Any item that looks like these is a fake.

    How do we know?             

Because these all came from a bead dealer, who advertised them honestly as Indonesian buffalo bone carvings.  

    They are carved in Indonesia; imported by the thousands; often misrepresented as genuine old Native or Eskimo artifacts. 

     In many auctions you will find them in frames of 12 or 50, all alike and in perfect condition; with a label claiming they are real, old native artifacts.  On eBay it is common to see them with a fake date and location written on the back, in black ink.   That is in itself a sign that the item is fake.

• Prices are about $10 per dozen, wholesale.  Many eBay sellers get $100 or more each,  by misrepresenting them.

The designs are obviously carved with a hand-held motor-tool.   They are made in hundreds of identical copies.

Any item which is commonly available in multiple copies, and which is commonly and openly sold as an import, cannot possibly be a genuine old Native American artifact.                   

It is self-evident that genuine old native items  do not come in boxes or bags of a dozen or a hundred.

Each design can be found in many colors, from white to reddish or brownish tones (the bead catalogs list those as "tea-stained.")     

How do we know these are fakes?  Because they are commonly available from the import dealers, by the dozen or hundred.

Regardless of what label may come with the item, or what may have been written on it: 

  these items are not native.