Ritual Dance in Brazil in the 17th Century on a Copper Engraving by Montanus

Name: Ritual Dance in Brazil in the 17th Century on a Copper Engraving by Montanus
Brand: Montanus & Ogilby
SKU: BG-13596-30
Price: 505 USD
Availability: InStock

$505

€450 · dollar price at today's exchange rate

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Shipping to the United States: $51 standard, $73 express, insured and tracked.

Date: 1673
Maker: Montanus & Ogilby
Kind: Views & Engravings
Size: 31 × 19 cm (12.2 × 7.5 in)
Condition: Good. Expected age-related tonality changes and potential marginal foxing. The paper shows signs of handling, such as soft creases and wear along left edge. Lower left corner cut short. Please study the image carefully.
Places: Brazil
Reference: BG-13596-30

What the condition grades mean

Excellent: Bright and clean, with no faults worth mentioning.
Very good: Only light signs of age, such as faint toning.
Good: Normal signs of age for a sheet of this period: toning, some foxing, small marks or neat old repairs.
Fair: Clear faults such as staining, tears or repairs, priced to match.

Every fault we see is written in the condition note, and the whole sheet is shown uncropped in the photos.

Guaranteed original. This is an original of the period stated, not a later reproduction or print-on-demand copy. If it is ever shown to be otherwise, we refund you in full.

Shipping to the United States. Sent from our gallery in Langweer, the Netherlands, flat between boards or rolled in a tube, and fully insured. Delivery and import charges.

About this piece

A ceremonial dance in Brazil, an original copper engraving from the German edition of Arnoldus Montanus's Die Unbekante Neue Welt oder Beschreibung des Welt-teils Amerika und des Sud-Landes, published in Amsterdam by Jacob Meurs in 1673. The title appears in the listing as "Ritual Dance in Brazil"; the sheet is trimmed to the picture.

A crowd of dancers fills an open compound enclosed by a palisade. At the center a man wearing a feather costume stands on a box and raises a rattle, while others in feather garments, some holding rattles or pipes, dance around him. In the foreground, men crouch and move with large bunches of feathers tied at the waist. Palm trees and tall cypress-like trees rise behind the fence, and the curved roof of a long thatched house stands at the back right.

Montanus compiled his account of the Americas from earlier travel writers, and plates like this one fed the picture seventeenth-century readers had of the peoples of the New World.

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