These bejeweled boxes were made to hold snuff, a powdered form of tobacco. The tobacco plant is indigenous to North and South America. For longer than memory, indigenous communities have used tobacco in religious ceremonies and as medicine, and it remains an important plant to Native lifeways. When European colonizers arrived in the Americas, however, they became interested in tobacco for its stimulating properties. They forced enslaved Native and African people to work on tobacco plantations, which supplied a new global desire for this plant. European jewelers and goldsmiths crafted snuffboxes, like these examples, to amplify the luxuriousness of snuffing.