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 3931419282

Table of contents :
00_Maya Cosmology_ToC_FINAL
00a_Maya Cosmology_Preface_FINAL
01_Maya Cosmology_Kovác et al_FINAL
02_Maya Cosmology_Sprajc_FINAL
03_Maya Cosmology_Hudson, Henderson&Matsumoto_FINAL
04_Maya Cosmology_Gutieérrez González_FINAL
05_Maya Cosmology_Bernal_forREVIEW_FINAL
06_Maya Cosmology_Velásquez García&Tiesler_FINAL
07_Maya Cosmology_Maitland-Gardner_FINAL
08_Maya Cosmology_Katz_FINAL
09_Maya Cosmology_Valencia_FINAL
10_Maya Cosmology_Braakhuis_FINAL
11_Maya Cosmology_Moreno&Romero_FINAL
12_Maya Cosmology_Somohano_FINAL
13_Maya Cosmology_Brady_FINAL
14_Maya Cosmology_Sachse_FINAL
15_Maya Cosmology_Williams-Beck_FINAL
16_Maya Cosmology_Chuchiak_FINAL
17_Maya Cosmology_Nielsen_FINAL

Citation preview

Acta MesoAmericana

Acta MesoAmericana Volume 29

Milan Kováč, Harri Kettunen, Guido Krempel (editors)

Maya Cosmology Terrestrial and Celestial Landscapes Proceedings of the 19th European Maya Conference, Bratislava, November 17–22, 2014

VERLAG ANTON SAURWEIN 2019

Wayeb Advisory Editorial Board: Alain Breton Andrés Ciudad Ruiz Elizabeth Graham Nikolai Grube Norman Hammond

Die Deutsche Bibliothek - CIP Einheitasaufnahme Ein Titelsatz dieser Publikation ist bei Der Deutschen Bibliothek erhältlich

ISBN 3-931419-28-2

Copyright Verlag Anton Saurwein, Munich, Germany, 2019 Alle Rechte vorbehalten / all rights reserved Layout & Design: Guido Krempel Cover Images: Pedro Guillén Cuevas (Front Cover image); Guido Krempel (Back Cover) Printed in Germany

Contents

Preface: Terrestrial and Celestial Landscapes in Maya Cosmology

v–viii

SACRED LANDSCAPES: ARCHAEOASTRONOMICAL IMPLICATIONS OF SPACE AND TIME Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

3–23

Lunar Orientations in the Maya Architecture Ivan Šprajc

25–42

Verticality, Commemoration, and Demarcative Practice in the Construction of Copán’s Historical Landscape Kathryn Marie Hudson, John S. Henderson & Mallory E. Matsumoto

43–55

A Directional Pattern in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s Stelae at Quiriguá María Eugenia Gutiérrez González

57–65

El Dios N-Sahbiin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días Guillermo Bernal Romero

67–81

MICROCOSMOS: BODY, GESTURES, SOUNDS AND TERRESTRIAL REFLECTIONS OF THE UPPERWORLD El Anecúmeno dentro del ecúmeno. La cabeza como locus anímico en el cosmos maya del clásico y sus insignias físicas Érik Velásquez García & Vera Tiesler

85–98

Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World Amy J. Maitland Gardner

99–116

A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form Jared C. Katz

117–130

Maíz y atole son su trono: K’awiil y la Montaña del Sustento Rogelio Valencia Rivera

131–142

UNDERWORLD: REPRESENTATIONS, ENVIRONMENTS AND INHABITANTS Watery Underworld or Realm of the Rain Deities: The Aquatic Environment of the Tonsured Maize God H. Edwin M. Braakhuis

147–159

Skeletal Supernaturals from the Maya Underworld Daniel Moreno Zaragoza & Roberto Romero Sandoval

161–169

Xibalba: Is it Really the Underworld? Ana Somohano Eres

171–180

The Translation of a Maya Cosmogram onto an Uncooperative Terrestrial Landscape James E. Brady

181–190

COLONIAL CODE: LATE REFLECTIONS OF ANCIENT MAYA COSMOLOGY Worlds in Words: Precolumbian Cosmologies in the Context of Early Colonial Christianisation in Highland Guatemala Frauke Sachse

193–207

The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche Lorraine A. Williams-Beck

209–228

Caves of Life and Caves of Death: Colonial Yucatec Maya Rituals and Offerings in Caves and Cenotes, 1540–1750 John F. Chuchiak IV

229–240

How the Hell? Thoughts on the Colonial Demonization of the Maya Underworld Jesper Nielsen 241–249

Preface A quarter of a century ago David Freidel, Linda Schele and Joy Parker published their book Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman’s Path (1993) in which they analyzed the cosmovision of the ancient Maya from a very new perspective, comparing new epigraphic data with concepts of the contemporary Maya. Today we look at this book with a somewhat critical eye, acknowledging, however, at the same time its value in opening up questions and new perspectives on Maya concepts of the universe. Twenty-five years after the publication of this book, a lot of new data has surfaced and new research has been carried out. This volume adds to the expanding knowledge of the Maya cosmos by addressing various issues about the Maya way of ordering the universe, of rituals involved in daily life, and of cosmological concepts associated with astronomy, agriculture, architecture, and mythology. This volume is based on the papers given at the 19th European Maya Conference that was held in Bratislava, Slovakia, from November 17th to 22nd, 2014. The conference was co-organized by the Comenius University in Bratislava, the Slovak Archaeological and Historical Institute (SAHI), the Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, and the University of Economics in Bratislava, in cooperation with the European Association of Mayanists, Wayeb. The title of the conference was Maya Cosmology: Terrestrial and Celestial Landscapes, focusing on Maya perceptions of space and of the cosmos and their reflections in archaeological and epigraphic sources as well as in colonial and contemporary ethnographic documents, including astronomically oriented objects and structures, terrestrial and celestial realms of the universe and the conceptualization of space by its mythological, ritual and eschatological aspects. A three-and-a-half-day workshop (November 17–20) preceded a two-day symposium (November 21–22). The speakers and workshop tutors of the conference were (in alphabetical order): Ramzy Barrois, Dmitri Beliaev, Guillermo Bernal Romero, H. Edwin M. Braakhuis, James Brady, Oswaldo Chinchilla, John F. Chuchiak IV, Albert Davletshin, Tomáš Drápela, James Fitzsimmons, Nikolai Grube, John S. Henderson, Kathryn Marie Hudson, Eva Jobbova, Jan Kapusta, Vladimír Karlovský, Jared Katz, Harri Kettunen, Milan Kováč, Guido Krempel, Alfonso Lacadena, Tibor Lieskovský, Jesper Nielsen, Christian Prager, Frauke Sachse, Jakub Špoták, Ivan Šprajc, Karl Taube, Rhonda Taube, Fátima del Rosario Tec Pool, Vera Tiesler, Rogelio Valencia Rivera, Érik Velásquez García, Elisabeth Wagner, Lorraine A. Williams-Beck, and Héctor Xol Choc. The conference was initiated by a welcome address and an introduction to the work-

shops and symposium on November 17th. Opening words were delivered by Jaroslav Šušol, Dean of the Faculty of Arts, Comenius University; Jana Lenghardtová, Vice-rector of the University of Economics in Bratislava; Luis Alfonso de Alba, Ambassador of Mexico in Austria, Concurrent to the Slovak Republic; and Milan Kováč; Head of Department of Comparative Religion, Comenius University and the main organizer of the 19th European Maya Conference in Bratislava. The opening words were followed by an introductory lecture by Harri Kettunen (University of Helsinki) and Alfonso Lacadena (Complutense University, Madrid). Over the following three-and-a-half-days, five separate workshops were available for the participants, with varying levels based on participants’ familiarity on the topic of the workshops. The introductory level workshop on Maya hieroglyphs was co-tutored by Ramzy Barrois (École du Louvre), Eva Jobbová (University College London), and Jakub Špoták (Comenius University in Bratislava). The objective of this workshop was to provide an intensive introduction to the study of Maya hieroglyphs. Participants had a chance to decipher hieroglyphs on their own during the workshop with the assistance of the tutors. The focus of the introductory level workshop was on the Late Classic history of Piedras Negras, Guatemala. The intermediate workshop, open to participants with basic knowledge of Maya writing, was titled Godly Stories and Earthly Matters: Hieroglyphic Narratives on Gods and Men and co-tutored by Christian Prager and Elisabeth Wagner (University of Bonn). The workshop was divided into two sections, of which the first concentrated on deciphering hieroglyphic narratives from the Dresden, Paris, and Madrid codices, with a special focus on God B or Chahk and God C or K’uh. The second part focused on the relationship between humans and deities as they were recorded on various monuments commissioned during the reign of K’inich Ahkul Mo’ Nahb at Palenque. The advanced workshop, targeted at participants with developed knowledge of Maya writing, was titled Methods in Maya Hieroglyphic Studies and co-tutored by Harri Kettunen (University of Helsinki) and Alfonso Lacadena (Complutense University, Madrid). The objective of this workshop was to discuss the methods involved in Maya epigraphy with a special focus on examining the graphic and lexical origins of Maya hieroglyphs, especially those related to the topic of the conference. Besides the Maya script, the workshop explored writing systems in the greater Mesoamerican cultural sphere, along with studying the topic in the framework of the world’s writing systems in general.

Milan Kováč, Harri Kettunen, Guido Krempel

Besides the three epigraphic workshops, there was a special workshop, open to participants on all levels, titled U Uich Ku: Tracking Maya Deities in the Codices and Ethnohistorical Sources. The workshop was co-tutored by John F. Chuchiak IV (Missouri State University) and Guido Krempel (University of Bonn). This workshop provided the participants with a basic introduction to the interdisciplinary study of Maya deities in the pre-Hispanic Maya codices and in the late Post-Classic and Colonial Maya ethnohistorical sources. Furthermore, the workshop explored the nature of colonial “graphic pluralism” or the Maya preservation of traditional information through the continued use of Maya hieroglyphic writing, along with the concurrent adaptation of Latin letters. After the workshops, and prior to the symposium, the participants were invited to the opening of an exhibition titled “Mysterious Maya: Slovak Investigations of the Most Advanced Civilisation of Ancient America” at the Slovak National Museum, Museum of Archaeology. Welcome addresses were delivered by Antonio Roberto Castellano, Ambassador of Guatemala in Austria, Concurrent to the Slovak Republic; Drahoslav Hulínek, Director of Investigations of Slovak Archaeological and Historical Institute (SAHI); and Milan Kováč, Director of the Archaeological Project SAHI–Uaxactun and Curator of the Exhibition. In the evening of November 18th, the conference participants were also invited to the screening of David Lebrun’s film Dance of the Maize God. Following the workshops, the conference symposium was held between November 21st and 22nd. Conference opening words were given by Sven Gronemeyer, Vice-President of the European Association of Mayanists, Wayeb; Alojz Kopáčik, Dean of the Faculty of Civil Engineering, Slovak University of Technology; Peter Valent, Director of the Slovak Archaeological and Historical Institute (SAHI); and Milan Kováč, Head of the Department of Comparative Religion at the Comenius University in Bratislava and the main organizer of the conference. During the two-day conference, altogether twenty-two papers were presented, along with a poster session introducing five projects. The poster session included the following: Carlos Morales-Aguilar (Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne): El orden del espacio en la arquitectura preclásica de El Mirador, Petén, Guatemala; Amanda Delgado (Leiden University) and Maurice Pico (ENAH): Motion Expressions and Space in Yokot’an Ritual Speech; Harald Thomaß (Hamburg University): Con palabras se camina en el paisaje celestial: Gráficos para el análisis del lenguaje ritual de los especialistas rituales de Yucatán; Evgeniya Korovina (Institute of Linguistics, RAS, Moscow): It is Impossible to Point to the Serpent: Rainbow in Mayan Languages and Legends; Valentine Losseau (Anthropologie sociale et ethnologie EHESS–Collège de France [Laboratoire d’Anthropologie sociale], CEMCA, Mexico): Transfigured Forest: Reflexivity in the Contemporary Lacandon Mayan Landscapes (Chiapas, Mexico).

vi

The contents of this book are based on the papers presented at the symposium. Unfortunately, this volume does not contain every presentation that was given at the conference. Out of the twenty-two speakers at the conference, nine con-

tributions are missing in this volume. On the other hand, the book was supplemented by four new papers to compensate for the missing ones. Presentations that did not find their way to the current volume are: Dmitri Beliaev and Albert Davletshin (Russian State University of Humanities): A Stairway to Heaven for the King: Royal Palanquins in Classic Maya Text and Image; Oswaldo Chinchilla Mazariegos (Yale University): Landscapes of Creation: An Interpretation of Mesoamerican E-Groups; Jan Kapusta (Institute of Ethnology, Charles University, Prague): Pilgrimage and Living Mountains among the Contemporary Highland Maya; James Fitzsimmons (Middlebury College): Searching for the Classic Maya “Upperworld”: A View from Epigraphy, Architecture and Material Culture; Nikolai Grube (University of Bonn): Hunting in the Forest of Kings; Karl Taube (University of California at Riverside): Centering the World: Ancient Maya Temples and the Creation of Sacred Space; Rhonda Taube (Riverside City College): Bounded Place and Segmented Time: The Function and Meaning of Space in Contemporary K’iche’ Maya Rituals; Fátima del Rosario Tec Pool (Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán): Venerar el inframundo: Tráfico y deposición ritual de cerámica en las cuevas mayas (del preclásico al clásico terminal); and Héctor Xol Choc (Universidad Rafael Landívar de Guatemala): Loq’laj choxaal loq’laj ch’och’ – Cielo sagrado, tierra sagrada. The volume consists of 17 articles, divided into four thematic parts: (1) SACRED LANDSCAPES: Archaeoastronomical Implications of Space and Time. This part of the volume consists of five chapters dealing with time, the calendar, and astronomical alignments and orientations, including the following articles: Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár: Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments; Ivan Šprajc: Lunar Orientations in the Maya Architecture; Kathryn Marie Hudson, John S. Henderson & Mallory E. Matsumoto: Verticality, Commemoration, and Demarcative Practice in the Construction of Copan’s Historical Landscape; María Eugenia Gutiérrez González: A Directional Pattern in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s Stelae at Quiriguá; and Guillermo Bernal Romero: El Dios N-Sahb’iin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días. (2) The second part, MICROCOSMOS: Body, Gestures, Sounds and Terrestrial Reflections of Upperworld, consists of four chapters dealing with a variety of cosmological models as they are presented by diverse entities, such as the human body, gestures, music, or mythological geographic formations: Érik Velásquez García & Vera Tiesler: El Anecúmeno dentro del ecúmeno: La cabeza como locus anímico en el cosmos maya del clásico y sus insignias físicas; Amy J. Maitland Gardner: Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World; Jared C. Katz: A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form; and Rogelio Valencia Rivera: Maíz y atole son su trono: K’awiil y la Montaña del Sustento. (3) The third part is titled UNDERWORLD: Representations, Environments and Inhabitants. This part consists of four chapters exploring the realm of the Maya Underworld, including the central mythological story of the Maize God, the wahy creatures, a critical review of our sources regarding the Maya Underworld, and

Preface: Terrestrial and Celestial Landscapes in Maya Cosmology

the presence of caves as a representation of the entrance to the underworld: H. Edwin M. Braakhuis; Watery Underworld or Realm of the Rain Deities: The Aquatic Environment of the Tonsured Maize God; Daniel Moreno Zaragoza & Roberto Romero Sandoval; Skeletal Supernaturals from the Maya Underworld; Ana Somohano Eres: Xibalba: Is it Really the Underworld?; James E. Brady: The Translation of a Maya Cosmogram onto an Uncooperative Terrestrial Landscape. (4) Finally, the last section, COLONIAL CODE: Late Reflections of Ancient Maya Cosmology, consists of four chapters and focuses on the strategies and interpretations of interference between the native Maya cosmological ideas and the Christian ideology brought by the Spaniards in early Colonial times: Frauke Sachse: Worlds in Words: Precolumbian Cosmologies in the Context of Early Colonial Christianisation in Highland Guatemala; Lorraine A. Williams-Beck: The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche; John F. Chuchiak IV: Caves of Life and Caves of Death: Colonial Yucatec Maya Rituals and Offerings in Caves and Cenotes, 1540–1750; and Jesper Nielsen: How the Hell? Thoughts on the Colonial Demonization of the Maya Underworld. Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský, and Ladislav Husáŕ explore the development of architectonic orientations at Uaxactun in their article Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments. The research is based on recent fieldwork conducted by the Slovak Archaeological Project at the archaeological site of Uaxactun, Peten, Guatemala. The authors compare results of excavations, exact measurement and architectural orientations in Preclassic Uaxactun, attempting their methodological grasp, typology and understanding of the calendar and astronomical context. These findings are compared with our knowledge from later periods, up to the present Maya, in particular in terms of the mythological and ritual aspects of observing celestial bodies. Ivan Šprajc examines the less-known architectural orientations in his article Lunar Orientations in the Maya Architecture. While the rising and setting points of the Sun have been recorded all around Mesoamerica, the Moon appears not to have been among the common motivations for architectural orientations. Based on Šprajc’s research, a considerable number of structures in the Maya lowlands appear to have been aligned to the rising and setting points of the Moon. Interestingly, the author points out that most of these alignments are found along the northeastern coast of the Yucatan peninsula, in an area where we have a large amount of data pointing out to the importance of the cult of Ixchel during the Postclassic period, with clear associations with the Moon. In their article Verticality, Commemoration, and Demarcative Practice in the Construction of Copan’s Historical Landscape, Kathryn Hudson, John Henderson, and Mallory Matsumoto examine how Copan’s built environment reflected the historical landscape through the use of verticality and stacked construction. Using Copan’s Temple 16 and the Hieroglyphic Stairway as a case study, the authors pay special attention to how the construction processes at Copan juxta-

posed cosmology and the mythical past with the constructed present. Moving fifty kilometers north, María Eugenia Gutiérrez González discusses the existence of directional ritual patterns for a number of monuments at Quirigua in her article A Directional Pattern in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s Stelae at Quirigua, pointing out patterns of orientation that directly correspond to the calendar data associated with gods G7 and G9. Furthermore, the author examines the ritual importance of the Moon Goddess associated with this directional pattern. In his article El Dios N-Sahb’iin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días, Guillermo Bernal Romero draws attention to the existence of a recently discovered cycle of 63 days in the Maya calendrical computations. The author points out that the “Cycle-63” was a constituent of two other cycles, namely those of 819 days (13 x 63) and 378 days (6 x 63), the synodic period of Saturn, and observes that the records of the cycle of 63 days are associated with fire rituals and especially with “fire drilling” dedicated to a deity called God N-Sahbiin, associated with the planet Saturn. In their article El Anecúmeno dentro del ecúmeno: La cabeza como locus anímico en el cosmos maya del clásico y sus insignias físicas, Érik Velásquez García and Vera Tiesler explore ever-changing roles of the entities and forces behind the concepts k’ihn, sak ik’aal, and the logogram T533, using the concept of ecumene/anecumene to unravel the emic conceptions of the human body and its constituents, along with body modifications. Amy Maitland Gardner explores gestures in Maya iconography in her article Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World. The author examines the ways in which both the spatial and the temporal orientation were communicated using gestures in Classic Maya imagery, and proposes that there were three hand gestures in Classic Maya iconography that communicated perceptions of space and time. The author points out that since these hand shapes are present also as graphic elements in the writing system, there appears to be a physical and symbolic relationship between their forms and meaning. Moving from signals to sound, Jared Katz explores Ancient Maya music in his contribution A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form. The author examines the possibilities of analyzing music to interpret the ancient Maya understanding of the connections between the underworld, the terrestrial world, and the celestial realm. He analyzes the connection between music and wind, using iconographic, archaeological, and ethnographic evidence, and pointing out that the ancient Maya believed that music was brought by the wind from another world into the terrestrial world, thus possessing otherworldly qualities. In his article Maíz y atole son su trono: K’awiil y la Montaña del Sustento, Rogelio Valencia Rivera examines the presence of K’awiil representations on capstones from the Northern Lowlands of Yucatan, focusing on Structure A-1

vii

Milan Kováč, Harri Kettunen, Guido Krempel

at Dzibilnocac with various K’awiil portrayals. Besides the iconography, the author discusses the associated hieroglyphic texts that point out to the interpretation of the aforementioned building as the Sustenance Mountain, a well-known mythical place described in various Mesoamerican creation myths. H. Edwin M. Braakhuis examines the aquatic realm of the dead and the role of the Maize God within that domain in his article Watery Underworld or Realm of the Rain Deities: The Aquatic Environment of the Tonsured Maize God. The author suggests that rather than a “Watery Underworld”, this realm is akin to the concept of Tlalocan. He also remarks that the Tonsured Maize God functioned as a prototype of the divine king, exercising power within this watery realm. In their article Skeletal Supernaturals from the Maya Underworld, Daniel Moreno Zaragoza and Roberto Romero Sandoval explore the various skeletal beings in Maya iconography and compare these to the later manifestations in the worldview of the Maya, all the way until the present day. The authors follow the trail of these beings from Late Classic wahy creatures to Postclassic underworld deities, and further to skeletal companion spirits and harmful beings of the contemporary Maya. In her article Xibalba: Is it Really the Underworld?, Ana Somohano Eres challenges the prevailing idea that the Maya world of the dead is located below the surface of the earth. The author points out that the use of the term ‘underworld’ is influenced by the Christian concept of Hell (see also the article by Jesper Nielsen in this volume), inviting us to reexamine the location of Xibalba by studying the evidence from different types of sources. She also remarks that rather than a concrete place, Xibalba is perhaps better considered as a state of being. James E. Brady discusses the interplay between natural and artificial sacred landscapes in his article The Translation of a Maya Cosmogram onto an Uncooperative Terrestrial Landscape, exploring areas in the Maya world where the scarcity of large and impressive caves led the ancient Maya to build their public architecture around small caves and sinkholes that were consequently formalized as sacred landmarks. Furthermore, the author points out that artificial caves have been created in the non-karstic areas of Mesoamerica where caves do not naturally exist, imposing the ideal landscape onto the physical environment.

viii

Moving from the Precolumbian era to the Colonial period, Frauke Sachse discusses the encounter of the indigenous and European religious systems and worldviews in her article Worlds in Words: Precolumbian Cosmologies in the Context of Early Colonial Christianisation in Highland Guatemala. The author examines how the Christian worldview translated into the Highland Maya cosmology by analyzing the terminology utilized by the missionaries who adopted indigenous terms that referred to concepts that were meaningful within the Highland Maya cosmology. Furthermore, Sachse points out that this practice contributed to the preservation of Precolumbian worldviews within the Christian faith.

Continuing within the transition from the Precolumbian to early Colonial eras, Lorraine Williams-Beck discusses the concept of ‘center’ in her article The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche. The author explores the idea of center as umbilicus, focusing on pre-Hispanic Canpech and Chanputun provinces, as well as early Colonial contexts at Ceiba Cabecera, Campeche. Williams-Beck observes that at Ceiba Cabecera’s Iglesia Mayor, the architectural components and mural paintings emphasize the function of the building as an umbilicus and place of spiritual rebirth, as well as a renewal of ritual religious universe for the local Maya during the Colonial era. Moving to the Colonial era in Yucatan, John F. Chuchiak IV explores the role of caves in the rituals and the changing worldview of the Yucatec Maya in his contribution Caves of Life and Caves of Death: Colonial Yucatec Maya Rituals and Offerings in Caves and Cenotes, 1540–1750. The author draws attention to the complementary nature of caves and cenotes, associated to both life and death in the Maya thought, by pointing out that caves and cenotes were associated both with the Rain God Chaak, as well as illness and death. Finally, Jesper Nielsen challenges some of the prevailing perceptions of the Maya underworld in his article How the Hell? Thoughts on the Colonial Demonization of the Maya Underworld. The author observes that European and Christian worldviews have influenced our ideas of Maya cosmology since the beginning of the European presence in the area. According to Nielsen, we seem to have inherited the idea that evil creatures are mainly to be found below us –something that was not originally as straightforward in the indigenous thought (see also the article by Ana Somohano Eres in this volume). However, the author also points out that this does not mean that the Maya, or other Mesoamerican peoples, did not believe in frightful beings in the dark spaces below the earth. Nonetheless, Nielsen reminds us of the indigenous complementary concept that this dark and moist territory also contained regenerative forces and allowed new life to be created. Returning to the subject at the beginning of this foreword, to quote David Freidel, Linda Schele, and Joy Parker in Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman’s Path (1993: 58): “In truth, there are many paths to an understanding of the reality of the Maya. These paths all follow a similar direction, but so far, no single road has yet appeared.” Although there may be no single road or even similar directions, the fact remains that we will keep looking, exploring, researching, and studying. This volume presents one part of that road network. Harri Kettunen, Milan Kováč and Guido Krempel

SACRED LANDSCAPES: ARCHAEOASTRONOMICAL IMPLICATIONS OF SPACE AND TIME

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták Comenius University in Bratislava

Tibor Lieskovský, Ladislav Husár

Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava

Abstract Uaxactun is one of the oldest known Maya cities with astronomical associations. The functions and hypotheses associated with astronomical alignments of specific buildings have been widely discussed for more than a century. However, after nine years of intensive archaeological excavations, the Regional Archaeological Project Uaxactun found a whole new set of data and specified the old ones. Therefore, the view of Uaxactun and its importance for ancient Maya astronomy should be supplemented. That is what our contribution is doing. We focus in particular on revealing new contexts and architectonical expressions in the Preclassic period, the original construction of the E-Group and its solar and lunar associations. Furthermore, this article deals with testing of calendar contexts, the meaning of Venus and Orion for the orientation of the most important buildings as well as testing of landscape features in connection with possible architectural alignments.

Resumen Uaxactún es uno de los más antiguos sitios mayas con connotaciones astronómicas. Las funciones de edificios específicos e hipótesis asociadas con alineaciones astronómicas han tenido extensas discusiones durante más de un siglo. Sin embargo, tras nueve años de excavaciones intensas, el Proyecto Arqueológico Regional Uaxactún ha producido nuevos datos que modifican los resultados presentados antiguamente. Por esta razón, la mirada a Uaxactún y su importancia para la astronomía maya, debería ser complementada, y este es el objetivo del presente artículo. En particular nos enfocamos en los nuevos contextos y expresiones arquitectónicas del período Preclásico, la construcción original del Grupo E, su significado y las asociaciones solares y lunares. El artículo además trata de examinar las observaciones de Venus y la constelación de Orion, en un contexto de alineaciones de los edificios más importantes del sitio. De la misma manera tratamos de examinar las relaciones de los edificios importantes con los puntos del horizonte natural, considerando siempre el contexto calendárico.

Since the discovery of Uaxactun in the early 20th century (Morley 1916), this important Maya city has often been investigated systematically. After the initial excavations conducted by the Carnegie Institution (Ricketson 1928; Ricketson and Ricketson 1937; Smith 1931, 1955; Smith 1950), the last major research project at Uaxactun in the 20th century was carried out by Juan Antonio Valdés in the 1980’s (Valdés 1986, 1999). For the history of research of Maya astronomy, Uaxactun has ever since played a significant role. At the

beginning of the 20th century, in the course of the initial investigations, Frans Blom discovered the existence of a solar astronomical observatory located in Uaxactun Group E, for which he used the term E-Group (Blom 1924); a term which thereafter became a technical term that was considered as a prototype for such architectural arrangements. Until 2009, when the first excavations of the Slovak archaeological project were conducted, only three so-called

Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

Triadic complexes, one E-Group and two radial structures, were known. In the course of nine years of field seasons, that were mainly focused on the identification and excavation of the Preclassic architectural structures of Uaxactun, we became aware of five Triadic complexes, five radial structures, and at least two E-Groups (Fig. 1). Because our knowledge about these structures and complexes with probable astronomical importance has dramatically increased, it appears to be time for rethinking the possible significance of various alignments formed by architecture or having major impact on the particularity of the layout of Uaxactun’s urban landscape. Furthermore, the possibilities of the current technological state-of-the-art regarding empirical measurements of architectural alignments increased dramatically, as, for example, LiDAR data differ conspicuously when compared to previous attempts. Due to these differences regarding the quantity (of the objects) and quality (of the measurements) of data, we would like to describe a view from a slightly different perspective on various astronomical aspects of prototypic site-planning patterns in Uaxactun.

Data Applicability and Methods of Measurement Firstly, we would like to turn the attention to a barely discussed problem that concerns the measurement of possible astronomical alignments: the supposed correctness of data. Aiming on precision, it could be a risk to use the majority of existing statistics that are based on site maps. Especially in the Maya Lowlands a great number of archaeological maps need to be considered with great caution, given that many were based on documentations of unexcavated buildings. In the case of the relatively well investigated region of Uaxactun, which counts on more than a century of archaeological investigations, we have a wealth of precise archaeological

a

4

data. These include orientations of the walls of main buildings, platforms or façades, staircases, etc., spanning approximately 60 structures from so far 3,500 registered structures that are distributed within the urban site core of Uaxactun, its periphery and satellite sites. However, even though we have been able to confirm an exactness for the majority of buildings located within the site core, in general, the precision of reliable data applies to less than 2% of structures from the wider region around Uaxactun, and it needs to be mentioned that this is an area which has been investigated intensely; in fact, for other parts of the Maya lowlands (Peten), the number is far worse and disillusioning. The accuracy of measurements of unexcavated structures for archaeoastronomical purposes is related to estimation involved in data production. It means that the orientations are essentially proposed after subjective and arbitrarily selected indicators. With the aim of lowering the impact of subjectivity as best as possible, we have tried to rely our work on empirical data of conducted excavations: measurements and alignments of true walls, staircases, stone blocks, etc. However, for the study of architectural alignments in the wider region, it is inevitable to also take some still unexcavated mounds into consideration. During the last field seasons of topographical investigations, we established specific ways of re-collecting data, which allowed us to also study hypothetical alignments that are still discernible from the preserved architecture (for the corresponding applied methodology, see also, e.g., Šprajc 2001: 31–54; 2017: 190–191). As for currently available tools and state-of-the-art technologies can either be used the following approaches, or a combination thereof, depending on the proper advantages or disadvantages that need to be considered in each case:

b

Figure 1. E-Group assemblage architectural variants defined in Uaxactun. Their particular proportions reflect the ideal azimuth for solstice and zenith passage; a) Group D, mound D-II; b) Group E, Eastern platform with restored architecture of the building E-I, E-II and E-III (Graphics by Tibor Lieskovský).

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

1) Direct observation by total station (theodolite) without the necessity of any additional calculations (cartographic distortion, refraction, projection on celestial sphere, etc.), but with the obligatory presence of technicians in the field during an appropriate moment in time, always hoping that the weather does allow to conduct the intended observations and measurements. 2) Measuring orientations by means of a total station (with the potential of capturing any astronomical alignment), defined by architectural features. In this case, direct visibility and assumptions about hypothetically observable phenomena (affected by subjective interpretation of architectural features, e.g., of the eroded stairway) are essential, and additional calculations are required. 3) Derivation from existing site maps with the issues of a low accuracy, distortion, divergent use of the Magnetic North, and the absence of data concerned with corresponding altitudes. In this case, additional calculations are required. 4) Deriving data from the Digital Elevation Model (DEM) is highly precise (for the condition of elaborate realization of the point field based on absolute coordinates) and offers the possibility of measuring any orientation, without the necessity to be in situ. Depending on a density of input data and a final resolution of DEM, as well as on a subjective definition of the direction. 5) Derivation from a precise measurement of the surface terrain by means of LiDAR. The data obtained by LiDAR is not necessarily ideal regarding visible architecture, even if being helpful for the detection of little nuances of the terrain within a larger area. 6) Derivation from remote sensing data is useful and effective for large areas with visible architecture (if not covered by vegetation), but is limited by the lack of corresponding

a

altitudes, low resolution, and lesser precision of the data. In this case, additional calculations are required, too. 7) Derivation from precise measurements of architecture and archaeological excavation units based on photogrammetry, or laser scanning, facilitates the consideration of any possible detected feature, and opens the possibility of taking measurements when not being present in the field, terminating in generated virtual reconstructions by means of computer devices. Naturally, this requires additional calculations and post-processing as well. The cardinal issue of any measurement of orientation is the hardly quantifiable precision due to the long-term, lasting and transformative process of the architectural landscape and related features. To proclaim any measured value valid for subsequent analysis, the distortion of height and form, according to gravity, rain, wind, vegetation and anthropological erosion needs to be taken into consideration. For the majority, these factors produce “the mounds” which highly confuse any hypothetical reconstruction, and even the visible ruins of architecture do not reflect an exact state corresponding to the past reality. Furthermore, the derivation of any orientation from visible architecture can be erroneous due to various constructive deflections (e.g., supporting walls can be crooked and corrected by new, non-surviving stucco applications) or an unknown chronology of construction stages. Even the archaeological situation in the testing samples can be affected by deformations coming out of gravity erosion or anthropogenic intervention (be it looting, or the archaeologist´s misunderstanding regarding chronological and/or constructive stages). In order to reduce all the error inducing issues, and to obtain more appropriate values of any orientation which can be taken into account, it is recommendable to adequately use methods which combine direct topographic measurements and data obtained from ground photogrammetry, as well as LiDAR. By doing so, (historic) site maps, the precision of which is often too limited for successful measurements of orientation required

b

Figure 2. Geostatistical identification of the feature orientation by the weighted average; a) restored stairway leading up to the Eastern Platform, Group H-North; b) Orientation of the mound surface covering the upper platform of Group H-South, Uaxactun (Graphics by Tibor Lieskovský).

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Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

for archaeoastronomical analysis, need to be excluded. Thus, the obtained data can be re-measured and reconstructed in the context of an automatization of the whole process in a GIS environment by means of using the method of “visual programming”. Within such an approach was built up a database of 320 different angles measured within the Preclassic site core of Uaxactun by following certain processes: – Data recollection in the field (DEM, archaeological probes, architecture, topographical measurement within the elaborate geodetic control based on absolute coordinates, UTM 16N projection, LiDAR), in the ideal case duplicated (e.g., measurement of stairways by photogrammetry can be validated or compared with topographical measurements). – Data processing, with the purpose of generating 3D models and 2D maps. – Identification of potential archaeoastronomically significant orientations manifested and their conversion into 3D vectors. – Identification of potential archaeoastronomically significant angles between the architectural objects, and their conversion into 2D vectors. – Geo-statistical calculations of the probable orientation of a part of the slope based on the orientations of certain contour lines. – Computational identification of the highest point of the mounds (for the elimination of its subjective determination). – Defining the relevant total altitudes for calculating the angular altitude. 8) Statistical summarization of the results regarding specific orientations or architectural features based on: – The identification and elimination of all extreme values which can distort the statistical average (could be considered as a “dangerous step” due to the possibility of subjective elimination of “uncomfortable” values that do not correspond with the assumptions). – Assigning different relevance to the features by means of weighted average e.g., a long line of preserved stairway orientation is more relevant than few preserved parts; the orientation of a longer part of a contour line representing the general orientation of a slope is more relevant than a short one which possibly manifests local deformation (Fig. 2). – Calculation of the middle value of orientation and its standard deviation. – Validation of the feature relevance by additional, external methods. 9) Dynamic algorithmic elimination of latitude based cartographic distortion.

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Calendrical Background When trying to detect any astronomical significance, in most cases we have to deal with calendar systems. All celestial phenomena are periodic, and therefore they create systems for calendrical calculations, because the movements of celestial bodies are regular and predictable (Iwaniszewski 2015: 11). By means of continuous observations throughout a certain period of time, an ancient astronomer would have been able to distinguish these phenomena according to the visibility of their appearances, magnitude, or difficulty of cycles of celestial bodies in connection to the agricultural year. The most easily observable celestial bodies are the sun and the moon. The synodical period of the moon is easily observable, but the position of the moon differs in two extremes throughout its periods: major and minor standstills. It is more difficult to use this celestial body as indicator of the agricultural intervals. Cycles of planets, visible with naked eye (from Mercury to Saturn), are too difficult and complex for the purpose of using them for permutations of the annual calendar. Stars, or star constellations, are rising and setting on specific, more or less predictable moments in time throughout the year, which makes them a better option in order to track time. Nonetheless, the movement of sun on the eastern horizon is the best recognizable phenomenon. Therefore, two types of possible astronomical calendars stand out: sidereal (or star) calendars, and solar horizon calendars (Ruggles 2015a: 20). We assume that observatories with the function of determining cycles of specific celestial bodies existed in ancient Uaxactun. With regard to the sidereal calendar, Group H North could have served for this purpose, whereas Group E may have been used for the calculation of the solar horizon calendar. Furthermore, Ruggles (2015b: 412) states: “There can be many reasons for a house, temple, or tomb to be oriented in a particular direction, and there are evident dangers in presupposing an astronomical, or even worse an exclusively astronomical motivation.” However, potential of astronomical observations as a function of E-Group assemblages should be taken into account. Astronomical alignments in specialized buildings can offer us a glimpse into the meaning of architectural space and how it was arranged in order to accommodate scheduled rituals (Aveni, Dowd and Vining 2003: 159). One of the main hypothesis regarding the E-Group of Uaxactun concerns the observation of solstices and equinoxes that are characterized by three temples: E-I, E-II and E-III, respectively. The position of the observer is on the radial Structure E-VII on the West. Thus, what benefits did we get by observing these solar phenomena? One of the main reasons is to keep the calendar, or to specify the time for particular rituals. But which calendar has to be controlled? The most reasonable one is the 365day calendar, the so-called Haab. It is clear that this calendar is based on one solar year of 365 days that are divided into 18 months with 20 days each, with an additional 5-day long period called Wayeb. Ruggles (2015: 19) also states: “The inevitable consequence is that however accurately the cycles are reckoned [...] the calendar will sooner or later start to conflict with actual observations and need adjustment.”

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

If the main function of an E-Group was to observe solstices and equinoxes, it has no effect on the Haab calendar. An imprecision of this calendar in comparison with the true (tropical) year led to the loss of one full day every 1.508 days (Rice 2007: 42), because the calendar year of 365 days did not maintain a fixed correlation with the tropical year of 365.24219 days, nor did the specific date of the tropical year had any permanent calendrical name (Šprajc, Morales-Aguilar and Hansen 2009: 91; Aveni, Dowd and Vining 2003: 157–158). Maya daykeepers probably did not try to correct this solar calendar Haab (e.g., by adding one day every four years), because it would also have had an effect on the Tzolk’in calendar and also on the calculation of the Long Count. Astronomical cycles do not necessarily need to be involved in the calendrical systems. Among many indigenous peoples, astronomical events were not rated any more reliable as an indication of the progress of the year (Turton and Ruggles 1978; Nilsson 1920), and, for example, in the case of Ancient Rome, due to the adoption of the Julian calendar, there was no need for astronomical observations. It was abandoned in favor of arithmetical reckoning with numerically defined “months” (Ruggles 2015a: 17). This means that after setting and harmonizing the annual calendar (Haab), the sacred calendar (Tzolk’in) and Long Count, it was just a matter of counting the days within these calendars, with no direct relation with astronomical observations. In fact, these calendars have turned into so-called “schematic calendars” (see Ruggles 2015a), where the entire functionality is solely based on arithmetic calculation. However, the calendars can serve for several purposes, even if ignoring the periodicity of the tropical year. It provides a framework for operations like collecting taxes and tributes, and also for ideological needs, such as to strengthen local identity by ensuring that the whole population celebrates festivals and performs rituals simultaneously (Steele 2012, 2015: 95). So why did the ancient Maya need to observe solar phenomena at the horizon? There is a certain possibility that a “Maya calendar reform”, so-called by Aveni, Dowd and Vining (2003), had been applied at some moment in time. The zenith passage is doubtlessly a clearly recognizable phenomenon. It happens twice annually, and according to Aveni and colleagues (2003), as well as Šprajc, Morales-Aguilar and Hansen (2009), it can divide the solar year into specific intervals between the dates recorded by different alignments. Then, “observational calendars”, based on observations of the movements of the sun within the horizon and counting intervals of days (see Aveni 2001; Aveni, Dowd and Vining 2003; Šprajc, Morales-Aguilar and Hansen 2009) could have facilitated an efficient scheduling of agricultural and associated ritual activities in the annual cycle, counted by multiple units of 20 or 13 days. However, the corresponding intervals between two zenith passages, or between zenith passages and equinox, and between zenith passages and summer solstice depending on the observer’s latitude. In the case of Uaxactun there has not been a verification of the significance of such possible observational counts (using multiples of 20 and 13 days) according to the hypothetical (regional) “observational calendars”, because, as illustrated in Figure 3, neither the interval from equinox to zenith passage (49.5 days), nor the

interval from zenith passage to summer solstice (43.6 days) is defined by any 20-day or 13-day multiplications. Such observational calendar in the alignments at Uaxactun can be consider only in rough approximations. Nonetheless, a possible pattern based on the count of days as intervals between equinoxes and solstices, and between the equinox and the solar zenithal passages has also been found on the floor of the Classic period palace A-V at Uaxactun, named as “pecked cross” (Aveni, Dowd and Vining 2003: 170–171). It can be considered as calendrical, because it represents sequences of tally marks or counts of days (Iwaniszewski 2015: 737). The intervals corresponding to the northern half of the outer circle (68 holes) add up to the interval between zenith passages at Teotihuacan (Aveni and Dowd 2017: 85) while southern half of inner circle (48 holes) as well as northern half of inner circle (51 holes) could approximates the number of days between spring equinox and the first of two annual solar zenith passages in the Peten (51 days). After all, the southern half of outer circle (88 holes) equals the observed interval between the autumnal equinox and the winter solstice, as well as the interval between the winter solstice and the spring equinox (Aveni and Dowd 2017: 84). Specific appearances of such symbols that can be fixed in the landscape were placed also in different locations: within the urban area of Teotihuacan and near or within the ceremonial districts of dozens of reported sites. They were found in spaces that hardly could accommodate more than a few people (Iwaniszewski 2015, 738). This kind of cross-circle motif was probably invented in Teotihuacan (Aveni, Dowd and Vining 2003: 170), but the design of pecked crosses is greatly patterned. The number of holes which formes axes remains static (20 or 10), while the number of holes in circles is highly variable (Iwaniszewski 2015: 738). This may suggest that the holes in circles served for very particular practices and then, the number founded on the floor of the palace A-V at Uaxactun may be rather random or dedicated to different use. There are also different interpretations, or meanings of this figure, ranging from, e.g., (unlikely) instruments for orientation in planning Teotihuacan (Dow 1967; Millon 1968; Aveni and Hartung 1982) to much more likely - ritual game boards (Aveni, Dowd and Vining 1978; Aveni 1988). In fact, this pattern is similar to patolli or “quince” boards, which we know from floors and walls through classical graffities (Źrałka and Hermes 2009: 146) and later also from the codices etc. (Freidel and Rich 2016: 249–251). It is obvious that calendars serve a variety of social purposes. Sometimes it is hard to distinguish between the purposes, for example, as practical benefit (regulating agricultural activities), ideological or ritualistic aspects for ensuring the correct timing of ceremonial activities. There is also the possibility of not determining the count of days or to specify the length of time between actions, but to provide a framework for action, in case of, for example, a farmer who tied a string around an ankle and carefully added a knot each day to determine the number of days between planting and harvest (Ruggles 2015a: 18). Therefore, also for Maya farmers, it was

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Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

Figure 3. Observational intervals of astronomical significance corresponding to the latitude 17.39°N, the location of Uaxactun (Graphics by Ladislav Husár and Tomáš Drápela).

not strictly necessary to observe the position of the sun at the horizon throughout the year with the help of an observatory. It is likely the reason for the construction of astronomical interpreted alignments could be more complex.

From Zenith Passage to Solstices

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Due to the fact that the Maya lowlands are located close to the tropical latitude, the above-mentioned astronomical event of the zenith passage, the sun in highest position of the celestial sphere at noon, can be experienced in the area. The importance of non-shady moments in time-counting has been examined in an ethnological context. As one of many examples of simple solar observatories the Ch’orti’ Maya used to mark the days of the zenith passage by observing where the sun rises or sets according to prominent features in the landscape and these people even perceive the rise-set direction of the sun on that day as east and west (Girard 1948). There is also evidence of a solar zenith tradition from the Early Colonial era based on a decree from 1577, issued by Philip II of Spain (see Aveni 2003: 42), stating that authorities of every city and town in “the Indies” had to provide exact reports of their latitude and the day of sun zenith passage. With the knowledge about these days, the colonial officials would have been able to maintain the control over any indigenous demonstration linked to the ancient practice. From Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica onwards the importance of the zenith is marked by the existence of numerous subterranean galleries with vertical shafts that extend from a cave up to the ground surface, e.g., at Xochicalco or Monte Alban (Aveni 2003: 42). During those occasions, when the sun passes the overhead point, it throws a powerful ray of light into the darkened environment. Given that the vertical alignments mainly derived from idealistic concepts, they probably had a more ritualistic function

and meaning (as part of a mythic landscape reflected in architecture) rather than actual effects on the functionality or applicability of calendar counts. Therefore, it is better to use horizon-based observatories to mark the position of the sun during the zenith passage than with the help of zenith tubes, because after the particular interval of days can be observed one apparently critical moment at the horizon, which happens when the sun changes the course of its annual movement (from the perspective of a terrestrial observer). At such moment, the solar disk seems to be stopped on the same point of the horizon at least 5 days, caused by little changes of its position every day by a smaller distance than is one quarter of his diameter (because of the annual “return” of sun movement perceived by an observer). The phenomenon of the solstices can easily acquire a great symbolic significance able to inspire a variety of ritual practices. In fact, there was no need to observe the positions of the sun throughout the year for the purpose of calendrical counts and correlating these with the actual tropical year; this was only necessary for few specific dates. The ancient astronomer could easily have recognized how distant the sun appeared to the first zenith passage by counting back and forth, which is, from an agricultural perspective, the time of the beginning of the rainy season. In southern Mesoamerica, the first zenith passage generally announces the rain at the end of April, thereby alarming farmers to clean the fields for planting, whereas when passing the second zenith passage it announces the rains and wind on 12–13 of August.

Two Types of E-Group Assemblages The occurrences of such architectonic complexes located within the Preclassic core of Uaxactun (in Group E and Group

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

Figure 4. Position of Uaxactun according to the corresponding tropical latitude affecting the values of azimuthal deflections (from the East) for the summer (winter) solstice and zenith passages (Graphics by Ladislav Husár and Tomáš Drápela).

D, respectively) are characterized by different proportions of each. Based on measurements of the proportions of such complexes registered at Uaxactun and its periphery, we here propose that the class of E-Group assemblage can be defined by means of two architectural types. One type of Group E assemblage can be defined as solstitial, due to the factual possibility of precise astronomical observations of the sunrise on the days of summer/winter solstice, according to which the architecture has been oriented in situ, whereas the similar assemblage of Group D does not allow such alignment for observations. The latter type does not allow such observations because it appears to have a smaller angle between the position of the observer (when standing in front of, or on the top of the western radial structure) and the corners of the eastern platform represent the extremities of the ecliptic belt (an angle that depends on the length of the eastern platform and its axial distance from the western position). Nevertheless, the angle defining this assemblage (±18°) enables observations of the sunrise during the days of the appearance of the zenith passage. However the observation possibilities are influenced also by other factors (angular altitude of the projection on celestial sphere, refraction, etc.), the assemblage evincing an angle of a value close to 18.4° can be defined as constructions with possibility of zenithal alignment, and therefore can be considered as a typological variant in a strictly architectural meaning, regardless that observations of astronomical phenomena of zenith passages could have been the source of inspiration for these particular architectural features. For the aim of identifying an astronomical phenomenon that is possibly reflected in a certain architectural alignment, the declination corresponding to the observer’s geographic latitude (Fig. 4), the alignments’ azimuth and the angular altitude of the observed point above the horizontal plane need to be calculated (see Šprajc, Morales-Aguilar and Hansen 2009:

83). Orientations around 90 degrees of azimuth lead to the acceptation of the assemblage being connected with the annual solstice-equinoxial observations maintaining the “ritual or canonical agricultural cycle” (e.g., Šprajc 2008: 237; 2015: 723–724; see also Aveni, Dowd and Vining 2003). Also, the proportions within their structural pattern create the plaza as the civic central place of public rituals. The nature of its planning is being treated through the various concepts; it seems to share a similar inventory of architecture and measurement conventions, governed by solar alignments and planar geometry (Doyle 2013:793), thereby expressing a geometric connection between buildings that goes in accord with the integral right triangles of the Geometry of Void (Harrison 1999:180). Its abstract notion could have the logical prototype in the cleared milpa ritually marked by the farmer (Andrews 1975:10) or could symbolically represent the primordial sea of which the Mountain of Creation emerged (Schele and Mathews 1998:43–46). Thus, the E-Group assemblage, delimiting and co-creating such meaningful open space (especially during the Classic Period), could easily allow very theatrical and impressive observations of astronomical events, even apart from its function as astronomical observatory, but still representing its spatial proportionality as the prototype of a certain cosmic order. In this regard, it is frequently also defined as Astronomical Commemorative Complex (e.g., Laporte and Fialko 1993). In sum, it cannot be surprising that the architecture of the E-Group assemblages expressing the astronomical significance by maintaining the axial 90° azimuth (±0,5°) is actually a rare phenomenon throughout the Maya lowlands. More precisely, the data resulting from measured assemblages lead us to point out intervals ranging from 7% (Aveni, Dowd and Vining 2003: 164–169) up to 18% (Drápela 2014: 92) that are associated with “essentially astronomical observatories”

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Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

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Figure 5. Locations of mentioned E-Group assemblages within the Uaxactun region and its northeastern periphery (Map by Tomáš Drápela).

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

Figure 6. Orientations of the architectural features measured on the bared architecture of buildings forming the E-Group Assemblage, Group E, Uaxactun (Regional Archaeological Project of Uaxactun, data based on photogrammetric measurements, Season 2014) (Graphics by Tibor Lieskovský).

that are known so far. However, when taking into account only the register within the wider region around Uaxactun, the amount is radically higher, reaching a value up to 34% (Fig. 5). And going even further by taking into account its Solsticial arrangement (+/- 24,5° deflection in proportionality)

Axial azimuth

distribution within the perimeter of 6 kilometers around the city-core of Uaxactun we reach a value of 50%. When paying attention to the distribution of the distinct typological variants of E-Groups, the zenithal arrangement seems to be more charZenithal arrangement (+/- 18° deflection in proportionality)

Axial azimuth

Uaxactun Group E

90°

Uaxactun Group D

90°

Dos Torres Group C

88°

Uaxactun Group L

90°

Sakapuk Group A

93°

Sakapuk Group C

92°

Vergel (Tz’ibatnah)

97°

Zompopal Group A

90°

Petnal Group A

95°

El Manantial Group A

97°

Buena Vista Group A

98°

Jimbal Group A

Table 1. Arrangements of the E-Group assemblages within Uaxactun region.

101°

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Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

acteristic for the Uaxactun region (see Table 1). At this point, it needs to be noted that in this case we have been working with a notably small sample of architectural assemblages, precisely with a total of 12. And only two “class-type”-specimen are backed up by valid measurements of an excavated structure. Also, any astronomical significance of the majority is not confirmed due to unverified levels of the natural eastern horizon behind the eastern platform, or due the fact that their existence is only visible in settlement patterns that have been covered and modified by later urban development, as is the case in Group L in Uaxactun, Group A in Buena Vista, Group A in Jimbal and Group A in El Manantial. Thus, their azimuthal orientation and with it any possible astronomical significance is quite uncertain. To conclude, we can carefully proclaim the site of Uaxactun and its surroundings as a region of the Maya lowlands that is characterized by the highest concentration of astronomically significant E-Group assemblages known up to date. Such proclamation can be reinforced by taking the assemblage at the sites of El Palmar into account, which, being located 20 kilometers southwest of Uaxactun, has not been included in our statistics, but shares the axial 90° azimuth according to the measurement of the site map made by Doyle (2013: 796). Furthermore, it has to be pointed out that 75% (3 out of 4) of the possible real astronomical observatories in the perimeter of 6 kilometers around Uaxactun evince a typological proportion of architecture based on the zenithal arrangement. At the moment, we can make the suggestion that for Uaxactun’s skywatchers or daykeepers, as well as for the builders of monumental architecture, the phenomenon of the zenith passages had, for certain reasons, the same significance as observations of the solstices. Furthermore, according to certain archaeological evidence, it is likely that the assemblages characterized by a zenithal arrangement have been constructed earlier in time and the Uaxactun emblematic assemblage expressing a solstitial arrangement thereafter.

that is oriented to the East (Rosal, Valdés and Laporte 1993: 73). At this early stage, during a not yet clearly defined Preclassic phase, this building was not a radial structure and there is no clear evidence of a related eastern platform neither. However, if a future excavation could eventually confirm the existence of such a platform, the height, orientation and exact position of the building would in fact fit perfectly to the ideal observation point (on top of the building) for the purpose of watching the solstices and equinoxes while standing in position of the later eastern platform (for the observation of the solstices the ancient observer would have used the front corners of the platform). The second phase corresponds with the well-known radial Structure E-VII Sub, which was constructed at the same place as the previous one, during the very end of the Preclassic period. At the same moment in time, the Eastern Platform was constructed by means of only one construction phase (Kováč 2017: 68), with one building (later called E-II) standing in the center (Rosal, Valdés and Laporte 1993: 74). The existence of a proper building in the center of the eastern platform (Fig. 7) could be an indicator of the original focus on the observation of equinoxes. However, the rear corners of the Eastern Platform may simultaneously have served for the purpose of observing the solstices, which is a plausible, alternative explanation.

Implications of Revised E-Groups Even though barely discussed, it is also important to take into consideration the chronological implications when observing the E-Groups of Uaxactun. The chronological results of Chase and Chase (1983: 1240) re-examination of the archaeological data shows that the materials associated with Structure E-VII postdate those recovered from structures E-I, E-II and E-III (Aveni, Dowd and Vining 2003:161). They considered the possibility of contemporary astronomical function of the E-VII Sub with the eastern temples (Fig. 6). However, judging from the results of our investigations, this theory cannot be confirmed. The re-examination of archaeological records from the Carnegie Institution (see Ricketson and Ricketson 1937) and further attestations resulting from investigations conducted during the 1980´s (Rosal, Valdés and Laporte 1993), together with recent excavations in Group E (Kováč 2017: 54–69) generate a different picture:

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The first phase of E-VII (E-VII Sub-1) shows a building that measures 3,5 m in total height, with only one stairway

Figure 7. Late Preclassic original construction of the Group E at Uaxactun (Based on Rosal, Valdés and Laporte 1993: 74, redrawn by Tomáš Drápela).

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

Figure 8. Solar trajectories of the important moments within the ecliptic belt. Appearance of astronomical phenomenon of the sunrise is affected by the height of horizontal plane, respectively, the ideal-observational azimuth (Si, Zi, Ei) is different than the azimuth of such appearance at architectural horizon (Sv, Zv, Ev). (Graphics by Tomáš Drápela and Tibor Lieskovský).

During the third phase, constructed in the Early Classic period, the position of the corners of the early eastern platform were set by means of constructing new corners for the lateral buildings E-I and E-III, and even though with other function, the new platform was conspicuously wider. On the one hand, this means that its Early Classic conception was identical with the previous one, even if two additional buildings and the radial Structure E-VII had been designed much higher. On the other hand, however, the new construction design made it impossible to define an observation point on top of the Structure E-VII (as well as before on top of E-VII Sub), not the least because in both phases the true horizon appeared higher as the observation level as seen at the eastern platform. Nonetheless, the positions and movements of an observer would naturally change any point of view with every step upwards the eastern stairway (Fig. 9a). Respectively, the Eastern Platform is optically closer – and therefore appears higher and wider – until the plaza level has been reached after the descend from the top of the radial structure downwards. From this hypothetical point of view, it is possible to see the sunrise during the days of the solstices from the plaza level, when it passes approximately along the lateral walls of buildings E-I and E-III (Fig. 8). Despite the fascinating scenery and its symmetry, it does not seem to function for exact observation purposes, which is the reason why this kind of observation mode is better described as an idealistic, rather than a practical one. Another possibility has already been offered for the perspective of Venus observations (Kováč

et al. 2015: 1035–1036). Uaxactun´s E-Group observatory perfectly enables observations of all Venus cycles. Five complicated trajectories including all sets and rises of Venus are well observable within the respective dimensions, as reflected by the altitudes and angles of the eastern platform and its buildings E-I, E-II and E-III (Fig. 9b). This might correspond to Freidel’s (1979: 46, 1981) hypothesis which is based on the iconography of the upper zoomorphic stucco façades of the radial Structure E-VII Sub, assuming that these reflect a relation between the Sun and Venus. Doubtlessly, Venus had an exceptional meaning for the ancient Maya. Several scholars have emphasized the importance of the maximum elongation of Venus (Schele and Freidel 1990: 444–446; Aveni 1980: 85), the retrograde period of Venus (Lounsbury 1982: 163), or the principal focus on the Evening Star (Šprajc 1993a, 1993b). Strong evidence for the importance of Venus cycles comes also from the Dresden Codex (Milbrath 1999: 163–177). At the southern part of the radial Structure E-VII was added a small platform, E-XII, which does not seem to form part of the observatory (Fig. 10). However, very similar additional platforms in other E-Groups are attested, for example at El Cenote (Chase 1985) and Yaxnohcah (Šprajc 2008). The question thus is, which kind of alignment could represent the small platform E-XII with regard to its relation to the eastern platform? At first, we have analyzed the very rare and incomprehensible deflection of Structure E-III, which has been intentionally oriented differently when compared to E-I and E-II. As a result, it appears that E-III is very accurately

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Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

Figure 9a. Some astronomical phenomenon at the E-Group assemblage functioning as an ecliptic observatory, Uaxactun, Group E. An observer is localized on the top of restored E-VII Sub. Meanwhile the observation from the top doesn´́t evince any direct alignments of sunrise with the Eastern platform, neither with buildings E-I, E-II nor E-III (caused by a higher position of the contour line marking the eastern horizon in landscape than of the artificial horizon formed by architecture), the observation from the level of plaza might provide some relevant alignments (Graphics by Vladimír Karlovský, Tibor Lieskovský and Tomáš Drápela).

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Figure 9b. All five different cycles of the Venus perfectly observable on the horizon of Eastern Platform and related buildings of the Group E, Uaxactun (Graphics by Vladimír Karlovský, Tibor Lieskovský and Tomáš Drápela).

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

Ixkun

Yaxnohcah

El Cenote

Chanchich II

Figure 10. Structure E-XII as an additional E-Group assemblage at Uaxactun and a comparison of its occurrence at various Southern Lowland sites (Graphic by Tibor Lieskovský and Tomáš Drápela).

oriented, including the orientation of the staircase and walls, exactly towards the platform E-XII that had been added to Structure E-VII. The analysis of the astronomically relevant viewpoints from this platform could indicate its orientation towards the heliacal rising of the constellation Orion. This constellation has been associated with the “three stones of creation” (Tedlock 1995: 119-120) which have played a pivotal role in Maya cosmology in context of the creation of the world (see, e.g., Milbrath 1999: 266–268). In addition, lunar alignments can supposedly be observed at the same eastern platform, given that there are clearly recognizable points at its northern and southern extremes during the 18.61-year cycle, when the nodes return to the same positions (Fig. 11). In the same space one could observe the interval between major standstills, when the moon reaches its maximum northern and southern positions (Aveni 1997: 33). All highly complex lunar cycles could be observed within this assemble

and there can also be no doubt about the importance of this cycle for Maya rituals, religion and mythology. Probably, it was likewise important for the common day-count, as can be deduced from the importance of the Lunar Series in the Long Count cycle (Marci and Beattie 1996). By the Classic period, the Lunar Series included information about the current lunar phase (Glyphs D and E), the length of the current or previous lunar month (Glyph A), and the position of the lunar month in the lunar half-year (Glyph C). As Milbrath pointed, the length of the lunar month was calculated in sets of five and six months used in eclipse predictions. On the other hand, the ancient Maya frequently “reconstructed” it with some errors or deflections (Milbrath 1999: 110–111), and its function in the frame of the supposed observational calendar still remains elusive. Nevertheless, the attention has recently been turned to the standstill positions of the moon (Šprajc 2016). We can assume that a vast number of different lunar counts existed simultaneously, and the more significant ones could have been observed in one way or another by means of the eastern platform. It is furthermore remarkable that some lunar obser-

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Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

Figure 11. Variability of the possibilities of solar and lunar observations at the Group E, Uaxactun (Graphic by Tibor Lieskovský and Tomáš Drápela).

vations can be traced back to the Preclassic period (Justeson 1989: 79, 87).

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Reconsidering the functions of the E-Group in Uaxactun, it appears that no single option is clearly dominant. Due to the historical evolution of the entire construction with corresponding optional observation points, alternative possibilities should be considered as well. In this context, it might be worth recalling Aveni´s proclamation concerning the general conception of E-Groups: “it was more performative than practice, more theatre than laboratory and more planetarium than observatory” (Aveni 2003: 163). Other statement declares, they “[...] may have been more important in their design than accurate solar alignment” (Aimers and Rice 2006: 87). Focused especially on the E-Group of Uaxactun, Kováč et al. (2015: 1036) highlight the roles of Sun and Venus in the similar way, supposing that the function of observations of periodical cycles of the sun were combined with the observations of periodical cycles of Venus. But a real function of the whole architectural complex was rather based on esoteric than astronomic grounds. The relation between the buildings of the E-Group embodied by these celestial phenomena probably represented an institutionalized mystery. This concept was intentionally incorporated into the architecture to create a so-called cosmogram, dedicated probably to some ritual acts based on imitations of celestial patterns. We can presume that these activities represent a particular myth with very practical consequences for agriculture, politics, social hierarchy and daily life (Kováč et al. 2015: 1036). In the same way, the symbolic meaning of the architecture could manifest myths about

a story of the Sun or relation between the Sun and Venus, the sun and the Moon, or, in the case of Orion, the creation story. In this light, we can see the E-Group of Uaxactun as an ecliptic planetarium, where the principal mythological stories reflecting the movements of celestial bodies were performed.

Group H North and the Constellation of Orion Among the unexcavated groups of Uaxactun, Group H North has been chosen for more detailed investigations that spanned eight years in total. In order to facilitate the answers to some chronological questions, it is important to note that the excavation results show that the whole plaza of Group H North had been built probably as an E-Group and then rebuilt to the final Triadic form during only one construction phase (spanning from ~40 B.C. to A.D. 10). The process could be similar to the architectural transformation registered in Caracol E-Group (Chase and Chase 1995: 98, 2017: 52). Group H North could have functioned originally as a solar observatory. Nonetheless, its final design manifested approximately 6° of deflection to the South between the radial Structure H-XV and the central building H-I (Fig. 12). Given the fact that exactly oriented buildings and stairways with a deflection of 0° (for the North-South and EastWest axis) were found in the same complex and phase, we interpret the main axis as an intentional deflection, and the result of the measurement seems to be clear:

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

Figure 12. Axial orientations between the structures of El Tiburon (Group F) and Group H North. In smaller scale within the frame of the Group H North. (The lines between radial structure H-XV and H-I on the one side and H-XV and F-VIII on the other side, connect the points of heliacal risings and settings of Orion) (Graphics by Tibor Lieskovský and Tomáš Drápela).

The main direction of the architectural complex that was relevant for the final phase of the Late Preclassic period points towards the heliacal rising and setting of the three brightest stars of the so-called Maya Triangle of the constellation Orion (Kováč and Karlovský 2011, 2015). For such orientation we have a plausible explanation that is based on a particular Maya cosmological concept. On Stela C from Quirigua, an inscription was identified that refers to the Maya creation story, dating it to the 13th of August 3114 BC. Even more important is its statement that at that time ‘the three stones were set’ (Freidel et al. 1993: 65-66). The reference to the three stones of the creation also appears in the inscriptions of Palenque (Tedlock 1995: 119–120) and it seems that the triangle of stars observed in the sky was considered to be the prototype of the Maya hearth, which, from

the earliest times of Maya culture, consists of three hearthstones in a triangular arrangement. These hearthstones were represented by the stars Rigel, Saiph and Alnitak (Freidel et al. 1993: 66–67). In the middle of this triangle of stars is located Nebula M-42, which is visible by naked eye observation, probably by ancient Maya associated with the primordial fire of the hearth of creation, or maybe the smoke ascending from it, while the stars were thought to represent the hearthstones. It is this nebula which may be related to the Aztec’s constellation of Mamalhuaztli, which has been tentatively associated with Orion (Milbrath 1999: 267), and which was of fundamental importance for the ancient Nahuas, as it probably represented the center of their universe and the place of creation. In the Maya Highlands inhabited by K’iche’ Maya, Orion was visible in a true zenith position (Milbrath 1999: 266). The cosmic hearth of creation is mentioned in the Popol

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Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

Vuh, too (see Tedlock 1985: 261). The apex of the hearth’s triangle is formed by the star Alnitak, which is at the same time the bottommost of the three stars of Orion’s belt. Thus, the belt connected to the hearth first emerges from behind the horizon, and in a more vertical position when compared to more northward latitudes. The Maya could have imagined it as a stick for igniting fire (Thompson 1972: 68). After its initial appearance when rising from behind the horizon, it immediately reaches the hearth and the fire in its center.

maize disappearing into the darkness of the earth. In this context, the sowing of the principal source of sustenance associated with the cosmic pattern seems to be a reasonable template. Moreover, besides Uaxactun, a number of temples that are oriented towards the setting points of stars within the constellation Orion have been attested in the capital of the K´iche’ Maya of Q´umarkaj/Utatlán (Freidel et al. 1993: 103).

According to Diego de Landa, one from most important Maya constellation was ak ek´ (Tozzer 1941: 132–133), literally the turtle star/s, represented probably by Orion. More clearly, a rendering of Orion was represented by a turtle in the Paris Codex (Milbrath 1999: 267) and recorded on the Murals of Bonampak, too. Furthermore, the present-day Lacandon Maya have identified a mythological episode in which a turtle living at the bottom of local lake at Naha is associated with mam and described as a very old primordial deity (Kováč 2013: 162; Kováč and Karlovský 2015: 163). This could confirm the concept corresponding to the idea of the beginning of the world represented by “turtle stars”. During the Late Preclassic period, Orion disappeared from the sky on May 2nd with an accuracy of ± 3 days and remained invisible until June 20th, when its heliacal rising occurred. We believe that the disappearance of Orion, exactly at the beginning of the rainy season, would certainly not have gone unnoticed in the context of rituals, especially when considering that the central axis of the whole complex H North was oriented towards Orion. Observations of the disappearance of this constellation could have marked the beginning of the main agrarian ritual that took place on the radial Structure H-XV. The ritual in turn could have been a general indicator of the beginning of the agricultural season.

City-Core Alignments within the Landscape

The heliacal rising of Orion on the 20th of June possibly marked the victorious return from the underworld. Young maize stalks appeared in the fields, life conquered death, and the fire of creation was ignited again. Considering the accuracy of +/- 3 days, it becomes clear that the heliacal rising of Orion is overlapped by the summer solstice, which in turn would have indicated plenty of ritual opportunities. In Uaxactun also winter solstice might be related with the heliacal rising of Orion, especially in the architectural alignments of the E-Group (from E-VII to E-III, and from E-XII to E-III, as well as from H-XV to H-I, and from H-XV to H-III). Nevertheless, the heliacal setting of Orion may have symbolically represented the sowing – the yellow grains of

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Fig. 13. Axial orientations of important Preclassic elevated complexes at Uxactun: El Tiburon, Group H-South Platform, Eastern and Western Platforms of Group H-North, Northern Platform of Group F, E-Groups of the Groups E and D, the ballcourt and buildings H-XVI Sub and E-VII Sub (Drawing by Tomáš Drápela).

The orientation of alignments embodied by the monumental architecture of the Preclassic core of Uaxactun seems to follow the common pattern, as becomes clear when taking a look at Figure 13. Such regularity in architectural orientations and urban layout demonstrating that complex rules based on astronomical and calendrical calculations were already fully developed in the central Maya Lowlands by the Late Preclassic period (Šprajc, Morales-Aguilar and Hansen 2009: 78). Such a pattern can be defined by the general west-east orientation and the south-of-east skew in the urban planning. The preference for a west-east orientation might be explained by concepts presenting the urban materialization of the celestial order emphasized by the axial ecliptic belt (see, e.g., Ashmore and Sabloff 2002), whereas the peculiarity of the south-of-east skew within the same belt – and prevailing throughout Mesoamerica – is being explained by a particular symbolism of directionality (see Šprajc 2003; see also Šprajc, Morales-Aguilar and Hansen 2009: 82). In the case of Uaxactun, we can also propose that such a skew could be influenced naturally by the morphology of the local landscape. The local visibility in general, and particularly from the center of the city-core (e.g., seen from the prominent elevation of the El Tiburon complex), is framed by a landscape reflecting the dichotomy of the western and eastern direction: located in the west is a hilly terrain that is formed by mountain ridges and valleys, whereas on the east side one can find plains with small emerging elevations and dividing line in between both landscapes, thereby forming marks of a certain east-of-north skew. In any case, the understanding of the concepts behind the symbolism of cardinal directions is one of the key-points of research which have led to the discovery of certain alignments in Maya architecture establishing the east or west oriented groups of alignments associated with observational calendars. In the Preclassic core of Uaxactun one can, approximately, detect a cluster of 8° in the alignments formed by structures H-I and H-XV that are oriented towards F-VIII. To the same group of orientation seem to pertain also, for example, the La Danta Acropolis of El Mirador, and Structure 59 of Nakbe (Šprajc, Morales-Aguilar and Hansen 2009: 85–86). It is interesting that such alignments also work in (or can be related with) both directions, from the central radial Structure H-XV, as well as westwards from Structure H-I (Fig. 12). Furthermore, Structure F-VIII can hypothetically be entangled in another possible alignment pertaining to the so-called Group of 17°, if we associate it with Structure RNO4-I located on the most prominent peak above the western horizon (Fig. 14). The abovementioned group is widely spread throughout Mesoa-

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

merica and it is particularly relevant in the context of cultural interaction (Šprajc, Morales-Aguilar and Hansen 2009: 79). The El Tiburon Complex and its highest located structure, F-VIII, played the prominent role in Preclassic Uaxactun. The orientation of its architectural pattern (Fig. 15), forming a double-triadic group, follows the orientation of a line of demarcation of the landscape division (as mentioned above) and thereby facing the chain of settlements located on the geomorphological shift between the levels of the north-eastern flatland and terminating with the extended site of Ramonal, located at a distance of 15 kilometers from Uaxactun. Undoubtedly, as a prominent urban peak, the El Tiburon Complex played various spatial roles and maybe one day, after a wider data collection, it should be understood as the dominant landmark, in a similar way as Structure 1 of Calakmul has been described: “[…] is skewed 14°19’ clockwise from cardinal directions (pertaining to the Group of 17° mentioned above), whereas its north-south axis prolonged southward passes exactly over the colossal Danta pyramid of El Mirador, visible from Calakmul as a small bump on the southern horizon (located at the distance of 40 kilometers). If there was a purpose underlying this alignment, it must have influenced the location of Structure 1 of Calakmul, which obviously postdates the Preclassic Danta Complex of El Mirador: in order to incorporate both the astronomically functional eastwest orientation and the alignment to the Danta pyramid of El Mirador into a structure with a rectangular ground plan, i.e.

with its north-south and east-west axes intersecting at right angles, the builders had to find an appropriate spot where the two relevant directions were perpendicular to each other.” (Šprajc, Morales-Aguilar and Hansen 2009: 94–95).

Conclusions It is important to emphasize that a correctly defined orientation of any alignment needs to be based on the extensive topographical background and adequate technologies that are considered credible for archaeoastronomical usage. The most productive is a combination of methods including 3Dand 2D-models, as well as DEM obtained by topographical measurements, in company with laser scanning and/or photogrammetry (in the ideal case based on LiDAR data). For unexcavated features, it is highly recommended to conduct geo-statistical calculations of a probable orientation of slopes, based on the orientations of its contour lines, including the elimination of all out layers which can possibly distort the statistical average and calculation of the middle value of orientations and its standard deviation. However, any detected alignment within unexcavated architecture should solely be considered as hypothetical due to its unknown original height. One group of alignments of buildings in Uaxactun probably did not follow any celestial phenomena, but its orientation could be explained by natural geomorphological variations

Figure 14. El Tiburon Complex (its highest structure F-VIII) and Structure F-XV associated with a prominent peak at the western horizon and its highest structure RNO4-I (Graphics by Tomáš Drápela).

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Milan Kováč, Tomáš Drápela, Jakub Špoták, Tibor Lieskovský & Ladislav Husár

Figure 15. Main Preclassic architectural complex El Tiburon and its orientations (Graphic by Tibor Lieskovský).

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of the site on the one hand, and by the possible sacral mountains and important points at the horizon on the other hand. Nevertheless, the astronomical meaning of some of the other alignments has been successfully attested. The Maya “composite” calendrical systems did not count with a precise tropical year and could not be fixed with the common agricultural year, or other periodically appearing natural phenomena for a long time. That is why is appropriate to consider that the horizon-based observational calendar functioned in parallel for main agricultural and ritual events, etc. However, the concept of the observations related to calendrical counts of 20 or 13 days between the zenith and solstice positions for Uaxactun is not verifiable. Nonetheless, we found various Preclassic architectural alignments which can be divided into solar horizon observations and sidereal observations. In this regard, we divide solar horizon observations into two typological groups, both having been based on definitions

of the so-called E-Groups. One of these can be defined as solstitial, given the real possibility of a precise astronomical observation of the sunrise during the days that correspond to the summer- and winter-solstice marked by the architectural features. The other one could enable the observations of the sunrise on the days around the zenith passage and we defined it as zenithal. From twelve E-Group assemblages known at Uaxactun and its surroundings so far, eight can be considered as zenithal, and four as solstitial due to the architectural proportionality that defines them. This division represents typological variants rather than factual evidence of strictly observational priorities. Nevertheless, for the solstitial assemblages, especially for the famous E-Group at Uaxactun, we propose a variety of possibilities for observation. It seems to be clear that E-VII Sub (the radial structure) is related with its eastern platform in only one construction period (during the Late Preclassic period), and in this period, it may have

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

served as an observatory featuring only one building in the center (Fig. 7). Besides their purpose for the observation of equinoxes, the rear corners of the eastern platform permitted credible solstice observations, too. Furthermore, all cycles of Venus (Fig. 9b), as well as Lunar movements (Fig. 11), were perfectly observable. A plurality of the possibilities and the absence of evidence for a fixed observation point lead us to the idea of an “ecliptic planetarium” where the main mythological stories were observed, and relevant rituals could have been performed. Possible sidereal observations were recognized in groups H North, F North, and in the E-Group alignments, all oriented to the heliacal rising and setting of the constellation of Orion. The heliacal rising of this constellation which overlaps with the summer solstice was impersonated by the three bright stars in triangular formation (Rigel, Saiph and Alnitak) and probably represented a mythological pattern for the so-called Triadic groups, idealistically associated with the concept of the first fire and the creation of the world. The celebration of this heliacal rising of Orion could be connected with the political authority of Maya elites and the resurrection of the Maize God. On the other hand, the heliacal setting of Orion could be related to the death of the Maize God, being the ritual designation for the beginning of the rainy season and the time of sawing. These alignments, observable from the radial Structure H-XV oriented Southeast and Northwest, connected two principal triadic groups of the Late Preclassic period: H North and F North (El Tiburon), respectively (Fig. 12). The same angle with identical possibilities (and overlapping with winter solstice) is confirmed in the E-Group between structures E-XII and E-III (Fig. 10). There remains no doubt regarding the deep ritual meaning of related dates, even if the exact position of the observer has not been detected yet, and the exact day could not be defined by direct observation (a phenomenon is observable for ± 3 days). A similar imperfection is reflected in the case of the alignments measured within the E-Group assemblage; the abovementioned ecliptic planetarium. We can conclude that the observational calendar in Preclassic Uaxactun probably indicated the beginning of an important period rather than corresponding to the exact day, and it requires more skills to recognize celestial patterns than real calendrical measurement. What seems to be clear is that more important celestial phenomena were connected with certain kinds of architectural alignments, some based maybe on the idea of ritual commemorations of crucial celestial tales of the Sun, Moon, Venus and Orion, each one probably represented by a set of supernatural beings or culture heroes. The movements of celestial bodies were identified and “petrified” into the architecture as if it were their terrestrial manifestation. Acknowledgements

The work was supported by the Slovak Research and Development Agency under the Contract APVV-0864-12 and in the aftermath under the Contract APVV-17-0648 and by the Scientific Grant Agency through the grant VEGA 1/0858/17.

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Kováč, Milan 2013 Ah Xok, transformaciones de un dios acuático. Del tiburón olmeca a la sirena lacandona. Contributions in New World Archaeology 5: 151–164. 2017 Excavaciones en la Plataforma Este del Grupo E. In: Milan Kováč, Sandra Ventura and Mauricio Díaz (eds.), Nuevas excavaciones en Uaxactun VIII (Temporada 2016), pp. 55–69. Bratislava: Center for Mesoamerican Studies. Kováč, Milan and Vladimír Karlovský 2011 Astronomická a rituálna funkcia architektonického Komplexu H Sever v Uaxactúne. Religio 19 (1): 27–48. 2015 New Maya Observatory Identified in Uaxactun, Guatemala. In: Drahoslav Hulínek, Dominik Bonatz and Milan Kováč (eds.), Archaeology on Three Continents: 2006–2011, pp. 143–156. Bratislava: SAHI. Kováč, Milan, Vladimír Karlovský, Alice Desprat and Teresa Navarro 2015 Observatorio E-VII Sub de Uaxactun: Reconsiderando su función en el pasado y propuesta de conservación en el futuro. In: Bárbara Arroyo, Luis Méndez Salinas y Lorena Paiz (eds.), XXVIII Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala 2014, pp. 1033–1044. Ciudad de Guatemala: Asociación Tikal. Lamb, Weldon W. 2002 The Maya Month Names. PhD. Dissertation, Tulane University. Laporte, Juan Pedro and Vilma Fialko 1993 El Preclásico de Mundo Perdido: Algunos aportes sobre los orígenes de Tikal. In: Juan Pedro Laporte and Juan Antonio Valdés (eds.), Tikal y Uaxactun en el Preclásico, pp. 9–38. México: IIA-UNAM. Lounsbury, Floyd G. 1982 Astronomical Knowledge and Its Uses at Bonampak. In: Anthony Aveni (ed.), Archaeoastronomy in New World, pp. 143–168. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Macri, Martha and Donald Beattie 1996 The Lunar Cycle and the Mesoamerican Counts of Twenty, Thirteen, Nine, and Seven. Paper presented at the Oxford Fifth Conference on Archaeoastronomy, Santa Fe. Milbrath, Susan 1999 Star Gods of the Maya. Astronomy in Art, Folklore, and Calendars. Austin: University of Texas Press. Millon, René 1968 Urbanization at Teotihuacan: the Teotihuacan mapping project. In: Juan Comas (ed.), Actas y memorias del XXVII congreso internacional de Americanistas, vol. 1. Buenos Aires: Buenos Aires Libería. Nilsson, Martin 1920 Primitive Time-reckoning: A Study in the Origins and First Development of the Art of Counting Time Among the Primitive and Early Culture Peoples. Acta Regiae Societatis Humaniorum Litterarum Lundensis. Lund: CWK Gleerup. Rice, Prudence 2007 Maya Calendar Origins. Monuments, Mythistory, and the Materialization of Time. Austin: University of Texas Press.

Skywatching at Uaxactun: Reconsidering Perspectives on the Astronomical Significance of Preclassic Architectural Alignments

Ricketson Jr., Oliver 1928 Astronomical Observatories in the Maya Area. Geographical Review 18 (2): 215–225. Ricketson Jr., Oliver and Edith B. Ricketson 1937 Uaxactun, Guatemala, Group E, 1926–1931. Publication 477. Washington D.C.: Carnegie Institution of Washington. Rosal, Marco Antonio, Juan Antonio Valdés and Juan Pedro Laporte 1993 Nuevas exploraciones en el Grupo E, Uaxactún. In: Juan Pedro Laporte and Juan Antonio Valdés (eds.), Tikal y Uaxactun en el Preclásico, pp. 70–91. México: IIA-UNAM. Roys, Ralph L. 1967 The Book of Chilam Balam of Chumayel. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. Ruggles, Clive L.N. 2015a Calendars and Astronomy. In: Clive L.N. Ruggles (ed.), Handbook of Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy, pp. 15–30. New York: Springer. 2015b Analyzing Orientations. In: Clive L.N. Ruggles (ed.), Handbook of Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy, pp. 411–426. New York: Springer. Schele, Linda and David Freidel 1990 A Forest of Kings: The Untold Story of the Ancient Maya. New York: William Morrow. Schele, Linda and Peter Mathews 1998 The Code of Kings. The Language of Seven Sacred Maya Temples and Tombs. New York: Scribner. Smith, Robert E. 1931 A Study of Structure A-I Complex at Uaxactun, Petén, Guatemala. Contributions to American Archaeology 19, pp. 189–231. Publication 456. Washington D.C.: Carnegie Institution of Washington. 1955 Ceramic Sequence at Uaxactun, Guatemala. Volume II. New Orleans: Middle American Research Institute Tulane University. Smith, A. Ledyard 1950 Uaxactun, Guatemala: Excavations of 1931–1937. Publication 588. Washington D.C.: Carnegie Institution of Washington. Šprajc, Ivan 1993a The Venus-Rain-Maize Complex in the Mesoamerican World View: Part I. Journal for the History of Astronomy 24: 17–70. 1993b The Venus-Rain-Maize Complex in the Mesoamerican World View: Part II. Archaeoastronomy (Supplement of the Journal for the History of Astronomy 24) 18: 27–53. 2003 The South-of-East Skew of Mesoamerican Architectural Orientations: Astronomy and Directional Symbolism. In: Maxime Bocas, Johanna Broda and Gonzalo Pereira (eds.), Etno- y arqueo-astronomía en las Américas, pp. 161–176. Memorias del Simposio ARQ-13 del 51 Congreso Internacional de Americanistas. Chile: Universidad de Chile. 2005 More on Mesoamerican Cosmology and City Plans. Latin American Antiquity 16 (2): 120–132. 2008a Reconocimiento arqueológico en el sureste del estado de Campeche, México: 1996-2005. Paris Monographs in American Archaeology 19. Oxford: Archaeopress. 2008b Alineamientos astronómicos en la arquitectura. In: Ivan Šprajc, Reconocimiento arqueológico en el sur de Campeche: nuevos hallazgos y contribuciones para una visión regional,

pp. 233–240. Oxford: BAR International Series 1742. 2015a Astronomical Correlates of Architecture and Landscape in Mesoamerica. In: Clive L.N. Ruggles (ed.), Handbook of Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy, pp. 715–728. New York: Springer. 2015b Pyramids Marking Time. Anthony F. Aveni´s Contribution to the Study of Astronomical Alignment in Mesoamerican Architecture. In: Anne S. Dowd and Susan Milbrath (eds.), Cosmology, Calendars, and Horizon-Based Astronomy in Ancient Mesoamerica, pp. 19–36. Boulder: University Press of Colorado. Šprajc, Ivan, Carlos Morales-Aguilar and Richard D. Hansen 2009 Early Maya Astronomy and Urban Planning at El Mirador, Peten, Guatemala. Anthropological Notebooks 15 (3): 79–101. Šprajc, Ivan and Pedro Francisco Sánchez Nava 2012 Orientaciones en la arquitectura Maya en Las Tierras Bajas: Nuevos datos e interpretaciones. In: Bárbara Arroyo, Lorena Paiz Aragón and Héctor Mejía (eds.), XXV Simposio de investigaciones arqueológicas en Guatemala, pp. 977–996. Guatemala: Instituto de Antropología e Historia and Asociación Tikal. Steele, John M. 2012 Living with a Lunar Calendar in Mesopotamia and China. In: Jonathan Ben-Dov, Wayne Horowitz and John M. Steele (eds.), Living the Lunar Calendar, pp. 119–172. Oxford: Oxbow Books. 2015 Astronomy and Politics. In: Clive L.N. Ruggles (ed.), Handbook of Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy, pp. 93–102. New York: Springer. Tedlock, Dennis 1985 Popol Vuh. New York: Simon and Schuster. 1995 Visions of the Maya Sky. Review Feature of Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman´s Path. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 5(1): 118–120. Thompson, J. Eric S. 1972 A Commentary on the Dresden Codex: A Maya Hieroglyphic Book. Philadelphia: The American Philosophical Society. Turton, David and Clive Ruggles 1978 Agreeing to Disagree: The Measurement of Duration in a Southwestern Ethiopian Community. Current Anthropology 19: 585–600. Valdés, Juan Antonio 1986 Reporte arqueológico de las exploraciones realizadas en Uaxactún durante 1983–1985. Guatemala: Proyecto Nacional Tikal. Valdés, Juan Antonio, Federico Fahsen and Héctor Escobedo 1999 Reyes, tumbas y palacios: la historia dinástica de Uaxactún. México D.F.: UNAM. Villa Rojas, Antonio 1978 Los elegidos de Dios: etnografía de los mayas de Quintana Roo. Mexico City: Instituto Nacional Indigenista. Źrałka, Jaroslaw and Bernard Hermes 2009 Los grafitos prehispánicos de los sitios Nakum y Yaxha, Peten, Guatemala. Su contexto arqueológico, iconográfico y cronológico. In: Cristina Vidal Lorenzo and Gaspar Muñoz Cosme (eds.), Los grafitos mayas, pp. 133–158. Cuadernos de Arquitectura y Arqueología Maya 2. Valencia: Ediciones UPV.

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Lunar Orientations in the Maya Architecture Ivan Šprajc Research Center of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts Ljubljana, Slovenia

Abstract The results of a recently accomplished archaeoastronomical study in the Maya area reveal the existence of architectural orientations corresponding to major and minor standstill positions of the Moon on the horizon. Their intentionality is supported by contextual data, particularly prominent being the fact that most orientations to major standstills are found in the northeastern lowlands, where lunar cult is known to have been important. This contribution analyzes relevant alignment data and discusses independent evidence, which sheds light on the use and cultural significance of lunar orientations.

Resumen Los resultados de un estudio arqueoastronómico recientemente realizado en el área maya revelan la existencia de orientaciones arquitectónicas que corresponden a los extremos mayores y menores de la Luna en el horizonte. Su intencionalidad es apoyada por datos contextuales, siendo particularmente prominente el hecho de que las orientaciones hacia los extremos mayores se localizan, en su mayoría, en las tierras bajas nororientales, donde sabemos que el culto lunar era particularmente importante. En esta contribución se analizan los datos relevantes sobre los alineamientos y se discuten las evidencias independientes que arrojan luz sobre el uso y el significado cultural de las orientaciones lunares.

Archaeoastronomical research carried out during the last few Aveni, Dowd and Vining 1975, 2003; Aveni and Hartung decades in different Mesoamerican regions, including the 1986; Galindo 1994; Tichy 1991; Šprajc 1993a, 1996, 2001), Maya area, has revealed that the orientations in civic and whereas the relationship of alignments with other celestial ceremonial architecture exhibit a clearly non-uniform distri- bodies has been much less certain. Aveni and Hartung (1978; bution, i.e. concentrations around certain azimuthal values.1 1979) mentioned that the main building at Paalmul and the The presence of such orientation groups at a number of sites east side of the Palace complex at Palenque may be oriented spread far apart in space and time can only be explained with to standstill positions of the Moon, but only recent research the use of astronomical objects at the horizon as reference ob- in the Maya area, involving field measurements of 271 orienjects (cf. Aveni and Hartung 1986: 7f). The prevailing orien- tations at 87 archaeological sites, has disclosed a considerable tation patterns indicate that most buildings were aligned upon number of structures that can be related to these phenomena sunrises and sunsets on particular dates; some orientations to (Šprajc and Sánchez 2012; Sánchez and Šprajc 2011, 2015). Venus extremes have also been identified (e.g., Aveni 2001; The present contribution summarizes the analyses that led to this conclusion, and presents contextual data that elucidate the significance of lunar alignments. 1 The azimuth is the angle measured in the horizontal plane clockwise from the North, having values from 0° to 360°.

Ivan Šprajc

Lunar Standstills If observed on consecutive days at the moment of rising or setting, the Moon moves along the horizon between its northerly and southerly extreme positions, taking one month to complete the circuit. However, since the Moon’s orbit is inclined to that of the Earth (the ecliptic) at an angle of 5.145° (i), and because the lunar nodes, or intersections of both orbits projected on the celestial sphere, move gradually along the ecliptic, completing the whole circle in 18.6 years, the extreme declinations2 of the Moon differ from those reached by the Sun at the solstices by up to ±5.145°, exhibiting variations with the same periodicity. Considering an approximate value of ±23.5° for the obliquity of the ecliptic ε (inclination of the Earth’s equator to the ecliptic), the extreme declinations of the Moon in an 18.6-year cycle vary between ±(ε + i) (ca. ±28.5°) and ±(ε - i) (ca. ±18.5°); the corresponding moments are known as major and minor lunar standstills, respectively, each of the two occurring at 18.6-year intervals. Consequently, at a major standstill the rising and setting Moon reaches its greatest extremes, i.e. the farthest northerly and southerly points on the horizon, while the smallest (innermost) extremes can be observed after 9.3 years (cf. Thom 1971: 15ff; Morrison 1980; Ruggles 1999: 36f, 60f; Aparicio et al. 2000: 32ff; González-García 2015). The apparent motion of the Moon is quite complicated. Due to its relative proximity to the Earth, the positions of the Moon, as seen from the Earth, are affected by the parallax, which must be taken into account in calculating geocentric lunar declinations corresponding to alignments (Hawkins 1968: 51f; Thom 1971: 34; Ruggles 1999: 36f).3 The exact 2 The declination is the celestial coordinate expressing angular distance of a point projected on the imaginary celestial sphere from the celestial equator, which can be imagined as a projection of the Earth’s equator on the celestial sphere. Declinations are measured perpendicularly to the celestial equator to the north and south, having values from 0° to ±90°. Possible astronomical referents of an alignment can only be identified by calculating the declination of the corresponding horizon point (considering its altitude above the horizontal plane corrected for atmospheric refraction, the geographic latitude of the observation point, and the alignment’s azimuth) and matching it with declination values given for celestial bodies in astronomical sources (ephemerides, star atlases etc.).

26

3 The declinations of the Moon given in astronomical ephemerides are geocentric (i.e. valid for an observer in the center of the Earth). For an observer on the Earth’s surface, however, the apparent declination of the Moon is slightly different (unless the Moon is in zenith, which means that the observer is located exactly along the line connecting the Moon and the Earth’s center). The difference between the two values – the parallax – thus depends on the position of the observer relative to the Earth’s center and the Moon. For determining the parallax needed in our calculations of geocentric lunar declinations, the mean values of the Earth’s radius and of its distance from the Moon have been considered, as well as the concrete horizon altitudes along the alignments (the parallaxes of the Sun and other celestial bodies are, due to their distances from the Earth, negligible for our purposes).

values of standstill declinations of the Moon are subject to a number of parameters, which vary as a function of time. As already mentioned, the differences between the extreme declinations of the Moon and those reached by the Sun at the solstices can be up to about ±5.145°; however, due to secular variations of the obliquity of the ecliptic (cf. Ruggles 2015: 479f), the exact values of lunar standstill declinations also vary in time. Furthermore, the mean value of the inclination of lunar orbit (i) to the ecliptic (5.145°) exhibits periodical variations of up to ±0.15°, or 9 arc minutes. Also the parallax of the Moon, depending on its changing distance from the Earth, manifests periodical variations of a few arc minutes. Another factor to be considered is that, strictly speaking, a lunar standstill corresponds to the moment in which the nodes of the lunar orbit coincide with the equinoctial points on the ecliptic, but this instant rarely coincides with the extreme declination reached by the Moon in a month. Moreover, if we assume that the ancient observers paid particular attention to the Moon’s northernmost and southernmost excursions on the horizon, it is important to consider that the moment when the Moon attains its extreme declination only exceptionally coincides with the time of its rising or setting; due to its relatively fast movement with respect to the starry background (ca. 13° per day), its declination at the moment of rising or setting can differ by a few arc minutes from the maximum/minimum declination reached in that particular month. Likewise, the need to postpone observations because of unfavorable weather conditions can additionally contribute to the error in determining the northernmost or southernmost position of the Moon. Owing to these and other variables, discussed by Ruggles (1999: 36f, 60f) and, in greater detail, by Morrison (1980), the extremes of the Moon determined through the observation of its risings and settings will tend to be smaller than those resulting from calculations based on the true standstill declinations. In other words, it can be expected that the declinations corresponding to the directions determined this way will be larger for southern standstills (negative declinations) and smaller for northern standstills (positive declinations); and this is precisely what is observed in our data.

