After a heavy rain or flood in the late 1980s and 1990s runners would bring bits of precolonial gold to the Ermita antique shops...

After a heavy rain or flood in the late 1980s and 1990s runners would bring bits of precolonial gold to the Ermita antique shops. Gold beads and sheets of unknown origin and use would then be weighed and sold for spot gold value. Nobody cared much for the thin crudely made pieces from death masks because the superstitious felt these carried bad juju.
These were so light compared to beads and necklaces of spun gold or intact artifacts that commanded way more. Death mask elements (I never en...