Description
From the first millennium B.C. until the arrival of Europeans in the 16th century, artists from across the ancient Americas created small-scale architectural effigies to be placed in the tombs of important individuals. These works in stone, ceramic, wood, and metal range from highly abstracted, minimalist representations of temples and houses to elaborate complexes populated with figures, conveying a rich sense of ancient ritual and daily life. Although described as models, these effigies were created not so much as reflections or prototypes of existing structures, but rather as critical, conceptual components of funerary practice and beliefs about an afterlife.
![In the Courts of Religious Ladies: Art, Vision, and Pleasure in Italian Renaissance Convents [Hardcover] Periti, Giancarla](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/71cbGJd7edL._SY342_-1.jpg)
![Ancient Bronzes through a Modern Lens: Introductory Essays on the Study of Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Bronzes [Paperback] Ebbinghaus, Susanne; Anderson, Lisa; Bewer, Francesca G.; Bielfeldt, Ruth; Eremin, Katherine; Hemingway, Seán; Lie, Henry; Mattusch, Carol C.; Riederer, Josef and Staehli, Adrian](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/516k-q2VTKL._SY385_-1.jpg)
![The Wyvern Collection: Medieval and Later Ivory Carvings and Small Sculpture [Hardcover] Williamson, Paul](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/61YR4fz0JsL._SY466_-1-300x450.jpg)
![Casting a Shadow: Creating the Alfred Hitchcock Film [Paperback] Schmenner, Will and Granof, Corinne](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/81D2s-ypoAL._SY466_-1-300x450.jpg)
![Swedish Wooden Toys (Bard Graduate Center for Studies in the Decorative Arts, Des) [Paperback] Ogata, Amy F. and Weber, Susan](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/61pbgkyHjxL._SY385_-1-300x385.jpg)
![Frans Wildenhain 1950-75: Creative and Commercial American Ceramics at Mid-Century [Hardcover] Austin, Bruce A. and Profusely illustrated](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/71ZQm1MYQNL._SY425_-1-300x425.jpg)
![The Jewelry and Metalwork of Marie Zimmermann [Hardcover] Deborah Dependahl Waters; Kimberley Ahara; Bruce Barnes and Joseph Cunningham](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/51-271x8apL._SY425_-1-300x425.jpg)
![George Inness and the Visionary Landscape [Hardcover] Bell, Adrienne Baxter](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/615PhhKthsL._SY342_-1.jpg)
![The dot man: George Andrews of Madison, Georgia [Hardcover] Gruber, J. Richard](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/71nDRlTt-dL._SY425_-1-300x425.jpg)
![Minol Araki [Hardcover] Brown, Claudia; Araki, Minol; Barnhart, Richard M.; Owyoung, Steven D.; Kuo Li Li Shih Po Wu Kuan (China) and Phoenix Art Museum](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/91qjbmUAwFL._SY385_-1-300x385.jpg)
![Gracious Plenty: American Still-Life Art from Southern Collections [Paperback] Pennington, Estill Curtis (Morris Curator of Southern Painting)](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/A18t6PF-OkL._SY342_-1.jpg)
![Panaesthetics: On the Unity and Diversity of the Arts (The Anthony Hecht Lectures in the Humanities Series) [Hardcover] Albright, Daniel](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/71tyEo5BxYL._SY385_-1.jpg)
![Aphrodite and the Gods of Love [Paperback] Kondoleon, Christine & Phoebe C. Segal (editors)](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/81X3edEty6L._SY466_-1-300x450.jpg)
![Continental Drift: Installations By Joan Jonas, Ilya and Emilia Kabakov, Juan Munoz; Yinka Shonibare (Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, Florida 2004) [Unknown Binding] Mark; Joan Jonas Yinka Shinobar Rosenthal](https://artwheelshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/91j6r60Oa6L._SY466_-1-300x450.jpg)