Orientations to Major Lunar Standstills Figure 1 presents relative frequencies of declinations corresponding to the east-west azimuths of architectural orientations in the Maya Lowlands. To illustrate the difference between lunar declinations, which are, on the average, about 0.37° greater than “normal” declination values (calculated without taking into account lunar parallax and employed for determining other possible celestial referents of alignments), the distribution of both types of declinations is shown. To facilitate further references, the declinations marked on the eastern and western horizon are designated briefly as east and west declinations, respectively. For obtaining the curves, the method known as kernel density estimation (KDE) was employed, taking into consideration the errors assigned to each value on the basis of the present state of the buildings observed in field and the estimated uncertainties regarding

Lunar Orientations in the Maya Architecture

Figure 1. Relative frequency distribution of declinations corresponding to the east-west azimuths of orientations in the Maya Lowlands.

the originally intended azimuths. For the error assigned to each declination value, a normal distribution centered on the nominal value and with a standard deviation of the specified uncertainty was assumed, and all normal distributions were summed up to obtain the data for the curves.4 It can thus be expected that the most prominent peaks of the curves closely correspond to the values targeted by particular orientation groups.

current era and around A.D. 1500 were 23.695° and 23.504°,5 the major standstill declinations (ε + i) at the two epochs were 28.84° and 28.65°, respectively, their mean being 28.745°, very close to the peak among the western lunar declinations (28.61°), whereas the eastern peak (-27.74°) differs by 1° from the negative value of this mean (Fig. 1). In both cases the absolute values of declination peaks are smaller than the “ideal” mean, as was to be expected in view of the observational complications mentioned above, but a better agreement Since most of the buildings that have been measured are with the western peak suggests that the orientations of this skewed clockwise from cardinal directions, which is a preva- group were intended to record the settings of the Moon at its lent characteristic of Mesoamerican architectural orientations, major northern standstills. the east/west declinations are predominantly negative/positive. Most of the prominent declination peaks correspond to Because of the complexities of the apparent motion of the solar orientation groups, being related with particular sunrise Moon and observational problems referred to above, we can and sunset dates (Sánchez and Šprajc 2015). In the curves assume that an alignment aiming at a standstill position on presenting lunar declinations, however, the two peaks corre- the horizon may be in error of up to ±0.5° relative to the exact sponding to declinations of -27.74° (east) and 28.61° (west) standstill declination. In order to find the buildings that could can be related to the major lunar standstills. The structures have been oriented to major lunar standstills, the estimated involved in the two orientation groups date to the Classic and errors of declinations were, therefore, incremented by this Postclassic periods. The chronological placement of these value. Selecting the lunar declinations that, considering the buildings is relevant because – as already mentioned – the range of these incremented errors, match the major standstill maximum/minimum declinations of the Moon vary in time values given above and valid for the periods in which the as a consequence of secular variations in the obliquity of the structures were built, the orientations listed in Table 1 were ecliptic ε. Since the values of ε around the beginning of the obtained, where the declinations that, taking into account these criteria, may refer to major lunar standstills are written 4 The software Curvigram Version 1.01, developed and kindly provided by Andrew G. K. Smith, School of Chemistry and Physics, University of Adelaide, Australia, was employed for these calculations.

5 The values of ε for certain past epochs can be found, for example, in Aveni (2001: 103) and Ruggles (2015: Table 31.3). For our purposes the formula presented by Meeus (1991: 135) was employed.

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Ivan Šprajc

site, structure

period

AE

lunar δE

error δE

lunar δW

LPC

119.500

-27.353

1.5

Cobá, Xaibé

LC

122.317

-29.898

2.5

30.202

2.5

Iglesia Vieja, Structure B-1

EC

122.800

-30.380

2.5

31.364

2.5

Iglesia Vieja, Structure B-3

EC

121.800

-29.309

2.5

30.364

2.5

Izamal, Chaltunhá

EC/EPC

120.350

-28.009

2.0

28.313

2.0

Buena Vista, Structure C18-1-a

27.647

error δW 1.5

La Expedición, Structures C25-1-a, 1-b 1-c

LPC

121.375

-29.025

1.5

29.326

1.5

Lagartero, Mound 2

LC

119.433

-26.867

1.5

28.691

1.5

Nuevo Chetumal, Structure 1

LC

57.970

33.685

3.0

-29.235

2.5

Palenque, Temple of the Cross

LC

120.115

-23.561

2.5

28.569

1.5

Sabana Piletas, Columnitas Group, upper building

LC

120.175

-27.681

1.5

28.405

1.5

San Gervasio, Group VI (El Ramonal), Acropolis

EC

120.038

-27.860

1.0

28.069

1.0

Tancah, Structure 12

EPC

119.533

-27.464

1.5

27.693

1.5

Tulum, Structure 25

LPC

119.809

-27.700

0.8

28.658

0.8

Xcalumkín, North Hill Group, South Building

EC/LC

121.400

-28.429

1.0

29.621

1.0

Xelhá Palace, northern part

EC/LC

120.452

-28.294

1.0

28.525

1.0

Xelhá, Structure of the Pillars

EC/LC

121.983

-29.697

1.5

29.932

1.5

Yaxchilán, Structure 40

LC

55.949

32.793

1.5

-31.052

2.5

Table 1. Orientations corresponding to the major lunar standstills (the declinations and errors matching standstill values are in bold type). AE: eastward azimuth; δE: declination east; δW: declination west; EC: Early Classic; LC: Late Classic; EPC: Early Postclassic; LPC: Late Postclassic.

in bold characters. We can see that, in various cases, it is impossible to determine whether an orientation was functional to the east or the west, but the correspondences with standstill declinations are better on the western horizon. It should be noted that some of the orientations given in Table 1, considering the estimated errors, might refer to the maximum extremes of Venus as evening star (Šprajc 1993a; 1996; 2015). The existence of both lunar and Venus orientations in the Maya Lowlands is indicated by two distinct peaks in the distribution of declinations on the western horizon (Fig. 1), the lower one (at 26.8°) corresponding to the maximum northerly extremes of Venus as evening star.6 In particular cases the intended celestial referent cannot always be reliably established; for the alignments discussed below, however, contextual data make a lunar interpretation much more likely.

concentration of these orientations has been found on the northeastern coast of the Yucatan peninsula, i.e. in the area where the worship of the goddess Ixchel is known to have been very important during the Postclassic period (Šprajc 2009; Sánchez and Šprajc 2015).

It is a rather common opinion that Ixchel, associated at the time of the Conquest with pregnancy, childbirth, medicine, divination and weaving (Thompson 1939: 166; Tozzer 1941: 9f, 129f, 154; Cruz 2005), was the Maya goddess of the Moon, identical to Goddess I, which in codices appears associated with weaving. Taube (1992: 64ff, 99ff), however, argues that there is little evidence allowing to relate Goddess I to the Moon and that Ixchel corresponds rather to Goddess O, associated with water, weaving, childbirth, medicine and divination, but not explicitly with the Moon. Even though also Thompson (1939: 133, 166; 1975: 296) admits that there In relation with the South Building of the North Hill are no direct proofs about Ixchel being a Moon goddess, Group of Xcalumkín, Campeche (Pollock 1980: 434ff; Oje- his extensive comparative study clearly shows that Mesoamerican lunar goddesses were generally associated with da and Benavides 2008: 65ff), it is worth mentioning that a seated anthropomorphic figure sculpted in stone and locally earth, water, weaving, childbirth, procreation, medicine and diseases; therefore, his conclusion that Ixchel, in view of her known as la vieja (or xnuc, in Yucatec Maya) was found in the vicinity (Benavides 2010: 31, Fig. 15); if it represents the old functions and attributes, must also have been a lunar deity is Moon goddess, as one can surmise (cf. Milbrath 1999: 141ff), compelling (Thompson 1939; 1975: 296ff). In her exhaustive presentation of iconographic, epigraphic, historical and the cult of this deity at the site would have been consistent ethnographic data about the Maya Moon deities and the conwith the presence of a lunar orientation. cepts related to this celestial body, Milbrath (1999: 27–34, The idea that one group of orientations in the Maya ar- 105–156) arrives to the same conclusion and suggests that the evidently related deities – such as Goddesses I and O in chitecture marked the major lunar standstills of the Moon the codices, which sometimes even appear in hybrid forms is most convincingly supported by the fact that the main – correspond to different aspects or phases of the Moon, one of their manifestations being Ixchel. Arguments about the 6 The corresponding peak among the east declinations identity of Goddesses I and O had been presented already by (-27.23°) cannot be related to the morning star extremes, due to Montolíu (1984).

28

the asymmetry of Venus extremes visible on the eastern and western horizon (Šprajc 1993a: 20f; 1996: 23ff; 2015).

Lunar Orientations in the Maya Architecture

site, structure Bonampak, Acropolis, Structure 21

period LC

AE 64.841

δE 25.619

error δE 1.0

δW -23.317

error δW 1.0

Buena Vista, Structure C18-1-b

LPC

113.417

-22.094

2.0

21.664

2.0

Comalcalco, Acropolis, Structure 3

LC

115.317

-24.187

1.0

23.724

1.0

El Gallinero, Structure C-4

EC/LC

114.500

-23.438

1.0

23.159

1.0

Iglesia Vieja, Group D

EC

114.967

-23.060

1.0

24.788

1.0

Janán I, Structure C8-2-a

LPC

116.500

-24.947

1.5

24.472

1.5

Labná, Palace, upper buildings

LC

115.283

-23.617

1.0

23.480

1.0

Lagartero, Mound 1

LC

116.433

-24.412

1.0

25.456

1.0

Palenque, Temple of the Cross

LC

120.115

-23.963

2.0

28.240

1.0

San Gervasio, Group I, Structure C22-5-a (Palace)

LPC

115.000

-23.537

1.0

23.099

1.0

San Gervasio, Group VI, Structure C22-38-a

LPC

114.600

-23.167

0.7

22.730

0.7

San Gervasio, Group VI, Str. C22-41-a (Ka’na Nah)

LPC

114.433

-23.058

1.0

22.545

1.0

San Gervasio, Group VI, Structure C22-48-a

LC

114.828

-23.378

0.7

22.941

0.7

Tancah, Structure 6

EPC

114.283

-22.963

1.0

22.510

1.0

-23.084

Toniná, Temple of the War

LC

114.327

Tulum, Structure 21

LPC

115.050

Xelhá, Palace, southern part

EC/LC

116.093

Yaxnohcah, Group F

MP/LP

114.000

0.7

23.651

0.7

NA

23.841

1.0

-24.638

1.0

24.140

1.0

-22.977

1.0

23.412

1.0

NA

Table 2. Orientations corresponding to the solstices (the declinations and errors matching solstitial values are in bold type). AE: eastward azimuth; δE: declination east; δW: declination west; MP: Middle Preclassic; LP: Late Preclassic; EC: Early Classic; LC: Late Classic; EPC: Early Postclassic; LPC: Late Postclassic; NA: not applicable (view to the horizon is blocked by another structure).

In view of the evident lunar nature of Ixchel, we can conclude that the popularity of her cult on Isla Mujeres and Cozumel, where her temples were centers of massive pilgrimages (Tozzer 1941; 9f, 109; De la Garza 1983: 187; Sierra 1994: 18f, 101), as well as representations of Goddess O, identified with Ixchel, in mural paintings of Tulum, reflect the importance of lunar cult along the northeast coast of the Yucatan peninsula during the Postclassic period (Miller 1974; 1982: 85f; Freidel 1975; Freidel and Sabloff 1984; Milbrath 1999: 147f). It may be added that the maritime environment could have been perceived as particularly appropriate for worshipping the goddess related to water and fertility, and that, in the specific coastal setting, some lunar phenomena arouse very special feelings, which could well have inspired, at least in part, the attention paid to this celestial body. In his presentation of physical geography of the Cozumel Island, Davidson (1975: 58f) comments: There are, however, additional items of a geographical nature that might have been of particular significance to early islanders. For example, I recall that as viewed from the east coast of Yucatan the rising full moon over Cozumel Island is indeed an impressive sight. Is it possible that such an occurrence so impressed the astronomically minded Maya that they placed shrines to their moon goddess, Ix Chel, on the offshore island? […] Could there be any relationship between mainland sites of embarkation and the locations on the horizon of the moonrises? Are the sites of ceremonial structures on Cozumel related to or oriented to moon movements […]?

Whatever the underlying causes may have been, the area in which the cult of the Moon goddess is known to have been important agrees with the concentration of orientations matching the major lunar standstills: so far they have been identified at Buena Vista, La Expedición and San Gervasio on the Cozumel Island, as well as at Cobá, Xelhá, Tancah, Tulum (Table 1) and, according to Aveni and Hartung (1978), also at Paalmul on the northeast coast. The buildings materializing these alignments were evidently important, including those on Cozumel, despite their relatively minor size and monumentality. Structure C18-1-a of Buena Vista is one of the residential and public buildings composing the largest plaza group of this site (Freidel and Sabloff 1984: 167ff). Structures C25-1-a, 1-b and 1-c of La Expedición enclose the main and “apparently the only planned plaza group at the settlement” (ibid.: 132). Since the type of buildings making up this group was “most importantly used in conjunction with major periodic ceremonies involving participation of the entire community and representatives from other communities”, Freidel and Sabloff (1984: 136) argue that La Expedición “was the major religious central place on the northeast coast of Cozumel.” Finally, Group VI (El Ramonal) of San Gervasio is the largest complex of monumental architecture on Cozumel, occupying the highest terrain of the island (Freidel, and Sabloff 1984; Sierra 1994).7

7 For designating the buildings at San Gervasio and other archaeological sites on Cozumel, I follow the nomenclature established by the Harvard-Arizona Project carried out in the 1970s, considering that it is based on uniform criteria valid for the whole island and explained by Gregory (1975: 91) and Freidel and Sabloff (1984: 5ff): the site code composed of a letter and number

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Ivan Šprajc

site, structure Acanmul, Palace

period LC

AE 109.171

lunar δE

error δE

lunar δW

error δW

-17.814

2.0

18.068

2.0

Calica, Temple of Kisim

LPC

70.317

18.519

1.5

-18.241

1.5

Chakanbakán, Xibalbá and ball court

EC

109.983

-18.774

1.5

19.638

1.5

Chichén Itzá, Palace of the Phalli

EC

110.367

-18.862

1.0

19.144

1.0

Chichén Itzá, Temple of the Initial Series

EC

108.398

-17.036

2.5

17.314

2.5

Chichén Itzá, Temple of the Warriors

EC/EPC 109.902

-18.437

Dzibanché, Temple of the Cormorans

LC

110.108

Dzibanché, Temple of the Lintels

LC

108.709

0.7

18.696

0.7

NA

19.281

1.0

-17.566

1.1

17.974

1.1

NA

Dzibilchaltún, Structure 36

EC/LC

109.925

-18.420

1.5

18.651

1.5

Edzná, Temple of the Masks

EC

110.217

-18.694

1.5

19.217

1.5

Edzná, South Temple (Structure 421)

EC/LC

109.717

-18.227

1.5

18.742

1.5

Edzná, Vieja Hechicera

LPC

110.342

-18.817

1.5

19.372

1.5

El Cedral, Strcuture C15-1-a

EPC

107.983

-16.688

1.5

16.960

1.5

La Blanca, Structure 6J2, south wing

LC

70.880

18.467

1.0

-16.664

1.2

Oxtankah, Plaza Abejas, Structure IV

EC/LC

111.125

-19.893

1.5

20.099

1.5

Palenque, Temple of the Inscriptions

LC

112.821

-18.628

1.5

22.206

0.7

San Claudio, Structure 1

EC

106.287

-15.392

2.5

16.080

2.5

San Gervasio, Structure C22-32-a (Nohoch Nah)

LPC

71.288

17.625

0.8

-17.349

0.8

Sayil, South Palace

EC/LC

108.067

-16.571

1.5

17.476

1.5

Tipikal, Structure 6

MP/EC

111.692

-20.015

2.0

20.407

2.0

Toniná, Temple I (Structure D5-2)

LC

109.163

-17.848

1.0

18.643

1.0

Tulum, Structure 35 (Casa del Cenote)

LPC

108.844

-17.545

1.0

18.198

1.0

Tulum, Structure 45

LPC

109.925

-18.558

2.0

18.787

2.0

Uxmal, House of the Turtles

EC/LC

109.694

-18.279

1.0

18.556

1.0

Uxmal, Great Pyramid

EC/LC

110.183

-18.733

1.0

19.012

1.0

Xlapak, Structure B

EC/LC

108.717

-16.637

2.5

18.037

2.5

Xlapak, Palace

EC/LC

110.550

-18.403

1.5

19.783

1.5

Yaxchilán, Structure 42

LC

107.199

-16.052

1.5

17.110

1.5

Table 3. Orientations corresponding to the minor lunar standstills (the declinations and errors matching standstill values are in bold type). AE: eastward azimuth; δE: declination east; δW: declination west; MP: Middle Preclassic; EC: Early Classic; LC: Late Classic; EPC: Early Postclassic; LPC: Late Postclassic; NA: not applicable (view to the horizon is blocked by another structure).

Another notable fact is that the orientations to major lunar standstills are very often associated with solstitial alignments. Taking into account the values of ε in respective periods of construction, as well as the estimated errors of declinations corresponding to the orientations we have measured in the Maya area (Sánchez and Šprajc 2011, 2015), we have determined that the alignments that probably marked the solstices are those listed in Table 2; again, the declinations that, on the basis of these criteria, can be related to the solstices are written in bold characters. Comparing Tables 1 and 2 we can observe that lunar and solstitial alignments occur together at Buena Vista and San Gervasio on the Cozumel Island, at Tancah, Tulum and Xelhá on the northeast coast of the Yucatan peninsula, and at Iglesia Vieja and Lagartero in Chiapas.

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is followed by the number assigned to a structure. For architectural groups at San Gervasio, Gregory’s (1975) Roman numerals are used. While other names have been introduced in more recent publications for some buildings and architectural groups at San Gervasio, no consistent and agreed-upon nomenclature has been established; therefore, I only use those newer names that have become rather popular, or I mention alternative labels in parentheses, in order to facilitate identifications in cited literature.

With the exception of Iglesia Vieja, where lunar and solstitial alignments appear in different architectural complexes, the buildings with both types of orientations are located in close proximity,8 whereas the Temple of the Cross at Palenque, Chiapas, may have been oriented both to the major northern standstills of the Moon on the western horizon and (due to a considerable altitude of the nearby eastern horizon line) to the December solstice sunrise. At La Expedición, in the northeastern part of Cozumel, no structure with a solstitial orientation has been detected in the immediate vicinity of the main group, but it may not be fortuitous that such an alignment is embedded in Structure C8-2-a of Janán I, located on the northeastern coast of the island, 650 m east of La Expedición (Table 2). If the latter case can be included, then all the orientations to major lunar standstills known so far in the

8 It can be added that, if Structure 40 of Yaxchilán was oriented to major southern lunar standstills on the western horizon (Table 1), Structure 39, notably skewed relative to the adjacent Structures 40 and 41, possibly incorporated a poor-precision solstitial alignment (Sánchez and Šprajc 2015).

Lunar Orientations in the Maya Architecture

northeastern part of the Maya Lowlands are associated with orientations to sunrises or sunsets at the solstices. In the attempt to explain these occurrences, which can hardly be attributed to chance, it should be noted that the major/minor lunar standstills repeat at 18.6-year intervals, but in these moments the Moon is not always in the same phase. If particular attention was paid to the risings and settings of the full Moon near its standstills, we should recall that, due to celestial mechanics, the full Moon extremes always occur near the solstices, when also the Sun reaches the extreme points of its movement along the horizon, but an interesting contrast can be observed: the full Moon reaches its northerly extremes always around the December solstice, when the Sun rises and sets at its farthest southerly point, whereas around the June solstice, when the Sun attains its extreme northerly rising and setting points, the full Moon rises and sets at its farthest southerly points. Since the full Moon always rises approximately at sunset and sets at sunrise, this means that the extreme positions of the Sun and the Moon are observed on diametrically opposite sides of the horizon, and that the full Moon illuminates the night for the longest time precisely in the period of the year with the shortest days, and vice versa; obviously, the time span during which the full Moon is visible above the horizon is particularly long/short near its major standstills (cf. Thom 1971: 22f; Ruggles 1999: 149; 2005: 272f). In view of these facts, the aforementioned associations of solstitial orientations and those referring to the major lunar standstills suggest that the latter phenomena were, indeed, observed during the full Moon phase. In the context of European prehistory, Sims (2006) argues that the associations of lunar and solstitial alignments reflect the observation of the dark (nearly new) Moon around the solstices; in this case the Moon is very near the Sun and thus the extremes of both celestial bodies are observed on the same horizon. Such a scenario cannot be discarded in our cases, but the available data favor the idea that lunar and solstitial extremes were observed on opposite horizons, implying the importance of the full Moon. As already mentioned, the distribution of declinations in Figure 1 suggests that the orientations to major lunar standstills were functional predominantly to the west. On the other hand, if we examine the data on the solstitial orientations associated with those to major lunar standstills (Tables 1 and 2), we can observe that the corresponding east declinations exhibit a better agreement with solar declinations at the December solstice than the west declinations with the declination of the Sun at the June solstice, suggesting that these orientations were functional mostly to the east. Such a scenario is supported, specifically, by the orientations at Lagartero, Chiapas, considering that the corresponding declinations and their estimated errors indicate eastern and western directionalities of solstitial and lunar alignments, respectively (Tables 1 and 2). The main buildings of this site, labeled Mound 1, 2, 3 and 4, delimit a plaza on its south, east, north and west sides, respectively. The east-west axis of Mound 2, aligned with Mound 4 on the opposite side of the plaza, points quite precisely to the major northern standstills

Figure 2. San Gervasio, Structure C22-41-a (Ka’na Nah), light-andshadow effect on the west face of the medial wall in the upper shrine, before sunset on July 3, 2009. Note that the illuminated strip on the left side of the central opening is considerably wider than on the right side, because the photo was taken 12 days after the summer solstice and, moreover, almost 20 minutes before sunset.

of the Moon on the western horizon (the ball court situated immediately south of Mound 1 and having its longitudinal axis in the east-west direction exhibits the same orientation), whereas the orientation of Mound 1 corresponds to the December solstice sunrise (Sánchez and Šprajc 2011). Nonetheless, in some cases a different observation scheme is indicated. The orientation of the southern part of the Palace at Xelhá matches more closely the June solstice sunset than the December solstice sunrise (Table 2). The characteristics and spatial relations of buildings at San Gervasio support the eastern directionality of lunar alignments, in combination with orientations to the summer solstice sunsets, while for Tulum alternative interpretations can be offered. The associations of lunar and solstitial orientations at San Gervasio and Tulum are examined in greater detail below, because their intentionality is, in both cases, reinforced by interesting contextual evidence. San Gervasio

Various sectors of the urban core of San Gervasio, the largest site on the Cozumel Island, are dominated by the direction approximately corresponding to the December solstice sunrise and the June solstice sunset. Most structures composing Groups I, II and III are arranged along this solstitial axis marked by Sacbé 2, which connects Groups I and III and

31

Ivan Šprajc

Figure 3. San Gervasio, map of Group VI (El Ramonal) (after Azcárate and Ramirez 2000), with alignments discussed in the text.

whose azimuth is approximately 115°/295° (cf. Sabloff and Rathje 1975a: Fig. 15). Running parallel to Sacbé 2 is Sacbé 7, in the compound southwest of Group I (ibid.: map in pocket), and it may not be fortuitous that Group IV (Murciélagos) and Structure C22-32-a (Nohoch Nah) are situated along an approximately parallel line. In Group VI, also known as El Ramonal, the orientations to the solstice positions of the Sun are associated with those marking major lunar standstills.

32

While many buildings of San Gervasio reproduced the solstitial direction only approximately, some orientations are quite precise and could have been astronomically functional (Table 2). One of the buildings for which the observational function is particularly likely is Structure C22-41-a (Ka’na Nah), one of the tallest and most important buildings of San Gervasio (Gregory 1975: 105; Freidel and Sabloff 1984: 63ff, Figs. 14 & 15; Sierra 1994: 109, Fig. 38). The upper sanctuary, with a doorway facing west, was originally a single-room structure with an altar either against the back wall or set out a

small distance from it, but was later modified by construction of a medial wall, which extends in the north-south direction, but does not reach the northern and southern walls, leaving narrow lateral accessways to the back part of the room. This wall, built over one part of the altar, also has a central opening or doorway. The azimuth cited in Table 2 represents the mean value of azimuths measured along the jambs of outer and inner doorways, but not necessarily reproduces the original and intended value with precision, because considerable portions of stucco originally covering the jambs are nowadays missing. Having both the main stairway and the entrance to the upper shrine on the western side, the building was likely oriented to the June solstice sunsets. Since the entrance to the upper sanctuary is slightly wider than the doorway in the medial wall, a light-and-shadow effect could have been observed: the rays of the setting Sun, when aligned with the building at the summer solstice, would have cast shadows of jambs of the outer doorway on the medial wall, leaving illuminated strips of equal width on both sides of its doorway

Lunar Orientations in the Maya Architecture

(Fig. 2). Alternatively, if the rectangular altar protruding from the west base of the doorway in the medial wall9 supported a statue of the deity worshipped in the temple (cf. Freidel 1975; Freidel and Sabloff 1984: 64), the rays of the setting solstitial Sun would have illuminated the idol, creating a solar hierophany that may have been observed by a wider audience. Freidel (1975) and Freidel and Sabloff (1984: 44, 63ff, 152f, 164) argue that Structure C22-41-a was a temple of Ixchel with a talking idol, because the characteristics of the upper shrine, particularly of its late stage with the medial wall and an altar in front, manifest a close correspondence with early Spanish descriptions of an oracle temple dedicated to the same deity and located on the coast, presumably in the settlement, now destroyed, near the modern town of San Miguel de Cozumel.10 Structure C22-41-a is located immediately southeast of the Acropolis of Group VI or El Ramonal (Sabloff and Rathje 1975a: Fig. 15 and map in pocket; Freidel and Sabloff 1984: Fig. 22; Robles 1986a: Figs. 5 and 6; 1986b: maps in annex; Azcárate and Ramírez 2000: Fig. 3; Ramírez and Azcárate 2002: 48), characterized by a combination of lunar and solstitial alignments. The east-west azimuth of the Acropolis (Table 1) corresponds to lunar declinations of -27.860° on the eastern horizon and 28.069° on the western horizon, both quite close to the major standstill values, but it should be noted that this azimuth was measured along the southern wall of the supporting platform and the access stairway, which are the only excavated elements of the Acropolis. According to the map published by Azcárate and Ramírez (2000: Fig. 3) and Ramírez and Azcárate (2002: 48), the orientation of this part of the Acropolis agrees with the orientation of most buildings on the platform (Fig. 3), but quite likely does not reproduce it accurately; the corresponding declinations thus do not allow any reliable conclusion regarding the directionality of the orientation. As mentioned above, the alignment data suggest that the orientations to the major standstills of the Moon were predominantly functional to the west, recording its northerly extremes. In the case of El Ramonal, however, a different scenario seems to be more likely. If we consider that, among the buildings on the Acropolis sharing the orientation possibly related to lunar standstills, the tallest one is Structure C2254-a (VI-3c), situated on the western side of the Acropolis and facing east, it is conceivable that this building served for observing moonrises on the eastern horizon: when the Moon reached its major southern extreme, it appeared not only along the central east-west axis of this building but also over 9 In the ground plans of this building published by Freidel

(1975: Fig. 25) and Freidel and Sabloff (1984: Figs. 14 & 15), this altar is erroneously shown on the east side of the medial wall. An accurate plan of this structure was published by Sierra (1994: Fig. 38).

10 Citing this information, Galindo (2002) maintains that Ka’na Nah is oriented, with the azimuth of 300°21’, to major northern lunar standstills on the western horizon. However, the results of measurements presented in Table 1, as well as photographic records of the light-and-shadow effect on a day near a June solstice (Fig. 2), demonstrate that the orientation of this building cannot be related to lunar standstills.

the center of Structure C22-49 (VI-3g), standing on the opposite side of the Acropolis. On the other hand, Structure C2248a (VI-2a), on the plaza immediately south of the Acropolis, is oriented solstitially (Table 2), and the same orientation seems to be shared also by Structure C22-47 (VI-2c) to the west, as well as by Structures C22-49 (VI-3g) and C22-50-a (VI-3f) on the eastern flank of the Acropolis (Fig. 3; Azcárate and Ramírez 2000: Fig. 3; Ramírez and Azcárate 2002: 48). It can thus be supposed that the orientation of most buildings on the Acropolis, dominated by Structure C22-54-a (VI-3c), referred to the southernmost rising position of the full Moon, while the solstitial orientations marked the northernmost setting point of the Sun. Indeed, the western directionality of solstitial orientations is supported by the west-facing Structure C22-41-a (Ka’na Nah), located immediately southeast of El Ramonal Acropolis and arguably oriented to the June solstice sunsets (see above). Even though the latest construction stage of Structure C22-41-a was shaped in the Late Postclassic, while all the remaining monumental architecture of El Ramonal dates to the Classic (some substructures might be even earlier: Gregory 1975: 103ff; Freidel and Sabloff 1984: 151ff; Sierra 1994: 109; Azcárate and Ramírez 2000: 15; Ramírez and Azcárate 2002: 48), it is reasonable to suppose that the observational scheme described above was in use in both the Classic and Postclassic periods. On the one hand, Structure C22-41-a, interpreted as a temple of Ixchel, has several earlier phases (Freidel and Sabloff 1984: 153), which may also have been functional to the west. On the other, Freidel and Sabloff (1984: 151ff) argue that the civic and ceremonial precinct of El Ramonal group (labeled District 2 in their nomenclature), being the center of the settlement during the Classic, functioned as the original focus of the oracle cult; in the Postclassic there was no construction activity in the sacred precinct, but the archaeological evidence (particularly the characteristics and contexts of ceramic material found in Structure C22-48a: ibid.: 151f; Gregory 1975: 103) indicates it was used for worship. Consequently, if El Ramonal continued to be the stage for ritual activities, it probably conserved also its astronomical function; while the ancient ceremonial precinct served for observing both the southernmost rises of the Moon and the northernmost settings of the Sun, the latter phenomena could now be sighted also in Structure C22-41-a, apparently the only one built (or remodeled) during the Late Postclassic. The fact that Structure C22-41-a marks solar rather than lunar events does not necessarily weaken its identification with the temple of Ixchel, based on the comparison of its architectural characteristics with historical descriptions of the shrine that was probably located in the vicinity of the modern town of San Miguel Cozumel (Freidel 1975; Freidel, and Sabloff 1984: 44, 152f, 164). In view of Ixchel’s attributes referred to above, the idea that the Sun was observed in her temple is not implausible: in the Mesoamerican world view the Moon was closely related to the night Sun, and both were associated with water, earth and fertility (Klein 1976: 97; 1980; Milbrath 1999: 105ff; Šprajc 1993a: 37f, 1996: 61); furthermore, Xbalanqué, one of the twin heroes of the Popol

33

Ivan Šprajc

Figure 4. Tulum, Room A of Structure 25, looking northeast. Note the Diving God figure above the central doorway, and the aperture in the east (right) wall.

Vuh, represents both the night Sun and the full Moon (Baudez 1985: 33ff; Tedlock 1985: 296ff; Milbrath 1999: 130; cf. Christenson 2007: 94f). Since the transformation from the daytime to the nocturnal Sun occurred at the horizon (Klein 1980: 165ff), it is not unreasonable to imagine that the solstitial solar hierophany produced in Structure C22-41-a was conceived as a liminal moment in which the setting Sun was acquiring the powers it shared with Ixchel and with her other celestial avatar, observed in her ancient shrine. The relation of her sanctuary with sunsets also agrees with the symbolism of the western side of the universe, associated with water, maize and fertility (Šprajc 1993a; 1993b; 1996; 2001: 88ff; 2004). While the practice of orienting certain buildings to major lunar standstills may be included among the cultural traits that reflect a “homogeneous development” on the northeast coast during the Postclassic (cf. Robles 1986a: 11f), the use of lunar alignments since the Classic period, attested in El Ramonal of San Gervasio, reinforces the idea that the Ixchel temple, instead of becoming important in the Late Postclassic, “might have been a much older shrine which was initially responsible for Cozumel’s increasing importance from Florescent [i.e. Terminal Classic] times onward” (Sabloff and Rathje 1975b: 27). Tulum

While Structure 1 (El Castillo) of Tulum seems to have dictated the orientations of many surrounding buildings (Sánchez

34

and Šprajc 2015), Structures 21 and 25 exhibit different orientations, which can be related to the solstices and major lunar standstills, respectively. On the south side of Structure 25, in front of its principal entrance, is a stairway leading to Room A, which has two openings in its east and west walls (Lothrop 1924: 102ff, Fig. 87), the western one being higher above the floor than the eastern one (Fig. 4). The eastern wall divides Room A from a smaller Room D, which has two columns on the east side (Fig. 5). The fact that, observing from the eastern opening, the visual line through the western opening passes exactly over the western segment of the wall enclosing the urban core of the site (Figs. 5 and 6) suggests the possibility that the two holes served for astronomical observations. Therefore, and considering that the alignment along the two apertures is parallel to other east-west lines (walls, colonnades) of the building, its azimuth was measured with precision and assumed to be representative of the structure’s east-west orientations (Table 1). The lunar declination corresponding to the line from the eastern to the western orifice (28.658°) is equal to the maximum declination reached by the Moon in the Late Postclassic. Due to its inclination, the alignment could not have served for observing southern major standstills on the eastern horizon: observing through both holes in the opposite direction, one cannot see the horizon but rather the natural ground some 20 m east of the structure.

Lunar Orientations in the Maya Architecture

Figure 5. Tulum, Room D of Structure 25, looking west. Note the aperture in the wall dividing Rooms D and A.

The idea that the alignment of the two vents in Room A of Structure 25 had a special significance is reinforced by its relationship with other architectural elements.11 Immediately west of the building is Structure 29 (Lothrop 1924: 108), a low platform with a small stairway whose midpoint is located exactly along the direction marked by the two orifices in Structure 25 (Fig. 7); extended further west, the same alignment passes exactly over a small stairway in the west arm of the defensive wall of the city (Fig. 8). It seems significant that this line coincides precisely with the two openings in the east

11 While another aperture perforates the west wall of Room C of Structure 25 (Fig. 7), Figure 6. Tulum, Structure 25, looking west through the aperture in the east wall of Room A. Note the it has no counterpart in the east height of the orifice in the west wall with respect to the segment of the defensive wall visible in the wall of the room (cf. Lothrop background to the left. 1924: 104, Fig. 87).

35

Ivan Šprajc

Figure 8. Tulum, small stairway located in the western segment of the defensive wall along the alignment of apertures in Room A of Structure 25; view to the northwest.

throp 1924: 104, Fig. 87), there is a stucco figure representing the Diving God. Although a similar plunging figure appears on page 58 of the Dresden Codex with a Venus glyph substituting its head, the fact that this page belongs to the lunar table, or table of the eclipses, indicates that this deity was also associated with the Moon.13 It should be noted, however, that this iconographic element is not necessarily relevant to the interpretation of the significance of the building’s orientation: the Diving God decorates various buildings whose orientations correlate with neither Venus nor the Moon.

Figure 7. Tulum, west facade of Structure 25, looking east from the stairway of Structure 29.

and west walls of Room A, rather than with the central eastwest axis of Structure 25.12 Although the alignment defined by the two apertures in Structure 25 corresponds to northern major lunar standstills on the western horizon with precision, it is not impossible that the stairway in the defensive wall marked the point for observing southern major standstills on the eastern horizon, approximately in the direction marked by Structure 25. If so, however, the alignment was of poor precision, because the difference between the corresponding lunar declination and the minimum declination of the Moon is quite large (Table 1). Above the central doorway communicating Room A with the central sanctuary of Structure 25 (cf. ground plan in Lo-

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12 Lothrop’s (1924: Pl. 25) map of Tulum is incorrect in showing the stairway of Structure 29 aligned with the central eastwest wall of Structure 25. It seems significant that another small stairway in the west segment of the defensive wall is located exactly along the axis of symmetry of El Castillo; Structure 8, a rectangular platform in the center of the interior precinct, is placed along the same axis, evidently stressing its importance (cf. Vargas 1995: 61f). Although there are several stairways in the west arm of the defensive wall (cf. Lothrop 1924: 72), it is hardly fortuitous that two of them are located exactly along the axes marked also by other architectural elements.

The orientation of Structure 21, immediately south of Structure 25 (Lothrop 1924: 99ff), corresponds to the June solstice sunsets (Table 2).14 Although it is not impossible that Structure 25 marked southern major lunar standstills on the eastern horizon, various circumstances mentioned above favor the idea that it was oriented to the major northern standstills on the western horizon. If the standstill positions were observed during the full Moon, we would expect Structure 21 to be oriented to the December solstice sunrises. Table 2 does not include the east declination for this building, because in this direction the northern annexes of the architectural complex of El Castillo block the view to the horizon, forming an artificial horizon line whose altitude depends on the exact observation point and thus cannot be reliably determined. However, if these buildings are later than Structure 21, or if the Sun’s appearance above them was observed, it is quite possible that the orientation of Structure 21 was functional to the east, marking sunrises at the 13 A fusion of Venus and lunar attributes does not come as a surprise, considering the relationships observed between the Dresden Codex Venus table and eclipse cycles (cf. Bricker and Bricker 2011: 180f, 214f), as well as Closs’s (1989) argument that Venus was considered to be an eclipse agent. On the other hand, if the diving deity on Structure 25 of Tulum refers to eclipses, it should be recalled that the periodicity of both lunar standstills and eclipses depends on the lunar nodal cycle of 18.6 years. In the absence of any further evidence, however, the question whether the observation of lunar standstills had any relation with eclipse predictions (cf. Thom 1971: 18ff) will not be pursued here. 14 On Lothrop’s (1924: Pl. 25) map Structures 21 and 25 are shown as having the same orientation. That this is not so can be seen on Google Earth (https://www.google.com/earth/).

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winter solstice. Another possibility is that Structures 21 and 25 were both functional to the west, marking summer solstice sunsets and the approximately concomitant northern major standstills of the dark (nearly new) Moon, respectively. In the light of the above mentioned comparative data, however, the first alternative seems more likely.

Orientations to Minor Lunar Standstills Since the existence of orientations to major lunar standstills is, in view of the above arguments, hardly disputable, can we suppose that there were also alignments recording the minor standstills? Between the years 500 B.C. and A.D. 1500, the mean values of minor standstill declinations of the Moon varied from ±18.61° to ±18.36°, hence the peaks in Figure 1 on the values -18.42° and 17.69° (east declinations) and -17.33° and 18.71° (west declinations) might be related to these phenomena; the two smaller peaks (17.69° on the east and -17.33° on the west) are produced by the few orientations skewed counterclockwise from cardinal directions. In order to find the buildings that may have been oriented to minor lunar standstill positions, the estimated errors of lunar declinations were increased, as in the case of major standstills, by an arbitrary value of 0.5°; selecting those that, taking into account these errors, fit the extreme lunar declinations at the time of construction of particular buildings, the orientations listed in Table 3 were obtained, where the values of declinations and errors possibly related to minor standstills are marked in bold type. It should be underscored, however, that the relation of these orientations with the Moon is much less certain than of those corresponding to major standstills, because their other astronomical referent could have been the Sun. Indeed, several of these orientations pertain to one of the solar groups that have been identified in the Maya Lowlands (Group 10: Sánchez and Šprajc 2015: Table 7). Others, however, do not correspond to any prominent solar group. Among them are, significantly, Structure C15-1-a of El Cedral, Structure C22-32-a (Nohoch Nah) of San Gervasio, the Temple of Kisim at Calica, and Structures 35 (Casa del Cenote) and 45 at Tulum: the fact that these buildings are located along the northeast coast of the Yucatan peninsula, i.e. in the region with the greatest concentration of orientations to the major lunar standstills (cf. Table 1), makes their relation with minor standstills more likely. The association with these phenomena is, in the absence of independent evidence, much less certain for other buildings listed in Table 3, but some information regarding the pyramid known as La Vieja or Vieja Hechicera at Edzná is probably worth mentioning. Malmström (1991: 45; 1997: 145, 149f) claims that this building, for an observer on the Five-Storey Pyramid, marked the moonsets at major northern standstills. Indeed, this alignment, whose azimuth is 300°11’, according to our measurements, corresponds to the lunar declination of 28°25’, very close to the maximum declination attainable by the Moon. Since the orientation of neither of the two buildings matches the alignment, there is no indication

suggesting its intentionality, but the fact that the orientation of La Vieja corresponds to minor lunar standstills does call attention. Moreover, according to a local legend summarized by Benavides (n.d.), the peasants taking a rest at the base of La Vieja used to receive little cocoyol bowls of water from an old woman, in exchange for coins they would leave there. Recalling aquatic attributes of the old Moon goddess in prehispanic times (Milbrath 1999: 141ff), the old lady of the legend may well be related to this celestial body, as supposed by Benavides (n.d.); if the story, indeed, represents a survival of the prehispanic importance of the Moon at the site, it lends some support to the lunar interpretation of the alignments mentioned above.

Cultural Significance of Lunar Orientations As is well known, the Maya were acutely aware of many regularities of the apparent motion of the Moon, including the eclipse patterns (e.g.: Thompson 1939; Milbrath 1999: 105ff; Cruz 2005; Bricker and Bricker 2011). The orientations discussed above indicate that they also perceived the periodical oscillations of its extreme rising and setting points. This sophisticated astronomical knowledge, possessed by astronomer-priests, was lost soon after the Conquest, when its bearers, pertaining to the highest layer of the vanquished society, were subject to an intensive Christian indoctrination.15 However, the attention paid to this celestial body was largely motivated by the beliefs that were widely shared among people and which still persist, although impoverished and modified, among the present-day communities. The Moon is associated with water, earth and fertility, and its phases still represent an important factor in scheduling agricultural activities (Thompson 1939; Neuenswander 1981; Montolíu 1984; Báez-Jorge 1988; Köhler 1991; Atran 1993: 678f; Milbrath 1999: 27ff; Bassie-Sweet 2008: 33ff; Redfield and Villa Rojas 1962: 205f; Iwaniszewski 1992, 2006; Vogt 1997: 112). The aquatic connotations of the Moon and its relations with fertility, found not only in Mesoamerica but also in many other cultures (cf. Eliade 1972: 150ff), can be largely accounted for by observational facts. The parallelism between the synodic month, the tides and women’s menstrual cycle must have called attention since remote times. Furthermore, various researchers have noted a correlation between certain phases of the Moon and rainfall, hurricanes, tropical storms, temperatures, and germination of certain plants (e.g.: Car15 An informant from Chan Kom reported to Redfield and Villa Rojas (1962: 206) that “every eighteen years the moon passes under the sun covering the earth with its shadow”. Although this seems to be a reference to the eclipse cycle known as saros (18.03 años), it should be recalled that the periodicity of the eclipses depends on the nodal cycle of 18.6 years, which is also the cycle of lunar major/minor standstill declinations. Citing this piece of information, Nahm (2004: 50) remarks that “a survival of knowledge about such an astronomical period among rural Maya is unlikely, but it is hard to think of an obvious alternative”. A possible alternative is, of course, that the informant was “contaminated” by modern astronomy.

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penter et al. 1972; Balling and Cerveny 1995; Cerveny et al. 2010; González 2001: 171f). Specifically, for North America and New Zealand it has been demonstrated that heavy rains tend to occur more frequently in the first and third weeks of the synodic month (Bradley et al. 1962; Adderley and Bowen 1962; Brier and Bradley 1964). Interestingly, and in agreement with these findings, Judith Remington (1980: 112) was told, during her ethnographic research in Guatemala Highlands, that during the rainy season “llueve más cuando la luna está tierna que cuando está madura”, while Diego de Landa (1973: 4) reported that “por fines de enero y febrero hay un veranillo de recios soles y no llueve en ese tiempo sino a las entradas de las lunas”; if the analyses of rainfall data from two widely separated regions resulted in the same conclusion, we can assume that it also applies to the Mesoamerican latitudes, thus being highly likely that the above cited ethnographic and Landa’s reports are based on observational reality.16 While the significance of lunar orientations can be understood in the light of the above mentioned concepts, it may have been related to even more specific observational facts. According to several recent studies (e.g., Mitra and Dutta 1992; Currie 1993, 1995; Currie and Vines 1996; Manzi et al. 2012; Baart et al. 2012; Agosta 2014), a correlation exists between tides, rainfall patterns and temperatures, on the one hand, and the lunar nodal cycle of 18.6 years, on the other. These correspondences, in spite of the lack of evidence that they were actually perceived, offer an attractive basis for interpreting the meaning of orientations to lunar standstills, whose periodicity obeys the node cycle. Finally, if the associations of lunar and solstitial orientations reflect the observation of standstill phenomena during the full Moon phase, they can be explained not only in terms of the attractiveness of the opposite positions of the Sun and the full Moon and the contrasting roles of the two luminaries during the shortest/longest days/nights of the year, but also in the light of their closely related symbolism. Since the orientations pointing to the Sun on the horizon may refer to its nocturnal aspect, let us recall that the night Sun was closely related to the full Moon; both were personified by Xbalanqué, one of the twin heroes of the Popol Vuh (Tedlock 1985: 296ff; Milbrath 1999: 130; cf. Christenson 2007: 94f; Baudez 1985: 33ff), and associated with water, earth and

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16 Another illustrative piece of information, indicating that some concepts about the influence of lunar phases on natural phenomena must derive from empirical knowledge, is the opinion, shared by a number of Mesoamerican indigenous communities, that the trees should be felled during the full Moon, to prevent the wood from insect-induced rotting (Köhler 1991; Atran 1993: 678f; Vogt 1997: 112; López 2001: 296f). As Köhler (1991: 246f) notes, even if ideas of this kind are often contradictory and some of them, particularly those concerning the proper growth of cultivated plants, can be interpreted in terms of magical thinking, the unanimity in the case mentioned above suggests the existence of a factual correlation between the two classes of phenomena. Significantly, similar concepts have also been documented in Europe (Iwaniszewski 2006).

fertility (Klein 1976: 97; 1980; Milbrath 1999: 105ff; Šprajc 1993a: 37f; 1996: 61).

Summary The distribution of data corresponding to architectural orientations in the Maya Lowlands exhibits notable concentrations that correlate with standstill positions of the Moon on the horizon. Particularly compelling is the relationship of one group of orientations with the major standstills, because they can be related to no other celestial event of comparable importance, and considering that most of them are found along the northeastern coast of the Yucatan peninsula, i.e. precisely in the area where the cult of the Moon goddess is known to have been particularly important. While there are a number of orientations matching minor lunar standstills, the intentionality of these correspondences is less certain, because an alternative celestial referent of these alignments may have been the Sun. Nonetheless, the Moon does seem to have been targeted by some of these orientations, particularly those that are concentrated along the northeastern coast and do not pertain to any prominent solar group. The buildings oriented to major lunar standstills are, in many cases, in immediate vicinity of those aligned to sunrises or sunsets at the solstices. The analyses of the alignment data suggest that these associations, which are hardly coincidental, reflect the observation of full Moon extremes nearest to the standstills and always occurring around the solstices: the northernmost positions of the full Moon approximately coincide with the southernmost positions of the Sun, and vice versa. The significance of lunar orientations can be accounted for by the widespread concepts associating the Moon and related deities with water, earth and fertility. There is evidence indicating that these ideas were motivated by observational facts. Moreover, in the light of several recent studies demonstrating interrelationships between the lunar nodal cycle, which determines the periodicity of standstills, and oscillations in rainfall, temperatures and sea level, it is tempting to suggest that the alignments to lunar standstills reflect, specifically, the observation of these correlations.

Postscript After this article had been submitted for publication, further research was accomplished on the northeast coast of the Yucatan peninsula, resulting in the discovery of additional lunar orientations at several sites (Sánchez et al. 2016).

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Thom, Alexander 1971 Megalithic Lunar Observatories. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Thompson, J. Eric S. 1939 The Moon Goddess in Middle America: With Notes on Related Deities. Contributions to American Anthropology and History, No. 29. Carnegie Institution of Washington Publication 509. Washington: Carnegie Institution of Washington Publication. 1975 Historia y religión de los mayas. México: Siglo XXI (transl. by F. Blanco; orig.: Maya history and religion. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1970). Tichy, Franz 1991 Die geordnete Welt indianischer Völker: Ein Bespiel von Raumordnung und Zeitordnung im vorkolumbischen Mexiko. Das Mexiko-Projekt der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft 21. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag. Tozzer, Alfred M. 1941 Landa’s Relación de las cosas de Yucatán: A Translation. Papers of the Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, Vol. XVIII. Cambridge: The Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University. Vargas Pacheco, Ernesto 1995 El espacio sagrado en Tulum. In: Carmen Varela Torrecilla, Juan Luis Bonor Villarejo, M. Yolanda Fernández Marquínez (eds.), Religión y sociedad en el área maya, pp. 57–69. Madrid: Sociedad Española de Estudios Mayas. Vogt, Evon Z. 1997 Zinacanteco Astronomy. Mexicon 19 (6): 110–117.

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Verticality, Commemoration, and Demarcative Practice in the Construction of Copan’s Historical Landscape Kathryn Marie Hudson University at Buffalo

John S. Henderson Cornell University

Mallory E. Matsumoto University of Bonn Abstract Maya historical landscapes were made manifest in architecture reflecting the physical and metaphysical realities of particular polities. Although landscapes are often defined by physical markers, historical landscapes –spatial and cosmological mappings of history– indicate that markers can reflect preexisting meanings. This paper explores how Copan’s architecture reflected the historical landscape through verticality. Structures 10L-16 and 10L-26 are the results of vertically oriented building processes reflecting historical landscapes that juxtaposed cosmology, the mythical past, and the constructed present. This shows that historical landscapes existed alongside – and within – Copan’s physical landscapes.

Resumen La arquitectura de las ciudades mayas creaba paisajes históricos que reflejan las realidades físicas y metafísicas de estados específicos. Aunque con frecuencia los paisajes se definen en términos de indicadores físicos, los paisajes históricos –cartografías espaciales y de la historia– indican que marcadores puedan reflejar significados preexistentes. Este capítulo investiga la manera en que la arquitectura de Copan reflejaba el paisaje histórico por medio de la verticalidad. Las Estructuras 10L-16 y 10L-26 resultaban de procesos de construcción vertical que reflejaban paisajes históricos que oponían la cosmología, el pasado mítico, y el presente construido. Los paisajes históricos existían a lo largo de –y dentro de– los paisajes físicos de Copan.

Monumental architecture, often elaborately embellished with modeled and painted imagery, is arguably the central defining feature of lowland Maya city-states. The most obvious function of these construction projects, and of the hieroglyphic texts associated with them, is political. They served the purposes of rulers and their factions, legitimizing their claims to power by detailing their genealogies and supernatural connections, and by extolling their accomplishments in the spheres of political alliance and military activity. Like all human actions, the construction of monumental buildings entailed unintended consequences beyond the goals foreseen by the individuals who undertook the planning and organization (see, e.g., Joyce 2004). Buildings whose location, form and decoration memorialized predecessors and ancestors in ways that were politically useful to successors also permanently altered local landscapes. Commemorative

temples, which served as a common mode of architectural reference to ancestors, and sometimes mortuary temples housing their actual remains, strongly emphasized the vertical dimension. Temple buildings had small footprints and stood atop tall, steep platforms. Their remodeling almost always increased the vertical dimension more than the horizontal. The initial effect was to increase the local visibility of the commemorative structures. The simultaneous construction of these buildings marked locations in the landscape –both particular points and their surrounding spaces– as special. This often involved differential access to spaces, which entailed differential knowledge of –and participation in– the activities that took place in them and spawned new perceptions and uses of landscapes. The concept of history and historical memory is key to such considerations, since relationships can legitimize con-

Kathryn Marie Hudson, John S. Henderson, Mallory E. Matsumoto

The Copan City-State The archaeological record in the Copan valley of northwestern Honduras (Fig. 1) is largely one of continuing growth. From the earliest known village occupations of the late second millennium BC through the emergence and florescence of a prosperous city-state in the seventh and eighth centuries AD, population size and the number, scale, and complexity of communities increased steadily. There are indications that the centralization of political power and concomitant economic and social changes may have been under way in the early centuries of the first millennium AD, and there is material evidence that these processes had resulted in city-state organization by the fifth century. The construction and remodeling of civic architecture, in combination with the production of monumental art, testify to the growing power of the Copan state that they were designed to support. These developments generally intensified, though not continuously, through the eighth century. In the early ninth century the Copan state, like most of its contemporaries, failed in the context of area-wide economic and political transformation.

Figure 1. Map of the Maya world (map by John S. Henderson).

temporary endeavors and secure future prospects. Analyses of the histories embodied in architecture are particularly concerned with what Van Dyke and Alcock (2003: 3) describe as “the awareness and construction of the past in the past,” and with the kind of selective historical reconstruction –physical or otherwise– discussed by Lowenthal (1985: 210). The intentionality that underlies such endeavors facilitates their function as legitimizers of political or social entities, since “people remember or forget the past according to the needs of the present” (Van Dyke and Alcock 2003: 3). This propagandistic use of history underlies political actions in many parts of the world; for the lowland Maya, architecture was an effective way of mobilizing historical agency to create physical environments spanning the conceptual space between past and present.

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This conscious generation of historically-based spaces does not, however, mean that the interpretive dimensions of such built environments are easily accessible to contemporary observers. Although many approach issues of collective social memory from a phenomenological perspective, such subjectivity is easily contaminated by modern historical inheritances and associated assumptions about the kinds of history likely to be preserved and presented in particular ways. A more productive approach attempts to remove etic perceptions insofar as possible within a particular analytical context and replace them with a contextualized view rooted in the localized history of a particular site. Such methodology requires the identification of the historical landscapes superimposed onto the physical world and, consequently, the reconceptualization of landscape markers as historical indicators of a present justified by its association with the past.

Surviving hieroglyphic texts refer mainly to rulers and their activities during the later period of florescence of the city-state. The epigraphic record is less continuous than the archaeological record of royal art and architecture, especially in the early period of the city-state, so the textual view of Copan’s early kings (Stuart 2004) is partly dependent on retrospective texts commissioned by later kings and thus heavily conditioned by their historical perspectives and political agendas. Seventh and eighth century texts make it clear that the late kings of Copan represented themselves as heirs to the throne in the context of a dynastic sequence beginning with a founder, Yax K’uk’ Mo’, who came to power early in the 5th century. There are no contemporaneous texts from the reigns of several early rulers, and not all of the early texts that do survive explicitly represented the lords they refer to as part of this sequence. It is clear, however, that the succession celebrated by Copan’s Late Classic rulers was historically grounded, at least in the sense of referring to lords who had actually lived and who played prominent roles in the building of the Copan city-state. Together, the archaeological and epigraphic records provide multiple perspectives on the development of the Copan state. Thanks to the painstaking correlation of deep architectural excavations, we can follow the architectural history of Copan’s royal court and the symbolic messages it conveyed in considerable detail. A striking dimension of this story is the degree to which Copan’s kings sought to ground their claims to power in the history of the city-state through the buildings, art, and texts produced by the architects, sculptors, painters, and scribes who served them. We see the history of Copan’s court largely in terms of the changing ways that successive kings represented the past and positioned themselves in relation to it. Early in the fifth century, Copan’s leaders began a program of large-scale platform and superstructure construction along the west bank of the Río Copan, covering preexisting cobble-faced platforms that had probably supported earli-

Verticality, Commemoration, and Demarcative Practice in the Construction of Copan’s Historical Landscape

Figure 2. Hieroglyphic Stair (Str 10L-26) and Acropolis restoration sketch (drawing by John S. Henderson).

er residential buildings. This is the time when, according to hieroglyphic texts, Yax K’uk’ Mo’ –later revered as the dynastic founder– arrived at Copan and assumed the throne. Initially consisting of three adjacent but independent building complexes, this emerging royal precinct was soon united by common platform enlargement. During the following four centuries, this ancestral royal precinct was vertically enlarged into a massive architectural complex –the Acropolis and the Temple of the Hieroglyphic Stairway on its northern margin– that housed the royal court (Fig. 2). The locations eventually occupied by Structures 10L-26-1st, the latest version of the Temple of the Hieroglyphic Stairway, and 10L-16-1st, the final enlargement of the temple at the core of the Acropolis,

served as the focus of architectural elaboration throughout the long history of the royal court. The development of these buildings and the features associated with them provides a fascinating view into the shifting ways in which history was mobilized in the underwriting of royal power at Copan through the creation of a historical landscape.

Structure 10L-16 and its Ancestors During the early centuries of the first millennium AD, the first known public structures at Copan were built atop a broad, low platform beneath the Acropolis (Fig. 3) (Sedat and López

Figure 3. Structure 10L-16, schematic section (after Agurcia and Fash 2005: Fig. 6.1).

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2004; Traxler 2004; Sharer et al. 2005; Agurcia and Fash 2005). The first masonry building beneath the location where Structure 10L-16-1st eventually stood, nicknamed “Hunal,” replaced an earlier earthen structure with a thatched roof. The Hunal platform, with its red-painted talud-tablero facing, supported a three-room building whose final version likely had a beam and mortar roof. Fragments of painted plaster showing footprints ascending a stair and a seated figure gesturing toward a standing individual suggest that one of the rooms was decorated with a mural depicting an inauguration scene. The tomb chamber underneath the northern room of the final building contains the skeleton of an adult male who had suffered a series of ball game and/or combat injuries (Bell et al. 2004: 132–136; Reents-Budet et al. 2004; Buikstra et al. 2004; Price et al. 2010). Bone chemistry locates his early life in the central Peten, probably in the zone stretching from Tikal in the west to Caracol in the east. Sourcing studies show that the pottery interred with him included vessels imported from the central Peten, from the highlands or the Pacific coast to the southeast, and from Teotihuacan in central Mexico. Costume elements found in the tomb included the remains of a headdress covered with shell spangles and a shell pendant

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or collar with jade and pearl inlays. The tomb was re-entered at least once for ritual activities, presumably including veneration of the deceased as well as the coating of his bones with cinnabar. Many features of the Hunal building and tomb point to connections between early Copan and distant places (Sharer 2004), and the individual in the tomb was clearly connected to one or more of them. The talud-tablero platform, roof construction, imported pottery, shell pendant, and shell-spangled headdress (which would have looked very much like the Teotihuacan warriors’ helmets depicted on Stela 31 at Tikal) all indicate a connection with Teotihuacan, perhaps mediated by less distant places –such as Tikal or Kaminaljuyu– that themselves had Teotihuacan connections. The evidence of bone chemistry makes a close link with the central Peten certain, and the presence of imported pottery from central Mexico suggests that the possibility of a direct tie with Teotihuacan as well cannot be discounted. These features, along with a short text on the shell collar that identifies it as belonging to someone designated by the key elements used in later texts to refer to the dynastic founder, combine to indicate that the remains in the tomb are those of Yax K’uk’ Mo.’

Figure 4. Rosalila structure, full-scale replica (photo by John S. Henderson).

Verticality, Commemoration, and Demarcative Practice in the Construction of Copan’s Historical Landscape

Later hieroglyphic texts also indicate that Yax K’uk’ Mo’ came to Copan from the central Peten region (Sharer 2003; Stuart 2004). The longest text referring to him, carved on the top of Altar Q in the eighth century and set in front of the stair of Structure 10L-16-1st, says that he arrived at Copan in AD 427 from a place where he received the key emblem of royal authority. In subsequent passages, reference to him shifts from the pre-accession Ajaw (‘lord’) K’uk’ Mo’ to K’inich (‘Sun God’) Yax (‘new’) K’uk’ Mo’. Here and elsewhere, Yax K’uk’ Mo’ bears the title West Kalomte’, which was also carried by Tikal kings. A text carved on the back of the Hombre de Tikal sculpture, found in a tomb in Structure 3D43 on the northern edge of central Tikal, refers to actions of a person named K’uk’ Mo’ in AD 406, two decades before the arrival at Copan (Fahsen 1988; LaPorte 2001; Sharer 2003). These factors combine to suggest that Hunal was the palace of Yax K’uk’ Mo’ decorated with a mural that may depict his inauguration and that the tomb within the platform was his final resting place. Not long after the burial, Hunal was covered by the slightly larger Yehnal structure. The Yehnal platform facing was also painted red, but was embellished with apron moldings and stucco masks of the kind used on central Peten platforms, rather than with talud-tablero panels. Like all of its successors at this location, the Yehnal structure was a temple, rather than

a palace. It was arguably built by Ruler 2, the successor of Yax K’uk’ Mo’, as a memorial to his father. The masks flanking the main stair depict the sun god, recalling the K’inich title that is commonly attached to the name Yax K’uk’ Mo’. The Teotihuacan relationship, overt in the talud-tablero facing of Hunal, was now replaced by an architectural reference to the central Peten. A tomb chamber was placed beneath the new platform surface, adjacent to the Hunal tomb. If this indicates Ruler 2’s intention to be interred next to his father, it was apparently not fulfilled, for the tomb remained accessible but empty for some time, though it may have been a venue for ritual activity. In the mid fifth century, Yehnal was buried by the Margarita building, a much larger structure, again painted red and faced with Peten-style apron moldings. The façade on each side of Margarita’s western stair was decorated with a painted stucco relief representing a pair of birds with their necks intertwined. One is red and has the head of a macaw (mo’); the other is green with the topknot of a quetzal (k’uk’). Each bird has the glyph for Yax on its head, and a face representing the sun god appears in the beak of each. The composition, at once figural and glyphic, represents the name and title K’inich Yax K’uk’ Mo,’ the common designation for the founder. Each pair of birds stands on a hieroglyphic “9 Imix” on the south side of the stair and “7 Kan” on the north. These glyphs,

Figure 5. Rosalila structure (replica), sun god face (photo by John S. Henderson).

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which may refer to supernatural places, also appear beneath the portraits of Yax K’uk’ Mo’ and Ruler 2 on the capstone of the Motmot tomb at the base of the 10L-26 sequence. The body interred in the enlarged platform that buried Margarita‘s stair had shell goggles on its face and was accompanied by a bundle of atlatl darts (Bell et al. 2004: 142–144; Buikstra et al. 2004; Price et al. 2010). A new building, on the summit, Xukpi, was soon demolished and the Yehnal tomb, which had remained accessible but empty, was enlarged with a new chamber built over the access stair. A bench or step removed from its original location was re-set in the upper chamber (Stuart 2004: 244–246). The text on its face refers to Yax K’uk’ Mo’, Ruler 2, the 9.0.0.0.0 baktun in AD 435, and some kind of mortuary structure or ritual, perhaps the tomb of Yax K’uk’ Mo’ in Hunal a few meters beneath it. The upper chamber was then dedicated to offerings and rituals connected with the burial finally placed in the much-remodeled Yehnal tomb chamber below (Bell et al. 2004: 136–143; Reents-Budet et al. 2004; Buikstra et al. 2004; Price et al. 2010). The skeletal remains indicate that the occupant was a mature woman, and her bone chemistry indicates that she was of local origin. She was laid to rest with an extraordinarily rich suite of mortuary furniture including pottery vessels imported from central Mexico, the central Pe-

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Figure 6. Structure 10L-16 (photo by John S. Henderson).

ten, and the Guatemalan highlands. A stuccoed tripod vessel that was probably made in central Mexico was painted with an image of a talud-tablero building and a goggle-eyed face in definite Teotihuacan style, but seems to show indications that the painter was familiar with Maya canons as well. Carved slate mirror backs and painted organic objects also reflect Teotihuacan designs. The upper tomb chamber remained accessible from the structure that buried the Margarita building for a substantial period during which additional offerings were placed, the lower chamber was re-entered, and the bones were covered with cinnabar. The most plausible interpretation is that the woman interred in the Margarita tomb was the wife of Yax K’uk’ Mo’, and a woman of considerable consequence. Although she was of local origin, her mortuary furniture includes many objects that suggest foreign connections, especially with Teotihuacan. These objects, like the shell goggles and atlatl darts of the Teotihuacan warrior buried in the enlarged platform, were not a public representation of connection with the central Mexican city. What was visible to visitors to the royal precinct were the elegant representations of K’inich Yax K’uk’ Mo’ on each side of the stair and the central Peten apron moldings of the Margarita platform itself. The glyphs on which the birds stand, directly associated with the founder and his successor on the Motmot marker, suggests that the imagery was also

Verticality, Commemoration, and Demarcative Practice in the Construction of Copan’s Historical Landscape

Massive platform enlargements in the late fifth century buried Margarita. The temple that replaced it was completely destroyed by later construction, but it apparently remained in use until the erection of a temple nick-named Rosalila (Fig. 4) near the end of the sixth century (Agurcia 2004; Agurcia and Fash 2005). Much of this construction was probably commissioned by Ruler 8. The platform on which Rosalila stands was adorned with red-painted sun god masks very similar to those on Structure A1 at Kohunlich in central Yucatan. Thanks to its careful burial prior to subsequent construction, the decoration on the façade of the Rosalila temple is remarkably well preserved. The façade of the building was elaborately decorated with reliefs repeatedly refurbished with new plaster and paint during the seventh century. The imagery represents an array of supernatural and ancestral figures, prominently featuring the sun god. The lower façade boasted seven panels with the same composition: a central sun god head framed by reptile heads, feathers, and bird talons (Fig. 5). Above the sun god’s head is the head of a composite bird combining features of the quetzal (k’uk’) and macaw (mo’). The image can be read as the sun god wearing a bird headdress and framed with other bird elements or as the full figure of a bird with “serpent wings.”

Figure 7. Structure 10L-16, goggle-eyed face and skulls (photo by John S. Henderson).

Under any interpretation, the 7 panels are the equivalent of the birds flanking the stairs of the earlier Margarita structure below, representing the founder’s normal title-name combination, K’inich Yax K’uk’ Mo’. Rosalila memorialized Yax K’uk’ Mo’ in just the way that Margarita had.

intended to emphasize the connection between Yax K’uk’ Mo’ and his successor (who probably commissioned the building). The structure was a memorial to the dynastic founder, now referred to by name, not indirectly by title, and to his central Peten connections, not his links to distant Teotihuacan.

Near the end of the seventh century –late in the life of Ruler 12 or near the beginning of the reign of his successor, Waxaklajun Ubaah K’awiil– elaborate termination rituals paved the way for the next construction episode in this location. Rosalila was covered with a final coat of white plaster,

Figure 8. Structure 10L-26, schematic section (after Fash, Fash and Davis-Salazar 2004: Fig, 4.2).

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and earth and stone were carefully packed around it before it was encased in the fill of the larger Structure 10L-16-2nd. The care with which this interment was undertaken ensured the preservation of Rosalila’s program of decoration. The temple building of Structure 10L-16-2nd stood atop a massive platform faced with beautifully dressed blocks, but it was entirely destroyed by the final construction episode. The final version of Structure 10L-16 (Fig. 6) was built late in the 8th century, during the reign of Yax Pasaj, Ruler 16. Construction of this building, only a slight enlargement of its predecessor, entailed the first change in the axis of construction in this location, a shift 13 meters south of that established by the Hunal building three and a half centuries earlier. An outset platform in the lower part of the stairway featured a goggle-eyed face surrounded by skulls carved in relief (Fig. 7). A panel just above held a figure with sun god features framed by a rope, possibly a representation of K’inich Yax K’uk’ Mo’ as the sun god. A similar image may have sat on the bench in the summit temple. The fragmentary surviving decoration of that building emphasized a goggle-eyed being and the interlocked V and trapezoid motif. The goggle-eyed faces are a clear reference to central Mexican imagery, usually labeled Tlaloc after the Mexica deity with that facial feature. The V and trapezoid design, often associated with that being in central Mexico, is also used there to mark the names of years. The stair outset with relief skulls is sometimes interpreted as another indication

of central Mexican linkage because of its resemblance to the tzompantli platforms that supported skull racks. In combination with rope imagery, particularly a bound figure found on the main stair, this platform and its skulls can be seen as a reflection of emphasis on warfare and sacrifice in the decorative program of Structure 10L-16-1st. Reference to ancestors was probably among the intended meanings of the death imagery as well. The stair outset recalls structures in central Peten sites, particularly the one on Structure B4 at Altun Ha, which contained the tomb of one of its lords. At Tikal, a similar outset was built into the stair of Temple 2, arguably Jasaw Chan K’awiil’s memorial to his deceased wife. Ropes were widely employed as a metaphor for descent, so the rope framing of the panel that held the image with sun god features can be seen as another ancestral reference. Altar Q, set at the base of the stair of Structure 10L-16-1st, focuses explicitly on the founder. The pivot of the composition is the passing of a scepter, emblematic of legitimate rule, from the founder to Yax Pasaj, who commissioned the final version of the building. Yax K’uk’ Mo’ has goggle eyes and carries a shield with the same serpent device that appears on shields in fragments of sculpture from the temple façade. A bird combining features of the quetzal and macaw and a yax sign in his headdress spell Yax K’uk’ Mo’. The 14 intervening rulers, in Yax Pasaj’s version of dynastic history, flank them. The text covering the top of the monument recounts the inauguration of Yax K’uk’ Mo’ as king and his arrival at Copan. The remains of (approximately) 15 jaguars deposited in a chamber buried between Altar Q and the stair represent the residue of a ritual that may have evoked the same succession culminating in the accession of Yax Pasaj. The final building at this location was a very grand memorial to Yax K’uk’ Mo’. Direct reference to the founder is emphatic on Altar Q, but less obvious in the architectural decoration, which, after a lapse of some three centuries, again emphasizes central Mexican connections.

Temple of the Hieroglyphic Stairway (Structure 10L-26) and its Ancestors Construction in this location began in the early fifth century, with a platform that was largely destroyed by later construction (Fash, Fash and Davis-Salazar 2004; Sharer et al. 2005). The earliest well-preserved building, nicknamed “Motmot,” (Fig. 8), had Peten-style apron moldings on the face of its platform and a mask depicting a supernatural figure, possibly associated with the sun, at the center of at least one side. Motmot is stratigraphically connected to Margarita by a plastered floor and may have been a project of Ruler 2. A floor to the west connects Motmot with the earliest version of Copan’s main ball court.

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Figure 9. Hieroglyphic Stair, figure with central Mexican year sign (photo by John S. Henderson).

Immediately in front of the platform on the west, the Motmot “marker” was set into the floor, covering a circular tomb chamber (Fash, Fash and Davis-Salazar 2004: 68–74; Price et al. 2010). Relief carving on the capstone depicts Yax K’uk’ Mo’ and Ruler 2 celebrating the 9.0.0.0.0 baktun ending in AD 435 (Stuart 2004: 240–241). The text suggests

Verticality, Commemoration, and Demarcative Practice in the Construction of Copan’s Historical Landscape

that this may have been a building dedication date, perhaps that of Motmot or its predecessor. The inscription also refers to the arrival of Yax K’uk’ Mo’ in 427. He is depicted with Maya, not central Mexican, accouterments. The glyphs beneath the feet of Yax K’uk’ Mo’ and Ruler 2 –9 Imix and 7 Kan– are the same as those on which the K’inich Yax K’uk’ Mo’ birds stand on the Margarita façade. Wear on the capstone suggests that it was exposed for a substantial period. The circular burial chamber itself is very reminiscent of Teotihuacan mortuary practice. The principal occupant was an adult woman whose bone chemistry indicates that she was from a region outside the Copan valley, quite possibly the Peten. With her were interred the skulls of three men, two of them local and one from the same region as the woman. The skulls, often interpreted as battle trophies, are at least as likely to be those of important ancestors. At some time after the burial, the tomb was re-opened; the woman’s body was removed and involved in a ritual that left smoke residues on the bones, then replaced. Motmot and its tomb capstone emphasize the founder, Ruler 2, the 9.0.0.0.0 baktun ending, and Peten connections. The tomb implies links with Teotihuacan, but only well-informed members of the court would have likely been aware of this. Central Mexican connections are not implied by the architecture or its decoration that were visible to all. Later in the fifth century, the Papagayo building –whose platform had a tablero on its face– buried Motmot. The façade of the much larger Mascarones platform that was soon built behind it to the east featured large masks representing deities, perhaps the sun god. Stela 63 was set on a low platform inside Papagayo superstructure directly over the Motmot capstone and tomb (Stuart 2004: 230–231, 241–243). The excellent state of preservation of its relief carving and the placement with its uncarved back against the wall suggest that this was Stela 63’s original location. The Initial Series records the 9.0.0.0.0 baktun ending, and the text explicitly names Ruler 2 as the child of Yax K’uk’ Mo’. Placement of an altar or step whose text refers to Ruler 4 marks the re-dedication of the building near the end of the

fifth century. Eventually Stela 63 was broken, part of it was removed, and the chamber was filled with debris, including macaw heads from the early ballcourt. The chamber and Stela 63 remained accessible through the reigns of several of Ruler 4’s successors, perhaps as late as the end of the seventh century. Papagayo was a long-lived monument to the founder, his son, and the baktun ending they jointly celebrated. The tablero on the substructure (without a talud) may have implied a central Mexican connection, but this is not a major theme of the building’s public message. Ruler 12, who was on the throne for most of the seventh century, commissioned a construction that buried the Mascarones platform and part of the Papagayo building, but the front of Papagayo was not covered, and access to Stela 63 was maintained. The new platform, Chorcha, contains Ruler 12’s tomb, which was dedicated in a ritual that involved the breakage and deposition of 12 incense burners. One of the effigy censer lids depicts a goggle-eyed figure that may represent the founder. Another has the central Mexican year sign in its headdress, recalling the way Ruler 12 had himself depicted on Stela 6. If these censer lids were meant to represent Ruler 12 and his 11 dynastic predecessors, the interment of Ruler 12 can be seen as the beginning of an emphasis, not just on Yax K’uk’ Mo’ but on the whole dynasty, that would mark the latest buildings in this and the Structure 10L-16 location. The Esmeralda structure, which buried Chorcha and finally closed off access to Stela 63, was built by Waxaklajun Ubaah K’awil as a monument to Ruler 12 and to their earlier dynastic predecessors. The hieroglyphic steps that eventually became the lower part of the stairway of the succeeding Structure 10L-26-1st (Fig. 9), were probably commissioned by Waxaklajun Ubaah K’awil and originally installed on the east side of Esmeralda (Stuart 2005). The text recounts Copan’s dynastic history through the reign of Ruler 12. This overt focus on the dynasty itself, rather than on the founder, would be repeated in the Hieroglyphic Stairway of the subsequent Structure 10L-26-1st and in the final version of Structure 10L-16. Following the death of Waxaklajun Ubaah K’awil in AD 638 at the hands of the ruler of Quirigua, building activity went into a lull for a generation. The final temple in this

Figure 10. Structures 10L-26 and 10L-16, schematic section (after Fash, Fash, and Davis-Salazar 2004: Fig. 4.2, and Agurcia and Fash 2005: Fig. 6.1).

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location was commissioned by Ruler 15, who removed Waxaklajun Ubaah K’awil’s hieroglyphic steps from their original location and re-set them as the lower courses of his new, much taller stair (Fash 2002; Stuart 2005). This arrangement entailed the carving of the text on his new upper steps at a larger scale, presumably to ensure its visibility from below. Ruler 15’s text continues the story of Copan’s dynastic history from Ruler 12 through the dedication of the building in the mid-eighth century. Sculptures representing the kings of Copan as warriors were set in the stairway, embedded in the text. Their arrangement preserves Waxaklajun Ubaah K’awil’s emphasis on Ruler 12, whose image is at eye level for viewers at the base of the stair. The Temple of the Hieroglyphic Stairway, like its predecessor, was a memorial to the dynasty as a whole, rather than a monument emphasizing the founder. With the possible exception of the tablero on the Papagayo platform, Mexican year signs in the headdresses of two of the royal warrior figures (Fig. 9), along with owls and other elements decorating the building façade, represent the first architectural references to central Mexican connections in this location. The unusual text on an interior wall of the final summit building also has central Mexican references in the form of a series of figures with Mexican elements paired with full-figure Maya glyphs. Mexican connections seem distinctly subordinate to the theme of dynastic celebration.

Discussion The early buildings at the heart of the Acropolis and on its northern edge –Hunal-Yehnal-Margarita and Motmot-Papagayo, respectively– commemorate Yax K’uk’ Mo’, Ruler 2, and the 9.0.0.0.0 baktun ending. The talud-tablero façade of Hunal, most likely the palace used by Yax K’uk’ Mo’ during his lifetime, is the only obvious reference to Teotihuacan on an early building in either location. Its successor, Yehnal, and Motmot, the first well-preserved building in the 10L26 sequence, have Peten-style apron moldings and sun god masks referring to the founder’s K’inich title. Yax K’uk’ Mo’ presented himself to the contemporary population participating in activities in and around the royal court as a foreigner, celebrating his connections with Teotihuacan and/or with the central Peten, his likely origin, which had its own Teotihuacan links. After his death, his successors continued to celebrate him, but shifted the focus to the central Peten aspect of his identity. This is the same trajectory followed by Sihyaj Chan K’awil and later successors of Yax Nuun Ahiin at Tikal (Sharer 2003: 325–326; Martin and Grube 2008).

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As the core of the Acropolis became progressively more elevated, and consequently more private, the 10L-26 location at the northern edge of the royal precinct became the more public face of the royal court (Fig. 10). The much lesser emphasis on external connections of any kind, even with the central Peten, in this location may reflect intent on the part of Copan’s kings to present different self-representations to the public at large. There is a sharp contrast between the degree to which external connections, particularly with Teotihuacan, are embodied in architecture as part of the public personae

of Copan’s kings and the degree to which mortuary practice reflects foreign links. Well-informed members of the court, participants in interment and subsequent rituals involving tomb re-entry, would have been aware of Teotihuacan and central Peten burial furniture and practices, but the public at large would not. Late buildings in both locations reflect two shifts in royal self-presentation: an emphasis on the Yax K’uk’ Mo’ dynasty as a whole rather than on the founder figure and an overt celebration of central Mexican connections. The incense burners used in the dedication of Ruler 12’s tomb may mark the beginnings of the former, though not in public imagery. The last two versions of Structure 10L-26 and the final version of Structure 10L-16 clearly reflect both new emphases. In each case, the focus on the dynasty is reflected much more directly in texts, while central Mexican connections are more obvious in architectural decoration. In keeping with its more public location, the decoration of Structure 10L-26-1st, notably the royal warrior figures, create a much stronger emphasis on the dynasty than on foreign links. Increasing emphasis on the dynasty would not, of course, have obscured the importance of its founder. Structure 10L16 in particular, positioned directly above his tomb, in what had likely been the focal building of his court, must always have been recognizable as a memorial to Yax K’uk’ Mo’. The careful preparation of Rosalila for enclosure within an enlarged temple, in effect entombing the building itself, strongly suggests Gell’s (1998: 126–154) notion of containment. The temple may have been an embodiment of the continuing presence of Yax K’uk’ Mo’, a skin enclosing part of his essence that continued to exercise agency in the affairs of his successors. It is important to note that, by the time these late buildings were commissioned, Teotihuacan itself had not been involved in the Maya world for two centuries; its political order and economic system had disintegrated a century earlier. The architectural references are historical and indicate the earlier history of Copan’s participation in networks that linked them to the central Mexican city. They also form part of a constructed historical landscape that combined the mythicized past –with all of its accompanying connotations of grandeur and legitimacy– and the materialized present. This landscape also arguably served as indication that architectural development was analogous to the passage of time and thus that the royal authority responsible for translating the passage of time into building phases was equally immutable. Although later building phases contained fewer overt references to this history in form and decoration, their placement on top of constructions in which these connections were embodied indicated that later instantiations of the Copan political elite were inescapably connected to the power and perceived grandeur of their predecessors. The propagandistic implication is that challenging royal authority is the same as challenging history and questioning the place of Copan itself within the broader network of historical connections. By enshrining foreign connections within architectural development, Copan’s rulers were literally building on the past and inserting a legitimizing historical narrative into the very fabric of their city.

Verticality, Commemoration, and Demarcative Practice in the Construction of Copan’s Historical Landscape

It is interesting that in re-setting the hieroglyphic steps of Waxaklajun Ubaah K’awil’s original stair, Ruler 15 took pains to set it at the base of the new Hieroglyphic Stairway, even though this entailed carving the new glyphs at a larger scale and resulted in a text that began at the top with the later history of the dynasty followed by a flashback to its earlier rulers below. The rationale for this may have been something like a principle of vertical landscaping: maintaining the verticality reflected in the architectural sequence, with later stages of the court positioned above their predecessors. Directional symbolism must have been a key aspect of the meaning attached to the court and its commemorative architecture. Structure 10L-16, situated directly above the tomb of the founder, is located at the southern edge of the royal court, the direction associated with the underworld. It is hard to imagine that the kings of Copan would have missed the opportunity for contrast with the siting of Structure 10L-26’s celebration of the dynasty in the north, the direction associated with the celestial realm (Ashmore 1991). All of the temples themselves are oriented toward the west, except for the Esmeralda phase of Structure 10L-26, which faces east. The prominence of solar deities in the imagery of several versions of Structure 10L-16 suggest that this orientation to the axis of the sun’s daily path was a conscious dimension of the commemoration of Yax K’uk’ Mo’, for whom the solar title K’inich was an important epithet. The hieroglyphic texts on the stairs of Structure 10L-26 make it clear that these monuments were the focus for the construction of narratives about dynastic succession (Stuart 2005). The text on the original stair on the Esmeralda building, grounds the dynasty in the accession of Yax K’uk’ Mo’. The account of the accessions and deaths of his successors emphasizes the most recent kings, Ruler 12, with his tomb placed beneath the Chorcha temple encased by the Esmeralda expansion, and Waxaklajun Ubaah K’awil, who commissioned the building. The final hieroglyphic stair, moved back to the traditional western façade, adds a new text above the re-set original, carrying the dynastic narrative forward to the accession of Ruler 15, who oversaw the construction of Structure 10L-26-1. Most of the people who gathered in the plaza for public events would not have been able to read the text themselves. Since its content served to situate the current ruler in Copan’s history, specifically in the context of a long succession of legitimate kings, it would be surprising if its content were not alluded to, explained, or even read aloud, as part of political performances. Surely similar narratives were constructed and performed –presumably for a more restricted audience– around successive versions of Structure 10L-16. The construction of Yehnal and Motmot permanently changed the landscape of Copan’s court, establishing loci of architectural focus for increasingly grandiose commemorations of Yax K’uk’ Mo’ and the 9.0.0.0.0 baktun ending. These center points, and the space between and around them, were unmistakably demarcated as special. Patterns of connection to the royal court, to its architectural landscape, and to the history that was represented there changed as access to the Structure 10L-16 location and knowledge of the structures

and the activities that took place there became increasingly restricted. The buildings comprising the physical markers of this historical landscape generated secondary spaces in the areas between them that were equally significant. Constructed spaces can be defined as locations created through the establishment of definitions, descriptions and rules specifying how the space should be used (Delle 1998: 38); they are thus analogous to the built environment as defined by Harvey (1982: 233) and represent “use values embedded in the physical environment” (Delle 1998: 38). This embedding of meaning in physical space begins with the significances ascribed to the buildings themselves and their historical implications, but it also extends to the socially conceptualized space believed to exist as a direct result of the meanings of the physical markers. This space, which combines the functions of both social space and cognitive space as they have been defined by Delle (1998: 38–39), is rooted in the verticality of its demarcating buildings even though it occurred at ground level. Social spaces instantiate the complex suite of relationships that can exist between individuals and between an individual and the material space (Delle 1998: 38); they are places where the values embedded in material space are actualized and negotiated. In the case of Copan’s royal precinct, social positions and dynamics were reinforced through the relationships of individuals to the built environment. Access to these buildings indicated access to history and thus to its legitimizing powers, while a lack of access –or, arguably, a limited form of access– simultaneously reified the official historical narrative by reinforcing a system of sociopolitical differentiation in which those with historical connections held positions of power and indicated at least tacit acceptance of its political ramifications. Spatial access thus reflected historical access and, by extension, historical relevance that could be channeled into contemporary legitimacy. Such implications are suggestive of Delle’s (1998: 38–39) discussion of cognitive spaces, since they indicate that accessing and using the spaces generated by the architecture of the royal precinct were intimately connected to norms of behavior. They are also indicative of a knowledge base that reaffirms the royal position by allowing for the successful navigation of both the physical landscape and its historical counterpart. Royal knowledge of the architectural history of these spaces allowed Copan’s kings to make use of them in the proper ways, and these behaviors situated rulers in both space and time. The vertical dimension of the architecture allowed the city’s elite to exist simultaneously in the historical landscape and in its current counterpart; this, in turn, rooted political and ritual action in both temporal locales and reinforced the perception of historical validation.

Concluding Remarks The royal precinct of Copan was progressively elevated through some four centuries of construction and remodeling of civic buildings. Commemorative temples of each royal

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court literally rested on the remains of those used by their predecessors, in which their most illustrious forebears were entombed. Current courtly activities took place atop –on the foundation of– the courts and mortal remains of the ancestors who were the basis for the legitimacy of the kings who presided over those activities. All visitors to the city center would have appreciated these facts, especially when they were assembled for public events in the Great Plaza, with the Acropolis towering above them. From their point of view, buildings like Structure 10L-16-1st (Fig. 6), whose floor stood 30 meters above the Río Copan and the tomb of Yax K’uk’ Mo’ in the early palace on its bank, must have seemed to approach the celestial realm.

References Agurcia F., Ricardo 2004 Rosalila, temple of the sun-king. In: Ellen E. Bell, Marcello A. Canuto and Robert J. Sharer (eds.), Understanding Early Classic Copan, pp. 101–111. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Agurcia F., Ricardo and Barbara W. Fash 2005 The evolution of structure 10L-16, heart of the Copán acropolis. In: E. Wyllys Andrews and William L. Fash (eds.), Copán: The History of an Ancient Maya Kingdom, pp. 201–237. Santa Fe: School of American Research. Ashmore, Wendy 1991 Site-planning principles and concepts of directionality among the ancient Maya. Latin American Antiquity 2 (3): 199–226. Bell, Ellen E., Robert J. Sharer, Loa P. Traxler, David W. Sedat, Christine W. Carrelli and Lynn A. Grant 2004 Tombs and burials in the Early Classic Acropolis at Copan. In: Ellen E. Bell, Marcello A. Canuto and Robert J. Sharer (eds.), Understanding Early Classic Copan, pp. 131–157. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Buikstra, Jane E., T. Douglas Price, Lori E. Wright and James A. Burton 2004 Tombs from the Copan Acropolis: a life-history approach. In: Ellen E. Bell, Marcello A. Canuto and Robert J. Sharer (eds.), Understanding Early Classic Copan, pp. 191–212. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Delle, James A. 1998 An Archaeology of Social Space: Analyzing Coffee Plantations in Jamaica’s Blue Mountains. New York: Plenum Press. Fahsen, Federico 1988 A new Early Classic text from Tikal. Research Reports on Ancient Maya Writing 17. Washington: Center for Maya Research. Fash, William L. 2002 Religion and human agency in ancient Maya history: tales from the Hieroglyphic Stairway. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 12 (1): 5–19.

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Fash, William L., Barbara J. Fash and Karla Davis-Salazar 2004 Setting the stage: origins of the Hieroglyphic Stairway plaza on the great period ending. In: Ellen E. Bell, Marcello A.

Canuto and Robert J. Sharer (eds.), Understanding Early Classic Copan, pp. 65–83. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Gell, Alfred 1998 Art and Agency: An Anthropological Theory. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Harvey, David 1982 The Limits to Capital. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Joyce, Rosemary A. 2004 Unintended consequences? Monumentality as a novel experience in Formative Mesoamerica. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 11(4): 5–29. Laporte, Juan P. 2001 Trabajos no divulgados del Proyecto Nacional Tikal, Parte 2: hallazgos en las exploraciones de la Zona Norte. In: Juan Pedro Laporte, Ana Claudia Monzón de Suasnávar and Bárbara Arroyo (eds.), XIV Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala, 2000, pp. 259–296. Guatemala: Instituto de Antropología e Historia. Lowenthal, David 1985 The Past is a Foreign Country. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Martin, Simon and Nikolai Grube 2008 Chronicle of the Maya Kings and Queens: Deciphering the Dynasties of the Ancient Maya. Second Edition. New York: Thames and Hudson. Price, T. D., James H. Burton, Robert J. Sharer, Jane E. Buikstra, Lori E. Wright, Loa P. Traxler and Katherine A. Miller 2010 Kings and commoners at Copan: Isotopic evidence for origins and movement in the Classic Maya period. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 29 (1): 15–32. Reents-Budet, Dorie, Ellen E. Bell, Loa P. Traxler and Ronald L. Bishop 2004 Early Classic ceramic offerings at Copan: a comparison of the Hunal, Margarita, and Sub-Jaguar tombs. In: Ellen E. Bell, Marcello A. Canuto and Robert J. Sharer (eds.), Understanding Early Classic Copan, pp. 159–190. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Sedat, David W. and Fernando López 2004 Initial stages in the transformation of the Copan acropolis. In: Ellen E. Bell, Marcello A. Canuto and Robert J. Sharer (eds.), Understanding Early Classic Copan, pp. 85–99. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Sharer, Robert J. 2003 Tikal and the Copan dynastic founding. In: Jeremy A. Sabloff (ed.), Tikal: Dynasties, Foreigners, and Affairs of State, pp. 319–353. Santa Fe: School of American Research Press. 2004 External interaction at Early Classic Copan. In: Ellen E. Bell, Marcello A. Canuto and Robert J. Sharer (eds.), Understanding Early Classic Copan, pp. 297–317. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Sharer, Robert J., David W. Sedat, Loa P. Traxler, Julia C. Miller and Ellen E. Bell 2005 Early classic royal power in Copan: the origins and develop-

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ment of the acropolis (ca. ad 250–600). In: E. Wyllys Andrews and William L. Fash (eds.), Copán: The History of an Ancient Maya Kingdom, pp. 139–199. Santa Fe: School of American Research. Stuart, David S. 2004 The beginnings of the Copan dynasty: a review of the hieroglyphic and historical evidence. In: Ellen E. Bell, Marcello A. Canuto and Robert J. Sharer (eds.), Understanding Early Classic Copan, pp. 215–247. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. 2005 A foreign past: the writing and representation of history on a royal ancestral shrine at Copán. In: Ellen W. Andrews and William L. Fash (eds.), Copán: The History of an Ancient Maya Kingdom, pp. 373–394. Santa Fe: School of American Research. Traxler, Loa P. 2004 Redesigning Copan: early architecture of the polity center. In: Ellen E. Bell, Marcello A. Canuto and Robert J. Sharer (eds.), Understanding Early Classic Copan, pp. 53–64. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. Van Dyke, Ruth and Susan E. Alcock 2003 Archaeologies of Memory: An Introduction. In: Ruth Van Dyke and Susan E. Alcock (eds.), Archaeologies of Memory, pp. 1–14. Malden: Blackwell Publishers Ltd.

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A Directional Pattern in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s Stelae at Quiriguá María Eugenia Gutiérrez González Universidad Autónoma de Chiapas (UNACH), Centro de Estudios Interdisciplinarios de las Culturas Mesoamericanas (CEICUM)

Abstract K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat, ruler of Quiriguá, made a constant and accurate record of hotun period endings in the monuments he dedicated during his government (AD 725–785). Through a detailed analysis on the Initial Series and other dates, this paper suggests the existence of a directional ritual pattern for, at least, six of those monuments (Stelae F, D, E, C, A, and Zoomorph B) where their orientation directly corresponds to the calendar data linked to gods G9 (to the east) and G7 (to the west). It also explores the ritual importance of the Moon Goddess associated to this directional pattern.

Resumen K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat, gobernante de Quiriguá, llevó a cabo un registro constante y preciso de finales de periodo hotun en los monumentos que dedicó durante su gobierno (725–785 d.C.). En un análisis detallado de las Series Iniciales y otras fechas, este trabajo sugiere la existencia de un patrón ritual direccional en, al menos, seis de esos monumentos (Estelas F, D, E, C, A y Zoomorfo B), donde su orientación corresponde directamente con información calendárica relacionada con los dioses G9 (mirando al este) y G7 (mirando al oeste). También se explora la importancia ritual de la Diosa Lunar asociada a este patrón direccional.

After defeating Copán ruler Waxaklajuun Ubaah K’awiil time (1929), J. Eric Thompson identified nine glyphs in the in AD 738, K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat of Quirigua started a Initial Series. He observed that they formed a sequence and constructive program that reached its peak during the second suggested a relation between them and the bolon ti ku deity, half of the eighth century, the result of which are eleven mon- presiding “over the day on which the day of the I.S. terminal uments –eight stelae, two altars and one zoomorph– most of date falls” (Morley 1938: 104). them erected in the Great Plaza and six of them located in Epigraphers call these gods G1, G2, G3, G4, G5, G6, G7, Platform 1A-1 (Looper 2003). This paper explores a directional pattern for the hieroglyphic inscriptions carved in an G8 and G9, the “G” standing for “god” (Fig. 1). Due to the east-to-west style on these six K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s uninterrupted repetition of these nine gods or nine glyphs monuments: Stelae F, D, E, C, A, and Zoomorph B. All these in the Maya calendar, there is an endless correspondence of hieroglyphic texts depict a directional pattern where the ori- one of these glyphs with any given date from the Maya Long entation corresponds with the calendar data linked to Lord Count and Calendar Round (Montgomery 2002: 89, 90). We of the Night G9 when the inscription looks to the east and to know that the “G”-associated god from the Lords of the Night Lord of the Night G7 when the inscription looks to the west. Series is an unchangeable element in the Maya calendar during a k’atun. This means that every time a k’atun is completed Since the beginning of the twentieth century, a group of there are different changing elements in a Long Count while specialists on Maya calendars dedicated their efforts to study the “G”-associated god does not change. He remains the same. the variable glyphic elements in the Initial Series. During the The nine G-gods are frequently found next to a constant first decade of that century, Charles Bowditch suggested a relation between the variable elements of the Initial Series In- calendar glyph called Glyph F, of still unknown meaning. troductory Glyph (ISIG) and the variable months of the Haab Glyphs G and F can also be found merged in a single comor 365-day year (in Morley 1938: 104). Twenty years later, pound (Fig. 2). For those inscriptions where the nine G-gods in 1931, Hermann Beyer discovered a direct relationship be- are not visually depicted, their correspondence can be accutween those variable glyphs and the months when he pointed rately calculated as long as the date is not ambiguous. Alout that the glyphs in the ISIG were the patron gods for the though not so much studies have been made on these G-gods, Maya twenty-day “months” (Morley 1938: 104). By the same a detailed description of the few studies on the subject can be

María Eugenia Gutiérrez González

Figure 1. Nine G-gods or Nine Lords of the Night. Drawings by John Montgomery (in Kettunen and Helmke 2011: 41).

found in Sven Gronemeyer (2006), his own proposal being that this is a maize-related cycle where G-gods and Glyph F act as manifestations of the Maize God in a cycle of three stages. This paper does not discuss Gronemeyer’s proposal. It concentrates on systematizing some calendrical information strictly related to G7 and G9 gods at Quirigua. It also explores the presence of the Moon Goddess as a patron for five of those six monuments analyzed, as well as her importance for Quirigua’s ritual life. A comment on the relation between solar and lunar counts is also made.

