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Male Dog
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
One of the best-known subjects of West Mexican tomb sculpture is the native hairless dog, which is shown naturalistically-as here-but also wearing a human mask, signaling complex meanings.These meanings are not well-understood, but like later Mesoamericans, West Mexicans may have believed that dogs served as guides or guards in the underworld realm of the dead. For the living, they also served as food.
Cleveland Museum of Art’s own descriptionCredit lineMale Dog, 200 BCE–300 CE. West Mexico, Colima, Comala style. Earthenware with burnished red slip; overall: 39.5 x 20.8 x 47.8 cm (15 9/16 x 8 3/16 x 18 13/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cornelia Blakemore Warner Fund, 1964.37
