Lot 22
Pre-Columbian, Olmec-influenced, ca. 500 BCE to 800 CE. composed of sixteen hand-carved serpentine toad effigies, each rendered with softly rounded features and a lustrous green polish, interspersed with disk-shaped shell spacers. The pendants are graduated in size, forming a beautifully balanced ceremonial adornment. The toad, a sacred symbol throughout Mesoamerica, represented fertility, rain, and agricultural renewal—its seasonal reappearance signaling the life-giving rains. The Olmec, often regarded as the “mother culture” of Mesoamerica, produced some of the earliest and most refined lapidary works in greenstone and serpentine. This necklace embodies their aesthetic and spiritual ideals: harmonious symmetry, naturalistic modeling, and reverence for transformative life forces. Likely worn by an elite individual or shaman, such ornaments served both as prestige symbols and ritual instruments invoking fertility and abundance. The polished serpentine surface retains traces of mineral patination consistent with ancient burial conditions. Size of strand doubled: 10" L (25.4 cm); frog: 2.5" L x 1" W (6.4 cm x 2.5 cm)
Provenance: ex-private Massachusetts collection, acquired through descent.
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#198275
- Condition: Choice. Some nicks and abrasions, but otherwise intact. Natural pitting and ossification to bone beads. Strung in modern times on a modern monofilament wire.
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| $5,000 + | $500 |