Quirigua Monuments Found in situ Quirigua offers advantages to anyone interested in studying directional patterns in Maya inscriptions, for most of its monuments have been found in situ, in their original position. When Quirigua was first visited by Frederick Catherwood in 1840, he described the site to John Lloyd Stephens and reported that all monuments located in what we know call the Great Plaza had been found erected (Stephens 1993: 130–133). A year later, Catherwood created a series of drawings that depict the monuments in the exact arrange they can be seen today.

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Figure 2. G9 and Glyph F in one glyphic compound. Quirigua, Stela F, West, C6. Drawing by the author.

In his archaeological studies, Alfred P. Maudslay noticed that the stelae had been in their original position for centuries. On one of his reports on his visits to Quirigua (1886), Maudslay states that he saw “five monoliths in position and one fallen” (Maudslay 1886: 186) making reference to Stela E and its then noticeable inclination. Maudslay explains that the stelae, to which he refers to as monoliths, were covered by a meter of sand from different and constant floods caused by the Motagua River. As for the zoomorphs from the Great Plaza (B and G), he reports that “the earth round the monuments had to be cleared away usually to the depth of two or three feet, as, probably owing to floods from the river, the level of the ground had considerably altered since they were originally placed in position” (Maudslay 1886: 569). It can be inferred that the floods helped maintain the monuments in their original arrangement. During his excavations in Quirigua in the early twentieth century, Sylvanus G. Morley (1935, 1938) took a series of photographs from the monuments and published several plates that can be of great interest regarding the observation of the original position of the monuments in the Great Plaza. There are not many studies concerning the orientation of written monuments rom the Classic period. This scarcity may be due to the fact that there are few cities preserving their monuments in their original position. Palenque is one of those cities, its tablets carved on several temple walls. Even though neither monuments nor stelae were carved in its plazas, most of Palenque’s abundant hieroglyphic texts were written inside temples with a precise orientation towards the horizon. This has contributed to the identification of cult patterns associated to the Triad gods in some buildings looking northward (Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993: 140, 433; Looper 2003: 161–164). In a recent research, Guillermo Bernal (2011) indi-

A Directional Pattern in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s Stelae at Quiriguá

cates a directional cult for Palenque where the rulers are associated to the four world directions in the glyphic formulae chan tikil ch’ok taak and chan ch’ok taak, that can be translated as “the four young men” (Bernal 2011: 566, 567). In other Maya cities, however, these kind of studies are difficult since the original position of written monuments has been altered by time. As to the study of directional patterns in portable devices portraying inscriptions, it is worth noticing that their mobile nature seems to have defined the content of their texts, most of them lacking an Initial Series date and, therefore, most of them lacking an Introductory Glyph. The same can be observed in Maya lintels, whose hieroglyphic inscriptions look directly to the ground, not Figure 3. Quirigua Platform 1A-1, showing Stelae E, D, F, C, and A, and Zoomorph B (from to the horizon or to the sky. Though Martin and Grube 2008: 214, modified by the author). further research is needed to assume of the Great Plaza grouping Stelae F, D, E, C, A and Zooa ritual Maya pattern here, I suggest that this tendency in both portable objects and lintels lacking an Initial Series date may morph B, the six monuments studied here. Looper suggests the platform was a dancing space used in ceremonies with a be due to the fact that they were not meant to look towards a route for the priests to follow the stelae, starting with Stela specific cardinal direction where the sun, the moon and the stars’ movement is visible, contrary to stelae, altars, tablets D, continuing with stelae C and A, then with Zoomorph B and finally with stelae F and E (Looper 2003: 182–183). He and panels. In other words, the study of directional patterns in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s texts indicates a direct asso- proposes a specific function in the arrangement of stelae ciation between the orientation of monuments and the cult directly related to ritual practices associated with sacrifice, rain petition and fertility (Looper 2003: 181). Though I do of calendrical gods, offering a possible explanation for the not discuss Looper’s proposal, for the purposes of this article notorious absence of Initial Series dates in both portable it is very important to notice that ritual directional patterns objects and lintels. may have existed in Quirigua. Further below, I will add some directional information not previously discussed.

A Pattern in the Orientation of Six Quirigua Monuments An analysis of monuments F, D, E, C, A and B with their Initial Series indicates a directional pattern where the inscriptions of Quirigua look towards a specific cardinal point according to the event dates they portray (Fig. 3). Both Long Count and Calendar Round dates are associated with the god G9 when the text is looking east. Both Long Count and Calendar Round dates are associated with god G7 when the text is looking west, except in the case of Stela C and for reasons I will explain further below. As it has already been pointed out by Matthew Looper (2003: 179), Quirigua Platform 1A-1 displays a directional pattern with a “uniform east-to-west sequence of monument dedication and text ordering” that may be evoking “the movement of the sun during the day” (Looper 2003: 179). Looper has studied some of the implications for this distribution and orientation of stelae in Quirigua’s Great Plaza, and he considers the possibility of Platform 1A-1 being a ritual space to perform dances. This platform is a space on the north part

K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat ordered the construction of five monuments, four of them with hieroglyphic inscriptions (stelae H, J, S and Altar M) and one without a hieroglyphic text (Altar N). None of these five monuments are studied here, since they are not located on Platform 1A-1 nor do they depict inscriptions in a strict east-to-west order. According to Looper (2003: 88), Stela S, dated in 9.15.15.0.0 9 Ajaw 18 Xul (June 4, AD 746), was found far away from the Great Plaza and the main group, but it is not possible to know its original position. This is the reason why there is no way to identify the original orientation of the glyphic text carved on it. Neither Altar M nor Altar N were discovered in their original position, and the latter does not even have a hieroglyphic text. Therefore, the three monuments S, M and N are not analyzed here. Stela H, dated 9.16.0.0.0 2 Ajaw 13 Sek (May 9, AD 751) depicts a text only to the west, while Stela J, dated 9.16.5.0.0 8 Ajaw 8 Sotz’ (April 12, AD 756), depicts texts to the west, north and south, so that they cannot be analyzed within the east-to-west pattern here explored. It is important, though, to mention that both stelae H and J with their texts oriented to the west depict an Ajaw date associated with G9.

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Regarding the directional pattern in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s monuments, the data recorded in the six monuments, here provided in chronological order, are as follows.

Stela F

Stela F (Fig. 4) has two Long Count dates, one looking east and one looking west. The Long Count date looking east is the dedication date. Dedicated in 9.16.10.0.0 1 Ajaw 3 Sip (March 17, AD 761)1. The patron god for the Haab is Sip (C1–D2). Lord of the Night is G9 (C6), looking east. The stela has another Long Count date describing K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s enthronement in 9.14.13.4.17 12 Kaban 5 K’ayab (January 2, AD 725). The Haab patron goddess is K’ayab (the moon) (A1–B2). No glyph is depicted for the Lord of the Night but its corresponding G-god is G7, looking west. Another date recorded on this west side is 9.15.6.14.6 6 Kimi 4 Sek (May 3, AD 738), the day when Waxaklajuun Ubaah K’awiil from Copán was decapitated. The patron god for the Haab Sek is not visible as it is a Calendar Round. No glyph is depicted for the Lord of the Night but its corresponding G-god is G7, looking west. The east side of Stela F also depicts two (perhaps mythical) dates describing some rituals performed in 1 Ajaw 13 Mol and 1 Ajaw 13 Yaxk’in, respectively. Since these two dates are not depicted in a Long Count style it is not possible to determine the associated G-god.

Stela D

Stela D (Fig. 5) has two Long Counts dates, one looking east and one looking west. The Long Count date looking east is the dedication date. Dedicated in 9.16.15.0.0 7 Ajaw 18 Pop (February 19, AD 766). The patron god for the Haab is Pop (C1–D2). Lord of the Night is G9 (C15), looking east. The west side of the stela has another Long Count date describing some rituals performed by K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat when he completed his second k’atun in power. The date is 9.16.13.4.17 8 Kaban 5 Yaxk’in (June 6, AD 764). The patron god of the Haab is Yaxk’in (A1–B2). Lord of the Night is G7 (A15), looking west. Stela E

Stela E (Fig. 6) has two Long Count dates, one looking east and the other looking west. The

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1 Dates are given in Gregorian calendar, according to the GMT correlation.

b

a

c

Figure 4. Quirigua Stela F: a) East C1-D8; b) West A1-A6; c) West B11-A13. Drawings by Matthew Looper (in Looper 2003: 125-126).

Long Count date looking east is the dedication date. Dedicated in 9.17.0.0.0 13 Ajaw 18 K’umk’u (January 24, AD 771). The patron god of the Haab is K’umk’u (C1–D2). Lord of the Night is G9 (D5), looking east. K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat plants a monument and scatters incense. The west side of the stela has another Long Count date describing the enthronement of K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat. The date is 9.14.13.4.17 12 Kaban 5 K’ayab (January 2, AD 725). The Haab patron goddess is K’ayab (the moon) (A1–B2). No glyph is recorded for the Lord of the Night but its corresponding G-god is G7, looking west. Another date recorded on this west side is 9.15.6.14.6 6 Kimi 4 Sek (May 3, AD 738), the day when Waxaklajuun Ubaah K’awiil from Copán was decapitated. The patron god for the Haab Sek is not visible because it is a Calendar Round. No glyph is depicted for the Lord of the Night but its corresponding G-god is G7, looking west.

Stela C

Stela C (Fig. 7) has two Long Count dates, one looking east and the other looking west. The Long Count date looking east is the creation date for this era. The date is 13.0.0.0.0 4 Ajaw 8 K’umk’u (August 13, 3114 BC). Patron god of the Haab is K’umk’u (A1–B2). No glyph is depicted for the Lord of the Night but its corresponding G-god is G9, looking east. The west side has another Long Count date, perhaps a mythical date, describing a ritual where the ancient ruler Tutum Yohl K’inich plants a stone. The date is 9.1.0.0.0 6 Ajaw 13 Yaxk’in (August 28, AD 455). The Haab patron god is Yaxk’in

A Directional Pattern in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s Stelae at Quiriguá

a

b

Figure 6. Quirigua Stela E: a) East C1-D9; b) West A1-B7. Drawings by Matthew Looper (in Looper 2003: 150, 153).

an independent text but only forms the first part of a whole narrative that is either completed on Stela A (Gutiérrez 2014: 161–178) or even on Zoomorph B (Looper 2003: 158), where the pattern is fulfilled with G9 beng associated with the east. This stela has no date associated with G7.

a

b

Figure 5. Quirigua Stela D: a) East C1-D15; b) West A1-B15. Drawings by Matthew Looper (in Looper 2003: 142, 144).

(C1–D2). No glyph is depicted for the Lord of the Night but its corresponding G-god is G9, looking west. The dedication date for this stela is a third date –not depicted here in a Long Count date, but in a Calendar Round style– looking west. The dedication date is 9.17.5.0.0 6 Ajaw 13 K’ayab (December 29, AD 775) (D11–C12). The patron goddess for the Haab, K’ayab (the moon), is not visible as it is a Calendar Round. No glyph is depicted for the Lord of the Night but its corresponding G-god is G9, looking west. K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat performs some rituals. These two cases seem an exception for the directional pattern studied here, since the G9 Lord of the Night is looking west, not east. However, it is important to mention that Stela C does not bear

The southern and northern base texts of Stela C depict a short narrative recording two dates: 1 Eb 5 Yax (probably 9.17.4.10.12, corresponding to August 3, AD 775, with associated G5), and 9 Ajaw 13 Yax (probably 9.17.4.11.0, August 11, AD 775, with G4 being associated).

Stela A

Stela A (Fig. 8) has two dates, one looking east and the other looking west. Only one date (east) is depicted as a Long Count. It is the dedication date 9.17.5.0.0 6 Ajaw 13 K’ayab, (December 29, AD 775). The Haab patron goddess is K’ayab (the moon) (A1–B2). Lord of the Night is G9 (A6), looking east. The other date, looking west and recorded only in the Calendar Round, is a rare case for Maya calendar notations. A 6 Ajaw is clearly visible in C2, as well as the number 13 for the Haab count in D2, however, the number 13 is followed by a siho’m sign of the four color months with no precise data on the prefix, leaving four possibilities open for this month: 13 ik’siho’m / 13 yaxsiho’m / 13 saksiho’m / 13 chaksiho’m. The

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María Eugenia Gutiérrez González

date is even more difficult to understand when we observe that it derives from a still not well-understood calendrical notation of 19 periods (D1), a notation also present in stelae F (east, C14) and E (east, D12) associated with an Ajaw day. Stela A blocks C1–D1 can be read as tzuhtzjiiy bolon lajun tuun (it was completed the nineteenth tun). Thus, no further analysis can be done on this date concerning the directional pattern studied here. Zoomorph B

Zoomorph B (Fig. 9) consists of eighteen cartouches. The first six cartouches (0–5) constitute the Introductory Series Initial Glyph and the Long Count in full figure glyphs, looking east. The date is 9.17.10.0.0 12 Ajaw 8 Pax (December 2, AD 780). Patron god for the Haab is Pax (0), and the Lord of the Night is G9 (7), looking east. K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat dedicates the monument. Since it is not a stela, it has a very peculiar composition. A human figure, commonly identified as K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat (Looper 2003), is coming out from the mouth of a mythical monster looking south, whereas the full figure hieroglyphic text goes all around the zoomorph forming a long inscription that starts east, and then goes on from the north and ending to the west. This monument depicts one of the few existing examples of god G9 in a full figure carving. His image marks the closure of the east line of the zoomorph and the beginning of the north line. The face of god G9 looks towards the eastern horizon, thus fulfilling the pattern. a

b

Figure 7. Quirigua Stela C: a) East A1-B15; b) West C1-D14. Drawings by Matthew Looper (in Looper 2003: 159, 166).

The Directional Pattern and the Moon Goddess

c

d

a

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b

Figure 8. Quirigua Stelae A, F and E: a) Stela A East A1-B11; b) Stela A West C1-D11; c) Stela F East C14-D14; d) Stela E East D12-D13. Drawings by Matthew Looper (in Looper 2003: 167-168).

The five stelae studied here (F, D, E, C and A, respectively) record K’ayab dates, mostly describing K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s enthronement or dedication dates, with the Moon Goddess as a patron for the Initial Series Introductory Glyph. Stelae F, D, E and C depict the goddess associated with G7 and looking west. The only exception can be observed in Stela A, where the Moon Goddess looks east but, as has been explained already, Stela A is part of the narrative contained in Stela C. I suggest that there is a direct relation between the ruler’s enthronement in a K’ayab month (9.14.13.4.17 12 Kaban 5 K’ayab) and the frequency of the depiction of this goddess in the texts of Quirigua. It should also be noted that the ruler’s date

A Directional Pattern in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s Stelae at Quiriguá

Figure 9. Quirigua Zoomorph B, Initial Series 9.17.10.0.0, 12 Ajaw 8 Pax, G9 ti’ huun (cartouches 1-7 and 11b) and Lunar Series (8-11a) in full figure glyphs. The Moon Goddess is depicted in cartouches 8, 9 and 11a. Drawing by Matthew Looper (in Looper 2003: 175).

of enthronement happens on a Kaban day, which is also related to the moon (Thompson 1960). The number 17, which is directly associated with the Moon Goddess (Thompson 1960), may have been of great significance for Quirigua, particularly for K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat. From the first inscription in the fifth century to the last one in the ninth century, the rulers of Quirigua established

a

a precise record of five year periods or hotun. It is worth noticing, though, that between AD 731 (9.15.0.0.0) and AD 810 (9.19.0.0.0), the monuments of Quirigua display a precise and uninterrupted record of 17 hotun endings. Because these monuments were not only dedicated by K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat but also by his successors, the importance that K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat had for his successors was maintained long after his death (see also Martin and Grube 2008; Looper

b

Figure 10. Quirigua, the Moon Goddess depicted in full figure variants, a) Zoomorph B, cartouche 8 (Photo and drawing by the author, based on Looper 2003: 125); b) Zoomorph P, cuff on feet North West (Photo and drawing by the author).

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María Eugenia Gutiérrez González

2003; Gutiérrez González 2014). The 9.17.0.0.0 celebration marked the exact half of the 17 hotun commemorated between 9.15.0.0.0 and 9.19.0.0.0. It was the ninth hotun of the series.

tun periods or k’atun (7,200 days). The relation is evident in the constant variation of days in the Lunar Series, since they descend regularly such as Tzolk’in numerals ascend regularly within the Long Count advance. As the hotun advances, the moon count looses 1.4 days in a regular pattern, 5.5 days with each k’atun. It is known that the ancient Maya did not count fractions, but I think they may have noticed the regular descending movement of the moon. Although this Long Count advance has been already described, I want to underline the opposite relation between k’atun days and Lunar Series days observable in the following 17 Quirigua examples (Table 1):

There are some data indicating that this 9.17.0.0.0 period may have had a particular importance for K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat. It was commemorated with the dedication of Stela E, the tallest Maya monument known today (10.67 m) (Morley 1935; Looper 2003). The relation between number 17 and the Moon Goddess is notorious again in Stela E. The 17 bak’tun ending coincided with a total new moon night. It is hard to imagine K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat Table 1. Examples demonstarting the opposite trelation between k’atun and Lunar ignoring this coincidence. As already mentioned, Series day records in the inscriptions of Quirigua. this stela not only records the dedication date 9.15.5.0.0 (1 mon: I) 10 Ajaw 8 Ch’en 9.6 days for the moon but also K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s enthrone9.15.10.0.0 (1 mon: F) 3 Ajaw 3 Mol 8.2 days for the moon ment, which is also associated with number 17: 9.15.15.0.0 (1 mon: S) 9 Ajaw 18 Xul 6.8 days for the moon 9.14.13.4.17 12 Kaban 5 K’ayab. 9.16.0.0.0 (1 mon: H)

2 Ajaw 13 Sek

5.5 days for the moon

The Calendar Round for that 17th bak’tun 9.16.5.0.0 (1 mon: J) 8 Ajaw 8 Sotz’ 4.1 days for the moon celebration, 13 Ajaw 18 K’umk’u, may also have 9.16.10.0.0 (1 mon: F) 1 Ajaw 3 Sip 2.7 days for the moon been important for Quirigua’s ritual life, since it 9.16.15.0.0 (1 mon: D) 7 Ajaw 18 Pop 1.4 days for the moon connects an interesting series of liminal elements 9.17.0.0.0 (1 mon: E) 13 Ajaw 18 K’umk’u 0.0 days for the moon in a row: 13 is the top number for the Tzolk’in, 9.17.5.0.0 (2 mons: C, A) 6 Ajaw 13 K’ayab 28.2 days for the moon the Ajaw is its top day, 18 is the top number for the Haab, the K’umk’u is its top month but such 9.17.10.0.0 (1 mon: B) 12 Ajaw 8 Pax 26.8 days for the moon combinations deserve further analysis not to be 9.17.15.0.0 (2 mons: G, O’) 5 Ajaw 3 Muwaan 25.4 days for the moon done here. What I want to suggest is a possible 9.18.0.0.0 (2 mons: O, O’) 11 Ajaw 18 Mak 24.1 days for the moon relation between the abundant depiction of the 9.18.5.0.0 (2 mons: P, P’) 4 Ajaw 13 Kej 22.7 days for the moon Moon Goddess in Quirigua and the coincidence 9.18.10.0.0 (1 mon: I) 10 Ajaw 8 Sak 21.3 days for the moon of important dates related to the number 17 that 9.18.15.0.0 (1 mon: K) 3 Ajaw 3 Yax 20.0 days for the moon is associated with her. Most calendrical records in Quirigua depict a Lunar Series. On Zoomorph 9.19.0.0.0 (1 mon: 1B-1) 9 Ajaw 18 Mol 18.6 days for the moon B, the Lunar Series records one of the few Classic period examples of the goddess being depicted in a full This evident opposite relation between the solar and the figure portrayal within a calendric context. She also can be lunar counts most likely implied a ritual importance for Classeen on Zoomorph P. sic Maya calendar rituals. Though we cannot offer a convincing explanation for the relation between the Moon Goddess and the G7 god associated with the west in Quirigua texts –mainly for an exception we see in Stela A, where the K’ayab glyph is looking east–it can confidently be stated that the Moon Goddess was of great importance for K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat and ritual life in Quirigua’s.

A Comment on a Relation between Solar and Lunar Countings at Quirigua

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The ritual relation between solar and lunar countings can be studied at Quirigua through the analysis of the monuments recording the seventeen continuous hotun period endings: Stela S, Stela H, Stela J, Stela F, Stela D, Stela E, Stela C, Stela A, Zoomorph B, Zoomorph G, Zoomorph O, Altar O’, Zoomorph P, Altar P’, Stela I, Stela K, and texts from Structure 1B-1. In a previous investigation (Gutiérrez González 2008: 98–101) I pointed out that Quirigua’s seventeen uninterrupted celebrations show a clear relation between the passing of days in the Lunar Series and the passing of twenty

Final Comments I suggest that such an important presence of the Moon Goddess in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s life may have led to the ritual arrangement of his stelae at the Great Plaza, particularly at Platform 1A-1 in order to direct the inscriptions towards the line followed by both the sun and the moon, the solar god G9 related to period endings looking east and the god G7 looking west. K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s successors did not direct stelae texts in an east-to-west orientation. They directed texts southwards and northwards, except for Zoomorph G texts, that was mainly dedicated to describe K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s funerary rites, and for some texts on Structure 1B-1. All dates recorded east on the six monuments studied here (F, D, E, C, A and B) are either dedication dates or dates related to the passing of time, associated with G9 and with the exact direction where both the sun and the moon appear. All dates recorded west are related to rituals (some performed during mythical times), most of them concerning K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s enthronement and Waxaklajuun Ubaah K’awiil

A Directional Pattern in K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat’s Stelae at Quiriguá

beheading, associated with G7 and with the exact direction where both the sun and the moon disappear. I mentioned before that Looper (2003) studied a ritual intention in Quirigua’s constructive program, ruled by the ending of periods, and following the solar movement. I agree with the importance of the solar movement but suggest that the lunar movement was also important for K’ahk’ Tiliw Chan Yopaat. The directional pattern here described could be related to the links Looper has found between the cardinal points and the way Quirigua monuments narrate events associated with sacrifice, fertility and rain petition formulae (Looper 2003: 181). In sum, by means of the present investigation I propose that the arrangement of the six monuments studied here was a ritual practice for the cult of the G7 and G9 gods, the Moon Goddess, and maybe the Haab patrons. Further studies of the patron gods depicted in the Introductory Glyphs are necessary, since epigraphic data also suggest a relationship between these Haab patrons and the orientation of stelae at Quirigua.

Montgomery, John 2002 How to Read Maya Hieroglyphs. New York: Hippocrene Books. Morley, Sylvanus G. 1935 Guide Book to the Ruins of Quirigua. Washington: Carnegie Institution of Washington. 1938 The Inscriptions of Peten, Vol. I. Washington: Carnegie Institution of Washington. Stephens, John L. 1993 Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan. New edition by Karl Ackerman. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press. Thompson, J. Eric S. 1960 Maya Hieroglyphic Writing: An Introduction. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.

References Bernal Romero, Guillermo 2011 El señorío de Palenque durante la Era de K’inich Janaahb’ Pakal y K’inich Kan B’ahlam (615–702 d.C.). Unpublished PhD-thesis. México: UNAM. Freidel, David, Linda Schele and Joy Parker 1993 Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman’s Path. New York: William Morrow and Co. Gronemeyer, Sven 2006 Glyphs G and F: Identified as Aspects of the Maize God. Wayeb Notes No. 22. http://www.wayeb.org/notes/wayeb_notes0022. pdf (March 20, 2015) Gutiérrez G., Eugenia 2008 El paso del Katun. La personificación del tiempo entre los mayas del Clásico, Unpublished M.A.-thesis. México: UNAM. 2014 Los dioses y la vida ritual de Quiriguá en sus textos jeroglíficos. México: UNAM. Kettunen, Harri and Christophe Helmke 2011 Introduction to Maya Hieroglyphs. Copenhagen: University of Copenhagen /National Museum of Denmark /Wayeb. Looper, Matthew G. 2003 Lightning Warrior. Maya Art and Kingship at Quirigua. Austin: University of Texas Press. Maudslay, Alfred P. 1886 Explorations in Guatemala and Examination of the newly discovered Indian Ruins [sic] of Quirigua, Tikal, and the Usumacinta; Exploration of the Ruins and Site of Copan, Central America, pp. [185]–204, 568–596. Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society and Monthly Record of Geography. London: W. Clowes. Martin, Simon and Nikolai Grube 2008 Chronicle of the Maya Kings and Queens. 2nd Edition. London: Thames & Hudson.

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El Dios N-Sahbiin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días Guillermo Bernal Romero Centro de Estudios Mayas, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) Abstract This article provides evidence for the existence of a newly discovered Mayan cycle of 63 days, calendrical and astronomical factor in hieroglyphic inscriptions of the Classic period. That cycle was the result of the multiplication of two previously known cycles of 7 and 9 days. In turn, the “Cycle-63” was the essential factor which articulated two higher cycles: 819 days (63 x 13) and 378 days (63 x 6), the latter used to calculate the synodic period of the planet Saturn. In 1950, J. Eric S. Thompson argued that the cycle of 819 days was conceived from the multiplication of three “holy numbers”: 7, 9 and 13, alluding to the number of layers of the earth, the underworld and the sky, respectively. Thompson suggested that this cycle was generated by serial multiplication of the same: 7 x 9 x 13 = 819. It would be reasonable to require that the cycle of 819 days was not made serially, but segmented: 9 x 7 = 63 > 63 x 13 = 819. The “Cycle-63” is a calendrical factor that was needed in order to make sense out of that formula. The hieroglyphic records of the cycle of 63 days are associated with ritual ceremonies generation of fire and, in particular, rites of “fire drilling” (joch’ k’ahk’) dedicated to a deity called God N-Sahbiin. This deity was conceived as the herald or divine personification of the planet Saturn.

Resumen Este trabajo ofrece evidencias sobre la existencia de un nuevo ciclo maya, de 63 días, factor astronómico y calendárico documentado en inscripciones jeroglíficas del periodo Clásico. Ese ciclo fue el resultado de la multiplicación de dos ciclos previamente conocidos, de 7 y 9 días. A su vez, el “Ciclo-63” fue el factor esencial que articuló dos ciclos superiores: de 819 días (63 x 13) y 378 días (63 x 6), este último empleado para calcular el periodo sinódico, canónico, del planeta Saturno. En 1951, J. Eric S. Thompson argumentó que el ciclo de 819 días fue formulado a partir de la multiplicación de tres “números sagrados”: 7, 9 y 13, alusivos al número de estratos de la tierra, el inframundo y el cielo, respectivamente. Thompson sugirió que este ciclo fue generado a partir de la multiplicación seriada de los mismos: 7 x 9 x 13 = 819. Hoy resultaría razonable proponer que el ciclo de 819 días no fue formulado de manera seriada, sino segmentada: 7 x 9 = 63 > 63 x 13 = 819. El “Ciclo-63” es un engrane calendárico que era necesario para que esa fórmula tuviese sentido. Los registros jeroglíficos del ciclo de 63 días están asociados con ceremonias de generación de fuego ritual, en particular con ritos de “taladrado del fuego” (joch’ k’ahk’) dedicados a un numen llamado Dios N-Sahbiin. Esta deidad fue concebida como un heraldo o personificación divina del planeta Saturno.

Durante la primera mitad del siglo XX, los avances sustancia- significado de los textos glíficos asociados con las fechas y les de la epigrafía maya se dieron en el área de los cómputos cómputos: se especulaba, con cierto pesimismo, que el mencalendáricos. Fue en esa época cuando varias generaciones saje contenido en la parte no-calendárica o explicativa de los de brillantes investigadores explicaron la estructura y mecá- textos glíficos era indescifrable. nica de los componentes del calendario, tales como la Cuenta Larga, la Rueda Calendárica, la Serie Lunar y diversos ciclos Sin embargo, en esa misma época surgieron las contribuastronómicos y rituales. En 1950, John Eric Thompson pu- ciones seminales de Yuri Knorozov, Tatiana Proskouriakoff blicó su obra Maya Hieroglyphic Writing: An Introduction y Heinrich Berlin, quienes establecieron los principios del que, como una verdadera summa de los avances de su época, sistema de la escritura maya y su naturaleza histórica, sencompendió los conocimientos vigentes sobre los múltiples tando las bases para el desarrollo ulterior del desciframiento, aspectos y compleja mecánica del calendario y la astronomía mismo que ha registrado un avance notable en los últimos 60 mayas. El propio Thompson había descubierto el ciclo de 9 años. Revitalizada por las nuevas ideas, la epigrafía histórica días o “de los Señores de la Noche” (glifos G/F) y el de 819 maya comenzó la tarea de reconstruir la historia dinástica de días, entre otras notables contribuciones (Thompson 1929, numerosas capitales mayas del periodo Clásico. En pleno 1943). Pero a mediados del siglo XX no se sabía cuál era el proceso de maduración, el desarrollo reciente de la epigrafía

Guillermo Bernal Romero

T64

T64: PAWAAJ?/ XIIW?

T64

SAHBIIN

na

a

SAHBIIN na b

c

SAHBIIN na

d

e

Figura 1. Ejemplos del nombre glífico del Dios N-Sahbiin y la comadreja de cola larga: a) Tablero Este del Edificio 1, Grupo XVI de Palenque, Chiapas (Foto: Guillermo Bernal Romero); b) Tablero Oeste del Edificio 1, Grupo XVI de Palenque, Chiapas (Foto: Guillermo Bernal Romero); c) Dintel 29 de Yaxchilán, Chiapas (Dibujo: Guillermo Bernal Romero, basado en un dibujo de Ian Graham); d) Columna 1 de Ek’ Balam (Dibujo: Guillermo Bernal Romero, a partir de un dibujo de Alfonso Lacadena); e) Comadreja de cola larga, Mustela frenata (Foto: Rick Derevan).

maya la ha llevado al estudio lingüístico y filológico de los textos jeroglíficos. Este innovador desarrollo puede caracterizarse como una fase inédita de la disciplina, la de la “epigrafía lingüística”. A pesar de dicho logro, esta nueva época de desarrollo relegó en cierto grado la discusión sobre la naturaleza de los cómputos calendáricos y astronómicos mayas. Por alguna razón, la “vieja epigrafía calendárica” y la “nueva epigrafía histórica y lingüística” se distanciaron, aunque sin llegar al divorcio. Notable excepción fue una contribución de los investigadores japoneses Yoshiho Yasugi y Kenji Saito, quienes a principio de los 90’s dieron a conocer su identificación del ciclo de 7 días (Yasugi y Saito 1991). Con las ventajas que otorga el desarrollo de la epigrafía histórica y lingüística, este trabajo retorna a la línea de investigación calendárica y astronómica. Ofrece el descubrimiento de un nuevo factor, el de 63 días, mismo que engrana con los ciclos de 7, 9 y 819 días, El ciclo de 63 días está registrado en algunos textos glíficos mayas del periodo Clásico que refieren ritos de carácter ígneo, particularmente de ciertas ceremonias de taladrado de fuego o joch’ k’ahk’.1 De manera adicional, en tres de ellas está involucrado un ciclo de 378 días, la duración del periodo sinódico (canónico) de Saturno. Esos ritos de taladrado de fuego fueron dedicados a un dios cuyo nombre glífico merece un comentario previo (Fig. 1). Por ello, antes de abordar las evidencias e implicaciones de

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1 En 1994, el autor dio a conocer este descubrimiento a través de un breve artículo de seis páginas (Bernal Romero 2014a). Debido a que fue un trabajo de difusión académica, en él solamente ofreció los datos y argumentos básicos, simplificados, sobre la existencia del ciclo de 63 días. La presente contribución proporciona, de manera extensa e integral, un estudio actualizado y detallado sobre el tema.

ese nuevo ciclo calendárico, resulta necesario analizar el misterioso nombre glífico de dicho numen.

El Dios N-Sahbiin El nombre de esta entidad está compuesto por tres elementos glíficos. En uno de los ejemplos, proveniente del Grupo XVI de Palenque (Fig. 1a), el primer glifo muestra un objeto textil, una especie de banda tejida de red o malla, doblada y sujeta por el centro mediante una cuenta circular (hairnet glyph). En el Catálogo de Thompson (1962: 446) este elemento glífico recibe la clave T64. En otro caso (Fig. 1b), el “Glifo de Red-T64” está compactado con el segundo glifo, la cabeza de una comadreja, del que hablaremos después. En el tercer ejemplo (Fig. 1c), T64 precede al glifo de la comadreja, tal como ocurre en el primer caso, pero aquí asume su forma más típica, que es un diseño de malla con un óvalo en su parte central. El cuarto caso (Fig. 1d), muestra tanto la compactación como la separación de los dos glifos. Aunque existe consenso sobre el carácter logográfico de T64, su lectura sigue siendo debatida. En 1994, a través de una carta que dirigió a Linda Schele, David Stuart dio a conocer el desciframiento del nombre glífico del Dios D, portador del valor logográfico ITZAM, lectura sólidamente sustentada que ha cobrado amplia aceptación entre los especialistas (Stuart 1994). Debido a que suele estar asociado o integrado con el logograma ITZAM, dicho autor consideró que T64 forma parte de dicho logograma (Stuart 1994 2007). En su opinión, el “Glifo de Red-T64” no es independiente de la “cabeza glífica” del Dios D, ITZAM, sino parte de ella. Esta propuesta resulta cuestionable, ya que T64 suele formar parte del nombre glífico de una entidad bien diferenciada iconográficamente, el Dios N, mismo que en las fuentes yucatecas coloniales aparentemente recibe el nombre de pauah-

El Dios N-Sahbiin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días

Tabla 1. Un ND- de 1.11 (31 días) relaciona la fecha de Cuenta Larga 9.12.1.0.5* 11 Chikchan 8 Yaxk’in (reconstruida) con la Rueda Calendárica (9.12.0.16.14) 6 Hix 17 Tzek. Tablero Este del Edificio 1 del Grupo XVI, Palenque. *9.12.1.0.5*

ND-

11 Chikchan 8 Yaxk’in 28 de junio de 673 CL reconstruida, RC explícita

1.11 (9.12.0.16.14)

Suceso no determinado. Posiblemente un evento och k’ahk’, “entrada del fuego”, relacionado con la inauguración de templos, entre otros ritos. Número Distancia negativo de 31 días.

6 Hix 17 Tzek 28 de mayo de 673 CL implícita, RC explícita

Joch’ k’ahk’ o taladrado de fuego del dios Pawaaj Sahbiin. Día del ciclo de 7 días: 6Y. Día del ciclo de 9 días o de los “Señores de la Noche”: G1

tun (pawahtun).2 Algunos autores, como Stanley Guenter y N: PAWAAJ?/XIIW?-SAHBIIN-na, pawaaj?/xiiw? sahbiin, Karen Bassie-Sweet (citados por Stuart 2007) piensan que el “Dios N-Comadreja”. “Glifo de Red-T64” se lee PAW o PAWAH, tal como lo han sugerido, desde hace algún tiempo y con algunas variaciones, otros autores.3 El autor de este trabajo considera que T64 proEl Tablero Este del Grupo XVI bablemente es portador del valor logográfico PAWAAJ (?) y que, efectivamente, es independiente del logograma ITZAM. La primera pista sobre la existencia de un ciclo de 63 días en No obstante queda como una posibilidad latente que el “Glifo los textos calendáricos mayas surgió a partir de la reconstrucde Red-T64” exprese el valor XIIW (?), si atendemos a una ción parcial de un tablero de estuco del Edificio 1 del Grupo posible sustitución fonética (xi-wa) registrada en los soportes XVI de Palenque (Fig. 2). Esta tarea fue promovida por la del Trono del Río, en Palenque (Stuart 2007). restauradora Luz de Lourdes Herbert, de la Coordinación Nacional de Conservación del Patrimonio Cultural (INAH), Prosiguiendo con el análisis, el segundo glifo es la cabeza apoyada por el arqueólogo Arnoldo González Cruz, director de un mamífero, que Luís Lopes (2005) ha identificado como del Proyecto Arqueológico Palenque (INAH). Herbert y sus una comadreja de cola larga, Mustela frenata (Fig. 1e), razón colaboradores reconstruyeron parte del marco y, en la esquina por lo cual lo lee como SABIN, “comadreja”. En dicho logo- superior izquierda de éste, ubicaron confiablemente el cartugrama, un achurado recorre parte de la nariz y el ojo de ese cho del Dios N-Sahbiin (Luz de Lourdes Herbert, comunianimal, lo cual señala una mancha oscura, un rasgo caracterís- cación personal, abril de 2014). A partir de la colocación de tico de la comadreja de cola larga, que por tal razón también este cartucho el autor comenzó a probar arreglos, secuencias suele ser llamada “comadreja de cuatro ojos”. El tercer glifo y ubicaciones de los demás cartuchos. Como resultado de este es el fonograma na, que opera como complemento fonético trabajo de conjunto de restauración y epigrafía, el tablero fue del logograma SABIN, lo cual es una buena indicación de reconstruido en más de un 50%.4 que la lectura de Lopes es esencialmente correcta. La inscripción del tablero ha perdido los cartuchos del En su reconstrucción de la lengua proto-maya, Terrence Glifo Introductor de la Serie Inicial (GISI) y de la Cuenta Kaufman reconstruye el término *saqbiin, “comadreja”, y Larga (CL), pero la conservación de la Rueda Calendárica en proto-ch’ol, *sahbin (Kaufman 2003: 572). En ch’ortí (RC) 11 Chikchan 8 Yaxk’in y del glifo G5 del ciclo novemoderno documenta sajbin y en yucateco, sahbin. La pre- nario de los “Señores de la Noche” permitieron reconstruirla sencia del complemento na indica que el logograma posee confiablemente como *9.12.1.0.5* 11 Chikchan 8 Yaxk’in, una vocal larga, en tanto que las cognadas cholanas señalan 28 de junio de 673 (los asteriscos marcan elementos glíficos la existencia de una consonante interna o , razón por reconstruidos) (Fig. 3). Después de los cómputos de la serie lo cual preferimos transliterarlo como SAHBIIN. En suma, lunar y del ciclo de 819 días, la inscripción refiere que 31 días proponemos que el cartucho expresa un advocación del Dios antes de la fecha de Cuenta Larga, en (9.12.0.16.14) 6 Hix 17 Tzek, 28 de mayo de 673, “había sido taladrado el fuego del Dios N-Sahbiin”.5 Por las razones que veremos adelante, 2 En documentos de la Santa Inquisición, el autor ha resulta muy importante señalar que tal fecha coincide con 6Y, documentado cultos agrícolas yucatecos del siglo XVII que o sexto día del ciclo de 7 días, y con G1, el primero del ciclo atestiguan ciertas pervivencias de ceremonias dedicadas a de 9 días o de “los Señores de la Noche” (Tabla 1).

los pawahtuno’ob de los cuatro rumbos: Chak Pawahtun, K’an Pawahtun, Ek’ Pawahtun y Sak Pawahtun, entidades que eran significadas a través de cuentas de piedras semipreciosas (los “tunes”). El sacerdote llevaba los tunes dentro de una “senadera” (bolsa de red) que llamaban paboh (pawoj) (Bernal Romero 1994). Barrera Vásquez (1980) ofrece las entradas paw y pawo’ para “bolsa o talega de red”. 3 La lectura pauahtun del nombre glífico del Dios N fue inicialmente propuesta por Michael Coe (1973). La identidad, atributos y aspectos iconográficos del Dios N han sido tratados por Karl A. Taube (1989).

4 El autor agradece a la epigrafista Sara Isabel García Juárez su apoyo durante esta actividad. 5 Nikolai Grube (2000) fue el primer investigador que reconoció la existencia de registros de ritos relacionados con el fuego, insertos en series iniciales mayas, uno de los cuales es el de taladrado de fuego. De manera genérica, Grube les llamó “ritos de la Secuencia del Fuego”.

69

Guillermo Bernal Romero

70

Figura 2. Reconstrucción parcial del Tablero Este, Edificio 1, del Grupo XVI de Palenque, Chiapas. La sección reconstruida corresponde a la Serie Inicial del monumento. Foto: Guillermo Bernal Romero.

El Dios N-Sahbiin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días

[Glifo Introductor de la Serie Inicial con el patrón de la veintena Yaxk‘in*]

[9 bak’tunes*]

[12 k’atunes*]

[1 tun*]

[0 winales*]

[5 k’ines*]

buluch chan 11 Chikchan 9.12.1.0.5*, 28 junio de 673

ho hul ch’ab Ho’ Hul Ch’ab (G5)

ti’ hu’n (está en) la orilla del códice (Glifo F)

[Glifo E/D, perdido]

k’al naah wuh es la presentación de la primera ... lunación

.. nal Glifo X

ch’ok k’aba’a es el nombre infantil

jun winaak lajun de los 30 (días de lunación)

waxak[te’] yaxk’in (es el día) 8 Yaxk’in

waklajun [hew] chanlajun winikijiiy habían pasado 16 (días) y 14 winales

wuklajun yax sihom 17 Yax 9.12.0.3.9, 5 de septiembre de 672

jun “muluk” desde el día 1 Muluk wa’lijiiy cuando se colocó

chak sip (el dios) Sip Rojo

... (expresión glífica no decifrada que alude una advocación del dios K’awiil)

.. k’awiil

un elk’in en el 1-Oriente

buluch [hew] jun winikijiiy habían pasado 11 (días) y 1 winal (31 días)

jo[h]ch’jiiy esde que había sido taladrado

u k’ahk el fuego del

pawaaj sahbiin (el dios) Pawaaj Sahbiin

wak hix (en) el día 6 Hix

uklajun kasew 17 Tsek (9.12.0.16.14, 28 de mayo de 673)

Figura 3. Lectura de la inscripción glífica del Tablero Este del Grupo XVI. Reconstrucción de la Cuenta Larga *9.12.1.0.5*, correspondiente con el Glifo G5 y la Rueda Calendárica 11 Chikchan 8 Yaxk’in, (28 de junio de 673). Un Número Distancia negativo de 11 días y 1 winal (31 días) parte de esta fecha y llega a 9.12.0.16.14 6 Hix 17 Tzek, 28 de mayo de 673, cuando “fue taladrado el fuego” del Dios N-Sahbiin. Los asteriscos (*) marcan elementos reconstruidos. Foto: Guillermo Bernal Romero.

71

Guillermo Bernal Romero

Tabla 2. Un ND- de 6 días relaciona la fecha de Cuenta Larga 9.13.17.12.10 8 Ok 13 Yax con la fecha de CL/RC (implícita) 9.13.17.12.4 2 K’an 7 Yax. Dintel 29 de Yaxchilán. 9.13.17.12.10

ND-

8 Ook 13 Yax 23 de agosto de 709 CL y RC explícitas.

Nacimiento de Yaxuun Bahlam, Sagrado Gobernante de Yaxchilán.

(2 K’an 7 Yax) 17 de agosto de 709 CL y RC implícitas.

Taladrado de fuego para el dios Pawaaj Sahbiin. Día del ciclo de 7 días: 6Y. Día del ciclo de 9 días o de los “Señores de la Noche”: G1

.6 (9.13.17.12.4)

Tabla 3. El intervalo de 1.16.13.10 (13,230 días) que separa las fechas (9.13.17.12.4) 2 K’an 7 Yax y (9.12.0.16.14) 6 Hix 17 Tzek equivale 210 ciclos de 63 días. Ese lapso también es igual a 35 ciclos de 378 días (periodo sinódico de Saturno) Monumento

Cuenta Larga

Rueda Calendárica, fecha juliana

Ciclo-9 días

Yaxchilán, Dintel 29

(9.13.17.12.4)

(2 K’an 7 Yax) 17 /ago./709

6Y

G1

Palenque, Tablero Este del Grupo XVI

(9.12.0.16.14)

6 Hix 17 Tzek 28 /may./ 673

6Y

G1

Lapso/diferencia entre fechas

= 1.16.13.10

= 13,230 días = 210 ciclos de 63 días = 35 ciclos de 378 días (378 días = 1 periodo sinódico de Saturno)

= 1,890 ciclos de 7 días

= 1,470 ciclos de 9 días

El registro de un rito joch’ k’ahk’ en el Dintel 29 de Yaxchilán La Serie Inicial (SI) de este monumento muestra la fecha 9.13.17.12.10 8 Ook (13 Yax), 23 de agosto de 709 (Fig. 4). Después de los glifos G7/F está registrado el ciclo de 7 días (5Y) y la serie lunar. La inscripción añade que 6 días antes6 “había sido taladrado el fuego del Dios N-Sahbiin”, en la fecha implícita 9.13.17.12.4 2 K’an 7 Yax (17 de agosto de 709). Una vez más, la realización de este joch’ k’ahk’ dedicado al dios comadreja coincidió con 6Y y G1, tal como se observa en la Tabla 2. Las fechas de los ritos joch’ k’ahk’ documentados en los monumentos de Palenque y Yaxchilán coinciden con 6Y y G1, lo cual implica que el lapso temporal existente entre ellas es un múltiplo perfecto de 63 días (9 x 7 = 63). Y en efecto, la Tabla 3 demuestra que el intervalo entre ambas es de 13,230

72

Ciclo-7 días

6 Este número distancia negativo está escrito a través de la expresión 6-WAY-ji-ya, wak wayijiiy, “habían pasado 6 días con sus noches”. El logograma WAY “día con su noche” es poco habitual en las inscripciones, pero, en los casos donde ocurre, opera confiablemente con ese significado. Por ejemplo, en la Estela 12 de Piedras Negras se observa la expresión 13-1-WAY-jiya, uxlaju’n ju’n wayijiiy, “habían pasado 13 y 1 [veintena] de días con sus noches”. El valor de este logograma WAY fue propuesto por el autor en un artículo publicado en la revista Arqueología Mexicana (Bernal Romero 2001). El diseño de dicho logograma es un óvalo con tres círculos pequeños, en arreglo triangular, y dividido en dos partes, una de ellas lisa y la otra, achurada. Esta característica señala dos zonas, una de claridad y otra de oscuridad, concepto acorde con su significado: “día con su noche”. Este logograma no debe ser confundido con otros dos que expresan términos semejantes: WAY, “abismo”, “cavidad subterránea”, y WAHY, “nahual”, “coesencia animal”. El diseño de estos últimos es muy diferente.

días, equivalente a 210 ciclos exactos de 63 días, y, de manera aún más notable, de 35 ciclos de 378 días, duración del periodo sinódico (canónico) de Saturno. La lectura del texto glífico del Dintel 29 continúa en el Dintel 30, donde está registrada la estación del ciclo de 819 días y la fecha haab 13 Yax, así como el acontecimiento principal de la Serie Inicial: el nacimiento del gobernante Yaxuun Bahlam.

El rito de taladrado de fuego del Panel 2 de Laxtunich La escena del Panel 2 de Laxtunich (Fig. 5) muestra a Itzam Bahlam Chelew Chan K’inich, gobernante de Yaxchilán (hijo y heredero directo de Yaxuun Bahlam), quien taladra el fuego sobre una especie de palangana. Le acompaña un dignatario llamado K’uh[ul?] U Kan (o Ik’ K’uh U Kan). El texto glífico refiere esa acción ritual e identifica a ambos personajes (Fig. 6). Itzam Bahlam es aludido mediante su título favorito: [u] cha[’]n taj mo’, “El Guardián (o Captor) del señor Taj Mo’. El suceso ocurrió en (9.16.18.0.19) 1 Kawak 2 Woh 18 de febrero de 769. La fecha de este joch k’ahk’ vuelve a resultar muy relevante, ya que coincide con 6Y y G1. Ello predice que los intervalos entre este acontecimiento y los joch’ k’ahk’ de Yaxchilán y Palenque necesariamente se deben constituir como múltiplos de 63 días. El intervalo entre las fechas joch’ k’ahk’ del Panel 2 de Laxtunich y del Dintel 29 de Yaxchilán es de 21,735 días, equivalente a 345 ciclos de 63 días y 57.5 de 378. El intervalo entre las fechas de taladrado de fuego del Panel 2 de Laxtunich y el Tablero Este del Grupo XVI de Palenque es de 21,735 días, equivalente a 555 ciclos de 63 días y 92.5 ciclos de 378 (Tabla 4).

El Dios N-Sahbiin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días

[Glifo Introductor de la Serie Inicial con el patrón de la veintena Yax]

huxlajun winikhaab 13 k’atunes

bolon pik (son) 9 bak’tunes

wuklajun haab 17 tunes

lajcha’ winik 12 winales

lajun k’in 10 k’ines

waxak ook en el día 8 ook (9.13.17.12.10 8 Ook 13 Yax, 23 de agosto de 709)

wuklajun haab 17 tunes

ho bixiiy habían pasado 5 días

... Glifo Y. Evento del dios K’awiil (día 5Y del ciclo de 7 días)

holajunijiiy habían pasado 15 días

huliiy desde que había llegado (la luna)

k‘al u ho ... wuh es la presentación de la quinta lunación

Glifo X

k’aba’a es el nombre infantil

jun winaak lajun de los 30 días (de la lunación)

wak wayjijiiy habían pasados 6 dias con sus noches

joch’ijiiy desde que fue taladrado

u k’ahk’il el fuego del

pawaaj sahbiin (dios) Pawaaj Sahbiin (en 9.13.17.12.4 2 K’an 7 Yax, 17 de agosto de 709)

Figura 4. Inscripción del Dintel 29 de Yaxchilán. La Serie Inicial registra la fecha 9.13.17.12.10 8 Ook (13 Yax), 23 de agosto de 709. Seis días antes, en la fecha implícita 9.13.17.12.4 2 K’an 7 Yax, 17 de agosto de 709, se realizó un rito de taladrado de fuego en honor del Dios N-Sahbiin. Dibujo: Ian Graham, modificado por el autor.

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Guillermo Bernal Romero

Figura 5. La escena del Panel 2 de Laxtunich muestra a Itzam Bahlam Chelew Chan K’inich taladrando el fuego dentro de un recipiente. Le acompaña el señor K’uhul U Kan, “Nahualista Principal” (baah wahyib), quien sostiene un cartucho glífico ch’ab ak’ab, “creación (en la) oscuridad”, expresión relacionada con la invocación o conjuro de entidades sobrenaturales. Ambos se encuentran sobre un mascarón de la entidad Sak Baak Naah Chapaat, “Ciempiés de la Casa de los Huesos Blancos”. Dibujo: Peter Mathews.

74

jun “kawak” (en el) 1 Kawak

cha[te’] ik’at 2 Woh (9.16.18.0.19 18 de febrero de 769)

jo[h]ch’aj es taladrado

k’ahk’ el fuego

u kabijiiy así lo mandó

...

[u] cha’n taj mo’ el captor de Taj(al) Mo’

k’uh[ul] pa’chan ajaw sagrado gobernante de Pa’chan (Yaxchilán)

yitaaj en compañía de

k‘uh[ul] u kan (señor) K’uhul U Kan

baah wahyib Nahualista Principal (título)

ch’ok el joven

saja(l) Sajal

matwi[il] Matwiil

Figura 6. El texto glífico del Panel 2 de Laxtunich refiere que el rito de taladrado de fuego fue ordenado por el gobernante de Yaxchilán U Cha’n Taj Mo’ (Itzam Bahlam Chelew Chan K’inich). Esta ceremonia ocurrió exactamente en una estación del ciclo de 63 días: 9.16.18.0.19 1 Kawak 2 Woh. Dibujo: Peter Mathews, modificado por el autor.

El Dios N-Sahbiin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días

Tabla 4. El intervalo de 4.17.2.5 (34,965 días) que separa las fechas (9.16.18.0.19) 1 Kawak 2 Woh y (9.12.0.16.14) 6 Hix 17 Tzek equivale 555 ciclos de 63 días. Ese lapso también es igual a 92.5 ciclos de 378 días (periodo sinódico de Saturno). Monumento

Cuenta Larga

RuedaCalendárica, fecha juliana

Ciclo-7 días

Ciclo-9 días

Laxtunich, Panel 2

(9.16.18.0.19)

1 Kawak 2 Woh 18/feb./769

6Y

G1

Palenque, Tablero Este del Grupo XVI

(9.12.0.16.14)

6 Hix 17 Tzek 28 /may./ 673

6Y

G1

Lapso/diferencia entre fechas

= 4.17.2.5

= 34,965 días = 555 ciclos de 63 días = 92.5 ciclos de 378 días

= 4,995 ciclos de 7 días

= 3,885 ciclos de 9 días

Tabla 5. El intervalo de 1.8.3.3 (10143 días) que separa las fechas (9.13.9.1.17) 9 Kaban 0 Woh y (9.12.0.16.14) 6 Hix 17 Tzek equivale a 161 ciclos de 63 días. Monumento

Cuenta Larga

Rueda Calendárica, fecha juliana

Ciclo-7 días

Ciclo-9 días

Motul de San José, Estela 1

9.13.9.1.17

9 Kaban 0 Woh 5/mar./701

6Y

G1

Palenque, Tablero Este del Grupo XVI

(9.12.0.16.14)

6 Hix 17 Tzek 28 /may./ 673

6Y

G1

Lapso/diferencia entre fechas

= 1.8.3.3

= 10,143 días = 161 ciclos de 63 días

= 1,449 ciclos de 7 días

= 1,127 ciclos de 9 días

Presencia del “Factor-63” en la Estela 1 de Motul de San José

El “Ciclo-63” en textos de la región de Chichén Itzá

El ciclo de 63 días también está relacionado con el rito tihl k’ahk’, “prender o encender la lumbre”, otro evento de la Secuencia de Fuego (Fig. 7). El caso se encuentra en la Estela 1 de Motul de San José, cuya Serie Inicial muestra la fecha 9.13.9.1.17 9 Kaban 0 Woh (5 de marzo de 701), con G1 o primer “Señor de la Noche” (Fig. 7). El texto asienta que ese día ocurrió “el encendido del fuego (tihl k’ahk’) de una deidad llamada Yax Xib Chaahk. La realización de este rito en 9.13.9.1.17 vuelve a ser relevante pues esta fecha coincide con 6Y y G1. Ello indica que entre él y los anteriores registros de taladrado de fuego existen lapsos temporales que son múltiplos exactos y solidarios del “factor-63”. La Tabla 5 demuestra la existencia del “Ciclo-63” entre las fechas de la Estela 1 de Motul de San José y el Tablero Este de Palenque.

A finales del periodo Clásico y en el norte de Yucatán, parece haber una variación de 1 día en la celebración de ceremonias de fuego. Ello con respecto a las estaciones esperadas del “Ciclo-63”, en términos de la secuencia establecida en las tierras bajas centrales. Un registro de la Casa Colorada de Chichén Itzá refiere dos ceremonias de taladrado de fuego dedicadas a sendas deidades locales (Fig. 8), y de invocación o conjuro de otra. Estos ritos ocurrieron en 10.2.0.1.9 6 Muluk 12 Mak (11 de septiembre 869), un día después de la estación del ciclo de 63 días 10.2.0.1.8 5 Lamat 11 Mak (10 de septiembre de 869). Por su parte, el Dintel 1 de Yula registra un rito de fuego que ocurrió en 10.2.4.8.4 8 K’an 2 Pohp (3 de enero de 874), un día después de la “estación-63” 10.2.4.8.3 7 Ak’bal 1 Pohp 1 (2 de enero de 874). Aun considerando esa variación, obviamente ese factor está implícito en el intervalo de tales fechas (Tabla 6).

Aunque aquí hemos dado eminencia al registro de la Secuencia de Fuego de la Estela 1, cabe señalar que el suceso principal de 9.13.9.1.17 9 Kaban 0 Woh (5 de marzo de 701) fue la entronización de un soberano llamado Yejte’ K’inich, como Sagrado Gobernante de Ik’ (Motul de San José). La actividad ritual de generar fuego en ese día es importante, pues revela que, al menos en algunos sitios, se producía como parte de las actividades de investidura de los jerarcas.

El “Ciclo-63” en inscripciones de Ek’ Balam - El Mural del Cuarto 22 de la Acrópolis El ciclo de 63 días fue significativo en Ek’ Balam, Yucatán. En el Mural del Cuarto 22 de la Acrópolis está registrada una ceremonia relacionada con el fuego (¿taladrado?) que ocurrió “en una “casa” (ti otoot) (Fig. 9). Alfonso Lacadena (2003) ha establecido que sucedió en (9.17.12.16.14) 13 Hix 7 K’ank’in,

Tabla 6. Las ceremonias de fuego asociadas con las fechas 10.2.4.8.4 8 K’an 2 Pohp y 10.2.0.1.9 6 Muluk 12 Mak están separadas por un intervalo de 4.6.15 (1,575 días), mismo que equivale a 25 ciclos de 63 días. Monumento

Cuenta Larga

Rueda Calendárica, fecha juliana

Yula, Dintel 1

10.2.4.8.4

8 K’an 2 Pohp (3 de enero de 874)

Chichén Itzá, Banda Jeroglífica de la Casa Colorada

10.2.0.1.9

6 Muluk 12 Mak (11 de septiembre 869)

Lapso/diferencia entre fechas

= 4.6.15

= 1,575 días = 25 ciclos de 63 días

75

Guillermo Bernal Romero

[GISI: deidad patrona de la veintena Pohp]

9-PIK bolon pik

13-WINIKHAAB uxlajun winikhaab

9-HAAB bolon haab

1-WINIK jun winik

17-K’IN wuklajun k’in

CH’AM-ma-9-[K’UH] ch’am bolon [k’uh]

TI’-HU’N-na ti’ hu’n

TIHL-K’AHK’ tihl k’ahk’

YAX-XIB yax xib

CHAAK-ki chaa[h]k

CHUM-mu-IHK’-AT chum ihk’at

9-KAB bolon kab

ti-JOY-ja ti jo[h]yaj

ti-a-AJAW-wa-le2 ti ajawlel

ye-TE’ ye[j]te’

K’INICH-ni-chi k’inich

K’UH-AJAW*-wa k’uh[ul] ajaw*

Figura 7. Estela 1 de Motul de San José (fragmento). Registra “el encendido del fuego” (tihl k’ahk’) del dios Yax Xib Chaahk en 9.13.9.1.17 9 Kaban 0 Woh (5 de marzo de 701), una estación del ciclo-63. Dibujo: Guillermo Bernal Romero.

ch’o

u

K’ABA’

jo

k’a

a

bi

k’a

K’UH

ya

76

k’a

u

ki

u

Figura 8. La Banda Jeroglífica de la Casa Colorada registra ceremonias de taladrado de fuego dedicadas a dos dioses, ocurridas en 10.2.0.1.9 6 Muluk 12 Mak (11 de septiembre de 869). Este detalle muestra el registro del joch’ k’ahk’ consagrado a uno de ellos, cuyo nombre no ha sido descifrado. Dibujo: Nikolai Grube, modificado por el autor.

El Dios N-Sahbiin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días

Tabla 7. La ceremonia ígnea de la fecha (9.17.12.16.14) 13 Hix 7 K’ank’in ocurrió 3.15.4.10 (27,090 días) después del rito de taladrado de fuego de (9.13.17.12.4) 2 K’an 7 Yax. El lapso equivale a 430 ciclos exactos de 63 días. Monumento

Cuenta Larga

Rueda Calendárica, fecha juliana

Ciclo-7 días

Ciclo-9 días

Ek’ Balam, Mural del Cuarto 22

(9.17.12.16.14)

13 Hix 7 K’ank’in, 18/oct./ 783

6Y

G1

Yaxchilán, Dintel 29

(9.13.17.12.4)

(2 K’an 7 Yax) 17 /ago./709

6Y

G1

Lapso/diferencia entre fechas

= 3.15.4.10

= 27,090 días = 430 ciclos de 63 días

= 3,870 ciclos de 7 días

= 3,010 ciclos de 9 días

18 de octubre de 783, fecha que al coincidir con 6Y y G1 se constituye como otra estación de ese ciclo. El intervalo que existe con respecto al registro del Dintel 29 de Yaxchilán muestra la presencia del “Factor-63” (Tabla 7).

La Columna 1 de Ek’ Balam Otro caso interesante es el de la Columna 1 de Ek’ Balam (Fig. 10). Según Lacadena (2003: 22–23), el monumento despliega una SI cuya Cuenta Larga corresponde al final del bak’tun décimo: 10.0.0.0.0 7 Ajaw 18 Sip (11 de marzo de 830). El suceso principal fue la colocación de la propia columna, llamada sak ahk baahil tuun, “la Imagen de piedra del galápago” (Lacadena 2003: 23). Después de la Serie Lunar se presenta el registro del rito de taladrado de fuego, formado por la expresión joch’ool k’ahk’, seguido por el nombre del Dios N-Sahbiin. Lacadena propone que la forma verbal joch’ool muestra el sufijo –VV₁l (-ool), marca de participio presente, razón por la cual la traduce como “está taladrado”. Así, tal expresión significa “está taladrado el fuego del Dios N-Sahbiin”. El suceso ocurrió en la fecha 10.0.0.0.0 7 Ajaw 18 Sip, pero la estación esperada del “Ciclo-63” ocurrió el día siguiente, en 10.0.0.0.1 8 Imix 19 Sip (12 de marzo de 830). La peculiar expresión “está taladrado el fuego” parece advertir que el rito joch’ k’ahk’ se realizó con un día de antelación. Es muy probable que la dinastía de Ek’ Balam decidiese hacerlo así para magnificar la ceremonia de final de bak’tun, periodo de 144,000 días que pocas ciudades mayas del periodo Clásico tuvieron la oportunidad de celebrar. Una estación del “Ciclo-63” nunca coincide con un final de bak’tun, pero sí es factible que sitúe un día después, aunque ello solamente puede ocurrir cada 7 bak’tunes (1,008,000 días), es decir, una vez cada 2,759.8 años solares. La dinastía de Ek’ Balam reconoció la importancia de tan feliz circunstancia y por ello adelantó por un día el taladrado de fuego del Dios N-Sahbiin, haciéndolo coincidir con la celebración del final de bak’tun.

13*-HIIX

7-UNIIW-wa

#-ja-K’AHK’

No obstante, puede haber una explicación más sencilla y natural: Guido Krempel (comunicación personal, febrero de 2017) me ha hecho notar que la ceremonia de taladrado de fuego posiblemente se realizó en la noche, justo en la transición del día 7 Ajaw 18 Sip (el final de bak’tun) al 8 Imix 19 Sip (la estación del “Ciclo-63”), razón por la cual ese desfase sólo puede ser aparente.

La Estela 1 de Ek’ Balam Por su parte, la Estela 1 de Ek’ Balam no registra un joch’ k’ahk’ dedicado al Dios N-Sahbiin, sino un “sahumerio” realizado “con el fuego” de esa deidad (Fig. 11). Es posible inferir que ese “fuego” fue taladrado en una estación del ciclo de 63 días. La Cuenta Larga/Rueda Calendárica de la Estela 1 se puede reconstruir confiablemente como 10.0.10.0.0 6 Ajaw 8 Pohp, 18 de enero de 840. De acuerdo con el cómputo lunar, la lunación vigente comenzó 13 días antes, en la fecha implícita 10.0.9.17.7 6 Manik’ 0 Wayeb, 5 de enero de 840. Fue una ocasión memorable, ya que el inicio de la lunación coincidió con el de los ritos y penitencias de los cinco días “aciagos” del wayeb. El pasaje relativo a la Secuencia del Fuego se encuentra después de la Serie Lunar. El primer glifo de la secuencia está muy deteriorado, pero Lacadena (2003) lo ha identificado como el “Glifo de vasija invertida con signo de Kib”, del que hay ejemplos bien preservados en otros textos de Ek’ Balam. Tal glifo es un alógrafo o variante caligráfica del “Glifo de Cántaro Invertido con bandas cruzadas”, que, de acuerdo con una propuesta previa del autor de este trabajo, es portador del valor logográfico PUL, “sahumar”, “incensar”. Lacadena ha asumido que el “Glifo de vasija invertida con signo de Kib” tiene dicho valor logográfico. Debajo del logograma PUL se encuentra el glifo silábico -li. La combinación PUL-li forma la expresión pulil, “sahumerio”. Después se presenta la expresión u k’ahk’ y, por último, un glifo erosionado, que Lacadena reconstruye como el nombre de la

ti-OTOOT-ti

AJ/a-1?-#-#-#

AJ/a-AJAW?-#

Figura 9. Mural del Cuarto 22 de la Acrópolis, Ek’ Balam; detalle de pasaje glífico. Registra una ceremonia relacionada con fuego que ocurrió en la estación-63 (9.17.12.16.14) 13 Hix 7 K’ank’in, 18 de octubre de 783. Dibujo: Guillermo Bernal Romero, a partir de un dibujo de Alfonso Lacadena.

77

Guillermo Bernal Romero

Tabla 8. Reconstrucción de efemérides calendáricas y astronómicas de la Estela 1 de Ek’ Balam. 10.0.9.17.7

6 Manik’ 0 Wayeb (5 de enero de 840) Fecha implícita.

Primer día de lunación. Primera jornada de los “cinco días aciagos” del wayeb.

10.0.9.17.12*

11 Eb 0 Pohp* (10 de enero de 840). (*) Fecha inferida.

Día de año nuevo y estación del ciclo de 63 días. Rito de taladrado de fuego para el dios Pawaaj Sahbiin**. Día del ciclo de 7 días: 6Y. Día del ciclo de 9 días o de los “Señores de la Noche”: G1 (**) Acontecimiento inferido.

10.0.10.0.0

6 Ajaw 8 Pohp (18 de enero de 840)

Fecha explícita. Final de laju’ntuun o medio k’atun. Realización de sahumerios “con el fuego del dios Pawaaj Sahbiin”. Dedicación de la Estela 1 de Ek’ Balam.

Tabla 9. Cómputo de la Columna A de la Tabla de los Intervalos, Estructura 10K-2, Xultún. Ciclos rituales y astronómicos involucrados. Datos seleccionados de Saturno, Stuart, Aveni y Rossi (2012: 716, Tabla 1), con modificaciones por parte del autor.

Columna A de la Tabla de los Intervalos, Estructura 10K-2, Xultún Día tzolk’in

1 [Kaban] *

Intervalo

8 [bak’tunes] 6 [k’atunes] 1 [tun] 9 [winales] 0 [k’ines]

Número total de días del intervalo:

8.6.1.9.0 = 1,195,740 días

Ciclos tzolk’in, de 260 días:

4,599

Ciclos haab, de 365 días:

3,276

Ruedas Calendáricas (RC’s), de 18,980 días:

63

Años computados (AC’s), de 364 días:

3,285

Periodos canónicos de Venus (PCV’s) de 584 días:

2,047.5

Ciclos de 5 Periodos canónicos de Venus (5PCV’s) de 2,920 días:

409.5

Ciclos de 2,340 días:

511

Largo de la Tabla de Venus, de 37,960 días:

31+1 RC

Periodos canónicos de Marte (PCM’s), de 780 días:

1,533

Ciclos de 56,940 días:

21

Largo de la Tabla de Eclipses, de 11,960 días:

100–1 tzolk’in

Ciclos de 819 días:

11,960 *

Ciclos de 9 días o “de los Señores de la Noche”:

132,860 **

Ciclos de 7 días:

170,820 **

Ciclos de 63 días

18,980 **

(*) Datos tomados de MacLeod y Kinsman 2012. (**) Datos tomados de Bernal Romero 2014b.

jo-ch’o-li

78

PAWAAJ?/XIIW?-SAHBIIN-na

9-AJAW

13-CHAK-AT

WA’-la-ja

u-SAK-AHK-ba-li-TUUN-ni

u-ki-si-4-le-ku TAL-lo-AJAW

Figura 10. Columna 1 de Ek’ Balam, detalle de la inscripción. Registra que en el final de bak’tun 10.0.0.0.0 7 Ajaw 18 Sip (11 de marzo de 830) fue taladrado el fuego de la entidad Dios N-Sahbiin. Ese mismo día el gobernante local Ukit Kan Le’k dispuso la erección de la columna, llamada u sak ahk baahil tuun, “la imagen de piedra del galápago”. Dibujo: Guillermo Bernal Romero, a partir de un dibujo de Alfonso Lacadena.

El Dios N-Sahbiin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días

[GISI: deidad patrona de la veintena Pohp]

10-PIK*

MIH-WINIKHAAB*

0-HAAB*

MIH*-WINIK*

MIH-K’IN*-ni*

6*-AJAW*

TI’-HU’N-na

13-HUL-li*-ya*

K’AL-3-#-WUH*

Glifo X

u*-K’ABA’*

PUL*-li

#-#-# Dios N-Sahbiin*

1*-WINAAK*-10

u-K’AHK’

8-#-# 8 Pohp

Figura 11. Estela 1 de Ek’ Balam. Registro de la ceremonia de final de periodo 10.0.10.0.0 6 Ajaw 8 Pohp, 18 de enero de 840. Dibujo: Guillermo Bernal Romero, a partir de un dibujo de Alfonso Lacadena.

entidad que nosotros llamamos Dios N-Sahbiin. Así, el texto señala que en 10.0.10.0.0 6 Ajaw 8 Pohp ocurrió “el sahumerio del fuego del Dios N-Sahbiin” (pulil u k’ahk’ pawaaj?/ xiiw? sahbiin). Sin mayores dudas, señala que los sahumerios implementados en la celebración del final de laju’ntuun 10.0.10.0.0 6 Ajaw 8 Pohp se realizaron con “el fuego” del dios comadreja. Sin embargo, cabe preguntarse: ¿cuándo fue taladrado ese fuego? En nuestra opinión, ello debió ocurrir 8 días antes, en la fecha 10.0.9.17.12 11 Eb 0 Pohp (10 de enero de 840), estación del ciclo de 63 días que coincidió con un día de Año Nuevo. Resulta razonable inferir que ese día

se realizó el habitual taladrado del 1 Kaban fuego del Dios N-Sahbiin, mismo que coinci8 [bak’tunes] dió con la costumbre anual de sacar “lumbre 6 [k’atunes] nueva” en el primer día 1 [tun] del año (0 Pohp), práctica obliga9 [winales] toria que, tal como lo asevera 0 [k’ines] fray Diego de Landa Figura 12. Cómputo de la Columna A de la Tabla (1978: 90), de los Intervalos, Estructura 10K-2 de Xultún, Gua- realizaban temala. El intervalo de 8 bak’tunes, 6 k’atunes, 1 los yucatetun, 9 winales y 0 k’ines equivale a 1,195,740 días, cos. Es por factor de conmensurabilidad entre los ciclos de RC esta razón y 819 días. Dibujo: David Stuart. que 8 días después, en el final de laju’ntuun 10.0.10.0.0 6 Ajaw 8 Pohp (18 de enero de 840), la dinastía de Ek’ Balam celebró ese final de periodo y la dedicación de la propia Estela 1 con “el sahumerio del fuego del Dios N-Sahbiin”. La Tabla 8 muestra la secuencia de ceremonias inferida en la Estela 1 de Ek’ Balam. Si es correcta la inferencia del rito de joch’ k’ahk’ para el Dios N-Sahbiin en la fecha 10.0.9.17.12 11 Eb 0 Pohp*, ésta no solamente resultaría relevante para establecer un ejemplo adicional del ciclo de 63 días, sino también del ciclo de 378 días, el periodo sinódico de Saturno. Entre ella y la fecha del Dintel 29 de Yaxchilán, (9.13.17.12.4) 2 K’an 7 Yax existe un intervalo de 47,628 días, que equivale exactamente a 756 ciclos de 63 días y 126 ciclos de 378 días. Cabe recordar que entre las fechas de joch’ k’ahk’ registradas en el Dintel 29 y el Tablero Este de Palenque existe un lapso que se constituye como un múltiplo de ciclos de 63 y 378 días. De ello se puede deducir que el intervalo existente entre la fecha inferida de la Estela 1 de Ek’ Balam (10.0.9.17.12 11 Eb 0 Pohp) y la del Tablero Este también debe expresar la presencia de esos factores. Y en efecto, entre 10.0.9.17.12 11 Eb 0 Pohp* y (9.12.0.16.14) 6 Hix 17 Tzek media un lapso de 966 “ciclos-63” y 161 “ciclos-378”. El ciclo de 63 días también esté atestiguado en los murales de Xultún, Guatemala. William Saturno, David Stuart, Anthony Aveni y Franco Rossi (2012) señalan que, en la Tabla de los Intervalos, el lapso de la Columna A, 8 bak’tunes, 6 k’atunes, 1 tun, 9 winales y 0 k’ines (Fig. 12), equivale a 1,195,740 días, cifra que comprende exactamente 4,599 ciclos tzolk’in, 3,276 ciclos haab y 1,533 periodos sinódicos de Marte, entre otros (Tabla 13); hoy podemos añadir que dicho

79

Guillermo Bernal Romero

lapso también abarca exactamente 18,980 ciclos de 63 días.7 Por su parte, Barbara MacLeod y Hutch Kinsman (2012) han hecho notar que esa cifra también contiene justamente 1,460 ciclos de 819 días8 (Tabla 9).

pero resulta sugerente que también contenga ciclos exactos de 378 días (35). Esa misma relación de completamiento de ciclos de 63 y 378 días aplicaría para la fecha-joch’ k’ahk’ inferida de la Estela 1 de Ek’ Balam en relación con las fechas de Yaxchilán y Palenque (tablas 11 y 12, respectivamente).

Conclusiones

Saturno es el planeta más lejano de nuestro sistema solar que puede ser observado a “ojo desnudo” o simple vista. Se aprecia mejor cuando se encuentra en su punto más cercano a la Tierra, o en oposición, cuando alcanza una elongación de 180°, por lo que aparece opuesto al Sol. Al margen de la supuesta validez de la correlación GMT, es muy posible que las fechas (9.12.0.16.14) 6 Hix 17 Tzek y (9.13.17.12.4) 2 K’an 7 Yax hayan marcado estaciones en las que Saturno se hallaba en ese punto de oposición. Esas estaciones mayores o principales habrían sido fijadas después de 6 rondas del “Ciclo-63”, marcando así el día de término y reinicio del periodo sinódico del planeta.9 En las estaciones 6 Hix 17 Tzek y 2 K’an 7 Yax, a la medianoche, debió estar situado en el cenit de la bóveda celeste. En coincidencia con esta eminente posición de Saturno en las alturas celestes, en esas noches debieron realizar las ceremonias de taladrado de fuego para El Dios N-Sahbiin, entidad que muy probablemente representaba a ese astro.10 En Palenque, la ceremonia joch’ k’ahk’ para el Dios N-Sahbiin de (9.12.0.16.14) 6 Hix 17 Tzek posiblemente se realizó en el Edificio 1 del Grupo XVI, lugar de donde proviene el registro del evento. El rito debió ser ejecutado por K’inich Janahb Pakal, el gobernante palencano en turno (cuyo nombre se aprecia en otros cartuchos de la inscripción), acompañado del ajaw-“nahbat” o sacerdote principal del señorío. El Grupo XVI fue un espacio ceremonial y residencial habitado por el grupo sacerdotal-“nahbat” de Palenque y el Edificio 1, su recinto ritual más eminente (Bernal Romero 2009). En Yaxchilán, el joch’ k’ahk’ para el Dios N-Sahbiin de (9.13.17.12.4) 2 K’an 7 Yax quizá se realizó en la Estructura 10, recinto de donde fue colocado el Dintel 29, monumento que registra el acontecimiento. El rito debió ser realizado por Itzam Bahlam, el jerarca que regía en Yaxchilán durante esa época.

En las inscripciones mayas, no todos los ritos de producción de fuego se ajustan a un patrón calendárico, pero la reiteración del “Factor-63” en los casos aquí presentados indica que una parte de ellos estaba regida o normada por él, particularmente de aquellos que se dedicaban al Dios N-Sahbiin. Todo parece indicar que la formulación del “Ciclo-63” fue resultado de la multiplicación de los ciclos inferiores de 7 y 9 días, conmensurándolos. Sin embargo, su mayor utilidad fue la de armonizar ciclos superiores, como el saturnino de 378 días (63 x 6) y el de 819 días (63 x 13). La inserción de los ciclos de 7, 9, 63 y 819 días en la Serie Inicial de los dinteles 29 y 30 de Yaxchilán parece mostrar un interés específico por establecer la articulación de los mismos, por ser simétricos o armónicos. Thompson (1950) planteó que el ciclo de 819 días fue concebido a partir de la multiplicación de tres “cifras sagradas”: 7, 9 y 13, alusivas al número de estratos de la tierra, el inframundo y el cielo, respectivamente. Postuló que dicho ciclo se había generado por la multiplicación serial de las mismas: 7 x 9 x 13 = 819. Sería razonable precisar que el ciclo de 819 días no fue formulado de manera seriada, sino segmentada: 9 x 7 = 63 > 63 x 13 = 819. El “Ciclo-63” es un engrane y factor calendárico maestro que hacía falta para que esa fórmula tuviese sentido. Un aspecto fascinante del ciclo de 63 días es su utilidad para calcular el periodo sinódico de Saturno, cuya duración canónica fue estimada en 378 días, periodo que se constituyó como un múltiplo perfecto del primero (63 x 6 = 378). Así, dado que el “Ciclo-63” divide al “Ciclo-378” en 6 segmentos iguales, resulta posible que se empleara para fijar seis posiciones del planeta sobre el manto celeste. Tal como lo hemos visto en la Tabla 3, el intervalo de 13,230 días entre los ritos del taladrado de fuego del Tablero Este de Palenque y el Dintel 29 de Yaxchilán contiene ciclos cerrados de 63 días (210),

7 Resulta interesante advertir que el intervalo 8.6.1.9.0 (1,195,740) días equivale a 63 ciclos de Rueda Calendárica, cuya duración es de 18980 días (63 x 18980 = 1,195,740). De modo inverso, esa cifra equivale a 18,980 ciclos de 63 días. El carácter “reversible” de la cifra 1,195,740 y sus múltiples propiedades para armonizar otros ciclos fue el resultado una larga y concienzuda formulación.

80

8 El “intervalo 8.6.1.9.0” es un factor de conmensurabilidad entre los ciclos de RC y de 819 días, ya que 1195740 es el lapso que debe transcurrir para que una estación del ciclo-819 se repita con la misma combinación de fechas tzolk’in y haab, es decir, con la misma RC. Es indudable que el “intervalo 8.6.1.9.0” está primariamente relacionado con el ciclo de 819 días (Bernal Romero 2017).

Tal como se ha planteado, el Dios N-Sahbiin fue el heraldo o personificación divina del planeta Saturno. Esa deidad fue un aspecto específico del “Dios Genérico-N”, entidad que, aunque tiene múltiples advocaciones, siempre fue representado como un anciano. En términos de la inmensidad del tiempo mítico, él fue una deidad antiquísima cuya existencia

9 Tal como se ha señalado, el Ciclo-63 es un factor maestro del ciclo de 819 días, que probablemente fue útil para calcular el movimiento de otros cuerpos celestes. Susan Milbrath (1999) y otros autores han propuesto que el ciclo de 819 días fue empleado para calcular los ciclos sinódicos de Saturno (378 días) y Júpiter (399 días). Al menos por lo que toca a Saturno, la evidencia actual sobre el ciclo compuesto de 63/378 días apunta en ese sentido. 10 Un caso interesante es el de la fecha-joch’ k’ahk’ del Panel 1 de Laxtunich, misma que no marca una estación o punto de reinicio del ciclo saturnino de 378 días, sino el punto intermedio o conclusión de la primera mitad de ese periodo: 189 días (equivalentes a 3 ciclos de 63 días).

El Dios N-Sahbiin y Saturno: el ciclo maya de 63 días

se remontaba a una época anterior a la reordenación del cosmos, ocurrida en la fecha Era 13.0.0.0.0 4 Ajaw 8 Kumk’u. Ello explica su aspecto senil. Con características a menudo cambiantes, algunas vasijas pintadas mayas muestran al Dios N como un cortesano del máximo jerarca cósmico que regía el universo en esa época mítica, el Dios L, quien en ocasiones es llamado Pawaaj?/Xiiw? Aat, Uxlaju’n Chan o Tz’am Ajaw, entre otras denominaciones. Como otras deidades que personificaban cuerpos celestes, el “Dios N-Sahbiin-Saturno” fue concebido por los mayas como un numen primordial, un acompañante eterno del Sol. En otras culturas del Mundo Antiguo, ese astro también fue personificado por dioses viejos y primigenios, tales como: el griego Cronos, progenitor de Zeus y deidad del tiempo, o su equivalente romano Saturno, padre de Júpiter, así como el hindú Shani y el hebreo Shabbathai, entre otros. Hoy, El Dios N-Sahbiin se incorpora a este concierto de deidades saturninas, iluminando aspectos insospechados sobre los concepciones míticas y prácticas rituales de los antiguos mayas, estrechamente vinculadas con los cómputos astronómicos y calendáricos que dejaron puntualmente registrados en sus inscripciones jeroglíficas.

Referencias Berlin, Heinrich y David H. Kelley 1961 The 819-Day Count and Color-Direction Symbolism among the Classic Maya. Archaeological Studies in Middle America, pp. 9–20. Middle American Research Institute Publication 26. New Orleans: MARI, Tulane University. Bernal Romero, Guillermo 1994 Uso ritual y simbolismo de algunas piedras sagradas entre los mayas de Yucatán. En: Memorias del Primer Congreso Internacional de Mayistas Vol. III, pp. 445–469. México: Centro de Estudios Mayas, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas, UNAM. 2001 Glifos y representaciones mayas del mundo subterráneo. Arqueología Mexicana 48: 42–47. 2009 El Tablero de K’an Tok: una inscripción glífica del Grupo XVI de Palenque, Chiapas. México: Centro de Estudios Mayas, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas, UNAM. 2014a El Fuego, el Taladro y el Tlacuache: ritos de joch’ k’ahk’ en inscripciones mayas del Periodo Clásico. Arqueología Mexicana 128: 66–71. 2014b L’homme, Le Temps, Les Astres. En: Mayas. Révélation d’un Temps Sans Fin, pp. 38–43. París: Musée du Quai Branly, Les éditions Réunion des Musées Nationaux Grand Palais. 2017 “El Intervalo 08.06.01.09.00”: factor de conmensurabilidad entre el Ciclo de 819 días y la Rueda Calendárica. Reportes de Investigación Epigráfica del Centro de Estudios Mayas, 5. México: Centro de Estudios Mayas, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas, UNAM. https://www.academia. edu/31186480/_El_Intervalo_08.06.01.09.00_factor_de_conmensurabilidad_entre_el_Ciclo_de_819_d%C3%ADas_y_la_ Rueda_Calend%C3%A1rica_2017_?auto=download Coe, Michael 1973 The Maya Scribe and his World. New York: The Grolier Club. Barrera Vásquez, Alfredo (ed.) 1980 Diccionario Maya Cordemex, maya-español, español-maya. Mérida: Ediciones Cordemex.

Grube, Nikolai 2000 Fire Rituals in the Context of Classic Maya Initial Series. En: Pierre R. Colas, Kai Delvendahl, Marcus Kuhnert y Annette Schubart (eds.), The Sacred and the Profane. Architecture and Identity in the Maya Lowlands, pp. 93–109. Acta Mesoamericana vol. 10. Markt Schwaben: Verlag Anton Saurwein. Kaufman, Terrence 2003 A Preliminary Mayan Etymological Dictionary. FAMSI: http:// www.famsi.org/reports/01051/pmed.pdf (diciembre, 16, 2014). Lacadena, Alfonso 2003 El Corpus Glífico de Ek’ Balam, Yucatán, México. Reporte de Investigación, FAMSI: http://www.famsi.org/reports/01057es/ (mayo, 18, 2014). Landa, Diego de 1978 Relación de las cosas de Yucatán. México: Editorial Porrúa. Lopes, Luís 2005 A New Look at the Name Phrase of the “Snake Lady”. Wayeb Notes 19. http://www.wayeb.org/notes/wayeb_notes0019.pdf (agosto 8, 2014). MacLeod, Barbara y Hutch Kinsman 2012 Xultun Number A and the 819-Day Count. Maya Decipherment: http://decipherment.wordpress.com/2012/06/11/xultunnumber-a-and-the-819-day-count/ (mayo 17, 2014). Milbrath, Susan 1999 Star Gods of the Maya. Astronomy in Art, Folklore, and Calendars. Austin: University of Texas Press. Saturno, William A., David Stuart, Anthony F. Aveni y Franco Rossi 2012 Ancient Maya Astronomical Tables from Xultun, Guatemala. Science 336, 714. DOI: 10.1126/science.1221444. Stuart, David 1994 Letter to Linda Schele. Maya Decipherment: https://decipherment.files.wordpress.com/2007/09/itzam-letter-1994.pdf (septiembre 14, 2014). 2007 Old Notes on the Possible ITZAM Sign. Maya Decipherment: https://decipherment.wordpress.com/2007/09/29/old-noteson-the-possible-itzam-sign/ (septiembre 14, 2014). Taube, Karl A. 1989 Ritual Humor in Classic Maya Religion. En: William F. Hanks y Don S. Rice (eds.), Word and Image in Maya Culture: Explorations in Language, Writing, and Representation, pp. 351–382. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. Thompson, John Eric S. 1929 Maya Chronology: Glyph G of the Lunar Series. American Anthropologist 31: 223–231. 1943 Maya Epigraphy: A Cycle of 819 Days. Notes on Middle American Archaeology and Ethnology Vol. 22. Washington: Carnegie Institution of Washington. 1950 Maya Hieroglyphic Writing. An Introduction. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. Yasugi, Yoshiho y Kenji Saito 1991 Glyph Y of the Maya Supplementary Series. Research Reports on Ancient Maya Writing, 34: 1–12. Washington: Center for Maya Research.

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MICROCOSMOS: BODY, GESTURES, SOUNDS AND TERRESTRIAL REFLECTIONS OF THE UPPERWORLD

El anecúmeno dentro del ecúmeno: la cabeza como locus anímico en el cosmos maya del Clásico y sus insignias físicas Érik Velásquez García Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México

Vera Tiesler Facultad de Ciencias Antropológicas Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán

Abstract The Classic period Maya projected cosmic dominions in the human body and its constituents. Using the concept of anecumene/ecumene and the head as proxies, we explore the shifting roles of divine entities and forces, expressed as k’ihn, sak ik’aal, and the logogram T535. Their embodiment in humans explains native conceptions of head countenance, rendered in the native imagery, some of them enhanced artificially during the socialization process, such as infant head modeling and in the sculpting of skin and teeth among youngsters and adults.

Resumen Los mayas del periodo clásico proyectaban los ámbitos del cosmos en el cuerpo humano y sus constituyentes. Usando como puntos de aproximación el concepto de anecúmeno/ecúmeno y la misma cabeza, exploramos los roles cambiantes de las entidades y fuerzas anímicas, expresadas como k’ihn, sak ik’aal y el logograma T535. Su incorporación en los seres humanos explica concepciones nativas del rostro y de la cabeza, representadas en la imaginería indígena. Fueron, de hecho, adecuados artificialmente algunos atributos físicos durante la infancia y socialización de los jóvenes: la cabeza fue modelada, la piel labrada y los dientes mutilados.

Este trabajo se enfila en una serie de estudios mayistas epigráficos, iconográficos, bioarqueológicos, antropológicos y etnográficos, algunos muy recientes, que conciben el cuerpo humano como una combinación de sustancias de naturaleza extremadamente diversa (vid. v. gr. Houston et al. 2006; Velásquez García 2009: 459–634; 2011; 2015; s/f; Duncan y Hofling 2011; Tiesler 2012; 2014; Tiesler et al. 2015). Unas proceden del ámbito sagrado del anecúmeno, pero generalmente habitan dentro de los tejidos del ecúmeno o espacio mundano de las criaturas (vid. López Austin 2015a; 2015b; 2016: 79–80). Posicionado en el intersticio entre ambos dominios espacio-temporales, el cuerpo humano para los mayas

era una amalgama compleja de componentes disímiles que provienen de esas dos mitades del universo, algunas perceptibles a través de los sentidos ordinarios en estado de vigilia, y otras intangibles o casi intangibles, pero todas de naturaleza igualmente material. En el cuerpo, los mayas proyectaban las potencias y niveles cósmicos, por lo cual era una réplica o proyección a escala del universo (Villa Rojas 1995: 188, 190–196). Como afirman Alfonso Villa Rojas (1995: 188) y Pedro Pitarch Ramón (2013: 38), los antiguos evangelizadores, así como los estudiosos modernos de la cultura maya, han

Érik Velásquez García, Vera Tiesler

puesto un interés especial en el tema de las almas, entidades o fuerzas anímicas, así como en sus funciones cognitivas, espirituales, oníricas o psicológicas, por considerar ingenuamente que el resto del cuerpo, compuesto de huesos, carne y otros tejidos que intervienen en las funciones fisiológicas, es una “realidad” supuestamente obvia, objetiva, universal y dada por hecho. No obstante, la idea del cuerpo humano en Mesoamérica difiere radicalmente de nuestra concepción occidental, de origen judeo-cristiano y greco-latino, al grado que incluso es posible que hayan creído en un cuerpo sin órganos funcionales, en el sentido que los entendemos, pues sólo a la totalidad del cuerpo perceptible se le atribuye la capacidad de desempeñar funciones, no a las vísceras por separado (vid. Pitarch Ramón 2013: 50). Para llevar este esquema a un plano ritual y cotidiano, nos centraremos en la “cabeza”, un ancla temática ideal para explorar lo corpóreo entre lo humano y lo divino, sobre todo al considerar que la cosmovisión indígena usaba la testa y en particular la cara como sinónimo del “yo” frente a la sociedad, la cual otorgaba identidad y poder (López Austin 1989; Houston y Stuart 1998; Houston et al. 2006). En las inscripciones mayas existe un término que resulta clave para entender las ideas de esa cultura en torno a la cabeza, b’aahis (Fig. 1a), un referente social que equivale a ‘frente, cara’ o ‘rostro’, aunque por extensión también significa ‘cabeza, cuerpo, imagen, reflejo, retrato’ y posiblemente ‘así mismo’ o ‘apellido’ (Houston y Stuart 1998: 91–92, 95; Houston et al. 2006). La cara encapsulaba esencias anímicas importantes y sus órganos sensoriales contenían los vehículos de la vista, del sonido, del gusto y el olfato, en interacción activa con el mundo extrínseco. De tal forma, la “piel social” de la testa1 se convertía en un poderoso espacio de convergencia y de exhibición, tanto en un plano mundano como en la comunicación con lo divino. Sus componentes anatómicos eran el objeto central de numerosas creencias y prácticas muy arraigadas que en el fondo estaban destinadas a la persona. Debían proteger y estabilizar, alinear y dotar de energía vital, embellecer y decorar, en ocasiones castigar o destruir, en otras distinguir a la persona. Esta última noción, dotada de exclusividad, podía alcanzar la identificación con lo divino en el caso de la nobleza maya del Clásico. Estas y otras nociones guiarán nuestras interrogantes sobre cómo la interacción entre el ecúmeno “orgánico” y el anecúmeno sagrado encaminaba la representación de la fisionomía cefálica maya y, aún mas allá, sus cambios morfológicos artificiales, como decoraciones dentales y modificaciones craneales, rasgos culturales por los que los mayas clásicos son ampliamente reconocidos. Buscaremos las respuestas al contrastar, reflexionar y generalizar sobre diferentes fuentes de información, incluyendo los mismos restos craneanos de aquellos que antiguamente constituían la sociedad, que han sido objeto de estudio regional de muchos años por parte de la segunda autora.

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1 Ese término fue acunado por Terence Turner, cuya obra seminal de corporeidad introduce la noción activa y multi-facetica de la interacción del cuerpo con el mundo extrínseco (Turner 2007: 83–107).

