Pestle

7567B

The biggest pestle in the North America! Maybe? Museums are notoriously prone to claiming that the oldest, biggest, smallest, weirdest, and most rare things reside in our collections. This propensity may be a hangover from our early days as Victorian "edutainment" extravaganzas–think notorious bunkum purveyor P. T. Barnum and his American Museum. That New York City institution opened in 1842 and presented the public with a one–stop zoo, universal museum, wax museum, theater, lecture hall, and circus–style sideshow (at least until it burned down in 1865). The large North American stone pestle in our collections is indeed a rare specimen (7567B). It is 33 ½ inches long; 3 ½ inches in diameter; and weighs 25 ½ pounds. The woman or women who made and used this tool were experts both at ground stone technology and the demanding physicality of processing foodstuffs. Is it, as its late 19th–century museum label claims, the largest pestle in North America? If you know of a bigger one, please let us know!

Inorganic/Stone

North America; United States; California

Anthropology; North America; California