Feline-Head Bottle, Cupisnique

(jazzy piano music) - [Host] We're in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the gallery devoted to pre-Colombian art. We're looking at a ceramic vase from South America from the area that is now the nation of Peru. What's interesting is that when you think of pre-Colombian cultures from South America, we generally think of the Inca, that was the culture that was dominant when the Spanish arrived. But art had been made, and people had lived in this area for thousands of years before that. We're looking at an object that may be as old as 3500 years. - [Host] It was a bottle that was made by a group of people who's name we don't really know. And we refer to them instead by a general style category of Cupisnique. This particular one is from the Jequetepeque Valley on the coast of Peru. - [Host] But Cupisnique refers to a style that came before a culture that we have more confidence about. That is Chavin. - [Host] What used to be thought was that Chavin is what we would call a mother culture. Anything that was found in a style that reminded us of Chavin was some kind of Chavin. Now we know that this is actually something that is part of the development of that style prior to Chavin, and Chavin is the culmination of that development. - [Host] This is such a good reminder that our history is something that is always growing. - [Host] These cultures weren't oral cultures. They were not cultures that developed writing, it wasn't important to them. And so we instead have to rely on archaeological information to help us place these styles in their proper temporal context. - [Host] And it also helps us when we look closely at the object. It helps us identify things that might be otherwise mysterious if you see lots of examples of the same kind of form, the same kind of animal face. And we see here, in fact, several animal faces. - [Host] And that's part of the idea of this style as it was developing. It relies on combining multiple points of view together in one image. And what we see is something that is meant to distinguish whether or not you were a member of the group. - [Host] So if you could read it, you belonged. - [Host] Absolutely. And if you don't belong, you're not going to be able to understand it's mystical imagery. - [Host] The easiest thing for me to read is the right hand side. You see a kind of thinning of the clay. And the representation of a feline face. You can just see a fang, you can see an eye, perhaps a ridge above the head, a snout. And then perhaps some fur that comes down below the neck. - [Host] Very hard to tell, these animal forms are sometimes so generalized that all we can say is it's feline. It's reptilian. That sort of thing. - [Host] And then, if you imagine that the vessel is then tipped over on its side, so that it can pour, another face emerges. The face of another feline. You can see a large eye that seems to be looking upward. You can see this snout that curls around and shows us that the fur is spotted, and just below that, more teeth, and more fangs. - [Host] There's so many fangs that I'm questioning whether that's actually meant to be a set of feline fangs, and might instead be the fangs of a caiman. Caiman are similar to alligators and crocodiles. Very fearsome, very dangerous. They did not actually live in the areas where these things where being made. They were more legendary predators from the lands beyond the mountains and the jungle. - [Host] So it might have had a kind of mythic quality, even in this era. - [Host] Absolutely. What you noted, that eye with the black pupil looking up, we refer to that as a pendant iris. Because it's hanging from the top of the eye. And that again, is something that we see in Chavin. Originally people thought, well that must mean that these people are looking at Chavin style, and making Chavin derivative art. Instead, it turns out, they were making what would become Chavin. - [Host] There's another bit of clay that wings out. And that can be read as the tongue of the large face. But when the vessel is placed back on the table, that almost functions as the tail of the reptilian, or feline creature that we saw on the right. Except that this is maybe even more complex. Because we notice that there's a large eye in the upper left that reorients us yet again. - [Host] And even then, what we just saw as a tongue, and possibly a tail, if we look at the eye in one direction, might be an ear. - [Host] I love this idea that we see multiplicity of forms that become more or less dominant depending on the orientation of the vessel. - [Host] This is something that is for ritual purposes. We know that it was painted after being fired, rather than before being fired. Which means it has a very delicate surface. It's not something that you're to use for everyday wear. This is the good stuff. And the imagery is part of that. This creation of what some people have interpreted as being a shamanic vision, a mystical vision of the world beyond our world where powerful spirit animals are the rulers. (jazzy piano music)