Key Marco Carvings

Key Marco carvings, large group of carvings excavated at Key Marco in southern Florida that provide the finest extant examples of North American Indian wood carving through the 15th century. The coastal mud of the area helped preserve hundreds of perishable artifacts, which were unearthed in 1896 during an excavation led by Smithsonian Institution-affiliated ethnographer Frank Hamilton Cushing. Among the artifacts found were painted wooden plaques, animal sculptures, human masks, nets, weights, and numerous tools. On the basis of radiocarbon dating, some of this material can be dated to the Late Woodland period (ad 1000–500), and it is believed to have been the work of the now-extinct Calusa Indians.

Especially notable among the artifacts are the highly realistic and sensitive animal carvings. These figures, presumed to have had a ceremonial use, retain traces of paint that once highlighted their sculptural form. Parts of these carvings, such as the ears of a deer, were originally hinged with leather to allow movement, and shell inlays were used for eyes. A 6-inch- (15-cm-) high wooden feline figurine is the most famous of these objects. The degree of realism achieved in the carvings is unequaled in sculpture from the period produced north of Mexico, and some scholars have speculated—without evidence—that commerce might have gone on between the Indians of the Florida Keys and those of Mexico.