Planteamiento general El cuerpo humano, para los mayas antiguos –y deseamos mostrar que este modelo explicativo es útil específicamente para los del periodo Clásico– era una amalgama de sustancias heterogéneas de origen y características muy diversas, que en última instancia reflejaban la estructura y organización del cosmos. Por una parte constaba de huesos, vísceras y tejidos perceptibles mediante los sentidos ordinarios de la vigilia, pues estaban hechos de materia pesada, aunque lábil y perecedera, sujeta a degradación, envejecimiento y desgaste, perteneciente al ecúmeno, que es la mitad espacio-temporal del universo donde habitan el hombre y las demás criaturas (vid. López Austin y López Luján 2009: 43–50, 163–166; López Austin 2015a; 2015b; 2016: 79–80). Otra parte del cuerpo, en cambio, consistía en sustancias etéreas, airosas, espirituosas, vaporosas y caleidoscópicas que la mayoría de las veces sólo se percibían en estado onírico o de trance. Podían habitar en el interior de las estructuras anatómicas pesadas o lejos de ellas, podían salir y regresar. Incluso podían permear segmentos separados y extensiones fabricadas del cuerpo, tales como el excremento, las uñas cortadas, los nombres personales, la indumentaria, las joyas o las herramientas de trabajo, o residir temporal o permanentemente en los retratos tallados o esculpidos. Este segundo tipo de sustancias corporales han recibido el nombre de entidades y fuerzas anímicas en la tradición académica de algunos distinguidos estudiosos. También se conciben como componentes materiales, pero etéreos o ligeros. Procedían del anecúmeno, que es la mitad espacio-temporal del universo donde habitaban los dioses y ancestros, así como diversas fuerzas numinosas o sagradas cuyo origen precede a la creación del ámbito mundano del ecúmeno, es decir, antes de la Fecha Era (loc. cit.). De acuerdo con Alfredo López Austin (1989, vol. 1: 197– 198), las entidades anímicas se distinguen por tener personalidad, volición y “una conciencia distinta e independiente del ser humano al que pertenecen”. La más importante de ellas es el “alma corazón”, “ánima corazón” o “semilla corazón”, identificada en distintos rincones de Mesoamérica con el espíritu del dios del maíz (López Austin 1994: 119), que en el caso de las inscripciones mayas podría corresponder al sustantivo o’hlis o ‘corazón anímico’, cuya raíz morfémica se escribía mediante el logograma T506, de valor polivalente OL, ‘corazón, centro’ o ‘ánimo’, o WA:J, ‘tamal’ o ‘tortilla’. En la frenología propia de los mayas del Clásico, el pecho o epigastrio era habitado por seres de carácter terrestre o telúrico –las entidades anímicas o’hlis y wahyis–, como se puede desprender de una pléyade de documentos antiguos e informes etnográficos, entre los cuales podemos citar, a manera de ejemplo, la imaginería del nagual K’ahk’ Yo’hl May Chamiiy, ‘Muerte es el Fuego en el Corazón de la Ofrenda’ (Stuart 2005a: 164), quien aparece en el vaso K3924 y que, como han observado Nikolai Grube y Werner Nahm (1994: 706, fig. 39a), emite de su vientre espirales o flamas rojas de fuego, lo que sugiere que los mayas del Clásico ubicaban el sustantivo o’hlis, ‘ánimo, centro, corazón’ o ‘entrada’ en el epigrastrio.

El anecúmeno dentro del ecúmeno. la cabeza como locus anímico en el cosmos maya del Clásico y sus insignias físicas

a

b

c

d

e

Figura 1. a) Forma absoluta del sustantivo B’A:H-si, b’aa[i]s, ‘frente, cabeza, cuerpo’ o ‘imagen’, vaso K1440, dibujo de Marc U. Zender (2004: 201); b) fuerza anímica SAK?-IK’-li, sak ik’[aa]l, ‘hálito de la respiración blanco’, Dintel 27 de Yaxchilán (B2), tomado de Ian Graham y Eric von Euw (1977: 59); c) fuerza anímica T535 (posiblemente leída saak[?], ‘pepita[?]’) en contexto iconográfico, Estela 33 de Naranjo, tomada de Ian Graham (1978: 87); d) cartucho jeroglíficos K’IN-ni, k’in, ‘Sol’, o k’ihn, ‘calor’ o ‘temperamento’, Estela I de Quiriguá (A4b), tomado de J. Eric S. Thompson (1960: fig. 26.56); e) logograma MAM, mam, ‘abuelo, ancestro’ o ‘nieto’, Estela 31 de Tikal (J1), tomado de Christopher Jones y Linton Satterthwaite (1983: fig. 51).

En contraste con las entidades anímicas, las fuerzas anímicas carecen de personalidad y volición. Fueron definidas recientemente por Roberto Martínez González (2007: 154) como elementos no cuantificables ni individualizables, que dotan de vida a las personas sin estar directamente ligadas a funciones cognitivas o intelectuales, y se vinculan con fuentes externas que les permiten regenerarse o renovarse, como son la respiración y el calor. En las inscripciones mayas parecen ser elementos de esta clase el hálito sak ik’aal (Fig. 1b), así como el elemento T533 (Fig. 1c) –aún sin descifrar–, que fueron identificados gracias a las frases de muerte encontradas por Tatiana A. Proskouriakoff (1963: 163), en asociación con el cartucho jeroglífico T76:575, que ahora –gracias al trabajo de Barbara MacLeod (apud Schele y Looper 1996: 41)– podemos leer como k’a’[aa]y o k’a’[a]yi, verbo de movimiento que traducimos como ‘se perdió’ o ‘se acabó’. La propia Proskouriakoff (1963: 163) observó desde el principio que este tipo de pasajes jeroglíficos hacían “referencia a la partida del espíritu”. En lo que atañe al logograma T533, no ha sido posible detectar hasta ahora una substitución silábica segura que ayude a determinar su valor léxico, aunque nos parece factible la idea sugerida por David Stuart –aún inédita–, en el sentido de que pudo haberse leído SA:K, saak, raíz que se encuentra en el núcleo de las palabras saakil o sikil, ‘pepita’ o ‘semilla de calabaza’, atestiguada en distintas lenguas mayances2.

(Villa Rojas 1995: 188–190; Bourdin Rivero 2007: 115–117; 2014: 71, 97; Chávez Guzmán 2013: 88–92), mientras que los yucatecos modernos lo conciben como un fluido que emana de las personas, se recibe a través de la fontanela y se puede transmitir con las manos (Hirose López 2008: 88, 115–116); la razón de que se reciba a través de la mollera o fontanela obedece a que para los jmeenes esta parte de la cabeza es un centro receptor de las fuerzas solar y de las Pléyades, mismas que descienden hasta la columna vertebral (ibídem: 158). Por su parte, entre los tzeltales de Yajalón el k’ajk’al es una especie de calor o luz que impulsa las acciones de las personas y se asocia con la violencia y los estados irascibles (Sánchez Carrillo 2008: 49). Mientras que entre los cakchiqueles antiguos el natub’ era una fuerza derivada del Sol que no sólo parece haber tenido las facultades de percibir o sentir, sino que conllevaba cierto grado de conciencia (Hill II y Fischer 1999: 319–320) por lo cual, a diferencia del k’íinam y del k’ajk’al, presenta rasgos más nítidos de entidad anímica.

Es probable que el k’ihn o ‘calor’ (Fig. 1d) pudiera comportarse en el Clásico como una fuerza anímica, pero no tenemos datos muy claros al respecto, toda vez que no resulta nítido si se pensaba que este elemento desempeñaba funciones intelectuales o tenía volición. Como dato comparativo podemos mencionar que entre los mayas yucatecos coloniales el k’íinam, ‘temperamento’ o ‘fuerza del Sol’, alude a la “causa recia y fuerte” que impulsa a un individuo a comportarse de un modo determinado, misma que se manifiesta con ferocidad y bravura, provocando en los demás temor y respeto

Ahora bien, la cavidad craneana, el cabello y el nombre personal eran propiamente los centros anímicos3 donde se concentraba mayormente la fuerza anímica k’ihn, de origen solar y cualidad caliente (Wichmann 2004: 80–81). Eran portales de tránsito, de salida y entrada de componentes anímicos (vid. Velásquez García 2009: 240–242, 244). Es preciso aclarar que

2 David S. Stuart, comunicación personal a Érik Velásquez García (24 de julio de 2015). Los argumentos completos de esta propuesta, así como las implicaciones tan productivas que tiene para entender la cosmovisión maya, se encuentran explicados con lujo de detalle en un libro recientemente entregado a publicación (Velásquez García ).

Finalmente, resulta de ayuda el concepto genérico de componente anímico, usado por Martínez González (2011: 29) “para designar de manera genérica a los elementos de cualquiera de estas clases”: entidades o fuerzas.

La cabeza como locus anímico

3 El concepto de entidad anímica, empero, carece de sentido si no se le complementa con el de centro anímico, que según la definición clásica de López Austin (1989, vol. 1: 197) puede enunciarse como “la parte del organismo humano en la que se supone existe una concentración de fuerzas anímicas, de sustancias vitales, y en la que se generan los impulsos básicos de dirección de los procesos que dan vida y movimiento al organismo y permiten la realización de las funciones psíquicas […] estos centros […] pueden corresponder o no a un órgano particular, pueden ser singulares o plurales dentro de cada organismo.”

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Érik Velásquez García, Vera Tiesler

si bien puede decirse que ciertas entidades o fuerzas anímicas se concentran en determinadas partes del cuerpo (centros anímicos), ello no afirma que su presencia se restrinja a esas áreas anatómicas. En realidad parecen abarcar toda la geografía humana, distribuyéndose a través del flujo sanguíneo, la red neuronal y la respiración pulmonar, sin concentrarse en una sola parte, sino a menudo en más de una4. De este modo, el k’ihn o ‘calor’ no se acentuaba solamente en la frente o en alguna de las fontanelas, sino también permeaba el cabello, y más abajo, las muñecas, manos y uñas (Bourdin Rivero 2007: 116; Hirose López 2008: 87, 115), como también el pecho (Chávez Guzmán 2013: 116). Inclusive la ropa y hasta los objetos personales podían cargarse de k’ihn o calor (Hirose López 2008: 87). Eso podría explicar el por qué muchos grupos mayas se apropiaban de los mechones de cabellos de cautivos sacrificiales, o podían incurrir en grandes esfuerzos para enterrar a los difuntos junto con sus pertenencias personales, incluyendo las uñas y el cabello que habían crecido durante toda su vida (Houston et al. 2006: 25–26). En este esquema, los orificios del cráneo como la boca, las fosas nasales y las fontanelas deben haberse concebido como cuevas o puertas liminares entre el ecúmeno y el anecúmeno. Los números del cosmos y del calendario se manifiestan en el cuerpo humano también mediante la imagen de una montaña sagrada con siete cuevas: “dos cuencas oculares, dos fosas nasales, la boca, el ano y el ombligo”, a los cuales se podrían sumar “los meatos auditivos externos, las dos axilas, el meato urinario y la fontanela o mollera”, para dar lugar a trece cuevas (López Austin 2004: 34). Una versión diferente, hallada entre los mayas yucatecos, utiliza el número nueve como patrón: dos ojos, dos oídos, dos fosas nasales, una boca, una uretra y un ano, si bien otros jmeenes manejaron la versión de diez orificios corporales: dos ojos, dos fosas nasales, una boca, dos orificios auditivos, la mollera, el corazón y el ombligo (Hirose López 2008: 103, n. 9). A estas definiciones quizá podríamos agregar un elemento distintivo del periodo Clásico maya, que consiste en que algunas partes del cuerpo –incluyendo al parecer las entidades anímicas– son partes íntimas e inalienables del cuerpo cuyo estado habitual es estar acompañadas por pronombres posesivos, añadiendo el sufijo –is en estado absoluto. Dicho sufijo fue asociado por Marc U. Zender (2004: 200–204) con el gramema –is de las lenguas pocomameanas, que se añade a partes inalienables del cuerpo cuando no se hallan acompañadas por pronombres posesivos, y aún se encuentra presente en pocomán y pocomchí durante los siglos XVII (Morán y Zúñiga 1991: 8) y XXI (Mó Isém 2006: 71–73, 293). Romelia Mó Isém añade la importante observación de que en pocomchí occidental el sufijo –is no sólo se aplica a ciertas partes del cuerpo, sino a la ropa y a las enfermedades que no se pueden poseer mediante pronombres, así como a acciones y sustantivos que se relacionan con las emociones. Alfonso Lacadena García-Gallo (2010: 4, nota 2) sospecha que dicho sufijo o su equivalente occidental –al, señala tam-

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Figura 2. Signo T535 provisto de volutas bifurcadas de aliento, que se externa del cuerpo humano por medio de una de las fontanelas; Monumento 74 de Toniná, tomado de Ian Graham y Peter Mathews (1996: 107).

4 Para referencias etnográficas, véase, por ejemplo, Groark (2005: 134) y Houston (2009: 336).

El anecúmeno dentro del ecúmeno. la cabeza como locus anímico en el cosmos maya del Clásico y sus insignias físicas

a

b

c

Figura 3. Ejemplos de antropónimos mayas que comienzan con el adjetivo k’ihnich, ‘caliente, airado, bravo, colérico’ o ‘furioso’: a) K’ihnich Yahx K’uk’ Mo’; Altar Q de Copán (B5), dibujo de Linda Schele, tomado de Elizabeth A. Newsome (2001: 44); b) K’ihnich B’aaknal Chaahk; Panel 1 de Toniná (A3); tomado de David S. Stuart (2013); c) K’ihnich Kan B’ahlam II, alfarda este del Templo de la Cruz de Palenque (I1), tomada de Linda Schele y Peter L. Mathews (1979: fig. 272).

bién que se trata de partes del cuerpo que, en estado de salud, se encuentran sujetas a voluntad del ser humano. En particular para los mayas del Clásico, la evidencia epigráfica sustenta que los componentes somáticos sak ik’aal, ‘respiración blanca’ (Fig. 1b), saak(?), ‘pepita[?]’ (Fig. 1c) y k’ihn, ‘calor’ o ‘temperamento’ (Fig. 1d) pertenecen a otra categoría de partes del cuerpo, que no necesitan los sufijos –is o –al en estado absoluto y que, plausiblemente5, no estaban sujetas a la voluntad consciente del ser humano. Aunque este patrón morfológico sugiere que las entidades anímicas (o’hlis y wahyis) eran partes inalienables del cuerpo, mientras que sak ik’aal, saak(?) y k’ihn, al no pertenecer a esta categoría, eran concebidas en consecuencia como simples fuerzas anímicas, no podemos por ahora afirmar esta correlación entre cosmovisión y gramática, puesto que en realidad carecemos de evidencia interna en las imágenes o inscripciones del Clásico como para asegurar que estas últimas partes del cuerpo fueran impersonales y, por ende, carentes de capacidades intelectuales, agenciales o volitivas, rasgos definitorios de las entidades anímicas. Por todo lo anterior podría afirmarse que la cabeza humana era el asiento físico donde transitaban, entraban, salían y posiblemente se concentraban los componentes anímicos procedentes de la región celeste, luminosa y cálida del anecúmeno, mientras que el pecho, el hígado o el epigastrio eran centros anímicos susceptibles de albergar potencias ctónicas, nocturnas, húmedas, terrestres o frías originadas en los ámbitos telúricos. Aunque es preciso decir que esta afirmación no debe entenderse en sentido absoluto, pues es plausible –como vimos– que el k’ihn también se pueda concentrar en el tórax6, mientras que el componente vegetal T533, que remite

5 De tener razón la conjetura de Alfonso Lacadena García-Gallo (2010: 4, nota 2). 6 Un nagual muy conocido en el arte maya prehispánico es K’ihn Tahnal K’ewel (Grube y Nahm 1994: 687), que nosotros traducimos como ‘Piel de Pecho Caliente’, y que Alejandro Sheseña Hernández (2010: 28) intuitivamente traduce como ‘Jaguar Iracundo’, dado que k’ihn es ‘calor’ o ‘ira’. Su imagen en el vaso K533 o M.2006.41 de Los Angeles County Museum of Art representa justo un felino con el signo K’IN cubriéndole el pecho y el abdomen.

Figura 4. Ejemplo de una típica expresión de la edad o cuenta de los k’atuunes, en este caso 4-WINIKHA:B’-AJAW, chan winikhaab’ ajaw, ‘señor de cuatro k’atuunes’; Escalón IV de la Escalera Jeroglífica 3 de Yaxchilán (A6b), tomado de Ian Graham (1982: 170).

a las semillas –quizá de calabaza– y contiene hojas tiernas de maíz, aparece con gran insistencia sobre la cabeza de los seres plasmados en la imaginería maya (Fig. 2), aparentemente en eje con alguna de las fontanelas.

El k’ihn calor Similar al concepto toonalli de los nahuas, que era considerado una entidad anímica calorífica de origen solar, responsable del destino, del vigor y de la vitalidad del ser humano (vid. López Austin 1989, vol. I: 223–252; McKeever Furst 1995: 15, 75–81), varios grupos mayas creen en la existencia de una fuerza o cualidad que procede del Sol, a la cual ya nos hemos referido antes, cuando expusimos la dificultad de saber si en el caso maya podríamos considerarla como una entidad o tan sólo como una fuerza anímica. Aunque todos los humanos nacen con ella, se acumula o intensifica con el avance de la edad o la adquisición de cargos públicos. Cada individuo absorbe durante su vida la cantidad que necesita de esa fuerza, que otorga carácter, respeto, autoridad, vigor e incluso salud (vid. Guiteras Holmes 1965: 248–249; Gossen 1989: 60–67; Villa Rojas 1995: 188–190; Álvarez Lomelí 1997: 35–36; Hill II y Fischer 1999: 319–320; Wichmann 2004: 77–82; Bourdin Rivero 2007: 115–117; 2014: 71, 97; Hirose López 2008: 86–87, 90, 115–116, 147, 158; Sánchez Carrillo 2008: 49; Velásquez García 2009: 543–552; 2011: 244; s/f; Chávez Guzmán 2013: 88–92; etcétera). En este mismo orden de ideas, quizá por ello diversos gobernantes mayas del periodo Clásico anteponían a sus nombres el adjetivo k’ihnich, ‘airado, bravo, caliente, colérico’ o ‘furioso’ (Fig. 3), vocablo que se compone del sustantivo k’ihn, ‘calor, temperamento’ o ‘ira’, más el sufijo –ich, que lo convierte en adjetivo (Wichmann 2004: 80–81; Velásquez García 2009: 543–552; 2011: 244; 2015: 186–187; s/f) 7. Se trata de una cualidad que en las inscripciones es exclusiva y

El desciframento del logograma T832 es obra de Marc U. Zender, Dmitri Beliaev y Albert Davletshin (2016: 47–51). Agradecemos a Guido Krempel (19 de febrero de 2017) por haberse dado cuenta que debíamos actualizar esta nota, tomando en cuenta la reciente publicación de Zender, Beliaev y Davletshin. 7 Alfonso Lacadena García-Gallo, comunicación personal a Érik Velásquez García (4 de julio de 2007); Lacadena García-Gallo (2010: 12).

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distintiva de los soberanos mayas. Como dicha fuerza se acrecentaba por medio de la edad biológica y de los cargos que se iban ocupando, los gobernantes mayas también añadieron a sus nombres la cuenta de los k’atuunes (Fig. 4) que habían vivido (Velásquez García loc. cit.). Teniendo en cuenta que el promedio de vida que alcanzaban los mayas del periodo Clásico ‒aun entre los miembros de la nobleza‒ rara vez entraba a la segunda mitad del centenar, algunos mandatarios longevos llegaron a distinguirse a sí mismos tanto con el adjetivo k’ihnich integrado en el antropónimo, como con el calificativo de k’uhul ajawtaak, ‘señores sagrados’ (Wichmann 2004: 80–81; Grube 2005: 164–165; Velásquez García loc. cit.). En esta coyuntura, resulta obvio que la cuenta de los k’atuunes acrecentaba el aliento del dios solar, representado en el rostro o en eje directo con la cima de su testa, como parte inherente de sus atributos de dignidad y reconocimiento social. Estos distintivos incluso acompañan a los jerarcas al más allá, como expresan las imágenes e inscripciones que recuerdan al difunto como posible ancestro deificado con atributos solares, justo porque al haber llegado al Paraíso Florido, celeste y solar (vid. Taube, 2004), se encontraba más cerca que nunca de la fuente que alimentaba toda clase de k’ihn o ‘calor’.

Figura 5. La serpiente de nariz torcida en ángulo en 90º, que representa el hálito caliente (k’ihn) del dios solar (K’inich), se coloca sobre la cabeza de algunos personajes de la imaginería maya en eje con una de las fontanelas; Tablero del Templo XIV de Palenque, tomado de Linda Schele y Mary E. Miller (1986: 272).

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El lugar por donde emana y penetra al cuerpo parece ser la mollera o fontanela (ya “seca” o cerrada) y en general la cima de la cabeza, tal como se representa en los retratos mayas del Clásico (Fig. 5). De ahí se comunica hasta el corazón y el vientre a través de la columna vertebral (Hirose López 2008: 88, 115–116, 158); al llegar al corazón plausiblemente

Figura 6. Diferentes estados de cierre de la fontanela craneana infantil (anterior y posterior), acorde con la edad posparto.

El anecúmeno dentro del ecúmeno. la cabeza como locus anímico en el cosmos maya del Clásico y sus insignias físicas

Figura 7. Escena mítica que muestra varios personajes (representando al Dios del Maíz) con parches de cabello (con el valor simbólico propio de las insignias de esta deidad), cubriendo superficies que pensamos se consideraban vulnerables. Concretamente se trata del área encima de la frente (fontanela anterior “seca”), la cima de la cabeza (fontanela posterior “seca”), y la saliente occipital aplanada. El personaje masculino sentado sobre una gran piedra, quien porta un yelmo o tocado de animal, contiene sobre la parte superior el signo T535 (saak[?] o ‘pepita[?]’) con volutas o espirales de aliento en eje aparente con su fontanela “seca” posterior. Es probable que algo semejante es lo que surja de la fontanela posterior del anciano Itzam Kokaaj? Muut, quien se encuentra sentado sobre un trono, aunque no lo podemos asegurar, pues contiene diseños diferentes; tal vez se trate de una manifestación simplificada del signo T535, pero en vez de las típicas volutas de aire o aliento, lo que emana es un alargado logograma YAX, ‘primero’ (yahx), ‘azul’ o ‘verde’ (ya’x), que quizá califica la fuerza anímica del dios senil como algo de carácter especial; vaso K7727 (fotografía de Justin Kerr), perteneciente al Princeton Art Museum.

permea el resto del cuerpo a través de la sangre bombeada. Con respecto a la acumulación de este componente anímico tras el paso de la edad, conviene advertir que el logograma MAM, ‘abuelo’ o ‘nieto’ (Fig. 1e), representa un anciano que, entre sus rasgos diagnósticos, incluye un mechón de cabello sobre la frente. A este respecto, es justo recordar que muchos grupos mesoamericanos, por ejemplo los tzotziles modernos, piensan que el cabello que crece sobre la cabeza es una parte del “alma”, muy apegada al espíritu y a la vida (Holland 1989: 148). Ello sugiere que una parte de los componentes anímicos se heredaban de los antepasados (mam) a los nietos (mam) usando algún vehículo que justo podría ser el nombre propio, como ocurre en diversos sitios mayas, donde el mismo antropónimo real se repite alternadamente a lo largo de la línea señorial (vid. Martin y Grube 2008). La convención figurativa de sujetar por el cabello a los cautivos de guerra, como se aprecia por ejemplo en el Dintel 1 de Bonampak y en el 8 de Yaxchilán, podría ser un indicio de que ahí se concentraba una fuerza de bravía. Conceptos parecidos se encuentran en maya yucateco, tzeltal colonial y jacalteco moderno, en palabras como k’íinam (Barrera Vásquez 1980: 402; Arzápalo Marín 1995: 425), k’in (Ara 1986: 373) o k’inal (Hecht 1998: 222), que significan ‘fuerza, braveza, ferocidad, temor que uno inspira a los demás, respeto, cosa venerable, reciedumbre, vigor, suerte’ y ‘vida’. Entre los tzeltales de la época virreinal la cabeza era considerada el centro anímico donde se concentraba la autoridad, el coraje, el valor y la nobleza, según afirma Mario Humberto Ruz Sosa (1992: 161).

Ahora bien, como ha demostrado Karl Taube (2003: 428, 431; vid etiam Stuart 2005b: 22–23; Houston et al. 2006: 156), el ‘calor’ k’ihn se representa en la iconografía por medio de una cabeza estilizada de serpiente que surge de las fosas nasales de los mandatarios o de su coronilla (Fig. 5) —en la noción indígena—, la fontanela anterior ya “secada” tras madurarse (Tiesler 2014: 141–145). Se trata de un ofidio de hocico largo y angulado hacia arriba, que al parecer representa el aliento caliente del dios solar. Velásquez García (2009: 545–546; s/f) ha observado que se trata de la misma serpiente que años antes había sido interpretada como sangre (Stuart 1988: 198), y al comparar esta situación con el hecho de que la sangre es el líquido responsable de conservar el calor corporal y difundir la fuerza, el vigor y la salud a todas las partes del cuerpo (Wisdom 1961: 352)8, sugiere que tanto la vieja interpretación iconográfica sobre este ofidio (sangre), como la más reciente (aliento caliente del dios solar), no son tan incompatibles como a primera vista parece. Pensamos que este concepto del calor vital también era objeto de los cuidados en el recién nacido. Poco sabemos todavía sobre las dinámicas entre las fuerzas y entidades anímicas en el caso de los bebés, si bien las ideas mesoamericanas, incluyendo la maya, coinciden en denotar una volatilidad de tal fuerza calorífica, al no haberse anclado ni balanceado propiamente en el cuerpo inerte. La fuerza vital infantil podía huir por las fontanelas aún húmedas (sin osificarse) del 8 Los nahuas pensaban que la fuerza calorífica toonalli era portada en la sangre (McKeever Furst 1995: 106).

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a

b

c

Figura 8. a) Retrato de Janaab’ Pakal de Palenque en perfil, omitiendo la saliente occipital por completo (más allá de ser posible anatómicamente), a la vez que sobrerepresenta rasgos deseables (nariz prominente, cara saliente y hundimiento en la frente); b) muestra los efectos anatómicos reales de la compresión en la dignataria palencana denominada “Reina Roja”, probablemente consorte del gobernante y madre de sus sucesores al trono (con modificación cefálica muy similar a la de Janaab’ Pakal); c) sobrepone los trazos reconstruidos sobre el contorno cefálico de la Reina Roja.

pequeño cráneo por estados intrínsecos o extrínsecos (Fig. 6) (Tiesler 2014: 141) 9. En la práctica cotidiana, estas medidas podían consistir en la protección dentro del hogar, en envolturas y vendajes. Medidas que podían suplantar la manipulación directa de la testa infantil podían consistir en situar al pequeño en la cercanía del fuego, una medida aún practicada entre los lacandones actuales, quienes ponen brasas ardientes debajo del lecho del recién nacido10. Además de las fontanelas, el occipucio ponía en peligro la salud del pequeño; motivo suficiente para cubrirlo con cabello, envolverlo o reducirlo (Fig. 7). Esas últimas medidas formaban parte de las prácticas de modificación cefálicas muy difundidas hasta la Conquista. Aprovechando su plasticidad, se comprimía la cabeza de los recién nacidos ya fuera entre dos planos compresores, vendando la testa con bandas bien ajustadas o masajeándola repetidamente. Francisco López de Gómara (1826, tomo I: 161) afirma todavía sobre los mayas del siglo XVI, que “las parteras hacen que las criaturas no tengan colodrillo, y las madres las tienen echadas en cunas de tal suerte que no les crezca porque se precian sin él”. Viene también al caso recordar que los yucatecos coloniales usaban el término de up’ k’abtah para denotar el acto de enderezar la cabeza del bebé para adaptarlo o componerlo (Barrera Vásquez 1980: 901). Entre otros autores, Calixta Guiteras Holmes (1965), y recientemente Mónica Chávez Guzmán

(2017), infieren un rol pernicioso a la saliente occipital entre diferentes grupos mesoamericanos, al poder obstaculizar el tránsito armónico entre las entidades anímicas. Eso se refleja también en las series craneológicas de Mesoamérica, la mayoría de las que muestra señas de aplanamiento posterior (Tiesler 2014: 185–203). Tampoco es casualidad que las convenciones del retrato prehispánico maya parecen omitir la saliente occipital fisiológica, al parecer una componente anatómica superflua o no deseada. Mientras tanto, los artistas resaltaban otros rasgos cefálicos, más deseables, como son la inclinación de la frente, la saliente nasal y bucal. Esos aparecen desproporcionalmente aumentados de su tamaño, anatómicamente esperado (Fig. 8a-b). En esta dirección va también un testimonio histórico de la frontera mesoamericana del siglo XVI donde se lamenta que los hombres Uacusecha (no-mesoamericanos), con su occipucio redondeado, carecían de las insignias de bravura y fuerza y de valor de los señores de la aristocracia local michoacana (Pereira 1999: 167–168). Regresando a los mayas del Clásico, pensamos por todo lo arriba asentado que la cabeza (b’aahis), el cabello y la(s) mollera(s) o remolino(s) (suuy), deben haber fungido como sitios liminares, donde penetraba el componente anímico k’ihn y donde se acentuaba.

El sak ik’aal o aliento vital 9 Trabajo importante sobre este particular ha sido avanzado, entre otros, por William Duncan y Charles Hoflin (2011), quienes hablan de la necesidad de “techar” a la persona y de sellar la cabeza del bebé.

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10 Don José, comunicación personal a Vera Tiesler (Mensabak, 2013).

A edades infantiles mayores, el papel protector del cabello adquiría importancia, pues era uso entre muchos grupos dejarse crecer de media cabeza para atrás hasta entrando la edad adulta, cubriendo así una superficie anatómica vulnerable. Esto no sólo recuerda la asociación del cabello con un componente calorífico vinculado con la edad (Fig. 1d-e y

El anecúmeno dentro del ecúmeno. la cabeza como locus anímico en el cosmos maya del Clásico y sus insignias físicas

a

b

Figura 9. a) Canino superior incrustado con jadeita obscura, enderezado en su porción incisal y pulido; dinasta cuyos restos se recuperaron de la Estr. II-sub 4a, Calakmul, México; b) compuesta, muestra en vista labial y lingual el incisivo superior central izquierdo de Janaab’ Pakal, Palenque. Muestra una muesca de la esquina lateral (para reproducir el signo de ik’) y brillo.

3), ya mencionado, o la conocida vinculación del hálito serpentiforme del dios solar con el eje de una de las fontanelas secas (Fig. 5), sino la presencia de otra fuerza anímica a la que nos hemos referido antes, identificada mediante el logograma T533, ‘semilla de calabaza’ (Fig. 1c)— que al parecer podía externarse de manera temporal a través de otra de las fontanelas (Fig. 2) y que fue la misma que se perdía de forma definitiva tras la muerte, tal como fue identificado por primera vez en las inscripciones por Tatiana Proskouriakoff (1963: 163). El deceso físico, concebido no como un hecho concreto, sino como un proceso por medio del cual se separan todos los componentes del cuerpo humano, fue también la ocasión en que se perdía el resuello de la respiración, designado en las inscripciones, una vez más, por medio del concepto sak ik’aal (Fig. 1b). Tal como Karl Taube (2005: 30–32) ha observado, el espíritu o aliento vital al que se refieren las inscripciones fúnebres del Clásico –el sak ik’aal y probablemente el T533– era el huelgo que se esperaba capturar a través de cuentas o mosaicos de jadeíta, pues para los mayas ese mineral verdoso se identificaba con el viento y era capaz de inhalar o exhalar aliento o humedad. La fuerza sak ik’aal (Fig. 1b), símbolo del aliento sagrado puro, parece encontrarse en forma de signo ik’ en las mismas incrustaciones dentales de hematita, pirita o jadeíta. Esta última se identificaba con el viento –según Taube (2005)– que a través de un sufijo derivacional -aal se convertía en el sustantivo ik’aal, ‘espíritu’, o sak ik’aal, ‘respiración blanca’ (Lacadena García-Gallo 2010: 4). A este respecto conviene decir que el vaso de ónix K4692 dice expresamente que ese ‘hálito del rostro’11 se perdió al morir el gobernante de Hiix Witz, lo que podría indicar que fue externado por 11 La inscripción de ese vaso contiene en la posición C5 la secuencia silábica u-ti-si, que algunos epigrafistas han interpretado como utis, u-tis, ‘su ventosidad’ o ‘su flatulencia’ (Eberl 2005: 54; Fitzsimmons 2009: 31). No obstante, aquí seguimos las ideas de Lacadena García-Gallo (comunicación personal a Érik Velásquez García, 26 de noviembre de 2008), quien lo analiza como utis, ut-is, ‘cara, ojo’ o ‘rostro’, portando el sufijo –is para partes inalienables del cuerpo.

alguno de los portales naturales que hay en la cabeza entre el ámbito mundano (ecúmeno) y el de lo sagrado (anecúmeno). Y a juzgar por la imagen de un cánido descarnado que se encuentra en una concha sin contexto arqueológico (Houston et al. 2006: 146, fig. 4.7b), dicha cueva o portal quizá no es otra que la boca. En la frenología indígena, la cavidad bucal era portal de la voz y la palabra, lugar anatómico por excelencia para realizar ajustes permanentes y mostrarlos en público. En este intersticio, los dientes, que el mito quiché del Popol Vuh identifica como granos de maíz (Craveri 2013: 37), otorgaban fuerza vital a su portador humano y, además del sonido, canalizaban aromas y el tránsito vital respiratorio ik’ en su paso hacia los pulmones (Groark 2005; Houston et al. 2006). Y en efecto, las dentaduras visibles de la mitad de los adultos mayas del Clásico lucían contornos artificiales, muchos en formas clásicas, invertidas o dobles (maxilo-mandibular) de ik’, atributo del dios solar (Thompson 1960: 133; Tiesler 2000; Tiesler et al. 2017) y símbolo del viento (Thompson 1960: 73, 132–133; Taube 2005). Perforaciones para contener las incrustaciones de jadeíta distinguen a una tercera parte de los individuos con artificios dentales, al lado de piritas pulidas como espejo (Figs. 9a y 9b). Todavía en el siglo XVI, Diego de Landa (1994: 132) afirma sobre los mayas yucatecos: “tenían por costumbre aserrarse los dientes dejándolos como dientes de sierra y esto tenían por galantería y hacían este oficio unas viejas limándolos con ciertas piedras y agua“. Mucho más diversificadas que durante la era del contacto –aserrados mediante limados– se presentan las operaciones dentales durante el Clásico. Es cuando todavía se advierte un abanico muy variado de enderezado, hendiduras y motivos incisos e incrustados en las poblaciones, algunos conteniendo piedras semipreciosas. La entrada a la edad adulta era el momento que propiciaba la mayoría de las intervenciones dentales, sobre todo en el caso de los jóvenes varones, quienes deseaban realizarse incrustaciones. Limados primarios o secundarios podían ocurrir también a edades más avanzadas, al igual que los pulimentos,

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eran, porque “el labrarse era gran tormento.” Entretanto, Laura Caso Barrera (2002: 225, 234–237) afirma que los itzáes, consideraban todavía siglos después del colapso maya, que los motivos tatuados transformaban a las personas en su alter ego o nagual. No dudamos que la noción de valentía y resistencia al dolor haya jugado un papel importante en el acto de inscribir las marcas indelebles de identidad y, en la perspectiva del presente estudio, debe haber promovido la comunicación con lo sagrado a través de los componentes anímicos.

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Ahora, ¿cómo reconciliar esta información dentro de la colectiFigura 10. Limado de la arcada superior e inferior en un individuo adulto femenino del sitio de vidad regional? Tras el análisis de Altar de Sacrificios, Guatemala. Sectores de la dentición frontal quedaron sin oclusión, mostrando nueve centenares de denticio- nes compensación fisiológica subsecuente (Museo Peabody, Universidad de Harvard). frontales de diferentes partes de enderezados o cualquier medida de mantenimiento odon- las Tierras Bajas Mayas, surgen algunas tendencias interesantológico que hemos documentado en las cuantiosas series tes aunque no sean concluyentes. Al parecer, se trata de una esqueléticas del Clásico (Tiesler 2000; Tiesler et al. 2015: práctica diversificada con tintes de distinción, al observar que 7–18). Estas medidas suelen percibirse en la revisión antro- existían edades determinadas para las incrustaciones, que se pológica como una especie de “estética dental”, encaminada efectuaban sobre todo en hombres jóvenes y tendían a ser más a homogeneizar el aspecto de la dentadura, a eliminar frac- elaboradas entre las élites políticas y económicas de las urbes turas dentales o a contrarrestar daños estructurales sufridos y centros de comercio que entre los sectores populares. En durante la intervención original (o durante el uso cotidiano nuestra muestra el abolengo tiende a portar trabajos dentales de la dentición ulterior a la intervención). Los pulimentos de más elaborados, predominando incrustaciones confeccionalas superficies labiales hacían brillar aun más las dentaduras. das de hematita, pirita o jadeíta, combinadas o no con limados Interesa notar que algunas reducciones, más que en un diseño en forma de ik’, atributo del dios solar (Thompson 1960: 133) particular, generaban la pérdida total o parcial de la oclusión y símbolo del viento, el aliento puro (Thompson 1960: 73, frontal, resultando en espacios abiertos entre la arcada maxi- 132–133; Taube 2005). lar y mandibular, aun en estado de cierre (Fig. 10). En la persona viva, esta medida habrá repercutido seguramente no Tal es el caso de K’ihnich Janaab’ Pakal de Palenque, cusolo en la funcionalidad masticatoria como tal, sino también yos incisivos laterales se habían desgastado parejos al igual en el aspecto de la dentición frontal, en el tránsito del aliento que las esquinas de sus centrales, a fin de resaltar la saliente ik’ y la entonación vocal. en medio (Fig. 9b). En conjunto, las modificaciones delinean la forma de “T” en la boca del jerarca, cuyo efecto visual se En otros casos más, resulta evidente que la misma inter- exagera aun más en su máscara de jadeíta. El abolengo de vención dental adquirió un rol prominente, como acto que Calakmul, Dzibanché y Yaxuná, todos centros urbanos al podía causar mucho dolor a quien lo soportaría, por ejemplo este de Palenque, estilaba igualmente formas dentales en ik’ al abrir la cámara pulpal (Tiesler et al. 2015: 10). Tal es el y además incrustaciones de piedras minúsculas confeccionacaso de unos jóvenes de las ciudades de Copán y Dzibanché, das de jadeíta y pirita pulidas (Fig. 9a). Esta modalidad no cuyos lijados frescos resultaron en el momento en la expo- solamente demandaba una considerable cantidad y pericia en sición pulpar colectiva y, como suponemos, de los paquetes las maniobras de perforación e incrustación, sino tenía que vasculares y nervios. Nos preguntamos si las maniobras po- seguir una rutina de mantenimiento de la dentición en los drían haber adquirido una forma de “autosacrificio”. Como años y décadas siguientes. parte de ritos iniciáticos que quizá fueron, invitan a especulaciones sobre el rol del dolor en la trascendencia profana para Como sea, aprendimos que las intervenciones sobre la establecer visiones clarividentes del anecúmeno, tal como lo arcada dental deben haber tenido no sólo relevancia respecto concibe Martha Ilia Nájera Coronado (1987) para este tipo al mismo acto y su resultado visible en los órganos dentales de ritos liminares, para los cuales se preveían dolorosas es- que implicaban, sino, más allá, para el tránsito bucal del sak carificaciones o tatuajes de la piel, o perforaban las mucosas ik’aal por un espacio liminar (Fig. 1b). Así se impregnaba y para insertar narigueras, bezotes u orejeras. Ya fray Diego promovía el flujo del hálito e incluso —en un nivel lingüísde Landa (1994: 116) asentó sobre los mayas yucatecos, que tico— de los fonemas, identificados ambos con el viento se tenían por “más valientes y bravos” cuanto más labrados (véase también la interpretación de Houston et al. 2006).

El anecúmeno dentro del ecúmeno. la cabeza como locus anímico en el cosmos maya del Clásico y sus insignias físicas

Reflexiones finales Hemos revisado en este trabajo algunas de las antiguas concepciones mayas sobre el cuerpo humano, en particular las interacciones entre las materias pesadas y frágiles del ecúmeno y las ligeras pero resistentes del anecúmeno. Ese fue el punto de partida para examinar las formas de representación de las fuerzas y entidades anímicas y sus roles en la adecuación de la fisionomía maya y en particular de la testa, siendo objeto central de las creencias y prácticas destinadas a la persona. Combinando información bioarqueológica con la discursiva, luego hemos puntualizado sobre la manipulación de fuerzas y entidades anímicas en la reproducción y en los mismos efectos visibles de ciertas prácticas culturales que tenían como objeto la cabeza. Concluimos que además de la vitalidad y clarividencia alcanzada durante el rito, estas prácticas eran referentes sociales, aludidos con el término b’aahis, que equivale a ‘frente, cara’ o ‘rostro’ del periodo Clásico (Houston y Stuart 1998). En esta función otorgaban identidad y personalidad al portador, que era mediada por el rostro frente a la sociedad, destinado a ser vista y a interactuar12. Esta interfase de los portales del tránsito, su movimiento propio y sus ajustes artificiales, conferían al individuo un lugar y a la vez un papel dinámico frente a la sociedad y al cosmos indígena. Esta misma noción confiere poder a la “piel social” como espacio de convergencia y de exhibición personal. Las adecuaciones de los tegumentos debían prevenir o proteger, estabilizar o proveer las energías vitales, en ocasiones castigar o destruir, en otras enaltecer a personas destacables. Esta última noción, dotada de exclusividad, servía para enaltecer a la nobleza maya del Clásico para identificarse con lo divino, tal como otras medidas menos invasivas de identificación social (Houston et al. 2006)13. Por último, conviene destacar, una vez más, que las herramientas teóricas proporcionadas por conceptos vinculados con el anecúmeno, centro anímico, componente anímico, cuerpo-presencia, ecúmeno, entidad anímica y fuerza anímica, nos han permitido engranar los datos bioarqueológicos con los elementos de la cosmovisión maya proporcionados por la epigrafía, la iconografía y la lexicografía, aunque enriquecidos por datos tardíos procedentes de la etnografía. Pensamos en este sentido que la fructífera conjunción de estas

12 Sobre este particular, creemos de especial valor el concepto de cuerpo-presencia acuñado por el etnólogo Pedro Pitarch Ramón (2013: 42–47), que entre otras muchas facultades tiene la de poder reconocer a los demás y ser reconocido socialmente. 13 Sabemos, por ejemplo, que los artistas mayas trazaban sobre el tocado de una persona los instrumentos que detentaban su oficio. Christina T. Halperin (2008: 114) ha observado que los artistas mayas representaban sobre el tocado de los personajes diversos instrumentos vinculados con sus oficios, como la fibra enrollada en el huso en el caso de las tejedoras, o los pinceles, códices o tinteros en el de los escribas, debido a que semejantes implementos enfatizaban sus identidades personales, lo cual nos remite de nuevo a la importancia de la cabeza.

lentes de aproximación, propicia muchos nuevos enlaces y puntos de partida para explorar el intersticio del cuerpo y el universo nativo, sobre todo en una esfera cultural como la maya, donde el cuerpo parece un espejo a escala de todas las regiones del cosmos. Reconocimientos

Este trabajo es el producto de una colaboración que ha sido posible gracias al apoyo académico, financiero y logístico de muchas instituciones y colegas. Agradecemos las amenas conversaciones y comentarios que en todo momento hemos recibido de parte de Stephen D. Houston, Karl Taube, Alfonso Lacadena García-Gallo, Alfredo López Austin y David S. Stuart. Alfredo siempre mostró su generosidad inacabable compartiendo todo tipo de materiales, lo mismo que Pedro Pitarch Ramón, quien tuvo la deferencia de obserquierle a Érik un ejemplar de su libro La cara oculta del pliegue, en el mismo instante en que salió de la imprenta. Las muestras ejemplificadas en este trabajo fueron recuperadas o se encuentran en resguardo en el Peabody Museum (Harvard University), la Dirección de Antropología Física (INAH) y el Proyecto Arqueológico Sur de Quintana Roo (INAH). Recibimos financiamiento por el Conacyt Project 152105, Wenner Gren International Collaborative Research Project, UC MEXUS Sabbatical Stipend, UC MEXUS Collaborative Grant, así como por la Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores de México, quien financió el viaje para que el primer autor pudiera presentar una versión preliminar de este trabajo en la ciudad de Bratislava. Agradecemos y reconocemos también a la Dirección General de Asuntos del Personal Académico (DGAPA) de la UNAM por el apoyo brindado a Érik, en el marco de su proyecto colectivo PAPIIT intitulado “Las escrituras jeroglíficas maya y náhuatl: desciframiento, análisis y problemas actuales” (clave IN402213), pues la elaboración de esta ponencia y de su versión in extenso tuvieron lugar durante las vigencia de ese proyecto. Finalmente deseamos expresar nuestra gratitud a Milan Kováč y a todo el equipo que lo asistió en la organización de la 19th European Maya Conference, no sólo por permitirnos presentar este trabajo, sino por su infinita paciencia en esperar la versión in extenso que el lector tiene en sus manos. Bibliografía Álvarez Lomelí, María Cristina 1997 Diccionario etnolingüístico del idioma maya yucateco colonial. Volumen III: aprovechamiento de los recursos naturales. México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México-Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas. Ara, fray Domingo de (editado por Mario Humberto Ruz Sosa) 1986 Vocabulario en lengua tzeltal según el orden de Copanabastla. Fuentes para el Estudio de la Cultura Maya 4. México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México-Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas-Centro de Estudios Mayas. Arzápalo Marín, H. Ramón (ed.) 1995 Calepino de Motul. Diccionario maya-español. México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México-Dirección General de Asuntos del Personal Académico-Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas.

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Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World Amy J. Maitland Gardner Institute of Archaeology, University College London

Abstract The way the Maya perceived space is reflected in many archaeological and epigraphic sources. Yet the ‘body’, the fleshly medium through which space is perceived and from which conceptions of space are projected into the material world, has received limited attention in studies of ancient Maya cosmology. This chapter seeks to address this concern by exploring the ways in which spatial and temporal orientation were communicated through gesture within the framework of Classic Maya iconography. Drawing inspiration from cross-cultural studies of gesture families (Morris et al. 1979; Kendon 2004), recent research in psycholinguistics (Haviland 2000; Le Guen 2012) and contemporary Maya gestural practices (Neuenswander 1981; Fox Tree 2009), I propose that three gestures represented in Classic Maya art encode important information about perceptions of space and time: (1) hands with index finger extended; (2) ring-shape hands (formed by bringing the tips of the index finger and thumb together); (3) pincer hands (formed by extending the forefinger and thumb with a space in between the extended digits). These hand shapes also feature as graphic elements in glyphs that express spatial and temporal information, suggesting that there is a physical and symbolic relationship between their forms and meaning. This chapter will attempt to highlight the significance of hands in the communication of spatial and temporal orientation, and to demonstrate that iconographic gestures are a valuable source for comprehending such perceptions in the ancient Maya world.

Resumen La manera en que los mayas percibían el espacio se refleja en muchas fuentes arqueológicas y epigráficas. Sin embargo, el «cuerpo», el medio carnal mediante el cual se percibe el espacio y desde el cual se proyectan las concepciones del espacio en el mundo material, ha recibido una atención limitada en los estudios de la antigua cosmología maya. Este trabajo intenta considerar estas limitaciones, explorando las formas en que la orientación espacial y temporal se comunicó a través del gesto dentro del marco de la iconografía maya clásica. Dentro de mi trabajo, y basado en estudios interculturales de diferentes familias de gestos (Morris et al., 1979; Kendon 2004), investigaciones recientes en psicolingüística (Haviland 2000; Le Guen 2012), y las prácticas gestuales de los mayas contemporáneas (Neuenswander 1981; Fox Tree 2009), propongo que hay tres gestos representados en el arte maya clásico que codifican información importante sobre las percepciones del espacio y del tiempo: (1) las manos con el dedo índice extendido; (2) manos en forma de anillo (formadas por acercar las puntas del dedo índice y el pulgar); (3) manos de pinza (formadas extendiendo el dedo índice y el pulgar con un espacio entre los dígitos extendidos). Estas formas de mano también se presentan como elementos gráficos en glifos que expresan información espacial y temporal, sugiriendo que hay una relación física y simbólica entre sus formas y su significado. Este trabajo intentará iluminar la implicación de manos para la comunicación de la orientación espacial y temporal, y además propone demostrar que los gestos iconográficos son una fuente importante para comprender tales percepciones en el antiguo mundo maya.

The cosmos –the complex, ordered system of the universe, including both terrestrial and celestial lands and spaces– is encountered through the physicality of human bodily existence. All spaces, immediate and distant, are perceived, com-

prehended, recorded, and mapped through bodily thoughts and actions. Traces of the materialization of cosmological order in ancient Maya culture can be found in astronomical orientation or in the design and layout of the built environ-

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ment. People’s actions in the construction of such spaces and their participation in observing, tracing, and recording the movements of celestial matters illustrate the dynamic interplay of bodies, the cosmos, and the built environment. The body, however, has received limited analytical attention in studies of Maya cosmology. Here, I place the body and its representation at the centre of analysis. My discussion focuses on three gestures –index finger extended hands, ringshape hands, and pincer shape hands– which are represented in three main sources: (1) Classic Maya figural art, (2) Maya hieroglyphic writing, and (3) contemporary Maya gestural practices. I argue that in the Classic period, these gestures encoded important information about space and time in Maya culture and played a critical role in the communication of spatial and temporal information.

Embodied Encounters The body plays a central role in the perception, conception and projection/expression of space and the cosmos as the medium through which the outside world is encountered (Merleau-Ponty 1962). Metaphorical mapping of the body onto celestial objects –including assigning gender to, or personifying, both local and distant phenomena– illustrates the important role of the body in assigning meaning to the external world, with the body’s familiarity allowing one to make parallels or map similarities in distant phenomena. Indeed, Graham (2009: 21) points out that ‘knowing or understanding Maya worldviews entails grappling with the implications of metaphorical understanding’. Through metaphors, people reference the external world through their individual and collective experiences. Distant spaces are mapped onto local ones and explained through the familiarities of immediate surroundings. These encounters, by their very nature, can only happen through the flesh and blood of the human body: being in the world is the only way we can comprehend it. Results in the body become the reference point through which we try to make sense of what we see, hear, and feel around us; indeed, even seeing, hearing, and feeling entails the body. The attribution of experience and character, movement, age, feeling, and temperament to celestial ‘bodies’ and the creation of stories, legends, and myths to tell the origins of the cosmos, including terrestrial and celestial deities, expresses the interplay between what is human (or indeed what is ‘living’) and what is ‘other’. The phenomenon of humanizing the ‘other’ is not only present in Maya culture, as I discuss below, but features in many other cultures as well. For example, amongst English speakers, constellations are anthropomorphised (such as Orion the Hunter) and the planets of the solar system all possess Roman names. Yet, despite the commonality in bodily experiences among humans and parallels in metaphorical mapping or ‘structuring’ of the external world (Lakoff and Johnson 1980), people also perceive and conflate distant spaces with immediate ones, and conceptualise time through bodily expressions and bodily spaces in different ways. Thus our bodies’ centrality in our encounters with the

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cosmos, and indeed how we map, talk about, and present features in our worlds, requires close consideration.

Maya Bodies and the Cosmos Steven Houston (2012) has recently explored the relationship and interplay between terrestrial and heavenly bodies. Houston points out ‘that a correspondence might exist between a celestial body and terrestrial events is hardly strange. Every tide shows this to be so.’ Furthermore, the Maya express interactions between terrestrial and celestial realms in terms of bodies and body movements. Indeed, Houston argues that in the Classic period, Maya scribes transferred the expression for celestial motion, hul, to the arrival of kings and queens. Early examples of this glyph, Glyph D (the compound of which consists of a number followed by a hand with an extended index finger), and which expresses the ‘arrival’ or sighting of the new moon as crescent, include Balakbal Stela 5 and Tikal Stela 40 (Ruppert and Denison 1943: pl. 56a; and photograph by D. Chauche, in Houston 2012). The transference of the lunar ‘arrivals’ to the ‘arrivals’ of royal persons can be found in the text on Naranjo Stela 24, which describes the arrival of a princess from Dos Pilas to the city of Naranjo (see CMHI, in Houston 2012). Houston points out that the merger of such celestial and royal movement establishes an intriguing simile, one that suggests the actions of celestial bodies and human bodies mirror one another (Houston 2012). In English, the words ‘rotation, orbit, procession’ are applied to planetary bodies and royal movements (Elizabeth Graham, pers. comm. 2017). The body’s centrality to the comprehension of the external world may also be evident in the Maya calendars. Molesky-Poz (2006) has suggested that the Tzolk’in, the 260-day lunar cycle, is likely embedded in the human body: the twenty toes and fingers parallel the twenty days of each month and the thirteen major joints of the human body (ankles, knees, hips, shoulders, elbows, wrists, and neck) mark the thirteen numbers. The 260-day Tzolk’in calendar also approximates the length of human gestation, which has been recorded as between 255 and 266 days (Earle and Snow 1985; Aveni 1992 in Milbrath 2000: 2). Among the modern K’iche’, it is believed that a newborn baby has already lived for one Tzolk’in (Miller and Taube 1993: 48, in Normark 2000: 9). The correlation between the lunar cycle and length of gestation has led some scholars to suggest a connection between the moon and pregnancy. Stephen Houston (2012) argues that the impersonation of the Moon Goddess by royal Maya females, records of their bloodletting and giving birth to heirs, in addition to texts which describe their ‘arrival’ to cities in the same terms as the movements of the moon, ‘savors of an overall arc of lunation and cycles of fecundity in females’. Furthermore, Houston notes that hula means menstruo o regla de la mujer in Colonial Yucatec, and that a connection between hul in Classic period writing and hula in Colonial Yucatec is unlikely to be coincidental, given the connection between the arrival of the moon and the woman’s cycle.

Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World

Evidence to suggest the importance of the moon in Maya affairs can be found in the work of Helen Neuenswander (1981). Working in a local hospital with pregnant Cubulco Achi women, Neuenswander found that the women were able to give precise accounts of the progress of their gestation through gestures by reference to the moon, which they call ‘our grandmother’ (Neuenswander 1981, cited in Rice 2007: 39). “What was our grandmother doing when you last saw your month?” “Oh, she was but a child.” “Our grandmother?” “Yes, the moon. She was over there (motioning with palm up and fingers pointed in the direction of the western horizon). She was just coming out, just showing herself. Now, our grandmother is old (hand sweeps across the sky from west to east, with the palm-up position rotating to a palm-down position and with the back of the hand exposed and the fingertips pointing toward the western horizon). After this moon is finished, after our grandmother is buried, and when she is new again –just three days old– then I will complete five months.” (Neuenswander 1981: 129).

In Maya cosmology, the moon’s ‘journey’ in the night sky, appearing on the western horizon and disappearing again at the end of the lunar cycle, is conceptualized in terms of four periods of seven days; each phase corresponds to a phase of a living being from birth, to maturation, withering, and then death. Interestingly, the Achi also conceptualise the moon as ‘walking’ (binik) (Neuenswander 1981: 135), similar to the English word ‘planet’, which comes from the Greek planetes, which means ‘wandering (star)’. The interpretation of the moon’s journey as a life-cycle and the personification of the moon as a grandmother suggests a type of cosmological anthropomorphism; i.e. cosmic matters are described and understood through human attributes and features, and in turn play an important role in the actions and fate of terrestrial events. Indeed, among many Maya groups today, including Tzotzil, K’iche’, and Itzaj, the young Moon Goddess with her rabbit companion is patron of fertility, pregnancy, and childbirth, and the Old Lunar Goddesses including Goddess O, a variant of Goddess I, and both Xmucane (in K’iche’) and Ix Chel (in Yucatec and Lacandon) are associated with the moon, divination, childbirth, and medicine (Tedlock 1985: 40, 369; Tozzer 1941: 129; and Taube 1992: 68–69, in Milbrath 2000: 141). Because the moon determines the rainy and dry seasons (Neuenswander 1981: 130), the Tzolk’in calendar also forms the basis for the agricultural cycle in Maya culture (including planting and harvesting) and is central to ritual divination and prognostications (Milbrath 2000: 32). Such connections between the cycles of celestial bodies and temporality in human affairs including subsistence and procreation, illustrate the interplay between, or synchronisation of, the terrestrial and celestial realms of experience. For the Maya, this synchronisation centres on the body; with its two arms and two legs, the body embodies the four cardinal directions, its breath embodies the wind, and its fluids (or itz in Yucatec, which includes blood, sweat, tears, milk, and se-

men) forms the cosmic sap of the world tree (Normark 2000: 9–12). Furthermore, as the locus for experience, encounters, and metaphorical extensions, the body becomes the centre point for communicating precise spatial and temporal information through speech, writing, and gestures.

The Body’s Centrality to Communicating Orientation in Space and Time Communication –the exchange of information by speaking, writing, or using the body– plays a central role in human discourse (Kendon 2004). Gestures, defined as significant bodily actions that communicate meaning (Kendon 2004), are important for expressing temporal and spatial information (see for example De Jorio [1832] 2000; Cooperrider and Núñez 2009). People use time and space-related gestures to express where they are situated in both space and time. The situation of one’s body can be called ‘orientation’. Orientation is most often expressed by using people and features in the environment as external referents. Referents can be physical places, objects in local spaces, or even celestial bodies, including the sun, moon, stars, and planets. Such referents are used to pinpoint the orientation of one’s own body within the world and gestures are used to communicate spatial and temporal information to other persons. Time- and space-related gestures can be performed in interpersonal exchanges to indicate location in immediate spaces with respect to others and to indicate location in space and time through reference to distant phenomena. Gestures of time and gestures in space are produced as part of –and reflect culturally shared conceptions of– space and time. Spatial and temporal gestures can be used in conjunction with speech or performed as independent meaning-conveyers. In many cultures, spatial and temporal orientation is communicated predominantly through index finger extended gestures, but other hand shapes can also be used to communicate spatial and temporal information. In the following sections, I discuss the form and significance of pointing gestures in the communication of spatial and temporal information in Maya communities today. I present the formal variations of pointing gestures in Classic Maya figural representations and discuss their placements (in relation to the body) and the context in which they feature. I lend particular focus to the way in which Maya cognitive and cultural perceptions and expressions of space and time, as observed in Maya communities today, likely structured the production and representation of Maya gestures in the past. In particular, I argue that index finger extended gestures express orientation in time and space and that ring-shape gestures express concepts of completion and renewal in the Maya world. I conclude by reflecting critically on the paradigmatic context in which ancient Maya gestures are interpreted, arguing for a broader approach to the subject and wider understanding of gestures beyond elites.

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The Significance of Pointing Gestures ‘Pointing’ occurs when a vector is produced from the origo (the reference point for deictic relationships, i.e. the gesturer) through an anchor point (an extended part of the body which signals the orientation of the vector), to a ‘target’ (the point of referent) (Le Guen 2011: 272–3). Pointing gestures are generally executed with the hands and fingers, but pointing can also be performed with the head, eyes, elbow, or foot (Kendon 2004: 199). What unifies pointing gestures is that the body part carrying out the pointing is (1) extended and (2) moves in a well-defined path (Kendon 2004: 199). Pointing gestures executed with the hand do not exclusively feature the index finger extended. Adam Kendon (2004: 205) observes seven different handshape and handshape/ forearm orientation configurations that can be classified as pointing gestures used in Northamptonshire, England and Campania, Italy. Kendon (2004: 223) notes that speakers use particular hand shapes according to how they are treating the object referred to in his/her discourse. For example, among the pointing gestures discussed, those that feature the index finger extended are most likely to be used when a person is singling out an individual object (Kendon 2004: 205). In contrast to pointing with the index finger extended, when the Open Hand is used in pointing, ‘. . . the object being indicated is not itself the primary focus or topic of the discourse but is something that is linked to the topic, either as an exemplar of a class, as the location of some activity under discussion, because it is related to something that happened, or it is something that should be inspected or regarded in a certain way because this leads to the main topic.’ (Kendon 2004: 208)

My discussion of pointing gestures in this chapter primarily focuses on studies of pointing executed with index finger extended hands but it is not proposed that pointing as a gestural action is exclusively executed with index finger hand shapes. For example, a fist hand shape depicted in the image on vessel K2873 may function as a pointing gesture. The figure’s fistshape hand is extended in front of his body at chest-level; he holds an object in his left hand; and his head is bent forwards and his gaze is directed downwards. The position of his right hand above the object held in his left hand, the form of the fist (fingers partially extended and curved into the palm), and his posture (head tilt) and gaze direction suggests that the fist in this context may be a pointing action referring in a ‘loose’ way to the object. Furthermore, the gestures described by Helen Neuenswander (1981) are pointing actions executed with flat hands (all fingers are extended and together produce a pointing gesture in combination with arm movement). The flat hand pointing gesture may be used instead of an index finger extended hand because the speaker is discussing something that happened. Interestingly, there is an example of a flat hand employed in the logogram TZUTZ, ‘to complete (a period of time)’, as I discuss below.

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Pointing gestures that feature the extended index finger are significant because pointing is one of the very first communicative skills that infants acquire (Butterworth 2003: 11).

Yet pointing does not yield to simple interpretation. ‘[Y]ou stick your finger out in the appropriate direction, perhaps saying some accompanying words, and your interlocutors follow the trajectory of your arrow-like digit to the intended referent . . . Nothing could be simpler –and nothing could be farther from the truth’ (Haviland 2000: 14). Indeed, studies in biology, psychology, and semiotics demonstrate that pointing is not a trivial phenomenon, but is rich evidence of spatial knowledge (Haviland 1993). In order to understand the richness of pointing gestures, it is first essential to examine the spaces in which these gestures are produced.

Space and Spatial Perception Space is the continuous area or expanse within which all things exist and move. Yet, ‘space, no matter how immediate or unproblematically accessible it may seem, is always itself a construction, conceptually projected from not only where we are but who we are and what we know’ (Haviland 2000: 38). Spaces can be conflated, constructed, shifted, temporal, permanent, local, and distant. They can be imbued with knowledge, or charged with social norms and boundaries, with taboos often set in spatial terms. Furthermore, people think about, talk about, and gesture with respect to immediate locations of things as well as with respect to points in distant and celestial spaces in different ways. This is because people use different spatial ‘Frames of Reference’. Spatial Frames of Reference (FoR) are coordinate systems used to localise a figure with respect to a ground (Le Guen 2011: 273). They structure how people situate themselves and other people, things and places in a particular setting, and thus central to communicating spatial and temporal orientation. There are three distinct types of FoR: (1) intrinsic – locations are described in relation to an object’s intrinsic properties, e.g. front, back, sides; (2) egocentric or relational – relations between objects are specified from an individual’s point of view; and (3) geocentric or absolute – positions are described in terms of fixed angles extrinsic to the objects, which, in many societies corresponds to the cardinal directions north, south, east or west (Le Guen 2009: 1). It is extremely important to differentiate among uses because each FoR constitutes a fundamentally different strategy of spatial conception (Brown and Levison 1993).

Frames of Reference and Gesture The close connection between the development of language and the development of gestures (Kendon 1975; McNeill 1992, 2005) has prompted researchers to investigate the extent to which different FoR, as they occur in spoken language, can be used to structure spatial gesture production. Studies in language, culture, and cognition led by Stephen Levinson at the international Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics based in Nijmegen, suggest that there are substantial and significant differences in how gestures can be performed to express spatial locations according to the gesturer’s cognitive frame of reference (Levinson 2003). For example, gestural deixis in direction-giving, in which pointing hands are the

Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World

primary gestures of communication, is not the same in all cultures, and in order to understand directions correctly, the viewer needs to interpret the pointing gestures within the same frame of reference in which the gestures were produced and transmitted (Le Guen 2009).

Frames of Reference and Gesture in Contemporary Maya Communities Initial research on spatial frames of reference in Mesoamerican languages suggests that spatial language differs within and among Mayan languages and that gestures are a rich source of information regarding conceptualisation and expression of space (Brown and Levinson 1993; Haviland 2000; Le Guen and Pool Balam 2012). Such research in psycholinguistics suggests that the egocentric spatial system is not the ‘natural’ frame of reference in all societies (Brown and Levison 1993: 47) and that people do not always situate themselves and things in time and space in relative terms (O’Meara and Pérez Báez 2011: 839). In Tzeltal, for example, spatial language relies on a geocentric frame of reference using the slope of the land with an ‘uphill/downhill’ axis (Brown and Levinson 1993). Rather than explicitly oriented to the cardinal directions, the geocentric FoR is based on certain ecological and socio-geographical phenomena that defines the Tzeltal-speaking territory (Brown and Levinson 1993: 49). Studies of the gestures produced by Zinacantecans and Yucatecans have also shown that orientation (and the referents used therein) plays an important role in gesture production (Haviland 2000, 2003; Le Guen 2012). Tzotzil speakers produce gestures in ‘directionally anchored’ local space (Haviland 2000: 27). An example of such spatial expression can be found in an interview that John Haviland conducted with a Tzotzil-speaking farmer. Haviland asks Maryan how to get from Nabenchauk to Cancún. Haviland observes that Maryan begins his direction-giving by shifting his sitting position so that his line of shoulders runs exactly east-west. Maryan’s gestures are cardinally oriented. Distant places in remote space are superimposed onto features in the local terrain; and the consistency of the cardinal directions allows for the conflation of two different spaces: one immediate, one narrated (Haviland 2000: 38). Yucatec Maya gestures are also a primary medium for expressing spatial information (Le Guen and Pool Balam 2012). Like Tzotzil-speakers, Yucatec-speakers use manner deictics (e.g. ‘like this’) in accompaniment to gestures to express directions and spatial location (Le Guen 2011: 291). Furthermore, even when Yucatec-speakers use different linguistic FoR in speaking, in gesturing, they tend to align themselves within a geocentric FoR (Le Guen 2009: 1). To summarise Le Guen’s interview with a Yucatec Maya couple, Le Guen asks ‘where is the Nance tree in relation to the house?’ The two interviewees (‘I.’ and ‘S.’) reply in different ways: ‘I.’ uses deictic terms (‘like this’ and ‘like that’) while pointing and ‘S.’ uses an intrinsic FoR to say that the tree is ‘in front of the house’ while using iconic gestures to symbolize the

tree and the house. However, in both conversations, the interviewees’ gestures situate the tree ‘to the north of’ the house, which suggests the gestures performed by both interviewees are structured by a geocentric frame of reference. Le Guen tested whether such geocentric structuring was coincidental, because the interviewees were facing west during their conversation. However, he found that ‘free oriented’ gestures, asked for in direction-giving, did indeed show a reliance on a geocentric frame of reference (Le Guen 2009: 9).

Pointing Gestures in Maya Communities Today As in other cultures, Tzotzil and Yucatec Maya infants point from an early age (Haviland 2003). During infancy, spatial knowledge is still fairly limited to the house compound, but infants are able to indicate general directions through pointing gestures. Pointing gestures can be performed independently from speech, or in accompaniment to speech, particularly with the deictic verb, ‘taj’, which in Tzotzil means ‘there’ (Haviland 2003). Throughout childhood, Zinacantecan and Yucatecan spatial awareness is developed. Pointing can still be performed in a non-transferred context (i.e. pointing in the current location), but through learning and language acquisition, pointing is performed in a transferred context (when pointing is directed to a distant figure or object) (Le Guen 2011). Additionally, pointing becomes more complex owing to the different ways in which the gesturer learns to conflate spaces around his or her body and transposes himself/herself to other spaces (Haviland 1993). As I discuss above, the space that the gesturer permeates is multifaceted: it can be the present space, a narrated ‘space recalled’ through story-telling, or a ‘space projected’ through direction-giving (Haviland 1993). Another example of conflation of spaces and use of pointing gestures can be found in an interview Haviland conducted a

b

Figure 1. Index finger extended hands in Maya representations: a) Index finger extended upwards, 45 degrees up from horizontal, horizontal, 45 degrees down from horizontal, and downwards; b) Differences between wrist flex and direction of the index finger. Illustrations by the author.

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a

a PALM

BACK

SIDE

b

c

THUMB NOT VISIBLE THUMB VISIBLE AND EXTENDED

d

THUMB VISIBLE TOUCHING FINGER

Figure 2. Features of index finger extended hands in Maya representations: a) hand rotations; b) visibility and position of the thumb. Illustrations by the author.

with an elderly Tzotzil Maya man, called Petul. The owner of the plot of land, M., complains about the destruction of his young trees and points with an extended index finger in the direction of his land, south by south-east of where the men are standing. Petul responds by saying that it may have happened because the gate fence around the plot was left open. When Petul provides this possible explanation, he points north by north-east because he has transposed himself to where the trees were cut down and thus the gate would be north by north-east from where he was now standing in the transposed context (Haviland 2003). This transposition is also similar to what Olivier Le Guen observes when interviewing Yucatec Maya persons about spatial relationships (Le Guen 2009).

Index Finger Extended Gestures in Maya Representations Gestures made with an extended finger are represented in Maya iconography from Early Classic art –for example the San Bartolo murals (Urquizú and Hurst 2003) and Kaminaljuyu Monument 65 (Kaplan 2000)– to Classic Maya figural imagery on ceramics and stelae, and in Postclassic codices. However, despite the prominence of index finger extended hands in Maya representations, they are often overlooked in analyses of ancient Maya gesture (see for example Miller 1981; Ancona-Ha et al. 2000). Index finger extended gestures in Maya representations can be sub-classified according to the degree of flex, the orientation of the hand (such as whether the palm is visible or not), and where the thumb is positioned in relation to the index finger (e.g. extended away from the index finger, flush against the index finger, or making contact with another digit; see Maitland Gardner 2017 for discussion of handshape classification in Maya art).

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Figure 3. Index finger extended gestures in representation on ceramic vessels: a) index finger extended over shoulder (detail of gesture on vessel K593); b) hand with index finger extended under arm (detail of gesture on vessel K625); c) hand extended away from the body (detail of gesture on vessel K8791); d) hand placed in front of chest (detail of gesture on vessel K5545); e) hand resting on thigh (detail of gesture on vessel K625). Illustrations by the author.

The Formal Characteristics of Index Finger Extended Gestures in Maya Representations Index fingers are extended upwards or downwards, horizontally, or at 45 degrees up from horizontal, or 45 degrees down from horizontal (see Fig. 1a). Several hands display a difference between the flex of the hand and the direction of the index finger (see Fig. 1b). For many hands, the index finger follows the same direction of the hand, i.e. if the hand is flexed vertically downwards, then the finger tends to follow this trajectory. However, there are also examples of hands that exhibit a difference between the flex of the hand and the direction of the extended finger: hands can have a horizontal flex with the index finger extended vertically downwards, and hands can have a horizontal flex with the index finger extended vertically upwards. In addition to flexes, rotations of index finger extended hands differ (see Fig. 2a): the palm of the hand (when in a horizontal position) can be upward- or downward-turning; or, a hand (when in a vertical position) can face towards or away from the performer’s body. The majority of horizontally flexed hands in Maya representations are rotated with the palm turned downwards as opposed to upwards. Another observation is that the majority of hands flexed upwards (45 degrees above horizontal and vertically up) are rotated with the palm towards the performer compared to the few types which are rotated with the palm facing outwards from the performer. Downward-flexed, index finger extended gestures feature hands which are either rotated towards the body or away from the body.

Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World

There are also differences among index finger extended hands based on the visibility and/or position of the thumb (see Fig. 2b). Index finger extended hands with the ‘thumb visible and extended’ tends to be depicted when hands are angled in the lower flexes. Hands that feature the thumb extended such that a space is created between the tips of the thumb and index finger are classified as pincer gestures (see Maitland Gardner 2017). Pincer gestures may denote measurements, or used in the action of picking something up, or as emblem gestures, such as representing the moon crescent and used in reference to the amount of water that the moon ‘holds’ at certain times of the year. I will discuss this latter hypothesis in relation to contemporary Maya lunar gestures below.

Copan Altar Q, and Machaquila Stela 4). Index finger extended gestures on stone monuments are typically placed by the side of the body (e.g. Yaxchilan Lintel 12 and Machaquila Stela 4), in front of the body (e.g. Seibal Stela 3 and Seibal Stela 17) or extended away from the body (e.g. Kaminaljuyu Monument 65). The occurrence of index finger extended gestures in both stone and on ceramic vessels, which likely had different iconographic purposes and audiences, is an interesting observation, as it suggests that the gestural repertoire bridged representational media in Classic Maya society (see Maitland Gardner 2017).

What’s the Point?

Index finger extended gestures in representation on ceramic vessels are positioned in different places in relation to the body (see Fig. 3). Several index finger extended hands are placed close to the body with the arm positioned across the body and the extended finger directed under the arm (e.g. K625), over the shoulder (e.g. K512), resting over the chest (e.g. K5545), by the side of the body (e.g. K1196), over the opposite upper arm (e.g. K5609), over the opposite elbow (e.g. K8889), or with the hand only just visible (e.g. K8820). Several index finger extended hands are also placed by the side of the body, with the hand either resting by the side of the hip (e.g. K868) or positioned on the thigh (e.g. K1669). Several index finger extended hands are represented with the hand extended away from the body (e.g. K1225 and K5371). Index finger extended gestures are also represented in stone (see for example Tak’alik Abaj Stela 1, Aguateca Stela 19,

I argue that the variations in flex, orientation, and positioning of index finger extended gestures in Maya imagery reflect the diversity of pointing gestures present in human discourse. The time depth of the index finger extended gesture and its representation in Maya iconography over time suggest that it was an important part of Maya gestural repertoire. Recent interpretation of index finger extended gestures in Maya iconography include to ‘mark conversation’ or mark ‘emphatic declaration’ (see Houston 2012) and for ‘issuing command’ (see Kaplan 2000). Yet the co-occurrence of index finger extended gestures by central and peripheral figures in scenes on ceramic vessels suggests that marking conversation/declaration or issuing command cannot be their only function. For example, in the scene on vessel K625 two figures are depicted with index finger extended gestures. However, the extended index fingers are directed away from the focus of action, and in the opposite direction to the speech scrolls. Speech scrolls in Maya art mark statements or conversation, and gestures can be used to enforce such vocal actions in representations.

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The Positioning of Index Finger Extended Gestures in Maya Representations

Figure 4. a) Yucatec Maya ‘rolling gesture’ (in Le Guen 2012: 224, Fig. 1); b) Ring-shape gesture.

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Most index finger extended hands in Maya representation are not aimed at people or things in the visible space of the image. Rather the fingers point up, down, or across the body with no visible target. What are the functions and meanings of these gestures? An important feature observed cross-culturally is that pointing gestures are not only used to indicate the location of things in immediate spaces but also to communicate orientation with respect to distant terrestrial and celestial spaces (Haviland 2000; Kita 2009). Given further findings by Jokinen (2010) who examined the function of index finger extended gestures used in free conversation at the ATR Research Labs in Japan, three hypotheses are possible: (1) that index finger extended gestures in Maya iconography are represented to indicate something physical outside of the confines of the image; (2) that index finger extended hands are represented as indicators of orientation with respect to larger time- and space-scapes; and (3) that index finger extended gestures serve to emphasize particular ideas, to acknowledge and create shared understanding, and/ or to indicate common ground. Index finger extended hands are likely used for a wide range of things in Maya art. Given that index finger extended hands are selected to function in a particular semantic context in Maya glyphs –the expression of orientation in time and space– I explore whether certain index finger extended hands function as temporal and spatial indicators within the iconography.

Figure 5. Stela B from Copan displaying two ring-shape hands. Illustration of hands by the author.

The positioning of index finger extended gestures horizontally behind the body, however, or to the ground, or away from an interacting figure is not in keeping with the use of pointing gestures in other cultures to illustrate commands or to express emphatic speech (see for example Brilliant 1963; Gombrich 1966). Returning to the scene on vessel K625, one of the two figures that is depicted with speech scrolls does not show a hand with an extended index finger (the figure depicted on the bench); the figure on the far left of the scene is depicted with his right index finger extended; but similar to the figure on the far right of the image, he is not depicted with speech scrolls. Thus, it is important to consider alternative hypotheses for the use and meaning of index finger extended gestures in Maya culture.

Pointing with No Visible Target

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Although there are a few index finger extended gestures directed towards objects, these instances are rare in Maya art. An example would be the gestures depicted on ceramic vessel K1225; the index fingers of the right hands of both figures extend downwards to the codices that are held in their left hands. In this image, the figures’ extended index fingers function as deictic pointing gestures, serving to indicate something in the codices that are held in their left hands. The torso angle, head position, and gaze of each figure are organised in relation to the hand-arm action that is depicted.

The Relationship between Time and Space ‘All human beings experience time; we are born, we live and we die.’ (Normark 2000: 30). Indeed, ‘[t]he diffuse, endlessly multiplying studies of sociocultural time reflect time’s pervasiveness as an inescapable dimension of all aspects of social experience and practice’ (Munn 1992: 93). Yet time is not entirely an abstract concept (Normark 2000: 30). The ways in which people experience, conceptualise, and map time differs among cultures. In many cultures, time is mapped onto space, and time is usually expressed spatially (Le Guen and Pool Balam 2012). Metaphors for mapping time into space can be linear, such as the horizontal and vertical spatialisation of time in English and in Mandarin. For English speakers, ‘future time’ is in front of the body and ‘past time’ is behind the body. English speakers employ the terms ‘front’ or ‘forwards’ and ‘back’ or ‘behind’ to talk about time. Examples in English would be ‘moving meetings forwards’ and ‘leaving hardships behind us’ (Boroditsky 2001: 4). Vertical spatial terms can also be used by English-speakers to talk about time (Boroditsky 2001: 5). Examples would be ‘to hand down knowledge from generation to generation’ and ‘the meeting was coming up’ (Boroditsky 2001: 5). However, vertical spatial terms are not as common in English as horizontal spatial terms. The preference given to horizontal spatial terms in spoken English is reflected in the way in which English speakers gesture about time. English speakers gesture in the space in front of their bodies to indicate future events, and gesture over the shoulder/to behind the body to indicate events in the past. Mandarin-speakers use both horizontal and vertical spatial terms to talk about time (see Scott 1989; Boroditsky

Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World

2001: 5). However, the most common spatial terms in Mandarin are vertical spatial terms. Mandarin-speakers use the terms shàng (‘up’) and xià (‘down’) to talk about the order of events, weeks and months (Scott 1989; Boroditsky 2001: 5). The term shàng (‘up’) refers to events closer to the past; the term xià (‘down’) refers to events closer to the future (Boroditsky 2001: 5). This preference for the vertical axis is speech is also expressed in gestural production: ‘last week’ is expressed with the arm extended upwards and the hand positioned near the head; ‘next week’ is expressed by gesturing around the lower body (see Fig. 3 in Gu et al. 2014: 550). Expressions of time passage in Maya communities today may help shed further light on the form and meaning of gestures performed and represented earlier in Maya history. Studies of contemporary Maya gestures have predominantly been conducted among Yucatec Maya communities. Of particular importance are two key points, that (1) in Yucatec Mayan, event succession is expressed linguistically in terms of completion by using completive markers. An example would be the statement ‘wash your hands before and after eating’ which in Yucatec Mayan is expressed, p’o’ a-k’ab ken ts’o’ok-ok-e’ k-a-hanal ken ts’o’oh-k a-hanal-e’ p’o’ a-k’ab ka’en: ‘wash your hands, when it’s done, you eat, when you’re done eating, wash your hands again’ (Le Guen 2012: 218). Second, there is no metaphorical time line; instead, time passage is expressed in cyclical terms (Le Guen 2012; Le Guen and Pool Balam 2012). I discuss Yucatec Maya gestures of time and in space in more detail in the following section before turning to consider ring-shape gestures in ancient Maya art, arguing that such gestures likely communicated the cyclical comprehension of time and event succession in ancient Maya culture similar to the expression of event succession among Yucatec Maya communities today.

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Gestures of Time and Space among Yucatec Maya Speakers Yucatec Maya speakers use pointing gestures to indicate spatial orientation, but they also use them to express situation in time; pointing is used to indicate the position of the sun and the moon in the sky as a means to record and signal the time of day. For example, midday can be expressed by pointing directly up, whereas 10am can be expressed by pointing 45 degrees up from horizontal (Le Guen and Pool Balam 2012). Because the moon cycle is irregular, the Yucatec Maya consistently monitor its cycle in order to adjust this type of pointing accordingly (Le Guen and Pool Balam 2012). Yucatec Maya speakers also make a distinction between ‘current time’, which is mapped on ‘here’ space, and ‘remote time’ –both past and future– which is mapped onto ‘distant’ space (Le Guen and Pool Balam 2012). This conception of space-time is also mapped onto the space around the gesturer’s body: Yucatec Maya speakers gesture 1) in the space above the body when they refer to distant Time-Space (both past and future), 2) in the space around the body to make spatial indications (not time), and 3) towards the space at their feet to communicate precise Time-Space (in the here-and-now) (Le Guen and Pool Balam 2012). An example is the ‘here-now’ gesture (way-e’), which accompanies such time references as be’oora, which means ‘now’, and te’ semana he’ela’, which means ‘this week’. This ‘here-now’ gesture is expressed with an index finger extended, usually directed towards the feet of the speaker (Le Guen 2012: 222). It is also important to note that both Yucatec Maya speakers and Yucatec Maya signers perform these gestures. In Yucatec Maya communities, deaf individuals are fully integrated into the community, and gestures are central in daily engagements and interactions between hearing and deaf individuals (Le Guen 2012).

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Figure 6. Ring-shape gestures in Classic Maya art a) Sketch of Stela 3 from Piedras Negras; b) Sketch of the Oval Tablet from Palenque. Illustrations by the author.

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Cyclical Comprehension of Time

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As the Yucatec Maya timespace mapping shows, time a b c d is not always expressed in a Figure 7. Variations of TZUTZ, ‘to complete (a period of time)’: a) hand with index finger extended directional manner that has and ring-shape element; b) hand with index finger extended; c) hand holding thin rod; d) flat hand shape. a start point and an end point Illustrations by the author based on drawings by Harri Kettunen, Matthew Looper, and John Montgomery. along a line, with the body as a frame through which to locate the future (in front of round-shaped object and can be used as a notion of wholeness the body) and the past (behind the body). Indeed, in Yucatec (see De Jorio [1832] 2000; Morris et al. 1979; Kendon 2004). Maya, there is no metaphorical time ‘line’ expressing relations between events (Le Guen and Pool Balam 2012). RathSuch observation, that the physical form of ring-shape er, time is conceived as cyclical and consisting of numerous gestures is the likely source for the meanings communicated cycles which revolve around a central point, with time going by the gestures, opens up a different way to think about the away from the body and coming back to ‘stick’ to the back production of gestures in past and present communities (see of the previous cycle. The cyclical concept of time features Maitland Gardner in press). In the sections that follow, I in Olivier Le Guen’s interview with a Yucatec Maya couple discuss the contexts of ring-shape gestures in modern Maya who talked about the age of their daughter. The mother states representations and argue that these gestures communicated ‘She is three years old, now she goes to her fourth, her fourth cyclical time and completion (and renewal) of events in Preyear comes to her back, it sticks to her (in) June’. The girl’s columbian Maya culture. father then adds, ‘It revolves like a turn/circle like this [full circle tracing]. When it’s closed it’s one year like that (and) it begins for the second year, (and it’s) two years [full circle Ring-Shape Gestures in tracing].’ In Yucatec Maya, the first part of time goes away Maya Representations and the second part comes back to meet it before going away again. Thus, sequential time is not conceived as unfolding Ring-shape gestures in Maya representations are depicted by from past to future, but rather as a succession of events in a figures on stone monuments and also represented in scenes on circle. This concept of time also features in their gestural lan- ceramic vessels. On many stelae, hands are often described guage: Yucatec Maya speakers use a ‘rolling gesture’ to refer as ‘holding’ the ceremonial bar. Yet the hands are not holding to the repetition of events or time unfolding. This gesture can the bar in many representations: the bar rests in the crook of be performed with one hand or one finger, but it is always a the elbows and the hands make particular gestures. Whereas rolling action that traces a circle in the air, with the hand most certain figures are depicted with flat-hand gestures, the maoften positioned at chest-level (Le Guen 2012: 224; Fig. 4a). jority of figures ‘holding’ ceremonial bars make ring-shape gestures with either one hand (in earlier iconography) or both hands (in later iconography). Figures with both hands showing the ring-shape gesture are found in the art from seven Ring-Shape Hands in an Anthropological sites: Bonampak, Copan, Kuná-Lacanhá, Dos Pilas, Quiriand Cross-Cultural Perspective gua, Tonina and Uaxactun. Copan has the highest number of representations with figures showing two ring-shape gestures In addition to index finger extended gestures, another group with a count of 13 monuments. The Copan stelae, which feaof gestures likely communicated information about time among the Maya. This second group, or ‘family’ of gestures, ture figures with both hands showing the ring-shape gesture, mark k’atun and tun period endings. Based on the pattern of includes ring-shape hands. Ring-shape gestures are formed association, I hypothesise that the ring-shape gestures deby bringing the tips of the forefinger (or middle finger) and picted on stelae are related to the completion of time-cycles: thumb together to make a circle (see Fig. 4b). Precision grips ring-shape hand gestures may allude to the event that marked are similar to ring-shape gestures in that the forefinger and thumb meet, but the shape formed is not necessarily circular the completion of the time period. Examples of monuments because the action of putting the digits together is slightly that feature ring-shape hands include Stela B from Copan, different to the action of putting the digits together in ring- Dos Pilas Panel 10 (which celebrates the period ending of shape gestures. Studies in anthropology and the behavioural (9.16.0.0.0), Kuná-Lacanhá Lintel 1, and Bonampak Lintel sciences suggest that the semantics of ring-shape gestures and 4 (see Fig. 5). This ring-shape gesture would be a shape depiction: what is depicted is a ‘cycle’, which is conceived of precision grip gestures are related to the physical form of the as going in a circle. gesture. Meaning derives either from (1) the pinching action of bringing these digits together, known as a precision grip The representation of ring-shape gestures can also be and which is defined as ‘the use of the index finger to pick up and hold onto something small’; or (2) the round shape found in Early Classic art, although in a slightly different formed by the finger and thumb position (Kendon 2004: 240). form: the hand is more akin to a fist shape, but retains the Precision grip gestures can mean precise, exactness, togeth- curve of the hand and features a connection between thumb and fingers. An example is the figure on the Dumbarton Oaks erness, making something precise or making prominent some pectoral, which probably dates to A.D. 120 (see Urquizú and specific fact or idea; ring-shape gestures derive meaning from Hurst 2011: 11). The gesture is made by the left hand over something that is round in shape, such as bodily orifice or a

Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World

the chest. Another example is the depiction of a figure on a jade from Tikal (see Fig. 3.8 in Looper 2009: 88). The figure shows the arms positioned in front of the body with the hands, depicting ring-shape gestures, placed in the centre of the chest. The absence of ceremonial bars in these depictions is noteworthy. The fact that the ring-shape gesture could be represented independently from holding (an object) suggests that the gesture was both related to, yet independent from, the object held in the arms. Further examples of ring-shape gestures in Maya iconography include the figures on Piedras Negras Stelae 1, 3, and 10 (see Clancy 2009); the figural scene on the Copan peccary skull (see Helmke and Nielsen 2009); K’inich Janaab Pakal’s sarcophagus lid (see Scherer 2012), and the Palenque Oval Tablet (see Schele 1979). Each context for these ring-shape gestures suggests that the meaning of the ring-shape gesture in Maya culture is related to the physical form of the hand shape and that ring-shape gesture communicates cyclical completion (and renewal) of events, dynastic sequence, and life/death cycles of birth and rebirth. The representations from Piedras Negras, Stelae 1, 3 and 10 coincide with the completion of significant periods of time and events. Stela 1, for example, records and celebrates the completion of the 1st year of Ixwinikhaab’s husband’s reign. In the carving, Ixwinikhaab Ajaw is depicted with a ring-shape gesture over her chest. Given the form-meaning relationship of the rolling gesture among Yucatec Maya speakers (the circle-tracing action expresses the cyclicity of time), I suggest that the Classic Maya formal variant of this gesture (in the art) is the ring-shape, which expresses the same notion and conception of time as cyclical. The ringshape gesture, represented with the same royal lady on Stela 3, is mirrored by her daughter, who sits next to her on the bench and touches her mother’s knee with her elbow. The mother’s and daughter’s gestures feature ring-shape elements, but whereas the mother’s gestures are rotated with palm upwards, the daughter’s gesture is turned with palm down (see Fig. 6a). The centrality of the ring-shape gesture to lineage representations can also be found in the scene on the Oval Palace Tablet at Palenque. Both figures, K’inich Janaab Pakal (sitting on the bench) and his mother (Ix Sak K’uk’), who kneels beside the bench, are represented with ring-shape gestures (see Fig. 6b). Interestingly, the ring-shape the gesture of Ix Sak K’uk’ is turned palm upwards, whereas Pakal’s gesture is turned with palm down. It is not entirely clear what this pattern in the ring-shape gesture combination could signify. However, the pattern between upward rotation for the elder and the downward rotation for the younger may express the order of rulership, between mother and daughter at Piedras Negras and between mother and son at Palenque.

life’. Andrew Scherer shares this view, and suggests that Late Classic Maya sarcophagi ‘were imbued with metaphors of rebirth and renewal’ (Scherer 2012: 243). In the representation on the lid, Pakal is shown ascending from the underworld (Martin 2006; Stuart and Stuart 2008; Scherer 2012), and thus the sarcophagus lid ‘works as a powerful statement of rebirth, vitality, and continuity.’ Furthermore ‘beyond these standard Maya tropes of death and the afterlife, the lid is, more specifically, an essential statement of dynastic vitality and continuity that was necessary following the death of an exceptionally long-lived king.’ (Scherer 2012: 248). What has been omitted in these iconographic studies is a discussion of Pakal’s gestures. Pakal’s hands are at the very centre of the iconography (his hands are equidistant to the top and bottom edges of the lid, and equidistant to the left and right edges). The whole rendering of the cosmos, with the world tree, Milky Way, stars, and planets, is represented around, and centre on Pakal’s hands. Pakal’s representation in a moment of rebirth and renewal is an interesting context for this gesture: its appearance at centre of the image suggests the form of the ring-shape gesture, in which the forefinger and thumb touch to make a circle, expresses the cyclicality of time and renewal, both for life and death and lineage in the Maya world. The rarity of the sarcophagus representation –Pakal’s is unique in that both the sarcophagus and lid are inscribed with text and imagery (Scherer 2012: 246)– means that there is no direct image with which to compare it. However, another image at Palenque, the Relief Panel in Temple XIV, expressing the death of the ruler K’inich Kan Bahlam II, also represents a ring-shape hand. The deceased king (Pakal’s son) K’inich Kan Bahlam II stands on watery iconography (the surface of the underworld) (Looper 2009: 66–67); he gestures with his right hand across his body, making a ringshape with a pointing index finger. The trajectory of his index finger directs towards glyphs, which Looper notes expresses his entrance into a ‘black lake? Place cave’ (a metaphor for death in Maya culture). However, this index finger extended/ ring-shape gesture combination appears to signal the completion (and rebirth) of K’inich Kan Bahlam II’s life; with his extended index finger functioning in two ways: (1) to indicate the viewer’s gaze between iconography and text, and (2) to express the direction of his journey between the terrestrial and otherworld realms.

Another image supports this hypothesis; the image is the scene on the Copan peccary skull (see Helmke and Nielsen 2009). Two figures are represented in a quatrefoil, with a possible stela and altar combination represented between them. The figure on the left is depicted with a combination of a ring-shape and pointing gesture. Helmke and Nielsen argue that this is an underworld scene, populated by wahy entities which surrounds the two figures, who are themselves conThe ring-shape gesture features in two more images from tained in the quatrefoil (the portal to the earthly realm). They Palenque: K’inich Janaab Pakal’s sarcophagus lid and the argue that the figures, labelled glyphically as the mako’m (lit. Relief Tablet inside Temple XIV. Kaplan (2000: 194) argues ‘tapaderos’), are ‘the ones who keep the portal shut’ (Helmke that the mythological narrative featured on Pakal’s sarcoph- and Nielsen 2009: 57). I argue that the ring-shape gesture, and its prominence at the centre of this scene, expresses the agus lid metamorphises the journey of the dead ruler through the underworld and back via resurrection as the Maize God, connection between realms. The peccary skull on which this image was carved was found in Tomb 1 at Copan. Its morthus ‘living on’ with a ‘magical, world-creating fertility and

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tuary context, similar to Pakal’s sarcophagus lid, is evidence to suggest that the meaning of this gesture is linked to cycles of time, birth, death and renewal. Furthermore, the extended index finger, which is similar to the gesture represented on the relief panel in Temple XIV, is represented with the figure on the left in the quatrefoil on the Copan peccary skull and points towards the glyph blocks above his head. The glyphs record the ritual stone binding on 1 Ajaw 8 Ch’en on 8.17.0.0.0 (Stuart 1996: 156). The completion of this significant period of time in combination with the iconographic representation of the portal between realms (and centred by the ring-shape hand) suggests the centrality of the body in Maya cosmology as a locus for expressing temporal and spatial information.

Ring-Shape Gestures and Maya Expressions of ‘Completion’ The scene on the Vase of the Seven Gods (see Kerr Maya Vase database, K2796) also features a ring-shape gesture. The text on the vessel states that on the date of creation, the gods were ‘ordered’. The groups of gods are represented by the figures on the left. The figure sitting on the jaguar bench and smoking a cigar is God L, who performs a ring-shape gesture. The action of ordering is indicated by the verb tz’ak, which means to order or to count. The tz’ak glyph is interesting because there are many graphic variants of this logogram, but the tz’ak glyphs always consist of two parts, with representations of sun/moon, female/male, food/water, day/night, and sky/earth (Stuart 2003). Stuart argues that these paired signs that stand for TZ’AK illustrate concepts of wholeness and completeness: one part cannot exist without the other, and together they represent a whole. The ring-shape hand type that God L performs may again be related to the concept of time flow as cyclical succession, or as ordering and signify the complete or wholeness that tz’ak seems to convey.

