked directly onto the covering glass, notably Christ's crown of thorns and the streams of blood at his hands and side. Around a yellow crucifix writhe pale limbs, birds, a green-skinned dancing figure, a trumpet and a hand raised in benediction, all outlined in soot-dark contour. Inscribed cartouches carry the argument: "THOMAS JEFFERSON SAID ALL PEOPLE AND DUCKS ARE CREATED EQUAL"; "THE PEOPLE ARE STARVING. THEY HAVE NO BREAD"; "W.C. FIELDS SAID NEVER GIVE A SUCKER AN EVEN BREAK"; "GENTLEMEN IF WE DON'T HANG TOGETHER WE WILL HANG SEPARATELY. BEN FRANKLIN 1776"; and, in the largest panel, "SHE SAID HEY LET THEM EAT CAKE. I'M THE GODDAMN QUEEN AND I NEED SOME NEW DIAMONDS AND I GOT A PROBLEM WITH MY HAIR. WHY SHOULD I GIVE A SHIT ABOUT A LOT OF DIRTY STARVING HOMELESS ASSHOLES I DON'T EVEN KNOW?" William Wallace "Bill" Norton, Jr. (1925-2010) came to painting from the screen. A Utah-born, California-raised screenwriter, he wrote "The Scalphunters" (1968), "White Lightning", "Gator", "Big Bad Mama" and John Wayne's "Brannigan", building a reputation for hard-edged action narrative. His politics ran ahead of his scripts: a Depression childhood, service as an infantry officer in Patton's Third Army, membership in the Communist Party, and testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1958. The later chapters read like a treatment he never sold. Living in Ireland and enraged by the violence in the North, Norton attempted in 1986 to run a cache of American weapons to the Irish National Liberation Army, was arrested in France with his wife Eleanor, and served a prison sentence. Asylum in Nicaragua followed, then a year in Cuba and a growing disillusion with Communism, before a return to Santa Barbara and a final screenplay, "Exiled in America". The painting's sarcasm about queens, diamonds and the starving belongs squarely to that biography. Norton's stacked, hand-lettered cartouches set Jefferson, Franklin, W.C. Fields and Marie Antoinette in a single argument about who eats and who does not, with the crucifixion above them as the presiding image of a scapegoat. Painting a portion of the composition onto the glazing itself, so that Christ's thorns and blood float a few millimeters in front of the paper, produces a literal separation of the sacred layer from the human one. Item # 203975

Lot: 367 - Patrick Swazo Hinds 'Ladies in Waiting' Lithograph, 1972

Patrick Swazo Hinds a.k.a. Jose Patricio Swazo (Tesuque Pueblo, 1924-1974). "Ladies in Waiting" lithograph, 1972. Edition 62 of 70. Hand-signed, dated, and numbered at lower left. Printed as part of "Pueblo Dancers" by master printer Harry Westlund at the Tamarind Institute, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Published by Art Consultants, LTD, Phoenix, Arizona. A stone lithograph in tones of grey and black in which three Pueblo women stand in solemn procession, their faces serene and eyes downcast, hair falling in long dark cascades over shoulders draped in richly feathered garments. Each wears a stepped, terraced tablita crowned with prayer feathers and inscribed with cloud, rain, and terrace motifs drawn from Pueblo cosmology, the headdresses rising like miniature adobe altars above the figures. Titled "Ladies in Waiting," the composition fuses ceremonial figuration with the artist's characteristically modern, abstracted line. Hand-signed, dated, and numbered 62/70 at lower left, it was pulled by master printer Harry Westlund at the Tamarind Institute in Albuquerque as part of the "Pueblo Dancers" suite. The lot comprises three sheets: the lithograph together with the printed title page and end page for "Pueblo Dancers." Artist's bio: "Patrick Swazo Hinds was a renowned artist and painter whose work combined Native motifs with a modern style that became an expression of his heritage and culture. As a child, he was adopted and moved to California where he pursued his education in art. He attended Hill and Canyon School of Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico; California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland; Mexico City College; and the Art Institute of Chicago. He also served in the U.S. Marines during the Korean War, and later worked as a teacher before becoming a full-time artist. Over his lifetime, Swazo Hinds's works have been shown in numerous exhibitions, including at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and are in the permanent collections of the Institute of American Indian Arts and the National Museum of the American Indian. As an important person in the California art scene, Swazo Hinds departed from the traditional style and painted highly abstracted pieces that emphasized his connection to his Pueblo culture, which he visited every summer after his adoption. He stated, 'I have worked hard to learn to paint and now I have chosen to paint the Indian . . . and his religion and his culture as I understand it. I can paint an Indian as ugly as I want, because there is pain, there is sorrow, there is suffering. I can paint him beautiful, because that is there, too.'" (Autry Museum of the American West website) Item # 203530

