Chocolate in Mesoamerica

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In Mesoamerica, feasting was a significant way to show power or to celebrate life events. Feasts were also used as a spark between economic and political relationships between groups of people. The foods involved in these feasts were luxurious along with everyday foods. The cacao was one of the luxurious foods. The elite and royal males were the only ones that could consume the cacao, in liquid form. The cacao was considered to be an intoxicating food, which is why women and children were forbidden from having it (Dillinger 2000). The trading of cacao required a very organized and strong system. A ruler could extend his power all the way to the ends of his borders and demanded cacao. It would be grown at the borders and then taken back to the city. The codices that have recorded these settlements showcase that the cacao was in bean form, which made it easier to transport (Million 1955: 139-149). This task was so labor demanding that feasts were given in reward along with trade. At times clothes and salt were also involved in these transactions.

Cacao was used as the glue in social and political relationships since it was used as a market exchange. One could assume that the level of labor intensity for growing the plant and the ability to produce the plant could be considered a competition, which added to the class structure and showed off their wealth and power. [pic 3]

Henderson notes that there is ceramic evidence for cacao use and it’s available through the chemical signature of theobromine but also in the shape of the vessel. Among the Mayan people, cacao was being used in spouted pots by the early pre classic period (1400-1100) in Honduras (Henderson 2007). When these vessels were tested in labs, the alkaloid theobromine was found which confirmed that they were used as cacao containers. Henderson informs us that the earliest chocolate pot that has been found was in Puerto Escondido, Honduras inside a household. This vessel would have been used for pouring and drinking cacao drinks during special occasions. At this point, there is no indication that froth was being produced. But later on the vessels that had spouts, were used to blow air, which enhanced the froth level.

Although over time, the methods to prepare the frothy drink changed, the importance of the crop has never changed. The drink’s place in Mesoamerican society is so stable that the only change that’s occurred regarding it is the type of vessel that it’s in or associated with. These vessels were usually unadorned but sometimes they had humanlike or animal like images on them (Berry 2004:208). There are some vessels that have sketches of the cacao pod or sometimes they have the imagery of a scene where a feast is being held and characters are being offered foods. Later on the chocolate pots started to be adorned with the glyph for cacao along with iconography that depicts the deceased’s role in the elite’s court life. An example of this was found in northern Guatemala. A royal tomb was discovered there which contained seven containers, covered with hieroglyphics, which most likely held cacao in it.

There have been spouted vessels that have been found at burial sites. The tombs usually belong to the elite, who had the most access to the drinks. The cacao drinks and sometimes beans were seen as ‘offerings’ to the gods and seen as a companion to the deceased in their journey through the afterlife. If a spouted vessel is placed in an elite’s tomb, then it symbolizes his social prominence even in his death.

Henderson discusses that there are three stages of ceramic evolution regarding the cacao drink. The earliest is the Barraca Brown jug which goes back to the Middle Formative period, which was most likely used just for pouring not for producing froth. In the Late Preclassic period, spouted vessels began to be used in functional ways so they could create froth. There were also some vessels that were made to be unusable because of the positioning of its spout. Along with the cacao being used as a currency, the vessels were starting to be used as political and social exchange. Vessels were given the same appreciation and symbolic meaning as the cacao itself. An empty cacao vessel could be gifted, and it would be given the same importance as cacao (Henderson 2007). Vessels had started to become like an additional gift to the cacao and eventually became critical during the elite’s feasts.[pic 4]

In this paper I have discussed the basic Mayan creation myth, the ecology of the plant, how it’s prepared, its social importance, the chocolate vessels, and how in a way it was used as currency. Although the indigenous people didn’t have chocolate in a bar form, they still loved it and they loved the intoxication it brought.. So in conclusion, chocolate is very important!

RESOURCES

Coe, SD & Coe, MD 1996, The True History of Chocolate, Thames and Hudson, New

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Dillinger, TL, Barriga, P, Escárcega, S, Jimenez, M, Lowe, DS, & Grivetti, LE 2000,

‘Food of the Gods: Cure for Humanity? A Cultural History of the Medicinal and Ritual Use of Chocolate’, The Journal of Nutrition, vol. 130, no. 8S, pp. 2057S-2072S

Dreiss, L, & Greenhill, SE 2008, Chocolate: Pathway to the Gods, University of Arizona

Press, China

Henderson, John S. and Rosemary A. Joyce

2006 Brewing Distinction: The Development of Cacao Beverages in Formative Mesoamerica. In Chocolate in Mesoamerica: A Cultural History of Cacao, edited by Cameron L. McNeil, pp. 140-153. University Press of Florida, Gainesville, FL.

Henderson, John S., Rosemary A. Joyce, Gretchen R. Hall, W. Jeffrey Hurst, and Patrick

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2007 Chemical and archaeological evidence for the earliest cacao beverages. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104: 18937–18940.

Millon, Rene Francis

1955 When money grew on trees: A study of cacao in ancient Mesoamerica. Ph.D. dissertation, Columbia University. University Microfilms International, Ann Arbor.

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Tarka, Jr. 2002 Spouted Vessels and Cacao Use among the Preclassic Maya. Latin American Antiquity 13(1): 85-106.

Reents-Budet, Dorie