Rounding to a Close? It appears, based on the evidence I have presented above, that the action of putting the forefinger and thumb together as a ring-shape gesture in ancient Maya art is symbolic of Maya cultural and cognitive conceptions of time as cyclical, with one part going away and the other coming back to meet the first part, signified by the joining of the digits. Also performed in scenes of tribute ‘counting’ or transactions, processions and presentations of captives (see Maitland Gardner 2017), ring-shape gestures may signal the completion of an obligation, activity, or lifespan. Thus, while the context is varied, the meanings communicated by these gestures share the same semantic basis. A consideration of the contexts of index finger extended and ring-shape gestures as graphic elements in Maya writing may help to understand the origins of hand forms as gestures in the communication of spatial and temporal knowledge and meaning in Maya culture, and also provide dynamic comparisons between languages in bodily and written forms.

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Hands and the Expression of Space and Time in Maya Glyphs Hands are an important graphic element in Maya hieroglyphic writing (Boot 2003) and show a variety of forms and shapes. What is interesting is that hand shapes seem to have been selected to function in particular logograms and syllables: hand shapes are related to the meanings that the signs denote. Index finger extended hands and ring-shape hands share semantic bases in spatial and temporal expressions. Ring-shape hands also feature in contexts in which what is expressed is round in shape. An example would be chi, which means ‘mouth’ and by metaphorical extension ‘edge’ or ‘border’ in modern Mayan languages (Bricker et al. 1998; see Fig. 6 in Levinson 1994: 810) and which is depicted as a ring-shape hand in Classic Maya writing. Index finger extended hands feature in composite signs representing large calendrical periods of time known as k’inichiltuun (see Boot 2003: 14–15); they also figure in the verb, TZUTZ, which means ‘to end’ or ‘to complete’ a period of time (Montgomery 2006: 245; Fig. 7), and which is employed in the context of period-endings. Some renderings show TZUTZ as a flat hand (Fig. 7d), but always with the same glyphic element attached. The glyphic element attached to the hand in the TZUTZ logogram has been called a ‘bauble’ or ‘jewel’ and ‘stick’ (see Montgomery 2006; Macri and Looper 2003: 124). I propose that this ‘bauble’ or ‘jewel’ is a celestial element that is also represented in the space-scape on Pakal’s sarcophagus lid. The combination of the index finger extended hand or flat hand and the celestial element may graphically represent the completion of a celestial body’s cycle, with the pointing finger indicating the position of the celestial body in the night sky when it has ‘completed’ its cycle. The inclusion of a long thin object held in the hand in some variants of the TZUTZ glyph (see Fig. 7c) may represent an instrument used to measure and record the movements of heavenly bodies (see Taube 2014). Such representation of object in hand may also suggest the centrality of hands in the action of time-keeping. Other renderings of the TZUTZ glyph feature a hand with an index finger extended and a ring-shape element (Fig. 7a). Another ring-shape variant of a verb can be found in renderings of HUL, which means ‘to arrive (to a place)’ (see Montgomery 2006: 123; Kettunen and Helmke 2011: 72; Fig. 8c). The logograph HUL comprises a hand and the moon sign, ja. The glyph HUL is often rendered as a pincer hand. An early form of HUL is known in the Late Preclassic in which the hand is oriented with the back visible and with the index finger and thumb extended horizontally and downwards (Fig.

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Figure 8. Variations of HUL, ‘to arrive (at a place)’: a) downward turned pincer-shape hand; b) upward turned pincer-shape hand; c) ring-shape hand (illustrations by author based on drawings by Harri Kettunen and Nikolai Grube).

Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World

8a). In the Late Classic, the hand graphic component of HUL is illustrated with the palm visible and the index finger and thumb extended 45 degrees above horizontal (Fig. 8b). What is interesting in the HUL sign is the combination of the pincer hand-shape and the moon sign (ja), which features droplets of water. I suggest that hand gestures in the renderings of HUL are related to the moon’s journey in the night sky and seasonality, similar to the use of hand gestures in modern Maya communities (as observed by Neuenswander 1981). An examination of hand shapes in glyphs shows that index finger extended hands, ring-shape hands, and certain pincer hands are used to express calendrical information, temporal phrases, and verbs that express orientation in space and time, such as ‘to arrive’ (at a place) and ‘to finish/to complete’ (a period of time). A connection between these hand shapes and expressions of orientation in space does not seem coincidental. Rather, hands seem to have been carefully selected in the graphic origins of the script. Even hands borrowed from the Isthmian script (Kettunen and Lacadena 2014) find place in relevant semantic contexts. Perhaps it should not be surprising that the ancient Maya gestural repertoire contributed to the formation of the graphics in the Maya hieroglyphic script. Knowledge of celestial movements and precision in

Achi hand position for dry season (sa’ih); moon in upright position to retain water (tikilik).

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Achi hand position for rainy season (alah); moon on her side (xotolik) to allow water to escape.

Figure 9. a) Achi hand gestures for the dry season and for the rainy season (hands redrawn by author after Neuenswander 1981: 162); b) Detail of Heather Hurst’s rendering of the San Bartolo North Wall Mural (in Urquizú and Hurst 2011: 10, Fig. 2).

orientation in localised and distant space is likely to predate writing, and as such it is important to consider the depth of gestural practices and their contribution to gestures expressed in iconography and contemporary communities.

The Arrival of the Moon and Lunar Gestures The cycle of the moon is extremely important in both ancient and contemporary Maya culture. Maize, the staple crop in Central America, was to be sowed and harvested at certain points in the lunar cycle (Milbrath 2000: 30). Thus observing, watching, and recording lunar phases was crucial to agricultural production, particularly with regard to the rainy and dry seasons. The importance of time keeping for the ancient Maya is found in agricultural planting and harvesting of maize and other crops and Karl Taube has argued that the Classic association of the moon with maize suggests that planting cycles based on the moon are pre-Hispanic in origin (Taube 1992: 69). Several Maya groups today (including Achi, Tzotzil, and Tzutujil Maya speakers) use hand gestures as part of the terminology for lunar phases (Milbrath 2000). Such gestures are produced in relation to how much water the moon ‘holds’ at certain times of the year. As Neuenswander observes: ‘When it is dry, it is because the moon is tikilik “upright”, with the tips of the crescent turned up in such a way that the water is unable to get out. When it is rainy, it is a sign that the moon is xotolik “lying on its side” with the crescent turned sideways so that the water can get out. To demonstrate the dry season position of the moon, the arm is bent at the elbow, with the forearm vertical and at a 90° angle with the upper arm; the hand, representing the crescent of the moon is tilted back with the thumb extended so that the concave line thus exposed between the thumb and index finger is capable of retaining water. To demonstrate the rainy season, the arm is lower to a horizontal position so that the water held in the crescent may now run out.’ (Neuenswander 1981: 146–7; Fig. 9a). Studies of gesture among modern Maya communities (Du Bois 1978; Neuenswander 1981; Hanks 1990; Haviland 2003; Fox Tree 2009; Hoenes del Pinal 2011; Le Guen 2009, 2011, 2012; Le Guen and Pool Balam 2008, 2012) suggest the importance and richness of gestures for understanding communication within and among Maya communities. However, few studies compare the ethnography of modern Maya gestures with Classic Maya art and vice versa. One exception is Erich Fox Tree’s (2009) study of sign languages in Mesoamerica. Fox Tree notes that ‘signs for time expressions related to the moon in Meemul Tziij of Nahualá in Guatemala [observed by Neuenswander 1981] correspond uncannily to gestures in Classic Maya artwork, such as the Maya Moon Goddess carrying her rabbit-shaped infant, a symbol of fertility’ depicted on ceramic vessel K2776 (Fox Tree 2009: 353; see Plate 120 in Schele and Miller 1986). Fox Tree (2009: 353–4) argues that the Moon Goddess’ right hand (which is depicted as a left hand attached to a right arm) bears resemblance to the

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gesture that expresses ‘rising wet season moon’ used in the Achi-Maya community of Cubulco in Guatemala. Gestures that express seasonal rainfall in Nahualá and Cubulco are found across southern Mesoamerica, including the Yucatán (Fox Tree 2009: 353). Based on my own observations, evidence to support Fox Tree’s hypothesis are gestures on figurines and gestures in renderings on the North and West Wall murals at San Bartolo, as I discuss below. In the North Wall mural at San Bartolo, two female figures in the right of the image are depicted with hand gestures similar to the achi hand position for ‘dry season’ described above: the index finger is extended and a crescent-shape is formed between the extended forefinger and thumb; the palm faces upward (Fig. 9b). On the other side of the standing male figure (who turns his head over his shoulder to look at the females behind him), there is a kneeling male figure who holds an object above his head from which emerges a type of plant (Urquizú and Hurst 2003: 9). The watery iconography, including the shell and foliage around the standing and kneeling male figures, combined with the water jug and the gestures performed by the female figures in this scene, could

make reference to lunar phases and the rainy/dry seasons that determine plant growth. Another scene in the West Wall mural at San Bartolo supports Fox Tree’s hypothesis that certain pincer gestures may express seasonal rainfall in Classic Maya art. The scene represents three figures in a quatrefoil. The central figure is identified as the Maize God, who is flanked by two seated individuals (see Fig. 1 in Braakhuis 2014: 1). The figure on the viewer’s left displays his left hand as a pincer gesture. This gesture bears similarity to the achi hand position for the rainy season, with the crescent on its side that allows the water to run out. The figure on the viewer’s right is depicted with a pincer gesture with thumb extended and hand flexed upwards on his right hand, and a fist/ring-shape gesture on his left. The right-side figure’s pincer gesture bears similarity to the achi hand position for the dry season, with the moon in upright position so that the water cannot get out. What is interesting is that these gestures are represented around the Maize God. Braakhuis argues that this scene can be viewed in two ways: one naturalistic and the other conceptual. He argues,

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Figure 10. Classic Maya figurines: a) Figurine with a pincer gesture that bears resemblance to the achi hand shape for the rainy season (figurine in Mayas: Révélation d’un temps san fin Exhibition, Musée du Quai Branly, Paris, 2015); b) Female figurine from Lubaantun, Belize which features a ring-shape, index finger extended handshape (sketch by the author based on drawing by Mr. Waterhouse in Joyce 1933: Plate IV); c) Female figurine from Lubaantun, Belize holding a water jar (sketch by the author based on drawing by Mr. Waterhouse in Joyce 1933: Plate IV).

Gestures of Time, Gestures in Space: Communicating Orientation in the Classic Maya World

‘According to the naturalistic interpretation, the Tonsured Maize God is little more than a personification of the plant. His infant form represents the seed, his feather adornments are maize leaves, his dance movements express growth, and the emptying of a jar into the cleft from which he emerges signifies watering the maize. More generally, the relevant scenes are seen as expressing the developmental and seasonal stages of the crop. According to the conceptual interpretation, aspects and scenes of the Tonsured Maize God are explained symbolically, with a marked emphasis on broad concepts such as ancestry, kingship, world creation, and the world centre. Thus, the maize deity’s canoe voyage is thought to symbolize the destiny of dead kings; the lightning torch in his forehead, royal ancestry; and his acrobatic stance, the world tree at centre.’ (Braakhuis 2014: 1–2).

erence that structure contemporary Maya gestures are good indications of –or at least a good starting point for understanding– the production of gestures in the past. Pointing gestures may have been represented in the art as notational references to the physical and temporal situation of the engagement or the significance of the activity represented, which took place within the larger calendrical cycles and were recorded in accompanying hieroglyphic texts, particularly on stone monuments. Thus in addition to the written texts, gestures provided a visual language that can communicate when events take place.

I suggest that the gestures represented in this scene function to communicate the lifecycles of the maize plant and the Maize God in both the naturalistic and conceptual views. In support of Fox Tree’s hypothesis, the gestures represented in the two scenes on the North Wall and West Wall murals at San Bartolo express the seasonality of rainfall according to the lunar cycle. The crescent-shape hand gestures, for both the rainy and dry seasons, express the importance of knowing and understanding seasonality for Maya maize production. Such iconography also illuminates the importance of hands in the communication of meaning in Maya culture, and shows that the Maya place the body at centre of celestial and terrestrial activities.

More recent studies in Maya archaeology have considered how we think about what is ‘elite’ and ‘non-elite’ in the Maya world and in particular in what ways we can understand the practices and beliefs of all levels in Maya society. Astronomy in Maya culture was not an abstract science, but was an integral part of daily life (Milbrath 2000: 1). Models of cosmic order can be found in the configuration of monumental architecture to the arrangements of caches, altars, and milpas (Mathews and Garber 2004: 49). Ritual acts from everyday practices to courtly ones did not separate people in Maya society. Rather what bound them together was a shared cosmos (Mathews and Garber 2004: 56).

The Body in the World: Conceptualising the Maya Cosmos ‘Space’ and how people perceive and construct space is part of cultural knowledge. Gestures do not make use of ‘raw’ space; rather they are performed within the conceptual entities that are projected onto the world (Haviland 2000: 38). This projection includes broader notions of time as well as immediate interactional space and bodily boundaries. The Maya devised ways of marking the passage of time and mapping their perception of the universe in the physical world in which they lived. Several scholars note that the Maya perception of world order includes a horizontal division of the world into four quarters with an axis (ceiba tree). This quadripartite division of the universe is associated with concepts of creation, cosmic structure, cyclical completion, and cardinal directions (Mathews and Garber 2004: 51). Indeed, completion is a key concept in Maya beliefs about time passage (Rice 2007: 62). Orientation in local spaces can be extended from immediate surroundings in social encounters to temporal and spatial situation in the cosmos. Telling the time by reference to the movement of celestial elements occurs in space-tobody and body-to-body dialogues. Whereas pointing gestures performed in Maya communities today are used as time referents, and are fleeting productions accompanying speech, representations of pointing gestures in Maya art act to express the timing of the events depicted. The spatial frames of ref-

‘Elite’, ‘Non-Elite’ and the Longevity of Maya Practices

The longevity of Maya practices is testimony to the endurance and significance of concepts of space and time in Maya culture. Concepts of space and time survived periods of extreme social change (Mathews and Garber 2004: 56). Gestures, produced as part of this worldview, may also have continued through these social and political changes. In research detailed elsewhere (Maitland Gardner 2017), I argue that viewers and audiences inside and outside of Late Classic Maya courts could read the visual language of gestures and that their physical gestural repertoire allowed them to make sense of what was represented. What may be lunar phase-related gestures also occur on Classic Maya female figurines. These figurines have been regarded as non-elite objects, such as the figurines from Lubaantun in Belize (Joyce 1933). Examples include women that are depicted with a pincer gesture (Fig. 10a), a ring-shape/index finger extended gesture combination (Fig. 10b), and pincer hand shape holding a water jar (Fig. 10c). In the latter example, the middle, ring, and little fingers of the left hand are adducted; the index finger is set apart from the adducted fingers and the thumb is extended. This hand shape may function to hold the pot, but it could have meaning associated with the action of pouring water: when the water jar is held upright there is a crescent shape formed between the extended forefinger and thumb; as the jar would be rotated to let water out, the crescent shape between forefinger and thumb would be rotated downwards. Indeed, the Moon Goddess is widely connected with water, and water storage jars are traditionally carried by Maya women (Milbrath 2000: 33). These gestures occur in media other than in stone or in painting, suggesting that their production

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and meanings were found both inside and outside the courtly sphere. David Stuart (1996) has pointed out that, as a result of our involvement in the historical paradigm that emerged in the 1960s and which overturned previous notions that the inscriptions treated the passage of time and nothing else –some essential truths of earlier scholarship may have been overlooked. Time and space are central to existence and indeed the Maya placed time and renewal at the centre of their ritual life. The centrality of time keeping in Maya culture is attested in Maya communities today (Taube 2014). The presence of particular hand shapes in calendrical expression in Maya glyphs, the depiction of index finger extended, ring-shape, and pincer gestures in Maya iconography, and the expression of temporal and spatial orientation in physical and cosmic space-scapes by Maya communities today, all suggest a survival of gestural languages and is testimony to endurance of cognitive and cultural perceptions of space and time in Maya practices and culture.

Conclusions The analyses I present in this chapter emphasise the importance of Maya perceptions of space and time in interpreting the symbolism, and understanding the significance, of Maya gestures. I also highlight the important roles of the body and bodily expressions for comprehending the complexities of Maya cosmology. Cosmology –ideas about the universe and the place of humans in the universe –centres on bodily thoughts and actions, including bodily perceptions and expressions of place, space, and time. As the medium through which the outside world is encountered (including terrestrial and celestial lands and spaces), the body becomes the reference point through which we try to make sense of external worlds. Drawing from the form and meaning of time- and space-related gestures in contemporary Maya communities, I argue that index finger extended, ring-shape, and certain pincer gestures represented in Classic Maya iconography express temporal and spatial information. Whereas the cognitive and cultural production of Maya gestures today cannot necessarily be traced from Precolumbian times, practices are indeed helpful in thinking about ancient Maya body language. The presence of hand representations in certain semantic fields in Maya writing also suggests that Maya body language was established and practiced before the representation of gestures in Classic Maya figural art. I argue that the broader societal practice of gesturing formed the repertoire from which gestures used by elites in art were drawn, with careful selection to function in particular iconographic contexts during the Classic Period. In ancient Maya cosmology, the body is at the centre of experience and expression. Gestures –as significant body movements that communicate meaning– provide rich evidence of Maya spatial and temporal orientation.

Acknowledgements

I thank Elizabeth Graham for reading an earlier version of this chapter and for her kind comments and insightful suggestions, which were helpful in revisions. I also thank Claudia Zehrt for translating my abstract into Spanish and thank Panos Kratimenos for reading this chapter and providing helpful feedback. Further thanks are due to Olivier Le Guen and Heather Hurst for their kind permission to include their images in this chapter. Any shortcomings, however, are my own. References Ancona-Ha, Patricia, Jorge Perez de Lara and Andrea Van Stone 2000 Some Observations on Hand Gesture in Maya Art. In: Justin Kerr (ed.), The Maya Vase Book, Vol. 6, pp. 1072–1089. New York: Kerr Associates. Aveni, Anthony F. 1992 The Moon and the Venus Table: An Example of the Commensuration in the Maya Calendar. In: Anthony F. Aveni (ed.), The Sky and Mayan literature, pp. 87–101. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Boot, Erik 2003 The Human Hand in Maya Hieroglyphic Writing. Mesoweb. http://www.mesoweb.com/features/boot/human_hand.pdf (accessed August 23, 2010). Boroditsky, Lera 2001 Does Language Shape Thought? Mandarin and English Speakers’ Conceptions of Time. Cognitive Psychology 43: 1–22. Braakhuis, H. Edwin M. 2014 Challenging the Lightnings: San Bartolo’s West Wall Mural and the Maize Hero Myth. Wayeb Notes 46. http://www.wayeb. org/notes/wayeb_notes0046.pdf (accessed March 14, 2015). Bricker, Victoria R., Eleuterio Po’ot Yah and Ofelia Dzul de Poot 1998 A Dictionary of the Maya Language as Spoken in Hocabá, Yucatán. Salt Lake City: The University of Utah Press. Brilliant, Richard 1963 Gesture and Rank in Roman Art. The Use of Gestures to Denote Status in Roman Sculpture and Coinage. Memoirs of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences, Vol. XIV. New Haven: The Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences. Brown, Penelope and Stephen C. Levinson 1993 ‘Uphill’ and ‘Downhill’ in Tzeltal. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 3 (1): 46–74. Butterworth, George 2003 Pointing is the Royal Road to Language for Babies. In: Sotaro Kita (ed.), Pointing: Where Language, Culture and Cognition Meet, pp. 9–33. Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum. Clancy, Flora 2009 The Monuments of Piedras Negras, an Ancient Maya City. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press. Cooperrider, Kensy and Rafael Núñez 2009 Across Time, across the Body: Transversal Temporal Gestures. Gesture 9: 181–206.

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Jokinen, Kristiina 2010 Pointing Gestures and Synchronous Communication Management. In: Anna Esposito, Nick Campbell, Carl Vogel, Amir Hussain and Anton Nijholt (eds.), Development of Multimodal Interfaces: Active Listening and Synchrony, pp. 33–49. Heidelberg: Springer-Verlag. Joyce, Thomas A. 1933 Presidential Address. The Pottery Whistle-Figurines of Lubaantun. The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland 63: xv–xxv. Kaplan, Jonathan 2000 Monument 65. Ancient Mesoamerica 11: 185–198. Kendon, Adam 1975 Gesticulation, Speech and the Gesture Theory of Language Origins. Sign Language Studies 9: 349–373. 2004 Gesture: Visible Action as Utterance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kettunen, Harri and Christophe Helmke 2011 Introduction to Maya Hieroglyphs. www.wayeb.org. Kettunen, Harri and Alfonso Lacadena 2014 Methods in Maya Hieroglyphic Studies. Workshop at the 19th European Maya Conference, Bratislava, Slovakia. November 17–20, 2014. Kita, Sotaro 2009 Cross-cultural Variation of Speech-accompanying Gesture: A Review. Language and Cognitive Processes 24 (2): 145–167. Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson 1980 Metaphors We Live By. Chicago/London: Chicago University Press. Le Guen, Olivier 2009 Geocentric Gestural Deixis among Yucatec Maya. In 18th IACCP Book of Selected Congress Papers, pp. 123–136. Athens: Pedio Books Publishing. 2011 Modes of Pointing to Existing Spaces and the Use of Frames of Reference. Gesture 11 (3): 271–307. 2012 An Exploration in the Domain of Time: From Yucatec Maya Time Gestures to Yucatec Maya Sign Language Time Signs. In: Ulrike Zeshan and Connie De Vos (eds.), Endangered Sign Languages in Village Communities: Anthropological and Linguistic Insights, pp. 209–250. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter and Ishara Press. Le Guen, Olivier and Lorena Pool Balam 2008 The Emotional World of the Yucatec Maya: From Universal to Culturally Specific. XIII European Maya Conference (EMC), 1–6 December 2008, Paris. 2012 No Metaphorical Timeline in Gesture and Cognition among Yucatec Mayas. Frontiers in Psychology 3 (271): 1–15.

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Göteborg: Göteborg University, Museion Department of Archaeology and Ancient History. O’Meara, Carolyn and Gabriela Pérez Báez 2011 Spatial Frames of Reference in Mesoamerican Languages. Language Sciences 33: 837–852. Rice, Prudence M. 2007 Maya Calendar Origins: Monuments, Mythistory, and the Origins of Time. Austin: University of Texas Press. Schele, Linda 1979 Genealogical Documentation on the Tri-figure Panels at Palenque. In: Merle Greene Robertson and Donna Call Jeffers (eds.), Tercera Mesa Redonda de Palenque, 1978, Part I, pp. 41–70. Monterey: Pre-Columbian Art Research. Schele, Linda and Mary Miller 1986 The Blood of Kings: Dynasty and Ritual in Maya Art. Fort Worth: Kimbell Art Museum. Scherer, Andrew K. 2012 The Classic Maya Sarcophagus: Veneration and Renewal at Palenque and Tonina. RES 61/62: 242–261. Scott, Amanda 1989 The Vertical Dimension and Time in Mandarin. Australian Journal of Linguistics 9: 295–314. Stuart, David 1996 Kings of Stone: A Consideration of Stelae in Ancient Maya Ritual and Representation. RES Anthropology and Aesthetics 29/30: 149–171. 2003 On the Paired Variants of TZ’AK. http://mesoweb.com/stuart/ notes/tzak.pdf (accessed November 30, 2014). Stuart, David and George Stuart 2008 Palenque: Eternal City of the Maya. London: Thames and Hudson. Taube, Karl 1992 The Major Gods of Ancient Yucatan. Studies in Pre-Columbian Art and Archaeology 32. Washington D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. Taube, Rhonda 2014 Bounded Place and Segmented Time: The Function and Meaning of Space in Contemporary K’iche’ Maya Rituals. Paper presented at the 19th European Maya Conference, Bratislava, Slovakia 21–22 November 2014. Tozzer, Alfred M. 1941 Landa’s Relación de las cosas de Yucatan (papers of the Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology, Vol. XVIII). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University. Urquizú, Mónica and Heather Hurst [2003] 2011 The Murals of San Bartolo: A Window into the Art and Cosmovision of Precolumbian Man. The PARI Journal 12 (2): 8–13. http://www.mesoweb.com/pari/publications/journal/1202/Urquizu-Hurst-2011.pdf (March 20, 2015).

A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form Jared C. Katz University of California, Riverside

Abstract The music of the ancient Maya can be used to reexamine and further elaborate our interpretation of how the Maya understood the connection of the terrestrial realm to the underworld and the celestial world. This paper analyzes the integral connection that the Maya drew between music and wind. The paper is divided into three sections. The first describes general connections between music and wind. The second section addresses how music could control the rain bringing winds. A large number of musical instruments were discovered in caves, places where the Maya would often hold ceremonies to summon the rains. The final section focuses on the interpretation of the iconography on a Classic Maya tripod vessel housed at the Miho museum, Japan. This vessel depicts the Maya mythological origin story of music. The Maya believed that wind brought music into the terrestrial realm from another world, most likely the Flower Mountain, the paradisiacal realm of ancestors, demonstrating that music came from another world and held an otherworldly quality.

Resumen La música de los antiguos mayas puede ser usada para reexaminar y complementar nuestra interpretación de cómo entendieron la conexión del reino terrestre con el inframundo y el mundo celestial. Este artículo analiza la conexión integral que los mayas trazaron entre la música y el viento. El ensayo está dividido en tres secciones. La primera describe las conexiones generales entre la música y el viento. La segunda sección trata de cómo la música podía controlar la lluvia, atrayendo los vientos. Un gran número de instrumentos musicales fueron descubiertos en cuevas, lugares donde los mayas a menudo habrían llevado ceremonias para pedir lluvias. La sección final se enfoca en la interpretación de la iconografía y la mitología de una vasija trípode en el Museo Miho, Japón. Esta vasija presenta la historia mitológica del origen de la música. Los mayas creían que el viento trajo la música al reino terrestre desde el otro mundo, muy probablemente de la Montaña Florida, el reino paradisíaco de los ancestros, demostrando que la música vino del otro mundo, y que tuvo una calidad “espiritual”.

Based on the frequency with which music is depicted in artwork, the number of musical artifacts that have been found in archaeological excavations, and the strong link that existed between instruments and particular deities, this article puts forth the argument that music was a central aspect of the daily and ceremonial activities of the ancient Maya. Musicians are

depicted at many ritual events, such as the ball game, ritual sacrifice, political proceedings, and religious ceremonies. Music also held a significant position in the mythology of the ancient Maya. This article discusses the integral connection that existed between music and wind in order to further explain the role of music in mythology. The connection between

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music and wind is evident in the cosmological beliefs of the ancient Maya and it is found within their depictions of the paradisiacal realm of ancestors known as the Flower World (Taube 2004a: 69). There is a strong link between wind and music in the ancient Maya world. Music not only had the ability to control wind, as has been argued previously by several scholars (Ishihara 2008: 178), but the Maya believed that wind brought music into the terrestrial world.

The Connection between Music and Wind Music and wind are connected in a variety of ways. To begin, many musical instruments are associated with wind; the clearest example of this link being the conch shell. The swirling form of the conch shell resembles depictions of wind and water, and conch shell trumpets often evoked wind and the roaring sea as noted by Houston and Taube (2011: 15). The cross sectioned conch appeared as a symbol of breath and wind in the Maya area as early as the 5th century BC on Stela 9 of Kaminaljuyu, as also noted by Houston and Taube (2011: 16). The conch shell is used in many instances as a symbolic representation of breath and wind. For example, in the murals of San Bartolo, the breath of the Maize God is represented as a spiraling conch shell (Fig. 1a; Saturno et al. 2005: 7–8, 12).

Many conch shell trumpets found in the archaeological record are decorated with incised images. These depictions often show an ancestor or a deity on the side, and occasionally, the inscriptions suggest that the tone produced by the conch shell is actually the voice and breath of the ancestor (Carter 2010: 126; Taube 2010b: 125). One such conch shell depicts an ancestor with a ‘breath-serpent’ in front of his face. A hole drilled at the mouth of the serpent would have allowed the musician to alter the tone of the conch trumpet, thus connecting the physicality of the trumpet with the depiction of the ancestor’s speech scroll. Covering the serpent’s mouth altered the tone of the instrument, thus indicating that the sound of the trumpet is meant to be the voice of the ancestor (Carter 2010: 126). A shell plaque, described by Zender (2010), shows a priest talking to a large conch shell, and out of the conch emerges “a serpentine head representing either the denizen of the shell or, perhaps, the embodied voice and spirit of the conch itself” (Zender 2010: 84). Such examples show that the conch shell is often associated with breath, and thus the wind of ancestral spirits and deities. The conch shell is often depicted alongside deities or spiritual creatures that are associated with wind. There is a strong connection between the plumed serpent, a creature of wind, and the conch shell, because the shell evokes the coiled

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Figure 1.a) Maize God with conch shaped breath scroll as depicted in San Bartolo murals. Drawing by Jared Katz (after drawing by Heather Hurst, in Saturno et al. 2005: 12, fig. 8a); b) Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl as depicted on page 36 of the Borgia Codex. Image Courtesy of Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt Graz (ADEVA), used with kind permission; c) Rattle with IK’ sign. Drawing by Jared Katz (after Taube 2004a: 73, fig. 3f); d) Drum with an IK’ sign. Drawing by Jared Katz (after Stone and Zender 2011: 89); e) Drum with sound being depicted as flowers representing wind or breath, from the Santa Rita murals. Drawing by Jared Katz (after Hammond 1972: 126).

A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form

a

b Figure 2. a) Classic period vessel depicting music and incense, dancer dressed as Maya Wind God. Rollout © Justin Kerr, The Maya Vase Database file no. K3247. Used with kind permission; b) Music and incense in the Dresden Codex being depicted in a similar way to reach the upper world. Drawing by Jared Katz after Dresden Codex, Page 34.

form of snakes and whirlwinds, and because the conch converts air, thus breath or wind, into sound (Taube 2001). Many depictions show Quetzalcoatl, the plumed serpent, wearing a conch shell, reaffirming this connection (Miller and Taube 1993; Taube 2001). During a later time period, in Central Mexico, the Wind God Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl often wears a cut conch shell, making the conch shell a key part of his garb (Fig. 1b; see also Miller and Taube 1993). Not only conch shells are associated with wind. Frequently, the wind sign, IK’, appears on musical instruments

(Fig. 1c; Taube 2004a: 73; Looper 2009: 159; Stone and Zender 2011: 89). As argued by Karl Taube, this could be due to the fact that wind was associated with a creative source that carries music (Taube 2004a: 72, 74). Flutes had a strong connection with wind. An excellent example is an Early Classic deer bone flute found in Oaxaca, dating to between 100–250 C.E (Barber et al. 2009). The flute bears an incised iconographic depiction along its shaft that shows a partially skeletal male figure facing toward the bell of the instrument (Fig. 3c). The skull is incised around

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c

b Figure 3. a) Maya Wind God. Drawing by Jared Katz (after Stone and Zender 2011: 174); b) Maya Wind God playing the drum from Madrid Codex. Courtesy of Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt Graz (ADEVA), used with kind permission; c) Iconography on Oaxacan flute. Drawing by Jared Katz (after Barber et al. 2009: 100, Fig 4).

one of the finger holes of the flute, thus connecting the figure directly to the actual physicality of the instrument, similar to the conch trumpet discussed earlier (Barber et al. 2009: 100). A long breath scroll representing the sound of the skeletal figure stretches from the skull towards the bell of the instrument, which is where sound emerges, thus demonstrating that the voice of the ancestor is also the voice of the flute. This again directly links music to breath, wind, and ancestors. Out of the breath scroll emerges a human face that wears the mask of the duck-billed Wind God (Fig. 3c; Barber et al. 2009: 99–100). Percussive instruments are also often associated with wind. The glyph for drum commonly contains an IK’ sign (Fig. 1d; Stone and Zender 2011: 89). There is also an image from the Santa Rita murals that shows a figure playing a drum (Hammond 1977: 127), and from the mouth of the drum stretches a chain of flowers, another symbol that is often used to represent wind or breath, thus relating the sound of the drum to wind and breath (Fig. 1e; see also Taube 2010a: 156–158). Karl Taube has also noted the connection between rattles and wind, and he discusses many instances of the Wind God playing rattles, some of which are marked with the IK’ sign (Fig. 1c; Taube 2004a: 74). Often times, rattles are shown with flowers or strips of paper on the top (Houston et al. 2006: 266). These flowers are used to draw a connection between wind and the rattles, because, as mentioned previously, flowers are often used to represent wind (Houston et al. 2006: 266).

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The significance between music and ancestor worship also serves to reaffirm the important relationship with wind. The Maya believed that their ancestors could not eat solid food because they were “not of the substance of which this world is made”, they are beings that are connected to wind (Ishihara 2008: 181; Taube 2001, 2004). Therefore, the ancestors could only consume offerings that were carried by the wind, such as the aroma of incense, flowers, and music (Ishihara 2008; Taube 2001, 2004a). Jane Hill (1992: 117) was the first scholar to describe the flowery sun filled abode where the ancestors and gods resided known as the Flower World. The Flower World is also a place of music, wind, and the breath soul (Taube 2004a, 2006). Again, the breath soul is often closely related to both music and the sweet aroma of flowers, because all three are ethereal and are carried by the wind (Taube 2004a: 72). Because of the close connection between ancestors and wind, music and incense were used in ceremonies to contact ancestors and deities in the Flower World, as depicted on a Classic Maya vessel and more clearly shown in a scene in the Dresden Codex, in which music and the smoke of incense are depicted in a similar way (Figs. 2a and 2b; see also Taube 2004a: 78). In addition to ancestors, there is a strong connection between various gods, wind, and music. As described by several scholars, including Andrea Stone, Marc Zender, and Karl Taube, the Maya Wind God is often shown as a young man wearing an IK’-shaped earspool, and a prominent flower on his brow or on his headband (Fig. 3a; Ishihara 2008: 178; Stone and Zender 2011: 175; Taube 2001: 109). The Wind God is also generally identified as the god of music, and he is

A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form

Figure 4. Scene from the West Wall, San Bartolo. Drawing by Heather Hurst, San Bartolo Regional Archaeological Project (after Taube et al. 2010: 105, Fig. 66); used with kind permission.

often shown with rattles and other musical instruments (Ishihara 2008: 178; Looper 2012; Taube 2001: 114–115; 2004a: 73–74). Classic Maya texts provide clear evidence that the Wind God was indeed the god of music, and at sites including Copan, Palenque, and Tikal, as well as in later Maya codices, there are either depictions of the Wind God playing musical instruments, or an epigraphic association between the Wind God and musical instruments (Fig. 3b; Taube 2004a: 73–74). In a conference presentation in 1995, Andrea Stone drew a comparison between the Maya Wind God and Xochipilli, the later Central Mexican god of music (see Houston et al. 2006: 152). The numerous depictions showing the Wind God performing music reaffirm the importance of the connection between wind and music. The Classic Maya had another form of the Wind God. This duck-billed Wind God, first identified by David Stuart (Stuart et al. 1999), is most likely related to the later Central Mexican Wind God Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl (Taube 2004b: 173, 2009: 43). This wind god is also shown in scenes of music and dance (Taube 2009: 43). In the mural paintings of Bonampak, a figure wearing a duck-billed mask stands amongst the musical group in Room 1 (Miller 2015). In Chichen Itza, there is a depiction of the duck-billed Wind God surrounded by music, which has lead Karl Taube (pers. comm. 2015) to argue that the duck-billed Wind God may also be a god of music. Later, in Central Mexico, there continued to be a connection between Ehecatl and music. The Aztec priests would strike a large drum at ceremonies held at wind temples in order to represent the voice of the Wind God (Durán 1971; Taube 2001: 114). In many Postclassic codices, duck-billed figures representing the Wind God are often shown playing rattles, drums, and other instruments (Looper 2009: 59–60; Taube et al. 2010).

Not only the Wind God was linked to both wind and music. The Maize God also serves as an excellent example of the connection between the two. The association between the Classic Maya Maize God and dance has been noted by many scholars, namely Karl Taube (Houston et al. 2006: 267; Looper 2009; Miller 1992; Taube 1985; 2009). Mary Miller argues that this connection is due to the fact that maize plants often sway in the wind, thus making it seem as if maize crops are dancing in the breeze (Miller 1992; Taube, pers. comm. 2014). Taking a phenomenological approach, it can be argued that if wind is present, the Maize God not only dances, but also produces music. If wind blows through a mature cornfield, the plants not only sway back and forth, but they also rustle against one another, creating a sound that is reminiscent of a shaking rattle. It is most likely for this reason that the ancient Maya often showed the mature Maize God with rattles when in the act of dancing (Fig. 8d). Michael Coe (pers. comm. 2014), argued that when the Maize God is depicted in the contortionist pose, it probably represents mature corn. When maize is mature, the Maya break the maize stalk and bend it over so that rain and moisture cannot enter into the ear of maize, just as the contortionist Maize God is shown with his feet and legs bent (Coe, pers. comm. 2014). The contortionist Maize God, therefore, represents a mature maize plant that would create a rustling sound when blowing in the wind. The Maize God thus demonstrates that when wind is present, he both dances and plays music. This section demonstrates that there are many clear connections between wind and music in the ancient Maya world. Many musical instruments are directly connected to wind in iconography, in part by having an IK’ glyph on the instruments. The discussion of the ancestors emphasizes that music is carried on wind, and thus nourishes as well as has the ability to contact the ancestors. Finally, the discussion of

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a

b

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Figure 5. a) Ceremonial warfare between Chaak and the wind god. Rollout © Justin Kerr, The Maya Vase Database, file no. K1365. Used with kind permission; b) Depiction of dancer with dance fan. Rollout © Justin Kerr, The Maya Vase Database, file no. K8947. Used with kind permission; c) Depiction of dancer with dance fan. Rollout © Justin Kerr, The Maya Vase Database, file no. K1439. Used with kind permission; d) Copan Sculpture 131 showing four musicians playing music in a quatrefoil cave. Drawing by Jared Katz (after Houston et al. 2006: 265, fig. 8.16).

the intersection between various gods and wind serves to emphasize that the Maya were making intentional connections between music and wind in their pantheon.

How Music Can Control Wind

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The Maya believed that music could actually be used to summon wind. A scene in the San Bartolo murals depicts just that, the use of music to summon wind (Fig. 4). The scene depicts the earth turtle with its carapace in the form of a quatrefoil cave (Taube et al. 2010: 72). Within the quatrefoil cave are Chaak, the god of terrestrial water, and the Maize God (Taube 2009: 48; Taube et al. 2010: 75). The two water gods are shown seated on either side, and in the center of the cave, the Maize God dances while striking a turtle carapace and shaking a rattle (Taube 2009; Taube et al. 2010: 72). It

has been noted that the turtle carapace is strongly connected with thunder, and therefore with rain and rain-making (Taube 2009: 48; Taube et al. 2010: 76). Edward Seler (1990: 281) noted that “the turtle shell is a natural drum […] The crashing of the storm, the thunder, is the celestial drum” thus reaffirming the connection between the turtle shell drum and rain. This scene probably depicts a rain dance, as has been argued previously, but in order to demonstrate how this connects to wind, we must first turn to other iconographic material. There is a series of at least twenty Late Classic Codex Style vessels that depict a mythic episode of the capture of the Wind God (Taube 2004a: 74–76). The scenes tend to follow a similar pattern. There are warriors, one representing an anthropomorphized version of the Rain God, the rest representing his retinue, and the warriors are capturing an unarmed young noble representing the Wind God (Fig. 5a;

A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form

Figure 6a. Origin story of music found in the Borgia Codex, Page 35. Image Courtesy of Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt Graz (ADEVA), used with kind permission.

Taube 2004a: 74–76). In this example Chaak can be idenThere is ethnographic as well as archaeological evidence tified by his knotted necklace (Taube 2004a: 74–76). There that demonstrates the connection between rain and wind, and are several key elements within this depiction demonstrating shows how music could be used to summon the wind. In the that it is not supposed to represent an actual mythic battle, but ethnographic record, wind and wind gods are inseparable rather a symbolic capture of the Wind God (Taube 2004a). from rain, because, as stated by Reiko Ishihara (2008: 178), Chaak and one of his retinue are each carrying what appears “wind and wind gods are the carriers of the rain deities to bring to be a shield, but could be a dance fan instead. This same rain of the fields”. Indeed, wind was viewed as the bringer of style of fans is depicted on many vessels with scenes of music rain and clouds (Schaafsma and Taube 2006: 270). Ishihara and ceremonial dances (Figs. 5b and 5c). The person behind (2008: 178) also states that in order to summon rain bringing Chaak’s retinue has his mouth wide open, but, as noted by winds, “contemporary Maya farmers whistle a tune”, thus Taube (2004a: 74), rather than representing a war cry, this demonstrating that music is still used to summon wind today. most likely represents the individual in the act of singing. Finally, all figures stand in terrestrial water (Taube 2004a: Archaeologically, many musical instruments have been 74). This scene, therefore, appears to be a ritual capture of the found within caves. A specific example is that many instruWind God conducted by the Rain God, because rain needs ments have been found within the main chasm on Chill Hill, wind in order to be blown over the fields. located at the site of Aguateca. An important attribute of

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Figure 6b. Origin story of music found in the Codex Borgia, Page 36. Image Courtesy of Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt Graz (ADEVA), used with kind permission.

Chill Hill is a natural phenomenon that occurs every half hour, in which thick clouds rise up from the Chasm (Ishihara 2008: 176). The Maya associated this natural phenomenon with the breath of the mountain as well as with concepts of wind. Due to occurrences such as this, caves were perceived as the source of wind, mist, clouds, and rain (Ishihara 2008: 177–178; Houston et al. 2006: 149–150; Schaafsma and Taube 2006: 236–237). Ethnographic work with the Tzotzil and Tzeltal Maya demonstrates that they still believe that clouds and wind originate in caves (Vogt and Stuart 2005: 164, 166, 171; Schaafsma and Taube 2006: 237). The Tzeltal Maya believe that hail, wind, and storms come from caves, but they see these as destructive forces (Vogt and Stuart 2005: 270–271). Pugh notes that caves in general are often connected with wind and breath, and that “winds move water from subterranean passages into the sky” (Pugh 2005:

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50). It, therefore, makes sense that in order to summon wind, ceremonies would have been held where the Maya believed wind originated. Many musical instruments have been found within the chasm at Chill Hill as well as cave features. Such instruments include drums, flutes, whistles, bone rasps, and turtle carapaces (Ishihara 2008: 179–181). It is clear that the Maya conducted pilgrimages to and ritual events in caves (Ishihara 2008: 179–181; McKillop 2004: 154; Vogt and Stuart 2005: 160). It is probable that the Maya played music in caves in order to summon the wind gods and the rain bringing wind, which is necessary for it to rain (Ishihara 2008). The scenes described above in which Chaak is shown ritually capturing the Wind God are, therefore, showing that in order to make rain, Chaak needs the rain bringing winds.

A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form

The depiction from the site of San Bartolo, a Late Preclassic mural dating to ca. the first century B.C. represents such a scene. Chaak and the god of standing water are shown (Fig. 4; see also Fig. 5a). The Maize God is shown dancing, singing, and playing music in a quatrefoil cave, similar to many later iconographic examples that show musicians playing music in quatrefoil caves in order to summon the Wind God and the rain-bringing wind (Fig. 5d). In the image from San Bartolo, everything present indicates that this scene is a rain dance, as has been previously argued (Taube 2009: 48–49; Taube et al. 2010: 76–77). Due to the strong symbolism of both music and wind in this depiction, I argue that this scene is showing the Maize God playing music in order to summon the Wind God, or wind, who would then carry Chaak over the fields in order to make it rain.

a The scene from the San Bartolo murals demonstrates that as early as the first century B.C., the Maya believed that music had the ability to summon rain-bringing winds. This is not the only example in the San Bartolo murals of linking music with wind. This belief continues up to contemporary times, as demonstrated by the fact that Maya farmers whistle for the explicit purpose of summoning winds. Many other iconographic scenes demonstrate that this belief was widespread in the Maya area, reaffirming the strong belief that music could indeed control the winds.

How Wind Brought Music into Our World

b Figure 7. Continuation of the origin story of music from Borgia Codex. a) Page 37; b) Page 38. Drawings by Jared Katz.

Now, entering into the final section of this discussion, the author argues that the Classic Maya believed that wind brought music into the terrestrial world. This argument is based on a classic Maya tripod vessel that depicts the Maya’s mythic origin story of music. To begin this discussion, we must first turn to a later Central Mexican Codex, the Borgia Codex, in order to detail a story depicted within the manuscript. Karl Taube (2001) was the first scholar to have argued that a series of images in the Borgia Codex depict the origins of music. On page 35 and 36 of the Borgia Codex, there is a depiction of two gods, Tezcatlipoca and Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl, who take a burning bundle from the night sun and bring it to the

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watery underworld. Once the bundle is placed in the underworld, it emits a spiraling wind that contains flutes, rattles, drums and other instruments in addition to flowers, birds and butterflies (see Figs. 6 and 7; see also Taube 2001: 114–115). The scene ends with the Stripe Eye form of Quetzalcoatl emerging from the mouth of Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl (Boone 2007: 192; Taube 2001: 114). This scene depicts the birth of music into the earthly realm. Music is born from the wind emerging from the burning bundle and is carried into our world by Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl, the god of wind, thus showing that Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl is the bringer of music (Taube 2001: 115). This scene demonstrates that in the Borgia Codex, wind and the Wind God are responsible for the birth of music into our world.

a

b

Taking a closer look at some of the specific scenes within this story can help to reveal further connections between wind and music. Taube (2004a: 88) has argued that the transformative agency of fire can reanimate mortuary bundles, often turning them into butterfly souls. When the burning bundle in the Borgia reaches the underworld, it becomes animate and is depicted with the same flute that Xochipilli, the god of music, is shown playing on the following page (Fig. 7; Taube 2001: 115). The wind emanating from the flute on the bundle is actually the breath of Xochipilli’s flute. Furthermore, the bundle is shown draped with the same fabric that Ehecatl is shown wearing earlier in the Borgia Codex, thus supporting the link between the Wind God, this bundle, and the birth of music (Fig. 8a,b). The final part of this story shows the birth of music, as it emerges from the mouth of Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl (Boone 2007; 190, Taube pers. comm., 2014). On the bottom of the same page, a baptismal scene is taking place. The baptismal scene shows a string of flowers representing music, which connects to the upper world where Tlaloc dances and Xochipilli plays his whistle in his house of flowers (Fig. 7; Taube 2001: 115). This shows that music being played in the earthly realm reaches the upper world. The string of flowers is akin to the flowers shown emerging from the mouth of the drum on the Santa Rita murals (Fig. 1e). The entire story then shows how music can reach every realm: the underworld, the terrestrial realm, and the upper world. The birth of music as depicted in the Borgia Codex is strikingly similar to a scene depicted on a Classic Maya tripod vessel located in the Miho Museum, Japan. Stone and Zender (2011: 89; see also Fig. 8d) describe this scene by stating that “[...] soothing sounds represented by iconic blossoms and buds

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Figure 8. a) Bundle from which music emerges in the Borgia Codex. Image Courtesy of Akademische Druck- und Verlagsannstalt Graz (ADEVA), used with kind permission; b) Depiction of Ehecatl whose garb is the same fabric that wraps the bundle. Drawing by Jared Katz, based on Borgia Codex, Page 19; c) Strpie Eye emerging out of the mouth of Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl carrying music into the terrestrial world. Drawing by Jared Katz based on Borgia Codex, Page 38; d) The Maize god bringing music into terrestrial world. Drawing by Jared Katz (after Zender 2004: 87); e) Flower road depicted on the North Wall, San Bartolo. Drawing by Heather Hurst, San Bartolo Regional Archaeological Project (after Saturno et al. 2005: 16, Fig. 12); used with kind permission.

e

A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form

emerge from an IK’ marked drum and rattles played with extraordinary dexterity by an acrobatic musician. Bearing the distinctive tapered forehead and tonsure of the young Maize God, he partakes in a scene of verdant paradise, surrounded by flowers, birds, acrobats and musicians”. This scene depicts the Maize God, playing rattles and a drum, emerging from the mouth of a serpent that is surrounded by flowers. The scene depicted on the classic Maya tripod vessel is similar to the depiction in the Borgia Codex (Figs. 8c and 8d). In the Borgia Codex, music is born out of wind, surrounded by flowers and bird elements, emerging from another world, and carried into the earthly realm through the mouth of Ehecatl-Quetzalcoatl. On the Maya vessel, the Maize God is shown emerging from the mouth of a serpent. The serpent is a creature that is directly connected to the concept of breath and wind in the Maya world (Houston and Taube 2011: 21–22; Taube 2003: 422–423; Taube 2001: 108; 2010a: 172). Serpents are also directly connected to the celestial paradise, Flower World (Hill 1992; Taube 2001; 2003; 2004a; 2010a). Serpents often times form the flower roads, or the paths that lead away from Flower Mountain, as depicted on the murals of San Bartolo (Fig. 8e; Saturno et al. 2005: 25, Taube 2006: 156) and as shown on the frieze recently found at the site of Holmul (Francisco Estrada-Belli, pers. comm. 2014). Throughout the scene depicted on this Classic Maya vessel there are flowers. In the upper left hand corner a glyphic representation of a flower is shown with breath scrolls emanating from it (Fig. 8d). Flowers, as previously discussed, are also strongly connected to music, wind, the life force contained in breath, the soul, and of course to the concept of Flower World (Hill 1992: 117; Taube 2001: 103; 2004a: 69; 2010a: 156). It seems that the Maya vessel depicts Flower World and a flower road. The Maize God is, therefore, emerging from another world, probably the flowery paradise, carrying music, just as the Stripe Eye form of Quetzalcoatl is shown emerging from another realm into the terrestrial realm carrying music. The remainder of the iconography found on the Classic period tripod vessel helps to strengthen this argument. Marc Zender (2004: 194) argues that the stepped undulating body of the celestial serpent found in the center of the scene is in fact the façade of the Flower Mountain, strengthening the argument that the mouth of the serpent, from which the Maize God emerges, could be intended to represent the flower road that leads to or from the Flower Mountain (Fig. 9). He also points out that to the left of the scene the young Wind God, who is also the god of music, sits on the celestial serpent while playing two rattles (Zender 2004: 193). Throughout the entire scene are iconographic depictions of beauty, music, and growth (Zender 2004: 193). On the opposite end of the scene is the depiction discussed previously, the Maize God emerging from a wind serpent. The serpent from which the Maize god emerges stretches through the entire scene and is the same serpent on which the Wind God is sitting (Zender 2004: 193). Zender notes that the serpent represents the wind and breath soul of the cosmos, and states that “this serpent is at once the conduit and the inspiration for the music played by all these important deities” (Zender 2004: 193). Finally, a

hieroglyphic inscription on the serpent states that the serpent is the wak ik’ chan ch’een or the “celestial spring of the six winds” (Zender 2004: 193–194). This vessel, therefore, shows that not only is music brought into this world surrounded by symbolism of breath and wind, but also that music emerges from the mouth of the serpent named the “celestial spring of the six winds”. The flowers surrounding the scene on the Maya vessel are indicative of breath, wind, and Flowery Paradise. Finally, the Maize God, in his contortionist dance pose, plays musical instruments. As noted above, when wind blows, maize not only dances, but makes music. Therefore, the Maize God dancing and playing rattles is evoking the image of mature maize blowing and rustling in the wind. The Classic period vessel then shows music emerging from another world, carried and surrounded by wind, and played by a god that has a strong connection to wind. Due to the similarities between this scene and the scene in the Borgia Codex in which music is born, the author argues that this Classic Maya tripod vessel in the Miho Museum depicts the Maya’s mythic origin story of music, and does indeed show that in Maya mythology, music was born from wind and delivered into our world by means of the wind. This also indicates that the Classic Maya shared a very similar origin story in regard to music as depicted in the Borgia Codex, highlighting the significance of this myth. The Aztec origin story for music is also very similar. As noted by several scholars including Both and Taube, the Aztecs believed that drums were actually former court singers who resided at the house of the sun, but were stolen by Tezcatlipoca and delivered to earth in their present form (Both 2007; Taube 2001). In another version, according to the “Histoyre Du Mechique,” (quoted in Bierhorst) music was taken from the sun by Ehecatl, the Wind God: “…Having arrived, the wind god called to them [one of four musicians staying with the sun] with a song, and one of them immediately answered it and went off with him, carrying the music that they perform to this day in their dances in honor of their gods.” (Bierhorst 1985: 21). All three of these origin stories involve gods, all of whom have a direct connection with wind, venturing into other worlds in order to retrieve music. In both the Borgia Codex and in the Aztec case music is retrieved from the Sun God, in the Maya case music is retrieved from Flower Mountain; a celestial solar paradise of ancestors, wind, and flowers. All stories highlight the connection between music, wind, deities, and ancestors. Returning to the Classic Maya, there is other evidence that helps to demonstrate that the origin story of music may have been a widely recognized myth. On a Classic Maya vessel (K8947) a group of musicians emerges from a large stylized Witz monster (Fig. 10). The latter is covered with stone markings that are generally used to designate mountains (Stone and Zender 2011: 139; Montgomery 2002: 270). The maw also has a number of flowers surrounding it, thus likely indicating representations of Flower Mountain. The musicians, being guided by Chaak, are walking out of the mouth of Flower Mountain while playing a drum, rattles, and a turtle carapace. This could possibly be a ceremony recreating the birth of music into our world as it has many strong

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Figure 9. Classic period Maya vessel depicting the origin story of music, housed in the Miho Museum, Japan. Drawing by Jared Katz (after Zender 2004: 87).

connections to the scene shown on the Classic period vessel, and to the scene in the Borgia Codex. In sum, based on the variety of images found in the Maya world, it seems that in Maya mythology, music was born into the terrestrial realm from another world, namely the flower paradise. Wind is often shown surrounding music as it is brought into our world, thus reinforcing that the Maya, just like later central Mexican cultures, believed that wind both created music and brought it into the terrestrial realm.

Conclusions In conclusion, this essay has brought together the work of numerous scholars in order to help emphasize the connection between music and wind in the Maya area. The first section demonstrated that many instruments were connected with wind, and some instruments, such as drums and other per-

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cussion instruments, were actually marked with the IK’ sign in order to indicate that they were musical instruments. Also, several deities associated with wind, including the Wind God and the contortionist Maize God, are often shown playing music. It has further been demonstrated that the Maya believed that music could be used to control wind. Ceremonies were often held in caves in order to summon rain-bringing winds. Music was a key component in these ceremonies and several instances in the ethnographic, archaeological, and iconographic record demonstrate the belief that music could summon rain-bringing winds. This article focused on the depiction from the San Bartolo murals in order to provide a slightly different interpretation of this scene. It has long been argued that this scene demonstrates an early form of the rain dance, but more specifically, the dance was meant to summon the winds, thus demonstrating that the Maya believed music could call the wind as early as the first century B.C.

Figure 10. Depiction of a ceremony recreating the birth of music on a Classic period Maya vessel. Rollout © Justin Kerr, The Maya Vase Database, file no. K8947. Used with kind permission.

A Blustery Melody: An Analysis of the Classic Maya’s Use of Music as a Mediatory Art Form

Figure 9 (continued)

Finally, this study demonstrated that the scene from the Classic Maya tripod vessel in the Miho Museum depicts a similar creation story of the origin of music as found in the Borgia Codex. The vessel shows how wind brought music into the earthly realm from the celestial realm of ancestors. This essay, therefore, has demonstrated that not only are music and wind connected to one another, but the Maya believed wind created music and brought it into the terrestrial world, and that, once here, music could summon the rain bringing winds. This strong link between music and wind was – and continues to be – widespread throughout Mesoamerica as many cultures seem to have had similar beliefs.

Hammond, Norman 1972 Classic Maya Music. Cambridge: Centre of Latin American Studies, University of Cambridge. Hill, Jane 1992 The Flower World of Old Uto-Aztecan. Journal of Anthropological Research 48: 117–144. Houston, Stephen, David Stuart and Karl A. Taube 2006 The Memory of Bones: Body, Being, and Experience among the Classic Maya. Austin: University of Texas Press. Houston, Stephen and Karl Taube 2011 The Fiery Pool: Water and Sea among the Classic Maya. In: Christian Isendahl and Bodil Liljefors Persson (ed.), Ecology, Power, and Religion in Maya Landscapes. Markt Schwaben: Verlag Anton Saurwein.

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Both, Arnd Adje 2007 Aztec Music Culture. The World of Music 49 (2): 91–104. Carter, Nicholas 2010 Catalogue entry 43. In: Daniel Finamore and Stephen D. Houston (eds.), Fiery Pool: The Maya and the Mythic Sea, pp. 126. New Haven: Peabody Essex Museum in association with Yale University Press. Durán, Diego (edited and translated by F. Horcasitas, and D. Heyden) 1971 Books of the Gods and Rites and The Ancient Calendar. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.

McKillop, Heather 2004 The Ancient Maya: New Perspectives. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. Miller, Mary 1992 The Image of People and Nature in Classic Maya Art and Architecture. In: Richard F. Townsend (ed.), The Ancient Americas: Art from Sacred Landscapes, pp. 158–169. Chicago: The Art Institute of Chicago. 2015 A Feathered Plate for the Afterlife. In: In the Realm of the

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Vision Serpent: Decipherments and Discoveries in Mesoamerica. Los Angeles: California State University at Los Angeles. Miller, Mary and Karl A. Taube 1993 An Illustrated Dictionary of The Gods and Symbols of Acncient Mexico and the Maya. New York: Thames & Hudson. Montgomery, John 2002 Dictionary of Maya Hieroglyphs. New York: Hippocrene Books, INC. Pugh, Timothy W. 2005 Caves and Artificial Caves in Late Postclassic Maya Ceremonial Groups. In: Keith M. Prufer and James E. Brady (eds.), Stone Houses and Earth Lords: Maya Religion in the Cave Context, pp. 47–69. Boulder: University Press of Colorado. Robicsek, Francis and Donald Hales 1981 The Maya Book of the Dead: The Ceramic Codex. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. Saturno, William A., Karl A. Taube, David Stuart and Heather Hurst 2005 The Murals of San Bartolo, El Petén, Guatemala: Part 1: The North Wall. Ancient America 7. Barnardsville: Boundary End Archaeology Research Center. Schaafsma, Polly and Karl A. Taube 2006 Bringing the Rain: An Ideology of Rain Making in the Pueblo Southwest and Mesoamerica. In: Jeffrey Quilter (ed.), A Pre-Columbian World: Searching for a Unitary Vision of Ancient America, October 6th and 7th 2001, pp. 231–285. Washington D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks. Seler, Edward (edited by John Eric Sidney Thompson and Francis B. Ricardson) 1990 Collected Works in Mesoamerican Linguistics and Archaeology. Culver City: Labyrinthos. Stone, Andrea 1995 The Nik Name of the Codical God H. Presentation held at the 94th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, Washington D.C. Stone, Andrea and Marc Zender 2011 Reading Maya Art: A Hieroglyphic Guide to Ancient Maya Painting and Sculpture. New York: Thames & Hudson. Stuart, David, Stephen Houston and John Robertson 1999 Recovering the Past: Classic Maya Language and Classic Maya Gods. Austin: Maya Workshop Foundation. Taube, Karl A. 1985 The Classic Maya Maize God: A Reappraisal. In: Merle Greene Robertson and Virginia M. Fields (eds.), Fifth Palenque Round Table, pp. 171–181. San Francisco: The Pre-Columbian Art Research Institute. 2001 The Breath of Life: The Symbolism of Wind in Mesoamerica and the American Southwest. In: Viriginia M. Fields and Victor Zamudio-Taylor (eds.), The Road to Aztlan: Art from a Mythic Homeland, pp. 102–123. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art. 2003 Maws of Heaven and Hell: The Symbolism of the Centipede and Serpent in Classic Maya Religion. In: Andrés Ciudad Ruiz,

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Mario Humberto Ruz Sosa and Ma. Josefa Iglesias Ponce de León (eds.), Antropología de la eternidad: La muerte en la cultura maya, pp. 405–442. México: Sociedad Española de Estudios Mayas/Centro de Estudios Mayas, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. 2004a Flower Mountain: Concepts of Life, Beauty, and Paradise among the Classic Maya. RES Anthropology and Aesthetics 45 (Spring): 69–98. 2004b Olmec Art at Dumbarton Oaks. Washington D.C: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library Collection. 2006 Climbing Flower Mountain: Concepts of Resurrection and the Afterlife at Teotihuacan. In: Leonardo López Luján, David Carrasco, and Lourdes Cué (eds.), Arqueología e Historia del Centro de México: Homenaje a Eduardo Matos Moctezuma, pp. 153–170. Mexico City: Instituto Nacional De Antroplogía E Historia. 2009 The Maya Maize God and the Mythic Origins of Dance. In: Geneviève Le Fort, Raphaël Gardiol, Sebastián Matteo and Christophe Helmke (eds.), The Maya and their Sacred Narratives: Text and Context in Maya Mythologies, pp. 41–52. Markt Schwaben: Verlag Anton Saurwein. 2010a At Dawn’s Edge: Tulúm, Santa Rita, and Floral Symbolism in the International Style of Late Postclassic Mesoamerica. In: Gabrielle Vail and Christine Hernández (eds.), Astronomers, Scribes, and Priests: Intellectual Interchange between the Northern Maya Lowlands and Highland Mexico in the Late Postclassic Period, pp. 145–191. Washington D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks. 2010b Catalogue No. 42: Conch trumpet with a floating ancestor. In: Daniel Finamore and Stephan D. Houston (eds.), Fiery Pool: The Maya and the Mythic Sea, pp. 125. New Haven: Peabody Essex Museum in association with Yale University Press. 2015 The Initial Series Group at Chichén Itzá Yucatan: Recent Studies and Interpretations. Presentation held at In the Realm of the Vision Serpent: Decipherments and Discoveries in Mesoamerica. A Symposium in Homage to Linda Schele. April 10–11, 2015. Los Angeles: California State University at Los Angeles. Taube, Karl A., William A. Saturno, David Stuart and Heather Hurst 2010 The Murals of San Bartolo, El Petén, Guatemala Part II: The West Wall. Ancient America 10. Barnardsville: Boundary End Archaeology Research Center. Vogt, Evan Z. and David Stuart 2005 Some Notes on Ritual Caves among the Ancient and Modern Maya. In: James E. Brady and Keith M. Prufer (eds.), In the Maw of the Earth Monster: Mesoamerican Ritual Cave Use, pp. 155–185. Austin: University of Texas Press. Zender, Marc 2004 Catalogue No. 34: Tripod Vessel. In: Ancient Civilization of the Americas Splendor of 3000 years, pp. 86–88, 193–194. Shigaraki, Japan, Miho Museum. 2010 The Music of Shells. In: Daniel Finamore and Stephen D. Houston (eds.), The Fiery Pool: The Maya and the Mythic Sea, pp. 83–85. New Haven: Peabody Essex Museum in association with Yale University Press.

Maíz y atole son su trono: K’awiil y la Montaña del Sustento Rogelio Valencia Rivera Universidad Complutense de Madrid

Abstract K’awiil, one of the major gods among the Prehispanic Maya, appears represented on capstones, especially in the Northern Lowlands of Yucatan. These images represent abundance of food, as they are often quoted with the epithets ox wi’il, ‘a lot of food’, or waaj ha’, ‘bread and water’, meaning feast. In the vast majority of these images K’awiil appears carrying bags filled with seeds, especially maize or cacao. In some occasions, these images appear together in a single building, conferring it with some special meaning. This chapter tries to explain the presence of these capstones in a building provided with some specific characteristics. In particular, the study focuses on the information coming from Structure A-1 in Dzibilnocac, where many capstones representing K’awiil were found along with a pair of cornerstones which depict K’awiil and provide epigraphic information that validates the interpretation of this building as the Sustenance Mountain, a place described in many Maya and Mesoamerican creation myths.

Resumen K’awiil, uno de los principales dioses entre los mayas prehispánicos, aparece representado con frecuencia en tapas de bóveda, sobre todo en la región norte de la península de Yucatán. Estas imágenes representan la abundancia de alimento pues regularmente aparecen con epítetos que representan dicha abundancia, tales como ox wi’il, “mucha comida”, waaj ha’, “comida y bebida” y otros. En la mayor parte de dichas representaciones aparece junto a bultos llenos de semillas que regularmente son de maíz, o de cacao. En algunas ocasiones, varias de estas tapas aparecen en el mismo edificio, dotándolo de una cierta significación. El presente artículo pretende dar una explicación a la presencia de este conjunto de representaciones en conjunto con otras características del edificio donde están localizadas. En particular la Estructura A-1 del sitio de Dzibilnocac, en el cual aparecieron, junto a varias tapas de bóveda, representaciones de K’awiil en los esquineros del edificio, los cuales aportan información adicional que sustenta la tesis de este trabajo, la cual consiste en definir al edificio como la montaña de la que proviene el sustento, lugar que aparece descrito en varios mitos de la creación en el área maya.

 El mito de la Montaña del Sustento Uno de los soportes artísticos en los que más aparece representado el dios K’awiil es en las tapas de bóveda, elemento que sirve de cierre para los techos de las estructuras mayas abovedadas (Fig. 1).

tapa de bóveda de la Estructura 6 Ajaw (Fig. 2a) (Carrasco et al. 1999) o algunas tapas de bóveda procedentes de Caracol, Belice (Chase y Chase 1987: 15, 43; Chase y Chase 1998: 313), las cuales fueron encontradas en cuartos empleados como tumbas.

Dentro de la cultura maya existió la tradición de decorar las piedras con las que se cerraba la bóveda de los cuartos de los edificios. La decoración de dichas piedras se realizaba principalmente mediante la pintura, aunque existen algunos otros ejemplos, como los de Kiuic, Calakmul, Xculoc o Mopila, en que las piedras eran labradas. Aunque esta es una tradición especialmente empleada en las Tierras Bajas del norte de la península de Yucatán, no es exclusiva de esa región, tal y como lo permiten comprobar algunos escasos ejemplos provenientes de Calakmul, como es el caso de la

Una de las principales funciones de las tapas de bóveda era el registrar la fecha en la que se realizaba el cierre o terminación de la estructura en la que se colocaban. Tal es el caso de las tapas de bóveda de Caracol (Fig. 2b), las cuales registran con el verbo mahkaj, ‘se cerró’, la fecha de finalización del cuarto empleado como tumba (Chase y Chase 1987: 43, 1998: 313). Éste es, a su vez, un uso bastante extendido en las Tierras Bajas del norte de la península, tal y como se puede verificar en las tapas de bóveda procedentes de Ek Balam, como las tapas 1 y 2 que indican la fecha del cierre

Rogelio Valencia Rivera

Figura 1. Localización de una tapa de bóveda (en color naranja) dentro de un cuarto abovedado (Dibujo de Alejandro Villalobos).

de la habitación o cuarto perteneciente a un tal Tz’ihb’am Tuun, con la expresión: mahkaj u way, ‘se cerró su cuarto’ (Lacadena 2003: 24–28). Otra función de las tapas de bóveda, no tan usual como la anterior, es la de dar nombre a la estructura que las contiene. Tal es el caso de la tapa de bóveda proveniente de Calakmul

(Fig. 2a), la cual posee la inscripción: 6 ajaw naah, ‘la casa 6 Ajaw’ (Carrasco et al. 1999). Pero quizás la función más importante de este elemento decorativo fue la de emplear dichas tapas como indicadores o favorecedores de abundancia alimenticia (García Campillo 1998) pues, además de estar ilustradas, los textos que las acompañan son muy similares a los augurios positivos que aparecen en los códices mayas (Fig. 3). Tal y como muestra la Tapa de bóveda 3 de Dzibilnocac (Fig. 3), el conjunto de augurios más empleados en las tapas consiste de las siguientes expresiones: Ox wi’il, ‘abundante alimento’.

a

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b

Figura 2. Tapas de bóveda procedentes del Petén maya. a) Tapa de Bóveda de la Estructura 6 Ajaw, pro- [Ti’] waaj [ti’] ha’. Difrasiscedente de Calakmul (Fotografía de Rogelio Valencia Rivera); b) Tapa de bóveda procedente de la Tumba mo que literalmente significa de Estructura L3, Caracol, Belice, fechada para 9.9.0.16.17 2 Kaban 15 Wo (Chase y Chase 1987: 43). ‘alimento y bebida’, pero que

Maíz y atole son su trono: K’awiil y la Montaña del Sustento

en su conjunto posiblemente signifique ‘banquete’ (Christophe Helmke, comunicación personal 2011) o “festín” (Albert Davletshin, comunicación personal 2011). Haciendo un análisis más detallado de la expresión, Érik Velásquez (comunicación personal 2011) piensa que TI’-WAJ TI’-HA’ puede tener una interpretación más compleja y que se trata en realidad de un difrasismo WE’-UK’ o WE’-UCH’, “comer-beber”, cuyo significado finalmente es abundancia de víveres. A veces, aparece esta expresión simplificada como waaj ha’. [u] T24-ajaw-T24. Este es un augurio positivo que, en el Códice de Dresde, casi siempre va asociado a Itzamnaaj y cuya lectura no es aún fiable. Ox b’olon waaj, ‘innumerables tamales’. Ib’, ‘Semillas’ (Tokovinine 2014). Kakaw, ‘Semillas de cacao’. #-k’an-yax.

Figura 3. Tapa de Bóveda 3 de Dzibilnocac (Dibujo de Christian Prager).

a

También suele ser representado un símbolo compuesto por un número y las palabras k’an ‘amarillo’ y yax ‘verde’. Estas dos palabras crean un difrasismo que tiene el valor de abundancia (Hull 2012: 100–103). Fray Thomás de Coto (1983) tiene varias entradas en su diccionario que definen este término, tales como: “Para significar prosperidad usan de este nombre

b

Figura 4. a) Tapa de Bóveda del Museo de Filadelfia (Dibujo de Simon Martin); b) Vasija K3801 (Fotografía de Justin Kerr).

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q’anal y raxal’ (1983: 29), ‘Ah q’an ah rax, estos nombres significan abundancia de bienes y riquezas, y que no falte cosa alguna, con abundancia de gusto y contento’ (ibid. 67), ‘q’anal raxal, bienes de fortuna” (ibid. 68). Como bien indica Stuart (2005: 100) en relación a la combinación yax-k’an que aparece formando parte del logograma TZ’AK, tiene que ver con el ciclo total de crecimiento de las plantas, al plantear la dicotomía maduro-inmaduro. Un aspecto intrigante acerca de este difrasismo es que en ocasiones aparece como ik’-k’an, o k’an-ik’, como en la Tapa de Bóveda del Museo de la Universidad de Filadelfia (Fig. 4a). En esta tapa de bóveda, un enano que acompaña a K’awiil lleva el símbolo en sus manos. Esto podría apuntar a un error del escriba, pero no es el único caso. En un cajete tipo balanza del Clásico Temprano (Fig. 4b) se puede apreciar que K’awiil lleva en sus manos de nuevo este símbolo compuesto por el número siete y los signos k’an e ik’. Es muy probable que esto se refiera a la maduración, y por consiguiente, con la abundancia de cacao, planta con la que K’awiil tiene una estrecha relación. También en Coto (1983: 368) se dice lo siguiente en relación al color negro, q’ek: ‘ponerse alguna cosa negra dicen. Y esto es el cacao cuando lo asolean, o los plátanos que ponen a secar al sol, las vainillas, etc.’ Y en relación al color amarillo q’an: ‘Usan también (esta palabra), por ponerse amarillas las frutas duraznos, peras, y de toda fruta que madura y sazona, aunque no tenga el color amarillo’. De cualquier manera, el difrasismo tiene una connotación de riqueza, abundancia y prosperidad, y como lo demuestra el cajete, estos conceptos se asocian a K’awiil desde épocas muy tempranas de la historia de la cultura maya.

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Figura 5. K’awiil con alas y acompañado de un enano, Tapa de Bóveda 1 de Sacnicte (Acuarela por Walter Lehmann, 1926, tomado de Mayer 1986: 32, Abb. 7).

García Campillo realizo un análisis detallado de las expresiones empleadas en las tapas de bóveda y se aproxima a una conclusión a la que también se llega en el presente análisis, la de que son textos propiciatorios, o más bien, rogatorios, que pretenden solicitar o favorecer una gran abundancia de alimentos y no solo son pronósticos asociados a las fechas de las tapas (García Campillo 1998: 310-319). Además de indicar dichos textos, estas tapas fueron regularmente ilustradas con imágenes de dioses entre los que se encuentra el Dios del Maíz, pero sobre todo, se ilustran con la imagen del dios K’awiil (Carrasco y Hull 2002: 26–27; García Campillo 1998: 302; Mayer 1983, 2014, 2015). K’awiil suele representarse sentado en un trono cubierto con piel de jaguar y frente a canastas o bultos rellenos de semillas, lo cual sabemos porque a veces dichos bultos aparecen con secciones transparentes para dejar ver su contenido. En ocasiones, K’awiil sostiene los bultos abiertos y de ellos sale gran cantidad de semillas, como si los estuviera vaciando. En otras representaciones sostiene lo que parecen ser canastas o platos repletos de semillas. A veces dichos platos contienen el signo de tamal, o waaj, y en otras ocasiones estos tamales aparecen en sus manos o a su alrededor (ver Fig. 3). Los bultos que se ilustran en las tapas de bóveda se asemejan a los que llevan los mercaderes para transportar mercancías. Dichos bultos suelen además llevar una marca con la cantidad de semillas que contienen, casi siempre con múltiplos de

Figura 6. K’awiil con alas, Tapa de Bóveda del Templo de la Lechuza (Dibujo de Simon Martin).

Maíz y atole son su trono: K’awiil y la Montaña del Sustento

8000 (pik) y en ocasiones marcas como ox-bolon-waaj, ‘tres-nueve-tamal’, indicando grandes cantidades de alimento. Otras veces, K’awiil aparece de pie con todos los elementos antes mencionados a su alrededor, siendo representado ya sea con su usual pie de serpiente o con ambos pies antropomorfos sin modificación alguna. En algunas representaciones aparece acompañado por un enano (Mayer 1986). Suele aparecer a la izquierda de K’awiil en actitud de hablar con él o de ayudarle en la tarea que está realizando (ver Figs. 4a y 5).

El ave K’awiil Pero quizás lo más intrigante de las representaciones de K’awiil en el corpus de las tapas de bóveda sea que éste aparece adornado con grandes tocados de plumas y específicamente con plumas por todo Figura 7. Tapa de Bóveda 6 de Dzibilnocac, donde se muestra el logograma WAJ, waaj, el cuerpo, especialmente en los brazos a ‘tamal’, como el trono sobre el que se encuentra sentado el dios K’awiil, que además posee modo de alas (ver Figs. 5, 6 y 7). plumas en los brazos y un pico de ave (Fotografía de Rogelio Valencia Rivera).

a

f b

c

d

e

Figura 8. K’awiil con forma de ave, a) Plataforma del Osario (Schmidt 2007); b) Variante del logograma K’AWIL con plumas en la cabeza, Chichén Itzá, Estela del Caracol (Dibujo de Alexander Voss); c) Estela Merriam (Fotografía cortesía del Museo De Young); d) Dintel Central de la Estructura 4B1 de Sayil (Pollock 1980: 123, fig. 255c); e) Mural 1, Estructura 5, pared interior, lado este de Tulum (Miller 1982: Plate 28); f) Tapa de bóveda de Uxmal (Dibujo de Martine Fettweis).

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a

c

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b

d

Figura 9. K’awiil transformándose en ave. a) Tapa de Bóveda 4 de Ek Balam (Lacadena 2003); b) Tapa de Bóveda 19 de Ek Balam (Lacadena 2003); c) Tapa de Bóveda 7 de Ek Balam (Lacadena 2003); d) Tapa de Bóveda de Uxmal, Museo Nacional de Antropología México (Fotografía de Rogelio Valencia Rivera).

Maíz y atole son su trono: K’awiil y la Montaña del Sustento

a

b

c

Figura 10. Menciones a una advocación aviaria de K’awiil en textos del Clásico. a) Copán, Detalle Banqueta Templo 9M-158 (Fotografía de Dmitri Beliaev); b) Panel del Templo de la Cruz Foliada, detalle (Dibujo de Linda Schele); c) Elemento 2/93, Balunté 770 – 850 d. C. (Fotografía de Ángel Sánchez Gamboa, cortesía del proyecto de Catalogación de Incensarios de Palenque, INAH).

En la Tapa de Bóveda 6 de Dzibilnocac (Fig. 7) K’awiil tiene unas enormes alas y tiene el pico de un ave en la cara, pero manteniendo la mandíbula inferior, es decir se encuentra en un proceso de transformación. Ya en otras representaciones tardías K’awiil aparece como un ser alado, tales como en las pinturas de Tulum donde apa-

a

rece en el extremo de una banda celeste, lugar generalmente ocupado por un ave y donde se le muestra con alas y con garras semejantes a las de un ave predadora (Fig. 8e). También aparece ya transformado en pájaro (Fig. 8a) en la Terraza superior de la Plataforma del Osario de Chichén Itzá (Schmidt 2007) y con alas en los dinteles de la Estructura 4B1 de Sayil (Fig. 8d), una tapa de bóveda de Uxmal (Fig. 8f) y con alas y

b

Figura 11. Tapa de Bóveda 2 de Dzibilnocac. a) Dibujo de Teobert Maler; b) Dibujo de Christian Prager.

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acompañado de pájaros en la Estela Merriam, en el Museo De Young en San Francisco, procedente de Hecelchakan (Fig. 8c). La forma de ave de K’awiil es tan importante en Chichen Itzá, que posee una advocación llamada Yax uk’uk’um K’awiil (Boot 2005; Grube, Lacadena y Martin 2003: 40–42; Stuart 1997), ‘K’awiil de las plumas verdes’ y quizás debido a la influencia de esta advocación, el logograma con el nombre del dios presenta plumas y pico (Fig. 8b). Pero es en el corpus de las tapas de bóveda donde podemos apreciar una gran cantidad de representaciones de K’awiil con plumas y alas, y donde apreciamos que en la narrativa mítica asociada a K’awiil éste acaba transformado en un ave. Esta transformación se puede apreciar muy bien en las tapas de bóveda de Ek Balam, en las que primero se presenta a K’awiil con alas y después con cuerpo de ave, pero aún con la cara de la deidad, en la que se aprecia el elemento flamígero saliendo de su frente (Fig. 9).

Pero es muy posible que el estado final de la transformación sea Yax Kokaaj? Mut, la advocación aviaria de Itzamnaaj (Fig. 9d), que en textos del Clásico aparece como Kokaaj K’awiil y que durante la Colonia es denominado Itzamnaaj K’awiil (Valencia Rivera 2011). Asimismo, la advocación aviaria de K’awiil no sólo aparece en las Tierras Bajas de la Península de Yucatán, sino que también tenemos evidencias de su presencia más al sur, ya que también se le menciona en otros textos (Fig. 10), tales como el de la Banqueta Templo 9M-158 de Copán donde se menciona el nombre del gobernante copaneco K’ahk’ Yipyaj K’awiil Mut CPN ajaw o el texto del Panel del Templo de la Cruz Foliada, donde se puede leer: ...yax muut k’awii[l] winik uux ahaal k’uh ch’ok unen k’awiil, ‘el ave verde K’awiil Winik, el dios tres veces aparecido, el joven bebé K’awiil’, así como en imágenes procedentes de Palenque, como en la parte superior del incensario de la Fig. 10c, donde se puede apreciar a K’awiil transformándose en un pájaro, al haber perdido parte de las piernas y los brazos y surgir un ala de su espalda. Esta ave jugará un papel muy importante en las subsecuentes fases de la narrativa mitológica contenida en las tapas de bóveda, pero para poder analizar este aspecto, debemos determinar dónde se encuentra K’awiil y hacia dónde se dirige.

Donde habita K’awiil

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Figura 12. Esquinero de Bóveda 1 de Dzibilnocac (Fotografía de Rogelio Valencia Rivera; dibujo de Guido Krempel).

El lugar donde se encuentra K’awiil dentro de las representaciones de las tapas de bóveda, ya sea de pie o en su trono, es identificable por algunos escasos ejemplos de tapas que muestran algún detalle relacionado con la localización de la escena, como en la Tapa de Bóveda 2 de Dzibilnocac (Fig. 11). En ésta aparece K’awiil rodeado por rostros, que Zender (2008) ha identificado como la representación de una montaña. O como en la Tapa de Bóveda del Templo de la Lechuza en Chichén Itzá (Fig. 6), donde se le muestra con un signo de aguada a sus pies, similar al de la Tapa de Bóveda de San Francisco (Carrasco y Hull 2002), donde aparece el Dios del Maíz sentado dentro de otro signo de aguada. Esto nos permite inferir que la escena donde se representa a K’awiil está localizada dentro de una montaña y que el recinto donde se encuen-

Maíz y atole son su trono: K’awiil y la Montaña del Sustento

Como parte de los trabajos de recuperación del sitio de Dzibilnocac después del paso del Huracán Isidore por la Península de Yucatán (Carrasco y Boucher 1985: 60–62; Carrasco 2002; Sánchez López y Anaya 2006), fueron localizados un par de esquineros de bóveda (Figs. 12 y 14) en la primera subestructura de la Estructura AI de este sitio (véase también Mayer 2015). Ambos monumentos presentan a K’awiil de nuevo sentado frente a un trono, con un plato con tamales en la mano y frente a él un bulto con el numeral 12 pik. La inscripción que acompaña a K’awiil en uno de los casos es muy importante porque nos permite comprender porqué K’awiil se encuentra ahí (Fig. 12). La inscripción dice lo siguiente1: a-AL?-ya 1-OK-CHAN-na K’AWIL K’UH u-tz’a-ma PIK-TE’ WAJ alay jun ook chan k’awiil k’uh, u tz’am pikte’ waaj ‘Aquí está el dios K’awiil de un pie de serpiente, su trono son 8000 tamales’.

1 Los esquineros de bóveda de Dzibilnocac fueron presentados por primera vez, junto con su lectura, en el XIX Congreso Europeo de Maysitas (19. EMC) de Bratislava en 2014 por el autor del presente artículo. De manera independiente, Guido Krempel también publicó su lectura en dos ocasiones (Mayer 2015: 144; véase también Mayer 2014: 100) y ambas lecturas coinciden en su mayor parte. Figura 13. Tapa de bóveda en la bodega del INAH en Campeche procedente de Dzibilnocac (Fotografía de Rogelio Valencia Rivera).

tra debe ser una cueva, o una aguada dentro de la misma. Otro elemento que nos permite contextualizar el espacio donde se desarrollan los eventos descritos en las tapas de bóveda es el enano que acompaña a K’awiil (ver Figs. 4a y 5). De acuerdo con varios investigadores (Houston 1992; Prager 2002; Storniolo 2009), los enanos son seres que representan el interior de la tierra, donde suelen habitar y en ocasiones llevan marcas de kaban, ‘tierra’ en sus ropas. Con el fin de determinar porqué K’awiil, un dios que muchos investigadores consideran como una entidad celeste, dados los epítetos con los que se le suele nombrar en las claúsulas nominales de los gobernantes mayas, aparece dentro de una montaña y más específicamente dentro de una cueva, vamos a emplear un conjunto de inscripciones que nos pueden aportar información más detallada al respecto.

Figura 14. Esquinero de Bóveda 2 de Dzibilnocac (Fotografía de Rogelio Valencia Rivera; dibujo de Guido Krempel).

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En el texto, es muy probable que el numeral ‘8000’ implique una gran cantidad de comida, no exactamente esa cantidad de tamales. A pesar del nombre que porta K’awiil en estas representaciones, en ninguno de los dos esquineros aparece con un pie de serpiente, lo cual es muy interesante, ya que parece ser que K’awiil podría tener advocaciones de las que el pie de serpiente no forma parte. Aunque la palabra ook parece nombrar no sólo al pie sino también a la pierna: tzotzil: ok, ‘pie, pierna’ (Weathers y Weathers 1949: 21), en algunos diccionarios parece aludir sólo al pie: tzotzil: ta yolon yok, ‘debajo de los pies’; ta lajuneb kok, ‘con los diez dedos de mis pies’ (Laughlin 2007: 227), en tzotzil colonial: ok, ‘pie, cabo’ (García de León 1971: 63). Un posible ejemplo en el periodo Clásico de esta referencia al pie proviene de un plato hallado en Dos Pilas que hace referencia a un gobernante de Motul de San José (Demarest et al. 1992). El plato es llamado en la inscripción como k’ahn ookwante’, que significaría ‘plato tetrápodo’ (Lacadena en Velásquez 2009a: 56). En las imágenes de K’awiil, la serpiente sustituye solamente al pie, pero debido a que ambas piernas poseen escamas semejantes a las de los reptiles, se ha asumido que es toda la pierna la que representa al ofidio, pero en la misma Fig. 12 podemos apreciar que los brazos de K’awiil también poseen dichas escamas. El factor importante a tomar en consideración es entonces la presencia o ausencia del pie, el cual es el que es sustituido por la serpiente y de ahí que le de preferencia a esta traducción y no a la de ‘pierna de serpiente’ en este texto. La identificación correcta de la frase nominal para K’awiil se pudo realizar gracias a otra tapa de bóveda proveniente de Dzibilnocac (Fig. 13), recientemente publicada por Karl Herbert Mayer (2014: 100) y leída por Guido Krempel, donde aparece el mismo nombre para K’awiil2. Esta tapa de bóveda fue fotografiada junto con los esquineros y en ella aparece K’awiil con un pie de serpiente y esparciendo semillas. Concuerdo en la mayor parte de la lectura propuesta por Guido Krempel para este monumento: 1-OK-ki CHAN-na K’AWIL?-la? K’UH jun ook chan k’awiil k’uh, ‘El dios K’awiil de un pie de serpiente’. El segundo esquinero (Fig. 14), aunque con algunas lagunas, ahonda en la misma idea que el anterior, pues su texto menciona que cacao, atole y tamales son el trono de K’awiil: ka-wa u-? yu-la ?-tu-? u-WAJ lu u-tz’a-ma kakaw u… yuul?… u waaj [u]l u tz’am ‘... kakaw … su atole, su tamal, su trono…’ Una muestra gráfica de la naturaleza del trono de K’awiil lo podemos apreciar en la Tapa de Bóveda 6 de Dzibilnocac (Fig.

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2 Este mismo apelativo para el dios K’awiil aparece en el Dintel 1 de H’wasil (Pallán y Benavides 2012: 149), agradezco a uno de los revisores anónimos de este capítulo la mención a esta inscripción.

Figura 15. Fachada del Edificio A1 de Dizibilnocac donde se muestra donde fueron encontrados los esquineros de bóveda (Carrasco y Boucher 1985).

7), donde se puede ver al dios K’awiil sentado en su trono, el cual esta formado por el logograma WAJ, waaj, ‘tamal’. Lo que este conjunto de inscripciones nos indican es que estos son los dominios del dios K’awiil, esta es su corte y todo lo que se representa a su alrededor son sus posesiones. Su trono está conformado por todos los bienes de que dispone y sobre todo de alimento. Aunado a esto, el enano que lo acompaña además de representar el interior de la tierra, actúa como cortesano de K’awiil, de forma similar a como lo haría en el exterior de la montaña, acompañando a los gobernantes en los eventos que ocurren en la corte (Houston 1990). Algo que también tiene especial relevancia en esta narrativa, ya que nos encontramos en realidad en una corte de la cual K’awiil es el máximo responsable y que se localiza dentro de la montaña.

La Montaña del Sustento Ya Carrasco y Hull, en su trabajo de 2002, habían determinado que el cuarto abovedado hace las veces de la aguada representada en la tapa de bóveda que lo cubre y lo equiparaban con la tortuga de la que sale el Dios del Maíz al renacer, situando a K’awiil como un cooperante en dichas labores de renacimiento. Resulta interesante notar que el término para escribir aguada en el maya Clásico es idéntico al usado para nombrar a un cuarto o recinto: way. Parece que más allá de una coincidencia, hay una clara relación cultural entre ambos elementos. Coincido con estos autores en que la habitación actúa como una cueva o una aguada dentro de la montaña, pero no para representar a una tortuga, sino para conformar un espacio mitológico y arquitectónico específico, el de la Montaña del Sustento, lugar que representa o sintetiza la idea detrás del origen mitológico de los alimentos en varios mitos mesoamericanos.

Maíz y atole son su trono: K’awiil y la Montaña del Sustento

En su trabajo acerca de las tapas de bóveda, García Campillo (1998: 320) se dio cuenta de que éstas suelen aparecer en grandes cantidades en determinados edificios, tales como el de Las Monjas en Chichén, con 20 ejemplos, y el Palacio de Santa Rosa Xtampak, con 11 ejemplos. Dicho investigador indicaba que dichos edificios pudieran tener una función específica debido a la marcada presencia de dichas tapas. Tal es el caso de la Estructura A1 de Dzibilnocac (Carrasco 2002; Carrasco y Boucher 1985; Nelson 1973: 15) con más de 203 ejemplos de tapas de bóveda y esquineros (Fig. 15). Estos edificios tienen en común, junto a la Estructura A1 de Dzibilnocac, la presencia de una fachada zoomorfa que representa las fauces de la tierra (Carrasco 2002: 29), es decir, la entrada a la montaña . Si cada cuarto representa una cueva o una aguada, el edificio en su conjunto representa a la montaña donde se encuentran los alimentos, la mítica montaña de los mantenimientos, el Paaxil de las narraciones que aún perviven entre los mayas. De acuerdo con varios autores (Navarrete 2002; López Austin y López Luján 2004), existen gran cantidad de mitos, incluidas narraciones contenidas en el Popol Vuh y diferentes Títulos de las Tierras Altas de Guatemala, que hacen referencia al lugar mitológico donde fue hallado el maíz, una montaña llamada Paaxil para los mayas, o Tonacaltepetl entre los nahuas, que contenía gran cantidad de semillas, especialmente de diversas variedades de maíz. En el relato, los hombres no conocen su localización y le piden ayuda a una gran variedad de animales para localizarla. Cada mito cuenta con uno o varios animales que se ofrecen a realizar la búsqueda, entre los cuales se encuentran el cuervo, el pájaro carpintero, las hormigas, el zorro, el gato montés el mono o la ardilla y otros más que dependen de la versión del mito. Una vez hallada la montaña y, al no poder abrir la cueva donde se encuentra el maíz por hallarse cerrada por una piedra, los hombres llaman al rayo para que la destruya. Éste accede a hacerlo, con lo cual los hombres pueden acceder a los alimentos. Si bien estos mitos describen el lugar donde se hallan los alimentos, no nos indican nada acerca de quién es el poseedor o poseedores de los alimentos contenidos en la montaña. Simon Martin (2006) y Marta Ilia Nájera Coronado (2011), de manera independiente en sus investigaciones acerca del origen mitológico del cacao, nos hablan de un pasaje en el Chilam Balam de Chumayel que hace referencia a una deidad llamada Bolon Dzacab. Aunque Eduard Seler (1904: 26–35) identificó a esta deidad con K’awiil, identificación que ha sido ampliamente apoyada por varios investigadores (Valencia Rivera 2011, 2016). En una parte de esta narración se hace referencia a un evento mitológico en el que se describe la confrontación entre Oxlajun Ti K’u y Bolon Dzakab, en la cual Oxlajun Ti K’u es humillado y Bolon Dzakab toma semillas de varios tipos, las envuelve y se las lleva al decimotercer estrato del cielo. Martin además de identificar a K’awiil 3 No se tiene cuenta exacta de la cantidad de tapas de bóveda que proceden de Dzibilnocac, pero hay una en la bodega del INAH de Campeche con el número consecutivo 26, por lo que se prefiere emplear el término impreciso de ‘más de 20’.

como la deidad que se lleva las semillas al cielo, identifica a Oxlajun Ti K’u como el Dios L, deidad con la que K’awiil está muy relacionado. El Dios L, deidad relacionada con el comercio y muy particularmente con el cacao (Martin 2006), es un ser ubicado en el inframundo, es decir, dentro de la montaña. Es quizás debido a que tanto K’awiil como el Dios L son los poseedores de los bienes localizados en su interior, que aparecen representados juntos con asiduidad. Ambos son muy parecidos a los Kanhel (Landa 1986: 64; Barrera Vásquez 1980: 296) que podemos encontrar en las descripciones de los mitos asociados a las montañas narrados por los habitantes de las Tierras Altas de Chiapas. Pitarch (1996: 100) describe a estos personajes como los dueños de todos los bienes que se localizan en el interior de las montañas. Algunos de estos seres son rayos, pero los hay de diversas formas, destacando uno por ir siempre con sombrero y pidiendo cigarros, siendo éstos atributos del Dios L (Ruz 1983: 434). Los kanhel son seres que en los libros del Chilam Balam tienen que ver con el aire y que ayudan a Chaahk a traer las lluvias. Landa menciona en su relación a estos seres como los que portan los sacerdotes en las ceremonias de Fin de Año, uno de los cuales es Bolon Dzacab. Seler (1904: 26–35) determina que Bolon Dzacab es K’awiil pues al comparar las páginas del Año Nuevo del Códice de Dresde con la descripción de Landa, se da cuenta que K’awiil sustituye a ésta deidad. Por otra parte, el investigador Braakhuis en un trabajo reciente (2019), presenta una asociación de la mitología del Dios del Maíz del área maya, con la tradición mitológica de la Costa del Golfo, en donde al Dios del Maíz se le llama Homshuk. Dentro del mito del Homshuk, hay una parte en la que viaja a buscar a su padre al país de los truenos, lugar donde habitan los seres que son poseedores de la riqueza alimentaria, pues son los dueños del maíz. Los truenos llegan a un acuerdo con Homshuk para que use el maíz para alimentar a los hombres y se comprometen a traer la lluvia a tiempo para que crezca. Si tomamos estas ideas en su conjunto y las aplicamos a lo que nos muestran las diversas tapas de bóveda que representan a K’awiil, podríamos crear una narrativa que sería la siguiente: K’awiil es el trueno que custodia las semillas y es quien tiene que negociar con los dioses de las lluvias para que puedan ser empleadas por los hombres. Es el custodio de los bienes en la montaña, donde se encuentra su trono. Estas deidades tendrían su equivalente dentro de la cosmovisión maya en los Kanhel, de los cuales K’awiil forma parte. Estas deidades viven en las montañas y son las poseedoras de los alimentos. Debido a una disputa con otro Kanhel, el Dios L, K’awiil decide sacar las semillas de donde se localizan y las lleva al cielo transformado en ave. Es muy probable que dicha ave sea una deidad cuyo nombre fue empleado por gobernantes mayas desde el periodo Clásico y que aparece aún en textos coloniales como Itzamnaaj K’awiil. Es bien conocido que una de las principales advocaciones del dios Itzamnaaj es un ave y

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ésta aparece también representada en tapas de bóveda, sobre una banda celeste, siendo posiblemente el último paso en la transformación de K’awiil para llevar las semillas al cielo (Fig. 9d). Una vez ahí, los alimentos quedan a la disposición de los seres humanos, motivo por el que acuden a K’awiil para que favorezca su abundancia. Sería así, a través de la mediación de un dios transformado en animal, que los seres humanos adquieren los alimentos, tal y como lo reflejan una gran cantidad de mitos aún en la actualidad (Navarrete 2002).