Lot: 368 - Patrick Swazo Hinds 'Eagle Dancers' Lithograph, 1972

Patrick Swazo Hinds (Tesuque Pueblo, 1924-1974). "Eagle Dancers" stone lithograph on paper, 1972. Edition number 62 of 70. Hand-signed at lower left; dated and numbered at lower center. Patrick Swazo Hinds (Tesuque Pueblo, 1924-1974). "Eagle Dancers" stone lithograph on paper, 1972. Edition 62 of 70. Hand-signed at lower left; dated and numbered at lower center. Printed as part of "Pueblo Dancers" by master printer Harry Westlund at the Tamarind Institute, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Published by Art Consultants, Ltd., Phoenix, Arizona. A pair of Eagle Dancers is depicted against a field of sky blue and desert ochre, their outstretched arms fitted with feathered wings. The composition sets the twinned dancers against a white disc, edged in a zigzag band and spinning rings. The figures wear kilts, sashes, and moccasins in golden yellow, their faces turned in mirrored profile. The Eagle Dance honors the bird as messenger between earth and sky, its wingbeats invoking rain and blessing. Size: 29.75" W x 22.25" H (75.6 cm W x 56.5 cm H) Artist's bio: "Patrick Swazo Hinds was a renowned artist and painter whose work combined Native motifs with a modern style that became an expression of his heritage and culture. As a child, he was adopted and moved to California where he pursued his education in art. He attended Hill and Canyon School of Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico; California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland; Mexico City College; and the Art Institute of Chicago. He also served in the U.S. Marines during the Korean War, and later worked as a teacher before becoming a full-time artist. Over his lifetime, Swazo Hinds's works have been shown in numerous exhibitions, including at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and are in the permanent collections of the Institute of American Indian Arts and the National Museum of the American Indian. As an important person in the California art scene, Swazo Hinds departed from the traditional style and painted highly abstracted pieces that emphasized his connection to his Pueblo culture, which he visited every summer after his adoption. He stated, 'I have worked hard to learn to paint and now I have chosen to paint the Indian . . . and his religion and his culture as I understand it. I can paint an Indian as ugly as I want, because there is pain, there is sorrow, there is suffering. I can paint him beautiful, because that is there, too.'" (Autry Museum of the American West website) Item # 203529

Lot: 369 - Patrick Swazo Hinds Lithograph "Kachina Dancer" (1972)

