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Bird Pendant (Buzzard or Vulture?)
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
Before about AD 500, when gold-working technologies were adopted in Costa Rica, jade was the quintessential luxury material and it was masterfully carved into exquisite ornaments of many kinds. Ancient Americans did not use many metal tools, and artists carved jade, a tough stone, with implements of stone, bone, bamboo, or reed.
Cleveland Museum of Art’s own descriptionCredit lineBird Pendant (Buzzard or Vulture?), c. 300 BCE–600 CE. Costa Rica, Atlantic Watershed region. Jadeite; overall: 4.3 x 3 x 4.9 cm (1 11/16 x 1 3/16 x 1 15/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund, 1954.148
