Shaman Pots, Sympathetic Magic, and Spinning Souls among the Medio Period Casas Grandes: Altered States of Consciousness in Other-than-Human Persons
Religions March 27, 2024 DOI: 10.3390/rel15030286 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Historical analysis Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Intervention | tobacco |
| Topics | Altered states of consciousness Shamanism |
| Keywords | Archaeology Magic Other-than-human beings Trance |
| Key points | Proposes that Casas Grandes pottery effigies were animate objects designed to enter shamanic trance states through spinning and symbolic designs, paralleling human shamans. |
Abstract
Medio Period (AD 1200 to 1450) Casas Grandes shamans used tobacco and possibly other entheogens to initiate trance states that allowed their spirits to travel across the cosmos. These trance experiences involved a sense of vertigo and soul flight that is cross-culturally common and occurs with tobacco-based nicotine intoxication. The Medio Period shamans also relied on and interacted with other-than-human persons during their travels, including macaw- and serpent-linked deities, as well as animated objects designed to participate in their shamanic journeys. The animated objects included Playas Red and Chihuahuan Polychrome pottery effigies of humans, macaws, and snakes with shamanic themes that represented the spirit world. I propose these pots were animate “pot-people” created for shamanic rituals. They were created with unusual designs including painted images and incised patterns that emphasized the spinning/vertigo that was central to the shamans’ soul flight experience. In some cases, the pots were literally spun, as evidenced by the distinctive wear patterns on their bases. The shamanic designs on the pots that reflected the upper and lower worlds, the depiction of spinning in the pottery decorations, and the literal spinning of some pots reflected the sympathetic and mimetic magic that linked them to the spirit world. They were imbued with the liminal nature of the creatures they depicted, and the symbolic and occasional literal emphasis on spinning would allow them to enter into a shamanic trance in a manner similar to their human counterparts. They, thus, were designed to enter into ASC in a manner that paralleled their human counterparts.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on altered states of consciousness, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Altered States of Consciousness | 1966 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Functional neuroanatomy of altered states of consciousness: The transient hypofrontality hypothesis | 2003 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| The Psychedelic Mystical Experience in the Human Encounter with Death | 1969 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| A neurophenomenological approach to non-ordinary states of consciousness: hypnosis, meditation, and psychedelics | 2022 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Hypnotic phenomena and altered states of consciousness: a multilevel framework of description and explanation | 2003 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
Citations in the library
Cites 9
- What Geometric Visual Hallucinations Tell Us about the Visual Cortex Neural Computation March 1, 2002
- Anthropology, Shamanism, and Alternate Ways of Knowing–Being in the World: One Anthropologist's Journey of Discovery and Transformation Anthropology & Humanism December 1, 2010
- Reassessing Shamanism and Animism in the Art and Archaeology of Ancient Mesoamerica Religions May 28, 2021
- Trance, posture, and tobacco in the Casas Grandes shamanic tradition: Altered states of consciousness and the interaction effects of behavioral variables Anthropology of Consciousness November 8, 2023
- Art and Spirit: The Artistic Brain, the Navajo Concept of Hozho, and Kandinsky’s “Inner Necessity ” International Journal of Transpersonal Studies 2004
and 4 more in the library