FIG. 7 (above): Whistle in
the form of two human
fi gures. Tembladera, Peru.
700–400 BC.
Ceramic, pigment. H: 18.6 cm.
Saint Louis Art Museum, gift of
Morton D. May, inv. 186:1979.
98
an Inka context on the central coast of Peru.4
The simple diagonals and circles decorating the
wooden beam suggest a cultural association
with the Chincha region, which was conquered
by the Inka Empire in the 1470s. Spanish colonial
documents report that the Chincha served
as intermediaries in the spondylus shell trade between
the Ecuadorian source and the Inka elite
class, who distributed sumptuary goods to cooperating
conquests.5
Ceramics and other objects in the exhibition
enrich the picture of the dualities that permeated
ancient Peruvian life and textiles. For example,
a Tembladera ceramic whistle demonstrating
the productive unity of male and female accompanies
examples of gendered clothing. This remarkable
object, more than 2,000 years old, is
among the many superlative ancient American
objects gifted to the museum by Morton D. May
(fi g. 7). In an embodiment of the complementary
nature of Andean gender, a man and a woman
stand closely beside each other, each forming one
half of a body. Like other Tembladera fi gurines,
this whistle clearly delineates the characteristics
of gender-specifi c dress, with the male wearing
a loincloth and bird headdress and the woman
adorned in a long dress decorated with diagonal
lines and circles.6
ART ON VIEW
vanced degree of artistry invested in accompaniments
for the dead. Deceased ancestors were
preserved as mummy bundles so that they could
take part in ongoing ritual life. For example,
elite Wari individuals were placed in a seated position,
wrapped in numerous layers of cloth, and
dressed in elaborate textiles. The feather mask, a
gift to the museum from Mr. and Mrs. Alfred E.
Goldman, would have been stuffed with cotton
and placed atop the many layers of wrappings
enclosing a seated corpse (fi g. 9). The feather
mask’s open eyes, brightly colored face, and
realistic hair communicate the living essence of
the deceased individual it covered, establishing a
connection with the living.
In a literal reference to balance, a rare form
of textile from the Inka era had an as-yet-unknown
role in the empire’s political economy
(fi g. 8). Two nets, precisely hand-knotted from
fi ne cotton threads are suspended from a central
wooden beam, which is bisected by another fi ne
thread. The form suggests a balance scale for
measuring goods, but neither currency nor standardized
measures of capital existed in ancient
Peru. Ancient Peruvian balances are extremely
rare yet exist in the collections of a few prestigious
museums. Several balances of this type
were excavated in the early twentieth century in