Comments on: Well, it's not a platypus, but what is it?

Question: Well, it's not a platypus, but what is it?

dreamyshade — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 17:32:20 -0800

When and where does this little ornamental object (maybe a brooch) come from? Any guesses? I cut the picture out of a National Geographic several years ago, but I know nothing about it, and I'm getting curious because I like it a lot.

Additional questions: what kind of bird is it? What kind of stone do you think that is? Where could I find more information (or somebody who might know)?

By: iconomy

iconomy — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 17:42:27 -0800

Any guesses?

Pelican, turquoise and copper. Just guesses. The bird is adorable, for some reason. Very pretty trinket!

By: nomis

nomis — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 17:47:15 -0800

It's from Sipan, on the north coast of Peru. I think it's an ear plug, and the image is a muscovy duck.

By: nomis

nomis — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 17:50:59 -0800

Some more info on this page:
http://inkasperu.com/tours/northern_kingdoms/northern_kingdoms_6n.html

Scroll down a bit for the duck image.

By: nomis

nomis — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 18:02:55 -0800

This image shows the shafts at the back of the plugs that go through holes in the ear lobe, in case you were wondering how they are worn.

By: iconomy

iconomy — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 18:31:58 -0800

So cool, nomis....an earplug.

By: dreamyshade

dreamyshade — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 18:42:26 -0800

Cool! Thank you for identifying it (and so quickly). It's fun to see more pictures after staring at mine so much, and now I have a bunch of cultural context to learn about. I'm not sure Muscovy ducks look quite like it, but it does look like a duck of some kind.

The one in that picture is in much better shape (looks like this one) -- do you think it's the same object after some restoration, or a different one, maybe a reproduction?

By: RichardP

RichardP — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 18:55:24 -0800

Martha Cooper was the National Geographic photographer who photographed that Sipan ear ornament with the representation of a Muscovy duck. You can buy a poster of one of her photographs of that artifact from allposters.com.

By: zamboni

zamboni — Sun, 03 Jun 2007 19:47:13 -0800

The Moche are pretty awesome. I saw an exhibition of Moche pottery at the Harvard Peabody museum a while ago, and some of the pieces were just phenomenal.

By: dreamyshade

dreamyshade — Sun, 10 Jun 2007 03:03:17 -0800

Follow-up: If you're curious, I wrote a blog post about what I figured out with the help of these answers. :)