South America
In Peru, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, calabash gourds are dried and carved into mates, the traditional container for the popular caffeinated tea-like drink brewed from the yerba mate plant. In Brazil, this container is called cuia, porongo or cabaça. Gourds also commonly used as the resonator for the berimbau, the signature instrument of capoeira, a martial art/dance developed in Brazilian plantations by African slaves. The calabash gourd is possibly mankind's oldest instrument resonator.
In Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador, calabash gourds are known to have been used for medicinal purposes for over a thousand years by Andean cultures. The Inca culture applied folklore symbology to gourds to pass down from one generation to another, and this practice is still familiar and valued.
Bowls made of calabash were used by Indigenous Brazilians as utensils made to serve food, and the practice is still retained in some remote areas of Brazil (originally by populations of various ethnicities, origins and regions, but nowadays mainly the indigenes themselves).
Read more about this topic: Calabash, Cultural Uses
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