Pre-Columbian Gold Pendants, 1000-1500 AD
Watch
GUEST:
My father gave them to me.
APPRAISER:
And when did your dad get them?
GUEST:
I believe in the early '70s.
APPRAISER:
I understand he was a traveler, a world traveler?
GUEST:
Yes, he was. He told me they were pre-Columbian. They used to be attached to Mayan warriors' armor.
APPRAISER:
First of all, they're not Mayan.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
These are from actually Central America. And this one I believe is from Panama in a place called Veraguas. This one is Diquis from Costa Rica. In the process of authentication, what we want to look at first is do they look what we would expect them to look like if they were authentic? And the first part of that is yes, they do. Now, you know we already tested the gold, and they did... a lot of these that are fake are brass. So stylistically, they look good, and they are gold. We have some fantastic imagery. These are eagles here. These are probably some sort of crocodile or shaman imagery. And over here, again probably a crocodile and you have these snakes. These things were worn as pendants. Probably shamans would have worn these or important individuals in the culture. They were definitely status symbols. And you wouldn't have some ordinary Joe wearing these. It would only be worn by very important people. Now I'm going to first of all take this one off, and I want to show what a fantastic thing this is in profile. And really very, very strong. Now, looking at the back, you see where we have this support for the pendant?
GUEST:
Yes.
APPRAISER:
This is pretty low. I think this is a repair. You can see how the surface is somewhat different here than the surrounding surface. If you look very carefully here and here, it looks like that was where the old support was and it came off.
GUEST:
Oh.
APPRAISER:
All right? I'm going to put this thing back on. Now I'm going to take this one off. And again, I want to show what a fantastic thing this is in profile. It's a very, very powerful piece. All of these objects would have been buried, so when I see an indication that you have the support that's been crushed, that to me is a good sign. So we have two authentic pieces. They date between 1,000 and 1,500 A.D. Now let's talk about money.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
You want to take a guess?
GUEST:
No way.
APPRAISER:
All right. Now, the gold content alone on this one was $3,500. The gold content on this one was $5,500. I believe-- and again, it's a crazy market, it fluctuates a lot-- I'm going to say that this one is in the $8,000 to $10,000 range and this one is in the $12,000 to $18,000. It's a good day, isn't it?
GUEST:
Yes, that's so exciting!
APPRAISER:
Well, it's exciting that you brought them in, and we thank you for that.
GUEST:
Thank you!
Appraisal Details
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