A curious observation, but it occured to me to wonder if this sort of coat pattern is even possible on llamas.
Briefly looking into the matter, it appears they can indeed have "patched" or "paint" style coats, but every example photo I've found shows a pattern either made up of much larger individual "patches", or of smaller "spots" that very densely clustered (as opposed to spread out uniformly with lots of empty space around each).
Obviously only a very superficial glimpse, but it does make me curious - is this pattern artistic license, or is it accurate to the actual coat pattern of a historical llama variety / genetic variant that may or may not still exist?
Or maybe it's a recent fake. If you check the "provenance" at the Walters web site you see that it came through an antiquities dealer without a good source. That usually means it was looted from the ground but it might also mean it was actually done by a more recent artist who had seen cows.
So CUTE!
ReplyDeleteA curious observation, but it occured to me to wonder if this sort of coat pattern is even possible on llamas.
ReplyDeleteBriefly looking into the matter, it appears they can indeed have "patched" or "paint" style coats, but every example photo I've found shows a pattern either made up of much larger individual "patches", or of smaller "spots" that very densely clustered (as opposed to spread out uniformly with lots of empty space around each).
Obviously only a very superficial glimpse, but it does make me curious - is this pattern artistic license, or is it accurate to the actual coat pattern of a historical llama variety / genetic variant that may or may not still exist?
Or maybe it's a recent fake. If you check the "provenance" at the Walters web site you see that it came through an antiquities dealer without a good source. That usually means it was looted from the ground but it might also mean it was actually done by a more recent artist who had seen cows.
ReplyDelete