VIRÚ-GALLINAZO culture North coast 1250 BC – 1 AD
Stirrup vessel in the form of a couple 1250 BC - 1 AD ceramic14.3 (h) x 18.3 (w) x 8.4 (d) cm Museo Larco, Lima Photograph: Museo Larco
Virú-Gallinazo pottery developed in the Virú Valley, in the period preceding Moche occupation of the area. Of considerable charm, the pottery might be described as being uncluttered in design, in comparison with the ceramics produced by their contemporaries.
Unlike the Moche, who emphasised moulds and modelling, for the Virú-Gallinazo the application of resist or negative decorations was most significant. They drew the distinctive negative patterns as positives onto the clay in resists made of organic pigments or wax, and then subjected the pottery to a twofold firing process in an open oven.1 The red colour was achieved by adding crushed shell, and the black by smoking the work in the second firing.2 Both these pots typify Virú-Gallinazo style, not simply because of the use of these two techniques, but because they both also have a strap handle and single conical spout.
The best known of this pottery was found at Gallinazo by American archaeologist Wendell Bennett, who named the type of pottery after the site. Rafael Larco Hoyle had earlier uncovered similar pottery and named it after the Virú Valley in which he found it. Debate over whether or not Virú-Gallinazo is actually a culture or simply a style continues today.3
The round body of the bird bottle rests on four legs, each with the feet and carefully rendered claws of the Pampas cat (Leopardus pajeros). A handle connects the base of the bird’s neck with the conical neck of the pouring spout. The beak, wings and eyes are gently incised to delineate them from the rest of the bird’s form. The bottle is completely decorated with a pattern of stripes, circles and solid dots: the horizontal and at times wavy lines on the body of the bird, the legs and also up the spout combined with the spots on the front of the wings are distinctive to this style of ceramic. So too are the vertical lines on the bird’s chest and across the central handle. This type of decoration is very different from that of previous cultures, and seems more secular. However, a stylised octopus appears on the bird’s protruding throat. This combination of bird, Pampas cat and octopus is an excellent example of how the Virú-Gallinazo combined elements from the sky, land and sea into one figure. The bird symbolises the sky, which was the domain of the gods and rulers; the earth is represented by the cat and is the where the general population lived; and the sea or underworld, the realm of the dead, is embodied by the octopus.
Effigy sculpture was common across many ancient Peruvian cultures. In some cases, like this, the various religious realms are represented by particular animals. In other cultures, humanoid figures represent dead ancestors or their servants (see cats 141, 178, 179, 195).
The second pot shows limited use of the resist technique on each figure’s head. It also demonstrates the subtle variation from red to black made possible by the two-part firing process.
Simeran Maxwell
1. Christopher B. Donnan, Ceramics of ancient Peru, Los Angeles: Fowler Museum of Cultural History, UCLA 1992, pp. 22–23.
2. Cristóbal Campana, ‘The Virú culture’, in Peru. Art from the Chavín to the Incas, Milan: Skira 2006, p. 36.
3. See Jean-François Millaire (ed.), Gallinazo: An early cultural tradition of the Peruvian north coast, Los Angeles: Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press 2009.
Virú-Gallinazo pottery developed in the Virú Valley, in the period preceding Moche occupation of the area. Of considerable charm, the pottery might be described as being uncluttered in design, in comparison with the ceramics produced by their contemporaries.
Unlike the Moche, who emphasised moulds and modelling, for the Virú-Gallinazo the application of resist or negative decorations was most significant. They drew the distinctive negative patterns as positives onto the clay in resists made of organic pigments or wax, and then subjected the pottery to a twofold firing process in an open oven.1 The red colour was achieved by adding crushed shell, and the black by smoking the work in the second firing.2 Both these pots typify Virú-Gallinazo style, not simply because of the use of these two techniques, but because they both also have a strap handle and single conical spout.
