Mark D

Mearto specialist

Dear Ramiro, Thank you for sending Mearto this online appraisal, Your item is extremely decorative and certainly resembles genuine Tumbaga Tairona figures from Columbia. The stylised bird god has a lovely simplicity and primitiveness. The patterns, decoration and patina are all consistent with genuine ancient pieces. However, whether it is authentic or not is a much more complicated issue I'm afraid. The single way to identify a fake is look at the way the eyes, nose, braids, mouth, bracelets attach to the piece. In originals they were cast and not soldered on later. This will help you identify common fakes, but many later and better quality pieces are made via casting also. Another thing to look for is the polish on a larger smooth part such as the back. Tumbaga looks like copper, but the copper is leached out and the layer of gold/silver is polished. Modern pieces may have been polished using a jeweller's belt polisher creating a directional polish vs a burnishing circular polish. But many old pieces have been re polished in recent times. So this is also sadly not always conclusive Finally, you can get the metal tested. Tairona tumbaga has a higher surface silver content than Central American gold items because they couldn't remove silver out of the alloy in ancient times. So you see you must consider more than one factor to see if the piece 'fits' as ancient My gut feeling is also the large size of this figure makes this suspicious - but I hope for you that I am wrong. The only way to really know is to allow an expert in this art to handle it. The market is so fraught with copies that many auctions do not handle them or sell any they get as decorative items. You will also need documented provenance to sell in a reputable auction. Please don’t hesitate to reach us again for more online appraisals on your precious items, thank you for choosing Mearto. my valuation is subject to the piece actually being authentic and have the provenance to sell it Best Wishes Mark J Mearto