Can anyone help me identify Pre Columbian antiques I have?

I have many items from El Diquis region in Costa Rica that I inherited from my family. All pottery ranging from bowls to whistles. I need help identifying the age and type. If anyone can give me any clue I'd be grateful. U2U me your email and I can send you all my pics!

I'd email a university archaeologist, one probably in Costa Rica.

reply to post by chromatico

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Right.

And if you suspect they are very valuable or of extraordinary interest, you might consider consulting with a Christie's or Sotheby's expert.
(Preliminary consultations are possible via email, provided you have very good photos of the objects.)

I have contacted Christies and Sothebys and they both brushed me off a couple of years back without even seeing the pictures. I've contacted the Museum of Natural History here in LA and they gave me dates and wanted to put them on consignment a few year back but I need to sell them so I need a value on them basically.

I was just hoping someone here knew someone who would look at my pics and give me some info on them.

reply to post by favouriteslave

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Really?
Well, in that case I don't blame you if you don't want to do business with them again...

Keep bumping this thread. Maybe there is somebody who could help you.

And, of course, I would still pursue other, more reliable professional avenues, if I were you.
I am sure there are many experts worldwide - but especially in Costa Rica - who would be THRILLED to have a look at your collection.

I think it would be a good idea to research which museums (worldwide) have the most reputable collections of such items, and then contact their curators.
I can't see them refusing to have a look!







[edit on 4-3-2008 by Vanitas]

The problem is that not much exists from the Diquis -- some gold artifacts, but I don't clearly remember the pottery.

The Museo de Oro ( portal.ins-cr.com/Social/MuseoJade/ ) or Museo de Jade ( portal.ins-cr.com... ) in San Juan, Costa Rica, would be the place to start. Both had some Diqui material, as did the National Museum (which is very tiny. www.museocostarica.go.cr... )

You might be able to send a query to the editor of the museum's magazine:
www.museocostarica.go.cr...

Post some pictures, eh? And see if you can find notes on who collected these items and where they got them from. Provenance is important.

Ah Byrd I was hoping you would see this. I saw the Museo de Oro today and I tried to send a message to the Archaeology dept at the Museo Del Costa Rica but it kept failing to submit so I gave up. My Uncle was an amature archaeologist in his free time and had a large collection of these items from all over Costa Rica. He gave these to my Mom in 1976 when we were there visiting and then we brought them back in her suitcase in 1976. She gave them to me when she moved back to Costa Rica because she knew customs would take them on the way back in (2001).

Museum of Natural history gave me the year 500AD give or take a couple hundred years.

Here are some pics













[edit on 4-3-2008 by favouriteslave]

[edit on 4-3-2008 by favouriteslave]

Oh, if that is so, and provided the artifacts are genuine, the original poster can look forward to a very substantial selling price...

Good luck!

In my opinion, I think you've been had. Those artifacts look much to young to be Pre Columbian. The whistle looks a bit older, but most artifacts are represented by way of pottery shards. It looks more like someone passed on some junk to you.

It is my hope that they are worth alot! I am keeping two items that I didn't post pics of because they are in pretty bad shape. Another pot and whistle. I was hoping to collect enough for a good down payment on braces for me...........an investment my parent should have made when I was young and didn't.

hmmm I have no reason to believe they are junk as most of the rest of my uncle collection went to a museum when he died. Also doesn't it matter what type of substance the pottery is made of?

My mother informed me the site in El Diquis is being closed by 2009 as they are building a dam for hydroelectricity of which most will be funneled into the US. How about that? Archaeolgists are working to get as much as they can now.

reply to post by favouriteslave

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I'm just saying don't hold your breath.

Based on what I've seen, and the fact it's supposed to be from a underepresented society, I think you should proceed with the idea they are fakes or from a later culture.

The good reputation of your uncle's collection should be of considerable help in dealing with institutions.

Personally, I am a little suspicious of the little jar (third photo) - because of the shape of the opening (it seems almost machine-made, from where I am sitting) - but bear in mind that, while my eye is "trained", I have practically zero knowledge about this particular field of expertise.
Anyway, one dud - or even a few - would not automatically discredit the entire collection.
(I am yet to see a collection of art work without some suspect material in it .)

As for the ongoing excavations... I think you should absolutely profit from the interest that new finds (there are bound to be some at least!) are likely generate in the near future.

And BTW: have you considered EBAY?
It's still the fastest way to make money - the honest way, I mean.

Yes, not knowing the exact value I ran two this last week as a test to see if I got watchers and at what price they were drawn in. One watcher has been in contact with me and knows exactly what the colorful painted one with the lid is. Some type of zoomorphic aligator vessel.

reply to post by Byrd

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Byrd,

It does my heart good to read another one of your posts!

Harte

Hey Harte! Yes, school life gave me a breather for a bit.

As to the artifacts, I'd tend to agree on the 500 year figure. They DO look like items that I saw when I was at the museums in Costa Rica, though the mix of styles and glazes makes me think they're from several different sites. #1 is the oddest (to my eye), having elements of the Pueblo style. That would not be an impossibility, as the Pueblo Indians around the Albuquerque area were trading into Mexico and Central America for parrot feathers and parrots around that time (their ceremonial headgear includes parrot feathers and there's some nice petroglyphs that we have pictures of which are of parrots.)

#4 and #5 look fairly similar in firing technique.

There's an interesting overview of the pre-Columbian history here:
www.mcguinnessonline.com...

See if you can contact this guy. They may be Aguas Buenas style.www.archaeocostarica.com...

The brown one with the incised lines *might* be the older Conception style:
www.archaeocostarica.com...

I have a modern clay flute that is similar in shape to the little flute you pictured -- got it from a very funny street vendor in San Juan.

Much to the disgust of a number of archaeologists. Sadly, the country needs money and the needs of the present outweigh the treasures of the past.

I have a problem with anyone stealing artifacts from a site and then trying to make a financial gain from the theft. Inheriting them does remove the tarnish of the crime.

I don't care if they are fakes or the real deal. Give them to a local museum that can show the public a lost part of their history.

Maybe I'm being a little idealistic and don't know this happens all the time. That doesn't make it right.

reply to post by hinky

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There is nothing wrong with being idealistic, Hinky.

And you're right, of course, insofar art collecting in the past depended heavily on plundered objects. (Which doesn't necessarily mean that was bad for the fate of the objects in question - and consequently for the culture they represented - but that's a different story.)

On the other hand, there were also many cases, world-wide, when perfectly legitimate diggers and even official representatives of local museums - not to mention the local population themselves - offered such objects for a price to anyone interested in them.

Anyway, if the collection in question is a legitimate one - which automatically implies that the objects had not been stolen, certainly not in the recent past (a few generations back) - personally I see no reason why its owner could not profit from it without feeling bad for it.

Byrd the first pic was identified by a collector interested in the piece as a zoomorphic aligator vessel. We are going to the Natural History Museum this Sunday and I'm taking pictures of them and also some paper to take notes on their collection they already have there. The two I plan on keeping will probably be submitted to a museum for repair and display.

Um I don't feel bad at all for trying to sell them. They certainly weren't doing anyone any good in bubble wrap in the back of my closet.