Pre-Columbian, Colombia, Valle del Cauca, Calima, Yotoco period, ca. 1st to 7th century CE. A stunning gold headdress ornament featuring a central repousse human head flanked by abstract coiling motifs and surmounted by a huge pair of curved horns. Two birds are perched at either side of the horns, while the anthropomorphic face boasts crescent-shaped eyes, an annular nose, and a rectangular mouth held open to expose sharp teeth. All is carefully etched and punched with decorative concentric circles, dotted striations, and geometric designs. Size: 8" W x 6.6" H (20.3 cm x 16.8 cm); gold quality: 82.96% (equivalent to over 19 karats); weight: 32.4 grams

Elaborate ornaments like the present example expressed the wealth and status of the wearer. Worn attached to a turban, basketry headdress, or other form of textile construction, it would have offered a spectacular sight when in motion with its shining surface and several piercings for suspending ornaments. Yotoco headdress frontals come from the Calima River Valley in southwest Colombia and are complex constructions of many individual pieces of cut sheet gold assembled with gold wire.

The gold in this piece was first hammered into a sheet and subsequently cut into the desired shape. The artist then added details by further shaping the sheet with a bone or metal tool over a soft anvil made of leather or a sack of fine sand.

A similar gold headdress ornament hammered $18,750 (equivalent to $26,121.09 today with inflation) at Sotheby's New York on May 13th, 2011 ("African Oceanic And Pre-Columbian Art," lot 111).

Provenance: private Kihei, Hawaii, USA collection, purchased from Arte Primitivo, New York, New York, USA, 1999.