Conclusiones Hemos podido apreciar como ciertas estructuras dentro de las ciudades mayas tenían como objetivo la rememoración de los eventos a través de los cuales los hombres habían obtenido los alimentos por parte de los dioses. Dentro de estas estructuras, los cuartos representan cuevas o aguadas donde se localizaba el alimento. Dentro de los cuartos se colocaban tapas de bóveda pintadas o labradas en las que se representaban los diversos eventos que conformaban el mito de la salida de las semillas desde el inframundo hasta los cielos, manteniendo de esta forma viva la memoria de dichos eventos mitológicos e intentando favorecer la renovación de la abundancia de alimento al principio de la creación de los mismos mediante la intermediación del dios responsable de llevarlos a los cielos, K’awiil. Este tipo de rememoración sería muy similar a la recreación de espacios de carácter mitológico en otras culturas, tal y como dentro de la cultura nahua se construía el Templo Mayor con el fin de rememorar el mito fundacional del nacimiento de Huitzilopochtli en el Coatepetl (López Austin y López Luján 2004). La narración mitológica nos permite saber que los alimentos contenidos dentro de la montaña pertenecían a un dios muy particular, a K’awiil. Dentro de la montaña K’awiil tiene su trono, el cual estaba constituido por todo el alimento contenido dentro de la misma y ahí estaban su corte de enanos y sus dominios. De esta forma podemos apreciar como K’awiil forma parte de un conjunto de deidades llamadas Kanhel cuya misión era la de ayudar al dios Chaahk, en cualquiera de sus formas, a traer las lluvias, paso necesario para la regeneración y renacimiento de todas las plantas en general y del maíz en particular.

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K’awiil sería una deidad que actuaría como el mediador entre la deidad del maíz y las deidades del agua y de la lluvia, consiguiendo el compromiso por parte de estas últimas para que el agua llegara en el momento preciso a alimentar el crecimiento de las plantas, tal como se describe en las diversas variantes del mito de Homshuk. Sería a su vez quien llevaría la abundancia alimenticia a los hombres y estaría en constante confrontación con otros kanhel que también utilizan el alimento pero con otros fines, como el Dios L, dios patrono del comercio y del cacao, dando pie a una relación muy estrecha de ayuda y antagonismo entre ambas deidades que habrá que estudiar con mayor detenimiento. Toda esta evidencia fortalece cada vez más la imagen de K’awiil como un dios

asociado a la abundancia y a la transformación, pero sobre todo, lo vuelve asociar a los kanhel, algo que sobre lo que ya había llamado la atención otros investigadores (De la Garza 1986; Velásquez 2009b), al indicar que existe una amplia tradición historiográfica que asocia a K’awiil con estos seres.

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UNDERWORLD: REPRESENTATIONS, ENVIRONMENTS AND INHABITANTS

Watery Underworld or Realm of the Rain Deities? The Aquatic Environment of the Tonsured Maize God H. Edwin M. Braakhuis Utrecht University

Abstract After a critical look at the prevalent concept of a ‘Watery Underworld’, with its implied focus on Hun-Hunahpu, the case is made for the concept of a Mayan ‘Tlalocan’ inhabited by the dead and intimately connected to the maize god as a culture hero. The aquatic dead are likely to have included the king as well as the officials and priests involved in the water management of the kingdom. Ethnographic sources reveal the presence of the dead, and particularly of dead rainmakers, in the terrestrial waters. Aquatic iconography is shown to be more in keeping with the idea of a Mayan ‘Tlalocan’ inhabited by the dead than with that of a ‘Watery Underworld’. The Tonsured Maize God functioned as a prototype of the king in exercising power within this aquatic realm.

Resumen Tras de una mirada crítica al concepto prevaleciente de un “Inframundo Acuático”, con su enfoque implícito en Hun-Hunahpu, se plantea el concepto de un “Tlalocan” maya habitado por los muertos e íntimamente conectado con el dios del maíz como héroe cultural. Es probable que los muertos acuáticos hayan incluido al rey, así como a los oficiales y sacerdotes involucrados en la gestión del agua. Las fuentes etnográficas señalan la presencia de los muertos dentro de las aguas terrestres, entre ellos los hacedores de lluvia muertos. Se muestra que la iconografía acuática está más en consonancia con la idea de un “Tlalocan” maya habitado por los muertos que con la de un “Inframundo Acuático”. El dios del maíz tonsurado funcionó como un prototipo del rey en el ejercicio de poder dentro de este reino acuático.

¿Por qué me desenterraste del mar? – Rafael Alberti

The abundance of aquatic motifs on Maya ceramics encountered in burials, caches or out of archaeological context is often explained in terms of a ‘Watery Underworld’, an expression that has become an archaeological catchword for all kinds of aquatic fauna and paintings found in tombs, as well

as for scenes on friezes. This ‘Watery Underworld’ refers not merely to pools and rivers in the limestone underground, but more precisely to pools and rivers in a dark and grim aquatic underworld inhabited by the souls of the dead, akin to Xibalba. It is the relevance of this Popol Vuh-derived concept that is at issue.1 1 In the Popol Vuh, Xibalba is conceived as a subterranean realm inhabited by deities that cause sickness and death. It is not,

H. Edwin M. Braakhuis

‘Watery Underworld’ versus Tlalocan as a Realm of the Dead In the standard work on aquatic iconography, Nicholas M. Hellmuth (1987: 2, 356–357) used the non-interpretive term “surface of the underwaterworld” to refer to an environment inhabited by all kinds of aquatic creatures, as well as by certain heroes and deities. However, in Michael D. Coe’s foreword to the same book (p. 345), the term was construed as “the watery underpinnings of Xibalba.” More or less simultaneously, Schele and Miller (1986: 267–300) formulated a ‘Watery Underworld’ view focused on a single representative of the dead, namely the king (or rather his soul), transported by a canoe and sinking into the waters of Xibalba. In a reformulation (Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993: 112, 267ff), the king was recognized to be the Tonsured Maize God, the presumptive equivalent of Hun-Hunahpu. Since this Classic ‘Hun-Hunahpu’ was assumed not only to have died in the underworld, but also to have been resuscitated from it, aquatic scenes from the maize deity’s iconography were reinterpreted accordingly. Such scenes include his voyage in a canoe, as well as his encounter with naked women standing in the water and his emergence from a turtle carapace (ibid.: 92–93). The theory of a descent into a ‘Watery Underworld’, based on the parallel between the destiny of Hun-Hunahpu (viewed as the maize deity) and that of the king, also figures in a recent overview of Classic Maya funerary customs (Fitzsimmons 2009: 22, 35–36, 50, 68–71). Although widely accepted, the evidence for the ‘Watery Underworld’ theory is less than conclusive. The assumption that the canoe with the maize deity is disappearing below the water rests largely on a debatable interpretation of a handful of bone and flint artifacts. The two critical bone engravings from Tikal’s burial 116 (Schele and Miller 1986: 270, Fig. VII.1) are exceptional among the canoe scenes of the Tonsured Maize God, and the possibility that the engraver was led by the restrictions imposed upon him by the irregular shape of the material at hand does not appear to have been considered.2 As it stands, these scenes might just as well depict a paddler “guiding a canoe through rough water which hides the bow” (Trik 1963: 12, Fig. 4). Another piece of evidence (Schele and Miller 1986: 271; 286, Plate 114), an eccentric flint, shows only a vague resemblance to a canoe; instead of one maize deity passenger, it has anthropomorphic lightnings on all sides, and no paddlers.3 The scenes with the women are, in several cases, glossed in general terms as ‘entering the water’ or ‘entering the road’, but tend to be narrowly interpreted however, explicitly described as an abode of the dead. 2 It is noteworthy that in the four Tikal canoe scenes illustrated by Kelley (1976: 234–235) –including the ones discussed here– a row of water symbols invariably follows the lower contour of the bone’s engraved surface. In the two specific cases at hand, the divergent depiction of the canoe together with the row of water symbols makes it appear that some of the animals are going down, an impression belied by their unaltered arrangement and manner of gesticulation.

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3 The surmised canoe is further assumed to have been personified as a ‘Celestial Monster’.

as referring to the deity’s death and entry into the ‘Watery Underworld’ (e.g., Helmke 2012: 111). I believe a generalized view of the waters as akin to an underworldly reign of Xibalba to be much too restrictive. As I have shown elsewhere (Braakhuis 1990, 2009), equating the Tonsured Maize God with Hun-Hunahpu is questionable, and consequently so too is the associated concept of a ‘Watery Underworld’. Moreover, there are cogent reasons to assume that the ancient Maya myth of the Tonsured Maize God should be considered as another, and more extensive, version of contemporary Gulf Coast maize hero tales (Braakhuis 2009, 2014; Chinchilla Mazariegos 2011). Together, the Gulf Coast tales constitute the only Mesoamerican mythological complex to feature a specifically male maize deity and to incorporate conspicuous turtle symbolism. The great importance it assigns to the rain deities’ realm (lakes, rivers, lagoons, and the sea ruled by thunders and lightnings) is echoed in the iconography of the Tonsured Maize God and his Late-Preclassic predecessor. I therefore suggest that, with the Tonsured Maize God for a starting point, we take a wider view of Mayan aquatic imagery and the role played in it by the dead. This approach allows a fuller account of the ideological importance that the sea once had for the Maya (Finamore and Houston 2010). Instead of ‘Watery Underworld’, I will use the explanatory concept of a Mayan ‘Tlalocan’, the realm of the rain deities4 and of the aquatic dead. This realm subsumes but is not limited to subterranean waters.

The Concept of ‘Tlalocan’ The concept of ‘Tlalocan’ does not hold a prominent place in recent Maya scholarship. This is all the more surprising given that iconographically, representations of the rain and lightning deities abound and that aquatic head markers with a snout similar to that of the rain deity feature in many scenes. An exception is Taube (2010b: 215) who, in arguing his case of a Mayan celestial solar paradise, noted that among Huastec and Sierra Nahuat, there is a “merger of the eastern sea with the dawning sun and paradise,”5 the eastern sea being conceived as a paradisiacal afterlife region not unlike the Aztec Tlalocan. It may be noted that according to one informant, the maize hero’s home is precisely there, “on the other side of the pond (where the sea falls), where the sun goes up, the

4 The term ‘rain deities’ (or ‘pluvial deities’) is here used in the general sense of deities responsible for the aquatic cycle. They thus include the deities of the terrestrial waters and the sea, the lightnings, and the clouds, as well as their ophidian transformations. 5 As a matter of fact, in many representations the sun deity is assimilated to the lower aquatic, rather than to the upper celestial realm (e.g., Hellmuth 1987: 176, Fig. 359 and 283–286; Houston 2010: 74, Fig. 14; K114; K1485; Schele and Miller 1987: 206–207, Plate 73). In addition, the floral border that, following Taube, should denote the celestial road of the Sun, also adorns the well-known Río Hondo bowl with its exclusively aquatic iconography.

Watery Underworld or Realm of the Rain Deities? The Aquatic Environment of the Tonsured Maize God

wearing the attributes of the aquatic powers (e.g., the Waterlily Pad Serpent; Coltman 2015) and sitting in state in their abodes. Indeed, already at the end of the Preclassic period, ceremonial centers like that of Izapa were designed as stages where the king and his officials could ritually enact their roles within the aquatic domain (Guernsey 2010b: 207–221). As will presently be noted, there are indications that by having represented the rain and water deities, the king and his functionaries were thought to continue their water-giving activities in the afterlife. Particularly when shown enthroned within a quadrifoil turtle or crocodile (Guernsey 2010a: 82; Taube et al. 2010: 72–75), in the heart of the waters, the king may function as an ancestral ruler who, together with his retinue of dead human beings, governs the sea (Fig. 1). This concept is exemplified by the role still played in contemporary Central Mexican ethnometeorology by the ancient king of TexcoFigure 1. A King of the Sea. Altar 1, El Peru (Drawing by Linda Schele; FAMSI Schele co, Nezahualcoyotl (Lorente y Fernández 2011: 91–92, 121–123, 188–191; 2012: drawing 7623). 73–76, 84). The dead Nezahualcoyotl not dead rise” (Chevalier and Bain 2003: 204). The Tlalocan of only fulfills the role of an otherworldly ‘King of the Sea’, but also installs a new levy of invisible human ‘water masters’ contemporary Nahua speakers along the Gulf Coast includes lagoons and subterranean lakes or ‘seas’, “heavily populated (ahuaque) each year. In such a way, these ‘water masters’, with the souls of the dead” (Knab 2004: 111). Such local man- partly recruited through drowning, reproduce in the afterlife the former social class of the royal water managers. 7 Similarifestations of an all-encompassing ‘Tlalocan’ can, both along the Gulf Coast and among the Mayas, be conceived as par- ly, the Huastec assume the four earth carriers to be drowned humans who are replaced each year from the ranks of the adises full of fruit trees.6 Moreover, the subterranean world newly drowned – drowning being but a stereotypical form is often believed to be in communication with the sea, much of recruitment into a pluvial function – while the former inas the subterranean and lagoon paradises are mirrored by an cumbents retire to the eastern sea paradise of the aged thunder eastern sea paradise (Braakhuis 1990: 132–134; 2014: 16). deity, Muxi’ (Alcorn 1984: 57). As another ‘King of the Sea’, To the Aztecs, of course, Tlalocan is the watery, partly this deity may also have recruited and installed them. The four subterranean realm communicating with the sea and includ- human earth carriers appear to play the roles of the rain-bringing a paradise where the rain deity assembled the dead he had ing deities known to the Yucatec Mayas as the Bacabs (cf. claimed by way of drownings, strokes of lightning, and so on. Taube 1992: 97), who had likewise been installed in their positions (Landa, in Tozzer 1941: 135). Within a quadripartite Yet, the conception of the aquatic dead as it has come down organization, such men may, in the pre-Spanish past, have octo us may be too narrow, for it seems reasonable to suppose that persons were also assigned to the realm of the rain deity cupied important positions in the water management and the rain cult. Maya iconography actually shows young officials by virtue of having represented or otherwise served him. In cast in the roles of the Bacabs (Jackson 2013: 126–129), as the upper echelons, this would include such persons as the water managers responsible for irrigation (cf. Fash 2010), well as of other rain deities and rainmakers.8 the rainmakers and aquatic nahuales (cf. Braakhuis and Hull 2014), as well as the priests directing the rain deities’ cult. First among these aquatic and pluvial functionaries is the king himself who, among the Maya, is commonly shown 7 The term ahuaque ‘water master’ is elsewhere paral6 Examples are the great lagoon of Tamiahua, repository of all seeds (Reyes García 1976: 127); the cave where the Koy river rises, deep inside of which there is, according to a Huastec tradition, a paradisiacal garden full of fruit trees (Gutiérrez de Sánchez 1993: 169); and a cave in the Tojolabal area, reached by way of a subterranean stream, where an otherworld full of fruit trees awaits (MacLeod and Puleston 1979: 73).

lelled by apianih ‘caretaker of the water’ (Reyes García et al. 1976: 127), terms that appear to designate water management functions and to refer without distinction to human beings and to deities.

8 Young Bacab (God N) impersonator: Palenque throne supports, Pomona Panel 1 (Stuart 2005: Fig. 4), Laxtunich Lintel 4 (Jackson 2013: Fig. 34). Young rain deity (God B) impersonator: K521, K1250. Young rainmaker with lightning deity (God K) leg (cf. Braakhuis and Hull 2014: 451–452): K3367, K9205.

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Figure 2. Twenty ancestors flanked by aquatic skulls. Copan Str. 11 bench panels (Drawing by Linda Schele; FAMSI Schele drawing 1105).

The Dead in the Aquatic Cycle The notion of the dead living in aquatic bodies, rivers, and the sea and often playing the role of the rain and lightning deities and their assistants has been reported from several Mesoamerican groups. These include the Lacandon Maya, who believed that the dead entered a cliff at the shore of Lake Mensabäk to join and serve the rain deity after which it is named (Boremanse 1986: 73–77). Inside the lake’s cliffs, particularly in the Mensabäk cliff shrine itself, human skeletal remains have in fact been found, together with offerings of marine shell (Palka 2014: 229, 285–289; cf. 21). As regards the Huastec Maya, Stresser-Péan (2008: 76– 79) tells of beliefs concerning the transport of ancestors to the sea. Struck by lightning, these ancestors had been converted into the assistants of the supreme lightning deity living in the eastern ocean, “where the sun rises.” In order to bring the rains, these transformed ancestors travel through the sky from the sea to the mountains of the interior. Finally, however, “having passed their life’s summit [...] the lightning deities are forced to return all the way down. They follow the waters that are still in their charge, rise to the surface through the limestone springs welling forth at the foot of the mountains, and slowly return to the eastern sea.” The rivers and the sea are thus inhabited by the dead, a notion we already came upon in the case of the drowned Huastec men assuming the role of earth carriers.9 In the same vein, the Totonac perceive certain noises coming from a swollen river as signals that the drowned are at work for the supreme sea deity, Aktsini’ (Ichon 1973: 130). The cyclical transformation of the dead set out by Stresser-Péan partly coincides with beliefs reported from the Chontal of Oaxaca. These specifically concern nahuales, or men who, among the Chontal and Zapotec of Oaxaca (Carrasco 1988: 657–658), are considered capable of transforming into water serpents and lightnings in order to bring the rains. According to Oseguera (2003: 233), the Chontal believe that, “the naguales only live in the mountains, particularly those that have marshes or wells. Their life cycle reaches its peak when they grow old, a phase signaled by their emergence from the ‘enchanted place’ where they used to live. When they start to leave the marshes, the naguales cause the mountains to spill the water contained by them and to flood the river shores, so as to glide into their streams and reach the depths of the sea.” The destiny of the dying nahuales is, however, connected more generally to the way the Chontal conceive death: “Every Chontal is literally ‘looking’ to the sea upon dying. The burials in the cemeteries of the mountain and coastal communities confirm that the deceased are disposed

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9 This is further illustrated by a Huastec tradition (Alcorn et al. 2006: 604) concerning ancestors building a house in the middle of the sea for the supreme thunder deity, Muxi’.

of in such a way that, on ‘rising’ from their burial place, they can head for the sea without having to return to the village” (Oseguera ibid.). This generalized idea could also explain why, for the southern Zapotec, the deity of the ocean was also the god of the souls of the dead (Weitlaner 1964: 561). In accord with the Chontal model, the Tepehua living in the middle reaches of the Gulf Coast believe that the dead visiting their descendants arrive from the eastern ocean. As described by Williams García (1963: 225–227), on the Day of the Dead the ancestors are ushered in by a couple of Old Ones carrying lightning staffs and accompanied by a musician striking a turtle carapace. The male Old One (perhaps the aged thunder deity) declares that he brings the dead. At the same time, the Old Ones behave as if they bring in many shrimps, “to allude to their eastern origin,” the shrimps apparently representing the dead. Finally, all attributes (including the carapace drum) are put on an improvised raft in a stream and sent back to where they came from. Consistent with this picture, a Tepehua shaman would put a paper cutting of a skeleton under a stone in the river in order to prevent the spirit of a recently deceased from returning (Gessain 1952: 201).

The Classic Mayan Tlalocan as an Ancestral Abode In the case of the Classic Maya, the marine fauna remains included in burials testify to what has been called a “strategy to equate mortuary space with the sea” (Stone and Zender 2011: 141). Iconographically, the aquatic realm of the dead is commonly designated by rain deity-like heads topped by what may be sea sponges, sea anemones, or, perhaps, corals. In these as in many other cases, the ‘Watery Underworld’ is actually marked as the upper zone of a marine world. In what I take as references to the presence of the dead, rain deity-like head markers often display a skeletal lower jaw, while the aquatic flowers issuing from their heads can show human faces (Cancuen Panel 3, see Finamore and Houston 2010: 86; K1218; see Coe 1982: 26–27). These partly skeletalized rain deity head markers are sometimes replaced by human skulls resting at the bottom of the water and covered by sea sponges or similar creatures and waterlilies, as if belonging to an aquatic cemetery.10 The row of twenty ancestors depicted on Copan’s Temple 11 bench panels (Fig. 2), for example, is framed by such aquatic skulls, covered by funereal ‘centipede serpent’ jaws in addition to waterlilies. It is a distinct possibility that the dead in the sea, or rather their souls, are further represented by the jade heads, figu10 For a discussion of actually existing ancient Maya aquatic cemeteries, see Tiesler (2005: 342–344, 355–357).

Watery Underworld or Realm of the Rain Deities? The Aquatic Environment of the Tonsured Maize God

on his garment and an aquatic flower tied to the head, like one of the four young Bacab impersonators of Pomona Panel 1 (Stuart 2005: 3, Fig. 4); in the water below is a skull. Assisted by a noblewoman, the young man emerges from a snail or conch shell.14 The composition of the scene is reminiscent of Yaxchilan’s lintel 25, with its emerging ancestral Tlaloc impersonator looking down on an attendant queen holding a skull adornment. The young man on the vessel may represent a ‘water master’ who had been living among the servants of the rain deities.15

Figure 3. Snail shell with royal ancestress. Alabaster vase from El Peru Burial 61 (Photo courtesy El Perú Waka Regional Archaeological Project).

rines (sometimes showing kings) and beads placed inside spiny oysters, as parts of caches (e.g., Finamore and Houston 2010: 267, No. 89; Freidel et al. 2002: Figs. 3.15, 3.17 and 3.19). The symbolism of such caches appears to relate to that of burials, in which spiny oysters, sometimes covering the head or body (Fitszimmons 2009: 90–92), are common.11 In one instance (K7185), the Tonsured Maize God surfaces from the water holding such a spiny oyster – a scene that may show the institution of rites of incorporation into the aquatic realm. The theme of the aquatic life of the dead also comes to the fore in the iconography of snail and conch shells. The snail is a creature belonging to the imagery of the rain deity’s realm, as shown by the snail shell lodging a rain deity on the Palenque Foliated Cross tablet and by another serving as a home to a Bacab (e.g., K1285; Hellmuth 1987: 308, Abb. 706–709).12 The snail shell can also, however, be inhabited by a human with the features of a particular person, as shown by the alabaster jar from the grave of an El Peru queen (Fig. 3).13 Conches, too, can encase humans (e.g., Hellmuth 1987: 306, Abb. 691–692; Finamore and Houston 2010: 119, No. 37; K4958). A related scene on an alabaster vessel from Bonampak (Fig. 4) shows a young man with aquatic motifs 11 With respect to the jade beads, precious stones were believed to absorb the breath of the dying Pokom lords (Las Casas, in Taube 2005: 31) and the lords of Tlaxcala were said to change into precious stones upon dying (in addition to birds, clouds and mist; Mendieta 1971: 97). 12 The snail shell on the Foliated Cross tablet is inscribed with the mythical place name Matwiil preceded by “precious shell waters” (Tokovinine 2013: 72–73, Fig. 43a). 13 Another example is a greenstone snail shell jewel with a youthful human head peeping out (K7068, Precolumbian Portfolio).

The band of performers of Bonampak’s Structure 1, Room 1 (Miller and Brittenham 2013: 118–121) can be given a similar interpretation by assuming that creatures from the rain deities’ realm (perhaps the Usumacinta) escort a royal ancestress leaving her aquatic abode to attend festivities at court. Like the king’s mother on Bonampak stela 2, the woman wears a Waterlily Pad Serpent headdress, while her pose and dress recall those of two women depicted on vases who, seated on the ground and flanked by a centipede serpent jaw, are likely to be ancestral (see next section). Amongst the performers are a man with a head shaped like an aquatic skull (ibid.: Fig. 229), signaling the Tlalocan of the dead, a giant crayfish,16 as well as a crocodile that, seated like the ancestress, may have transported her through the waters. The snail and conch shells inhabited by what would appear to be ancestors belong to a wider group of possible funereal images reminiscent of the stuccoed ancestral busts set within cartouches of the Palenque Palace (House A). These cartouches are adorned with centipede serpent jaws symbolizing death and showing split fish tails.17 Within the wider group of images, one finds the heads and shoulders of young noblemen and kings (and in one case a noblewoman)18 that are topped by aquatic flowers (K762); framed by a number of aquatic symbols such as waves, fins, and serpentine 14 The flanking male seems to be drilling a hole in the conch, perhaps to make the mollusc release the ancestor (Houston 2010: 77–78; compare also K8817 and Boston MFA, Accession Number 2004.2203) –an action that might therefore be analogous to a ritual for freeing a soul captured by the water deities. 15 See K3036 for a comparable scene, including another woman lending a hand. A young man emerging from a conch, but now held by a dancing warrior, occurs on the southern door jamb of Cacaxtla’s Structure A (Lozoff Brittenham and Uriarte 2015: Figs. 280, 291). 16 The Huastec Maya believe a giant crayfish to live in a hill and protect its water supplies (Alcorn 1984: 79) while Gulf Coast Nahua tales stage a ‘Big Prawn’ (Hueyi Chakali) as an alter ego to the water goddess and intermediary to mankind (Hooft 2007: 236ff). 17 The text surrounding one of the House A cartouches (Medallion 3; Robertson 1985: Fig. 119a) specifically mentions a ‘heron star’ that –like the solar shell-wing bird– belongs to the aquatic realm (e.g., K6181), or, the eastern horizon where the stars seem to rise from the sea. 18 The seated woman (on K8685) holds a small mammal resembling a possum.

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Figure 4. Young man released from a snail shell or conch. Alabaster vessel from Bonampak, Building 10 (Drawing by Norberto García Benítez, Proyecto Arqueológico Bonampak-INAH).

Figure 5. Bust framed by the conch of a Bacab. Relief vase, Caracol (after Chase and Chase 2009: Fig. 85a, rearranged; copyright Caracol Archaeological Project, used with permission).

curls (e.g., K4463); framed by a Waterlily Pad Serpent and a conch (K8685); or inserted within the body of an aquatic serpent (K2292, K8257), a dragon fish (Houston 2012: 456, Fig. 268),19 or the conch of a Bacab (Fig. 5). Especially in these last cases, the busts seem to provide variations on the ancient motif of a king seated within a quadrifoil turtle or a crocodile.20 While suggestive of the identification of the nobility with the powers governing the aquatic cycle, these aquatic busts can equally give expression to the idea of ‘entering the water’ as a metonym for the destiny of the dead. Their interpretation as funereal images is strengthened by the presence of the same aquatic flowers on skulls (K5961). Similarly, the same wave symbols frame the posthumous representation of the 16th Copanec king (Fash 2001: 176, Fig. 108) as well as the child-like Tonsured Maize God lying for dead under a canoe (K3033; Chinchilla Mazariegos 2011: 76–77, Fig. 24). A final image supporting this view is the centipede serpent head at-

19 W. Fash (in Schmidt and Garza 1998: 590, No. 288) equally identifies the bust inside the fish dragon (which he views as a crocodile) as an ancestor.

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20 One may recall that ‘Crocodile’ is a royal name and epithet (and is also used for the Tonsured Maize God).

tached to the back of the Bacab conch mentioned above (Fig. 5). Rather than an imprisonment in a grim ‘Watery Underworld’, these vignettes convey the suggestion of absorption of the dead into the realm of the rain deities. The presence of phantasmagorical wading birds transmits a similar message. Such creatures would be at home on the beaches of one of the rain deities’ heartlands, whether this be a lagoon or the eastern sea paradise still recognized by Gulf Coast peoples. Mayan iconography (e.g., Hellmuth 1984: 176, Fig. 359; 284–286) places the aquatic sun deity, in the form of another wading bird, in such a sea paradise as the index for the eastern location. Such wading birds are intimately connected to the aquatic dead. The Berlin funereal pot (Schele Drawing 5503), for example, has a series of alternating shellwing birds (or ‘shell wing dragons’)21 and conch serpents positioned in the water that leads from the king’s dead body to what would appear to be his entombed and ‘submerged’ skeleton22 lying beneath an ancestral fruit grove. This grove 21 I will use the term ‘shell-wing bird’ also in those cases where the creature’s body consists of an anthropomorphous head and where its neck and head are snake-like. 22 The tomb on the vase, set within the water band, is comparable to Río Azul tomb 1 with its aquatic symbolism and to the many burials containing marine fauna remains.

Watery Underworld or Realm of the Rain Deities? The Aquatic Environment of the Tonsured Maize God

shell-wing bird ancestor, there is another ancestral figure who, looking down from a sky dragon and holding an axe, might well be a lightning maker.27 A sculpted drain, too, showing both an aquatic skull and a solar shell-wing bird (Houston 2010: 74, Fig. 14), seems to signal the ancestors’ beneficial action of sending the waters.

Figure 6. Vase showing enthroned shell-wing bird ancestor (Photo courtesy Kunsthaus Lempertz).

is in turn reminiscent of the local ‘Tlalocan’ paradises with fruit trees mentioned above. In another case (Fig. 6), a male human, with shell wings attached,23 is seated on a throne marked by the heads of the centipede serpent. This seated shell-wing character therefore appears to be an ancestor that has become part of the rain deities’ realm.24 The occurrence of the shell-wing bird in posthumous portrayals appears to convey the same message. In the accession scene of the Tablet of the Slaves, for example, there is a shell-wing bird on top of the head of the king’s deceased father (cf. Stuart 2005: 26, 152), while on Tonina’s Monument 171, a shell-wing bird adorns the palma with which a deceased king is playing the ball (cf. Stuart 2013). Both these otherworldly birds and the aquatic ancestors assimilated to them are, by virtue of their shell wings, likely to be involved in raising the sea water into the sky and thus in the production of rain. Moreover, shell-wing birds occasionally show undulating necks with fins suggestive of flying fishes (Fig. 7)25 and thus of upward movement of water, in contrast to a bird with fleshless vertebrae that merely spills out the precious liquid (Hellmuth 1987: 195, Fig. 409). Doyle and Houston (2012) have noted that on a frieze from El Mirador, phantasmagorical birds alternate with cloud symbols.26 In addition to this, hovering above the aforementioned 23 Compare these particular shell wings with the ones in Hellmuth (1987: 177, Fig. 358c). 24 Some of the shell-wing birds of K6167, with wings attached to human heads, may equally be transformed ancestors. 25 See also the finned water snakes and shell-wing bird on the stylistically similar K4958. 26 This frieze may be related to an ancient water collection

The continuity between the worlds of the living and the dead can at times cause ambiguity. A case in point is the sun temple shown in Fig. 8. This temple has a royal impersonator of the Waterlily Pad Serpent enthroned inside and Bacabs and human attendants congregating around the throne. The human attendants impersonate a shell-wing bird, a cormorant or spoonbill, and a serpent with the Tonsured Maize God’s head inside its maw. On the one hand, this scene could be viewed as a human court reproducing the divine pluvial apparatus and imagined, therefore, to be within the water itself. The bird impersonators specifically recall the priests who, in the Aztec feast of the Tlaloque, immersed themselves in the waters of a ‘house of mist’ (ayauhcalli) while imitating all kinds of aquatic fowl (Sahagún 1979: 115, Bk 2 Ch. 25). On the other hand, the shell-wing bird hints at an otherworldly realm, with the sun temple more particularly suggesting the eastern ocean, known to be a region of the dead. The impersonators could thus also be viewed as ancestors. Consider once more the label ‘Watery Underworld’. The centipede serpent jaws sometimes found in aquatic environments have been taken by Taube (2003) as designating an underworld akin to Xibalba, or rather its entrance. In the present framework, however, such jaws could signal the entry of the dead into the rain deities’ realm or, in certain cases, into some subterranean part of it.28 In several instances, the jaws are used as mere attributes (e.g., Figs. 5, 6) lending a liminal aspect to the human figures concerned (Stone and Zender 2011: 135),29 perhaps by signaling that the flesh is to be devoured by death before the soul can enter the rain deities’ realm.

system nearby (Doyle and Houston 2012). 27 The paradigm of the downward looking ancestor is provided by Tikal stela 31. The sky dragon may be related to the rain-producing sky crocodile of the Ch’orti’ priests (Girard, in Braakhuis and Hull 2014: 456). The adorned axe has a counterpart in the rain deity’s axe on K1250 and K2068. 28 Examples of centipede serpent heads with aquatic referents are the base of Quirigua’s stela J, with its rain deity-like head marker and wide-opened ‘centipede serpent’ maw (see Looper 2003: 85, Fig. 3.11 and 107, Fig. 3.35); the relief at the base of Copan’s Hieroglyphic Stairway, with the turtle abode of the rain deities framed by the same maw; and the right-hand player on the central Copan ball court A-IIb marker, wearing a rain dwarf heron as a front piece of the girdle and a ‘centipede serpent’ head for a headdress. 29 Chinchilla Mazariegos (pers. comm., 2014) considers this liminality to be related to the pollution accompanying birth, which in the present context would imply rebirth into the aquatic realm.

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a

b Figure 7. Vase showing shell-wing bird with serpentine extension, winged conch serpent, and dragon fish with Tonsured Maize God; a) Photo courtesy Galerie Mermoz; b) Drawing by Phoebe Maas.

Figure 8. Vase depicting Sun temple with aquatic impersonators; K114 (Photo courtesy Justin Kerr).

The Tonsured Maize God as a Lord of Tlalocan The Tonsured Maize God is strongly identified with the aquatic environment discussed above. In one case (K3640; Robicsek and Hales 1981: 156, Fig. 60; Braakhuis 2009: 10, Fig. 3; Finamore and Houston 2010: 264, No. 88) an aquatic skull seems to raise a dancing king assimilated to the Tonsured Maize God above the water, with a courtier watching the spectacle in awe.30 Being a prototype of the human king, the maize deity is often characterized as a person wielding power in Tlalocan. This is particularly evident when he is shown in his netted, aquatic costume, ceremonially dancing or sitting

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30 On this plate, the Tonsured Maize God ruler, a crocodile dancer, and a figure seated in a conch all wear an unusual nose piece with rain drop jewels that seems to follow the contour of the snout of an aquatic crocodilian dragon (‘Cosmic Monster’) viewed frontally (e.g., Temple of the Cross friezes; Quirigua, Altar P).

in state and attended by a child-like rain dwarf (Fig. 9).31 In such cases he may be situated in the heart of the rain deities’ realm, entirely surrounded by rain deity-like head markers and spoonbills (K6679; Kelemen 1969 I: Pl. 129b) or else occupying a ‘water throne’ (K6679) and wearing the nose piece of an aquatic deity or serpent (K6679, K703, K633). Thus, when, in a recurring scene, the Tonsured Maize God stands in the water to receive the ornaments of his aquatic costume from the hands of naked women, this ceremony appears to be preparatory to his investiture as a lord of the rain deities’ realm. Surrounded by waterlilies, water birds, and pond plants (e.g., K626), the hero may spe31 Like the rain deity, the rain dwarf can show a heron head extension (K4989, K8533). In the same way, on Machaquila Stela 2 (Graham 1967: 63), a king wearing the mask of an aquatic serpent is attended by an aged rain hunchback with such an extension.

Watery Underworld or Realm of the Rain Deities? The Aquatic Environment of the Tonsured Maize God

Figure 9. Vase showing enthroned Tonsured Maize God kings with rain dwarf attendants. K8533 (Photo courtesy Justin Kerr).

cifically –as suggested previously by Bassie-Sweet (2008: 292–294)– be visiting a ritual bathing place,32 whether his own or that of the women, in order to purify himself.33 Like certain maternal aquatic deities (Braakhuis 2009: 18), one female attendant wears a turtle shell on the hip (K3033). At the same time, however, the female attendants are often, and unlike the maize deity, marked as belonging to darkness and death.34 Another woman, dressed, is seated and flanked by a centipede serpent jaw (K1004). Given the accompanying emblem glyph35 and the parallel with the female figure on the Dumbarton Oaks travertine bowl (Tokovinine 2012: 127), she appears to be a historical or semi-historical ancestress. The Tonsured Maize God is thus assisted by women who seem to belong to the dead living in the realm of the rain deities, even if for the most part they are not shown to be intimately associated with aquatic creatures.36 The god’s ‘entry into the water’ (mentioned in two of the dressing scenes)37 appears to

32 Examples of divine bathing places are Chalchiuhapan (‘In the jade river’), visited by the culture hero, Quetzalcoatl (Sahagún 1979: 596, Bk 10 Ch. 29); the bathing place of Tohil (Popol Vuh); the bathing place of the Q’eqchi’ moon goddess (Braakhuis 2010: 292); and the seven bathing places of the Zinacantec ancestor deities (Vogt 1969: 387). 33 One of the naked women is extending a conspicuous knife for self-sacrifice (K626); a similar woman standing in the water is carrying such a knife in a bowl (Robicsek and Hales 1981: Vessel 80). 34 The women wear attributes such as a disembodied eye, a fleshless lower jaw, a ‘percentage sign’, or the black stripe over the eye also found with death god A’. As it happens, several of these death symbols also occur in variants of T598/599, commonly read as ch’een (cf. Stone and Zender 2011: 133). 35 For a discussion of this emblem glyph, see Helmke (2012: 107–116). 36 These women may relate to the dangerous ancestral spirits (yoalejkamej ‘nocturnal winds’) on the other side of the sea to whom the maize hero reveals himself as the principle of immortality (CM 183; CM 198–199). 37 An ‘entry into the water’ is mentioned on K1004 and K6979, an ‘entry onto the road’ on K1202, two phrases that, taken together, would constitute a diphrastic kenning.

be a prerequisite for his role as a lord of the life-giving waters, rather than referring to his death in a ‘Watery Underworld’. 38 Contemporary maize hero mythology connects the hero to the realm of the pluvial powers in numerous ways (see Braakhuis 1990, 2009), such as: his birth and rebirth among the fishes; his prolonged stay in a river or the sea following upon his death and rebirth; his interaction with aquatic creatures; his invention of lightning and rainmaking; and his final retreat into a river, the depth of the sea, or the realm of the lightnings. Moreover, the hero undertakes a maritime expedition to the heartland of the pluvial deities, takes power over their realm, and institutes the rainy season. This episode offers an explanation for the San Bartolo west wall scene of a maize god dancing and making music in front of water and rain deities enthroned in their turtle abode (Braakhuis 2014) –with no appeal (in contrast to Taube et al. 2010: 78) to an emergence from a ‘Watery Underworld’.39 Indeed, one narrator (in Rodríguez López 2003: 251) has explicitly identified the maize hero as “the Lord of Tlalocan”.40 Lordship over Tlalocan implies the power to bring the rain. It seems to be as a consequence of this power that the Tonsured Maize God is sometimes assimilated to the lightning deity, wearing the latter’s lightning blade or torch in his forehead (Braakhuis 2009: 13–15).41 On a par with kings wearing headdresses and masks of aquatic serpents (cf. Coltman 2015), the Tonsured Maize God can also appear in 38 The predominantly ritual perspective taken here should probably be embedded in a more narrative one, such as that offered by Chinchilla Mazariegos (2011: 129–133, 137–138, 225) on the basis of the Tonsured Maize God’s lunar role. 39 Significantly, the San Bartolo scene is set within the same turtle quadrifoil that can also be occupied by kings (see section 2). 40 In this designation, ‘Tlalocan’ is an encompassing concept referring to the powers of water, rain and fertility often situated below the earth’s surface. 41 The anthropomorphic lightnings of certain eccentric flints resemble the Tonsured Maize God; in addition, a series of five maize gods in the Madrid Codex (73–74) may show lightning blades in the forehead. The role of the lightning deity is still played by the present-day Gulf Coast maize hero (Braakhuis 2009: 13–15; 2014: 6).

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Figure 10. Floating maize children with feathered serpents. Río Hondo bowl (drawing by Linda Schele; FAMSI Schele drawing 5511).

the guise of a feathered serpent (Fig. 10; cf. Taube 2010a: 272, No. 92),42 a winged serpent (K3065), or a fish dragon (Fig. 7).43 Whereas the fish dragon may be comparable to the sea-dwelling lightning fish of Q’eqchi’ ethnometeorology (Braakhuis 2009: 8n18), the feathered serpent is thought –as for example in the Mayan and Mixtec highlands (Christenson 2003: 68n54; Monaghan 1989)– to cause rain storms and to live in wells, rivers, and the sea. By playing a vital role in the pluvial and agricultural cycle, it promotes the growth of the crop.44 As with the lightning serpent counterpart of the legendary Mixe king, Kondoy (cf. Braakhuis and Hull 2014: 457–458), these aquatic creatures could be interpreted as the transformative shapes of the maize hero as a rain bringer. The Tonsured Maize God’s role as a lord of Tlalocan inevitably involves the dead absorbed by its waters. In its strongest form, this connection is directly exemplified in the deity’s own body. The drowned Tonsured Maize God of the Museo Popol Vuh vase, for example, lying on his back at the bottom of the water with his feet in the maw of a serpent, could be viewed as a prototype of the dead –more particularly dead children– entering the aquatic realm and the service of its lords (Braakhuis 2009: 7). Similarly, the child-like maize gods floating on their backs, as shown on Calakmul vases and the Río Hondo bowl (Fig. 10), may represent dead children

42 For the type of maize deity on the bowl concerned, see for example K3065 and K8736. 43 In the case of Fig. 7, the dragon fish is accompanied by a serpentine conch creature and also –in apparent reference to the eastern ocean realm of the rain deities– by a shell-wing bird.

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44 On Cacaxtla’s Red Temple mural, a maize and cacao field is growing atop a blue feathered serpent. According to various Yucatec tales (Burns 1983: 244–257; Jong 1999: 156–157) the feathered serpent rises into the sky from a cave or sinkhole and then heads for the sea to put an end to the dog days. During these dog days, it is assisted by maize goddesses in producing the maize kernels that will subsequently fill the ears (Morris, in Bassie-Sweet 2008: 148).

dedicated to the pluvial deities.45 Analogous scenes occur in contemporary maize hero tales (Braakhuis 1990: 127–128; 2009: 6–7). The maize embryo is discovered floating in the water like an egg; maize kernels or flour made from the maize baby are cast into a river, carried away by the current, and changed into a maize field (e.g., CM 151, CM 162; Alcorn et al. 2006: 602). Casting the remains of the maize baby into the water invites comparison with the inauguration rituals of king Ahuitzotl’s great aqueduct (Durán II 1967: 376–377) when maize flour was cast onto the water and four children were sacrificed. Consistent with this overall picture, the Río Hondo bowl shows the floating maize children escorted by feathered serpent nahuales. Growth of the maize seems implied, with the human faces inside the serpents’ jaws representing maize deities, and possibly also ancestors. Rather than a ‘Watery Underworld’ (Taube 2010a: 271, No. 92; cf. Schele and Miller 1986: 280, Plate 106), this scene, too, seems more likely to depict the ‘surface of the underwaterworld’ –that is, the sea as part of the rain deities’ realm.

Conclusion The importance of the realm of the pluvial deities for the king and his officials in their quality of providers and distributors of the water is reflected in the aquatic inventory of burials and its attendant iconography. The concept of a ‘Watery Underworld’ should accordingly be subsumed under that of a Mayan Tlalocan, with the focus shifting from Hun-Hunahpu to the rain-bringing maize hero of contemporary Gulf Coast mythology.

45 On one Calakmul vase (K2723), a caption has been read as, “he who is born from liquid” (Houston et al. 2006: 167). On this vase, the water is marked by a symmetrical vegetal design with an aquatic deity head marker at its center. The head itself has a ‘split Ajaw’ forehead infix resembling (but not identical with) the T536 glyph. This iconographical classifier might refer to the water’s birth-giving quality.

Watery Underworld or Realm of the Rain Deities? The Aquatic Environment of the Tonsured Maize God

Acknowledgments

I am much indebted to Michael J. Watkins and Addie Johnson for revising the text. I am also grateful to Julia Guernsey and Erik Boot for their valuable comments.

Christenson, Allen J. 2003 Popol Vuh, Vol. 1. Winchester / New York: O-books. Coe, Michael D. 1982 Old Gods and Young Heroes. The Pearlman Collection of Maya Ceramics. Jerusalem: The Israel Museum.

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Endnotes Abbreviations used in the main text: CM = Cuerpos de maíz: danzas agrícolas de la Huasteca. Mexico: Programa de Desarrollo Cultural de la Huasteca (2000). K = Kerr Maya Vase Data Base (online). References to the Dresden and Madrid codices: Villacorta.

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Skeletal Supernaturals from the Maya Underworld

Skeletal Supernaturals from the Maya Underworld Daniel Moreno Zaragoza

Posgrado en Estudios Mesoamericanos, UNAM

Roberto Romero Sandoval

Centro de Estudios Mayas, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas, UNAM

Abstract In this chapter we analyze the development of the diverse skeletal beings in Maya iconography as represented in the Late Classic ceramic corpus and follow the trail of these beliefs throughout time up to the conceptions of modern day Maya people. In the Classic Period, a certain type of skeletal entities, known as wahy were depicted. During the transition into the Postclassic period the supernatural identity of these beings changed until they were clearly defined as gods. We propose an analysis to find out the changes and survivals of these supernatural entities until modern days, where a deep belief in them has survived in the form of figures of skeletal companion spirits and Underworld gods.

Resumen En este artículo se analizará el desarrollo de las diversas entidades esqueléticas o parcialmente descarnadas que aparecen en la iconografía del Clásico Tardío en el corpus cerámico maya. Seguiremos la trayectoria de estas creencias en el tiempo hasta la actualidad entre distintos grupos mayas contemporáneos. Durante el periodo Clásico dichas entidades esqueléticas eran conocidas como wahy, un tipo de espíritus del inframundo que los antiguos gobernantes mayas podían controlar a voluntad o transformarse en su figura para atacar a sus enemigos por medio de los sueños. En la transición hacia el Posclásico la identidad sobrehumana de estas entidades cambió hasta ser plenamente identificadas como dioses, k’uh. Proponemos un análisis de amplia escala en el tiempo con el fin de encontrar los cambios, las rupturas y supervivencias sobre estos seres y así delinear el desarrollo general que han tenido las entidades esqueléticas hasta nuestros días, donde prevalece una profunda creencia en varios grupos mayas contemporáneos en espíritus compañeros esqueléticos y dioses del inframundo.

The ancient Maya had a profound religious worldview abundant in supernatural entities that symbolized the sacred energies of the cosmos. They thoroughly represented these entities in plastic depictions, among which we can find diverse skeletal beings, which must have symbolized the energy of death, an aspect as sacred as life itself. The graphic expressions of skeletal entities among the Maya were diverse but they all shared a common trait, they were depicted with their eyes open and never closed as in the representations of the dead. As Sotelo (2002: 73) notes, this indicates that these entities were not conceived as dead, but as abstractions of sacred beings symbolizing the Underworld energy, diseases and death. These fleshless entities –portrayed as erect skeletons carrying out different activities– should have had, in the Maya worldview, a conscious existence as well as their own will and agency.

From our modern point of view, it is easy to associate these skeletal images with the concept of death, as they have traditionally been associated in Western imagery. However, in the Maya case we cannot aprioristically assume these entities as representing death gods, but we rather make a profound evaluation departing from their iconography and their epigraphic references. Not less important to understand the meanings of skeletal beings in Maya symbolism are the historical documents and ethnographical sources. This chapter analyzes the skeletal supernatural entities among the Maya in three different steps. First we will examine the images from the Classic period. Thereafter, those will be compared to the Postclassic codices, and finally they are confronted with the mentions in colonial indigenous texts and contemporary ethnography in order to detect possible continuities or differences in Maya religious worldview throughout time.

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Skeletal Figures on Maya Ceramics Throughout the Late Classic period, in different areas of Central Peten, ceramic vessels were produced in a wide diversity of styles. Several of these vases were fully decorated with pictorial depictions of fantastic scenes representing zoomorphic, anthropomorphic, hybrid, and most significant for our case study, skeletal entities. As many authors have pointed out (Grube and Nahm 1994: 683–715; Houston and Stuart 1989: 1–16; De la Garza 2012: 11–28; Moreno 2011: 6–12; Stuart 2005; Velásquez 2009, 2011; Zender 2004: 195–209), the accompanying texts refer to these beings as wahy.1 We share the idea with Velásquez (2009, 2011) that these are a kind of terrifying spirits which the ancient Maya rulers could control at will or even transform into them, and with that appearance attack their enemies in the dream realm (see Moreno 2013b).2 In this context, we can clearly distinguish individual wahy by their own proper name, a reason for which, at least during the Late Classic, we cannot state that there was a single death god, but various skeletal supernatural entities as representatives of diseases and death that populated Maya thought. The depictions of these entities in the vases imitate the human body decomposition between three days or three weeks after death, where the flesh begins to acquire a green-blueish color, it releases a strong rotten flesh odor and starts to swell and grow grotesquely until the face becomes unrecognizable. At the last stage the flesh is ultimately decomposed and the sole bones remain. Among the iconographic attributes found on ceramics, these beings use to carry decorations with death eyes as part of their apparel, a chest necklace with the sign T509 (the so called “percentage sign”) in reference to the wahy and the Underworld, and they appear with exposed ribs and vertebrae. Occasionally, they were depicted with long hair tied through a braid as well as a bone bundle tied to their waist. A way to characterize these entities is through their represented activities. As we can see in the examples of K718, K1256, K1490, K1653, K3924, K4384, K8803, and K8936 these spirits participated in blood sacrifices in the act of decapitating. To achieve it they used diverse cutting instruments

1 The are two different criteria to spell the generic name of these entities. Some scholars favor the spelling wahy, since this is how it is attested in the texts next to the depictions of these creatures. On the other hand, based on the works of Zender (2004) about intimate possession, there is an alternate spelling as wahyis, stating these beings are actual parts of a person, a kind of soul. We will utilize the first spelling as it is easier for the reader.

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2 The wahy are part of a larger belief system called nagualism. The term is a clear “nahuatlism” that is currently used as a category for this pan-Mesoamerican phenomenon. It is a convenient form to designate the relation between a human and its spiritual coessences either zoomorphic or anthropomorphic. We use the term nagualism provisionally, as a better one is lacking, to define all those relations with animal entities that form part of the Human Being and that in the Maya languages are cognates of the morphemic root way.

Figure 1. Skeletal supernatural defined as a wahy in a “Baby Jaguar sacrifice” scene. Vase K115; digital rendering after photograph at www.metmuseum.org).

as spears and other long weapons with three sharp obsidian blades which they used to slit the head of their victims. Among the sacrificial scenes, there is an outstanding mythic passage, the so called “Baby Jaguar sacrifice” (see Robicsek and Hales 1981: 21–26) as we can observe in vessels such as K521, K1003, K1152, K1199, K1370, K1644, K1815, K2207, K2208, K2213, K3201, K4011, K4013, K4056, and K4486. It is important to note that all these examples are Codex-style vessels from the Mirador basin, indicating this myth was important for the artists in that region. In one of the vases, K1152 (Fig. 1), the skeletal supernatural is explicitly referred to as a wahy and a baahtun, reason for which we can dismiss the idea of a death god, the term k’uh to identify a god is missing. In Codex style ceramics there was another theme repeatedly depicted: the reunion of diverse wahy sharing the corrupt body of their victims, as their nourishment consisted in blood and human remains such as eyes, hands and bones in what we could consider a “macabre feast” (see K1380, K1389, and K2802). Zender and Guenter (2003: 91–126) recognized that the skeletal entities were accompanied by the glyphs T15, T108 and T135, all of which represent death eyes with a syllabic value of cha, a term that in Yukatekan languages has meanings for “darkness” and “blindness”. This syllabogram prefixes another glyph in the form of a human head with its eye closed indicating a dead person. For such logogram the authors (Zender and Guenter, 2003: 91–126) proposed a reading of CHAM, a term that in the Mayan languages means death and disease (Kaufman and Justeson 2003: 1347–1348). With this we can affirm that the Maya represented plastic abstractions of the concept of death that symbolized specific ways of dying. These figures could acquire a zoomorphic appearance (such as birds or jaguars), or anthropomorphic, either as a complete human, or as a fleshless skeletal one.

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Figure 3. Chan Ut?, “Serpent Face?”. Vase K3395 (digital drawing after Grube and Nahm 1994: 706).

Figure 2. Jun Chamiiy, “One Death”. Vase K1197 (digital drawing after a photograph at www.metmuseum.org).

Among the figures that represented specific ways of death we can frequently find depictions of a wahy named U Kuhul Chij Chamiiy, “Sacred Deer Death” (Grube and Nahm 1994; see K771, K2023, K3061, K3924, and K4922). As its name states, it is a skeletal entity with deer attributes such as the antlers on top of its skull. This spirit is a traveler, as it uses a staff to help his walking and carries a walking stick and a mecapal with bulk including the head of a deer. He wears a hat usually associated with the hunting of this mammal and is sometimes depicted carrying a trumpet shell which he is ready to blow.3 K’ahk’ Ohl Chamiiy, the “Fire Hearted Death” is another skeletal wahy from the site of Río Azul (see K1197, K1380, K1653, K1646, K1652, K1389, K1256, K718, K2595, K3831, K3924, K4946, K5017; Clarkson 1978, Fig 11). He has black stains in its face and has a long braid. Its most distinctive traits are the fire scrolls springing from his igneous abdomen. At times he is represented carrying the head of a sacrificial victim in his hands.

fleshless hand he carries a trilobular blade and a spear which probably served to deflesh the bones of sacrificial victims.4 Chan Ut?, “Serpent Face?” appears on K3395 (Fig. 3). It is a partially skeletal wahy that shows his hands and feet still with its flesh and skin. He is depicted in a position holding his long hair and wears a red piece of clothing resembling a scarf with some unidentified object at his back, probably a throne. He has some hanging textiles or paper decorations stained with blood, a common symbol associated with sacrifice. ...ki Xinil Chamiiy, the “Stinking Death” (see K1211, K927, K5635; Benson and Forest 1983: pl. 20; Grube and Nahm 1994) is a skeletal wahy in a seated position with a death eyes necklace. In front of him he has a wide plate containing bones on fire as attested on K927 (Fig. 4a). There are smoke scrolls on K1211 probably indicating the odor produced by the decomposition.

Jun ...? Chamiiy, “One ...? Death”, is a skeletal wahy of which only two examples are attested (K1197; Schele 1985, 60, fig. 2). He has the typical long hair braid and black stains in his skull and wears the rigid necklace with death eye decorations. On K1197 he has an object pending with the T509 symbol representing crossed bones or death (Fig. 2). In his

As Sheseña (2010: 2) has pointed out, some of the wahy clearly refer to diseases caused by naguals (entities associated to a human to a degree where they share the same fate, see Martínez González 2011), such as the “Red Bile Death” and the “Gluttony Death”. Helmke and Nielsen (2009) have argued that the wahy were incarnations or personifications of diseases coming from the Underworld, which could be controlled and projected onto others. In this sense, what appears to us as animal figures on the painted vessels would actually serve as metaphors for diverse kinds of diseases, the birds would be related to asthma, centipedes to ulcers, while deer and monkeys would represent cramps.

3 Even though the skeletal wahy we mention subsequently belong to the supernatural realm they remain humans as they are coessences, meaning they are the spiritual counterparts of a person in the terrestrial space. For such reason we refer to them with the adverb “he” instead of “it” as they represented the counterparts of actual k’uhul ajawtak (holy lords).

4 The trilobular blade seems to have been used to remove the remaining flesh in the bones of the dead. It was a common practice to exhume the osseous remains of the ancestors and to place cinnabar on them on a rite called Butz’ Chan (Romero 2014).

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Figure 4. a) Xinil Chamiiy, “Stinking Death” burning bones. Vase K0927 (digital drawing after Grube and Nahm 1994: 707); b) Death God burning bones. Madrid Codex page 102b (digital drawing after photograph at www.famsi.org).

In this instance, Chak Ch’aj Chamiiy, the “Red Bile Death” (see K771, K5084, Quirarte 1979: figs. 8–1, 8–7; Schele 1985: 60, fig. 2) is an animated skeleton with a swollen belly with an infixed sign ju (Fig. 5). The meaning of ju in Tzotzil is “massage” or “massage for people with abdominal pain” (Sheseña 2010: 26). For which we can interpret that the skeletal image belongs to a producer of strong stomach aches, a sickness produced by the bile. Nowadays we know that biliary calculi are a cause for nausea, vomit and stomach ache due to the biliary conducts obstruction by substances that harden the gallbladder. The so-called “biliary stones” are common among senior adults, women and overweight people, and studies have shown the indigenous population of the Americas to be prone to such disease.5 It seems this was the kind of sickness produced by this skeletal being. Even though he was not depicted as a skeletal entity, there is another terrifying producer of disease with the term Chamiiy, “death” in its name. It is Sitz’ Winik Chamiiy, the “Gluttony Death”, as we can see on K2286, who could have been responsible of sending indigestion to people (Fig. 6). He is depicted as an anthropomorphic figure with a swollen belly, death signs in his face, a trilobed blade on its right hand and an obsidian or flint knife on the other. We know dyspepsia is a discomfort in the upper part of the abdomen while or after eating. As Holland (cited by Sheseña 2010: 26) reported for the San Andrés Larráinzar Tzeltal, to suffer for a long time from a ‘swollen belly’ (a day long discomfort caused naturally by the consumption of great quantities of food) can actually be the product of sorcery acts over the patient.

harmful supernatural entities with a close relation to death. They could be invoked through rituals to make the bearer a person with extraordinary abilities as he became intensely violent and irritable with the capability of spreading death and destruction and to cause terrible diseases.

The Postclassic God A For reasons still under discussion (see Demarest, Rice and Rice 2005), there were drastic changes in the geopolitical configuration in the Maya Lowlands throughout the Terminal Classic Period. What is clear is that there were major demographic movements and an accelerated site abandonment provoking a reconfiguration of the political sphere. Of course, this situation was reflected in the worldview, which preserved the general religious precepts from the Classic Era, although there were certain changes in the worshipped entities and the ritual practices towards them. Among these changes, the use of the logogram WAY (T539), so profusely employed during the Classic was abandoned towards the Postclassic and we cannot find it anymore in the Maya texts. This does not mean that nagualism had ceased, rather it acquired other manifestations, much less related to politics and the rulers exaltation and more tied and

As mentioned above, the disease-producing wahy could also have an animal form. Such is the case for Tahn Bihil Chamiiy, the “Death on the Path”, which could refer to a sudden or unexpected death in the route of a travelling person (see K791). This is an avian wahy in the form of a predatory bird as recognized by its bill and claws (Fig. 7). He has a darkness symbol on his body and a fiery snake wrapped around his neck. For all the aforementioned, the characters we see depicted in the vessels were extremely dangerous and

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5 Data from Medline Plus, National Library of Medicine.http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/spanish/ gallbladderdiseases.html, Consulted: May 15, 2013.

Figure 5. Chak Ch’a’j Chamiiy, “Red Bile Death” (digital drawing after Schele 1985: 60, fig. 2).

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preserved among the common people, developing in different ways in mostly every Maya group. In the Postclassic codices the skeletal figures were thoroughly represented. On the Paris Codex they appear twice, while Dresden Codex contains at least 28 depictions of skeletal beings; the Madrid Codex displays fleshless divinities in at least 48 occasions. In this latter codex in particular, we can find the skeletal beings not as wahy anymore, but properly defined as gods, k’uh. For instance, we can see it written on page 23c with the depiction of the skeletal divinity vomiting blood, the essence of life itself, confirming its sacred status. On the other hand, Dresden Codex page 53a shows the skeletal entity seated on a bone throne, which would indicate its status as a lord, rather than a subordinate. These figures represent the deity designated by Schellhas (1904: 10) with the letter “A”, and described as “a figure with an exposed bony spine, truncated nose and grinning teeth”. This god is characterized by Laura Sotelo (2002: 73) as having a head portrayed as a fleshless skull with round eyes and a little circle on the inside. He is regularly wearing extruded eye bracelets. Sotelo emphasizes that, in Mesoamerica, to represent a dead character it was always depicted with its eyes closed, contrary to the depictions of God A in the Madrid Codex, which means that he is not dead though his figure is that of a dead body. Having open eyes would mean he is alive and aware in the dark Underworld where he inhabits. We must remember that shamans, scribes and Maya priests descended to this obscure place in search for knowledge and transformation (Romero 2014: 38). In this sense, the Maya Underworld not only does shelter the vegetal and animal treasures, but also guards wisdom. Gabrielle Vail (1998: 169) states that God A is the “physical embodiment of death itself” because of its skeletal appearance and decorations with death eyes as well as the decomposition signs infixed in its body. We must point out among the continuities prevailing from the Classic Period the use of the extruded eye necklace which was worn by the wahy and seems to be distinctive to the inhabitants of the Underworld. The pendant with the glyph T509 also survived as we can attest for example in Dresden pages 10a and 12b. Through the codices we can also recognize the narrow ties between death divinations and certain calendar dates, something we

Figure 6. Sitz’ Chamiiy, “Gluttony Death”. Vase K2286 (digital drawing after Grube and Nahm 1994: 709).

cannot assert for the Classic, though it does not mean that such a relation did not exist. As some authors have exposed (Fox and Justeson 1984: 38–39; Taube 1992: 14; Vail 1998: 172), on page 87c of the Madrid Codex there is a nominal expression of the Death God syllabically written as ki-si-ni, Kisin, which means, “the flatulent”. This seems to be the proper name for the deity depicted as the otherwise recurring epithet term “Chamal” seems to function as a genre. For example, Kisin’s consort, Kab Ixik (Dresden Codex pp. 16b, 17c, 18c) or Sak Ixik (Ibid. p. 18b) is also labeled as Chamal and so is Jun Ajaw Chamal (Ibid. p. 2a). It seems that in the Postclassic as well as in Classic times “Chamiiy” or “Chamal” were terms used to designate any kind of supernatural (either skeletal or not) representing death. Noteworthy in the codices is that the skeletal supernaturals did not only send misfortunes and diseases, but they could also comprise positive presages as in Dresden pages 5c and 9c where the augury for those particular days (subject to the death God) is plenty of water (ha’) and food (waj). We cannot forget that in the Dresden codex page 9c the Death God (God A) appears in a feminine aspect as it wears a skirt and shows one of its breasts (Fig. 9). This could mean either the depiction of a different female death entity or that the Death God is androgynous. This would be a symbol of its divinity, perfection and totality, as it would blend in itself both the masculine and the feminine (Chevalier and Gheerbrant 2007: 94).

Rulers of the Underworld in Colonial Texts In colonial Yukatek docu-

Figure 7. Tahn Bihil Chamiiy, “Death on the Path”. K791 (digital drawing after Grube and Nahm 1994: ments, the Underworld divin704). ities receive various names

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like Ah Puch, “the Fleshless”; Kisín, “the Flatulent” (Morán 2004: 19); Jun Ajaw, “Lord One” and Yum Kimil, “Lord of the Death” (Garza, 1998: 115–118; 2009: 21). On the other hand, in the K’iche’ texts we find a pair of Underworld lords: Jun Kame, “One Death” and Wuqub’ Kame, “Seven Death” (Garza 1998: 115– 118; 2009: 21). It is interesting how the K’iche’ lords of death act as Figure 8. Death God seated on pair, similarly to the Nahua a throne of bones. Dresden CoMictlantecuhtli and Micte- dex page 53a, digitalized after cacihuatl; this could reflect Antonio Villacorta (Davoust the Underworld characteris- 1997: 200). tic of being both masculine and feminine at the same time; in the same way Alain Ichon (1973: 49) reported for the contemporary Totonac that “each half of the world is male and female at the same time”. Another explanation for the couple of Underworld gods could be because in the Popol Vuh the main characters tend to appear in pairs. Among the possible continuities we can highlight the name of the lord Jun Kame “One Death”, the same used by the wahy Jun Chamiiy during the Classic, whom we mentioned above. In this case, “One Death” was elevated in the supernatural hierarchy among the K’iche’ until becoming the lord and master of the Underworld. There are other recognizable reinterpretations of Classic figures among the characters in the Popol Vuh. Among them are Ajal Mes and Ajal Toq’ob, death entities who had the faculty to provoke accidents when people were coming home. These entities can be related to the wahy Tahn Bihil

Chamiiy, “Death on the Path” from the Classic, who could also provoke misfortunes to the travelers (Velásquez 2009: 618); they could also be an equivalent to the deity 1 Tox 13 Tox, found by Sheseña and López Tovilla (2010: 196) in a Tzeltal incantation from 1725, who is said to produce diseases at crossroads. These authors refer that La Farge had already registered this belief among the Qanjobal, for which it seems that the entities that Figure 9. Feminine Death God harm people on the roads is a A. Dresden Codex page 9a (dig- persistent idea shared among ital drawing after photograph at several Maya groups. www.famsi.org).

Skeletal Gods and Co-Essences in Modern Ethnography Recently, Moreno Zaragoza (2013b: 126–135) has highlighted the notable continuity in Maya nagualism from the Classic Period until today. Diverse Maya groups have preserved beliefs about animal co-essences (also known as companion spirits) whose native names are cognates parting from the morphemic root way. It is interesting that the idea of skeletal spirits associated with witches or shamans still survives in Highland Chiapas. Among the contemporary Ch’ol (Moreno 2013b), there is a belief in harmful spirits called xi’bajob, a kind of modern wahy (wäy in Ch’ol) that specialize in causing diseases with the capability of acquiring zoomorphic, anthropomorphic or skeletal appearances. The idea underlying this concept is shared by many Maya groups through time and space. As an example, we can find the name for the Underworld among the K’iche’ in Early Colonial times: Xi’b’alb’a. This place is described in the Popol Vuh as dark and inhabited by the enemies of men, ruled by the death lords with their retinue, who have the ability to produce various diseases (Recinos 1960: 49–51). The idea of Underworld was also shared among the colonial Ch’olti’, as is attested in Francisco Morán’s dictionary from 1695 where there is an entry for “infierno” as xibalba, and adds that its the way they call the deceased (Morán 2004: 38). On Codex Dresden the narrow relation betweens skeletal supernaturals and the xi’bajob is reasserted both linguistically and iconographically. Page 22c (see Fig. 10) shows images of different portents related to sickness and death (Davoust 1997: 171). The texts accompanying these images explicitly tag these entities to the term xib, and its portent: fright (see Taube 1992: 12–13).6 The main result from the human con-

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Figure 10. Death God A with xib, “fright” as its augury. Dresden Codex page 22c, digitalized after Antonio Villacorta (Davoust 1997: 171).

6 The syllable xi, denoting a skull, may refer to this kind of entities as producers of fright. A recent study by Alfonso Lacadena (2010) shows how it was replicated by the Maya from its original inventors, the Mixe-Zoque. They had to readapt the

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tact with the xi’bajob is an illness called fright. It happens because these spirits attack the people either materially or through their dreams until they catch them and devour their body and souls (Alejos 1988; Mayo Hidalgo 2003; Meneses Méndez 1994; Whittaker and Warkentin 1965). This type of spiritual anthropophagy has prevailed since Classic times as it is shown in the “macabre feast” vessels mentioned above. In Highland Chiapas, the skeletal spirits have different names such as Ch’ejch’ejbak, “noisy skeleton” or Kitz’il bak “squeaky skeleton” due to the sound of its bones when moving (López and Palacios 1994; Moreno 2013a: 79–80, 112–115). Another name is Yalan bek’et, “pull down flesh”, because of its nocturnal habits (Pérez López 1995: 14). These men have the ability to detach from their flesh and skin so they can frighten their neighbors in their sole skeleton appearance. This modern vision may be similar to that represented of the vessel K3395, where we can see a partially fleshless skeleton which still has parts of its skin on its hands and feet (Fig. 3). Nowadays, there are other names for the Underworld among Maya groups. Among the Ch’ol, Tzeltal and Tzotzil it receives the name K’ajk’timb’ak, literally, “to heat up with bones” (Guiteras 1996; Maurer 1985; Moreno 2013a: 43; 2010: 74–76). This is an underground place where it is said firewood does not exist, so they have to burn the bones of the dead (Maurer 1985; Slocum 1965). Similarly, among the contemporary Yukatek and Lakandon the “Lord of the Death” is known as Kisín, “the Flatulent”, who is identified with the devil (Barrera Vásquez 1980: 321). For the Lakandon this master sits in a big chair and burns the souls of the people (Boremanse 2006: 6, 316; Vail 1998: 177). The relation of these beliefs with the ancient skeletal wahy is attested on two vessels (K927 and K1211), where we can find the representation of Xinil Chamiiy burning bones and producing bad odor from the combustion. Furthermore, in the Madrid Codex page 102b we can also find a depiction of the Death God burning a pair of crossed bones in the same fashion as in the vessels (Fig. 4b). If the interpretation is correct, the bones would represent the burnt souls just like Kisín is perceived in modern day Lakandon beliefs. The case of the Chorti’ of Eastern Guatemala and Western Honduras is rather important concerning contemporary Maya death gods. As reported by Wisdom (1961: 449–450), there is a belief in a death God named Chamer. This divinity is conceived as a skeleton dressed in a white piece of cloth who carries a cutting arm similar to a scythe consisting of a wood stick with a bone knife attached to an end. Chamer is said to be invisible for everyone except for its victim, whom he attacks through dreams induced by his ally, the Dream God, Ah waynis. This appearance could easily recall glyphs to represent their own phonology. The analysis shows that the syllables xV, and for our case xi, were inexistent in the previous Mixe-Zoquean language and so the Maya had to invent new signs to represent such phonograms. These new glyphs were acrophones to existent concepts in their culture, and that’s why they probably used a skull for the newly created syllable xi encompassing the idea of fright.

the traditional representation of death in European imagery, however we must not discard that it could preserve some of the ancient ideas of skeletal wahy with spears and blades to attack humans, specially since both beliefs are intimately related to dreams.

Conclusions With the examples from various time periods presented above we aimed to highlight the continuity and differences in the Maya cosmological imagery concerning skeletal beings. We can attest how, since the Classic period, these were conceived as Underworld spirits called wahy, associated with sickness and death. Throughout the Postclassic they were depicted in the codices as portents for death and they were elevated to a status of gods. Such a sacred aspect prevailed up to the colonial K’iche’ in a pair of lords of the Underworld, and in various death deities among the Yukatek. Contemporary Maya groups also believe in death deities such as Kisín for the Lakandon and Chamer for the Ch’orti. In several modern Maya communities some ideas concerning nagualism were preserved, referring to skeletal spirits who produce diseases and death. The beliefs about these harmful beings have been readapted not without changes in different media such as ceramic vessels, written documents or oral tradition to prevail in Maya cosmology as symbolic representations of that obscure, intriguing and unknown aspect which is death. Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Martha Ilia Nájera, Guido Krempel and Harri Kettunen for their commentaries and suggestions regarding this paper as well as Lynneth Lowe for her valuable help with the English translation. References Barrera Vásquez, Alfredo 2001 Diccionario Maya Cordemex. Mexico: Editorial Porrúa. Clarkson, Persis A. 1978 Classic Maya Pictorial Ceramics: A Survey of Content and Theme. In: Raymond Sidrys (ed.), Papers on the Economy and Architecture of the Ancient Maya, pp. 86–141. Los Angeles: Institute of Archaeology, University of California at Los Angeles. Davoust, Michel 1997 Un nouveau commentaire du Codex de Dresde: Codex hiéroglyphique maya du XIVe siècle. Paris: CNRS Éditions. Demarest, Arthur, Prudence Rice and Don Rice 2004 The Terminal Classic in the Maya Lowlands: Collapse, Transition and Transfomation. Boulder: University of Colorado Press. Dresden Codex n.d. http://www.famsi.org/research/graz/dresdensis/index.html (March 30, 2015).

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Fox, James A. and John S. Justeson 1984 Polyvalence in Mayan Hieroglyphic Writing. In: John Justeson and Lyle Campbell (eds.), Phoneticism in Maya Hieroglyphic Writing, pp. 363–366. Institute of Mesoamerican Studies, Publication 9. Albany: University of New York. Garza, Mercedes de la 1998 Rostros de lo sagrado en el mundo maya. Mexico: Paidós, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras. 2009 La cara vital de la muerte en el pensamiento maya. Mexico: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Dirección General de Bibliotecas (Cuadernos de la dgb. Serie Cultural 4). 2012 Sueño y éxtasis. Visión chamánica de los nahuas y mayas. Mexico: Fondo de Cultura Económica/Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Grube, Nikolai and Werner Nahm 1994 A census of Xibalba: A complete inventory of way characters on Maya ceramics. In: Justin Kerr and Barbara Kerr (eds.), The Maya Vase Book, Volume 4, pp. 683–715. New York: Allen Press Inc. Guiteras Holmes, Calixta 1965 Los peligros del alma. Visión del mundo de un tzotzil. México: Fondo de Cultura Económica. Houston, Stephen and David Stuart 1989 The Way Glyph: Evidence for ‘Co-essences’ among the Classic Maya. Washington: Center for Maya Research. Research Reports on Ancient Maya Writing 30. Ichon, Alain 1973 La religión de los totonacas de la sierra. Mexico: Instituto Nacional Indigenista. Kaufman, Terrence, with the assistance of John Justeson 2003 A Preliminary Mayan Etymological Dictionary. http://www. famsi.org/reports/01051/pmed.pdf (March 30, 2015) Kerr, Justin n.d. The Maya Vase Database. http://research.mayavase.com/kerrmaya.html (March 30, 2015) Lacadena García-Gallo, Alfonso 2010 Historical Implications of the Presence of Non-Mayan Linguistic Features in Maya Script. In: Laura van Broekhoven, Rogelio Valencia, Benjamin Vis and Frauke Sachse (eds.), Acta Mesoamericana: The Maya and Their Neighbours: Internal and External Contacts Through Time. 10th European Maya Conference, Leiden, December 2005, pp. 29–39. Markt Schwaben: Verlag Anton Saurwein. López G., Juana and Juan Palacios S. 1994 El brujo que se convirtió en esqueleto. In: Cuentos y Relatos Indígenas 1. Segunda edición. San Cristóbal de Las Casas: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Centro de Investigaciones Humanísticas de Mesoamérica y el Estado de Chiapas. Madrid Codex n.d. http://www.famsi.org/research/graz/madrid/index.html (March 30, 2015). Martínez González, Roberto 2011 El nahualismo. México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de

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México, Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas (Serie Antropológica 19). Maurer A., Eugenio 1985 El infierno o k’atimbak (Calentar con huesos). Tlalocan X: 257–272. Mayo H., Deniz Y. 2003 Yotylel xk’añal ixim; Troje de maíz amarillo. In: Y el Bolom dice...: antologia de cuentos, Vol. 6, pp. 175–180. Tuxtla Gutiérrez: Consejo Estatal para la Cultura y las Artes de Chiapas. Meneses M., Domingo 1994 Cuando muere la persona que tiene su nahual; Che’ mi’ chamel amba way lak pi’alo’b. In: Cuentos y relatos indígenas 4, pp. 191–208. Mexico: Centro de Investigaciones Humanísticas de Mesoamérica y el Estado de Chiapas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Morán, Francisco 2004 Bocabulario Grande. Erik Boot (transcription). http://www. famsi.org/mayawriting/dictionary/boot/cholti_moran1695_revised.pdf (March 30, 2015) Moreno Z., Daniel 2011 Los espíritus del sueño. Wahyis y enfermedad entre los mayas del periodo Clásico. Thesis in Archaeology. Mexico: Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia. 2013a Xi’bajob y wäyob: espíritus del mundo subterráneo. Permanencia y transformación del nahualismo en la tradición oral ch’ol de Chiapas. Master Thesis in Mesoamerican Studies. Mexico: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Programa de Maestría y Doctorado en Estudios Mesoamericanos, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas. 2013b La transformación onírica a través de las representaciones de wahyis del Clásico. In: Bárbara Arroyo, Luis Méndez Salinas and Andrea Rojas (eds.), XXVI Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas de Guatemala. Guatemala, 22 al 26 de julio de 2012, pp. 391–401. Guatemala: Ministerio de Cultura y Deportes. Page P., Jaime T. 2010 Yombil “Puesta su flor en el altar”. Una mirada a la etnomedicina en Oxchuc, Chiapas, a partir de los j-poxtawanejetik organizados. Mexico: Programa de Investigaciones Multidisciplinarias sobre Mesoamérica y el Sureste. Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Pérez L., Enrique 1995 Yalan Bek’et. Bájate Carne. Mexico: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, DGFE. Quirarte, Jacinto 1979 The Representation of Underworld Processions in Maya Vase Painting: An Iconographic Study. In: Norman Hammond and Gordon R. Willey (eds.), Maya Archaeology and Ethnohistory, pp. 116–148. Austin/London: University of Texas Press. Recinos, Adrián 1960 Popol Vuh. Las antiguas historias del Quiché. Mexico: Fondo de Cultura Económica. Robicsek, Francis and Donald M. Hales 1981 The Maya Book of the Dead: The Ceramic Codex. The Corpus

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Romero S., Roberto 2014 El inframundo de los antiguos mayas. PhD thesis in Mesoamerican Studies. Mexico: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Programa de Maestría y Doctorado en Estudios Mesoamericanos, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas.

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Schele, Linda 1985 Balan-Ahau: A Possible Reading of the Tikal Emblem Glyph and a Title at Palenque. In: Merle Greene Robertson and Elizabeth P. Benson (eds.), Fourth Palenque Round Table, 1980, pp. 59–65. San Francisco: The Pre-Columbian Art Research Institute. Schellhas, Paul 1904 Representation of Deities in Maya Manuscripts. Papers of the Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology, Vol. 4, No. 1. Cambridge: Peabody Museum, Harvard University. Sheseña H., Alejandro 2010 Los nombres de los naguales en la escritura jeroglífica maya: Religión y linguística a través de la onomástica. Journal of Mesoamerican Languages and Linguistics 2 (1): 1–30.

Wisdom, Charles 1961 Los Chortis de Guatemala. Seminario de Integración Social Guatemalteca, Publicación No. 10. Guatemala: Editorial del Ministerio de Educación Pública “José de Pineda Ibarra”. Zender, Marc U. 2004 On the Morphology of Intimate Possession. In: Søren Wichmann (ed.), The Linguistics of Maya Writing, pp. 195–209. Salt Lake City: The University of Utah Press. Zender, Marc and Stanley Guenter 2003 The Names of the Lords of Xib’alb’a in the Maya Hieroglyphic Script. In: Renata von Hanffstengel and Cecilia Tercero V. (eds.), Eduard y Caecilie Seler: Sistematización de los Estudios Americanistas y sus Repercusiones, pp. 91–126. Mexico: Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas, Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas.

Sheseña H., Alejandro and Virginia M. López T. 2010 Ensalmo tzeltal de 1725. Liminar. Estudios Sociales y Humanísticos VIII (1): 193–207. Slocum, Marianna C. 1965 The origin of Corn and other Tzeltal Myths. Tlalocan 5 (1): 25–37. Sotelo, Laura 2002 Los dioses del Códice Madrid: Aproximaciones a las representaciones antropomorfas de un libro sagrado maya. Mexico: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Instituto de Investigaciones Filológicas, Programa de Maestría y Doctorado en Estudios Mesoamericanos, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras. Stuart, David 2005 Glyphs on Pots. Decoding Classic Maya Ceramics. In: Sourcebook for the 29th Maya Hieroglyphic Forum, pp. 110–197. Austin: The University of Texas at Austin, Department of Art and Art History, Maya Workshop Foundation. Taube, Karl A. 1992 The Major Gods of Ancient Yucatan. Studies in Pre-Columbian Art and Archaeology 32. Washington: Dumbarton Oaks, Research Library and Collection. Vail, Gabrielle 1998 Kisin and the Underworld gods of the Maya. Latin American Indian Literatures Journal 14 (2): 167–187. Velásquez G., Erik 2009 Los vasos de la entidad política de ’Ik’: una aproximación histórico-artística. Estudio sobre las entidades anímicas y el lenguaje gestual y corporal en el arte maya clásico. PhD Thesis in Art History. Mexico: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Facultad de Filosofía y Letras. 2011 Las entidades y las fuerzas anímicas en la cosmovisión maya clásica. In: Alejandra Martínez de Velasco Cortina and Maria

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Xibalba: Is it Really the Underworld? Ana Somohano Eres Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México

Abstract Traditionally, Xibalba, the world of the dead among the pre-Hispanic Maya, has been known as the ‘Maya Underworld’. However, certain data allow us to question the appropriateness of this label. Evidence suggests that the use of the word ‘Underworld’ is deeply influenced by the colonial conceptions that were attributed to the Maya Xibalba: Xibalba was assimilated to the Christian Hell and thus was thought to be located below the Earth. The aim of this paper is to reconsider the location of Xibalba by going through the evidence provided by different types of sources.

Resumen Xibalba, el mundo de los muertos de los mayas prehispánicos, ha sido tradicionalmente conocido como el ‘inframundo maya’. Sin embargo, ciertos datos nos permiten cuestionar si este apelativo es el más adecuado. La evidencia sugiere que el uso de la palabra ‘inframundo’ está fuertemente influenciado por las concepciones coloniales que le fueron atribuidas al Xibalba maya: éste fue asimilado con el Infierno cristiano y, de este modo, localizado bajo la tierra. El propósito del presente texto es reconsiderar el emplazamiento de Xibalba a través del análisis de la evidencia contenida en varios tipos de fuentes.

When we look at the literature on Maya cosmography, it is quite common to find that the pre-Conquest Maya divided the cosmos into three different, vertically organized layers. Thus, it is assumed that there were three ontologically different worlds located in the sky, the earth, and under the earth. Different kinds of beings inhabited each of these worlds, although they could travel from one to the other. However, the vertical division of the cosmos went even further: there were thirteen levels in the sky and nine levels in the underworld (Schele et al. 1993; Paxton 2001; de la Garza 2002: 68–71; Rivera Dorado 2005: 24).

in these sources. When looking at colonial dictionaries, this word is often translated as ‘diablo’ (devil) (Pío Pérez 1877: 100; Álvarez 1997: 593; Acuña 2005: 124) or ‘infierno’ (hell) (Arzápalo 1995: 2170; Acuña 2005: 193). The colonial chronicles refer to it in a similar way: according to Bartolomé de las Casas, Xibalba is hell, where life after death continues (1967 [1552–1556]: 506), and Diego López de Cogolludo (2012 [1688]: 169) describes it as the devil.

In this partition of the cosmos, the area under the earth has been associated with Xibalba, the destination where the two twins from the Popol Vuh narrative known as Junajpu and Xbalanke, respectively, travel to (Christenson 2007). Xibalba, an expression we find in various colonial sources,1 is a place/state of being usually defined in Christian terms

The fact that Xibalba seems to be a place associated with darkness, illness, and death, may be the reason for its association with the Christian hell (see Nielsen, this volume). As a consequence, Xibalba adopted some of the connotations that hell had; Xibalba, therefore, was assumed to be a world beneath the earth. This belief was extended to other sources written under Christian influence, such as the Popol Vuh, where the Lords of Xibalba hear the twins playing ball above their heads (Christenson 2007: 103).2

1 Although the name Xibalba appears in Colonial sources, it has not been found in Classic Maya epigraphic texts.

2 The fact that a document dates from Colonial times does not necessarily imply that it manifests Christian conceptions.

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Figure 1. Humans and non-humans, which belong to different spheres of existence, interact at the same level. Rollout Image K114 by Justin Kerr. The Maya Vase Database. As a result, when researchers look back to the pre-Conquest Maya, they take these assumptions about the world of the dead, and assume, with little questioning, that Xibalba is a synonym of the Underworld (Coe 1978; Hellmuth 1987; Nájera Coronado 2002; Stone 2010; Prufer and Hurst 2007; Romero Sandoval 2012, 2014). However, some studies about other places and temporalities of Mesoamerica seem to indicate that the location of this ‘other world’ beneath the earth may not be so clear, challenging the way we regard the Mesoamerican (and Maya) cosmos. Anthropological research conducted among the Tzeltal Maya (Pitarch 2013) and among the Nahua from the Sierra Norte de Puebla (Romero López 2011) suggests that some of the indigenous groups existing today do not divide the cosmos in three different layers. Instead, they conceive a world where ontologically diverse beings belong to different spheres, which coexist in the same world and are not distributed vertically. Other researchers have found some revealing facts that also challenge the idea of a vertical cosmos for Prehispanic Mesoamerica. Katarzyna Mikulska (2007), for instance, published an interesting study arguing that Mictlan, a Nahua concept that shared some characteristics with Xibalba,3 could

These documents tend to show the consequences of the relations between Christians and the local groups, and they are, after all, an indigenous source. However, there is no doubt that these relations led to the exchange of ideas, which explains why Christian concepts may be present in these sources, as Jesper Nielsen (this volume) accurately points out.

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3 One of the clues that support the idea that the Maya Xibalba and the Nahua Mictlan were similar concepts is that in some Maya colonial sources Xibalba is called Mitnal or Metnal, probably an adaptation of the Nahua name (Romero Sandoval 2014: table 1). This adaptation could have taken place due to the influence from central Mexico in the Maya area during the Postclassic period. However, each of these concepts also had its own particularities,

sometimes be placed on the top of the world. In fact, she came across expressions such as ‘to go up to Mictlan’. Furthermore, in a recent paper Mikulska (2015) also points out that Mictlan could also be more similar compared with Omeyocan, the highest place of the Nahua heaven, than it was originally thought. Likewise, both Ana Guadalupe Díaz (2009) and Jesper Nielsen and Toke Sellner Reunert (2009) concluded that the division of thirteen heavens and nine sections of the underworld, which was considered a pan-Mesoamerican conception, in fact was the result of Christian influence brought by the Franciscans and the Dominicans. If some specialists have started to question this Mesoamerican cosmography, could it be that we are also wrong about the way the Maya conceptualized their cosmos? The aim of this paper is to review the current assumptions about the Maya cosmos to determine whether the pre-Conquest Maya really placed Xibalba below their feet.

The Doorstep to Xibalba: Did the Maya descend? One of the arguments that has supported the idea of Xibalba as an underworld is the existence of thresholds that communicate with this area, holes that go into the earth, such as sinkholes, cenotes, or rifts. Nevertheless, these are not the only ways of entering Xibalba. One of the most significant entrances to Xibalba was through caves. Even though entering a cave is a way of entering into the earth, it does not always imply a descent; in many cases, entering the cave only implies walking horizontally. In fact, sometimes it is necessary to climb the rock in order to get to the mouth of the cave. Consequently, the way to Xibalba

and a more detailed analysis of the similarities and differences between them is needed.

Xibalba: is it Really the Underworld?

Figure 2. Madrid Codex 91c. Vulture perched on a tree. Image courtesy of Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt Graz, used with per- Figure 3. Madrid Codex 37a. Dog over a sky band. Image courtesy of Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt Graz, used with permission. mission. seems to be more a matter of getting in or out, rather than going up or down. If we take a look to Maya temples, this idea seems to be confirmed. Apparently, entering a temple was equivalent to getting into Xibalba.4 However, in most cases, it is compulsory to climb a considerable number of steps in order to reach the entrance to the temple. Hence, the path to Xibalba seems to be an ascending one. There were also other ways of communicating with Xibalba that did not require any physical movement, neither descending-ascending, nor in-out. Communication could be established through a considerable number of objects and beings: stelae, serpents, mirrors, trees, crosses, codices, censers, etc. All of these allowed the Maya to enter the ‘other world’ without having to move physically.5 Indeed, in most of the artistic representations of this communication involv-

4 Although it is more obvious in some Maya regions than others, entering a temple was the same as entering through the mouth of the Earth Monster (equivalent also to entering to a cave). We can recall, for instance, the beautifully ornamented entrances to the temples of the Chenes area. 5 As a matter of fact, when a censer is used, the smoke that comes from it is considered a path for communication with Xibalba. Since the smoke goes up, most likely the relationship is being established with something that is located above.

ing beings of the ‘other world’, they seem to be at the same level as the humans interacting with them (Fig. 1). Thus, getting into Xibalba seems to be a change of perspective, an alteration of the self, rather than a path to an actual physical place (see Romero López 2011). This alteration of the self demanded, in some way, for instance, a corporal permutation, be it through shamanic transformation, dreams or the intake of psychotropic substances. Nonetheless, there was a path to Xibalba that everyone, sooner or later, was forced to take: death. Markus Eberl (2005: 41–51) highlights some of the mortuary expressions that the Maya used when someone reached the end of life: kim or cham (“to die”); k’a’ay ‘u sak nich nahl (“his white flower conscience –soul– passes away”);6 och bih (he enters the road); u bah ti way (“his image while sleeping”); hil (“to end”). To these phrases, we have to add och ha’ (“to enter into the water”) (Lacadena 2009: 41). As we can see, none of the expressions found in the hieroglyphic inscriptions regarding the passage into the world of the dead implies the idea of descending.7 If we go over the numerous expressions

6 Harri Kettunen (2005) offers, however, a more updated reading. According to him, the sentence would be a diphrastic kenning involving two objects; his reading of the death phrase is ka’ay u…k usakik’il, ‘it got withered, his/her ?, his/her wind’. 7 The expression och ha’ may imply this idea of descending, given the fact that a considerable amount of water is subter-

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Figure 4. Jaguar on top of a stela. Rollout Image K928 by Justin Kerr. The Maya Vase Database. that Cristina Álvarez (1997: 260–267) found for the Colonial Maya, we can see the same pattern. In fact, one of those phrases, u canil cuxan (“what has been lived rises”), even implies the opposite direction.

Sky Symbols under the Earth, Underworld Symbols in the Sky One of the main focuses in the study of Maya religion has been the understanding of the meaning of different symbols that abound on Maya thought. Thereby, researchers have concentrated on the analysis of Maya art in order to unravel these symbols.8 Based on this symbolist perspective, scholars, when studying Maya cosmography, have identified/assigned symbols that are assumed to represent each of the layers of the universe (Tozzer and Allen 1910; Thompson 1970; de la Garza 1995, 1998, 1999; Arellano 1995; Valverde Valdés 2004; Rivera Dorado et al. 2004; Morales 2006; Arias 2007; Romero Sandoval 2014, among others). By this manner, a picture

ranean (see, for example, the canoe descending in the bones of Tikal’s burial 116). However, the universe of water bodies was broad for the Maya (see Kettunen and Helmke 2013), and the idea of ‘entering the water’ when death arrives could imply many watery locations that were emplaced over the earth (see also Braakhuis, this volume, for an alternative interpretation of these bones).

