Bats are depicted in various types of media in Central and South America. The Moche of northern Peru portrayed bats in many figurative ceramic vessels in association with themes of sacrifice, elite status and agricultural fertility. Osseous remains of bats in Moche ceremonial and domestic contexts are rare yet their various representations in visual media highlight Moche fascination with their corporeal form, behaviour and symbolic meaning. By exploring bat imagery in Moche iconography, I argue that the bat formed an important part of Moche categorical schemes of the non-human world. The bat symbolized death and renewal not only for the human body but also for agriculture, society and the cosmos. I contrast folk taxonomies and symbolic classification to interpret the relational role of various species of chiropterans to argue that the nocturnal behaviour of the bat and its symbolic association with the moon and the darkness of the underworld was not a negative sphere to be feared or rejected. Instead, like the representative priestesses of the Late Moche period, bats formed part of a visual repertoire to depict the cycles of destruction and renewal that permitted the cosmological continuation of life within North Coast Moche society.

中文翻译：

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倒置世界，夜间活动状态和飞行哺乳动物：蝙蝠及其在Moche影像学中的象征意义

在中美洲和南美洲的各种媒体中都描绘了蝙蝠。秘鲁北部的莫什（Moche）描绘了许多具象征意义的陶瓷器皿中的蝙蝠，并与牺牲，精英地位和农业生育率等主题相关。蝙蝠在Moche仪式和家庭环境中的骨质残留很少见，但它们在视觉媒体中的各种表现方式却使Moche对其形体，行为和象征意义着迷。通过探索Moche影像学中的蝙蝠图像，我认为蝙蝠构成了非人类世界Moche分类方案的重要组成部分。蝙蝠不仅象征着人类的死亡和更新，而且象征着农业，社会和宇宙的死亡与更新。我将民间分类法和象征性分类进行对比，以解释各种种类的手足动物的关系作用，并认为蝙蝠的夜行行为及其与月球和黑社会的黑暗的象征联系并不是一个值得恐惧或拒绝的消极领域。取而代之的是，蝙蝠像莫切时代晚期的代表性女祭司一样，构成了视觉剧目的一部分，用以描绘破坏和更新的循环，从而使宇宙在北海岸莫切社会中得以延续。