figurine

Fragment of statuette; traces of red pigment on headdress.

McPherson, John Dr

McPherson, John Dr

clay fired.clay pigment

H: 41 mm W: 45 mm

America Mexico Teotihuacan

Slate button mould (18th-19th cent). Clothing was fastened with buttons often made from horn or from cast metal, sometimes silver. A horn or wooden button often had a metal front with a design stamped on it. Some buttons were decorated with a design which might show the rank or the allegiance of the wearer. This is a slate button mould dating from the 18th or 19th century. It carries one round button matrix which has the design of a Greek cross carved into the stone, surrounded by a border of fine lines. The metal button or button front would have been hammered into the matrix.in order to stamp on the design. There is a second incised design resembling a spade from playing cards. This is much shallower, but would have been used to stamp a design on to metal. This button mould is Scottish but it is not known where it comes from. Clay figurines appear in the graves and household debris of the earliest farmers in Mexico and continued to be made and used by successive civilisations until the Spanish Conquest. Those made by the village farming communities of the Mexican Neolithic most often represent women, with exaggeration of the breasts and buttocks perhaps reflecting a concern with human fertility and increase. Images of the later period, especially those from the great classical city of Teotihuacan, illustrate a variety of gods and human types, reflecting the richness and diversity of an elaborate priest-temple cult.