On November 1, 2026, Boulder, Colorado-based auction house
Artemis Fine Arts
will present
World Treasures | Ancient & Ethnographic
, a comprehensive sale bringing to market a diverse range of antiquities, ethnographic artifacts, and natural history specimens. Spanning hundreds of thousands of years of human history and material culture, the auction features prehistoric tools such as an Acheulean hand axe alongside ancient artifacts from Egypt, Greece, Rome, the Near East, and Asia. Additional categories include Pre-Columbian, Native American, and tribal art, as well as fine art, fossils, and minerals, led by early highlights such as Predynastic Egyptian limestone and banded agate mace heads from the Naqada Period.
Egyptian Faience Bead Necklace | Turquoise and Blue Geometric Segments
. Estimate: $700 - $1,050.
Ancient Bronze Birds | Greek Geometric Waterfowl, Roman Rooster, Islamic Cock
. Mediterranean and Near East, Greek, Roman and Islamic. A trio of leaded bronze birds spanning nineteen centuries of Mediterranean and Near Eastern metalwork. The largest, Roman, is a proud rooster with incised wing feathers, an alert comb and wattle, and a stepped socket beneath the feet for mounting atop a staff, standard, or furniture element. Estimate: $800 - $1,200.
Hellenistic Gold Repoussé Plaque of Tyche, Ring Bezel, Phoenician Levant
. Near East, Levant, likely Phoenician, Hellenistic period. small oval plaque of high-karat gold, worked in low relief with the bust of Tyche in profile to the right, veiled and crowned. Estimate: $800 - $1,200.
Maricopa Black-on-Red Frog Effigy Bowl with Rim Frogs
. Native American, Maricopa. A Maricopa earthenware bowl with a rounded body and an inverted mouth, covered in a burnished red slip and painted in black. Two spotted frogs sit on opposite sides of the bowl. Their splayed bodies are modeled in relief down the wall, and their heads rise over the black-painted rim to look into the bowl, as if both have stopped at the same pond's edge. Estimate: $1,000 - $1,500.
Mammoth Ivory Scrimshaw Portrait Pendant Necklace by E. V. Wick
. North America, United States. A signed scrimshaw pendant necklace centered on a square plaque of mammoth ivory. The plaque holds a portrait of an African woman in traditional dress, built up from fine stippling and tinted with colored inks. The artist's signature is on the lower left. The strand is threaded with wood, cobalt and green glass, shell, bone, and walrus ivory beads and fastens with a hook clasp. Estimate: $1,000 - $1,500.
Carved Sperm Whale Tooth with Humpback Whale in Relief, Signed
. North America. A sperm whale tooth carved with a humpback whale swimming the length of its flank. The carver cut the ivory back into a shallow oval field framed by a double twisted-rope border. Against that hollow the whale rises in confident relief: its long pectoral fin sweeps down from the shoulder, a small dorsal fin sits on the back, and fine parallel lines mark the grooves of the throat. Estimate: $800 - $1,200.
Navajo Silver, Spondylus Shell & Turquoise Flask
. Native American, Southwestern United States, Navajo. A fine flask or snuff jar built around a natural spondylus shell. Its scalloped valves form the flask body in a coral orange flecked with the shell's own dark pitting. The two halves are held together by a sterling silver frame. Estimate: $800 - $1,200.
Silver Pendant | Sericho Pallasite Meteorite Slice with Olivine
. Sericho (Habaswein) pallasite, Isiolo County, Kenya. A gorgeous slice of a pallasite meteorite set in a sterling silver pendant of rectangular form with convex top and bottom peripheries. Boasting a metallic hue of silver with translucent inclusions in shades of caramel, toffee, and mocha, this shimmering shard of celestial matter is comprised of kamacite, an alloy of iron and nickel that creates the sparkling luster, as well as olivine (also known as peridot) crystal inclusions. Estimate: $1,000 - $1,500.
Chinese Qing Wood Corbel w/ Dragon
. East Asia, China, Qing Dynasty, ca. 19th to early 20th century CE. A large architectural corbel carved from wood, depicting a sinuous dragon adorned with vibrant polychrome pigments. Estimate: $600 - $900.
Roman Carnelian Intaglio of Enthroned Jupiter with Eagle
. Roman, Imperial period. An oval carnelian intaglio cut with the enthroned figure of Jupiter, king of the Roman gods. He sits in profile on a high-backed throne, his legs draped in a mantle. One hand rests on a tall scepter and the other holds out a patera, the shallow dish used for pouring offerings. Estimate: $700 - $1,000.
Close