Pre-Columbian, Caribbean, perhaps Dominican Republic, Taino (Arawak) peoples, ca. 1000 to 1500 CE. A dramatic stone head likely depicting the face of a zemi or ancestral spirit. Intricately hand-carved with dense linear motifs across the cheeks and forehead, the vizard presents huge, sunken eyes, a slender nose with broad nostrils, and a giant, gaping mouth. Additional incised linear patterns adorn the top of the head as a headband or diadem, while a pair of thin ears with annular earspools flank the haunting visage. Taino art centered on cult objects associated with the veneration of "zemis"-revered deities, ancestors, or landscape spirits. The term also refers to the idols and fetishes that were believed to be inhabited by powerful spirits. Large, cadaverous stone heads are thought to represent the deity Maquetaurie Guayaba, lord of the Land of the Dead. "Zemis" were kept in the home or in sanctuaries where they were honored with food and gifts. Size: 8.3" L x 2.8" W x 11.8" H (21.1 cm x 7.1 cm x 30 cm)

In the ancient Caribbean, the heads of ancestors were objects of devotion, kept in special baskets in the round temples known as bohios. The head, rather than other bones was kept because the Taino peoples of the Caribbean believed that spiritual power in the body resided in the head, particularly the face, through which people could communicate their emotions and spirit. However, although durable, these carefully kept skulls disintegrated over centuries of veneration, so later Tainos (ca. 1000-1500 CE) made stone representations of skeletal heads, like this one, that seem to have fulfilled the same purpose as the keeping of skulls. These are often known as "Macorix heads," as many of them have been found near San Pedro de Macoris, in the Dominican Republic. However, they are also part of a broader group of objects known as zemis or cemis, which refer to ancestral spirits and the earthly containers for those spirits. Because this head was the container for the presence of a known ancient and powerful ancestor, it was not necessary for the sculpture to be portraitlike. Most are quite generalized, but show status in part through a headband or diadem that wraps across the high foreheads of these figures, ending at their ears.

Provenance: private Florida, USA collection; ex-Mr. Pierre Fayet collection, France; ex-Mr. Philippe Bringuier collection, France

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#184582

A few chips and weathering with nicks and abrasions as shown, all commensurate with age, but, otherwise, intact and excellent with nice remaining detail and encrustations in some recessed areas.