Celt with Deity (1000–300 BCE): Art, History and Details

Celt with Deity (1000–300 BCE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This ceremonial object has the head of a deity and a body shaped like an axe blade (celt) used to clear land for agriculture. The flared mouth, toothless gums, and fangs are typical of Olmec supernatural beings. The meaning of the body's "four-dots-and-a-bar" motif is unclear, but it sometimes appears in depictions of plants. The deity, then, seems to be associated with fertility.

Object facts

• Title: Celt with Deity
• Date: 1000–300 BCE
• Culture: Mesoamerica, Mexico, Olmec
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: stone
• Dimensions: Overall: 32.2 x 14 x 11.5 cm (12 11/16 x 5 1/2 x 4 1/2 in.)
• Collection: AA - Mesoamerica
• Department: Art of the Americas
• Accession number: 1954.856

Collection credit

Gift of the Hanna Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Milliken, William M. "Two Pre-Columbian Sculptures." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 42, no. 4 (April 1955): 58-61.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.