Urn Figure (c. 200–500 CE (thermoluminescence date, 60 BCE–390 CE): Art, History and Details

Urn Figure (c. 200–500 CE (thermoluminescence date, 60 BCE–390 CE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

The figure projecting from the front of a cylindrical container wears a mouth mask perhaps shaped as a serpent’s fanged upper jaw. It probably served in a tomb as a companion to a larger, more complex figural urn. Though termed "urns," these ceramics do not contain the cremated ashes of the dead but usually are found empty.

Object facts

• Title: Urn Figure
• Date: c. 200–500 CE (thermoluminescence date, 60 BCE–390 CE
• Culture: Mexico, Oaxaca, Zapotec
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: earthenware
• Dimensions: Overall: 26.1 x 16.3 x 16.3 cm (10 1/4 x 6 7/16 x 6 7/16 in.)
• Collection: AA - Mesoamerica
• Department: Art of the Americas
• Accession number: 1990.277

Collection credit

Gift of Mr. and Mrs. James C. Gruener

Further reading listed by the museum

• Young-Sánchez, Margaret. "The Gruener Collection of Pre-Columbian Art." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79, no. 7 (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.