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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;all_fakes, post: 85879, member: 55&quot;]So many fakes, we could go on and on.&nbsp; &nbsp; I haven&#039;t talked about the bone &quot;fetishes&quot; yet.....or the baskets....</p><p>But yes, there are more fakes out there, and a bigger industry making them, than most folks realize.&nbsp; Is one reason Komokwa and myself are so incensed, and have been for years.</p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; It is a long story about the bone items, but in brief, in 2004 the US Wildlife folks busted an Indonesian fraud ring; they were illegally obtaining ivory from endangered species, shipping it to Indonesia to be carved, then sending it back to Alaska to be sold as genuine native items.&nbsp;&nbsp; After the bust the illegal items were destroyed; but they also confiscated <u>10,000</u> small bone carvings, made from local cow (water buffalo to us) bone.&nbsp; </p><p>These otherwise legal carvings were auctioned off; so you could imagine most were bought by wholesalers and large dealers; and also, the 10,000 represented stock on hand, likely only a few months production.&nbsp; &nbsp; These hit the ebay market shortly afterward, and that&#039;s why you&#039;ll see so many frames of &quot;Eskimo bone fetishes.&quot;&nbsp; Such as <a href="http://www.ebay.com/itm/252121468521?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&amp;ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.ebay.com/itm/252121468521?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&amp;ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT" rel="nofollow">http://www.ebay.com/itm/252121468521?_trksid=p2060353.m1438.l2649&amp;ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT</a></p><p>This is an Ethiopian style item, so far as I&#039;ve been able to determine; bead importers have been making rip-offs of Maori, African, and all sorts of other pendants for beading since the 1960s, openly sold by country of origin, usually Indonesia.....and more recently, secondary sellers have realized that they can be repacked as NW or Eskimo antiques....and buyers don&#039;t notice the designs are from elsewhere, because they don&#039;t subscribe to the bead import catalogs.&nbsp;&nbsp; See <a href="http://hohbead.com" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://hohbead.com" rel="nofollow">http://hohbead.com</a> and search for bone pendants.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>But imagine, since 2004, 10,000 fake bone items have been made in Indonesia, every month.&nbsp;&nbsp; Where do you suppose those are sold?</p><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; I&#039;ll have to find my link to the Fish and game article, it is eye-opening.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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