Charm

Charm that represents a duck with folded wings and a carved design in the shape of an eye. The lower part of the bird has a perforated protuberance through which passes a string with a fang fragment hanging from it. This small sculpture, made from walrus tusk and decorated with extraordinary finesse, is one of the most important ethnographic pieces of the Museum of America. It is the oldest piece from the north-western coast and there is precise documentation about its finding, which happened during the first Spanish expedition made to Nootka in 1774, commanded by Juan Pérez. The piece is listed in the document sent to Spain as “a small and fine bag or Vejuquillo bag and skilfully worked; and in It, there is a kind of bird made of bone with the upper beak broken, rescued from a native woman who wore it around her neck along with some teeth that appeared to be from a small cayman”. Thanks to the valuable information gathered by the expeditionary, we know that the beak fracture is old and that a woman wore it, and we can suppose it probably had a protective purpose.