A Multi Theory Approach for Studying Presumed Ritual Pottery - The Stirrup Spout Bottle as a Case Study from the Pre-Hispanic Andes

Anthropological art and culture theory, neurobiological cognition theory, comparative religious studies, form-function analysis as well as archaeological and pictorial scenic context information are used to identify the hitherto unknown functionality of the stirrup spout bottle, a predominant pre-Hispanic vessel type at the Peruvian north coast, and to allocate this and further spouted bottle types to its presumed cultural domain: the religious-cosmological realm.