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8 Some anthropologists have pointed out the dangers of using a symbolist point of view to address the art of groups outside our Western tradition. According to them, art within these groups is more a ‘presentation’ than a ‘representation’, and assuming that we are dealing with symbols (where the meaning is separated from the form), is thereupon incorrect. To have a better understanding of this issue, see Gell (1998), Keane (2005), Severi (2009), Leach (2007), among others. Susan Gillespie (2001) and Julia Hendon (2012) have considered these problems in relation to the Maya.

of the Maya universe has been created, with symbols of the sky (birds, monkeys, flowers, the sun and the stars, etc.), symbols of the earth (serpents, dragons, crocodiles, vessels, etc.), and symbols from the underworld (jaguars, shells, dogs, defleshed bodies, bats, etc.). The division between celestial/ underworld creatures and gods completes the picture. In spite of the fact that this distribution seems very clear when we read the work of the specialists, when turning to the artistic manifestations this partition is sometimes not so clear, and beings/symbols of one layer also appear in the other. Apparently, as pointed out before, birds are thought to be celestial beings. This is due to the fact that birds are normally seen furrowing the sky (de la Garza 1995, Rivera Dorado et al. 2005). However, at the same time, the same scholars that define birds as celestial symbols reckon that there are birds that belong to the Underworld, mainly due to their association with the night (Xibalba seems to be a place where darkness reigns) and death. Some of the birds related to Xibalba are vultures, owls, aquatic birds, or the mythical Moan bird (see de la Garza 2005: 79–96). Vultures are scavenger animals and are, therefore, linked to death; owls, on the other hand, are nocturnal animals and considered to be messengers of ‘other world’-creatures, bad omens and harbingers of death (Christenson 2007: 107; Kettunen 2016); and, as long as the underworld is considered to be a watery field, aquatic birds are associated with it. The contradiction that results from finding these species in the world under the earth may be resolved by making a difference between the birds which symbolize the sky and those which symbolize the underworld. Nonetheless, this distinction does not stand in all cases. In the Maya codices, for instance, we can see two instances of a vulture perched on top of a tree, a place considered to be a celestial realm (Dresden Codex: 3a; Madrid Codex: 91c) (Fig. 2).9 Mean9 The Moan bird can also have celestial connotations, as

Xibalba: is it Really the Underworld?

while, other birds considered to be celestial, such as the quetzal (see de la Garza 1995: 14), and solar par excellence such as the macaw or the hummingbird (see de la Garza 1995: 50, 58; see also Milbrath 1999: 95), can also be bearers of death and illness, the forces that depart from Xibalba; and are sometimes associated with the nocturnal Moon Goddess (de la Garza 1995: 34, 39–41, 50–53, 60). Also, according to an episode in the Popol Vuh, one of the creatures that the Hero Twins encounter in Xibalba, Vucub Caquix, as a matter of fact is a macaw. Monkeys are another example of an animal that has been described as a celestial creature (Morales 2006: 86–87) that can be found accompanying underworld beings in the same sphere of action. On vessel depictions, monkeys can be seen alongside defleshed bodies (K3038) or might be depicted as part of wahy scenes (K8733), creatures associated with illness and death. Nevertheless, birds and monkeys are not the only creatures that have been associated with one of the three realms that also appear in the others. Dogs are conceived as underworld creatures due to their role in conducting the dead to their new destination after they have passed away (de la Garza 1997: 120; see Stone and Zender 2011: 187). Furthermore, dogs are often seen interacting with the Moon Goddess and vultures (de la Garza 1997: 123). But, on the other hand, we can also find dogs in a celestial surrounding: for instance, in Madrid Codex’s page 37a, where a dog appears above a sky band, implying that he is somehow related to the sky in this case (Fig. 3). At the same time, Mercedes de la Garza (1997: 124–126) argues that the dog also belongs to the celestial realm, as there is a strong link that attaches dogs to the sun, fire and thunderbolts. Jaguars are also animals that have been reckoned as underworld creatures (Thompson 1970: 293; Valverde Valdés 2004; Rivera Dorado 2006: 150–151). The nocturnal behavior of these felines, combined with the similarities between their fur and the night sky filled with stars, has encouraged their association with Xibalba (see Valverde Valdés 2004). But there is, once again, a contradiction: jaguars are also considered to be celestial beings, in their role as the night sun. Jaguars, therefore, can be seen occupying Octavio Q. Esparza (2015: personal communica- Figure 5. Dresden Codex. Crocodile with a sky band in its body. Image courtesy of Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt Graz, used with permission. tion) indicated me.

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spaces that are believed to be heavenly connoted; this is the case of the feline on vessel K928, which is emplaced over a stela (Fig. 4). Stelae, as trees, have been described as axis mundi, that is, a shaft that vertically connects heaven to the underworld (Schele, Freidel and Parker 1993). The top of the axis, then, equals the sky. If the jaguar is lying over the monument, this means that he is in a celestial surrounding. There is another animal that, despite the consensus of considering it a symbol of the earth (Arellano 1995; de la Garza 1999; Arias 2007), can be seen in celestial and underworld spheres: the crocodile. The Maya conceived the earth as a crocodile that floated over the waters of creation, as the rough skin of the reptile corresponded to the rugged surface of the earth. Still, we have to take into account that the crocodile belongs to the heavens too: there is a creature nicknamed the Starry Deer Crocodile (Stuart 2009: 69–74, 168) that is seen dominating the topmost space of some artistic manifestations, the same space that belongs to the sky (Velásquez García 2006). As reported by Linda Schele et al. (1993: 85), this crocodile is an embodiment of the Milky Way, quintessentially a celestial element. This creature can be observed, for instance, on the so called Cosmic Plate (K1609) or over the entrance door to House E at Palenque (where it is also associated with a bird). On page 74 of the Dresden Codex, the body of the crocodile is a sky band and the creature looks downward throwing a flood of water from its mouth (Fig. 5). Furthermore, shells are other elements traditionally connected to the underworld. As already mentioned, Xibalba was perceived as a watery sphere; hence, everything that came from an aquatic environment was directly associated with the world of the dead. The presence of conchs and shells in burial offerings has strengthened this link. In spite of this, it would be wrong to assume that every time we detect a shell we are facing a depiction of the underworld, as shells can also belong to other layers of the universe. According to Lourdes Suárez Díaz (1991: 144) shells are linked to every type of water, including celestial waters, too. Furthermore, shells are strongly connected with the wind, perhaps because of their role as musical instruments (see Katz, this volume). In sum, many of the symbols that have been attributed to one of the three realms of the universe can also be found in the others. The same happens with certain deities: as, e.g., Jesper Nielsen (this volume) notices, there are deities that have been considered as entities of the underworld, such as God A and God L, but “in very few cases is it clear that these deities are in fact associated with this location and not any other supernatural realm”. If we can detect similar things in the sky and the underworld, is it then possible to state that they are different realms ontologically speaking? The presence of underworld signs in the sky and of sky signs in the underworld has been explained by saying that Xibalba is the same as the nocturnal sky. However, if Xibalba can be above the earth, is it correct to call it an underworld?

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Through this section we have seen, therefore, that the mélange of symbols attributed to the different universe realms, far from offering us a clear order and structure of the

cosmos, challenges instead the vertical distribution of three separated layers. In fact, maybe we should regard these elements not as symbols of a specific location, but as elements that can be seen in different places depending on the context in which they appear.

The Universe: The Union of Sky and Earth. And what about Xibalba? The idea of completion, tz’ak, was written in the Maya script using paired sets of logograms representing some binary relationship or opposition that, when put together, transmitted the idea of wholeness (Stuart 2003). One way of representing this concept was by combining the logograms chan (sky) and kab (earth) (Stuart 2003: 1). Alexandre Tokovinine (2008: 141, 159–160), based on Stuart’s (2003) analysis, stated that this expression was a way of referring to the whole world. Moreover, the combined use of the two terms as a diphrastic kenning is very common in Maya texts. A few examples are uyokte’ chan, uyokte’ kab (“the strides of the sky, the strides of the earth”) recorded on Stela J from Copan; numil ta chan, numil ta kab (“passing in the sky, passing in the earth”) on a bench at Palenque; chanal k’uh, kabal k’uh (“heavenly gods, earthly gods”) on the ‘Rio Azul mask’ (Hull 2003: 431–438). This opposition can also be seen in the Popol Vuh: “For thus was the creation of the earth, created then by Heart of Sky and Heart of Earth, as they are called. They were the first to conceive it. The sky was set apart. The earth also was set apart within the waters. Thus was conceived the successful completion of the work when they thought and when they pondered” (Christenson 2007: 62–63). Thereby, in the K’iche’ narrative, the universe is conceived as the union of the sky and the earth.10 According to Kerry Hull (2003: 432), there is ample evidence from modern Mayan languages for the combination of the words chan and kab as a diphrastic kenning. Hull believes that these contemporary examples reinforce the idea that the conjunction of both terms represents a larger conception of ‘everywhere’ or ‘world’. Hence, we can deduct from the previous arguments that the Maya conceived the universe or the cosmos as the union of two layers: the earth and the sky. If this is correct, where is, then, the third layer, the one associated with Xibalba or the Underworld? It appears that when the Maya thought of the way their cosmos was structured, they only recognized two components and that the third one is absent.11

10 As stated on footnote 3, the fact that some Christian ideas may have been introduced in the Popol Vuh does not mean that all of its content may be deemed as European: the roots of indigenous reality continue to manifest in these sources and, at the same time, European influence will always be reinterpreted in indigenous terms. 11 Both Hull (2003: 436) and Tokovinine (2008: 161) detect a complementary expression: chan, ch’en, kab (sky, cave, earth). The presence of the cave could allude to the third sphere,

Xibalba: is it Really the Underworld?

Figure 6. Panel from the Temple of the Cross, Palenque. Drawing by Linda Schele (Linda Schele Drawing Archive, No. 170). But the conception of the universe as the amalgamation of sky and earth can be perceived beyond the linguistics, it can be appreciated in Maya art too. In Maya plastic manifestations, it is easy to distinguish some creatures that combine the elements of different animals. These creatures have been called dragons by specialists (de la Garza 1999), due to the mixture of features they present. The most common of these animal combinations is a hybrid of reptile and bird that can the Underworld, and further examination of this combination is required. However, the existence of this saying does not prove that the Maya conceived a three-layer universe instead of a two-layer one. First of all because the recurrence of the expression is very low: as far as I am concerned, it only appears twice. One of these sources, the Ritual of the Bacabs, comes from the Colonial period and could be influenced by a European way of thinking. The other one, Tikal Stela 31, seems more appealing, but the fact that Tokovinine (2008: 161) translates the expression in E27–F26 as Tz’ak ch’en is revealing to me: the idea of completion continues to be in the words chan-kab, leaving ch’en apart.

be presented in two ways: as a bird with serpentine characteristics known as the Principal Bird Deity (Bardawil 1976) and as a lizard with avian characteristics. All in all, what these creatures manifest is the wholeness of the cosmos, by combining animals that represent the two layers that conform the world: the reptiles as a manifestation of the earth and the birds as a manifestation of the sky. I want to make clear that, while I consider that the previous arguments are enlightening to support a division of the cosmos in two layers instead of three, I do not believe that these two layers where conceived in cosmological terms; that is, they did not imply two different spheres of existence. Instead, I think that the opposition between earth and sky must have come from the realization that the world in which the Maya lived was limited by both of them. The conjunction of the limits implied, then, the idea of wholeness, as sky and earth encompassed everything.

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The Panel of the Temple of the Cross, Palenque Before reaching the conclusions of the present chapter I would like to examine one last image: the panel of the Temple of the Cross from Palenque (Fig. 6). According to some scholars (Bernal Romero 2011: 199; Romero Sandoval 2014: 34) the ruler of Palenque, Kan Bahlam, is interacting through the cross that appears in the middle of the scene, with his deceased father, K’inich Janahb Pakal, who appears at the left side of the stucco relief. The fact that K’inich Janahb Pakal belongs to the world of the dead is inferred from his cloths, but, above all, by the fact that he is standing over a glyph cartouche that reads, according to Alejandro Sheseña (in Romero Sandoval 2014: 34) Bolon Hul Nal (“The place of the nine abysses”), a name that is related to the Underworld. Albeit being in different spheres of existence, the two figures of the scene, the one that is alive and the one that is dead, are located at the same level. Hence, looking at this image we cannot say that the world of the dead is below the world of the living ones. Nonetheless, the most striking aspect of this scene is the fact that both men appear standing over a sky band. How can it be, therefore, that K’inich Janahb Pakal is at Xibalba and at the sky at the same time? As far as I am concerned, there is a possibility that solves this apparent contradiction: there is no such thing as a radical difference between the two realms of the cosmos.12

Conclusions Even though more research and reflection is needed, I believe enough information is available to challenge the tripartite division of the cosmos that has dominated in Maya studies. As I stated at the beginning of this chapter, this distribution of the Maya world may seem very clear, but, when examining it more closely, it begins to fade away. Apparently, the Maya cosmos was formed by the opposition of two layers, earth and sky, which, united, constituted everything. In these two layers lived and cohabited different creatures that, albeit being able to occupy both levels, pertained to different spheres of existence. Due to this fact, communication between these creatures was hindered: the only way of establishing it in a safe way was through several rituals. Perhaps Xibalba was a term that referred to these other spheres of existence that were foreign to humans.13 In this

12 The identification of the figure in the left as the dead K’inich Janahb Pakal is only one of the interpretations of this relief. Other scholars (Martin and Grube 2008: 169), for instance, state that this figure may be a young depiction of K’an Bahlam. Of all the interpretations, the one that connects the figure on the left with the dead ruler seems the most reliable to me, due to the fact that his clothes are similar to a mortuary bundle and that he is standing over the Bolon Hul Nal expression.

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13 It is necessary to take into account that Xibalba was

way, Xibalba would be more a state of being than a concrete place. The efforts trying to determine the exact location of Xibalba (Van Akkeren 2012: 114), then, appear fruitless. But, at this point, there is something that requires further explanation. Why did Xibalba appear to be associated with some tangible places, such as caves or cenotes? I feel that this is because Xibalba represented otherness to humans; thus, it tended to occupy those places that were difficult to access for humans: the sky, beneath the earth, deep in the water (see also Braakhuis, this volume), or inside caves. However, this does not mean that these places were different from each other: Xibalba was present in all of them. That is the reason why Xibalba, too, could be in the sky. Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Milan Kováč for his invitation to contribute to this volume. I am in debt with Antonio Jaramillo Arango and Octavio Q. Esparza Olguín for their useful suggestions on earlier versions of this paper. My sincere thanks to Guido Krempel and Harri Kettunen for their helpful comments, too. I am also very grateful to Frida Somohano Eres and William Johnston for making sure the English version made sense. Any mistakes, however, remain my sole responsibility. References cited Acuña, René 2005 Vocabulario de Lengua Quiche. Mexico City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Álvarez, Cristina 1997 Diccionario etnolingüístico del idioma maya yucateco colonial. Mexico City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Arellano Hernández, Alfonso 1995 El monstruo de la tierra: una revisión. In: Carmen Varela Torrecilla, Juan Luis Bonor Villarejo y María Yolanda Fernández Marquínez (ed.), Religión y sociedad en el área maya, pp. 15–28. Madrid: Sociedad Española de Estudios Mayas. Arias Ortiz, Teri Erandeni 2007 El simbolismo del cocodrilo en la mitología maya, análisis comparativo. M.A. Thesis. México City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Arzápalo Marín, Ramón 1995 Calepino de Motul. Diccionario Maya-Español, Tomo III. Mexico City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Bardawil, Lawrence W. 1976 The Principal Bird Deity in Maya Art. An Iconographic Study of Form and Meaning. In: Merle Greene Robertson (ed.), The Art, Iconography and Dynastic History of Palenque, Part III, pp. 195–209. Peeble Beach: Robert Louis Stevenson School. Bernal Romero, Guillermo 2011 El señorío de Palenque durante la era de K’inich Janaahb’ only one of the names that this ‘other world’ received and that it is only present in colonial sources (see footnote 2).

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The Translation of a Maya Cosmogram onto an Uncooperative Terrestrial Landscape James E. Brady California State University, Los Angeles

Abstract California State University, Los Angeles, has conducted a multi-year study of ancient Maya sacred landscape in northern Belize at the sites of Maax Na, La Milpa and Chawak But’o’ob. The investigation shows that the terrestrial model formulated for the Petexbatun Regional Cave Survey functioned in this area. The model focuses on features associated with earth and water. Despite the lack of large and impressive caves, public architecture was built around small caves in both large centers and rural settlements. In addition, karst features such as sinkholes were formalized as sacred landmarks.

Resumen La Universidad Estatal de California, Los Ángeles, realizó un estudio de varios años acerca del antiguo paisaje sagrado Maya en el norte de Belice en los sitios de Maax Na, La Milpa y Chawak But’o’ob, donde no se forman cuevas grandes debido a la blandura de la piedra caliza. Las investigaciones demuestran que los sitios están colocados alrededor de un modelo cosmológico asociado con la tierra y el agua. A pesar de la falta de cuevas grandes e impresionantes, la arquitectura pública fue construida alrededor de cuevas pequeñas tanto en centros grandes como en establecimientos rurales. Además, se formalizaron las formas artificiales tales como los chultunes n tanto que lugares sagrados.

In reviewing the archaeological literature from 1995 to 2005, An underappreciated aspect of the Petexbatun Regional Cave Michael Smith and Katharina Schreiber note that, “For the Project was its articulation of an explicit model of the general Classic Maya, studies of sacred landscapes are dominated principles on which ancient Maya landscape was conceptuby research on caves” and they go on to say, “In contrast to alized. The model recognized Earth as a sacred and animate the empirically grounded cave research, other work on Clas- entity and adopted an indigenous understanding of the term sic Maya sacred landscapes is highly speculative in nature” cave to approximate the Maya word ch’een which refers to (Smith and Schreiber 2006: 19). The more speculative studies almost any part of the environment that penetrates the earth are often attempts to read meaning onto the built environment and includes a range of natural features such as caves, canby drawing on plans from traditional archaeological investi- yons, cenotes, sinkholes, springs, crevices, and any number of gations that were conducted with little or no interest in sacred other holes. As I have noted, “it appears that the most sacred landscape. Furthermore, these sacred landscape studies rarely locations are those that combine the fundamental elements of engage the physical landscape as an experiential process as earth and water into a single sacred expression of the power suggested by Christopher Tilly (1994). In general, non-cave of earth” (Brady 1997: 603). Maya archaeologists appear to be at a loss on how to engage sacred landscapes because they lack basic models for the While Smith and Schreiber’s statement about cave publiphenomenon. cations dominating the study of Maya sacred landscape has

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Figure 1. Map of the Three Rivers area showing the location of Maax Na, Chawak But’o’ob and La Milpa (Brennan et al. 2013 as adapted from Scarborough et al. 2003: xvii, Fig. 1.1).

some validity, it is actually only applicable for the southern Maya lowlands. Even here, little work has been attempted in the northern part of the area because the soft dolomitic limestone bedrock does not support the formation of large caves that might have attracted archaeological attention (Brennan et al. 2013). As a result, the study of both caves and sacred landscape has languished. It is because of the lack of these impressive landmarks that I have referred to the northern part of the southern lowlands as an “uncooperative landscape.”

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It should be noted, however, that this is not the only “uncooperative landscape” from the cave perspective in the Maya area. The entire southern border of the Maya highlands consists of a chain of non-karstic volcanic peaks where caves do not naturally form (Brady and Veni 1992). Here, a large number of man-made caves have been documented (Brady

2004). Moving farther afield, this same principle is seen in volcanic Central Mexico where archaeologically important man-made caves have been reported (Aguilar et al. 2005; Heyden 1973; Hirth 2000; Manzanilla et al. 1994; Noguera 1945). This illustrates one way in which an element of the cosmogram can be translated onto an uncooperative physical landscape. It also clearly demonstrates that the cosmogram is still operative, even in the absence of a key natural element. Returning to the northern section of the southern lowlands, we should expect to see the same cosmogram found operating here as operates elsewhere, only with a distinctive regional translation. Over the last six years I have attempted to define the nature of that regional translation through a series of projects on small subterranean features in the Three Rivers area of northern Belize (Fig. 1).

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Maax Na Eleanor King and the late Leslie Shaw provided a vehicle for addressing this issue with an invitation to inspect a number of karst features at the site of Maax Na. This led to a joint project in 2008. Since a report on this project has already been published, I will only review it quickly (King et al. 2012). Our investigation focused on Spider Cave, associated with the East Building complex in the North Plaza. The complex consisted of a large range structure (1A8) and a smaller attached shrine structure (1A-9) (Fig. 2).

Figure 2. Map of the site of Maax Na showing the location of Structure 1A-9 and its relation to Spider Cave (after King et al. 2012: 617, Fig. 3).

Spider Cave, located on the north side of Structure 1A-9, is small, 8 m long x 7.5 m wide, and low enough that individuals cannot stand inside it (Fig. 3). At the time of discovery, the only known entrance was found at the base of the hill and consisted of a low 6-m-wide fissure that was covered with a travertine floor (Fig 4). The travertine floor indicated that water flowed from it at least on a seasonal basis and a hill with water flowing from its base is a fundamentally sacred motif. This fact seems to have been recognized in that the cave yielded Preclassic ceramics that predate the Early Classic construction of public architecture at the site. In addition, the cave produced a dense concentration of ceramics (1015 sherds) for this site indicating that it had been heavily utilized. The most significant discovery was an unsuspected entrance to the cave at the northeast corner of the shrine (Fig. 5). The bedrock around the opening had been chipped all along the exposed edge, indicating that the present size was the result of human workmanship. This opening is substantially larger than the fissure at the base of the hill. Both the size and the location suggest that it served as the principal, and perhaps only, access to Spider Cave. Furthermore, the opening left no doubt that the shrine had an intimate relationship with the cave in the minds of the Maya.

Chawak But’o’ob A second significant step was undertaken at Chawak But’o’ob with the Rio Bravo Archaeology Project. Chawak But’o’ob is a Late Classic farming community covering 0.5 km² along the Rio Bravo Escarpment. Stanley Walling showed me Cave 1 Figure 3. Plan and profile views of Spider Cave (by Allan Cobb in King et al. 2012: 618, in 2010 and we were finally able to arrange Fig. 4).

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Fig. 4. Photograph of upper entrance to Spider Cave being uncovered (Photograph by Leslie Shaw).

our schedules for a joint project during the 2013 season. An attraction of the project was the fact that Chawak But’o’ob was a non-elite community which nevertheless possessed architectural features like a ballcourt, sweatbath and water management features that marked the community center (Walling et al. 2007) (Fig. 6). Cave 1 is even smaller than Spider Cave, approximately 5 m long, north to south, and 3.5 m wide, east to west. The cave is 1.12 m high at its highest point but the ceiling is about 75 cm high in most places so it would have been impossible to stand in the cave. The feature is also not a true cave as one usually thinks of them. The eastern side of the cave is composed of large slabs of limestone that have collapsed from the exposed bedrock shelf that forms the ceiling (Fig. 7). Nevertheless, the fallen slabs create a darkened, enclosed space that would have been seen as a ch’een by the Maya.

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Figure 6. Plan of Chawak But’o’ob showing Cave 1 in relation to the ballcourt and sweat house (Courtesy of Rio Bravo Archaeological Project).

Two excavation units were placed within the cave and another was excavated above the cave. The excavation of two units inside the cave produced surprisingly meager ceramic and artifact assemblages (Fig. 8). The lack of a large ceramic assemblage was unexpected. It might be argued that the small size of the cave required constant cleaning but this appears to be too simple an explanation. Garrett Cook (1986) says that fire is so much a part of K’ichean ritual that ceremonies are

Figure 5. Photograph showing the low fissure at the north end of Spider Cave entrance with the crew uncovering the blocked upper en- Figure 7. Photograph of Cave 1 at Chawal But’o’ob showing slabs of ceiling collapse forming the outer wall of the cave (Photograph by Melanie Saldaña). trance (Photograph by Eleanor King).

The Translation of a Maya Cosmogram onto an Uncooperative Terrestrial Landscape

The sherds showed heavy fire blackening on the interior which signaled that the vessel may have been used to burn incense. The number of sherds present suggested that this might have been an important activity area and a 1 x 2 m excavation unit placed on top of the cave recovered a high density of ceramics. At both Maax Na and Chawak But’o’ob extensive ritual activity appears to have gone on just outside of the cave. At Maax Na, a 1 x 2 m unit excavated at the base of the hill, just outside the lower entrance to Spider Cave, uncovered a carpet of broken ceramic that was considered dense for the site. A similar pattern was found on the flat space above Cave 1. Cleaning almost certainly occurred at both caves so the material recovered reflects only a small percentage of all the ceramic that had been used there. At both Maax Na and Chawak But’o’ob space within the caves is very restricted but this is especially true of Cave 1. It is possible that ritual at Chawak But’o’ob was carried out for the most part outside of the cave. If so, it will be the first recorded instance of such a pattern of utilization. Among the artifacts found at Cave 1 were three Figure 8. Plan and Profile Views of Cave 1 at Chawak But’o’ob (Maps by Ann Scott). human bones recovered at a depth of almost 90 cm. Adreferred to as “burnings.” Ann Scott’s (2009) work with Kaq- ditionally, a number of speleothems were recovered which chikel ritual specialists also observed the significance that fire are interesting because no speleothem scars were found on had in Maya ceremonies as a means to communicate with the roof and no water dripped in the cave after rains. We are ancestors. During our investigation we found no evidence of currently testing the speleothems to see if they came from charcoal. This is significant in that charcoal is usually abun- another cave. We feel that the speleothems were deposited dant in caves. The actual physical evidence based on several in this feature as a way of solidifying its identity as a cave. different measures suggests, therefore, that the interior of the cave was little used. The most important aspect of Cave 1 is its location within the ballcourt complex. The cave is set into a low shelf of A number of sherds were noted eroding out of the thin exposed bedrock only 20 m west of the ballcourt and at the soil on the exposed bedrock shelf that formed the roof of court’s southern boundary (Walling 2011). In addition to the the cave. Particularly noteworthy were several sherds from ballcourt, the complex contains a sweatbath and a sinkhole, an unslipped flat-bottomed bowl, a form frequently used in architectural and natural features that are symbolically tied caves but this is in no way a vessel form exclusive to caves. to the concepts of earth and water. Both the ballcourt and the

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sweatbath are architectural elements that have been equated with caves. On the social level, Walling believes that the complex served as the focus of community identity with both the cave and the ballcourt being related to community genesis. Given the fact that the cave is more ancient and immovable, it appears logical to conclude that the cave probably determined the placement of this group.

La Milpa Finally, during the 2014 field season I directed the preliminary documentation of a sinkhole located within the site of La Milpa (Fig. 9). The feature was first noted in 2011 by the Three Rivers Archaeological Project (TRAP) and test excavations were carried out during the 2012 season but these were not resumed in 2013. Although there had been some disagreement about the feature’s function, it was presented to our project as a trash pit, perhaps Figure 9. La Milpa site map showing the location of the sinkhole (Courtesy of Norman serving a lithic workshop because of Hammond, Francisco Estrada-Belli and Gair Tourtellot). the lithic debris recovered during the initial excavations. The sinkhole is a conical pit 2.6 m along the north-south axis by 2.1 m along the east-west axis at the surface. At the bottom of the 1.7 m deep pit, the hole measured 2.1 m by 1.6 m (Fig. 10). Our excavations leveled the uneven floor and lowered the entire unit to 2 m below datum. There was a heavy density of ceramic with many large sherds of plates and bowls recovered. At the lowest level, we were encountering Late Preclassic material with probably another meter of deposit to be removed. Several intact bifaces and a good deal of obsidian were encountered. The Three Rivers Archaeological Project had initiated work on the sinkhole because an opening was noted at the

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Figure 10. Plan and profile view of the La Milpa sinkhole (by Ann Scott).

Figure 11. Excavation within the sinkhole showing the opening to a small chamber (Photo by Melanie Saldaña).

The Translation of a Maya Cosmogram onto an Uncooperative Terrestrial Landscape

Initial inspection of the sinkhole noted several courses of unshaped stone visible in the sidewall at the southern end of the pit and a discontinuous line of rocks at the same level in the sidewalls of the remainder of the sinkhole (Fig. 12). Three 1 x 2 m excavation units were placed along the north, south and east sides of the sinkhole (Fig. 13). All three encountered a rubble cored platform that once encircled the feature. Time did not permit the feature to be fully excavated but along the south end of the sinkhole, the platform extended at least 2 m back from the edge of the hole. Once again, excavations in the platforms revealed a heavy concentration of ceramic, obsidian and other artifacts. This study also allowed us to examine how deep seated convictions about Figure 12. The rubble core of the platform visible in the sinkhole side wall (Photo by Melthe way in which the world is constitutanie Saldaña). ed shaped archaeological inquiry. TRAP considered the sinkhole to be a trash pit north end of the feature. The removal of soil from the bottom because artifacts were found in the pit. This resonated with of the sinkhole revealed a small, irregularly shaped chamber Western normative experience where broken objects are gathwhose maximum dimensions were approximately 1.08 m ered up and deposited in a pit where they can then be buried. north to south and 2.2 m east to west. This is misleading, how- In Western thought trash belongs in a hole. The fact that large ever, because the walls of the chamber slope outward near quantities of what appeared to be lithic debitage were enthe floor. The actual useable space was considerably smaller. countered confirmed the utilitarian function for trash disposal. The chamber was cleared of ceiling collapse and a 1 m x 0.75 m test unit was excavated to 95 cm before hitting bedrock. My project relied on ethnographic sources that make The unit encountered a good deal of ceramic, obsidian and a it clear that any hole in the earth, even ones for mining or number of pieces of turtle carapace. the extraction of building materials, tend to become sacred features (Brady and Rissolo 2006). Thus, the presence of a hole made us suspect that we were dealing with a sacred landmark. The stone rubble at the south end of the sinkhole did not fit into the TRAP model of a trash pit and so was ignored. For our project, it was an enigma which was explored by our first test unit. Finally, as we excavated we encountered pieces of ceiling collapse with chert still embedded in its limestone matrix. This material was labeled as debitage by TRAP without close analysis. The material was restudied by our project and then by TRAP and we agreed that less than 5% was culturally modified. The La Milpa sinkhole study offered clear evidence of the necessity to constantly quesFigure 13. Three excavation units defined the platform surrounding the sinkhole (Photo by Melanie tion assumptions and carefully analyze all artifacts recovered. Saldaña).

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Discussion and Conclusions Cave archaeology has been guided in its study of ancient Maya sacred landscape by a terrestrial paradigm of Maya cosmology that was first explicitly set forward by the Petexbatun Regional Cave Survey in the early 1990s. This model has repeatedly yielded significant results in projects carried out in the southern Maya lowlands. The northern border of the region was largely ignored because of the almost total absence of reported caves. My initial encounter with the area occurred in the late 1990s when I sent two cave specialists, George Veni and Allan Cobb, to Stephen Houston’s Piedras Negras Project along with Pierre Colas (Fig. 14). No large caves were encountered but a number of smaller features were investigated. I did not pursue the project because of the lack of large caves. Over the next decade I became more concerned with the fact that sacred landscape was being totally ignored, specifically in northern Belize where a large number of archaeologists are working. The three projects carried out in that area were designed to explore Maya archaeology’s ability to address sacred landscape in this area. In the end, it wasn’t nearly the challenge that I had anticipated.

The Maax Na Project was a significant starting point for several reasons. First, Spider Cave was recognizable as a cave so that our results are widely generalizable in terms of cave utilization. Second, its small size made it an unlikely candidate in the minds of most archaeologists to be a feature that may have determined the layout of one of the site’s principal plazas. Finally, we were able to relate different aspects of our Maax Na results to findings in other areas. So many aspects of Structure 1A-9’s relationship to Spider Cave matched the shrine in the Bat Palace Complex at Dos Pilas that it proved our basic model of sacred landscape was applicable to northern Belize (Demarest et al. 2003). Our second field investigation at Chawak But’o’ob documented an even smaller cave located in the midst of community architecture at a rural settlement. In this respect Chawak But’o’ob mirrored results reported from Sabalam where this rural Middle Preclassic settlement was laid out on four hills with caves running through three of the four. The fourth hill had two architectural caves built onto it (Brady 2012). The architectural and natural features provided the cosmogonic symbols around which each community’s identity was anchored. At Chawak But’o’ob, however, the cave was not the type of natural feature that we normally encounter and was so small and unassuming that it would not be noticed if our theoretical model had not alerted us to its potential importance. The final feature, the sinkhole at La Milpa is the least impressive but perhaps the most exciting feature that we examined. The Maya clearly formalized the space by surrounding this sinkhole with a platform that leaves no doubt that this was a noteworthy sacred landmark. Sinkholes abound in karstic landscapes providing surface archaeologists with great opportunities to empirically document the sacred landscape within their site boundaries.

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Figure 14. Pierre Robert Colas at Piedras Negras in 1999 (Photo by George Veni)

Taken together these studies have demonstrated how the Maya terrestrial cosmogram has been translated onto an uncooperative landscape in both urban centers and rural settlements. More than that, these studies reflect an interesting relationship between the physical landscape and the ideal cognized landscape. Materialist archaeologists have tended to stress the primacy of the ecological over the ideological. In uncooperative landscapes, however, we see the ideal cognized landscape continuing largely unchanged by the absence or scarcity of elements like caves in the physical environment. Adaptations are certainly made but the physical environment seems not to have determinative power over the nature of the ideal cognized landscape. This is nowhere better illustrated than in non-karstic regions of Mesoamerica where caves do not naturally exist. In these regions, artificial or man-made caves are created in great numbers. In other words, the ideal cognized landscape is simply imposed on the uncooperative physical environment. I suspect that additional study will show both aspects of adaptation and imposition in northern Belize. For instance, the two large, partially collapsed chultuns in the central plaza of La Milpa are larger than the caves at either Maax Na or Chawak But’o’ob. They seem to be outside of what we conceptualize as chultuns but fit quite comfortably for me in a category of man-made caves.

The Translation of a Maya Cosmogram onto an Uncooperative Terrestrial Landscape

The implications of the studies described here are exciting because the karst features investigated are small and uncomplicated enough that surface projects do not need to mount specialized cave projects to record this data. I would challenge graduate students to consider undertaking sacred landscape projects and project directors to support them. Acknowledgements

All investigations were carried out with the permission of the Belizean Institute of Archaeology and the author would like to thank then director, Dr. Jaime Awe, for his help and support. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Lloyd Cotsen who provided funds for all three projects. His support has allowed us to accomplish a great deal, of which this study is but a small part. All three investigations were carried out in collaboration with other projects. I would like to thank Eleanor King and the late Leslie Shaw at Maax Na, Stanley Walling at Chawak But’o’ob and Brandon Lewis at La Milpa for the opportunity to conduct such interesting work. I loved working with all of you. Fred Valdez, director of the Programme for Belize Archaeological Project, was the guiding force behind all three studies and deserves much of the credit for our success. I would like to thank Michael Brennan, Allan Cobb, Eleanor King, Melanie Saldaña, Ann Scott, George Veni, and Stanley Walling for the use of their illustrations, maps and photographs. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the great job that Milan Kováč and his team did in organizing the 19th European Maya Conference and thank them for their warm hospitality in Bratislava. References cited Aguilar, Manuel, Miguel Medina Jaen, Tim M. Tucker and James E. Brady 2005 The Significance of a Chicomoztoc Complex at Acatzingo Viejo. In: James E. Brady and Keith M. Prufer (eds.), In the Maw of the Earth Monster: Mesoamerican Ritual Cave Use, pp. 69–87. Austin: University of Texas Press. Brady, James E. 1997 Settlement Configuration and Cosmology: The Role of Caves at Dos Pilas. American Anthropologist 99 (3): 602–618. 2004 Constructed Landscapes: Exploring the Meaning and Significance of Recent Discoveries of Artificial Caves. Ketzalcalli 1: 2–17. Brady, James E. and Dominique Rissolo 2006 A Reappraisal of Ancient Maya Cave Mining. Journal of Anthropological Research 62 (4): 471–490. Brady, James E. and George Veni 1992 Man-Made and Pseudo-Karst Caves: The Implications of Subsurface Geologic Features Within Maya Centers. Geoarchaeology 7 (2): 149–167. Brennan, Michael L., Eleanor M. King, Leslie C. Shaw, Stanley L. Walling and Fred Valdez Jr. 2013 Preliminary Geochemical Assessment of Limestone Resources and Stone Use at Maya Sites in the Three Rivers Region, Belize. Journal of Archaeological Science 40: 3178–3192. Cook, Garrett 1986 Quichean Folk Theology and Southern Maya Supernaturalism. In: Garry H. Gossen (ed.), Symbol and Meaning Beyond

the Closed Community: Essays in Mesoamerican Ideas, pp. 139–153. Albany: Institute of Mesoamerican Studies, State University of New York. Demarest, Arthur, Kim Morgan, Claudia Wooley and Héctor Escobedo 2003 The Political Acquisition of Sacred Geography. In: Jessica Joyce Christie (ed.), Maya Palaces and Elite Residences: An Interdisciplinary Approach, pp. 120–153. Austin: University of Texas Press. Heyden, Doris 1973 ¿Un Chicomostoc en Teotihuacan? La Cueva Bajo la Pirámide del Sol. Boletín del Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia II (6): 3–18. Hirth, Kenneth 2000 Archaeological Research at Xochicalco. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. King, Eleanor M., James E. Brady, Leslie C. Shaw, Allan B. Cobb, C. L. Kieffer, Michael L. Brennan and Chandra L. Harris 2012 Small Caves and Sacred Geography: A Case Study from the Prehispanic Maya Site of Maax Na, Belize. Latin American Antiquity 23 (4): 611–628. Manzanilla, Linda, Luis Barba, René Chávez, Andrés Tejero, Gerardo Cifuentes and Nayeli Peralta 1994 Caves and Geophysics: An Approximation to the Underworld of Teotihuacan, Mexico. Archaeometry 36: 141–157. Noguera, Eduardo 1945 Excavaciones en el estado de Puebla. Anales del Museo Nacional de México 1: 31–74. Scarborough, Vernon L., Fred Valdez Jr. and Nicholas P. Dunning 2003 Heterarchy, Political Economy, and the Ancient Maya. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. Scott, Ann Marie 2009 Communicating with the Sacred Earthscape: An Ethnoarchaeological Investigation of Kaqchikel Maya Ceremonies in Highland Guatemala. PhD thesis. Austin: The University of Texas Press. Smith, Michael E. and Katharina J. Schreiber 2006 New World States and Empires: Politics, Religion, and Urbanism. Journal of Archaeological Research 14 (1): 1–52. Tilley, Christopher 1994 A Phenomenology of Landscape: Places, Paths, and Monuments. Explorations in Anthropology. Oxford: Berg. Walling, Stanley 2011 Overview of Recent Ballcourt Complex Investigations at Chawak But’o’ob, Belize. In: Brett A. Houk and Fred Valdez Jr. (eds.), Research Reports from the Programme for Belize Archaeological Project, Volume 5, pp. 251–261. Mesoamerican Archaeological Research Laboratory, Occasional Papers 12, Austin: University of Texas Press. Walling, Stanley, Peter Davis, Jonathan Hanna, Leah Mathews, Nahum Prasarn, Christine Taylor and Erol Kavountzis 2007 Ballcourt and Residential Terrace Investigations at Chawak But’o’ob, Belize: Report of the Rio Bravo Archaeological Survey. In: Fred Valdez Jr. (ed.), Research Reports from the Programme for Belize Archaeological Project, pp. 83–91. Mesoamerican Archaeological Research Laboratory, Occasional Papers 8. Austin: University of Texas Press.

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Postscript The following season, the excavation of the “sinkhole” at La Milpa was completed and the feature was discovered to be a collapsed chultun. Our excavations, however, were not documenting its use as a chultun because when we came down on the collapsed roof and capstone, we found no artifacts beneath it. To find that the original chultun had contained no material at the time of its demise is fairly standard. It appears that after the collapse, the platform continued to be utilized with offerings being thrown into the hole. Above the collapsed roof, we recovered over 20,000 sherds. Many of these were large pieces that had not been trampled after deposition and were not heavily eroded indicating that they had not lain on the surface for an extended period. Thus, we are fairly certain that this material had not washed in. The artifact assemblage also contained 66 obsidian prismatic blades, a shell labret, worked bone, and bifacially chipped blades. Thus, it appears that the feature was repurposed and continued to be used during the Late Classic after its function as a chultun.

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COLONIAL CODE: LATE REFLECTIONS OF ANCIENT MAYA COSMOLOGY

Worlds in Words: Precolumbian Cosmologies in the Context of Early Colonial Christianisation in Highland Guatemala Frauke Sachse University of Bonn

Abstract The missionary and indigenous literature from Highland Guatemala is an exceptional resource for studying the colonial encounter of two religious systems and worldviews. The corpus of texts preserved in K’iche’ is particularly rich. In the process of translating Christianity into K’iche’ missionaries appropriated concepts from K’iche’ ritual discourse, while indigenous converts took up doctrinal discourse and integrated it in their narrative traditions. This contribution analyses how missionary authors communicated the concepts of the Christian worldview and how these translations mapped onto Highland Maya notions of cosmology and otherworld dimensions.

Resumen La literatura misionera e indígena de los altiplanos de Guatemala constituye una fuente excepcional para el análisis del encuentro colonial entre dos sistemas religiosos y dos conceptos del mundo. El corpus de textos preservados en lengua k’iche’ es particularmente extenso. En el proceso de traducir la doctrina cristiana al k’iche’ los autores misioneros se apropiaron de conceptos del discurso ritual k’iche’, mientras que indígenas conversos adoptaron e integraron el nuevo discurso doctrinal en sus narrativas tradicionales. La contribución presente analiza cómo comunicaron los misioneros las conceptualizaciones cristianas y cómo sus traducciones reprodujeron modelos cosmológicos y dimensiones ultramundiales.

The Highland Maya language K’iche’ was among the first native languages in the Americas to be instrumentalised in the conversion of the indigenous population to Christianity. The corpus of missionary writings in K’iche’ comprises various types of catechisms, theological treatises, confessionaries, and sermons as well as descriptive materials such as dictionaries and grammars. It is a rich resource that has received little attention from scholars until recently. In translating the concepts of Christianity into K’iche’ the missionaries undoubtedly had help from indigenous converts. Literate converts soon developed their own literary traditions by taking up the European genres and themes and filling them with Precolumbian mytho-historic narratives and contents. It is this combination of missionary and indigenous written resources that makes Highland Guatemala a particularly appropriate

place for analysing the confrontation of Old and New World cosmologies. This paper addresses the question of stability of prehispanic cultural concepts in Highland Maya Catholicism and the role of doctrinal discourse as a vehicle for conceptual continuity. I will analyse the role of translation in the process of conversion by focusing on conceptualisations of Christian cosmology and examine how the friars communicated ideas like Heaven and Hell in K’iche’. It will be shown that missionary and indigenous text production was interdependent and that indigenous authors adopted, influenced and modified the newly developed Christian discourse to fit their own cosmological perceptions. I will argue that the practice of translation preserved Precolumbian notions of otherworld dimensions and reinforced concepts that were fundamental to K’iche’ cosmology.

Frauke Sachse

Translating Christianity The sixteenth-century conquest of the Highland Maya was soon followed by a vigorous programme of Christianisation. Since their arrival in New Spain the orders of the Franciscans and Dominicans had adopted a strategy of evangelising in the vernacular languages, rejecting the order of the Spanish Crown for castellanisation and opposing Rome’s dogma of trilingualism, which permitted the preaching of the gospel only in Latin, Greek or Hebrew (Phelan 1970: 87–88; García Ruíz 1992: 84–86). Following the example of evangelisation practices in Central Mexico, missionary linguists began as early as in the 1540s with the production of doctrinal teaching materials in the K’iche’an languages, including catechisms, sermons, and texts of biblical and devotional contents explaining the Christian faith. Although the first catechisms were written in the lengua guatemalteca Kaqchikel, the language of the Spanish allies which became the matrix language for both linguistic description and evangelisation in the Guatemalan highlands (see Recinos 1950: 31; García Ruíz 1992: 84; Smith-Stark 2009), the most extensive body of doctrinal texts was written in K’iche’. K’iche’ was the language of the Kingdom of Utatlán, the dominant political power in the highlands in the Late Postclassic. The conversion of the k’iche’-speaking Central Highlands was mostly in the hands of the Dominicans, who produced most of the doctrinal materials preserved today. One Dominican text had particular impact on the process of conversion in the Highlands. Domingo de Vico’s Theologia Indorum (‘Theology for/of the Indians’) comprises two volumes and a total of 217 chapters, which includes explanations of the key concepts of Christianity, summaries of biblical narratives and catechetical literature, with the first volume covering the Old Testament and the second volume the New Testament. Compiled between 1550–54, the Theologia Indorum was entirely written in K’iche’ and found wide distribution across the indigenous highlands. It was translated into Kaqchikel, Tz’utujil and Q’eqchi’ still in the course of the sixteenth century, supposedly as a response to Vico’s martyr death in 1555. In his comprehensive study of the Theologia Indorum, Garry Sparks underlines the importance of Vico’s work as the Americas’ first theology to be written in an indigenous language (2011: 105–111; 2014a; Sparks et al. 2017). Given the number of complete and partial copies preserved in European and North American archives today, the impact the Theologia Indorum must have had on the formation of Christian discourse in the Highlands cannot be underestimated (see Sparks 2014a; 2016).

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(e.g. pascua ‘Easter’), (2) loan translations, or calques, i.e. literal translations of Spanish, Latin or Hebrew forms into K’iche’ (e.g. utz b’ij ‘speak well = lat. benedicere ‘to bless’; keje’ chuxoq ‘so be it = Hebr. amen’), or (3) descriptive paraphrases (e.g. uqajik uja’Dios ‘letting down the water of God (on one’s head) = baptism’. The latter of these strategies was very useful in the process of conversion, inasmuch as it communicated the Christian cultural practice along with a new term (Sachse 2016). Besides introducing neologisms, missionary authors also consciously accommodated terminology from K’iche’ ritual discourse. Vico, for instance, strategically adopted the name of highest K’iche’ creator deity Tz’aqol B’itol, which can be translated literally as ‘maker modeller’ (Tedlock 1996 [1985]) or ‘framer shaper’ (Christenson 2003), to refer to the Christian God; in the Theologia Indorum he identifies Tz’aqol B’itol as the only creator god, suggesting to the K’iche’ that they practiced monotheism in their past (see Sparks 2011: 171; 2014a: 420ff.). Franciscans and Dominicans had different theological positions on the matter of translation and entered into fundamental disputes about how to communicate the Christian doctrine correctly in the indigenous languages (García Ruíz 1992). This reflects clearly in the texts that were produced by missionaries of the respective orders. While Franciscan authors seemed to prefer the use of neologisms, Dominican texts exhibit more terms that were taken directly from K’iche’ religious discourse to express Christian concepts of faith and divinity (see Sachse 2016). This “recycling” of Maya religious terminology is particularly interesting, as the doctrinal usage can provide a vehicle by which cultural concepts and practices from the Maya prehispanic past may have survived until the present day. We may assume that Dominican translation practice involved close collaboration between the missionaries and their K’iche’ informants, who may have been Christian converts who were at the same time knowledgeable and practicing in Highland Maya religion (Sparks 2011: 186–243; 2014b).

We know that some of the K’iche’ intellectuals who assisted the friars in their translations also authored texts on behalf of the indigenous communities, as it was the case with Diego Reynoso who worked with Domingo de Vico and is also the author of the Título de Totonicapán (see Sparks 2014a: 402). The earliest texts that were written by K’iche’ authors date to the 1550s. Throughout the colonial era, indigenous communities had town scribes, who held notary positions within the colonial administration and were responsible for composing official documents, such as testaments, deeds, property sale contracts, legal and community records as well as church and confraternity registers. The same individuals also proThis process of translation of the Christian doctrine into K’iche’ challenged the missionaries to find the best termi- duced documents for purposes of the indigenous community, nological correlates for abstract Christian concepts, such as which did not serve an official function in the colonial system ‘salvation’, ‘confession’ or ‘contrition’. The creation of this and have therefore been described by Matthew Restall as new discourse genre, which we may want to name Doctrinal “quasi-notarial” (1997: 260). These non-official texts are our K’iche’, was not an ad hoc process, but carefully reflected. prime sources on the history of the highlands prior to Spanish The missionaries employed several linguistic strategies to invasion. The corpus of native texts that originate in the 16th introduce new terminology into the language, which included century includes the Popol Vuh –the mythological account of the use of neologisms as much as the reuse of terms from world creation and the origin of the K’iche’ people– as well K’iche’ religion (see Sachse 2016). Neologisms include (1) as two dozen títulos, documents that were modelled onto loanwords from Spanish (e.g. paraíso ‘paradise’) or Latin the Spanish genre of the land title, but relate native histories

Worlds in Words: Precolumbian Cosmologies in the Context of Early Colonial Christianisation in Highland Guatemala

to state the territorial or political legitimacy of local K’iche’ nobilities. These indigenous texts have been treated as windows into the Precolumbian past. Although they are routinely drawn on to reconstruct the history, concepts, and practices of prehispanic Maya culture, they primarily need to be seen as products of the colonial encounter. The authors were bilingual converts, who were writing decades after the conquest and from the perspective of individuals and communities who had grown up in a hybrid context of two cultural systems and worldviews. Indigenous discourse and conceptualisations became influenced and modified by Christianity, which makes indigenous texts key resources for analysing the impact of the conversion on native culture. The sources reflect how indigenous authors implemented Christian discourse in their historical traditions and appropriated Spanish literary genres for their own strategic purposes. Most K’iche’ títulos make references to Christian concepts and biblical contents. It has been pointed out by several scholars that the creation narrative in the Título de Totonicapán almost literally integrates passages from the Theologia Indorum (Acuña 1985; Dürr 1989; Bredt-Kriszat 1999; Sparks 2011). That Vico’s work must have had a wide distribution in sixteenth-century Highland Guatemala is also suggested by several explicit mentions of the Theologia Indorum and its author in the Título de Ilocab (see Carmack 1985) and the Título de Pedro Velasco (see Carmack and Mondloch 1989) as well as reports on Vico’s death in the Kaqchikel Xajil Chronicles and the Poqomchi’ Título del barrio de Santa Ana (see Sparks 2011: 124–126; 2014a: 402). Sparks has analysed the intertextual relations between the Theologia Indorum, the Título de Totonicapán, and the Popol Vuh and has argued for the Popol Vuh as a direct indigenous response to the concept of the Theologia Indorum as a central dogmatic text (Sparks 2011: 36, 189). This does however not contradict the traditional interpretation based on a statement in the text itself that it was written to preserve the ancient knowledge about Highland Maya mythology and to refute the Christian doctrine (see Dürr 1989; Tedlock 1996: 30). Just like the indigenous authors responded to Christianity by reproducing and modifying doctrinal discourse in their writings and by transforming native mythologies to match the template of biblical linearity, Vico adopted the formal features of K’iche’ ceremonial discourse and embedded them in the doctrinal language. The Theologia Indorum is written in a style full of parallelisms and couplets known from the Popol Vuh or contemporary Highland Maya ritual prayer (Sparks 2011: 168ff.; 221ff.). To understand which of the parallelisms are surviving Precolumbian conceptualisations and which have been created in the context of linguistic conversion, the intertextualities of the sources need to be systematically analysed and disentangled. In the following sections, we will look at concepts from the semantic domain of cosmology and try to unravel how the process of translation negotiated two entirely different views of the world.

Translating Cosmologies Missionary writings from Highland Guatemala refer to the concept of the ‘world’ in the Christian dichotomy of cielo y tierra ‘Heaven and Earth’ by appropriating the K’iche’ terms kaj ‘sky’ and ulew ‘earth’. Wakamik k’ut xchiqatikib’a ub’ixik ub’anoj, are’ utikerik ronojel chi kaj chuwach ulew

Now then we shall begin the account of its creation, it is the beginning of everything in heaven and on earth

(Theologia Indorum, GGMA1 ms. 187, p. 67) The diphrastic kenning of kaj ulew is also employed by indigenous authors, who use it mostly on its own but also extend it with the couplet cho palow ‘lake sea’. These four elements kaj, ulew, cho, palow define the human cosmos which combines a four-cornered sky and land that is surrounded by freshwaters and saltwaters. The Popol Vuh describes the creation of the world as a process of birth (alaj) which results from the interaction of the deities Uk’u’x Kaj ‘Heart of Sky’ and Tepew Q’ukumatz ‘Sovereign Quetzal Serpent’ in a primordial womb-shaped sky that is filled with the waters of the primordial sea. Xa utukel kaj k’olik, Just alone the sky exists, mawi q’alaj uwach ulew, the face of the earth is not clear yet, xa utukel remanik palo, just alone the calm sea, upa kaj ronojel all is in the womb of the sky … … Ta xkalaj, Then they gave birth, ta xkik’u’xlaj kib’. then they remembered themselves. Xewi saq (There was) just light ta xkalaj puch winaq when they gave also birth to people.

(Popol Vuh2, fol. 1v)

There is no straightforward decision whether the parallelism of ‘sky-earth’ existed as a concept in Precolumbian times. We can however say that the description of world creation in the Popol Vuh significantly deviates from the biblical genesis, in that ‘sky’ and ‘sea’ pre-exist creation and are not formed by a divine creator. Cosmological concepts are intrinsically tied to eschatological belief systems. The essence of Christian eschatology is founded on the hope for individual salvation, which is inseparably connected to the collective, as the fate of each soul –either the eternal life in Heaven or eternal death in Hell– depends on Christ’s last judgement at the end of the world. In the following sections, we will analyse how the Christian concepts of Heaven and Hell and associated ideas from the same frame of reference were translated into K’iche’ and explore how these renderings relate to notions of otherworld places known from prehispanic cosmology.

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Heaven To translate the Spanish term cielo the missionaries appropriated the K’iche’ term kaj. The concept of kaj in the indigenous sources refers to the cosmological location of the four-cornered sky as the dwelling-place of deities and deified ancestors. In the Popol Vuh the sky identified as the place of the creator god ‘Heart of Sky’, who is also referred to as the storm deity Juraqan. This conceptualisation corresponds with Christian cosmology as described in the doctrinal sources, where kaj is equally referred to as the ‘residence’ (siwan tinamit) and the ‘kingdom’ (ajawarem) of God and the angels, who are simply rendered as the winaqil kaj ‘people of the sky’. The traditional view in Mesoamerican studies sees the Precolumbian universe as multi-layered, consisting of thirteen levels of the upperworld and nine levels of the underworld. As Nielsen and Sellner (2009) have pointed out there are no truly Precolumbian depictions of this cosmological order, but all descriptions of the multi-layered universe are post-contact and post-Christianisation (e.g. Codex Vaticanus A, Chilam Balam of Chumayel) and may therefore be the result of Christian influence rather than indicative of Precolumbian cosmology. The first friars who preached in the New World used images of the world depicting several levels of the Heavens and Hell that were most likely based on Dante’s Divine Comedy and may have been adopted and modified by indigenous authors (Nielsen and Sellner 2009). Indeed, medieval Christian belief was based on a Classical geocentric Weltbild that was layered. Dante describes Heaven as consisting of nine concentric and moving planetary spheres, the locations of the moon, Mercury, Venus, the sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, the fixed stars and the so-called primum mobile, the place of the angels. These nine spheres are encompassed by the empyrion, the sea of eternal light and the abode of God, on the tenth and upper level of the sky. In chapter 29 of the Theologia Indorum, Vico reproduces Dante’s description of Heaven as he mentions that on the second day of Genesis, God created nine celestial spheres that are surrounding the earth, and that the tenth level above is the eternal abode of God where nothing moves. Nab’e q’ij Domingo ub’i’, xwinaqir saq chupam. Lunes ukab’ q’ij, b’elej tas chi kaj xk’ase’, chupam xwinaqir wi, xwinaqir pu rumal Dios nim ajaw. ub’elejichal kesolol chirij ulew, kesutinik kesutuw puch ronojel q’ij. Ulaju’ tas chi k’ut k’o aq’anoq puwi’, maja b’i chisilob’ik, xa junelik kub’ulik, rochoch utinamit Dios nimajaw.

Lunes ukab’ q’ij, b’elej tas chi kaj xk’ase’ rumal Dyos, nima ajaw. Ub’elejichal kesolow chi rij ulew, kesutu’ puch chi ronojel q’ij. Ulaju’ tas k’ut chisilab’ik, junelik kub’ul, rochoch utinamit chi ronojel q’ij.

Monday is the second day, nine levels of the sky were brought to life The nine(some) circle around the earth, by God, the great lord, and they surround it every day. The tenth level shall move, the eternal seat, his abode on every day.

(Título de Totonicapan, fol. 1r) At closer look, however, we can see that the authors of the Título have amended the text slightly to make it consistent with Precolumbian conceptualisations of the Upper Worlds. With respect to the tenth level the Título seems to make the exact opposite statement from what we find in Vico’s description. While in the Theologia Indorum the tenth level is static and the place of the eternal existence of God, the Título declares it to be moving. Given that medieval Christian cosmology associates the empyrion with eternal light and fire, it would not be surprising, if the K’iche’ authors of the Título saw the tenth level as the abode of the sun. In Mesoamerican cosmology, the sun surrounded the earth. The sun had divine status as a life-bringer and the solar cycle with the daily death and rebirth of the sun constituted a basic conceptual metaphor for life in general (Chinchilla Mazariegos 2013). Mendicant friars in Central Mexico introduced the association of Jesus Christ with the sun, which was both consistent with medieval and Mesoamerican thought (see Burkhart 1988). It may therefore be that the authors of the Título de Totonicapán adapted the description of the tenth level to make it fitting with Precolumbian cosmological perception. In Christian belief, the empyrion is the Kingdom of God, where Jesus sits at God’s righthand side and the souls of the deceased reside who after their death go straight to the ‘celestial paradise’. This conceptualisation of the upper level of the sky as the abode of souls is not inconsistent with Mesoamerican eschatology and the idea of a solar paradise.

The first day is called Sunday, When we look at translations of the term ‘paradise’ on which light was created. in the doctrinal sources, there are essentially three ways Monday is the second day, of rendering the concept: junelik ki’kotem ‘eternal joy/ nine levels of the sky were brought to life, happiness’, or ki’kotirib’al ‘place of joy/happiness’, were created in it, q’anal raxal ‘abundance/plenty’, and kotz’i’jalaj ulew and they were created by God the Great Lord. ‘flowery earth/land’. Table 1 indicates that Franciscan The nine(some) circle around the earth, and Dominican sources use all three terms to refer to they encircle and surround it every day. both the ‘earthly’ and the ‘celestial’ paradise (Table 1). The tenth level then exists above it, nothing would move, The most common of these translations is the deit is just the eternal seat, scriptive paraphrasing of the celestial paradise as a the abode of God the Great Lord. place of ‘happiness, joy’ (ki’kotem) and eternal life (junelik

(Theologia Indorum, GGMA ms. 178, ch. 29)

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idea that indigenous authors may have adopted the concept of the layers from early doctrinal literature.

Vico’s text is integrated almost literally into the account of the creation of the world in the Título de Totonicapán (Carmack and Mondloch 1983), which confirms Nielsen’s and Sellner’s

k’aslem). The concept of the ‘joys of heaven’ is discussed by Aquinas (Summa Theologica, Supplement, Question 69, Article 2, Objection 4) and is a straightforward Christian concept. While the second translation of paradise as a place of ‘abundance, plenty’ is also consistent with Christian thought, it furthermore can be identified as a Mesoamerican concept.

Worlds in Words: Precolumbian Cosmologies in the Context of Early Colonial Christianisation in Highland Guatemala

Table 1. Translations of the Spanish term ‘paraíso’ in the missionary sources. Paraíso ki’kotem ‘happiness’/ki’koti(risa)b’al ‘place of joy/happiness’

junelik ki’kotem

-

Nabe Tihonic

jupalik ki’kotem chi kaj

“paraíso çelestial”

Coto

pa ki’kotirisab’al ulew

“paraíso terrenal”

Coto

ki’kotib’al kotz’ijalaj tiko’n

“deleitoso paraíso”

Coto

q’anal raxal ‘(place of) abundance’

uraxal uq’anal ulew

“parayso terrenal”

Vico, Theologia

nima q’anal raxal

“paraíso çelestial”

Coto

kotz’i’jalaj ulew

“parayso terrenal”

pa kotz’i’jalaj ulew

“paraíso terrenal”

Coto

kotz’i’jaj tiko’n

“paraíso”

Vocabulario en lengua cakchiquel

kotz’i’jalaj ulew ‘flowery earth/land’

The diphrastic kenning of q’anal raxal ‘yellowness and greenness’ is attested in various Mayan languages including Classic Maya as a metaphor for ‘abundance’. Stuart has argued that ‘yellow and green’ represent the colours of ripe and unripe maize, and thus refer to abundance from a good harvest (2005: 275). In the doctrinal sources, the term q’anal raxal is used to refer to ‘paradise’, the ‘glory of God’ and the ‘beatitudes’. All three translations are conceptually related, inasmuch as the celestial paradise is the place where the souls exist in the presence of God’s glory which would be the faith of those who are blessed. In the Theologia Indorum, the term q’anal raxal refers to the earthly paradise, i.e. Garden of Eden before the Fall of Man, which seems to be consistent with Mesoamerican conceptualisations of human origin places that are commonly described as places of abundance, such as the Tonacatepetl (mountain of sustenance), Paxil K’ayala’ (place of human creation in the Popol Vuh). However, we will here focus on the third translation of ‘paradise’ as kotz’i’jalaj ulew ‘flowery earth/land’ that can be identified as a straight accommodation of a Precolumbian concept into doctrinal K’iche’an discourse. The metaphorical concept of a ‘flowery world’ as a paradisiacal realm of the dead is well known in Mesoamerica (see Hill 1992; Burkhart 1992; Taube 2004). Although conceptualisations vary, there is a general association of this Flower Paradise with a celestial place in the east, where the sun rises. According to Sahagun this is the place where the souls of those who die in battle transform into butterflies. While it is possible that the K’iche’ rendering of paradise as ‘flowery land’ was originally taken from Nahuatl catechetical texts available to the friars, related conceptualisations are found in past and present Maya culture. The concept of a ‘flowery mountain’ as a place of burial and rebirth has been identified in Classic Maya iconography (see below) and is known from Maya ethnographic studies (see Taube 2004 for detailed argument). There the solar paradise is the final resting place for the souls of heroic leaders or those who die violently in war, by murder, lightening, drowning or during childbirth (Chinchilla Mazariegos 2011; citing

AFD

Girard 1966: 236; Pitarch Ramón 1996: 54). The Tzotzil refer to this place as winajel, which is located in and moves with the sun and is also associated with the heavenly of Jesus Christ and other deities (Guiteras Holmes 1961: 143–144, 258; Villa Rojas 1990: 649). This aspect of Tzotzil eschatology may help us to understand why the authors of the Título de Totonicapán modified Vico’s cosmological description of the tenth level of the sky to associate it more closely with the movement of the sun. In Highland Maya culture the concept of the Flower Paradise also carries a connotation of rebirth. Among the Tz’utujil of Santiago Atitlán, Robert Carlsen and Martin Prechtel identified the concept of a ‘Flowering Mountain Earth’, which refers to an imaginary tree (or maize plant) at the navel of the world that is the origin and end of all life (Carlsen and Prechtel 1991). To explain why the missionaries adopted the concept of the Flower Paradise to refer to the Christian notion of the celestial paradise, we need to consider that the Mesoamerican understanding of the ‘flowery land’ as a place of rebirth matches with Christian belief in resurrection. In 16th-century Spain, Easter Sunday was referred to as Pascua Florida, and thus associated with flowers. In the Theologia Indorum Vico translates Easter Sunday accordingly as kotz’i’jalaj Pascua ‘flowery Easter’. Whether the translation of ‘paradise’ as kotz’i’jalaj ulew was taken directly from contemporary Highland religious discourse, however, cannot be confirmed, as the association of the resurrection with flowers and the translation of the Christian idea of paradise as ‘Flower Mountain’ are also attested in doctrinal Nahuatl literature (see Burkhart 1992). The analysis of missionary translations of Heaven and paradise show that the friars adopted terminology from K’iche’ ritual discourse that continued to be meaningful within Precolumbian cosmology, while the authors of the Título de Totonicapán analogically adapted the Christian idea of a layered universe to their own conceptualisation of a solar paradise. Similar adaptations and modifications can be identified in the missionary descriptions of Hell.

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Hell In all missionary authors translations the K’iche’ term that is used to translate the Spanish concept of infierno ‘Hell’ is xib’alb’a (or Kaqchikel xib’alb’ay), the name of the K’iche’ underworld known from the early colonial text of the Popol Vuh and other sixteenth-century sources from Highland Guatemala. The term is a locative derivation of an abstractive noun with the root xib’ ‘fear/fright’, which literally translates as ‘place of fearing, or fright’. Xib’alb’a Xib’-al-b’a(l) N:fear/fright-ABSTR-LOC “place of fearing/fright” Xib’alb’a was the K’iche’ concept of a non-human domain in the underworld. In Mesoamerican Studies, the term is often used indiscriminately to refer to the Classic Maya underworld, which is however only known from iconographic sources and for which no generic hieroglyphic term has been identified thus far (see Fitzsimmons 2009: 15). In Colonial Yukatek sources the underworld is named as metnal, which is commonly interpreted to be a mayanised form of the Nahuatl term mictlan ‘land of the dead’ (Thompson 1990 [1970]: 300), though the precise meaning is not understood. In Highland Chiapas, ethnographic accounts describe the concept of an underworld named Katinbak, which according to the Tzeltal of Cancuc is a dark and cold place (Pitarch Ramón 1999: 28), while the Tzotzil in Chamula define it as an underworld jail for murderers and witches (Pozas Arciniega 1987: 232–240). Much of our current understanding of the Maya underworld derives from Highland Maya mythology and in particular the Popol Vuh, which provides the only detailed description of Xib’alb’a. The Popol Vuh specifies Xib’alb’a as a place of darkness underneath the surface of the earth, to which one descends through caves and ravines, and by crossing dangerous rivers. Xib’alb’a is the realm of the lords of death and disease. However, its role as a place for the spirit-essences of the deceased is not mentioned explicitly in the text, instead all references to Xib’alb’a regard events in the deep mythic past, before the creation mankind.

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The Xib’alb’a episodes from the Popol Vuh serve the mythological function of defining the parameters for the relationship between humankind and the underworld. The text describes the journey of the Hero Twins Junajpu and Xb’alanke, who descend to the underworld to defeat the Lords of Xib’alb’a, whereby they define a new world order and create the conditions for the development of human life on earth. In the narrative the father of the twins, Jun Junajpu is summoned along with his brother to the underworld, where he is defeated in a ballgame and beheaded by the Lords of Xib’alb’a. Placed in a calabash tree, his decapitated head impregnates an underworld lady, who escapes to the surface of the earth and gives birth to the Hero Twins. Junajpu and Xb’alanke are likewise summoned by the lords, but are not defeated. Instead they sacrifice themselves in a fire and are reborn in the underworld to kill the Lords of Xib’alb’a before rising to the sky as sun and moon. We will look at eschatological meaning of the Hero Twin myth in more detail further

below, but for the moment it suffices to say in Highland Maya thought Xib’alb’a is a place of human defeat and renewal that constitutes a necessary element in the cycle of human life. When the first missionaries appropriated the term xib’alb’a to refer to the Christian concept of ‘Hell’, they drew a completely different picture of the underworld and transpositioned the term into new frame of reference, changing its meaning from the ‘place of fright’ to the place of eternal damnation. In chapter 28 of the first volume of the Theologia Indorum, Vico describes the attributes of Christian Hell, which narrates the Fall of the Angels and their banishment in Hell, at the centre of the earth: Ta xetzaq uloq, rumal Tz’aqol B’itol, Dios Nimajaw ub’i’. Keje’ k’ut keqajik koponik puch chunik’ajal ulew, chi rochoch k’axkol ra’il, chi rochoch chuk’a, chi rochoch q’aq’, chi rochoch k’atik poroxik, chi rochoch tew k’atan, chi rochoch wayjal chaq’ij chi’, chi rochoch meb’a’il ajkoq’owalil, chi rochoch kik’ raxtew, chi rochoch b’is moq’em , chi rochoch nimab’is, chi rochoch q’equm aq’ab’, chi rochoch pu jiloj poloj, qitzij chi kowinik chi k’ax, chi ra’, k’o chila’ xe’ok wi. Xawi xere ub’i’ Xib’alb’a, xub‘inaj rochoch pa ichab‘al.

Then they were thrown hither, by Framer-Former, God the Great Lord is his name. Thus they descended to arrive at the centre of the earth, at the home of suffering and pain, at the home of bitterness, at the home of fire, at the home of burning and firing, at the home of cold and fever, at the home of hunger and thirst, at the home of poverty and shortage, at the home of blood-sickness, at the home of sorrow and anguish, at the home of great sorrow, at the home of darkness and night, and at the house of groaning and grief, truly at the might of suffering, of pain, that is where they entered. Only so by the name of Xib‘alb‘a, is called the home in your language.

(Theologia Indorum, GGMA ms. 178, fol. 71) As expected, and consistent with the Christian concept of inferno, Vico describes Hell as the home of ‘suffering and pain’, ‘burning and fire’, diseases, hunger, poverty, sorrow and darkness. Some of these hardships that await the sinner find correspondences in the characterisation of the K’iche’ underworld in the Popol Vuh. Xib’alb’a was certainly a place of darkness and associated with sickness and ailment. The majority of underworld lords mentioned in the text carry the names of diseases, such as Xik’iri Pat ‘Flying Scab’, Kuchuma Kik’ ‘Gathered Blood’, Ajal Puj ‘Pus Demon’, Ajal Q’ana ‘Jaundice’ (translations Christenson 2003). Xib’alb’a was also a place of suffering and defeat. After their descent to the underworld, the Hero Twins have to pass through a series of trials (tijob’al) in form of different houses of elemental dangers, including darkness, cold, fire, knives, jaguars and bats (see Table 2). Given that some of the properties of Hell described by Vico and of the houses of trials in the Popol Vuh seem to overlap (‘darkness’, ‘cold’ and ‘fire’), it has been discussed whether both accounts may be conceptually related (see Bredt-Kriszat 1999: 193). Although the compartmentalisation of Hell and Purgatory into different levels or abodes was not alien to medieval Christian cosmology, the properties of Hell itemised by Vico do not correspond to the nine circles of Dante’s inferno, or the seven terraces of the mountain

Worlds in Words: Precolumbian Cosmologies in the Context of Early Colonial Christianisation in Highland Guatemala

Table 2. The houses of trials (tijob’al) of Xib’alb’a according to the Popol Vuh.

Houses of Trials in Xib’alb’a Q’equmaja

House of Darkness

Cha’im Ja

House of Blades

Tew Ja / Xuxulim Ja

House of Cold / House of Shivering

Ja chi q’aq’

House of Fire

B’alamija

House of Jaguars

Sotz’ija

House of Bats

of Purgatory. Moreover, Vico’s use of the possessed term rochoch ‘its home’ instead of the unpossessed form ja that is found in the Popol Vuh may indicate conceptual differences. The term rochoch is used in the Theologia Indorum generally to refer to the abode of either God in Heaven or Satan in Hell. The list in chapter 28 may be more an inventory of the horrors that await the sinner in Hell rather than conceptualisations of different stages of torture. However, what we cannot answer with any satisfaction is whether the ‘houses of trials’ in the Popol Vuh are indeed a Precolumbian concept, or whether they have been created by the indigenous authors in response to the Christian doctrine. Although there is no data that would corroborate a compartmentalisation of the prehispanic underworld, it can be shown that the image of a compartmentalised Christian Hell that was created through the process of translation did not entirely contradict Precolumbian perceptions of the underworld either. The Nabe Tihonic ‘First Lesson’ is an eighteenth-century K’iche’ catechism that gives a detailed description of the late medieval notion of Hell as being subdivided into the four realms of the Limbo of infants (limbus puerorum), Purgatory (purgatorium), Hell (infernum) and the Limbo of the Fathers (limbus patrum). These four parts are simply referred to in the catechism as the ‘first’, ‘second’, ‘third’, and ‘fourth Xib’alb’a’. The accompanying description specifies which of the Christian otherworld places each Xib’alb’a is referring to. Table 3 illustrates the relevant key terms, these four stages are associated with in the text. The ‘first Hell’ (nab’e

xib’alb’a) can be identified as the Limbo of Infants, a state between Heaven and Hell for the souls children (ak’alab’) who have not been baptised and died in original sin (alaxib’al mak ‘birth sin’) denying them direct access to Heaven. There is little ethnographic information regarding K’iche’an perceptions about the eschatological fate of infants. Bunzel describes that in Chichicastenango parents commonly put off costly baptism ceremonies until they could be sure that the infant would survive (1952: 162), which does not suggest a strong belief in the concept of original sin. Ethnographic accounts suggest that the Tzotzil and Tzeltal believe that the souls of infants who die before weaning continue to be nourished by an otherworldly tree between heaven and earth where they await their reincarnation on earth (Guiteras Holmes 1961: 143; Poza Arciniega 1987: 232–240). It is unclear whether any of the K’iche’an Highland Maya groups shared this concept of the nourishing tree, which might after all already be a fusion of the Christian idea of limbo and the Mesoamerican belief in a mountain of sustenance (see below). The ‘second Hell’ (ukab’ xib’alb’a) refers to the Christian concept of Purgatory, the place where the sinful human souls are purged to gain access to Heaven. Purgatory is described as a place of ‘suffering and pain’ (k’axk’ol ra’il) for the ‘completion’ (tz’aqatisaxik) and ‘well-being’ (raxwinaqil) of the human soul. The idea that those who have not committed any mortal sins will pass through a process of purification before they gain access to the celestial paradise is fundamental to the Christian conceptualisation of the afterlife. Purification is primarily achieved through the suffering of the soul, with fire being the most effective means. It is however quite striking that the Nabe Tihonic does not mention any fires in Purgatory. The medieval concept of Lat. purgare ‘to cleanse’ is translated with a K’iche’ term that refers to the recompositioning of one’s health. The root tz’aq is attested in several Mayan languages, including Classic Maya, with the meaning “to complete” (Kaufman 2003: 803–807). In the Popol Vuh, the root is used in the context of human creation and in reference to the ‘completion of cycles of time’. The use of the term with respect to the purging of the human soul may have been adjusted to the indigenous conceptualisation of a person’s health, requiring completeness, complementarity, and emotional balance. The term raxwinaqil is a compound consisting of the adjectival modifier rax ‘green, fresh, new’

Table 3. The four levels of Hell and associated terms in the Nabe Tihonic, GGMA ms. 190

Levels of Hell

associated terms

Nab’e Xib’alb’a

First Hell (Limbo of Infants)

ak’alab’ alaxib’al mak

‘children’ ‘birth sin’

Ukab’ Xib’alb’a

Second Hell (Purgatory)

k’axk’ol ra’il tz’aqatisaxik raxwinaqil

‘suffering-pain’ ‘completion’ ‘well-being’

Rox Xib’alb’a

Third Hell (Hell)

junelik k’axk’ol ra’il q’aq’al meq’enal Diablos k’axtok’

‘eternal suffering-pain’ ‘fires’ ‘heat’ ‘Devil-traitor’

Ukaj Xib’alb’a

Fourth Hell (Limbo of the Fathers)

chajib’al qachuch qajawixelab’

‘guardian-place of our ancestors’

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and the abstractive noun winaqil ‘humanity’. The term is exclusively attested in the doctrinal sources, which leaves it unclear whether we are dealing with a prehispanic or a borrowed European conceptualisation.

Finally, the ‘fourth Hell’ (ukaj xib’alb’a) refers to another prestage of Hell, the Limbo of the Fathers. Similar to innocent infants, medieval Catholic theology found an explanation for the whereabouts of the pious ancestral fathers, who died before the sacrifice of Christ could absolve them from original The ‘third Hell” (urox xib’alb’a) refers to the actual Hell, sin (e.g. Moses). The K’iche’ catechism describes this place the place of eternal damnation called ad infernum in the Latin as the chajib’al qachuch qajawixelab’ ‘guardian-place of our sources. In the Nabe Tihonic it is characterised as a place ancestors’. The concept of powerful ancestors who after their of ‘eternal suffering’ (k’axk’ol ra’il), that is full of devils death reside in caves and mountains, from where they con(k’axtok’), and associated with ‘fires’ and ‘heat’. The term tinue to influence the lives of the town, is rather prominent employed in the missionary texts to refer to the fires of Hell in Highland Guatemala ethnography (see Christenson 2001, is the term q’aq’al ‘fieriness’, which is paired in the following 2009; Cook 1986: 146–146). We even have evidence from the Classic Maya hieroglyphic record, where deceased kings example with meq’enal ‘heat’. are mentioned to witness accession ceremonies and therefore continue to have political influence post mortem (Fitzsimqitzij nim umeq’enal uq’aq’al truly great is the heat, the fieriness mons 2009: 142). We cannot say whether the Christian idea xib’alb’a of Hell of the Limbo of the Fathers and its reference as chajib’al ‘guardian-place’ showed any conceptual continuity with the (Nabe Tihonic, GGMA ms. 190, p. 127) prehispanic practice of ancestor worship, but the translation may unintentionally have reinforced existing ideas about the afterlife and even about the cultural principle of ancestor The Christian association of Xib’alb’a with fires and heat is the most significant contradiction of the Precolumbian un- veneration as a political institution. derworld, which is generally described as a cold and watery Particular mention deserves the unusual order of the levplace that is reached through caves and by crossing several rivers. It may therefore be a deliberate decision of the mis- els of hell in the Nabe Tihonic. Thomas Aquinas separated the sionaries that in the doctrinal sources we find the term q’aq’al concept of limbo, which had been introduced into Christian belief by Augustine, into two separate abodes for the children ‘fieriness’ rather than q’aaq’ ‘fire’ to describe the attributes of Hell. The term q’aq’al is an abstractive form of the noun who died in original sin and the holy fathers. Aquinas ordered q’aaq’ ‘fire’. In the Popol Vuh, the term forms various seman- the different abodes vertically according to the individual tic couplets, such as q’aq’al tepewal ‘fieriness and majesty’ hope for salvation, starting with Hell on the lowest level, the (Popol Vuh, fol. 37v), q’aq’al nimal ‘fieriness and greatness/ limbo for infants on the next, above that purgatory and on the upper level the limbo of the fathers (Summa Theologica, honour’ (Popol Vuh, fol. 49v), or q’aq’al ajawarem ‘fieriness and lordship’ (Popol Vuh, fol. 37v). In all three mentioned ex- Suppl., Question 69, Article 6). He clearly explains that the amples a translation of q’aq’al as ‘power’ would be the most children born in original sin have no hopes of going to Heavadequate. The couplet q’aq’al tepewal ‘power and majesty’ en, as they had not acquired faith nor grace before their death. is also attested in the doctrinal sources where it refers to the “authority and power of God”, i.e. uq’aq’al utepewal Dios Table 4. Hierarchical order of the abodes of the soul according to ‘fieriness (= power) and majesty of God’ (Arte de la lengua Aquinas kiche and catechism, GGMA, ms. 164). Limbus Patrum

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Fire is Power is a conceptual mapping found throughout Maya culture. In Classic Maya texts, rulers commonly carry the element of k’ahk’ ‘fire’ in their name phrase; e.g. Yich’aak K’ahk’ ‘Claw of Fire’ or K’ahk’ Upakal ‘Fire is his shield’ (see Colas 2004). Fire is associated with political as well as divine power. According to the Popol Vuh, the K’iche’ founder fathers left to their descendants a sacred bundle called the pisom q’aq’al ‘bundled fieriness’. Such sacred bundles are venerated in Highland Guatemala until today. For example, the Cofradía San Juan in Santiago Atitlán is the guardian for the Martin bundle that is seen by traditionalists as the most powerful creator deity in the town and addressed as the “lord of fire” (Christenson 2001). The reference of q’aq’al to divine power seems to perfectly fit Precolumbian understanding of Xib’alb’a as a place of origin and rebirth. The use of the term q’aq’al instead of q’aaq’ ‘fire’ may not have communicated the concept of the tormenting fires of Christian Hell particularly well, and instead, quite to the contrary of missionary intentions, may have ensured the indexical continuity of the word and its conceptual context.

Purgatorio Limbus Infantium Infernus While the description in the K’iche’ catechism does not specify the vertical order of the places of the soul, it follows Aquinas in the separation of the limbo into two abodes, with the limbo for children as the first and the limbo of the fathers as the fourth Hell. This ordering of the ‘four Hells’ seems to correspond with indigenous conceptualisations. In Mesoamerican thought, humankind and human communities are commonly seen as plants, with the ancestors constituting the roots, the old and wise forming the stem or trunk, younger people the branches, and children the flowers and fruits (see Carlsen and Prechtel 1991; Sachse in press). Moving the limbo of the honourable fathers to the lowest level of the earth would therefore be consistent with indigenous cosmology (Oswaldo Chinchilla, personal communication). However, whether the numbering of the four abodes of Hell is a de-

Worlds in Words: Precolumbian Cosmologies in the Context of Early Colonial Christianisation in Highland Guatemala

velopment in this particular set of colonial catechisms from Guatemala, whether it can be found elsewhere in New Spain, or whether it originally derives from European catechisms still requires clarification. The terminology used in the Nabe Tihonic to describe the Christian version of Xib’alb’a shows a relation to K’iche’ religion which does not draw a particularly negative picture of Hell. K’iche’ speakers, who assisted the missionaries in the translation process, may have introduced terms and modified

translations to adapt them to the otherworld concepts that were familiar to them.

Eschatology To fully appreciate the conceptual implications of the terminology chosen by the friars to express the Christian otherworld places of Heaven and Hell, we need to look at the meaning of these concepts within the framework of Highland

Figure 1. Image from an Early Classic vase (K6547) of unknown provenance. Ethnologisches Museum, Berlin. Drawing: Simon Martin.

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Maya eschatology. Whereas Christian thought sees Heaven and Hell as incompatible cosmological locations and the eternal fate of the human soul in either of these abodes determined by individual behaviour, Mesoamerican eschatological belief links the underworld and the celestial/solar paradise conceptually through the cycle of life that is metaphorically represented by the path of the sun and the analogy of human life to the growth-cycle of maize. The conceptual metaphor of Human Life is a Maize Plant pervades Maya culture and eschatology from the Classic to the present-time. Humans were created from maize, they grow as individual corn stalks, and the stages of their lives are expressed with the same terms that describe the development of the plant. When children are conceived they are ‘sown’, when they are born, they ‘dawn’ like a plant that breaks through the surface of the earth. Classic and Modern Maya refer to their children as ‘sprouts’ (see e.g. Christenson 2001). And at the end of life, the bones of the deceased buried into the ground and become the seeds from which the new maize plants sprout that provide –not just metaphorically– the food for the living (see Carlsen and Prechtel 1991). This idea of intergenerational exchange is represented in the Hero Twin episodes from the Popol Vuh. The close connection of the narrative with maize mythology has been widely recognised in the figure of Jun Junajpu, whose decapitated head becomes the fruit of a calabash tree, and thus primordial food that generates offspring (see among others Taube 1985; Martin 2006; Braakhuis 2009). The concept of the death and rebirth of the Hero Twins, who sacrifice themselves in a fire and have their bones ground and strewn into an underworld river from where they are reborn, has been associated with the present-day Tz’utujil practice of preparing maatz’, a ceremonial atole from toasted corn that is ground and mixed with ashes and consumed in ritual contexts at the time of sowing (Carlsen and Prechtel 1991: 32; Christenson 2001: 123–124; 196). The Hero Twin mythology characterises the underworld as a place of defeat, death and subsequent regeneration. Accordingly Xib’alb’a also has positive connotations in the indigenous sources. The Memorial de Sololá describes it as the raxa xib’alb’ay q’ana xib’alb’ay ‘green Xib’alb’a yellow Xib’alb’a’. As mentioned above, the kenning of rax q’an ‘green-yellow’ generally refers to ‘abundance of food’ and in the given context may even refer to the otherworldly Mountain of Sustenance as the origin place of humanity. Human fate is to be buried and regenerated in the underworld to give life to one’s descendants by fertilizing the ground that sustains the crops for future generations.

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The underworld as a place of human regeneration is eschatologically linked to the solar cycle, which is illustrated in Classic Maya imagery. The famous ‘death vase’ in the holdings of the Ethnologisches Museum in Berlin (K6547; see Fig. 1) depicts the body of a deceased ruler in a flowery mountain of sustenance underneath a radiant Sun God with a maize seed on the top of his head. In this scene, the sun represents the concept of a celestial paradise (Taube 2004), while the maize seed alludes to the cycle of life and rebirth. As the sun dies and descends every day in the west and his

reborn in the east, maize seeds are “buried” into the earth before they sprout again to new life. The other side of the vase depicts fruit trees growing out of the bodies of deceased ancestors (Schele and Mathews 1998; Taube 2004: 79ff.). The image is conceptually related to the depictions of the trees sprouting from the heads of ancestral kings on the sides of the sarcophagus of Pakal in Palenque (Carlsen and Prechtel 1991: 34; Schele and Freidel 1990: 221). Both scenes have been interpreted as representations of the mythical decomposition and rebirth of the Maize God in a paradisiacal place of creation (Martin 2006). The scholarly interpretation of the scenes on the Berlin vase seems to be consistent with contemporary Ch’orti’ belief that the human soul has to pass through suffering and trials in the underworld before it can rise to realm of the sun god (Girard 1966: 230–232). From a Mesoamerican perspective, the path of the sun, which descends in the west into the Pacific, passes through the underworld to reemerge every morning in the eastern Atlantic, locates the place of human death and human regeneration on the other side of the sea. The concept of ‘the other side of the sea’ as an abode of the dead is confirmed by ethnographic data from Guatemala (see Sachse 2008), and we know from the Classic Maya record that the verb phrase och ha’ ‘to enter the water’ was used as an expression to denote the death of a ruler (Fitzsimmons 2009). Consistent with the notion of a solar paradise as a place of rebirth, the eastern side of the ocean is seen as a place of origin. Oral traditions from Highland Guatemala relate that sacred objects, such as saint figures, have anciently been brought across the sea on the back of serpents or deer (see Hutcheson 2003: 176ff.). Similarly, most of the Highland Maya títulos state that the ancestors of the K’iche’an groups came ch’aqa palow ‘across the sea’ from releb’al q’ij “where the sun emerges”, i.e. from the east, into their present territories.

B’alam K’itze, B’alam Aq’ab’, Majukutaj, Iki B’alam e nab’e winaq, xepe chila’ ch’aqa palo chi releb’al q’ij.

B’alam K’itze, B’alam Aq’ab’, Majukutaj and Iki B’alam were the first people, who came from across the sea where the sun emerges.

(Popol Vuh, fol. 48r)

Most K’iche’ títulos and the Popol Vuh name the place where the ancestors came from as Tulan (Tollan) and Wuqub’ Pek Wuqub’ Siwan ‘Seven Caves, Seven Canyons’ (Chicomoztoc). Both toponyms refer to mytho-historical places of Central Mexican origin that were likely adopted into Highland Maya mythology in Postclassic times. I have argued elsewhere that in Highland Maya mythology these toponyms do not refer to actual geographical locations, but to otherworld places (Sachse 2008). This interpretation seems to be confirmed by a passage from the Memorial de Sololá which states that there were four Tulans, from where humankind originated. Consistent with the stages of the path of the sun: one in the east, one in the west, one in Xib’alb’ay, and thus nadir, and one in

Worlds in Words: Precolumbian Cosmologies in the Context of Early Colonial Christianisation in Highland Guatemala

chila’ chi kaj pa junelik ki’kotem chib’e q’ij chib’e saq

in Heaven in eternal joy as long as there is sun, as long as there is light

(Nabe Tihonic, GGMA ms. 190, p. 40) chib’e q’ij chib’e saq katkat pa Xib’alb’a

as long as there is sun, as long as there is light you burn in Hell

The peculiarity of this example proves that the metaphor cannot be a neologism created by missionaries, but a genuine K’iche’ concept that was appropriated into doctrinal discourse. In the indigenous sources, we find the diphrastic kenning of q’ij ‘sun’ and saq ‘light’, which occurs in semantic contexts referring to the thriving of human progeny. In the Título de Totonicapán, the K’iche’ founder fathers implore the creator deities for ‘sun and light’ in a petition prayer for offspring and food.

(Basseta 1698, fol. 142r) At Kaj Ulew, at pu Tz’aqol B’itol,

You sky and earth, and you Framer Shaper,

K’ab’owil1, which presumably refers to a celestial location chaya’ ta qami’al qak’ajol, give us daughters and sons, at the zenith (see Hill and Maxwell 2006: 7). chaya’ uxer web’al uch’ab’al chiqe, give us plates and cups, It needs to be noted that the indigenous sources describe at pu chaq’a cho, chaq’a palo, you across the lake, across the sea, these otherworld locations primarily as places of origin and at upam kaj, at relib’al q’ij, you Inside of the sky, you Sunrise, not as eternal abodes for the human soul. The idea of human at raq’anib’al q’ij, you Path of the sun, regeneration or intergenerational rebirth is fundamental to chaya’ ta qaq’ij qasaq’ xecha’, … give us our sun and our light, … the Highland Maya eschatology. The link of the human afterlife to the maize cycle and the solar cycle also reflects in (Título de Totonicapán, fol. 22v-23r) the translation of the Christian concept of ‘eternity’. One of the renderings of the term ‘eternity’ into K’iche’ that we find Founders of descent groups are frequently referred to as in the doctrinal literature is the expression chib’e q’ij, chib’e the ‘roots of sun, roots of light’. The founder father B’alam saq ‘as long as there is sun, as long as there is light’. The Aq’ab’, for instance, is described in the Popol Vuh as the metaphor occurs in contexts that refer to eternal states of the “root of sun, root of light of the people” (uxe’ q’ij, uxe’ saq soul in both Heaven and Hell and translates best into English chi winaq) of the Nija’ib’ K’iche’ (Popol Vuh, fol. 56r). Similarly, the ancestral creator couple Xmuqane and Xpiyakok as ‘forever’. who give life to humanity are named the ‘Grandmother of kaji’ k’a xpe wi From four (locations) came sun, grandmother of light’ (rati’t q’ij, rati’t saq) (Popol Vuh, winäq pa Tulan: the people from Tulan: fol. 3v), while humans, i.e. their creation, are referred to as chi releb’al q’ij jun Tulan, in the east is one Tulan, the ‘children of sun and light’. jun chik k’a chi Xib’alb’ay, jun chik k’a chi ruqajib’al q’ij, chi ri’ k’a xojpe wi , chi ruq’ajib’al q’ij, jun chik wi k’a chi K’ab’owil.

another one in Xib’alb’ay, another one where the sun descends (west), there we come from, where the sun descends (west), (and) another one is in K’ab’owil.

The reference to ‘sun and light’ in the context of descent and offspring is best understood in the context of the aforementioned conceptual metaphor human life is a maize plant (see Sachse 2012; in press). The maize plant needs sunlight to grow and reproduce. Thus, human life that is seen not only (Memorial de Sololá, transcription after Otzoy 1999: §4, 155) in analogy to the maize cycle but also depends on maize as the main staple crop, is inalienably dependent on ‘sun and The use of the metaphor is odd. In Christian thought, light light’. In the Popol Vuh, the first humans pray to the creator is an inherently positive concept that is primarily associated god Tz’aqol B’itol to give them offspring. They implore the with God, Divinity and the Heavens. However, the missionar- deity for calm and steady saq ‘light’ and amaq’ ‘settlement’2, ies use the expression chib’e q’ij, chib’e saq also with respect in order for them to ‘sow’ and ‘dawn’, that is to procreate eternally. The parallelism of saq amaq’ ‘light and settlement’ to the dark realm of Satan: is found in missionary dictionaries with the translation paz uq’equmal Xib’alb’al, in the darkness of Hell, ‘peace’ (Basseta, fol. 118r; Ximénez, fol. 146r) and refers chib’e q’ij chib’e saq as long as there is sun, as long as there is light to the two essential prerequisites plants need for successful growth –sufficient sunlight and stability. (Nabe Tihonic, GGMA ms. 190, p. 131)

1 The term k’ab’owil was used in Kaqchikel to refer to any kind of deity. Dominicans and Franciscans entered into a fierce debate about whether this term was permitted to be used in doctrinal discourse to refer to the Christian God (García Ruíz 1992). In the end, both orders introduced the term to refer to any kind of idol. The use of the term in reference to a celestial origin place indicates that Highland Maya deities were transcendental concepts rather than just the stone images that the friars saw as the objects of idolatry.

2 The term amaq’ denotes a unit within Highland Maya social organisation. In the colonial dictionaries amaq’ is given as ‘pueblo’ (see Basseta 2005 [1690]) or ‘ciudad’ (see Basseta 2005 [1690]; Anonymous Franciscan Dictionary) with connotations of both a social group and a place. As the term seems to carry the connotation of ‘permanence’ of a larger human group in a specific territory, I have chosen to translate it as ‘settlement’.

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Chaya’taj qetal, qatzijel, chib’e q’ij, chib’e saq, ta chawaxoq, ta saqiroq. Qi ta raxal b’e, raxal jok. Kojaya’ wi li’anik saq, li’anik amaq’ taj, utzilaj saq, utzilaj amaq’ taj, utzilaj k’aslem, winaqirem ta puch kojaya’ wi.

(Popol Vuh, fol. 35r) The metaphor of ‘sun and light’ alludes to the daily rebirth of the sun which assures the continuation of the cycle of life. In this worldview, eternity lasts as long as the sun sets and rises, and as long as one’s own descent group produces offspring. It is probable that the appropriation of the metaphor ‘as long as there is sun, as long as there is light’ in the doctrinal sources did not communicate the Christian concept of eternity very well. While the eternity of God is understood as the permanent existence outside of time and space, Christian eschatology locates the eternal existence of the human soul in either paradisiacal Heaven or in the never-ending condemnation of Hell. The afterlife is individualised and eternal life or eternal suffering the outcome of personal conduct and merit. In Highland Maya cosmology human fate depends on an intergenerational exchange of death and rebirth that connects both otherworld locations and turns eternity into a collective achievement, which is assured by the procreation of one’s own offspring.

Conclusions Analysing the terminology that was chosen by the missionaries to translate the Christian otherworld concepts of Heaven and Hell into K’iche’, we can see that they adopted terms referring to concepts that were meaningful within the semantic framework of Highland Maya cosmology. Although we do find this terminology in doctrinal texts produced by authors of both mendicant orders, it was a conscious Dominican practice to actively appropriate terminology from K’iche’ ritual discourse and to use elements from prehispanic religion as analogies to explain Christian ideas (see Sparks 2011, Sachse 2016). A document on the foundation of the congregación of Chamelco in the Alta Verapáz describes the indigenous performances that were held at the event, including the performance of the Hero Twin myth as a traditional dance with costume and masks. The anonymous author comments that the Dominican fray Luis Cáncer, upon watching the dance performance of the resurrection of the Hero Twins from the underworld, saw the parallels with the Passion and Resurrection of Christ and adopted the analogy for preaching the new faith to the Q’eqchi’ (Estrada Monroy 1979: 174).

