Pair of Ear Ornaments (c. 1200–1519): Art, History and Details

Pair of Ear Ornaments (c. 1200–1519) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

This set of ear ornaments, each with a rock crystal insert, is said to have been found with a pendant made of jade and gold (1983.190). They may come from a buried offering or the tomb of an Aztec noble.

Object facts

• Title: Pair of Ear Ornaments
• Date: c. 1200–1519
• Culture: Mexico, Guerrero, Ichcatiopan, Mixtec or Aztec
• Type: Jewelry
• Technique: obsidian, crystal
• Dimensions: Overall: 2.5 x 2.2 cm (1 x 7/8 in.)
• Collection: AA - Mesoamerica
• Department: Art of the Americas
• Accession number: 1983.191

A detail from the museum

These obsidian ear ornaments look black but have a golden sheen.

Collection credit

Gift of James C. Gruener in memory of his wife, Florence Crowell Gruener

Further reading listed by the museum

• Turner, Evan H. "Year in Review for 1983." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 71, no. 2 (1984): 38-79.
• Young-Sánchez, Margaret. "The Gruener Collection of Pre-Columbian Art." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79, no. 7 (September 1992): 234-75.

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.