The tomb environment provides clues which can authenticate shaft-tomb figures. Bacteria fixed manganese on the surfaces of ceramics from many West Mexican tombs, leaving black stains. Forgers have found ways to reproduce the stains to make their work look real. Physical anthropologist Robert Pickering applies knowledge from his forensic work to authenticate shaft-tomb figures. Flies whose larvae feed on decomposing flesh infested bodies and meat offerings in tombs. The larvae left the food source and attached themselves to a drier surface to form puparia, from which adult flies eventually hatched. Ceramics provided attractive surfaces for the insects. Figures which remained dry in the tomb setting, and collectors did not later over-clean, retain puparia. Forgeries do not.

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