The best known of this pottery was found at Gallinazo by American archaeologist Wendell Bennett, who named the type of pottery after the site. Rafael Larco Hoyle had earlier uncovered similar pottery and named it after the Virú Valley in which he found it. Debate over whether or not Virú-Gallinazo is actually a culture or simply a style continues today.3
The round body of the bird bottle rests on four legs, each with the feet and carefully rendered claws of the Pampas cat (Leopardus pajeros). A handle connects the base of the bird’s neck with the conical neck of the pouring spout. The beak, wings and eyes are gently incised to delineate them from the rest of the bird’s form. The bottle is completely decorated with a pattern of stripes, circles and solid dots: the horizontal and at times wavy lines on the body of the bird, the legs and also up the spout combined with the spots on the front of the wings are distinctive to this style of ceramic. So too are the vertical lines on the bird’s chest and across the central handle. This type of decoration is very different from that of previous cultures, and seems more secular. However, a stylised octopus appears on the bird’s protruding throat. This combination of bird, Pampas cat and octopus is an excellent example of how the Virú-Gallinazo combined elements from the sky, land and sea into one figure. The bird symbolises the sky, which was the domain of the gods and rulers; the earth is represented by the cat and is the where the general population lived; and the sea or underworld, the realm of the dead, is embodied by the octopus.
Effigy sculpture was common across many ancient Peruvian cultures. In some cases, like this, the various religious realms are represented by particular animals. In other cultures, humanoid figures represent dead ancestors or their servants (see cats 141, 178, 179, 195).
The second pot shows limited use of the resist technique on each figure’s head. It also demonstrates the subtle variation from red to black made possible by the two-part firing process.
Simeran Maxwell
1. Christopher B. Donnan, Ceramics of ancient Peru, Los Angeles: Fowler Museum of Cultural History, UCLA 1992, pp. 22–23.
2. Cristóbal Campana, ‘The Virú culture’, in Peru. Art from the Chavín to the Incas, Milan: Skira 2006, p. 36.
3. See Jean-François Millaire (ed.), Gallinazo: An early cultural tradition of the Peruvian north coast, Los Angeles: Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press 2009.
Virú-Gallinazo pottery developed in the Virú Valley, in the period preceding Moche occupation of the area. Of considerable charm, the pottery might be described as being uncluttered in design, in comparison with the ceramics produced by their contemporaries.
Unlike the Moche, who emphasised moulds and modelling, for the Virú-Gallinazo the application of resist or negative decorations was most significant. They drew the distinctive negative patterns as positives onto the clay in resists made of organic pigments or wax, and then subjected the pottery to a twofold firing process in an open oven.1 The red colour was achieved by adding crushed shell, and the black by smoking the work in the second firing.2 Both these pots typify Virú-Gallinazo style, not simply because of the use of these two techniques, but because they both also have a strap handle and single conical spout.
The best known of this pottery was found at Gallinazo by American archaeologist Wendell Bennett, who named the type of pottery after the site. Rafael Larco Hoyle had earlier uncovered similar pottery and named it after the Virú Valley in which he found it. Debate over whether or not Virú-Gallinazo is actually a culture or simply a style continues today.3
The round body of the bird bottle rests on four legs, each with the feet and carefully rendered claws of the Pampas cat (Leopardus pajeros). A handle connects the base of the bird’s neck with the conical neck of the pouring spout. The beak, wings and eyes are gently incised to delineate them from the rest of the bird’s form. The bottle is completely decorated with a pattern of stripes, circles and solid dots: the horizontal and at times wavy lines on the body of the bird, the legs and also up the spout combined with the spots on the front of the wings are distinctive to this style of ceramic. So too are the vertical lines on the bird’s chest and across the central handle. This type of decoration is very different from that of previous cultures, and seems more secular. However, a stylised octopus appears on the bird’s protruding throat. This combination of bird, Pampas cat and octopus is an excellent example of how the Virú-Gallinazo combined elements from the sky, land and sea into one figure. The bird symbolises the sky, which was the domain of the gods and rulers; the earth is represented by the cat and is the where the general population lived; and the sea or underworld, the realm of the dead, is embodied by the octopus.
Effigy sculpture was common across many ancient Peruvian cultures. In some cases, like this, the various religious realms are represented by particular animals. In other cultures, humanoid figures represent dead ancestors or their servants (see cats 141, 178, 179, 195).
The second pot shows limited use of the resist technique on each figure’s head. It also demonstrates the subtle variation from red to black made possible by the two-part firing process.
Simeran Maxwell
1. Christopher B. Donnan, Ceramics of ancient Peru, Los Angeles: Fowler Museum of Cultural History, UCLA 1992, pp. 22–23.
2. Cristóbal Campana, ‘The Virú culture’, in Peru. Art from the Chavín to the Incas, Milan: Skira 2006, p. 36.
3. See Jean-François Millaire (ed.), Gallinazo: An early cultural tradition of the Peruvian north coast, Los Angeles: Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press 2009.
