Pre-Colombian Jaguar Mortar from the Chavin culture Peru

For more information on this item, click through to GentlemanCollector.com

Reference No.: 7

Date: -700

Category: Tribal, Exotic, and Antiquity

Location of Origin: Latin America

Price: 16000

Medium/Materials: Stone

Dimensions: 7in (d) x 6in (h) x 4in (w)

Description: A stylized stone mortar used by shamans for ceremonial rituals primarily to crush psychedelic substances such as the San Pedro cactus (Echinopsis pachanoi), which contains mescaline or Vilca beans (Anadenanthera colubrina) which contain other psychedelic agents.

Provenance: Private New England Collection

Additional Information: The Chavin culture, one of the oldest in Peru, had vanished long before written sources appeared. And while caves containing bones of mastodons and llamas suggest that there was human occupation dating from as far back as 12,000 BC, it is believed that the Chavin culture started around 900 BC. The Chavin civilization was eventually conquered by the Incas less than a hundred years before the arrival of the Spaniards.

At its height from 400 to 600 BC, the Chavin civilization is regarded for its intense design skill fueled by the ritual use of psychedelic drugs. Often the Chavin culture is described as cult-like and there is no significant evidence that indicates that the culture was an empire or a state power; as in the main Temple, there are no military structures nor any indication of major public works like irrigation or housing.

Two of the main motifs in Chavin iconography are shapeshifting feline heads and the transformation of humans into something else, which suggest the intertwining of cultures from both the coast and the mountains and likely also from the jungle on the other side of the Andes.