[rhythmic percussion with native flute evoking period and mood]
Male Narrator: This container, called a poporo, played a role in a ritual practice of indigenous people throughout the Andes. Before chewing on coca leaves, a practice that continues today in some places, they increased the leaves’ potency as a stimulant by adding powdered lime. The lime was stored in containers like this one.
This especially elaborate example suggests it belonged to a prominent person. It’s made of sheet gold, and takes the shape of a feline, a symbol of power. Assistant curator James Doyle:
[music ends]
James Doyle: The artist used different techniques of crimping and also wires to join the various sheets of metal in the shape of the jaguar. The details are really exceptional. The front paws have individually crimped toes that come to a point like actual feline claws do. And the tail kind of arches up over the back in a way that’s depicting a realistic pose for a feline. Between the shoulder blades of the jaguar is an opening through which is inserted a dipper, or palillo in Spanish, that would retrieve the lime for the coca ceremony.
[rhythmic percussion with native flute evoking period and mood]
Male Narrator: The feline’s nose ring is made of platinum, which was both a rare material and difficult to work with because of its high melting point. Few artists in the Ancient Americas had mastered the technique for melting and shaping platinum.
[music ends]
James Doyle: The shaping of a poporo in the form of a feline would probably imbue it with a sense of power that’s referring to this predatory cat. And the owner then would have had an element of prestige—with the materials—but also a symbolic power associated with the feline as he or she used this poporo.
