Lup in Lima: A Plethora of Spiritual Riches

I got a tip to go out to the east end of Pueblo Libre to check out the anthropology museums. Convinced, I could walk to the Museum without really knowing where it was, I ended up covering a lot of ground by foot (like 5+ miles). But I finally found the Larco Museum.

Entering the museum

The first two rooms when you enter are dedicated to the museum's founding family. Rafael Larco Herrera was given a collection of archaeological artifacts from his brother-in-law, Victor, and left them all to his son, Larco Hoyle. Victor had already opened the first museum in Lima and he urged Larco to set up a new museum to house all of these pieces and begin to bring together a larger collection of artifacts. Larco was eager to create a monument in honor of his father, so he bought a number of private collections and in the 1920s, he opened his museum in an old Viceroyal building that had been built on top of a 7th century pre-Columbian pyramid.

The courtyard of the museum/house

As Larco begin to set up the museum and classify this acquired collection, he realized how few categories existed to classify Peruvian artifacts. Within a decade, he had documented a number of new Peruvian cultures, and developed the first Peruvian chronology of ancient cultures: a chronology that is still used today. Larco also developed new techniques to determine the age of artifacts based on their placement in ancient structures, as well as developed an early core sampling technique.

The museum is broadly divided into his own chronology. I am going to apologize now for not remembering which things belonged to which cultures specifically, but most of these things are from the coastal and mountain regions in the northern half of the country, with the final stuff being mostly Incan.

Given the dependence on agriculture by these ancient societies, the earth was seen to be composed of three "worlds": the sky (the source of rain), the land (which had to be worked), and the subterranean world (where the dead went to and where the fruits of the earth came from). Each of these were represented by an animal: the bird (often an owl), the feline, and the serpent (or also sometimes the spider), respectively. Representations of deities most often included these animals.

The three animals were often combined in pottery. For instance this shows the body of a bird combined with the feet of a feline and the tail of a serpent.

As early as 1000 BC, these societies were producing beautiful and complex pottery. These challenging shapes and constructions involved multiple laborious steps and often would take days to produce.

These two animals playing show how fluidly the movement of these deer were portrayed, as though you could see them moving (thought to be from 1-100 AD). Also, they are adorable.

In addition to portraying the three dominant animals, there was also a strong motif of the balance of good and evil, represented through darkness and light.

As you can see above, a number of pieces existed within this theme. Because there was no paint used at this point, these were done using the "negative" painting technique that I mentioned before (as opposed to a "positive" technique of painting or putting something on the finished piece). Again, they would cover the part they wanted to stay white with a heavy clay and bake the entire piece with the clay on it. This would preserve the parts under the clay as white, allowing shading without using any dyes or paint.

Another unique aspect was that there were also pots that portrayed real people. Rather than do portraits of powerful men (always men), they would create likenesses in pottery. Only if you were an elite, of course.

With the Spanish conquest, a lot of Andean art incorporated European influences such as using lead- and mineral-based glazes for the first time. Also, it was common for Pre-Colombian art to show a feline god attacking a deer, or a person carrying a subdued deer on their back to demonstrate their god-like strength. However, with the Spanish conquest, you began to see pieces that showed the feline figure subdued for the first time.

A subdued feline being carried by a powerful man. Doesn't take much to read into the meaning of this symbolism.

The three animals were also present in textiles. Can you find the feline, serpent and owl in this?

Human sacrifice was definitely also a big presence throughout the museum. Lots of ceremonial bowls and costumes for both the victims and overseeing priests.

Ceremonial owl bowls made of silver

There were a ton of Incan gold and silver artifacts as well, as you can imagine. While silver and gold were used in pieces of art, it wasn't the minerals that were valued, so much as the effect. The only things in nature that are associated with light are valued resources such as water and sunlight. Therefore, artifacts that also reflected light were seen to be connected to Gods as well. The elites then had lots of shiny accessories to wear, because if shined like the sun or the river, you must hold God-like power.

It was common during the Incan empire for elites to be buried with miniatures like this, made out of silver, copper of gold.

Because it was really the effect of shiny-ness that was important and not the minerals themselves, they would make a mixture of metals with just enough gold or silver to shine brightly. So when you actually look at how much gold and silver are in a collection like this, it doesn't actually come to much. After the Spanish conquest, when the conquistadores began to melt down these pieces of art and jewelry for booty. In the end, they actually did not end up with that much gold and silver. The mineral riches that brought Spain the most wealth were actually acquired through extensive mining. So in the end, all of those Incan artifacts were destroyed for nothing...

Silver alloy necklace that would have been worn by an elite.

Similarly quartz was valued, and was used in jewelry.

These shells were very valuable as well and sometimes even used for currency in Incan societies. However, this practice faded away once the Spanish arrived and established a new currency that centered exclusively around minerals instead of shells.

This is the largest and most complete set worn by an elite that exists in Peru. In addition to the pieces above, elites would also wear large nose rings, often large enough to obscure the bottom half of their face.

My favorite part was honestly the storage area. You finish going through the museum and were like, WOW. That was quite the collection! And then you turn a corner and there is room after room after room with tons of art, categorize by subject. And most of them are in great condition. Suddenly the collection gets a whole lot more impressive.

I finished up the day checking out the Colonial surroundings.