Photographer: Andrea Blumtritt | Rights management: Ethnologisches Museum, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
Attribution - NonCommercial - ShareAlike 4.0 International
Small, round-bottomed bowl with retracting rim. The object has been smoothed, slurried and primed on both sides. Its exterior is polychrome painted and polished. The paint and primer are slightly eroded. The restored vessel has cracks and flaws. The pottery has an orange-brown base colour, which was painted red and black on the outside of the vessel. A red band runs along the rim, decorating both sides of the object. The outside of the vessel wall is decorated with a central, circumferential frieze. It shows a horizontal row consisting of "Kan crosses" and diamonds. They are separated from each other by vertical, black line bundles. The sequence of motifs is bordered by surrounding black lines. A circumferential red band appears on the deeper parts of the wall. Irregular traces of a reddish primer are visible on the inside of the pottery. Symbolic meaning: Lothrop (1926) interprets "Kan crosses" as stylised snake eyes. In classic Maya iconography, the same motifs are often associated with sky bands. According to Lothrop 1926: Nicoya polychrome ware. Cultural significance: the ceramics of the Mora group were produced in the north-west of Costa Rica and traded to the Central Highlands and the Atlantic region of the country. It uses representational elements (seated anthropomorphic figures with headdresses, mat motif, Kan cross), which are also known from the Maya ceramics (Copador group) of the Clásico Tardío (900-600d.C.). The variant has been documented both in burials and in settlement contexts. Lange (1971) links the Mora pottery with the Bramadero Policromo type (1520-1200d.C.), which occurs in the Policromo Tardío (1520-1350d.C.). (Künne 2004)
