In most ancient cultures across Central and South America, music took a quite basic form. But throughout Peru, a large and varied range of musical instruments has been excavated from grave sites. Instruments from the early Paracas culture include elaborate clay antaras (pan pipes) with multiple tubes—commonly six but some with as many as 14. During the Chavín period, bone flutes with unevenly spaced holes were popular—they made a variety of defined musical notes and could be played in a complex manner. The Moche sometimes decorated their fine-line pots with depictions of musicians using these flutes, demonstrating quite clearly how they were played.

On other Moche ceramics, musicians are also shown playing different wind instruments, including trumpets. This elegant clay trumpet was made using a reduced firing process. The open mouth of its zoomorphic head, most likely a bat with some feline characteristics, reveals fangs and sharp teeth. Only minimal embellishment has been applied to the red-black surface of its twisted body: the smoothly polished spiral form is structural, creating a specific tone when blown. A variety of wind instruments was common in ancient Peru, especially in the coastal cultures such as the Moche, in which conch shells were also used as trumpets.¹ And Moche whistling pots or silbadoras, which make a shrill sound when air is blown through their ceramic bodies, may also have served as musical instruments, since there is evidence that different jars were designed to emit different pitches.²

Bells were tied to ceremonial animals such as llamas to ring as the creature moved,³ similar to the effect of the gold and silver adornments found on the crowns and other regalia worn by members of the elite (see cats 23, 24).

The austere and simple circular rattle, with its plain gold central disc, has bulbous, round spheres around the outer edge. Each of these domes contains a bead, making a noise when the object is shaken. This decorative element is also found on Moche body adornments, such as coccyx protectors (cat. 72). This type of rattle or bell may have been made for ceremonies in which shamans used rhythmical rattling to enter into trance-like states.⁴ Rattles also feature on pot designs showing how the Moche also used them to beat drums.⁵

Simeran Maxwell

1. Robert Stevenson, ‘Ancient Peruvian instruments’, The Galpin Society Journal, vol. 12, May 1959, p. 26.

2. Laurence Libin, ‘Musical instruments in the Metropolitan Museum’, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, New Series, vol. 35, no. 3, Winter 1977–78, p. 18.

3. Thomas Besom, Of summits and sacrifice: An ethnohistoric study of Inka religious practices, Austin: University of Texas Press 2009, p. 85.

4. Meinrad Maria Grewenig (ed.), IncaGold: 3000 years of advanced civilisations—masterpieces from Peru’s Larco Museum, Heidelberg: Kehrer 2004, p. 82.

5. Stevenson, p. 24.

In most ancient cultures across Central and South America, music took a quite basic form. But throughout Peru, a large and varied range of musical instruments has been excavated from grave sites. Instruments from the early Paracas culture include elaborate clay antaras (pan pipes) with multiple tubes—commonly six but some with as many as 14. During the Chavín period, bone flutes with unevenly spaced holes were popular—they made a variety of defined musical notes and could be played in a complex manner. The Moche sometimes decorated their fine-line pots with depictions of musicians using these flutes, demonstrating quite clearly how they were played.

On other Moche ceramics, musicians are also shown playing different wind instruments, including trumpets. This elegant clay trumpet was made using a reduced firing process. The open mouth of its zoomorphic head, most likely a bat with some feline characteristics, reveals fangs and sharp teeth. Only minimal embellishment has been applied to the red-black surface of its twisted body: the smoothly polished spiral form is structural, creating a specific tone when blown. A variety of wind instruments was common in ancient Peru, especially in the coastal cultures such as the Moche, in which conch shells were also used as trumpets.¹ And Moche whistling pots or silbadoras, which make a shrill sound when air is blown through their ceramic bodies, may also have served as musical instruments, since there is evidence that different jars were designed to emit different pitches.²

Bells were tied to ceremonial animals such as llamas to ring as the creature moved,³ similar to the effect of the gold and silver adornments found on the crowns and other regalia worn by members of the elite (see cats 23, 24).

The austere and simple circular rattle, with its plain gold central disc, has bulbous, round spheres around the outer edge. Each of these domes contains a bead, making a noise when the object is shaken. This decorative element is also found on Moche body adornments, such as coccyx protectors (cat. 72). This type of rattle or bell may have been made for ceremonies in which shamans used rhythmical rattling to enter into trance-like states.⁴ Rattles also feature on pot designs showing how the Moche also used them to beat drums.⁵

Simeran Maxwell

1. Robert Stevenson, ‘Ancient Peruvian instruments’, The Galpin Society Journal, vol. 12, May 1959, p. 26.

2. Laurence Libin, ‘Musical instruments in the Metropolitan Museum’, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, New Series, vol. 35, no. 3, Winter 1977–78, p. 18.

3. Thomas Besom, Of summits and sacrifice: An ethnohistoric study of Inka religious practices, Austin: University of Texas Press 2009, p. 85.

4. Meinrad Maria Grewenig (ed.), IncaGold: 3000 years of advanced civilisations—masterpieces from Peru’s Larco Museum, Heidelberg: Kehrer 2004, p. 82.

5. Stevenson, p. 24.