- Title
- Lime Spoon with Hummingbird
- Culture
- Inka
- Date Made
- 1250–1470
- Medium
- Gold and malachite
- Dimensions
- 3 5/8 x 1 1/2 in. (9.21 x 3.81 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.2003.77
- Collecting Area
- Art of the Ancient Americas
- Curatorial Notes
This elegant little spoon was once a fundamental component of Andean ritual practice—the chewing of coca leaves. The spoon is dipped into a container of lime powder (made from burned seashells), which was then taken into the mouth with a wad of dried coca leaves. Lime, a calcium carbonate, breaks down the alkaloids in the coca leaves, acting as a catalyst for their stimulating effect. The precious material and elaborate decoration of this particular Inka spoon proclaims it as an elite tool, while commoners—if or when they chewed the sacred leaf—would have used wooden sticks instead. The practice and associated paraphernalia (see M.2007.146.447) have been nearly unchanged for more than 3,000 years, and coca-chewing—in various forms—remains fundamental in the ritual practices of Indigenous peoples from Colombia to Argentina, accompanying all important ceremonies, conversations, and decision-making.
2025
- Selected Exhibition History
- Contested Visions in the Spanish Colonial World. November 6, 2011 - January 29, 2012
