Patrones formales en las piezas de orfebrería precolombina de la Cultura Tayrona

Abstract

With the first human societies, the configuration of the technical artifacts has presented persistent characteristics such as: different types of symmetries and geometric structures that control the shape. Besides the large variety of families of objects and images, common features, due to the existence of formal patterns beneath them, and in different ways they define its form, shape and order.

For the study of this type of features and patterns, a collection of Tayrona gold pieces was selected, due to its symbolic and formal richness, which would allow to explore and contrast the hypothesis about the existence (or not) of formal and aesthetic features, typical for this product family. For that purpose, three tools were defined, oriented towards formal analysis: symmetry laws, proportion patterns, and shape coherence (with PDwin software).

Once these tools were applied, the analysis showed the existence of reflection symmetry in all pieces, and in high percentage (between 70% and 100%) of these pieces adjusted to the patterns divided into 1/2, 1/3, 1/6, and 1/12. This means that there are pieces in which its “accidents” or section changes consent to divide it into halves or by multiples of three up to twelve segments. From the evaluation of all pieces, at the end of the paper, there is a proposal of a model for a pattern, with the origin of its vectors and the directions for the configuration parts of such pieces.