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A truly beautiful Hopi tufa-cast silver and

18K gold “Badger Paw” pendant necklace by Verma “Sonwai” Nequatewa, c. 2020’s

This is a truly spectacular and dramatic piece by a famous Native artist with a particularly famous pedigree.

The famous Native artist here, of course, is the brilliant contemporary Hopi jewelry maestro, Verma “Sonwai” Nequatewa (b.1949), the niece and former apprentice of renowned Hopi jewelry impresario, Charles Loloma (1921-1991). The “Badger Paw” design here is one of Verma’s later versions of Charles’ famous and iconic Badger Paw silver ring design which

he originally made in the 1960’s in honor of his belonging to the prominent and powerful Hopi Badger Clan, a ring which he famously wore nearly every day. Two of Charles’ original silver Badger paw rings are pictured here below along with

a photograph of him wearing one of them.

Verma, of course, like her Uncle and her sister and felllow jewelry artist, Sherian Honhongva, was also born into the Hopi Badger Clan, and, as can be seen here, she has depicted the silver Badger paw in this pendant in a somewhat stylistically different way than Charles did in his ring. Verma’s Badger paw is around the same size, but it is oriented in the opposite direction and it is somewhat more rounded, the design motif in the center is somewhat different, and, of course, the paw is presented in an upright manner only as opposed to Charles’ ring in which the Badger paw could be worn pointing in either an upwards or downwards manner on the hand, though Charles mostly wore it facing downwards.

“The Badger Clan is one of the four most important Hopi clans. It is custodian

of the sacred spruce, the most powerfully magnetic of all trees.”

-Frank Waters and Oswald “White Bear” Fredericks,

“Book of The Hopi”, The Viking Press, 1963, pp.47

Verma’s pendant version of the Badger paw also has a beautifully-crafted triangularly-shaped gold hanging baile and three long precious metal dangles, one gold and two silver, hanging from it as well. The tufa-casting of the pendant is particularly well done with a graceful, slightly contoured shape and some beautiful, slight "texturing" to the silver.

The pendant is very nicely and appropriately strung on a very finely hand-cut dark brown suede leather thong also hand made by Verma Nequatewa. This is the customary manner in which Charles and Verma have always traditionally presented their perecious jewelry pendants. However, for a change, should you ever desire, you could always wear the pendant on

a fine silver or gold chain to beautiful effect.

The entire pendant measures an impressive 4 5/8" in height from the top of the gold baile to the bottom of the longest dangle, the Badger paw itself measures just over 2” in height. The pendant is 1 1/2" in width at its widest point.

The pendant and suede leather thong together weigh a very comfortable and easy to wear 41 grams or 1 1/2 ounces.

The pendant is in excellent original condition, with some very slight scratching from abrasion on the hanging dangles which could be easily buffed out, if desired. Overall, this remarkably-shaped piece is in remarkable shape. The pendant is properly signed “Sonwai” on the back of the Badger paw and is also stamped with Verma’s butterfly insignia and the gold hanging baile is marked “18K” on the front.

This pendant is a powerfully beautiful and thoroughly iconic piece of precious jewelry perfectly hand made by

a prominent and primary member of an iconic family dynasty of brilliant Hopi jewelry artists, a piece to treasure

always and to wear with great pride.

SOLD

Verma Nequatewa often wears a different Sonwai "Badger Paw" pendant necklace. She is wearing it here in this 2019  photo standing next to "Stone Talker", a 1975 portrait of Charles Loloma.