Mortar
ClassificationsTools and Equipment-mortars
Date20th Century
Collection SiteMorobe Province, Papua New Guinea
MediumStone
Dimensions6 5/8 × 19 × 15 in. (16.8 × 48.3 × 38.1 cm)
Credit LineCollected on behalf of the Bowers Museum by the Roski-Keller-Martin Expeditions 2000-2008
Object number2011.11.7
DescriptionExperts believe that undecorated Papuan mortars developed concurrent with agriculture around 8,000 years ago and were used to pound taro into pudding. Mortars such as this are thought to have been used ceremonially rather than as tools for food preparation. Similar examples are still being produced today.Stone objects date back to the earliest inhabitants of Melanesia, growing in specialization over time with the evolution of practices like agriculture and hunting. Mortars, pestles, and ceremonial objects that might be hundreds or thousands of years old are rediscovered with some frequency, especially during construction or from tilling soil, and are used or instilled with a newfound spiritual significance. Utilitarian stone tools tend to be undecorated, but pieces created for ceremonial purposes are highly refined—painstakingly pecked and ground to create figurative or abstract geometric forms.
On View
On view
1500 BCE - 1600 CE
1500 BCE - 1600 CE
before 20th Century
date unknown
Prehistoric
mid 20th Century
mid 20th Century
mid 20th Century
20th Century
20th Century
20th Century