Unit 5 - Art of Indigenous Americas Flashcards
Chavin de Huantar: Identifiers
Location: Peru
Date: 900-200 BCE
Chavin de Huantar: Form Old Temple
• Built by Chavin people (pre date Inca)
• Old temple: built 900 BCE, inward facing U shape with central court
* obelisks & stone monuments w/ low relief carvings
* maze of passageways, chambers & water conduits
Chavin de Huantar: Form New Temple
• constructed between 500 and 200 BCE
• relief sculptures more block life form
• long staircase led to upper landing
• below- sunken rectangular court
• hidden passageways & platforms allowed priests to miraculously appear before audiences
Chavin de Huantar: Function Lanzon Stela
• to honor a god: likely to ensure good harvest
• Lanzon means ‘great spear’ but likely refers to an agricultural tool, not a weapon
Chavin de Huantar: Function Nose Ornament
- nose ornament: septum piercing, common in the Andes
- upward looking eyes: shows wealth, power, and allegiance to Chavin religion
- formed by hammering and cutting gold
- transforms wearer into supernatural being during ceremonies
Chavin de Huantar: Content
• Lanzon: deity, human & animal features, fangs and talons (jaguar + caiman), eyebrows & hair made up of snakes
• deliberately confusing
• contour rivalry: 2 faces sharing one mouth
Chavin de Huantar: Context
• Andean Highlands of Peru: 10,330 ft. in elevation
• Near 2 mountains that allow passage between desert coast (west) & Amazon jungle (East): 2 rivers join into one, seen as powerful phenomenon
• chavin declined in 200 BCE: site influenced many people 700 years, worshippers & spread artistic style
Mesa Verde Cliff Dwellings: Identifiers
Style: Anasazi
Location: Colorado
Date: 450-1300 CE
Mesa Verde Cliff Dwellings: Form
• 1.62 miles above sea level
• made of stone, mortar, and plaster
• largest archaeological site in US: over 600 dwellings - 3 to 4 stories high
• logs build into walls to make beams for ceilings - access floors through ladders
• mostly built during 12th century
• climb cliff walls using toe holds
Mesa Verde Cliff Dwellings: Function
- pueblo built into sides of a cliff, housed 100 people
- largest: cliff palace: 150 circular rooms, 20 circular rooms
- house organized around Kivas: wood-beamed roof, roof supported by 6 engaged support columns of masonry, shelf-like bench, fire pit/hearth, ventilation shaft, deflector, sipapu
- clans moved together for mutual support and defense
Mesa Verde Cliff Dwellings: Content
- mural 30 red against white wall theory:
- geometric shapes represent landscape
- red band at bottom is earth
- white represents sky
- top of red band forms horizontal line that separates sky and earth
- triangle peaks are mountains
- rectangle in sky: clouds, rain, sun, or moon
- dotted lines represent cracks in earth
Mesa Verde Cliff Dwellings: Context
- farming done on the plateau above pueblo; everything had to be imported into structure; water seeped through sandstone and collected in trenches near reaer of structure
- low winter sun penetrated pueblo; high summer sun did not enter interior, stayed cool
Anasazi
○ Inhabited from 450 CE-1300 CE
○ Sedentary farmers – beans,
squash, corn
○ Trade amongst many different
groups, extending down into
Modern day Mexico
○ Abandoned in 1300
■ Drought
● Mesa Verde means Green Table
● Rediscovery in 1888
○ Preservation for tourism
■ Mesa Verde National Park
Yaxchilan- Structure 40: Form
- overlooks main plaza
- 3 doors lead to a central room decorated with stucco
- roof remains nearly intact, with a larger roof comb
- ## corbel arch interior
Lanzon Stone: Function
- served as cult figure
- center of pilgrimage however few had access to it
- stone acted as oracle? point of pilgrimage
- importance of acoustics in underground chamber
Relief Sculpture: Content
- shows jaguars in shallow relief
- located on ruins of stairway at Chavin
Nose ornament: Context
- elite men and women wore ornaments as emblems of their ties to religion and eventually buried with them
- chavin religion related to appearance of fire large-scale precious metal objects; new metallurgical process
- technical innovations express whole other nature of religion
Yaxchilan- Structure 40: Identifiers
Style: Mayan
Location: Mexico
Date: 725 CE
Yaxchilan- Structure 40: Form
- 3 doors led to central room decorated with stucco
- overlooks main plaza
- roof remains intact, large roof comb (ornamented stone tops on roofs)
- corbel arch interior
- narrow, not meant to hold many people
- intricate lattice work
- carved lintels on underside of doorways
- painted: remnants of blue and red, very detailed
Yaxchilan- Structure 40: Function
*advertise Bird Jaguar IV power dynastic lineage and thus right to rule
*built by ruler Bird Jaguar IV for his son, who dedicated it to him
Yaxchilan- Lintel 25: Content
- bloodletting: loss of blood + burning incense = hallucinations, desired to gain access to other realm
- Lady Xook kneels before a vision serpent from whose mouth emerges a figure, commemorate husbands rise to throne
- holds a bowl w/ ceremonial items, runs a rope with thorns through her tongue, burns paper on a dish as gift to netherworld
- commemorate accession of Shield Jaguar II to the throne
Lintel 25: Function
- honor and feed the gods
keep order in cosmos - act of rebirth
- intended to relay a message of refoundation of site– long pause in buildings history
- Shield Jaguars building program throughout city may have been a attempt to reinforce his lineage and right to rule
Great Serpent Mound: Identifers
Style: Mississippian
Location: Ohio
Date: 1070 CE
Great Serpent Mound: Form
- southwest ohio
1300 ft. long, 1-3 ft. in height - largest serpent effigy
- not the only one ever made
Great Serpent Mound: Function
- atypical, no artifacts
- burials nearby
- no evidence to suggest Gr. Serpent Mound is for burial
- used to mark seasons, time, when to harvest? Lunar phases? compass or Halley’s comet?