Patrick Swazo Hinds (Tesuque Pueblo, 1924-1974). "Kachina Dancer" stone lithograph on paper, 1972. Edition 62 of 70. Hand-signed at lower left; numbered and dated at lower center. Printed as part of "Pueblo Dancers" by master printer Harry Westlund at the Tamarind Institute, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Published by Art Consultants, LTD, Phoenix, Arizona. A stone lithograph on paper by Patrick Swazo Hinds, drawn from the 1972 portfolio "Pueblo Dancers." The composition renders a kachina dancer in the artist's distinctive idiom, where Pueblo ceremonial subject matter is distilled into modern, boldly simplified form. Hand-signed at lower left, and numbered 62 of 70 and dated at lower center, the sheet was pulled by master printer Harry Westlund at the celebrated Tamarind Institute in Albuquerque and published by Art Consultants, Ltd., Phoenix. The present lot comprises three sheets: the lithograph itself, its printed title page ("Pueblo Dancers, Lithographs by Patrick Swazo Hinds, 1972, Tamarind Institute"), and an end sheet, together housed in the original portfolio boards. The kachina, an embodiment of ancestral and spirit forces in Pueblo cosmology, becomes here a study in rhythm, mass, and cultural memory. Artist's bio: "Patrick Swazo Hinds was a renowned artist and painter whose work combined Native motifs with a modern style that became an expression of his heritage and culture. As a child, he was adopted and moved to California where he pursued his education in art. He attended Hill and Canyon School of Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico; California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland; Mexico City College; and the Art Institute of Chicago. He also served in the U.S. Marines during the Korean War, and later worked as a teacher before becoming a full-time artist. Over his lifetime, Swazo Hinds's works have been shown in numerous exhibitions, including at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and are in the permanent collections of the Institute of American Indian Arts and the National Museum of the American Indian. As an important person in the California art scene, Swazo Hinds departed from the traditional style and painted highly abstracted pieces that emphasized his connection to his Pueblo culture, which he visited every summer after his adoption. He stated, 'I have worked hard to learn to paint and now I have chosen to paint the Indian . . . and his religion and his culture as I understand it. I can paint an Indian as ugly as I want, because there is pain, there is sorrow, there is suffering. I can paint him beautiful, because that is there, too.'" (Autry Museum of the American West website) Item # 203320

Lot: 370 - Patrick Swazo Hinds "Buffalo Dancer" Lithograph (1972)

Patrick Swazo Hinds (Tesuque Pueblo, 1924-1974). "The Buffalo Dancer" stone lithograph on paper, 1972. Edition 62 of 70. Hand-signed at lower left; numbered and dated at lower center. Printed as part of "Pueblo Dancers" by master printer Harry Westlund at the Tamarind Institute, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Published by Art Consultants, LTD, Phoenix, Arizona. A stone lithograph in which the Buffalo Dancer rises across the sheet, his headdress and horns rendered in bold planes of earth and shadow, the figure abstracted yet unmistakably rooted in Pueblo ceremony. Patrick Swazo Hinds distills the winter dance into a modern idiom, flattening form into rhythmic silhouette while preserving the gravity of the ritual it honors. Hand-signed at lower left and inscribed with edition and date at lower center, this is number 62 of an edition of 70. Pulled by master printer Harry Westlund at the Tamarind Institute in Albuquerque, the print belongs to the "Pueblo Dancers" suite. The lot comprises three sheets: the lithograph itself, accompanied by its title page and end page, documenting the portfolio in which it was issued. Artist's bio: "Patrick Swazo Hinds was a renowned artist and painter whose work combined Native motifs with a modern style that became an expression of his heritage and culture. As a child, he was adopted and moved to California where he pursued his education in art. He attended Hill and Canyon School of Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico; California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland; Mexico City College; and the Art Institute of Chicago. He also served in the U.S. Marines during the Korean War, and later worked as a teacher before becoming a full-time artist. Over his lifetime, Swazo Hinds's works have been shown in numerous exhibitions, including at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and are in the permanent collections of the Institute of American Indian Arts and the National Museum of the American Indian. As an important person in the California art scene, Swazo Hinds departed from the traditional style and painted highly abstracted pieces that emphasized his connection to his Pueblo culture, which he visited every summer after his adoption. He stated, 'I have worked hard to learn to paint and now I have chosen to paint the Indian . . . and his religion and his culture as I understand it. I can paint an Indian as ugly as I want, because there is pain, there is sorrow, there is suffering. I can paint him beautiful, because that is there, too.'" (Autry Museum of the American West website) Item # 203531

Lot: 371 - Patrick Swazo Hinds 'Chant to the Deer Spirit' Lithograph" (1972)

