Returned to lender The Met accepts temporary loans of art both for short-term exhibitions and for long-term display in its galleries.

Bimetallic Effigy Spoon

Chavín

Not on view

This spoon, possibly used to inhale hallucinogens during religious ceremonies, is made of twenty-two individually shaped pieces of gold and silver sheet. The narrow trough is surmounted by a seated male figure with a silver conch-shell trumpet held to his mouth and an abbreviated crested eagle on his back. A face on the underside of his stool would have been visible to the spoon’s user. Two perforations suggest the object could have been worn suspended on a cord.



Esta cuchara, posiblemente utilizada para inhalar alucinógenos durante ceremonias religiosas, está compuesta de veintidós hojas de oro y plata moldeadas de manera individual. Una figura masculina está sentada sobre uno de los extremos y sostiene junto a su boca un pututu de plata en forma de concha. La parte trasera de la figura muestra una versión abreviada de un águila harpía. La parte de abajo del lugar en donde está sentada esta figura masculina fue trabajada de forma que, al usar la cuchara, la persona pudiera ver un rostro. Dos perforaciones entre los hombros del personaje representado sugieren que la cuchara puede haber sido llevada colgada de una cuerda.

Bimetallic Effigy Spoon, Gold, silver, Chavín

This image cannot be enlarged, viewed at full screen, or downloaded.

Open Access

As part of the Met's Open Access policy, you can freely copy, modify and distribute this image, even for commercial purposes.

API

Public domain data for this object can also be accessed using the Met's Open Access API.