GUEST: I met this lovely woman through my husband. She and her husband, actually, were friends with my in-laws, and my father-in-law did some legal work for them, and then my husband took over and he did. She and I just got to be good friends. She had this collection because her nephew was an archaeologist, and so was her great-nephew. I would admire it, and one day, I was there, and she gave me a little box and she said, "This is a gift, and I don't want you to open it until you get home." So I didn't, and when I opened it, I was just stunned, because I loved them.
APPRAISER: What year was that?
GUEST: Probably early to mid-'70s.
APPRAISER: Now, since then, have you had them appraised, or have you taken them to a jeweler?
GUEST: I did. About two weeks ago, I took them to the jeweler, and he did tell me they were gold, and that he thought they were Mayan, but he really couldn't be sure. And then when I found out y'all were coming, I thought, "Well, hey, maybe they can help me."
APPRAISER: What we have here is, we have some pre-Columbian gold from the Veraguas area in Panama. Now, the question is: are they real, or are they not? Based on the information you have, you believe them both to be real.
GUEST: I do.
APPRAISER: Okay. One is real, and one is not.
GUEST: Well, that doesn't really surprise me.
APPRAISER: So which is which? Which do you think is real, and which do you think is not?
GUEST: I think the little animal is real, and the other one is not.
APPRAISER: Okay. I can tell you that you have it exactly backwards.
GUEST: Oh!
APPRAISER: We tested this one-- it's actually gold plate. So when we tested it, the outside, the plate, was 14. We flipped it over, it's a plated piece. It was made in the 20th century. This, on the other hand, which has a slight pinkish cast, it held at 18 karat, and this has a melt value of $1,100. This piece here, the figure, is something that you'd see 1000 to 1500 A.D. in that area, the border area in Panama and Costa Rica, and it would have been a pendant at one point, and it probably would have been an indication of status or power within that culture. On the market today, your animal would be, probably in the decorative, maybe a couple of hundred dollars, maybe $300. This one, a good retail value is $3,000 to $5,000.
GUEST: Wow. (laughing) That's great. I mean, I had no idea.
