Incense-burner Cover
Unknown Artist
c. 500
Medium
earthenware with slip and pigments
Dimensions
44.8 × 43 × 31.5 cm
Classification
Ceramic
Department
Art of the Americas
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Andrew R. and Martha Holden Jennings Fund
Accession Number
1969.25
About this artwork
This elaborate clay construction served as the cover and chimney of a basin used to burn copal incense. Although probably manufactured in what is now Guatemala, the form and fabrication are based on examples from Teotihuacan in central Mexico, hundreds of miles away. Intensive trade between the two regions, or even a Teotihuacan colony in Guatemala seems likely. The masked, dressed, and ornamented moundlike form probably represents a mortuary bundle or a cult image.