On view
Art of the Ancient Americas
Crescent-shaped ornament,
600–800
Mochica
Early Intermediate Period
2021-43
Spear-throwers, which enhance the power behind hurled darts, were the primary ranged weapons used by the Mochica. The example displayed here, composed of a bronze substructure with brown and black stone inlay, was likely used only for ceremonial purposes. The addition of a feline atop the handle suggests parallels between war and the hunt, as does the small deer that likely served as the burl on another ceremonial spear-thrower. The same type of spear-thrower is wielded by the mythical wrinkly-faced man who faces an anthropomorphic jaguar on the finial of a blade used to pierce the jugular of sacrificial war captives. The same two mythical figures face off on an ornamental crescent-shaped object. Here, they engage in melee combat, with the wrinkly-faced man gripping the feline’s hair to take it captive.
Information
Title
Crescent-shaped ornament
Dates
600–800
Medium
Copper alloy
Dimensions
7 × 8.2 cm (2 3/4 × 3 1/4 in.)
Credit Line
Museum purchase, Gillett G. Griffin Art of the Ancient Americas Fund
Object Number
2021-43
Place Made
South America, Peru, Loma Negra, North coast, Piura valley
Culture
Materials
Subject
After December 6, 1969 and before 1976, sold by André Emmerich Gallery/Alan C. Lapiner, New York, to Robert Sonin (1926-2011), New York [1]; 2011, sold to private collection, New York; 2020, sold to the Princeton University Art Museum.
Notes:
[1] The work was exhibited and published in André Emmerich, Sun Gods and Saints: Art of Pre-Columbian and Colonial Peru (New York: André Emmerich Gallery, New York), fig. 40. It was subsequently published as collection of Robert Sonin in Alan C. Lapiner, Pre-Columbian Art of South America (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1976), fig. 365.
Crescent depicting supernatural captive-taking
