Bell

This pear-shaped bell was fabricated through the process of lost-wax casting. Its top consists of a suspension loop that is 7.7 mm high. This loop, like the rest of the bell, originally was designed in wax. It was formed by joining two threads of wax—the distinction between the two has been partially preserved in the metal. The use of casting is confirmed by the dendritic appearance—the coarse grains evidence of slow cooling of the metal as it solidified—seen at the base of the loop. This area also is pinker in color than the rest of the bell, suggesting it has higher copper content at least at the surface, likely due to the fact that someone cleaning or polishing the bell—enriching the surface in gold through the oxidation of copper—would have had greater difficulty reaching this region. Indeed, there are scratches all over the resonator surface suggesting widespread polishing after the bell’s excavation. In originally fabricating the bell, two wax threads were wrapped around the base of this loop, signaling the top of the resonator, which flares outward to be, at its maximum, 23.5 mm in diameter (in the direction that includes the resonator opening); the perpendicular diameter is 20.7 mm. The walls of the resonator are approximately 1.4 mm thick near the top of the opening. There is a spherical clapper contained in the resonator; it appears to be made of metal, having a dull gold color. Interestingly, the edges of the resonator opening show evidence of cutting in certain areas; the metal is recessed in parts and reveals horizontal lines that may be the impressions of a cutting tool. Perhaps the metallurgist removed flash or excess metal from the casting that was attached to these edges. The clapper may have been cast with the bell, with core material enclosing it inside the resonator. Alternatively, it may have been inserted after the bell was cast. However, there does not appear to be deformation that would suggest the metallurgist opened and closed the resonator by hammering.

Metal bells have been recovered from a range of Central American and Colombian contexts but are more typical of the International Group of metals, dating typically to after A.D. 500 and which involved object fabrication in the Isthmus, than of the Initial Group, which includes metal imported to the Isthmus made by practitioners of the Quimbaya, Urabá, and Zenú metallurgical traditions in Colombia (Cooke and Bray 1985; Uribe 1988).

Bells similar to the present example with known archaeological provenience tend to appear as isolated finds or in pairs or small groups. It is difficult to pinpoint a particular archaeological region from which this bell came because this form is so spatially dispersed. A spherical plain bell, around 2 cm in height, with suspension loop and band separating the bell’s top from its resonator, was recovered from Finca Linares, a site near the Culebra Bay in northwestern Costa Rica, along with a frog figurine and a human figurine, all three in metal (Herrera 1998). These were recovered from a human burial, around the person’s neck, along with two serpentine pendants, providing unusual evidence of metal and greenstone in the same funerary context for the Bagaces period (A.D. 300–800 ).

Two bells were recovered from La Fábrica, located in the Central Valley of Costa Rica and dated to ca. A.D. 600–800 given the predominance of late Curridabat ceramics (Snarksis 2003, 178). These bells are copper-based and were associated with deer antlers beside a paved ramp leading to a residential structure.

One hundred and twenty-one bells, including some plain bells in the form of 1978.514.43, are part of the Minor Keith collection from a cemetery at Panteón de la Reina, located in the valley of the Chirripó del Pacífico River, which was in use likely around the time of occupation of the nearby Rivas site, from A.D. 1000 to A.D. 1300 (Quilter 2000). This collection is currently located at the American Museum of Natural History and at the Brooklyn Museum. Keith collected artifacts while laying the groundwork for the establishment of the United Fruit Company, a multinational corporation that dispossessed local banana growers of their lands (Chomsky 1996; Quilter 2000, 180).

Turning to the Greater Coclé region, at least eight spherical and pyriform bells (Penn 40-13-105a-h), were found in the neck region of a deceased human in the upper level of the three-level Burial 11 at Sitio Conte, a large cemetery (ca. A.D. 750–950) on the Río Grande, north of Parita Bay in Panama whose excavations established a ceramic sequence for the Greater Coclé archaeological region (Hearne and Sharer 1992, 106, pl. 41). Burial 11 dates to the later half of the Sitio Conte occupation (Plazas 2007, 55). These eight bells are each between 1.2 and 1.9 cm in height, all lost-wax-cast and relatively plain in design, and have a suspension loop at top and one or more bands between the top and the resonator. One bell was recovered from Burial 18 and another from Burial 25: the former (University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, PA, 40-13-178) (2.6 cm high) is a double bell with each finial showing a figure with crocodilian and feline characteristics and the latter (University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, PA, 40-13-198) (3.2 cm high) has a finial that includes an anthropomorphic armadillo, features a chevron band in the upper part of its resonator, and contains a gold clapper (Sharer and Hearne 1992, 106, pls. 42, 44). Three other bells, two of which are in fragmentary condition, were found in Grave 5 (which contained 15 individuals) associated with a human male. The complete bell is plain but again has a suspension loop and bands between its top and resonator. This object, together with the other metal objects adorning this individual, allowed him, in death, to transform into a person, as O’Day (2014) argues, with multivalent visual abilities, adopting the perspectives of the human and animal figures that feature in his ornaments. The bell may have played a special role in giving this new body and person sound-making abilities as well (O’Day, personal communication, 2017).

Excavators at El Caño, a large funerary complex near the Río Grande, Panama and historically associated with Sitio Conte to its south, recovered a plain pyriform bell (#9450) from Tomb 2, dated to 900-1020 cal. AD based on radiocarbon analysis of material associated with this tomb, the largest and most complex so far known from the site (Mayo and Mayo 2013). The bell, found with Individual 7, is 3.2 cm high and includes two circumferential bands in relief separating the bell’s top from its resonator. Interestingly, its suspension loop is broken off, and its resonator is crushed. A pendant that shows two birds and a human head, also associated with Individual 7, has evidence of burning on its surface, and four associated pectorals were folded leading investigators to believe that these actions of crushing, burning, and folding were part of the funerary treatment this individual was given (Mayo and Mayo 2013, 14). A plain spherical bell (#AU10534) (1.2 cm high) with at least one relief band separating its top from its resonator was also recovered from Tomb 2, but associated with Individual 16.

Today, a range of indigenous peoples live in the Central American Isthmus, including Borucas in the Diquís Delta, Bribris and Cabécares in the Cordillera de Talamanca, Ngäbe and Buglé peoples on the Caribbean in the area of Bocas del Toro, and Kuna and Emberá peoples also on the Caribbean side, farther into the east and south of the Isthmus. These peoples may involve sound-making instruments in their daily lives and ritual practices; sound, especially spoken ritual narrative, is able to produce history. Bribris use rattles, wooden drums, and armadillo shells to produce sound, and Kunas use bamboo, bone, and wood to make panpipes and flutes and gourds to make rattles (Cervantes 2003; Smith 1997). Among the Bribris, certain figures, often roles occupied by men, may practice ritual speech, and women incorporate particular ritualized words into their songs. While people have migrated over time and their sound-making practices may certainly have changed, the recognition of people in the Isthmian region today, creating sound through speech or by working with certain materials, opens up possibilities for interpreting sound-making materials from the past, and their role in the construction of the body and of people’s identities and histories.

Bryan Cockrell, Curatorial Fellow, Arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas 2017

References

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Snarskis, Michael J. “From Jade to Gold in Costa Rica: How, Why, and When.” In Gold and Power in Ancient Costa Rica, Panama, and Colombia, edited by Jeffrey Quilter and John W. Hoopes, 159-204. Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 2003.

Uribe, María Alicia. “Introducción a la orfebrería de San Pedro de Urabá, una región del Noroccidente Colombiano.” Boletín del Museo del Oro 20 (1988): 35-53.