Four-Cornered Hat (c. 400–1000): Art, History and Details

Four-Cornered Hat (c. 400–1000) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

A distinctive type of Tiwanaku and Wari headgear was a hat with four ear-like peaks rising from the corners. Depicted on warriors and other men who wear prestigious clothing and ornaments, the hats were made with knots, visible on all sides of this handsome Tiwanaku example. The hat is decorated with a pattern that includes a profile bird head.

Object facts

• Title: Four-Cornered Hat
• Date: c. 400–1000
• Culture: Peru, South Andes or Chile, Northern Andes, Tiwanaku style, 5th-10th Century
• Type: Textile
• Technique: alpaca
• Dimensions: Overall: 14.6 x 16 x 20 cm (5 3/4 x 6 5/16 x 7 7/8 in.)
• Collection: T - Pre-Columbian
• Department: Textiles
• Accession number: 1997.150

Collection credit

James Albert and Mary Gardiner Ford Memorial Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Young-Sánchez, Margaret. Tiwanaku: Ancestors of the Inca. Denver, CO: Denver Art Museum, 2004.

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.