The Oculate Being, likely the patron spirit or deity of an early fertility cult on Peru’s south coast, is embodied in this rare ceramic mask decorated with resin-based paint. Serpents slither across its face. The snake heads radiate from the sides and form a corona around the edges of the mask. The most prominent features of the mask are the large, round eyes. The curved, smiling mouth reveals a row of teeth. A small figure pops out from the top of the mask and, wearing a similar mask himself, impersonates the Oculate Being. The function of the mask is unclear.
Dated from 300 B.C. to 1 A.D., the mask belongs to the Paracas culture, which flourished in the first millennium B.C. on the southern coast of Peru in the Andes. It is among the earliest known complex societies in South America. The Paracas and other contemporaneous societies were the predecessors of later civilizations in the Andes, including the Incas.
The mask is in the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art.
The Oculate Being, likely the patron spirit or deity of an early fertility cult on Peru’s south coast, is embodied in this rare ceramic mask decorated with resin-based paint. Serpents slither across its face. The snake heads radiate from the sides and form a corona around the edges of the mask. The most prominent features of the mask are the large, round eyes. The curved, smiling mouth reveals a row of teeth. A small figure pops out from the top of the mask and, wearing a similar mask himself, impersonates the Oculate Being. The function of the mask is […]
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