Treasures of ancient America: Pre-Columbian art from Mexico to Peru - Hardcover

Lothrop, Samuel Kirkland

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0847800784 ISBN 13: 9780847800780

Publisher: Rizzoli, 1979

Synopsis

It is the purpose of this volume to describe and picture the outstanding arts and crafts of aboriginal America, which flourished over a vast area extending from central Mexico to Peru and Bolivia. The entire region lies within the tropics, but it embraces almost every type of environment from deserts and lowland rain forest to mountain ranges covered by glaciers and perpetual snow. In ancient times the inhabitants were scarcely less diversified than the topography: in their technological and social development. The area has never been a political unit, not even as a result of the Spanish Conquest and the subsequent centuries of colonial governments. The period covered is about 2,500 years, roughly from 1000B.C. to 1500A.D. Here is a comprehensive picture of the pre-Columbian civilizations: the Aztecs and Mayas, the less familiar cultures of Central America and the Northern Andes, and the successive cultures of Peru from early times to the Empire of the Incas. The illustrations include the pottery, sculpture and architecture of Teotihuacan, near Mexico City; Olmec carvings and Classical Very Cruz sculpture; the finds made at Tlateloco in the heart of Mexico City, at La Ventilla near Teotihuacan, and at Altar de Sacrificios in Guatemala; objects from the Maya temples at Palenque; jades and gold work from Costa Rica, Panama and Colombia; fine examples of Paracas, Tiahuanaco and Inca weaving; a and a wide variety of works preserved in museums and private collections in both Europe and the Americas.

About this edition

• Publisher: Rizzoli
• Publication date: 1979
• ISBN 10: 0847800784
• ISBN 13: 9780847800780
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 229