Art Institute of Chicago

Goldweight with a Geometric Design

Asante or related Akan-speaking peoples

Date

18th/19th century

Medium

Copper alloy

Culture

Ghana

Department

Arts of Africa

Institution

Art Institute of Chicago

This small, square gold weight consists of a pattern of four concentric semicircles on its face. It is probable that this weight was made sometime in the 18th or 19th centuries in light of its ornate “wax-thread” design, which was common during that period. Brass and copper weights were used for five centuries—between about 1400 and 1900—as a means to weigh gold mined by the Akan and traded first westward and then across the Sahara to North Africa, and later with the Portuguese and Dutch.

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