Los tupus y estatuillas de plata inka: una aproximación a sus aleaciones

Abstract

The tupu, tupo or pin has been manufactured for more than 1700 years to embellish women’s clothing in the Andes. Women typically wore clothing pins, but archaeological evidencs shows that these pins were also used as part of the capacocha ceremonies and as an offering to the huacas. Depending on fashion and woman’s social status, tupus were made using different metals and alloys such as gold, silver, tumbaga, copper, bronze and brass. When taken out of context they are difficult to date. In our work we searched for the characteristics of the silver alloys used in their fabrication to check whether any criteria could be linked to their period of production, in particular for the miniature tupus from the capacocha silver figurines. A group of silver tupus belonging to the Museo Inka of the Universidad Nacional de San Antonio Abad del Cusco, and to the Museo de Oro y Armas del Mundo of Lima were analyzed by X-ray fluorescence (XRF). A few capacocha silver figurines from the Museo de Oro y Armas del Mundo were included in this analytical study. Data obtained were compared to the composition of both silver coins struck in Potosi and the rare published tupus and figurines analysis.

Keywords

• alloy
• silver
• inca
• figurine
• XRF
• tupu