**Originally Listed At $500**

Pre-Columbian, North Coast Peru, Vicus, ca. 300 to 700 CE. A bichrome stirrup vessel featuring iconography that captures the imagination. Adorning its slightly compressed spherical body is a low relief design that depicts a profile headed creature with a very large eye, upturned nose, two legs, and a curved tail as well as a sinuous snake delineated in low relief with incised details on each face. The stirrup presents a tubular spout at one end and a blind spout adorned with what appears to be part of another visage at the other. Size: 6.25" in diameter x 6.375" H (15.9 cm x 16.2 cm)

In the Pre-Columbian world, serpents were oftentimes depicted in visual culture as they were regarded to be simultaneously a beneficial source of nourishment and at the same time quite deadly given their poisonous venom. Also important to the indigenous was the fact that snakes shed their skin annually, thus rejuvenating themselves and serving as symbols of renewal and good health.

Provenance: private Hawaii USA collection

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#124106

Loss to figural adornment to blind spout as shown. Expected surface wear and mineral deposits commensurate with age.