A Day at the Museums

The works created during the colonial times in Peru have been influenced by the previous eras in Peru's history. The painting below depicts the Last Supper, but as we can see it includes the Peruvian flat bread, cooked guinea pig, and a potato which shows us that the painter was influenced by the culture of Peru since all of those foods are common things to eat.

The candle holder below might have also been influenced since swirls were very common things to put on pots and jugs in previous eras and here the arms are swirled. Also birds and nature were common place on pots and jugs and now in colonial times they are still depicted.

The following two pictures are both from colonial times and each has a griffin in them, which is a bird creature. A creature similar to this can be seen on many different artifacts from Peru's earlier history. This symbol originally may have been a depiction of a god and as time passed it lost that meaning and became a symbol on a coat of arms.

Another symbol that can be seen through several eras of Peruvian history is the snake, which was seen as the guardians of the underworld.

On a vase from the Moche era, there is a depiction of a sacrifice ceremony. The top shows the world of the gods receiving the sacrificial blood and the bottom show the world of the humans with the captive warriors that will be sacrificed. The double headed snake separates the world of the gods and the world of the humans. The reason the snake may have been used to separate these two worlds in this picture is because the snake is of the underworld and this whole picture is depicting death of humans for the gods, so it makes sense that the snake was used as a divider.

The snake is another symbol the made its way into colonial works. As you can see in the following picture, the ropes that tie Jesus to the cross almost look like snakes.

 

In the same portrait there are several other symbols like the bird next to God in heaven, that may be remnant of the bird gods from early Peruvian eras, and the pan flutes, which were important musical instruments used in ceremonies.

We can also figure out what was important to the early Peruvian peoples by looking at their pottery. Corn is seen on many pieces of pottery throughout different eras. Corn was a main staple of their diet and corn beer which was the ritual and celebratory drink of the Andean people.

Another image often seen throughout the eras is that of pregnancy, childbirth, or a mother and her kid. This may show the importance of having kids in these early civilizations.