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Collections

Frog in Cave-Shaped Vessel300–600 CE

On view: David Geffen GalleriesKeepers of the Cosmos in Mesoamerican Art
Unglazed ceramic bowl with a scalloped, lobed rim and a low-relief sculpted bird figure resting at the center of the interior

Unknown, Quatrefoil Vessel with Frog, 300–600 CE, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Purchased with funds provided by Camilla Chandler Frost, photo © Museum Associates/LACMA

Title
Frog in Cave-Shaped Vessel
Culture
Maya
Place Made
Guatemala
Date Made
300–600 CE
Medium
Engobe-painted earthenware
Dimensions
Diameter: 9 in. (22.86 cm) Height: 3 5/16 in. (8.41 cm)
Credit Line
Purchased with funds provided by Camilla Chandler Frost
Accession Number
M.2010.115.121
Classification
Ceramics
Collecting Area
Art of the Ancient Americas
Curatorial Notes

A frog, modeled in clay, sits at the center of this blackware bowl. The vessel’s cloverlike shape, known as a quatrefoil, symbolizes the entrance to a cave. In the Maya worldview, caves are potent spaces, connected with the watery primordial underworld and the realm of ancestors. Imagine this bowl as a container for liquid: the frog would peer out from this four-lobed pool, re-creating the fivefold shape of the cosmos as its central axis.

Alyce de Carteret

2025

Selected Exhibition History
  • The Ancient Maya World: Masterworks from the Permanent Collection. Saturday, December 1, 2012- Sunday, March 2, 2014

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