Patrick Swazo Hinds (Tesuque Pueblo, 1924-1974). "Chant to the Deer Spirit" stone lithograph on paper, 1972. Edition 62 of 70. Hand-signed at lower left; numbered and dated at lower center. Printed as part of "Pueblo Dancers" by master printer Harry Westlund at the Tamarind Institute, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Published by Art Consultants, LTD, Phoenix, Arizona. Printed as part of "Pueblo Dancers" by master printer Harry Westlund at the Tamarind Institute, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Published by Art Consultants, Ltd., Phoenix, Arizona. A masked Deer Dancer strides across the sheet, crowned with branching antlers and a sunburst headdress rendered in the grisaille of stone lithography. The figure leans into two staffs tipped with evergreen sprigs, with a fringed kilt and a rattle-hung sash, while a second, half-glimpsed dancer crouches behind. Printed on deckle-edged wove paper. The subject depicts the winter animal dances through which Pueblo communities honor the deer spirit and petition for abundance. The lot comprises three sheets: the lithograph itself, accompanied by its title page and end page, documenting the portfolio in which it was issued. Size: 22.25" W x 30" H (56.5 cm W x 76.2 cm H) Artist's bio: "Patrick Swazo Hinds was a renowned artist and painter whose work combined Native motifs with a modern style that became an expression of his heritage and culture. As a child, he was adopted and moved to California where he pursued his education in art. He attended Hill and Canyon School of Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico; California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland; Mexico City College; and the Art Institute of Chicago. He also served in the U.S. Marines during the Korean War, and later worked as a teacher before becoming a full-time artist. Over his lifetime, Swazo Hinds's works have been shown in numerous exhibitions, including at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and are in the permanent collections of the Institute of American Indian Arts and the National Museum of the American Indian. As an important person in the California art scene, Swazo Hinds departed from the traditional style and painted highly abstracted pieces that emphasized his connection to his Pueblo culture, which he visited every summer after his adoption. He stated, 'I have worked hard to learn to paint and now I have chosen to paint the Indian . . . and his religion and his culture as I understand it. I can paint an Indian as ugly as I want, because there is pain, there is sorrow, there is suffering. I can paint him beautiful, because that is there, too.'" (Autry Museum of the American West website) Item # 203528

Lot: 372 - Louise Jeanne Cottard Fossey Oil Painting - "Mantua"

Louise Jeanne Cottard Fossey (French, 1902-1983). "Mantua" oil on canvas, n.d. Signed at lower right and lower left. Titled on verso. A view of the Italian city of Mantua by the French painter Louise Jeanne Cottard Fossey (1902 to 1983), worked in oil on canvas and signed at lower right and lower left, with the title inscribed on the verso. The composition drops the viewer above a tumble of tiled roofs, chimney stacks, and a single scarlet-roofed house, then releases the eye across a broad pewter sheet of lake water to a bank of blue hills and a scumbled, weather-heavy sky. Cypresses and a burst of acid-green foliage punctuate the middle ground. The handling is frank and unfussy: pigment laid on in flat, confident planes, contours left unpolished, color carrying the structure rather than line. Presented in a carved and gessoed Louis XV style frame. About the artist: Louise Jeanne Cottard Fossey (1902 to 1983) was born in Le Havre, where she began her training at the local Ecole des Beaux Arts before continuing at the Ecole des Arts Decoratifs in Paris. Among her instructors was Othon Friesz, the Havrais painter whose circle included a lifelong friendship with Raoul Dufy and close ties to the Fauves; that lineage is legible here in the frank color and the refusal to overwork a form. Her paintings are held in the permanent collections of the Musee d'Art Moderne in Paris and its sister institution in Le Havre. Mantua itself was a favored subject for northern European painters traveling south. The Gonzaga capital sits on a peninsula ringed by the Lago Superiore, Lago di Mezzo, and Lago Inferiore, artificial lakes engineered from the Mincio in the twelfth century, which give the town the aspect of an island and supply the wide, flat sheet of water that dominates the upper half of this canvas. Item # 203037

