Form
Function
Content
Context
Miscellaneous
100
This metal casting method was used to create many works from the Kingdom of Benin, including plaques and commemorative heads.
What is Lost-Wax Casting?
100
This Kongo sculpture was used to enforce oaths, resolve disputes, or call upon spiritual power. It is what encouraged the tradition of Voodoo Dolls.
What is Nkisi Nkondi (Power Figure)?
100
This Aztec relief depicts the dismembered body of this moon goddess.
Who is Coyolxauhqui?
100
The artworks of the Kingdom of Benin were created by this cultural group in modern-day Nigeria.
Who are the Edo people?
100
This Inca city built high in the Andes is one of the best-preserved examples of Inca architecture.
What is Machu Picchu?
200
The Lukasa (Memory Board) is made primarily of wood and decorated with these small objects used as mnemonic devices.
What are beads, shells, and metal pins?
200
These circular underground spaces in Ancestral Pueblo architecture were used for religious ceremonies and gatherings.
What are kivas?
200
The conical tower inside Great Zimbabwe may symbolize this valuable trade resource.
What is stored grain or prosperity?
200
This site in Mesa Verde National Park was built by this Indigenous culture.
Who are the Ancestral Puebloans?
200
This object signified the high status and divine authority of Hawaiian chiefs.
What is ʻAhu ʻula?
300
Many Polynesian ritual objects, including figures and ceremonial tools, were carved from this extremely hard volcanic material.
What is basalt?
300
These relief sculptures decorated palace pillars and recorded royal events and court life.
What are Benin Plaques?
300
This elaborately beaded shoulder bag created by Native American artists in the Great Lakes region often features symmetrical floral designs influenced by European trade materials and symbolizes status and cultural identity.
What is bandolier bag?
300
This artwork documents the tribal history and cultural identity during a period of forced reservation confinement, reflect the artist's effort to preserve Shoshone traditions amid colonial disruption.
What is Cotsiogo's painted elks hide?
300
This Pacific site is sometimes called the “Venice of the Pacific” because it is built on a network of small islands connected by canals.
What is Nan Madol?
400
This Pacific Islander navigation tool uses a framework of sticks and shells to represent ocean swells, currents, and island locations. Sailors memorized the patterns of this chart to navigate across vast distances without instruments.
What is the navigation chart?
400
The ceremonial center of Templo Mayor functioned primarily as a place for this type of religious activity.
What are ritual ceremonies and human sacrifice?
400
This painted bark cloth from Polynesia often features repeated geometric patterns and symbols representing ancestry, status, and cultural identity?
What is Hiapo (Tapa Cloth)?
400
This West African mosque, located in Mali and built primarily from mud brick, is famous for its distinctive pyramidal towers and is considered one of the largest mud-brick structures in the world. It has been rebuilt multiple times, most recently in 1907 after a period of neglect during French colonial rule.
What is the Great Mosque of Djenne?
400
This carved wooden ancestor figure from the Fang people was placed atop containers holding relics of important ancestors to guard them spiritually.
What is the Reliquary Figure (Byeri)?
500
This mask's formal characteristics—including its naturalistic proportions, delicate facial features, elaborate scarification, and ornate hairstyle—serve what primary function in Chokwe masquerade ceremonies?
What is to celebrate and honor feminine beauty, fertility, and social prestige?
500
These monumental statues primarily functioned to represent and honor this group.
Who are ancestors?
500
This mask dramatically opens during ceremonial dances to reveal another face inside, symbolizing transformation between human and animal or spirit forms.
What is the Transformation Mask?
500
This 1890 oil portrait by Gottfried Lindauer depicts a Māori leader and military strategist who played a crucial role in the New Zealand Wars, particularly during the conflict in the Waikato region. The subject is shown in traditional Māori dress with intricate facial moko, reflecting both his cultural identity and his status as a rangatira (chief) who eventually became an advocate for peace and land rights.
Who is Tamati Waka Nene? -or- What is the portrait of Tamati Waka Nene?
500
These elaborate ritual carvings from Papua New Guinea were created for funerary ceremonies and often destroyed after the event.
What is the Malagan Display and Mask?