Snuff tray

A snuff tray, also known as a snuff tablet, is a hand-carved tablet or tray that was made for the purpose of inhaling a psychoactive drug (also referred to as being hallucinogenic, entheogenic, or psychedelic), in the form similar to tobacco snuff prepared as a powder using a snuff tube. Snuff trays are best-known from the Tiwanaku culture of the Andes in South America. The principal substance thought to have been inhaled was known as willka (Anadenanthera colubrina), also referred to as cebil, and known as yopó in northern South America and cohoba in the Greater Antilles, where it was also prepared from other species of the genus Anadenanthera.

Most snuff trays are made of wood. Some are made of stone or bone, though there are very few examples of these materials being used.[1] Snuff trays are rectangular or trapezoidal in shape, depending on what style they are and have a shallow cavity running through them.[1] Their shape relates to the region as well as the culture that they originate from. Most snuff trays have been associated with the Tiwanaku (Tiahuanaco) or the Wari (Huari) culture. They may be decorated with intricate. hand-carved designs on one end as well as on the sides. Snuff trays with carvings represent iconographic motifs that are found in Tiwanaku and Wari art.[1]

  1. ^ a b c Niemeyer, Hermann, et al. “New Insights Into the Tiwanaku Style of Snuff Trays From San Pedro De Atacama, Northern Chile.” Latin American Antiquity, vol. 26, no. 1, Mar. 2015, pp. 120–137., doi:10.7183/1045-6635.26.1.120.