Lot: 373 - Frank Armah "Franokah" Painting, "Mother of All Fishes," 2006

Frank Armah "Franokah" (Ghanaian, b. 1973). "Mother of All Fishes," paint on wood board, 2006. Signed and dated lower left, titled upper left. A mermaid extends her hand toward a golden fish, with two additional fish swimming alongside, set against a dark coral reef background. Size: 24" W x 36" H (61 cm x 91.4 cm) About the artist: "Frank Armah is my name born in Ghana, Greater Accra Region of Ghana. I became a professional Artist when i finished school at the age of 21. about 25 years ago and before 25 years i undergone Art training proccess [sic] as an apprentice under the tutorship of my father in the year 1990 when i finished elementary school. I lost my father in the year 1996. Being the son of one of the progenitors as far as the Art is concerned in Teshie i undergone Art training for almost 10 years from 1986-1996 when my father died. I fully started from where he left off, i patched up the pieces turned and transform his Artistic prowess into something extraordinary." (source: artist's website) Item # 194054

Lot: 374 - Limited Edition Print by Agent X - "Elanna" (2017)

Agent X (American, Contemporary). "Elanna (White)" digital print on fine art paper, 2017. Edition 11 of 20. Artist's signature and edition number handwritten on lower margin. Agent X's "Elanna" presents a mesmerizing composition featuring back to back silhouettes of the profile bust of a woman. The work presents an enchanting layered effect. Note how the figures' outlines appear to be cut from the white background, thus revealing a Baroque-informed floral pattern behind, replete with wondrous color and imagery, Elanna's profile images housing blossoms of so many glorious floral species - tulips, gardenias, chrysanthemums, lilies, irises, and more - as well as endearing butterflies. Size: 40" W x 30" H (101.6 cm x 76.2 cm) Size: 30" L x 40" W (76.2 cm x 101.6 cm) About the Artist: Agent X was raised in Connecticut and studied in New Haven and Atlanta before moving to Canada and training at the Art Institute of Vancouver. While his work draws from formal training, his mash-up multimedia style is primarily self-developed. Agent X often combines the ephemera of the past with the glossy world of contemporary magazines and newspapers, adding paint and other mixed media to create images that cleverly critique humanity's current obsessions and where they are leading us. While presenting a contemporary, urban veneer in his work through influences of music and fashion, sub-layers of his work dive into loaded socio-political subject matter. Agent X was a semi-finalist in the 2011 New York Art Marathon, and multiple international honors quickly ensued, including winning Top Entry in the competitive Curious Art-Pie Show at Curious Duke Gallery, London and being named among '12 Artists to invest in now' by New Blood Art Gallery, London. Currently based in Vancouver, Agent X has exhibited in art meccas around the world including London, Singapore, Los Angeles, Germany, Amsterdam, New York, San Francisco, Spain and Toronto. Item # 197168

Lot: 375 - Alena Vavilina Mixed Media - "Depth of the Ocean" 2023

Alena Vavilina (b. Russia, b. 1986). "Depth of the Ocean" mixed media: ink, watercolor, and paper, 2023. Signed "AV" at lower right. A beautiful, abstract composition by award winning contemporary artist Alena Vavilina titled "Depth of the Ocean." Having always been fascinated by the elements of nature and the ocean, Vavilina depicts the sea in scribbled lines of black ink beneath mottled

Lot: 376 - Amiot & Laurent 'Pop Rivet Mask I' Mixed Media Sculpture

Patrick Amiot (Canadian, b. 1959) and Brigitte Laurent (Canadian, active XX-XI century). "Pop Rivet Mask I" latex resin with mixed media, n.d. Label with artists' names and title on verso.A face constructed from latex resin and an assortment of found elements, composed of overlapping panels that resemble riveted sheet metal, their irregular geometry evoking the improvised repairs of machinery or vehicle bodies. Size: 17" W x 21.3" H (43.2 cm x 54.1 cm) Item # 201354