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Male effigy cache figure
Muisca
A.D. 1100–1550
Place of Origin: Cundinamarca and Boyacá Departments, Colombia
Medium/Technique
Gold and copper alloy
Dimensions
6.9 x 2.8 cm (2 11/16 x 1 1/8 in.)
Credit Line
Museum purchase with funds donated by Landon T. Clay
Accession Number1975.71
NOT ON VIEW
CollectionsAmericas
ClassificationsRitual objects
DescriptionStanding male effigy tunjo holds a sinuous object, perhaps a serpent, across his chest. Multiple strands of what may indicate hair emerge from under his skull cap on his proper right side and extend down to his shoulder (missing from the left side but remains of which indicate these strands originally were present on the left side). He wears a necklace composed of three strands, each with a bell-like pendant.
ProvenanceBy 1908, collected in Colombia by Joaquin Arciniégas (b. 1865 - d. 1930), San José, Costa Rica and San Salvador, El Salvador; August 6, 1929, sold in San Salvador by Arciniégas to his brother-in-law, José Daniel Villatoro Rugama (b. 1887 - d. 1958), San Salvador; January 10, 1930, sold by Rugama to Oliverio Girondo (b. 1891 - d. 1967), Paris and Argentina. January 2, 1975, sold by Leon Buki (dealer), Buenos Aires, through Marcelo Buki, to Alphonse Jax (dealer), New York; 1975, sold by Alphonse Jax to the MFA. (Accession Date: March 12, 1975)
NOTE: The Arciniégas collection (MFA accession nos. 1975.35 - 1975.273) was offered to the Museum in 1975, accompanied by documentation of its ownership by Joaquin Arcienégas as early as 1908; photographs of it in the Arciniégas collection; and receipts for the collection’s sale in 1929 and 1930. Arciniégas had the collection in Costa Rica by 1908 and El Salvador by 1916; he asked his brother-in-law to sell the collection, and it was shipped to Paris for sale in December 1930/January 1931.
NOTE: The Arciniégas collection (MFA accession nos. 1975.35 - 1975.273) was offered to the Museum in 1975, accompanied by documentation of its ownership by Joaquin Arcienégas as early as 1908; photographs of it in the Arciniégas collection; and receipts for the collection’s sale in 1929 and 1930. Arciniégas had the collection in Costa Rica by 1908 and El Salvador by 1916; he asked his brother-in-law to sell the collection, and it was shipped to Paris for sale in December 1930/January 1931.