Photographer: Andrea Blumtritt | Rights management: Ethnologisches Museum, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin
Attribution - NonCommercial - ShareAlike 4.0 International
Three-legged bowl with an oval mouth, strongly overhanging rim and flattened lip. The object has a head protome on the upper edge, similar to a cat of prey. On the opposite side, a marginal tail protome appears. There are small, round openings on the conical legs. The ceramic was smoothed, slurried, primed and polished on both sides. The outside is painted in polychrome. The primer and paint are partially eroded. The outside of the object has a white-yellowish base colour, which was painted red, orange and black-brown. There is a band on the lip with a cat-of-prey-like fur pattern. The decoration is repeated on the legs of the vessel. The wall and the base are decorated with circumferential bands. The inside of the object is painted red. According to Lothrop 1926: highland polychrome ware. Cultural significance: the type was produced exclusively in the south of the Gran Nicoya region and traded to the Central Highlands and the Atlantic region of Costa Rica. The pottery is known both from burials and from settlement contexts. It was often associated with the Altiplano Policromo group (1350-800d.C.). (Künne 2004)
