Tunic with Profile Animals and Checkerboards (410–540 CE (radiocarbon date, 93% probability)): Art, History and Details

Tunic with Profile Animals and Checkerboards (410–540 CE (radiocarbon date, 93% probability)) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

The imagery in the central field of this unique tunic—animals with long tails and three-toed feet—seems to have been created by painting a slurry-like material on the pale areas to protect them when the fabric was immersed in a bath that turned other areas light brown. Then the slurry was removed, revealing the pattern. The checkerboard areas at the sides, on the other hand, are woven with brown and cream-colored yarns. Specialists puzzle over the origins of the tunic, some attributing it to the Paracas (700 BCE–1 CE) and others to the Nasca (100 BCE–650 CE), who sprang from Paracas roots.

Object facts

• Title: Tunic with Profile Animals and Checkerboards
• Date: 410–540 CE (radiocarbon date, 93% probability)
• Culture: Peru, South Coast, Paracas or Nasca?
• Type: Textile
• Technique: cotton; dye-patterned plain weave
• Dimensions: Overall: 72.4 x 104.1 cm (28 1/2 x 41 in.)
• Collection: T - Pre-Columbian
• Department: Textiles
• Accession number: 2005.16

Collection credit

Dudley P. Allen Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Donley, Gregory M., "Multi-track Mind", Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland Art: The Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine. Vol. 46 no. 03, March 2006

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.