Ulua Valley Marble Vessel | Jaguar Serpent Handles, Deity Mask

Pre-Columbian, Honduras, Ulua Valley, ca. 500–800 CE. A cylindrical vessel carved from pale marble, raised on an integral pedestal pierced with a band of openwork links. Two opposing handles take the form of fanged jaguars emerging from serpent maws, worked nearly in the round. The body carries a deity mask in low relief, its toothy mouth uncoiling into volutes, brow crowned by a headdress and flanked by scrolled smoke elements, the composition framed above and below by scale-like bands with stepped fret motifs. Vessels of this type held cacao beverages and other ritual drinks, prestige equipment for feasting and gift exchange among elites. Size: 7" Diam x 7.5" H (17.8 cm Diam x 19.1 cm H).

White marble vases of this class were produced at workshops near Travesia in the lower Ulua Valley of the Gulf of Honduras, and after roughly the seventh century they became among the most coveted luxury goods of the region. Their distribution maps an exchange network of considerable reach: examples travelled south into Guanacaste and west into the central Maya lowlands, carried as diplomatic gifts and elite trade goods. The formula is remarkably consistent, a straight-sided cylinder on a low ring foot, banded above and below, with paired zoomorphic handles and a scrolled central face, yet each carver handled the volutes differently, and the tight, interlocking scrollwork here belongs to the accomplished end of the tradition.

Provenance: NYC. collection. Acquired from Joshua Wallman, NYC., 2009. Ex. Dr. Paul Bennett, Jr., NYC., 1990, purportedly acquired from an old NYC. collection, 1970’s.

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Item #

73056

Condition
Overall excellent ancient surface patina. Upper portion of the cylinder is repaired from approximately six original pieces with restoration over the break lines. Restoration to the upper undecorated portion of the rim.

Buyer's Premium
30%