Stirrup-spout bottle with fruits

Between 1200 and 500 BCE, a religious tradition known today as Cupisnique or Chavín left its mark in the visual arts of the North Coast and highlands of Peru. While some works combined features of felines, raptorial birds, and reptiles, others were non-figurative, more abstracted, or represented other facets of life. Aspects of this striking style, such as the stirrup-spout—a form adopted from even earlier traditions of Ecuador—would endure for centuries, ending only in the sixteenth century with the Spanish occupation.

Cupisnique artists preferred a muted palette, usually the color of the fired clay itself, but they often tried to recreate tactile experiences in their ceramic sculptures. This bottle, for example, was inspired by the globose fruits of the lúcuma (Pouteria lucuma), a tree that thrives in the dry environs of the Peruvian coastal and highland valleys. The golden colored flesh of the lúcuma has a flavor described as resembling butterscotch, maple syrup, or sweet potatoes. Lúcumas are still eaten and used for flavoring in Peru and dried and frozen lúcuma preparations are available in specialty markets in the U.S. The composition of this bottle, featuring multiple fruits with their spiky ends bulging out, was likely inspired by how these fruits look when carried inside a mesh bag.

Hugo C. Ikehara-Tsukayama, Senior Research Associate, Arts of the Ancient Americas, 2023

References and Further Reading

Burger, Richard L. Chavin and the Origins of Andean Civilization. London: Thames and Hudson, 1992, pp. 90-99.

Burtenshaw-Zumstein, Julia T. Cupisnique, Tembladera, Chongoyape, Chavín? A Typology of Ceramic Styles from Formative Period Northern Peru, 1800-200 BC. Unpublished PhD dissertation. Norwich: University of East Anglia, 2014.

Elera, Carlos. "El complejo cultural Cupisnique: Antecedentes y desarrollo de su Ideología religiosa." Senri Ethnological Studies, No. 37 (1993), pp. 229-57.

Fux, Peter. Chavin: Peru’s Enigmatic Temple in the Andes. Zurich: Scheidegger & Spiess, 2013.

Ikehara-Tsukayama, Hugo C. The Cupisnique-Chavín Religious Tradition in the Andes. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Anthropology. https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190854584.013.448

Lapiner, Alan C. Pre-Columbian Art of South America. New York: H. N. Abrams, 1976, p. 59.