Description
The Raimondi Stele is a 1.95-metre-high, finely carved granite monolith from the pre-Columbian Chavín culture of Peru (c. 900–550 BC), which is now housed in the National Museum in Lima. It depicts the so-called ‘Staff God’ – an anthropomorphic, feline deity holding a staff or sceptre in each hand. The relief is designed in such a way that, when viewed from the opposite perspective (upside down), completely different figurative faces and symbols can be discerned. It is named after the Italian scholar Antonio Raimondi, who discovered it in the 19th century at the archaeological site of Chavín de Huántar. – Peru – 1976
