**Originally Listed At $450**

Pre-Columbian, Dominican Republic, Taino or Ciboney peoples, ca. 1200 to 1500 CE. A smooth, round, dark gray-green mottled stone ball with russet and black inclusions. Stone balls like this one are found in burials of the Ciboney and Taino people. Its beauty and perfect form demonstrate the mastery that these people had over pecking stone, shaping it through abrasion, and polishing it to a highly-reflective sheen. This example must have been some kind of votive or funerary offering, perhaps because of the intensive and meticulous crafting. Lucite ring display stand included. Size: 2.875" Diameter (7.3 cm).

Fascinatingly, these stone balls may tell us something about the people they memorialize. For example, in excavations at Cueva de los Ninos, archaeologists found a group of child burials where the size and age of child seems to correlate to the size of the ball in the grave (aka, the older the child, the bigger the ball). This example is small for being from a grave and may have commemorated a different kind of event.

Provenance: private Hawaii, USA collection; ex-Bob Dowling collection, San Francisco, California, USA

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#131966

Age-commensurate surface wear and abrasions, with some rough encrustations along bottom half, and light discoloration, otherwise intact and very good.