Currently not on view
Shell in the shape of a young bird,
250–500 CE
More Context
Didactics
The natural shape of the Spondylus shell, also known as the "spiny oyster," features a bulge encasing the distinctive ball-and-socket hinge, and must have struck the artist as remarkably similar to the form of a small bird. In this work, the shell form is only slightly modified, to clarify the bird's beak and suggest folds in the bird's neck as it turns its head. Incisions were subsequently added to represent a wing-in a stylized fashion typical of Early Classic Maya art-as well as a single foot at the bottom edge of the shell. Inlays of greenstone frame the bird's head, while an inlayed piece of obsidian serves as the eye. The resulting work is remarkably naturalistic, with the plumage suggested by the natural striations of orange and white that are characteristic of Spondylus. Likely worn as a pendant, the bird would seem to nestle into the chest of the wearer, further enhancing its liveliness.
Information
250–500 CE
North America, Guatemala, possibly Petén, Maya area
- Lee A. Parons, John B. Carlson, Peter David Joralemon, and Justin Kerr, The Face of Ancient America: The Wally and Brenda Zollman Collection of Precolumbian Art (Indianapolis: Indianapolis Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1988), cat. no. 86 (illus.); p. 126
- "Acquisitions of the Art Museum 1998," Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 58, no. 1/2 (1999): p. 86-123., p. 101 (illus.), p. 107
- Princeton University Art Museum: Handbook of the Collection (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2007), p. 313 (illus.)
