Moche lobster
2008-02-07 | Filed under Lobsters |
The Moche people of Peru inhabited coastal valleys. They were primarily farmers, cleverly diverted rivers to irrigate their crops. Perhaps due to the proximity and importance of water, their deity (a charming fellow known as the Decapitator) was sometimes depicted as a sea monster.
Not having developed television or a written language, the Moche had a lot of time on their hands. Based upon surviving pottery, they were pioneers of masturbation, fellatio, cunnilingus, and anal sex, in between more ritualized sessions of vaginal sex for purposes of procreation. Animals were also depicted in art; the lobster sculpture below dates to about 200 CE.
Human sacrifices may have appeased the Decapitator and encouraged rainfall…at least, until the sixth century. Thirty years of floods, followed by thirty years of drought, did not bring about the collapse of Moche civilization, but it did incite social unrest from which the Moche could not recover.
The lobster sculpture (which I can’t help thinking might, depending on scale, double as a sex toy) currently lives in Lima’s Larco Museum. The museum boasts an impressive collection of pre-Columbian art. It was also among the first museums to include its entire collection in an electronic catalog.
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[...] http://meganpowell.net/blog/2008/02/07/moche-lobster/The Moche people of Peru inhabited coastal valleys. They were primarily farmers, cleverly diverted rivers to irrigate their crops. Perhaps due to the proximity and importance of water, their deity (a charming fellow known as the Decapitator) was sometimes depicted as a sea monster. [...]