Beau metate - Lot 32

Beau metate Atlantic coast of Costa Rica 300 to 700 A.D. Basalt L. 51 cm Provenance : - Acquired before 1897 by William Downing Webster, inventory number "1245". - Collected by Augustus H. Lane Fox Pitt-Rivers, Farnham on September 18, 1897 and kept by his family. - Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford - Fred Benson Collection, African Sculpture Unlimited. acquired at Sotheby's, London, November 26, 1979, lot 5. - The collection of Allan Stone, New York, acquired from him in 1982. - "The Collection of Allan Stone" part 2, Sotheby's New-York sale May 16, 2014, lot n°92. - Private collection, Paris Publications: - Hartman Carl V. Archæological Researches in Costa Rica. The Royal Ethnographical Museum in Stockholm, 1901, plates 42 fig. 6 and 72 fig. 6. - Hartman Carl V. Archeological Researches on the Pacific Coast of Costa Rica. Pittsburgh, Carnegie Institute, 1907. - Buxton Leonard H. D. The Pitt-Rivers Museum, Farnham. General Handbook, Farnham Museum, 1929, reproduced on Plate X. - Waterfield Hermione and J C. H. King. Provenance: Twelve Collectors of Ethnographic Arts in England, 1760-1990. London: Paul Holberton Publishers, 2009. Originally, metates were standing millstones used to grind corn or cocoa, and became votive offerings placed in burials. This particularly elegant example is supported by two pairs of folded arms, the hands supporting two heads carved in high relief at either end.