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with Mesoamerican cosmology. These include the choice of the term q’aq’al ‘fieriness = power’ to refer to the Christian idea of the ‘fires of Hell’, which seems to match the Highland Maya notion of a cold and powerful underworld location better than the literal use of the term q’aaq’ ‘fire’. Furthermore, we have seen that the placement of the limbo of the fathers at the lowest level of Hell seems to correspond with the idea of the ancestors forming the roots of human progeny. Whether the rendering of the celestial paradise as ‘flower land’ was consciously introduced or simply seen by the friars as a reference to the concept of Christian resurrection cannot be conclusively answered. However, the translation did preserve Highland Maya belief in the divinity of the sun and a solar paradise of rebirth. The role of the sun as a provider of human life and descent also survived in the doctrinal sources in the translation of the Christian concept of ‘eternity’. These conceptualisations clearly survived and the slight modifications the authors of the Título de Totonicapán apply to Vico’s text may be another indication of that.

It shall be given our sign, our word, as long as there is sun, as long as there is light, may it be sown, may it dawn. Truly may there be green roads, green paths. Give us calm light, calm settlement, good light, good settlement, good life and creation may you give to us.

Native K’iche’ speakers were actively involved in the conversion and by helping and communicating with the missionaries influenced and shaped the creation of doctrinal discourse (see Hanks 2010; Sparks 2011). We have identified several translations that may reflect indigenous reactions to Christianity, who tried to make the new doctrine compatible

The deliberate missionary approach to make Christian faith comprehensible to converts by adapting the translation of Christian concepts to the cultural framework of indigenous religiosity led to the reproduction of the cultural logic of Highland Maya cosmology and contributed to the preservation of prehispanic worlds in the words of the new Catholic faith. Acknowledgements

The research presented in this chapter was undertaken during my fellowship at the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection in the academic year of 2012–13 and at the University of Pennsylvania Museum in 2014. I would like to thank Louise Burkhart, Oswaldo Chinchilla Mazariegos, Allen Christenson, Annette Kern, Jesper Nielsen and Garry Sparks for their comments on various aspects discussed in this paper.

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Endnotes

1 GGMA = Garrett-Gates Collection of Mesoamerican Manu­ scripts. 2 All transcriptions of the Popol Vuh-text into modernised spelling are originally based on Christenson (2004, 2007) with modifications and changes by the author of this chapter.

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The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche Lorraine A. Williams-Beck Universidad Autónoma de Campeche

Abstract As the Maya universe’s fifth component, the center is a little understood concept of Pre-Columbian and Post-Contact Cosmos. Despite more complete glyphic references in Pre-Hispanic Maya codices and graphic illustrations in Post-Contact ethnohistoric literature for the other four realms, often equated with approximate sectorial horizon coordinates or the sun’s daily pathway from East to West placed between contextual “north” as zenith and “south” as nadir, center was a pivotal point in celestial, terrestrial, and otherworldly domains as umbilicus through time. This chapter will explore a diachronic notion of function and form for center as umbilicus, placing particular emphasis on Pre-Hispanic Canpech and Chanputun provinces, and Early Colonial contexts at Dzaptun/Ceiba Cabecera, Campeche. As generic term which refers to this place as a ritual seat of power, dzaptun, that appears as “la Zeiba” and Ceiba Cabecera in later Colonial sources, had served as central cog in a hypothesized regional ritual religious pilgrimage circuit prior to European contact. As one of the earliest “pueblos de indios” in the Champotón and Campeche Missions region, Ceiba Cabecera’s town layout and it’s more prominent architectural features follow Pre-Hispanic directional primacy. Two churches, a diminutive sixteenth-century open “visita” chapel and later eighteenth-century massive “iglesia mayor”, flanked by two water wells one of which was refurbished during Colonial times, are central points of orientation placed strategically adjacent to “Main Street”, whose westerly limit ends in the town’s cemetery. Iglesia Mayor’s architectural components and secular iconographic mural painting contents reiterate this place’s message as umbilicus and place of spiritual rebirth and renewal for Campeche’s Early Colonial Mayas’ ritual religious universe. Ceiba Cabecera’s reign as a Colonial religious center probably ceased around 1799 and the town was later almost completely abandoned by 1860.

Resumen Como el quinto componente del universo maya, el centro es un concepto poco comprendido del Cosmos Precolumbino o de la época pos-contacto. A pesar de contar con referencias jeroglíficas más completas en los códices prehispánicos e ilustraciones gráficas en la literatura etnohistórica del periodo después del arribo de los europeos para las otras cuatro direcciones, a menudo relacionadas con las coordinadas sectoriales aproximadas del paso solar cotidiano del oriente al poniente, colocado contextualmente entre el norte como cenit y el sur como el inframundo, el centro era un punto esencial en los dominios celeste, terrestre y del más allá como el ombligo a través del tiempo. En este ensayo se explorará una noción diacrónica de la forma y función del centro como ombligo, haciendo énfasis particular en las provincias prehispánicas de Canpech y Chanputun, así como en los contextos del periodo Colonial temprano en Dzaptun/Ceiba Cabecera, Campeche. Dzaptun, como el término genérico que se le refiere a un lugar como sede religiosa de poder ritual que aparece más tarde como la “Zeyba” y Ceiba Cabecera en las fuentes coloniales, habría fungido como el eje central en un circuito regional ritual religioso hipotético antes del contacto europeo. Como uno de los primeros “pueblos de indios” en las Misiones de Champotón y Campeche, el diseño urbano y la ubicación de los elementos arquitectónicos más prominentes siguen patrones y direcciones primordiales prehispánicos. Dos inmuebles religiosos, a través de restos de una capilla abierta diminutiva del siglo XVI y una Iglesia Mayor del siglo XVIII, rematado por dos pozos con uno de remozado durante la época Colonial, son puntos céntricos de orientación colocados estratégicamente a ambos costados del “Eje Principal”, cuyo límite del rumbo poniente concluye en el cementerio del pueblo. Los componentes arquitectónicos y el contenido de motivos iconográficos naturalistas seculares de la pintura mural interior reiteran el mensaje de este lugar como el ombligo y el espacio liminal de renovación y renacimiento espiritual del universo ritual religioso. El dominio como sede del calendario ritual religioso durante el periodo Colonial concluyó probablemente en 1799 y el pueblo luego fue abandonado casi por completo en 1860.

The center plays a pivotal role in Maya worldview through time. This focal point as analytical concept illustrates multiple identities through differing stages of articulation beginning at the individual level and appearing as symbolic

icons included in archaeological features, placed on structural elements, set within one specific architectural compound (Mathews and Garber 2004; Chase and Chase 2009), and conceived as a complete site or geographical place within an

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entire region (Williams-Beck 2011; Williams-Beck 2012a, 2012b; Williams-Beck, Anaya Hernández and Arjona García 2009). Due to its complex nature through a combination of human, environmental, material or structural manifestations within each distinct level of complexity, the roles center as umbilicus play in each context, let alone in each realm, have been difficult to ascertain (Vogt 1976; Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993; Milbrath 1999; Chase and Chase 2009; Vail and Hernández 2010). Over half a century ago, Thompson first recognized the concept of center and then described some specific attributes surrounding the creation event with yaxche or first green tree, planted at a nuclear point surrounded by four others at their corresponding corners of the Earth (Thompson 1950: 71). Liminal traits of passing into or out of specific contexts (Chase and Chase 2009: 223) added later to this notion of first green tree as axis mundi upon whose crown perched a supernatural bird and whose roots and branches linked the underworld, middleworld and overworld, where “…[t]he souls of the dead and the supernaturals of the Maya cosmos traveled from level to level via this tree” (Schele and Miller 1986: 42), fusing origin and creation to present and future to past. The spatial dimensions of this revelation and subsequent versions divided the celestial sphere into thirteen levels, the underworld into nine strata, each one with corresponding deities, and all realms shared and set anchor at one terrestrial plane point of reference known as umbilicus. Through this more recent description, landforms and spatial configurations play a more prominent role in the cosmic configuration of center.

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Movements through those particular axis points of power creation, foundation, destruction, renovation and exchange between different cosmic strata provided the locus and framework for Maya moral and physical order, spatial and temporal structure, and social and cosmic harmony (Farriss 1987; Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993; Paxton 2001, 2010; Rice 2004). Identifying these permeable points of periodic passage in the visual and/or tangible and intangible landscape and fusing them with renewed power, by periodically executing activities to nourish and sustain them throughout the annual ritual calendar year, allowed predicting the future by anticipating the past. Sacred actions transpired in those spaces at specific temporal intervals through human agency and deity intervention, in order to sustain the cosmic cycle of creation, foundation, death, transformation and rebirth to maintain cosmic and calendric order (Paxton 2001, 2010; Vail 2004, 2006; Vail and Aveni 2004; Vail and Hernández 2010). An integral notion of Maya worldview, that incorporates these vertical and horizontal layers in their respective universes connected by an umbilicus, is their obsession with observing time and recognizing both the passing of linear intervals or particular cycles which followed the movement of different astral bodies and through a combination of both linear and cyclical images fashioned into a kind of spiral (Farriss 1987: 569, 572) closely identified with the observance of the ritual calendar (Rice 2010). “The key to…time and their entire cosmology is their preoccupation with order and above all with cosmic order…the drama of creation is therefore an ongoing one, for

the cosmic order must continually be reaffirmed in the face of this ever-looming chaos. Time is part of the cosmic order… its cyclical patterning the counterforce to the randomness of evil” (Farriss 1987: 574). Human agency, through reiterated offerings made to appease or channel divine intervention, in specific contexts observed at precise historic moments during celestial alignments predicted in this calendar, is essential. Another key factor in this equation is the particular iconic profile of the places destined to offer periodic ritual tribute for sustaining forward movement through the calendar cycles. Despite displaying multiple identities between several distinct yet associated icons, levels, and temporal frames in a concept of center, discrete aggregations or tropes tend to coalesce around particular groups of shared symbolic meanings (Kuntz and Reese-Taylor 2001; Masson 2003; Chase and Chase 2009) within each liminal setting or context in which they appear. Understanding these focal combinations in Maya worldview requires unravelling those essential metaphorical meanings which “…became nested within other meanings or became part of a complex of symbols as a process of becoming [literally] ‘read’ more easily by more people” (Graham 2009: 21). For example, modern peninsular Maya h’men traditional healers “[…] conceive the center, directional sides, and corners of communities as if in a perpetual cosmological balancing act…an established sense of place-within-space…within…a relational landscape template. The umbilical center…tends to represent the past, present, and future warmth and security of the home while the rural periphery can be somewhat perceived, although not in a binary entirety, as cold and unstable. The center as cast in line with the warmth of the sun, as a multidimensional being, provides a living, dynamic cosmovision that is lived day in and day out with the appearance and disappearance of the sun person and its heat” (Astor-Aguilera 2010: 188). Discovering the relationships between terrestrial landscapes, cosmological thought, and structural design and periodic replication of activities through ritual observance involves recognizing patterning and specific places to where these different social aspects might be linked. Pre-Columbian Maya people conceived of themselves and their celestial, terrestrial and underworld environments as integral parts of their immediate surroundings. These three external separate but conjoined spheres were in turn ordered by a principal east–west axis set between two other universal planes that roughly correspond theoretically to north, as zenith or level above, and south as nadir or level below, and as more specific directional points in the terrestrial and celestial planes (Paxton 2001: 19–28, 2010; Vail and Hernández 2010). The pre-Columbian northwestern Lowland Maya incorporated integral portions of the celestial, terrestrial and underworld realms and replicated them in selected environmental niches, through constructed features and specific landscape designs within those places, repeated those symbolic patterns throughout different levels of aggregation, and incorporated them into their surroundings ordered by quotidian solar move-

The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche

and components passed by moving into and out of those vertical and horizontal realms and backwards and forward in time. Clarifying the probable roles those symbolic sets of imagery and material culture played in successive levels of articulation through features, building compounds, sites and regions, and understanding their significance through space and time comprise the objectives to which this chapter is directed.

The Maya Cosmos Briefly Revisited The Maya considered their universe a mediating factor of complementary opposition between ego and other, center and periphery, home and forest, and town and wilderness, in order to organize the chaos surrounding them by signaling differential movements through points of exchange between differing cosmic levels (Gillespie and Joyce 1998). The first dichotomy, represented by the human body, is a particularly personalized version of Maya worldFigure 1. The human body as miniature Cosmos design template (redrawn from view, whose umbilici also represent symbolic Hirose López 2008: 80, Fig. 3.1.2a; used with permission). extensions of terrestrial components such as ments set between north, as zenith or celestial, and south, as the home, solar or house lot space, agricultural field plot, nadir or terrestrial and subterranean planes. A silk-cotton neighborhood, town and immediate region (Hirose López ceiba tree served as axis mundi with roots and branches to 2008: 1–3). An individual’s physique comprises a miniature anchor all levels at that one umbilical reference point in the version of the greater cosmos, not only by mirroring its four terrestrial sphere, yet still allowed those planes to continually realms and central umbilicus, but also by forming integral revolve around the sun, moon, certain constellations, and parts of the immediate surroundings by containing four key other celestial bodies as well as the multiple-leveled strata of natural elements through earth, water, fire and air. In addition, their universe (Schele and Miller 1986; Freidel, Schele and the human body possesses four spiritual principles: pixan or Parker 1996; Paxton 2001, 2010). soul, ool or ch’ulel as breath of life essence, kinam or corporal warmth, and íik as essential wind-born animus (Hirose López While centers as permeable thresholds between realms are 2008: 57–72). The human figure’s world directions correfound in all three levels of the universe throughout space and spond with East – upper torso, and West – lower torso, and time and their celestial, terrestrial, and underworld compo- bi-gender aspects through masculine right- and feminine leftnents are intimately and symbolically intertwined (Mathews hand sides respectfully that symbolize a cosmic unity comand Garber 2004), the structural replication of one attribute pletely enveloped by an energy plexus that centers humans identified in one particular stratum may link it with similar to provide personal order in an otherwise anarchic world that or related elements in the corresponding adjacent realms. oscillates between navel order at the beginning of the ritual Because such great complexity is involved, this chapter will calendar year and chaos which must be realigned near the briefly discuss all worldview components, beginning with the year’s end, but always manages to articulate the human body human factor, turning next to the celestial and underworld with the rest of the universe through cyclical time (Fig. 1) (Hilevels from which individual and deity elements came and rose López 2008: 74–88). This particular quadrilateral formal returned to, and finally followed by the spatial and terres- attribute reflects the primordial space human beings inhabit trial planes. However, because some of these sets of traits after having been crafted from maize by the deities at the moassume certain graphic and symbolic components which tend ment of creation (Coe 1965; Schele and Miller 1986; Freidel, to be more readily discerned in the terrestrial plane, empha- Schele and Parker 1993). The Maya term for human being or sis will be placed more thoroughly on specific archaeologi- winik simultaneously reflects aspects of their micro situation, cal, architectural, and environmental or landforms contexts their terrestrial position and essential bodily essence through throughout sites and places in Campeche and the Northern the agricultural portion of land to be planted with maize, their Lowlands through time. Key pieces of these symbolic terres- principal sustenance, measured by twenty kaanes within a trial repertoires usually situate themselves in non-domestic macro cosmic order known as uinan (Arzápalo Marín 1995: public contexts and ritual activity areas that in some settings 761). The inhabited space is in constant movement according may have provided the liminal points through which ahk- to twenty-day temporal periods, referred to as winal (Barrera inob timekeeper protagonists and other key cosmic players Vásquez et al. 1980: 923), a term whose root also symboli-

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cally illustrates the total number of a human being’s fingers and toes. The quincunx, or kanti’ts’1 in modern Yucatec Maya, shows the individual as umbilicus or central point set within the four-cornered world bearing a large circle over crossed bands bounded by a square. This same centralizing image repeats in Pakal’s carefully placed interred body holding a sphere in the left hand and a cubed shape in the right, elements found encased within the limestone sarcophagus and vaulted interior tomb as liminal passageway metaphor to the points of origin, creation, and the otherworld enclosed in the Temple of the Inscriptions at Palenque (Hirose López 2008: 95, 3.2.a, 3.2.b). Cantitz formal attributes represent a similar iconic feature that embellishes certain ceramic bowl and dish forms placed over the cadaver’s head, thorax, or pelvic regions associated with Lowland Maya funerary contexts since the Middle to Late Preclassic periods, to help center and order the deceased within the chaos of the immediate underworld to facilitate passage through those liminal contact points in the universe. These elements serve as conduits for the human body’s essence’s ool, as known by northern Lowland Yucatec speakers (Hirose López 2008), or ch’ulel, by Ch’olan speakers and other central and southern Lowland Maya people (Houston, Stuart and Taube 2006: 35), for escaping the bonds of death, towards transformation in the aqueous underworld, and later rebirth in the east. Four directional levels and center also are conceived at this individual level as “…[h]ouses and fields [as] the small-scale models of the quincuncial cosmogony. The universe was created by the…gods who support it at its corners and who designated its center, the ‘navel’ of the world…[H]ouses have corresponding corner posts; fields emphasize the same critical places, with cross shrines at their corners and centers. These points are of primary ritual importance” (Vogt 1976: 58). The Maya recognize several stellar aggregates in the celestial universe (Schele and Miller 1986; Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993; Milbrath 1999; Paxton 2001, 2010; Vail and Hernández 2010). While some constellations appear during exact seasonal periods, one such triangular-shaped grouping of bright stars, known as the three hearth stones, located in Orion, is placed close to the celestial equator, and divides the sky into two halves. This constellation shows a particular trait by rotating east to west when rising in the winter, and north to south when setting for a short time in the summer months, when the agricultural season is in full swing (Milbrath 1999: 266). Another assemblage, Aak the turtle, is stationed close by (Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993: 82; Milbrath 1999: 267), possibly representing the birthplace of maize as seen in Classic Maya imagery. The Pleiades, a group of several visible stars located in Taurus on the ecliptic, represent either seven maize kernels set in the sky by the Maize God, so that

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1 Kanti’ts is the manner in which the term appears in the Cordemex dictionary (Barrera Vásquez et al. 1980: 293), presumably reflecting the Yucatec dialect. However, in the Calepino de Motul dictionary, allegedly from the Dzibalche-Calkiní area in Campeche, where a localized dialect Campechthaan (Voss 2007) was spoken, rendering this concept as cantitz (Arzápalo Marín 1995: 110). I defer to the Campeche regional spelling throughout the rest of the article.

human beings would forever be conscious of their corporal origins (Hirose López, personal communication 2015), or tzab the tail rattles of the snake, which slithers towards the intersection of the ecliptic and the Milky Way, known as Wahkah Chan (Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993; Milbrath 1999: 258–264). All heavenly bodies danced around Wahkah Chan, identified with the World Tree and as the celestial road and conduit to other cosmic realms (Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993: 76–78; Milbrath 1999: 39–41). Each constellation grouping was perhaps tethered in one way or another to Polaris or Xaman Ek. Situated today at a hand’s vertical palm’s visual measure above the horizon, the two bowl ending stars in Little Dipper point to Xaman Ek, the Pole star around which the sky revolves (Rey 2008), while pouring its contents into Big Dipper (Milbrath 1999: 38–39). The early twentieth century peninsular lowland Maya referred to Big Dipper, or Ursa Major, as the seventh sacrament or Catholic last rites performed just before death (Redfield and Villa Rojas 1962: 115); and the more recent K’iche’ Maya identify it as Seven-Macaw or Itzam-Yeh (Tedlock 1985: 330). In the northwestern Maya lowlands, Polaris is placed more closely to the Horizon in the early evening, so that the larger stellar aggregation, Ursa Major, is not as readily visible throughout the year, appearing more frequently as inserted into rather than emerging out of Xibalba’s aqueous underworld realm, perhaps suggesting a reason for the peninsular peoples’ associating it with a person’s demise. The celestial realm connects to the underworld through a nebulous portal in a specific sector of the heavens, known as ek waay or “black transformer” (Arzápalo Marín 1995: 274, 745), encountered during an astronomical exercise to highlight specific creation or foundation dates identified in Cross Group glyphic panels from Palenque dedicated in A.D. 690 (Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993). This cosmic portal features a rotational phenomenon that begins in early February2, ends in mid-August, and highlights the Milky Way or Raised-upSky-Tree which emerges from it and connects the heart of the heavens to the underworld (Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993: 95–99). The cosmic themes associated with this liminal place rotate once again around celestial-underworld planes, portal to death, rebirth, creation, renovation, and renewal of the cosmos by uniting its different realms through specific way points in each one. The first act of creation in the Maya universe centered the earth by placing within it Aak or turtle’s three cosmic hearth 2 In Hool, Campeche, February 2nd celebrates the patron saint, the Virgin of the Candelaria, during a 20-day series of internal community processions and activities to mark winter’s midpoint juncture that heralds the beginning of spring and renewal (Williams-Beck 2010: 213–226). Hool, as toponym and concept, has several meanings, two of which emphasize “something begins or ends” there, possibly referring to a local ritual calendar, or as the human body’s cosmic essence ool, as it is pronounced without an aspirated initial “h” consonant by the locals. Both themes are particularly germane to a symbolic discussion of place within the immediate region.

The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche

vide the etymological bridge between those superior and inferior cosmic levels. When referred to as a kind of terrestrial spatial or landscape category, the glyph ch’e’en appears in conjunction with either a “sky-bone compound” or “earth-bone compound” (Vogt and Stuart 2005: 157–163). This latter rendition, as seen principally through long bones and crania, truly do warm the matrix in which they are interred (Astor-Aguilera 2010), and through this action the images’ trope conveys a contextual meaning as metaphor to suggest caves as interior-world dwellings for the gods and ancestors (Tokovinine 2013: 22–23). By combining either the sky-bone or earth-bone-cave relationship Figure 2. Panoramic view of the coastal saltwater wetlands, in which a slightly raised islet or peten, between the celestial, terrestrial as sacred firmament urban design pattern, resides within and is surrounded by a freshwater ecological and underworld realms, another niche. Photograph by the author, 2010. interpretation for this symbolic stones; next came lifting the sky from the primordial sea aggregation in certain instances comprises liminal points of and establishing the four sides and corners of that terrestrial passage, contact points between adjacent worlds or umbilici plane to form the Cosmic celestial house (Freidel, Schele, and connecting all three levels of the Maya universe. Parker 1993: 67–75). From there came the terrestrial central point or quincunx, cantitz, or in celestial terms interpreted as path or roadway be (Barrera Vásquez et al. 1980: 46) or Material Signatures that Create Symbolic bee (Arzápalo Marín 1995: 81) by Schele (Freidel, Schele Umbilicus Tropes in the Terrestrial Plane and Parker 1993), which might also represent the permeable passageway between the heavens, the terrestrial plane, and Certain prominent natural features in the environment comunderworld (Milbrath 1999: 40). This latter dimension of the bine with human action or agency to create Maya place names universe cradled the ancestors’ sculls and long bones in the and terms that recognize built landscapes, as inferred from subterranean realms, warmed the land, and served as the me- Classic period inscriptions (Tokovinine 2013: 7–12). Tokodia for housing their corresponding ool essences with which vinine notes that while mountains, rocks, plants, and watery their descendants conversed (Astor-Aguilera 2010: 157–161). places generate the vast majority of glyphic nomenclature themes (Tokovinine 2013: 4–18), relatively few Classic peThe umbilical cuxansuum also unites the sky, ecliptic, riod toponyms are derived from two particular landform feathe sun, as well as the cenote cave water sources or built tures, petenoob and ch’e’enoob. He concludes that perhaps infrastructural wells, ch’e’enoob, perforated in the earth to neither was an important indexing landmark due to their reltap underwater currents. The modern Maya narrate that this atively scarce presence in hieroglyphic record (Tokovinine celestial cuxansuum, or umbilical cord, located close to the 2013: 13). However, a more detailed account of their salient intersection between ecliptic and zenith, links the heavens natural characteristics and environmental context might sugdown to the Earth and enters the underworld via a sink hole gest a distinct interpretation. cave or cenote, referred to as ch’e’en3, in which the ancestors also dwell (Astor-Aguilera 2010: 240). Among the many renAs a geographical feature peten refers to slightly elevated derings of the words chen, ch’en or ch’e’en, one interpreta- islets set within a freshwater spring-fed wetlands interface tion in particular as chen “pure, not mixed” (Barrera Vásquez between swamp, salt marsh, and mangrove forests found in et al. 1980: 90) as youthful virginal energy (Hirose López, the coastal plains (Fig. 2), that house fauna such as turtles, personal communication 2015) and others as “well of my alligators, and certain fish species. Another similar inland fathers or cemetery” (Barrera Vásquez et al. 1980: 131), pro- niche features freshwater springs which surface in savannah plains surrounded by seasonally flooded broadleaf and spiny scrub forests. Both these ecotones comprise the two major 3 The literature contains several different spellings for ecological landscapes in the northwestern lowlands of the the term ch’e’en, as well, cave, cenote, or specific geographical state of Campeche (Williams-Beck 2008). Previous research or landscape reference. The three distinct spellings noted in this in these coastal and inland areas suggests both contain special paragraph reflect how each researcher’s source renders this landscape features which provided precise milieu for creating particular word.

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a

b

c

d

Figure 3. a) Edzna Classic Horizon monumental core site map (Williams-Beck 2011); b) Hydraulic system at Edzna (redrawn from Matheny et al. 1983a); c) Chelonian-shaped Formative Horizon creation architectural compound (Williams-Beck and Geovannini Acuña 2014); d) “Fortress” architectural compound topographical (redrawn from Matheny et al. 1983b).

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significant functional ecological stage sets, because they represent paradigmatically defined human activity areas (Williams-Beck 2011). Those cultural and natural resource themes fused together into a single united backdrop to constitute a recognizable pattern throughout several places in Campeche, as well as in other parts of Mesoamerica, for providing the canvas to inspire urban design models that designate places of creation since the Middle Formative Horizon (Schele and Guernsey Kappelman 2001; Koontz, Reese-Taylor and Headrick 2001). An appellative assigned to this trope, as siyan ca’an or heaven born, not only illustrates many environmentally symbolic regional landscapes (Ashmore 1989; Ashmore and Knapp 1999; Ashmore and Sabloff 2002), but also reiterates itself in certain places’ foundation through specifically hued first soil horizons, in their urban design, architectural repertoires, and spatial configurations (Williams-Beck 2011; Williams-Beck et al. 2005; Williams-Beck, Anaya Hernández and Arjona García 2009). This natural es-

thetic combination of attributes found in coastal plains or inland petenoob, when viewed in profile, suggest a formal association with that of a turtle’s carapace situated within an aqueous niche and provided the sacred firmament for creating Campeche’s prominent regal ritual sites. Immediately adjacent to the east of the northwestern peninsular area lies the Chenes region, a higher elevation, geographical heartland of the Yucatan Peninsula in which sites that exhibit long-term periods of human occupation relied on ch’e’enoob as freshwater springs and constructed water collection and storage infrastructures, in the form of consciously built chultunoob or as perforated and masonry reinforced-shaft wells tapping underground rivers, as their main sources for providing this vital life commodity at both the domestic and civic administrative levels (Williams-Beck 2012b). Both the Chenes and Puuc regions relied on chultunoob, built well shafts or ch’e’enoob, and aguadas, as natural and often times culturally improved topographic depressions for capturing and storing rainwater

The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche

(Williams-Beck 1999), rather than tapping the sinkhole cave cenotes more prevalent in Yucatan’s northern lowlands immediately adjacent and to the north of the Puuc hills region. Structural peten-like trope elements that date to the Middle to Late Preclassic periods comprise key urban design and planning models for central places in northwestern Campeche. One such set includes elevated built spaces or islands immersed in their corresponding primordial seas, as illustrated by an erroneously named complex set 500 m to the south of Edzna’s Classic Horizon monumental core. The “Fortress” (Matheny et al. 1983) embodies a slightly elevated island profile, completely surrounded by an integral hydraulic system as the northwestern corner of a huge natural polje valley depression (Matheny and Matheny 2012: 23–46) located some twenty kilometers to the south, in another wetlands area from where the Champoton River springs forth, and displays an intentionally excavated and culturally modified north-south aligned canal feature abutting the compound’s western edge (Fig. 3). A centrally placed and intentionally mounded earthen structure serves as compound umbilicus, connecting the heavens, terrestrial, and underworld realms. Surrounding low-elevation structural platform features set in each directional corner of this quadrangle-shaped built landscape are accessed by a raised, narrow northern causeway, whose entry point was completely unrestricted by structural elements or palisade pilings allegedly obstructing the raised road’s intersection with this non-domestic architectural compound (Williams-Beck and Geovannini Acuña 2014). This particular built landscape’s image simulates that of an enormous turtle of creation residing in a vast wetlands ecotone. Thirteen canals emanate from Edzna’s urban core (Matheny et al. 1983) and unite the natural underground springs sources of both of the Yucatan Peninsula’s singular twin watercourses, the Homtun and Champoton Rivers (Williams-Beck 2011; Williams-Beck and Geovannini Acuña 2014). This terminal phase Middle Preclassic period chelonian-shaped formal architectural compound delineated by an intentionally built water conduit as passage to distant corners of the immediate elliptically-shaped region, mirrors another natural and culturally sacrosanct subterranean contemporaneous sculpted feature in a lateral underground chamber to the immediate west of a sink-hole cenote as its community’s main water source in Mani, Yucatan. The Cabal Ch’e’en toponym refers to this subterranean umbilicus as places of origin and foundation (Hernández and Vail 2010: 244). The 4 Christine Hernández and Gabrielle Vail mention the term kab-ch’en, or earth-cave. According to the Cordemex Dictionary, kab has multiple meanings, such as soil, earth, world, region, town, honey, honey bee, strength, or underneath (Barrera Vásquez et al. 1980: 277–278). Mani’s example adds the suffix al to emphasize several interpretations including below and generational renewal through children (Barrera Vásquez et al. 1980: 9), or those virginal pure sources of energy, which also emanate from the Pleiades as do the holy maize kernels which crafted true humans, found in this particular water source (Hirose López, personal communication 2015). Both combined with the turtle’s subterranean aspect suggest their role in identifying a liminal place connecting the

Chilam Balam of Chumayel reiterates Mani’s role in this combined symbolic trope of creation, birth, renewal, and permanence through an illustration showing the armorial bearings of Yucatan, in which u puczikal luum Mani, translated by Roys (1933: 24, 86) as “the heart of the land is Mani”. Multiple renderings of the term puczikal also refer to “…have wisdom/judgement or memory…[or the] middle and heart of maize…”(Arzápalo Marín 1995: 652) of which humans were crafted. Both places comprise origin and creation spaces, as well as aquatic, children as pure energy, generational renewal, and maize themes related with umbilici that link both Formative Edzna and the geographic heart of the Yucatan Peninsula’s heaven, terrestrial and underworld realms through time. Chelonians are notably present from the Late Classic to Late Postclassic Periods in the Northern Maya Lowlands, and their associated contexts suggest many of them to be cosmic umbilici. One in particular illustrates principal life force deities’ scenes as they emerge, as does first Father, dressed as the Tonsured Maize God and witnessed by the Hero Twins, from a cracked carapace portal through which his transformed bones, sown beneath him in the underworld, sprouted and gave birth in the terrestrial universe. A similar sculpted limestone turtle (Fig. 4) sits atop the watery underworld’s central access point beneath a specific built space in Jaina (Williams-Beck 2015), which has been described as a ballcourt (Benavides Castillo 2002) whose central activity area is oriented to the north and south. While the cleft profile of these peninsular architectural infrastructures better insinuates a space to communicate with other worldly levels (Schele and Freidel 1991), an east-west orientation refers to the “endless solar cycle of life and death, … the north-south axis …correspond[s] to the maintenance of the solar cycle by human and divine agents” (Mathews and Garber 2004: 54). Intentionally set immediately above the phreatic interface in the island’s first horizon built space consisting of a mixed white marl and ash context and the aqueous realm below (Benavides Castillo 2002), this chelonian placed in a head down, anatomically correct position marked the terrestrial world’s portal to underworld (Williams-Beck 2015), where the Sun’s diurnal journey ended in death upon its aqueous entry to Xibalba, to be transformed and born again, through human agency and periodic offerings, the following mornings in the east at Tulum (Carvajal Correa et al. 2009; Williams-Beck, Anaya Hernández and Carvajal 2010; Williams-Beck 2012a). Over eighty-three per cent of those burials recorded to date in Jaina represent children (Williams-Beck, Anaya Hernández and Carvajal Correa 2010) as incarnated pure energy (Hirose López, personal communication 2010). These youngsters are often interred with child-deity portraits, such as those immortalized in fine-paste ceramic figurines depicting young ears of corn as the Tonsured Maize God. These infant kex offerings periodically paid tribute forward to maize, rain, and underworld deities (Williams-Beck, Anaya Hernández and Carvajal celestial, underworld, and terrestrial realms for providing the conduit to cosmic creation, foundation, and origin, connected with its source in the Pleiades, and to human rebirth and generational renewal from the space in which the deceased ancestors might also dwell.

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Barrel-shaped sculpted stone columns as inferior wall molding details on the eastern and western façades commemorate dawn and dusk archaeo-astronomical intervals between the annual solstices and equinoxes on this north–south oriented building (Victor Segovia Pinto, personal communication 1984), as a unique architectural compound and integral part of Uxmal’s centralized nuclear urban layout.

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The Initial Series Group is another centrally located a architectural compound in Chichen Itza, placed atop a slight elevation to which two sacbeob intersect adjacent dual northern perimeter’s vaulted accesses, two of seven total restricted entrance points to a patio group which contains both turtle and phalli images in addition to other Terminal c b Classic to Early Postclassic period cosmic icons. Figure 4. a) East-West facing “Cosmos creation” feature at Jaina (photo by the author 2009); b–c) Sculp- Structure 5C17, the Turtle ted limestone turtle interred within mixed ash and limestone marl in the island’s first horizon built matrix Platform, is a raised, ovlocated just above phreatic level (redrawn and photo from Benavides Castillo 2002). al-shaped, stepped platform with four stair risers on the Correa 2010). The island’s original toponym, hina, without eastern and western flanks, which in profile and layout reiterate its chelonian form at the heart of the group. A trio of the final silent [h] (Williams-Beck 2013c), mentioned in the sixteenth-century Calkiní codex as the place where the prin- edifices crowns the group’s southeastern corner: Structure cipal batab of the Ah Canul cuúchcabal moored his canoes 5C14, the House of the Phalli, with Venus star studded exte(Okoshi Harada 2009), figuratively means “seeds to the fu- rior friezes in addition to phalli stone sculptures gracing the superior wall section at either end of interior vaulted rooms; ture” (Arzápalo Marín 1995: 349) and reiterates the symbolic Structure 5C15, The House of the Dual Atlantean Figure matrix behind a Maya notion of generational renewal through children ritually stacked and stored in a metaphorically built, Columns; and Structure 5C5, the House of the Conches with powdered limestone marl “corn crib” island that guarantees frieze moldings that display full-round, sculpted conch shell transformation, regeneration, and rebirth after death, in ad- imagery (González de la Mata et al. 2014: 1037–1039). A dition to their ritual gift to the deities for cyclically righting painted capstone in the Temple of the Owls, located to the south of the Turtle Platform and a short distance to the west of the cosmic order (Williams-Beck 2013a). the southeastern Phalli-Atlantean-Conch structural trio, introduces another symbolic image to the trope through a k’awiil Other chelonian architectural sculptural elements that date to the Terminal Classic period in the surrounding North- portrait emerging “[…] from the gaping maw [of the underern Lowlands embellish the House of the Turtles at Uxmal, as world], carrying [cacao] pods and various seeds [and] bearing part of the Governor’s Palace complex, which also includes foods released from within the mountain of abundance […]” an additional symbolic focal point, an immense sculpted phal- (Hernández and Vail 2010: 22). Painted capstones with porlus monument, set a short distance from and atop a square- traits of k’awiil or Ah Bolon Dzacab, “the Great Lord of nine shaped, dressed stone masonry low platform to the Palace’s generations” (Taube 1992: 78) similar to this example, grace range structures’ interior roof vaults’ celestial sphere in the eastern façade. The exquisitely crafted, steep-vaulted range structure contains decorative lattice work, sculpted volutes, Chenes region. These symbolic images messages relate to life, death, maize, generational renewal, and the ancestors. Comzoomorphic masks, and other carved symbols adorning the superior molding façade that feature Venus as Morning Star. plete esthetic trope, which adds iconography to formal layout

The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche

Figure 5. K’awiil portrait painted capstone, with associated iconographic images that together suggest a liminal place of life, death, and generation renewal, in the Temple of the Owls, Initial Series Group, Chichen Itza (redrawn from Vail and Hernández 2010).

and spatial and architectural context in which these structures appear allows one to reconstruct the cosmic and religious ritual roles these buildings played in their corresponding urban landscapes (Williams-Beck 2001: 62–63; 2012a). In the Temple of the Owls at Chichen Itza, a coiled saurian earth monster, whose corporal image contains five large circles, creates a distinct portal image framed by a superior glyph band and laterally flanked by possible geometrical sky band images, enveloped by a dual dart or knife-shaped symbolic edge (Hernández and Vail 2010: 23) that allows centrally located k’awiil and his bounty to penetrate this liminal context (Chase and Chase 2009: 225) and facilitate his movement between universe planes (Fig. 5). A ch’e’en or chultun water capture and storage feature is located immediately adjacent to this temple’s western flank. While Hernández and Vail suggest this scene depicts an earth-cave or kab-ch’en imagery event (Hernández and Vail 2010: 20, 22–25), illustrated in both the Dresden and Madrid Codices, the other icons in addition to the structural architectural elements present in this discretely delineated compound with subterranean reference denote not just a foundation cave place, but also suggest another cabal ch’e’en umbilical site of maize origin, creation, and generational renewal inferred through Ah Bolon Dzacab’s painted capstone imagery.

Free-standing phalli sculpture monuments, mounted as unique chiseled features atop diminutive square or slightly rectangular-shaped, dressed-stone masonry low-rise platforms, comprise another Terminal Classic to Early Postclassic northern lowland artistic motif-set that identify specific umbilici contexts. Recent research suggests these carved stones placed in the center of courtyards or at the base of monumental structural components underscored not only the cosmological time depth their images possessed, but also the permanence of cosmological concepts through time “[…] and served as a reminder of significant creation myths that ultimately […] were conspicuous reminders of the cycle of creation and the necessity to maintain and order this cycle in the design of sacred ceremonial architecture” (Amrhein 2011: 124). At another site located a considerable distance to the southwest of the Eastern Puuc architectural stylistic sculpted phallus nuclear area that Amrhein discusses, Pollock first reports sculpted columns with protagonists’ portraits in conjunction with a single phallus monument5 at Acanmul, associated with Structures 8 and 9 in his mid-century recorded and decades-later published sketch map (Pollock 1980: 537–541). Initial reconnaissance of Acanmul (Williams-Beck and López 1999), and more intensive mapping strategies undertaken by the author from 2001 to 2003, re-located Pollock’s miscellaneous sculptures found together within a specific context later named the Columns Group, adding several more large sculpted cylinder-shaped ones strewn around a patio framed by a series of low platforms to the north (Pollock’s single Structure 8) with a large amorphous-shaped monumental structure abutting the eastern edge (Pollock’s Structure 9). Excavations undertaken in this group in 2004 revealed a sculpted panel (Fig. 6), dated stylistically to the Early Colonial period and found within structural collapse rubble framing the Columns Group’s northwestern corner (Williams-Beck et al. 2005). The sculpture’s high relief depicts two naked male individuals, one of which holds a dual-lobed, huskedear-of-corn-shaped item in upstretched hands, with lower torso and feet shown possibly dancing or in movement. Both protagonists wear distinctive headdresses and the one framing the panel’s left-hand side displays an erect penis. Controlled horizontal excavations that recovered associated cultural remains indicate that a pair of columns had been reset atop the northeastern platform6, perhaps at the beginning of the Early Colonial period. The combined data set suggests this architectural compound housed specific periodic activities

5 Pollock notes that between the time he first sketched the group and when his Puuc architectural study was later published, the phallus had been removed from this context and stored in the Campeche Museum of Archaeology, Ethnology, and History, where it remains today in the Sculpture and Monument Museum of the Centro INAH Campeche in the state’s capital city. 6 Permission granted by INAH’s Archaeological Council in 2004 to undertake excavations in the Columns Group and other contexts was granted to the author, as director, and undertaken by colleagues Joe Ball, Jennifer Taschek, and their students from San Diego State University. The author acknowledges their superb contribution to understanding this compound and Acanmul’s urban core.

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a

c

b

Figure 6. Probable Ah Kinoob portraits: a) Late Postclassic-Contact era high relief panel and b) Early Postclassic high relief sculpted column; c) phallus sculpted “miscellaneous” monument (Pollock 1980: 541) from the Columns Group, Acanmul (photos by the author, 2001/2004).

performed for ordering chaos and righting the Maya cosmic universe beginning perhaps at the moment of this group’s foundation, marked by a distinct red-soil initial horizon above bedrock, during the late phase of the Middle Preclassic period (Williams-Beck et al. 2005). The portrait of a Terminal Classic to Early Postclassic period column protagonist, possibly draped in cotton cloth and grasping a bag in the left hand and the two other individuals inscribed in the Early Colonial sculpted panel infer ah kinob time-keeper shamans may have frequented this particular architectural compound and carried out non-domestic ritual pursuits which linked past to

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present in this context perhaps since its formative roots7 and up through the contact period. Through their highly scripted placement and centralized location, both the Governor Palace complex at Uxmal and Initial Series Group at Chichen Itza, as well as the Columns Groups at Acanmul reiterate a probable 7 In this and other off-platform excavated contexts adjacent to multiple structures both large and small in different compounds at Acanmul, all first levels above bedrock illustrated a red-colored soil horizon carefully placed above the limestone substrate. One particular ceramic cache context in the Columns Group dated to the late Middle Preclassic period.

The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche

Figure 7. Ceiba Cabecera Colonial Period urban core religious architectural group flanking “Main Street”. Indigenous town’s layout design modeled after an Early Colonial period Maya Cosmogram (site drawing by Armando Anaya Hernández from the author’s original field notes and sketch map).

umbilical signature for these liminal contexts in each sites’ urban layout. The trios site cores also include north-south oriented ballcourt features that might have fostered periodic ritual activities through human agency asking for divine intervention aimed at sustaining the solar cycle (Mathews and Garber 2004). Combining both natural and built space environments at the feature, structure, and site stages, and then projecting them through the replication of these elements within particular architectural compounds at the regional level provide additional evidence from which to postulate territorial design models based on cosmographic creations, whose chelonian-like built landscapes provide human activity areas placed atop natural or culturally modified topographical rises surrounded by an aqueous environment (Williams-Beck 2011), as if the entire region with corresponding islets and primordial seas itself were conceived as a complete ritual universe. Such is the case for the Chanputun (Roys 1957), or revised name Chakanputun (Lundell 1933), and Canpech provinces in modern day Campeche (Williams-Beck 2008, 2011, 2012a, 2013c; Williams-Beck, Anaya Hernández, and Arjona García 2009; Williams-Beck, Liljefors Persson and Anaya Hernández 2012). Their combined natural environments and built landscapes include Snake and Maize/Sustenance Mountain Administrative Palace complexes, carefully set in

their own corresponding geographical directional positions within monumental plazuela urban cores, reiterate each sites’ earthly place within the region: Edzna to the East, Acanmul to the North, and, as urban design dictates would predict, Porfía-Pailbox to the South (Williams-Beck 2012b). Masonry architectural or sculptural elements, building placement, urban layout, and mural painting or other sculpted decorative motifs erected atop those turtle-shaped-profile topographical rises, provide elements for explaining Acanmul and Edzna´s presence as symbolic landscape recreations of the cosmic universe.8 In addition, the surrounding environmental and built space trope provides a sacred firmament shared by Late to Terminal 8 We also proposed that the same symbolic tropes illustrated through architecture, decorative structural elements, and site layout found at Edzná and Acanmul would be present in Late Postclassic period extended neighborhoods Porfia-Pailbox placed strategically atop elevated islands and inland along the banks of the Champoton River (Williams-Beck, Anaya Hernández and Arjona García 2009; Williams-Beck 2011; Williams-Beck, Liljefors Persson and Anaya Hernández 2012). While the evidence from specific contexts to corroborate these hypotheses has yet to be sampled, it still constitutes the point of departure to continue research in the immediate area.

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Classic Period seat Edzna, and Early Postclassic seat Acanmul, respectively set at the twin-rivers’ spring-fed origins and along the banks of the Homtun drainage system. An aquatic perimeter, created by a river, a culturally modified topographical drainage scheme, and a hydraulic system built at Edzna (Williams-Beck 2011; Williams-Beck and Geovannini Acuña 2014). These interconnected inland waterways situated in a vast wetlands plain interspersed between sporadic, vertical-relief limestone karst cones united the collective destinies of all regal ritual participants in a shared social, physical, and geographically delimited cosmic universe. The massive public works projects revealed by excavation and contextual analysis at Edzna and Acanmul suggest that during the Classic–Terminal Classic periods the first site began a specific temporal interval as seat of religious obligations and power after the mid-eighth century that continued until approximately A.D. 1020 (Williams-Beck 2011).9 According to the may calendar rotational model for political organization (Rice 2004), after A.D. 1020 the ritual religious insignias of power seated at Edzna passed on to another site in the immediate region, Acanmul, and rotated once again after completing another full k’atun calendar cycle in the late-thirteenth century to be installed at Porfía-Pailbox, the seat of Mayapan’s contemporary peer in the area along the Champotón River (Williams-Beck, Liljefors Persson and Anaya Hernández 2012; Williams-Beck 2013c). The provincial landscape’s site location design, based on a cosmological pattern10 that mimics the sun’s daily celestial journey beginning in the east, moving towards the north, passing to the south, and continuing along both riverine, hydraulic, and drainage systems, connected all three pre-Columbian regal ritual cities and suggest the fourth associate’s geographical location and umbilical placement according to cosmographic quincunx principles. This same cosmogonic model of creation, foundation, destruction, and rebirth served to structure and design public works projects in each k’atun seat to receive the insignias of power passed on from their predecessors and possibly from other peninsular ritual associates (Williams-Beck 2011; Williams-Beck, Liljefors Persson and Anaya Hernández 2012). The intermediate area’s central cog at Ceiba Cabecera displays extensive Early and Late Colonial Period building activities, with urban design and structural embellishment details based upon creation and foundation myths narrated in the Chilam Balam of Chumayel.11 The region’s final k’atun seating at Ceiba Cabecera 9 The structural reiteration patterning registered at Acanmul and Edzna also predicts a similar architectural solution in the third pre-Columbian regal ritual constituent situated on the Champotón River. 10 This pattern between site rotation and color coordination, “ ’x-hue’ settles there”, coincides with that narrated in the Venus passage of the Chumayel’s K’atun 11 Ahau creation myth (Knowlton 2010: 67–68).

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11 Structural replication through architectural and certain archaeological deposition contexts at Edzna and Acanmul were systematically dismantled after completing their calendar round cycles. This perhaps was the case at Porfía-Pailbox as well. Each place shows evidence of designing massive architectural public works projects that coincide with the temporal frame outlined by

Figure 8. Ceiba Cabecera’s Iglesia Mayor’s polychrome mural painting on interior piers, depicting thirteen red plumeria flowers interspersed within five tropical cedar or mahogany tree boughs gathered together within a tall-neck red ceramic jar (photo by the author, 2014).

probably coincided with the Campeche-Mayapan calendar’s second promulgation around 1539 (Rice 2004: 74-75; Williams-Beck, Liljefors Persson and Anaya Hernández 2012), during the K’atun 11 Ahau worldly creation, foundation, and destruction ritual cycle. While recent preliminary site core mapping, and iconographic and architectural features recording at Ceiba Cabecera in January, 2014, as well as solstice and equinox observations later the same year, represent an albeit incomplete initial data base for inference, the introductory information those elements provide complete a more diverse profile for designing future context sampling in this place as umbilicus for the Cochistan province during the Early Colonial period. A later building phase, probably during the seventeenth-century replaced the ramada walls with a more permanent refurbished structure with perishable thatched roof, and incorporated the sixteenth-century open ramada chapel’s stone masonry façade and presbytery’s remains. A minute mural painting remnant from that later construction period contains green-blue vegetation and red floral designs on the the may rotational power scheme, executed precisely to receive the insignias of ritual power and assume divine calendar mandate (Williams-Beck 2011; Williams-Beck et al. 2005; WilliamsBeck, Anaya Hernández and Arjona García 2009; Williams-Beck, Liljefors Persson and Anaya Hernández 2012). All will require specific research designs directed towards understanding these phenomena.

The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche

Figure 9. Ceiba Cabecera’s Iglesia Mayor’s east-facing recessed masonry and stucco i’ik altar and surrounding mural painting illustrating two dual lobed capitals above dual yellow painted columns outlined in red, supporting a horizontal beam and triangular shape, with two inverted ceramic jars on the beam’s either extreme (photo by the author, 2014).

western wall, placed atop a once yellowish-ochre-and-white colored stucco-finished stone masonry exterior, is located a few meters to the north of the standing nave’s western access. The sixteenth-century façade still shows some polychrome paint and stucco vestiges on its sculpted limestone lintel and doorjambs. A low, round-profile, thick masonry boundary wall atrium encircles the western access and south flank of this early religious architecture, set precisely adjacent to the north side of the town’s wide principal boulevard, oriented to the east and west. To the south of this promenade stands the massive, mid-eighteenth-century Iglesia Mayor, whose internal atrium

spatial confines include one-functional pre-Hispanic ch’e’en well with masonry reinforced mouth and neck, set strategically to the north of the structure’s east-west oriented walls a few meters from the north lateral entrance and placed between the church and atrium’s homologous boundary wall which abuts Main Street; another collapsed pre-Hispanic well or chultun cistern is located to the south of the atrium’s south wall. A few standing structural ruins and street curb borders, as well as some other architectural fragments that have yet to be recorded complete the urban core map (Fig. 7). While our surface reconnaissance strategies have yet to determine where this boulevard begins towards the east, its western terminus perpendicularly intersects at Ceiba Cabecera’s cemetery.

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The Iglesia Mayor’s atrium’s western vaulted access displayed four pointed decorative gables, two pairs atop either lateral jamb, with no superior ornamental feature detected amongst the collapsed ruins. The nave’s western façade’s upper bell tower repeats the decorative gable pair adding a single spike on its apex, and five additional pointed gable pairs on either side of the western exterior complete a total of thirteen decorative gables, one for each twenty-year k’atun period in a full 260-year calendar cycle. Particular naturalistic motifs, rather than Roman Catholic iconographic images, adorn the church’s massive interior recesses, accessed by five distinct entryways, of which the wall space above the southwesterly-most entrance’s lintel shows a possible shroud-draped cross12 flanked by jars holding greenish-blue leaf bunches. This vegetal motif repeats in greater detail on each of the six interior wall buttress piers that reinforce the church’s north and south lateral walls. Each one clearly illustrates large globular-shaped, restricted out-curving-neck, flat-rimmed red-colored ceramic jars, with numerous exterior circular decorative painted body motifs, placed approximately 2.5 m above floor level. Each jar holds five greenish-blue colored tropical cedar or mahogany branches with thirteen, red circular corona-centered, five-petal plumaria flowers. Each flower corona is adorned with seven dark red painted dots (Fig. 8). The striking main altar, at the nave’s east-facing end, illustrates a large, unique, stone masonry and stucco-covered recessed T-shaped form surrounded by a mural painting that features two vertical columns pair topped by dual-lobed capitals which support a red and yellow vertical beam enclosed by lateral red colored thin lines upholding a similarly yellow and red painted triangular central form flanked on either side by inverted red ceramic jars forms comparable to the upright buttress pier examples (Fig. 9). The combined tree boughs, flowers, columns, triangle and beam with lateral ceramic jars mural motifs suggests that this indigenous religious structure represents a Flower World paradise (Hill 1992; Taube 2004, 2010) that embodies an ancestral place of origin and return. Flower Worlds are commonly associated with the path of the sun across the heavens (Hill 1992: 125). A Floral World also assumed the guise of “[…] a Floral Mountain that served both as an abode for gods and ancestors and as a means of ascent into the […] realm of the sun […]” (Taube 2004: 69), situated in a terrestrial paradise with sweet smelling flowers, with thirteen components that represent the ch’ulel or soul of the maize field, and a beautiful garden of flowers, plants, and tropical birds among the Zinancantecos (Taube 2004: 71, 2010: 146–147, 156–161). The five petal flowers also identify this place as a Ho’ Janaab Witz or 5 Flower Mountain, “[…] the pivotal axis mundi supporting the stump of the ancestral maize tree” (Taube 2004: 81) in a pre-Hispanic context, but within an Early Colonial Nahuatl one, 5 Flower Mountain is a place of the dawning sun, wind, and sacred place of contact with the supernatural realm (Taube 2004: 87). The recessed masonry i’ik altar piece reiterates not only the wind-soul-breath-essence themes, but also suggests the supernatural forces directly involved with

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12 Draped crosses refer to the Maya World Tree, rather than representing a crucifix (Astor-Aguilera 2010).

human creation, death and rebirth as well as the sun and maize deity’s renewal on a daily and seasonal-planting basis (Taube 2010: 147). The seven dots contained within the five petal plumeria flower corona propose an additional celestial association with the Pleiades, a constellation correlated with planting maize (Milbrath 1999: 258–264), particularly in conjunction with Venus as Morning Star. Each flower corona adorned with seven dark red painted dots restates the relationship between maize kernels, creation, and Pleiades celestial imagery. According to the K’atun 11 Ahau myth in the Chumayel Chilam Balam, the heartless maize cores left behind fed the bloodless wooden people of a former creation destroyed in the deluge destruction before the present world, after Bolon Dzacab13 stole the maize (Knowlton 2010: 62). The five greenish-blue yax-colored tropical cedar or mahogany boughs of origin and creation advocate for multiple and mutually reiterative associations with an earthly engendering of Lady Quetzal–Lady Lovely Cotinga, a divine being in the Rabinal Achi also mentioned in the Chilam Balam Katun 11 Ahau creation myth. Her corporal description echoes the greenish-blue hues of the quetzal bird’s feathers, also reminiscent in the Chumayel of water that is carried from the well to irrigate plants of the previous bloodless wooden people destroyed in the flood, or of Bolon Dzacab who provides abundant food stuffs found in a milpa and their seeds as sources of life and nourishment in the coming world (Knowlton 2010: 59–62). Sunrise solstice and equinox observations in Ceiba Cabecera confirm that the central boulevard and monumental core layout possibly follow a solar-based cosmogram design (Paxton 2010: 286). On both the summer solstice and autumn equinox, Venus as Morning Star appeared in conjunction with or accompanied by the Pleiades. Venus complemented by the Pleiades clearly are the most important stellar components in Terminal Classic and Postclassic Maya architecture and art (Milbrath 1999: 157–163, 181, 190–191), ethnohistoric sources liken the planet to the “sun passer” or “great star” (Edmonson 1971: 159), and whose alter ego represents one of the Hero Twins as Maize God (Kelley 1980: 26). The association between the Pleiades, representing maize kernels cast into the heavens by Ah Bolon Dzacab, and the number thirteen brings Chahk into the fray, symbolizing the coming rains and storms that nourish the planted fields’ sustenance (Milbrath 1999: 201). In the Chumayel K’atun 11 Ahau Venus passage, a creation myth particularity for this stellar character notes “The ceramic idol sits down above the page (revealing the) katun (sic.)” as translated by the phrase u cah u lac canab ual katun for an event that occurred at the first dawn (Knowlton 2010: 67). In this instance u lac, “his/her plate/ bowl” (Arzápalo Marín 1995: 442) might also refer to the dual inverted large ceramic jars on either extreme of the mural painting upper horizontal beam that adorn the upper wall section above the i’ik east-facing altar. 13 Bolon Dzacab’s name also means “something perpetual” as does an additional rendering Ceiba Cabecera’s generic term dzaptun, located on Roys provincial map (1957: 166), that reiterates the “something perpetual” or multiple generational meanings (Barrera Vásquez 1980: 878, 822).

The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche

Concluding Remarks Maya ritual and cosmic worldviews illustrate symbolic aspects that relate to five directional realms, three vertical planes, and a conjoined center that links the present to the future for remembering the historic and ancient past (Coe 1965; Farriss 1987; Schele and Freidel 1990; Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993; Rice 2004). While these focal points consider the center as a pivotal point of contact between each and every level and realm in the Maya universe, they more clearly emphasize primordial links between places of origin, creation, destruction, and generational renewal. Movements through those particular axis points provided the locus and framework for Maya moral and physical order, spatial and temporal structure, and social and cosmic harmony (Farriss 1987; Freidel, Schele and Parker 1993; Paxton 2001, 2010; Rice 2004). Understanding where these permeable points occur as features, structures, sites, and regions in the archaeological record and connecting those places with aspects within Maya worldview requires unravelling their essential metaphorical meanings. The Maya cosmos and particularly Maya ritual religious actions commemorating specific calendric dates incorporated the concepts of movement or passage, considered as liminality (Chase and Chase 2010: 221), through particular sacred points betwixt and between the celestial, terrestrial, and underworld realms (Solari 2013: 45) for reenacting models of origin, creation, destruction, and generational renovation. While each distinct stratum could be discerned by different media that, at the same time, coalesced around certain symbolic tropes, Classic Maya narrative emphasized one particular term, ch’e’en (Tokovinine 2013), which in specific celestial, terrestrial, or otherworldly categories and syntactic contexts appears not only to link all three levels of the cosmos, but hark back to their symbolic creation and foundation origins. Regarding the infinitely more complex and difficult to grasp celestial realm, the Classic period inscriptions mention the phrase chan ch’e’n, originally thought to connote and revolve around two essential meanings as “the heavens and the caves” for worlds and “the sky, the cave” (Stuart 2006) or “heavens and holy grounds/city” (Tokovinine 2013: 55) for places. However, through Tokovinine’s detailed discussion, in certain contexts this phrase could very well infer liminal conduits between the celestial and interior mountain or underworld realms, through which the ancestors, deities and certain learned and duly indoctrinated ahkinob shaman passed to other transcendent states of being14. In the case of Tikal Stela 31, for example, a specific textual reference cites the words chan kab ch’e’en within a narrative passage that refers to “eight thousand celestial gods, terrestrial gods half diminished; it happened in Kukuul, in the sky, in the earth, 14 Modern h’men, those who know or actively intervene (Barrera Vásquez et al. 1980: 520; Arzápalo Marín 1995: 520) in otherworldly affairs in Campeche and Yucatan, stress that only those shaman born with the gift, carefully apprenticed with other more learned peers, and possessing specific ritual religious amulets and/or wearing special regalia can pass through and return from these threshold places (Javier Hirose López, personal communication 2012).

in the ch’e’en” (Tokovinine 2013: 39), implying such liminal passageways between all levels in this particular context. A similar “through-the-portal” kind of meaning in some specific narrative contexts might also apply to the combined term och ch’e’n, traditionally rendered as “ch’e’n entering” (Tokovinine 2013: 26) but through the present analysis interpreted rather as “passing through ch’e’en (umbilicus)”. In the earthly realm, another complex ecotone as terrestrial concept, peten, links the sacred turtle-shaped firmament surrounded by freshwater-spring fed primordial inland “seas” to provide a conceptual framework for understanding both human landscapes and cosmic histories. Certain natural, low elevation peten-like niches, that contain built infrastructures or naturally occurring freshwater springs as ch’e’en in their immediate surroundings, are key backdrops in these liminal points of origin, creation, and regeneration. Several iconographic representations created the media that could penetrate these visual and figurative threshold contexts through time. On the one hand, built landscape chelonians with first red-soil horizons or cinnabar subterranean cached offering contexts (Matheny et al. 1983) at the “Fortress” complex in Edzna (Williams-Beck 2012b; Williams-Beck and Geovannini Acuña 2014) or with ceramic cached vessels that permeate the red-soil initial horizon in Acanmul (Williams-Beck et al. 2005), imply intentional human agency through concrete actions to consecrate the foundation beneath that which is holy or created above these constructed peten islets with architectural features surrounded by primordial seas. Modified stalagmite turtle sculptures concealed in a lateral chamber within the surrounding community sink-hole water source in Cabal Ch’e’en, at Mani, Yucatan, and a corresponding kab-ch’en toponymic identity linked to virgin water sources, pure energy, children, and generational renovation, in addition to the symbols of origin and foundation narrated on the Quirigua Stela C text, graphically illustrate the first acts of origin and world creation through the placement of three stones, jaguar throne stone in the heavens at First Five Sky, serpent throne stone at kab-ch’en (earth-cave), and in the aqueous underworld with water-lily throne stone (Hernández and Vail 2010: 24). This act connecting the heavens, earth, and underworld with the sources of origin and creation is also present in the sculpted limestone water table–terrestrial interface turtle marker interred in a cleft-profile architectural feature whose north-south orientation demands periodic human and divine intervention to maintain the solar cycle in Jaina. At Acanmul, where another of these north-south oriented cleft-profile architectural features is placed in the monumental urban core built atop a similar chelonian-profile feature peten island sixteen kilometers from the Gulf coast and six kilometers inland from the interface between the vast coastal saltwater marsh plain and specifically placed within an inland wetlands ecotone, that exhibits sculpted columns and phallus monuments in association with other sculpted items depicting period endings or dwarfs accompanying protagonists placed within a particular non-domestic patio group context that functioned as such since its foundation during the late Middle Preclassic period. Late Middle Preclassic Edzna’s “Fortress” complex set precisely near the spring-fed origins of the Homtun River and the hydraulic system that connects it

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charged and solar ordered urban layout that highlights Venus, the Pleaides, Áak and other heavenly bodies, in association with other i’ik wind and ool breath, celestial, terrestrial, and underworld essences, whose pictorial images painted in greenish-blue, red, and yellow hues outlined in red, all recall those fateful predictions of origin, creation, foundation, and destruction narrated in the Chilam Balams. In this place, a planted WorldTree monument’s generic toponymic reference as dzaptun, mentioned in Roys cartographic rendition of the combined Canpech and Chanputun provinces, reiterates the role the great ceiba’s branches and roots served in binding heaven, earth, and underground realms together at this place within perennially tended rotating land parcel sections that house a rural community’s sown collective maize fields as a symbolic reminder to them for providing foundation, sustenance for the ancestors, rebirth, and renewal in Ceiba Cabecera, well after the K’atun Figure 10. Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial period Cochi[s]tan province, 1539 to 1795/1799, with 11 Ahau seat cycle’s late eighteenth century ending. tzolk’in calendar seat dzaptun at Ceiba Cabecera.

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with the Champoton River’s homologous beginnings reiterate The names Canpech and Chanputun or Chakanputun were its role as the site and immediate region’s cosmic creation, just initial plausible ways to refer to this area’s independent whose north-south oriented cleft-profile architectural feature geopolitical units, after Ralph L. Roys’ classic study desigalso requires human and divine agency to sustain the solar nated them as such at the time of Spanish contact, and few cycle (Mathews and Garber 2004). Homologous north-south would question either the organizational model or historic oriented ballcourt compounds, k’awiil painted portrait cap- sources even several decades afterwards (Okoshi Harada, stones or phalli and Venus sculpture imagery, in addition to Williams-Beck, and Izquierdo y de la Cueva 2006). Howturtle architectural superior molding embellishments or stone ever, Roys faced a conundrum when he defined those two masonry low elevation platforms in both Terminal Classic particular enigmatic “provinces”, neither of which yielded Uxmal and Early Postclassic Chichen Itza combine together sufficient references in Spanish or Maya document sources to identify these possible ritual religious sites umbilici with or contained a capital city in one instance or an allegedly iconographic elements linking not only all three realms, but completely dismantled urban center in the other as specific also points of origin, creation, and foundation in each archi- defining criteria to consider either one as a cuúchcabal in its tectural compound. Another precise symbolic trope element own right (Williams-Beck 2001, 2008, 2013c). Roys posincludes time-keeping visual features, whether conceived sible reason for establishing them as such might be due to either as Terminal Classic architectural sculpture columnettes an undisclosed Mexican source that “[…] the entire region adorning the Governor’s Palace inferior eastern façade walls [was named] the ‘province of Cochistan” (Roys 1957: 167), at Uxmal or sunlight and shadow phenomena that appear but didn’t elaborate as to political nature or significance of annually at sunset on May 3rd and August 15th in the Five the term. An etymological rendering of this combined topoStory Structure’s superior Temple in Edzna’s Great Acropolis nym, derived from the Maya terms co “maize kernel” or coh indicating the beginning and ending of the 260 day tzolk’in “precious”, chii “edge of the sea or the mouth of a well”, and ritual calendar. An additional architectural umbilical feature tan “that indicates an adverbial clause with special meaning is the Flower House at Ceiba Cabecera, laterally flanked to placed after a locale’s name” (Arzápalo Marín 1995: 125, 129, the north and south by che’e’en water sources built atop a 236, 699), suggests a more plausible alternative. Cochistan turtle-shaped peten topographical rise, set in a cosmically embodies a combined naturally and culturally unique yet

The Center as Cosmos in Pre-Hispanic and Early Colonial Period Campeche

specifically delimited regional landscape described as a “precious maize kernel at the edge of the sea or ch’e’en that contains all four directions and center of the cosmos” (Fig. 10). In addition to being surrounded by water, immersed in swampy wetland niches, and containing urban core landscapes erected atop low elevation, dome-shaped natural limestone protuberances likened to tortoise shells set in primordial seas, Cochistan provinces’ pre-Columbian and Early Colonial regal ritual urban centers combined natural resource heritage spaces with specific architectural elements in precise urban layout designs, whose form and surface finishes in carefully dressed stone, stucco, and whose interiors carried painted narratives inspired by creation, foundation, destruction, rebirth, and renewal accounts with noteworthy cosmogonic significance. The symbolic underpinnings for founding and placing each site in the region followed a cosmic design component part connected by pathways through the celestial, terrestrial, and otherworld realms to the center of origin and creation. Their terrestrial setting is repeated in the ah pay kab t u yum and ah pay oc t u yum verses of the K’atun 11 Ahau myth’s Venus passage (Knowlton 2010: 69–70) linking each to a specific geographical directionally-hued reference from where the ancestors came and resided and in which liminal thresholds linked different worldly dimensions for foundation, destruction, rebirth, regeneration, and righting the cosmic forces of the Maya universe. Within the regional terrestrial framework for Cochistan, in which Ceiba Cabecera plays the central cog surrounded by the other three provincial regal ritual players who illustrate different temporal and geographical aspects in accordance with their particular regional directional location: Rosiness in the East, as foot’s Heliacal rise, which coincides geographically with Edzna; Grayness to the North refers Acanmul as other foot, when Venus is last visible before its superior conjunction; Black to the West as one hand and Lahun Chan, first evening appearance in the western sky at umbilicus place adjacent and to the northwest of the region in Jaina; and Light yellow south as the other hand in Porfía-Pailbox as the last appearance before inferior conjunction and subsequent world destruction, before harking back to the province’s origins in its umbilical cosmic central place in Ceiba Cabecera. This completes the anthropomorphic image of the Divine Sun (Knowlton 2010: 67–70). With concrete archaeological and architectural examples and literary passages from the K’atun 11 Ahau myth in the Chumayel Chilam Balam graphically illustrated in each regal ritual member, the aptly-named Cochistan province truly completes its cosmic umbilical mandate by cycling back from the future as a means for predicting the past. Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Milan Kováč and his students, and the WAYEB organizing committee for their kind hospitality and camaraderie at the 2014 conference in Bratislava, Slovakia. Research, mapping and excavations permits were granted by the Consejo de Arqueología del INAH to the author for conducting mapping and reconnaissance work at Acanmul from 2001 to 2003, off-platform intensive excavation activities with Joe Ball, Jennifer Taschek and their students in Acanmul

during 2004, and for mapping strategies in the “Fortress” area in Edzna with Helga Geovannini and our students in 2012. The Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología in Mexico provided funding for work at Acanmul. Javier Hirose López has played a critical role as colleague, confidant, and sounding-board regarding traditional healing and cosmological themes applied to archaeological and architectural contexts during my continued research in Roys’ Cochistan province at Acanmul, Edzna, Porfía-Pa’ilbox, and Ceiba Cabecera since 2006. I would especially like to thank Lic. Fernando E. Ortega Bernés, Governor of the State of Campeche, for generously supporting our research in the “Fortress” area at Edzna in 2012, and for providing the financial means to attend the Bratislava meeting in 2014. Armando Anaya Hernández crafted a highly legible site map for Ceiba Cabecera from field data and Google Earth imagery. Fernando Campos Santoyo introduced me to the Initial Series Group umbilical world at Chichen Itza in 2014; and I was truly fortunate to accompany both Fernando and Alejandro Villalobos while viewing Pepe Huchin’s spot-on excavation and consolidation of the Governor’s Palace substructural platform at Uxmal in September of that same year. Finally, I greatly appreciate Mtra. Adriana Ortiz Lanz, Rector then (2008 to 2015), and L.A.E. Gerardo Montero Pérez, General Secretary (2008 to 2015 and now Rector (2015 to present) of the Universidad Autónoma de Campeche from, for their financial and logistical assistance of our field research and for partially supporting my numerous trips to professional meetings to share preliminary results with colleagues in the United States, Europe, Guatemala, and Mexico. References Amrhein, Laura 2011 Xkeptunich: Terminal Classic Maya Cosmology, Rulership, and the World Tree. In: Christian Isendahl and Bodil Liljefors Persson (eds.), Ecology, Power, and Religion in Maya Landscapes, pp. 115–126. Markt Schwaben: Verlag Anton Saurwein. Arzápalo Marín, Ramón 1995 Calepino de Motul. México, D.F.: Dirección General de Asuntos del Personal Académico e Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas, UNAM. Ashmore, Wendy 1989 Construction and Cosmology: Politics and Ideology in Lowland Maya Settlement Patterns. In: William F. Hanks and Don S. Rice (eds.), Word and Image in Maya Culture: Explorations in Language, Writing, and Representation, pp. 272–286. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press. Ashmore, Wendy and A. Bernard Knapp 1999 Archaeologies of Landscape: Contemporary Perspectives. London: Blackwell. Ashmore, Wendy and Jeremy A. Sabloff 2002 Spatial Orders in Maya Civic Plans. Latin American Antiquity 13 (2): 201–215. Astor-Aguilera, Miguel Angel 2010 The Maya World of Communication Objects. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.

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2012a Lowland Maya Postclassic Political Practices. Paper presented at the Society for American Archaeology, Memphis, TN, March. 2012b Las portadas zoomorfas y la región de los Chenes: Veinticinco años de investigación en Campeche. In: Bárbara Arroyo, Lorena Paiz Aragón and Héctor Mejía (eds.), XXV Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala, 2011, pp. 431–442. Guatemala: Ministerio de Cultura y Deportes, Museo de Arqueología y Etnografía, Museo Popol Vuh. 2012c Structure, Compound, Site, and Region as Cosmos. Paper presented at the International Americanists Congress, Vienna, Austria, July. 2013a El hina y la cumchee: Dos muestras del patrimonio biocultural en Campeche. En Red Patrimonio. Revista digital de estudios de patrimonio cultural (www.colmich.edu.mx/red Colegio de Michoacán, La Piedad). 2013b (2010) Religious Processions in Hool, Campeche, Mexico. Acta Americana, Journal of the Swedish Americanist Society 18–19: 13–26. 2013b ¿Qué quiere decir esto? Los topónimos del área inmediata de San Francisco de Campeche. Los investigadores de la cultura maya 21 (1): 311–323. 2015 Limestone Turtle Marks Portal to the Underworld. The Current [Newsletter of Island and Coastal Interest Group, Society of American Archaeology] 3 (1): 12–13. Williams-Beck, Lorraine A., Armando Anaya Hernández and Martha Arjona García 2009 Modelos de geografía sagrada prehispánica en la zona noroeste de la Península de Yucatán. In: Juan Pedro Laporte, Bárbara Arroyo and Héctor Mejía (eds.), Memorias del XXII Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala, pp. 1353– 1361. Guatemala: Ministerio de Cultura y Deportes, Instituto de Antropología e Historia, Asociación Tikal. Williams-Beck, Lorraine A., Armando Anaya Hernández and Marco Antonio Carvajal Correa 2010 Jaina: Gateway to the Underworld. Paper presented at the 75th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, St. Louis. Williams-Beck, Lorraine A. and Helga Z. Geovannini Acuña 2014 Interpretaciones nuevas para un complejo antiguo: La “Fortaleza” de Edzná, Campeche. In: Bárbara Arroyo, Luis Méndez Salinas and Andrea Rojas (eds.), XXVII Simposio de investigaciones arqueológicas en Guatemala, 2013, Tomo II, pp. 1011–1024. Guatemala: Ministerio de Cultura y Deportes, Instituto de Antropología e Historia, Asociación Tikal. Williams-Beck, Lorraine A., Bodil Liljefors Persson and Armando Anaya Hernández 2012 Back to the Future for Predicting the Past: Cuchcabal – Batabil – Cuchteel and May Ritual Political Structures across Archaeological Landscapes, in Ethnohistoric Texts, and through Cosmological Time. Contributions to New World Archaeology 4: 251–278. Williams-Beck, Lorraine A. and Edmundo López 1999 Historia en tres ciudades: Ah Kin Pech, Acanmul y San Francisco de Campeche. Estudios de Cultura Maya 20: 93–116.

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Caves of Life and Caves of Death: Colonial Yucatec Maya Rituals and Offerings in Caves and Cenotes, 1540–1750 John F. Chuchiak IV

Missouri State University

Abstract Caves and cenotes served as important sacred spaces where the Maya could access the underworld and make contact with their gods through certain rituals and offerings. Maya temples and shrines were also often built in close proximity to caves or cenotes, further emphasizing the sacred nature of caves and their important connection to the cosmology of the ancient and colonial Maya. Therefore, cave shrines and cave worship remained important factors in both Pre-Hispanic and colonial Maya cosmological concepts of the underworld, sickness, life and death. Dry caves, without water, served for the colonial Maya as places of sickness and death, while water filled caves and cenotes opened a direct connection to the raingod Chac, the bringer of sacred water and life. This paper examines the nature of colonial Maya cave worship and illustrates how caves and cenotes with their cosmological connection to the underworld became associated to both Maya conceptions of life and death, ensuring that they remained important sacred spaces in which colonial Maya rituals continued to be performed. By examining the ethnohistorical evidence for Maya cave rituals and the extant information on Maya ritual specialists this chapter illustrates the continuities and changes that occurred in the cosmological connections of Maya cave worship throughout the colonial period.

Resumen Las cuevas y los cenotes sirvieron como importantes espacios sagrados donde los mayas accedían al inframundo y mantenían comunicación con sus dioses a través de la práctica de ciertos rituales y ofrendas. A menudo santuarios y templos fueron construidos cerca de cuevas o cenotes debido al carácter sagrado que estos espacios tenían en la cosmología de los mayas antiguos y aquellos que vivieron durante el periodo del dominio colonial español. Por lo tanto, las cuevas, como santuarios y espacios de culto, siguieron siendo factores importantes en los conceptos cosmológicos mayas asociados al inframundo, de la enfermedad, la vida y la muerte durante la época pre-hispánica y aun en los tiempos coloniales. Así, los mayas del periodo colonial consideraron las cuevas secas, sin agua, como lugares asociados a la enfermedad y la muerte, mientras que las cuevas llenas de agua y los cenotes creaban una conexión directa con el dios de la lluvia: Chac, el portador del agua sagrada y la vida. Este capítulo examina la naturaleza de los rituales hechos por los mayas del período colonial en las cuevas. De igual manera, ilustra cómo fueron asociados con las cuevas ambos conceptos de vida y muerte, confirmando la existencia de una continuidad en la concepción que los mayas tuvieron acerca de estos lugares como importantes espacios sagrados que mantenían una conexión cosmológica con el inframundo. Con base en evidencias etnohistóricas referentes a la práctica de rituales en las cuevas, e información existente en fuentes coloniales acerca de la existencia de especialistas rituales mayas, este capítulo intenta mostrar las continuidades y cambios que se produjeron en las conexiones cosmológicas asociadas al culto y rituales llevados a cabo en cuevas a lo largo del período colonial.

“Heaven and earth trembled, and the wild bees buzzed at the wells and the caves before the wooden idols placed there by the Itza. . .” Book of Chilam Balam of Mani

By the early summer of 1619, a recorded drought in the region of Izamal plagued Maya farmers and threatened to extend the famine and crop failures that they had suffered two years before with the coming of an infestation of locusts in 1618 (Cárdenas Valencia 1937: 68).1 In order to secure the 1 A serious drought which lasted from 1618 to 1622 plagued the region in and around Izamal in the central Yucatan

rains for their corn crops and ensure the end to the drought in the region, Maya farmers from the visita town of Chalante organized small groups of pilgrims to conduct clandestine pilgrimages to a local hidden cave shrine near the town. Within the cave, the Maya came to venerate a large carved speleotheme in the center of the cave which had been shaped to resemble the Maya raingod Chac.2 Before the large carved

peninsula. Crop failures, famines, and higher instances of deaths during lost years give testimony to the impact of these climatologically induced problems. 2 Throughout the Maya region evidence suggests that the most common use of carved speleothemes inside and outside of cave contexts were as idols and images of veneration. Several

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image of the raingod, the Maya had placed a low stone bench or altar. The local Maya protected the cave itself by the communal rotational service of local Maya men who served as the shrine’s guards protecting the image from the local Spaniards and friars.3 By the following year of 1620, a new Franciscan Guardian, Fray Gerónimo de Porras y Montalvo, arrived in Izamal to take charge of the convent. Shortly after his arrival, the Franciscan guardian received word that the Maya due to the persisting drought continued to conduct pilgrimages into the forest to certain ritually important caves to venerate images of the “lord of the rain.” Based on these accusations, the friar actively began a campaign against idolatry that would last two years and almost claim his life in the process! By the summer of 1621, Fray Porras received specific reports that more than seventy Maya from the neighboring village of Chalante had rebelled against the friars.4 These Maya had fled into the monte and had taken up residence in a cave where they went to protect a major shrine and altar to their raingod Chac. Throughout the summer, as the drought and famine spread the Maya became more desperate, and the grave news arrived that the Maya had attacked several friars and Spaniards who wandered into the area, killing two Franciscans and wounding several Spaniards.5 Apparently the heavily armed Maya proved willing to defend their idols and the cave shrine by force of arms. A local Spanish official, Capitan Gerónimo de Yanguas, argued that they should alert the governor of the rebellion and ask for soldiers to take the native’s stronghold.6 Fray Gerónimo de Porras stopped him from immediately doing so, but after confiscating a large quantity of idols within the town itself, he too decided that idolatry in the Izamal region would not cease until the major cave shrine was destroyed. Arriving at the cave, the Franciscan discovered that there were more than sixty Maya men armed with bows and arrows, protecting the cave.7 At the very moment of their arrival the caves throughout the Maya lowlands have carved within them speleotheme idols and sacred images that are sometimes still venerated by the local Maya of the region. 3 See Interrogatorio de la probanza de méritos y servicios del ministro provincial Fr. Gerónimo de Porras y Montalvo, 2 de abril, 1624, AGI, Audiencia de México, 301, 12 folios. 4 Testimonio del Capitán don Juan Fernández de Castro, teniente de capitán general, en la probanza de los méritos y servicios de Fr. Gerónimo de Porras, 12 de abril, 1624, AGI, Audiencia de México, 301, 3 folios.

Figure 1. The Rain God Chac is seated in a cave, represented glyphically by the expression ta kab or “on the earth” (Source: Dresden Codex: 29a-30a, Frame 5.0).

Maya were conducting rituals and offerings to a large idol of the Rain God Chac that had been formed out of a stalactite. Angered by the act, Fray Porras made a move to enter the cave and smash the idols as he had done before. The Maya quickly reached for their bows and arrows and surrounded the friar and his companions. As the Maya threatened the friar and moved to shoot their arrows at the group, the small group of Spaniards tried to push their way back to the entrance to the cave, but the natives resisted and one of the Spaniards was shot with an arrow. While his other companions tended to the wounded Spaniard, Fray Porras went among the other natives, preaching to them in Maya, urging them to lay down their arms and surrender their idols.8 According to witnesses, after several tense minutes, the natives were convinced, seeing that the friar was

5 Testimonio del capitán Bernardo de Sosa Velázquez en la probanza de los méritos y servicios del Fr. Gerónimo de Porras, 15 de abril, 1624, AGI, Audiencia de México, 301, 3 folios. 6 Testimonio del capitán Gerónimo de Yanguas en la probanza de los méritos y servicios de Fray Gerónimo de Porras, del orden de San Francisco, 12 de abril, 1624, AGI, Audiencia de México, 301, 5 folios.

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7 Testimonio del Capitán don Juan de Montejo Maldonado en la probanza secreta de oficio contra Fr. Gerónimo de Porras, 22

de abril, 1624, AGI, Audiencia de México, 301, 3 folios. 8 Testimonio del Alférez Cristóbal de Paredes Valdés en la probanza secreta de oficio contra Fr. Gerónimo de Porras y Montalvo, 22 de abril, 1624, AGI, Audiencia de México, 301, 4 folios.

Caves of Life and Caves of Death: Colonial Yucatec Maya Rituals and Offerings in Caves and Cenotes, 1540–1750

such a good orator in Maya, they voluntarily laid down their bows and arrows and listened to the friar.9 After a brief sermon, without warning Fray Gerónimo de Porras stood up on the altar and smashed the clay idols. Upon the destruction of their idols and the desecration of this sacred space, many of the Maya fled the cave and ran away into the monte. With the aid of his companions, Fray Porras finished destroying the other idols, including a large stone idol of the Rain God Chac, the remains of which are still rumored to exist to this day. 10 Fray Geronimo de Porras, when he later wrote about the event commented: “These natives constantly abscond themselves into the hills and mountainous regions, hiding their rituals and continued ceremonies in the caves and distant cenotes where they go far away from the watch of their friars in order to make sacrifices and offerings….It is there in these dark and secret places that they make offerings to their demons and give the devil his due….”11

The friar later questioned a group of Maya men apprehended in that cave near the town of Chalante. Diego Puc, one of the Maya men who had so bitterly defended the cave, responded that they had been entrusted by the others from their town with the protection of their cave shrine which was dedicated to Chac “el padre de las lluvias.” Puc commented insightfully that those who defended the cave against the friar were acting as Ah Tanlahob Chac, or the “servants of Chac.”12 What the 1621 Chalante rebellion clearly illustrates is just how important caves and cave shrines were to the colonial Maya. As the brief insurrection of the Maya of the Chalante illustrates, for the Maya caves were places to be protected, and their shrines were worth fighting for even at the risk of dying to protect them.

9 Testimonio del capitán Ambrosio de Arguelles, en la probanza secreta de oficio hecha contra Fr. Gerónimo de Porras y Montalvo, 24 de abril, 1624, AGI, Audiencia de México, 301, 5 folios. 10 The entire dramatic event was witnessed by several Spaniards and sworn to in their written testimonies in Fr. Gerónimo de Porras’ Relación de Méritos y Servicios (AGI, Mexico, 301). Similarly, during my fieldwork in Yucatan in 1997–1998, I was told by several old Maya men from the town of Izamal, that there was indeed a cave where the Chacs were supposed to dwell. They even took me to the spot and showed me a pile of stone [perhaps a stalactite] that they said once was an image of “El padre de las lluvias...”. Whether this cave and the “padre de las lluvias” is the same one discovered by Fray Gerónimo de Porras or not, the incident is interesting in that it appears to be a modern oral survival of colonial campaigns of extirpation. 11 Carta del Provincial de la orden de San Francisco de Yucatán, Fray Gerónimo de Porras y Montalvo sobre los indios idolatras de Yucatán, 1624, AGI, Audiencia de México, 301, 3 folios. 12 Ibid.

The Significance of Caves and Cenotes for the Maya This paper examines the nature of colonial Maya cave worship and will attempt to illustrate how caves and cenotes remained important sacred spaces, in which colonial Maya rituals con- Figure 2. The Maya Hieroglyph tinued to be framed and CH’EN-na ch’een, for “cave, pit, performed. As the cosmo- cavity, hole, den” (redrawn by logical ritual entranceways Guido Krempel, after Kettunen into the underworld, caves and Helmke 2010: 138). served the colonial Maya as a means of direct connection to the underworld, and as a frame in which rituals of both life and death could be framed in their ritual cycle. Previous epigraphic studies have demonstrated that caves were important in establishing polities and have added to our understanding of Maya cosmology. By comparing the use of cave symbols in ancient Maya place-name glyphs to ethnographic documentation of the use of caves in modern ritual, scholars such as Evon Vogt and David Stuart (2005) illustrated that there exists a continuous Maya tradition in which caves were considered as sacred features of the landscape spanning from the Classic Period to the present day (Moyes 2006: 12). The identification for the logogram for cave, CH’EN ch’en, by David Stuart in 1999 revealed its use in texts. Stuart noted that its association with death as well as underworld and bat symbolism was commonplace (Stuart 1999). Similarly, Stuart and Vogt have argued elsewhere that mountains and caves represented topological and ritual boundaries for both ancient and modern Maya communities (Vogt and Stuart 2005: 155–185). Apparently, caves were not only boundary markers for the corporeal world, but they also served as the transitional spaces between the natural and supernatural planes of existence (Moyes 2006: 51). Moreover, caves embodied the very center or the “navel of the world” in the five part division of the cosmos that is prevalent throughout Mesoamerica. In Colonial Yucatan, the Maya used the word Actun to refer to both a cave and a stone building, suggesting to Thompson that the two were closely linked conceptually (Thompson 1959: 124). As James Brady has argued, mountains and caves are part of the same complex that represents the earth (Brady 2012: 64). Brady and others have described that for “the Classic Maya nature was a living and breathing social being whose natural features like mountains, caves, or bodies of water were represented artistically with faces or mouths and described as integral members of the social community” (Patel 2012: 39). Moreover, many Mesoamerican foundational myths involve ancestors who emerged from caves or trees linking and framing nature and humanity to the physical features of the sky and earth (Patel 2012: 69).

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Framing Sacred Spaces: Colonial Yucatec Maya Cave and Cenote Rituals Cave rituals, due to their secret nature even today, and the problematic archaeological evidence detectable in cave stratigrafy, are poorly understood. What little we know about these cave or cenote ceremonies comes from eyewitness accounts written down in the documentary evidence. Eyewitness accounts, such as the information on the rebellion at Chalante in 1621, are important sources of evidence concerning colonial Maya cave rituals since old remains and offerings are often swept away and disposed of before new ceremonies were held. Numerous reports of cave rituals and what the colonial clergy called acts of “idolatry” occurring in caves signal the central importance of caves and cenotes to the worship of the Maya raingod Chac (Chuchiak 2000, 2014a). By examining the ethnohistorical evidence for Maya cave rituals this paper will highlight the continuities and changes that occurred in Maya cave worship throughout the colonial period. We know that the Yucatec Maya ordered the natural world on cosmological principles. Mountains and caves, forests and milpas were points and channels of sacred power from historical events and timeless sacred forces. Geographical features were inscribed by human hands to mark their sacredness, while temples and shrines replicated holy mountains, caves, and water sources. Throughout the Yucatan Peninsula natural and constructed places commonly became centers of pilgrimage in patterns often maintained to the present. Moreover, Maya sacred landscapes evolved over time, influenced by local conditions. Written records from the Early Conquest and Colonial periods (particularly c. 1532–1650) illustrate the close relationship between cosmology, the environment and sacred space for the Yucatec Maya (Chuchiak 2000). Although incorporating the various motives and biases of their authors, these works, written mainly in Spanish or in a combination of Maya and Spanish, provide invaluable primary source data, particularly regarding Maya religious practices and politics (Chuchiak 2002: 20–29). We also know, for example, thanks to the ecclesiastical court documents that chronicle forbidden Maya religious practices that the colonial Maya believed in many gods that resided in or comprised the natural world (Chuchiak 2000: 243–312). These deities were responsible for providing water and bountiful crops but could also cause such disasters as droughts, floods and earthquakes, if not venerated properly.

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The sacred space of the Maya village itself was related to their cosmology, and it continued to be so during the colonial period. Thus, one division of the town is supposed to be related to the north, another represented the center; another division represented the west, another the south, and another the east (Chuchiak 2001: 145–147, 2004: 173). This four-part horizontal division of the world (into north, east, south, and west) was combined in the minds of the colonial Maya with a three-part vertical division (into lower world, this world,

and upper world) and these divisions and sacred spaces were reflected in the ritual behavior of the Maya in all of their religious shrines (Chuchiak 2000: 249–252). The colonial Maya also used frames and borders to delineate and mark sacred spaces. Maya concepts of the sacred, required that sacred spaces be “framed” or “enclosed” within borders, and enclosures that created or re-created the Maya universe and delineated sacred spaces within a bounded border (Chuchiak 2000: 354–359). In all religious rituals, the space or place of the ritual was not only significant, but also the enclosure, the border, or frame that the Maya placed around the ritual participants themselves (Chuchiak 2003: 145–147). Just as Maya glyphs, and time itself demanded borders, glyph blocks, and other framing elements, so too did Maya religious rituals. From the Classic to the Colonial period and beyond, the Maya have sought to harness the power, create, and re-create ritual space, and utilize sacred spaces for their religious rituals. Moreover, due to the existence of the anti-idolatry campaigns of the provisorato de indios, colonial Maya religion was forced to become less public and more a matter of smaller private ceremonies and festivals, well hidden from the eyes of the clergy and the Spanish officials (Chuchiak 2000, 2014b: 54–55). Nevertheless, rituals dedicated to the Maya deities continued to occur within places specifically related to pre-Hispanic concepts of the sacred and divine, ordered along cosmological principals that had their root in the preconquest period (Chuchiak 2000). The places of Colonial worship, though severally limited by the repressive measures of the ecclesiastical judges, continued to resemble the sacred places used for Maya ritual before the arrival of the Spaniards (Chuchiak 2014b). These sacred spaces in which Colonial rituals took place included the monumental temples and shrines of the Maya’s ancestors, as well as the inherently sacred spaces of cenotes and caves, which were held sacred because of their relationships with specific deities or other aspects of the supernatural. In effect the sacred places in which the Maya celebrated their ceremonies changed little from the late Post-Classic to the Colonial era. The only major change involved the necessity of suppressing public ceremonies and processions which, for fear of repression, the Maya conducted in a clandestine nature.

Sacred Caves and Maya Pilgrimages: Caves as Places of Continued Maya Public and Private Rituals The Yucatán peninsula is a limestone shelf that serves as a perfect example of karst topography marked by the existence of a countless number of caves and underground caverns (Bassie-Sweet 1991: 78). The Maya considered caves and cenotes as sacred spaces and important places in which Maya rituals and ceremonies took place. The Maya believed caves

Caves of Life and Caves of Death: Colonial Yucatec Maya Rituals and Offerings in Caves and Cenotes, 1540–1750

and cenotes to be the places of the birth and the abode of the gods, especially the rain gods and the gods of the underworld. The mouths of caves themselves the Maya believed to be the entrance to the Maya underworld, called Xibalba, where the death gods Ah Puch and Uac Mitun Ahau dwelled. The archaeological remains of ceremonies and rituals, including ritual paraphernalia from stingray spines to copal incense have been found inside of caves (Pohl and Pohl 1983: 28–51). Eyewitness accounts are important sources of evidence since during these ceremonies old remains and offerings are often swept away and disposed of before new ceremonies were held (Bassie-Sweet 1991: 91). The same is true for colonial ceremonies held in caves. What little we know about these cave or cenote ceremonies comes from eyewitness accounts written down in the documentary record during ecclesiastical idolatry trials. One seventeenth century account of the Itza Maya reported that they “held their idolatries in caverns as they call them, in the forests, hills and caves.” (Villagutierre y Soto-Mayor and Comparato 1983: 316). The Yucatec Maya took their idols of stone and clay to caves where they offered them sacrifices of birds, incense and cacao. Caves were also seen to be the place where the winds and the rains originated (Bassie-Sweet 1991: 85). Cave worship usually focused on the veneration of rain and earth gods. Cave shrines and cave worship remained important factors in both pre-Hispanic and colonial Maya religion. Many offerings, idols, and cave paintings of ancient rituals have been discovered in caves and pilgrimages to certain caves continue to this day (Thompson 1970: 183).13 Caves and cenotes, then, were important sacred spaces in which colonial Maya rituals continued to be performed. The number of incidents of cave rituals and idolatry occurring in caves signals the central importance of caves and cenotes to the worship of colonial Maya religion [See map 1]. Perhaps no other wells or caves received more veneration or worship than those on the island of Cozumel. As Fray Diego de Landa wrote: “... They held Cozumel and the well of Chichen Itza in the same veneration as we have for pilgrimages to Jerusalem and Rome, and so they used to visit these places and to offer presents there, especially to Cozumel, as we do to holy places ...” (Tozzer 1941: 109).

As the scholars Ralph Roys and France Scholes noted earlier, the ethnohistoric sources also record that Cozumel received pilgrims from distant lands (Roys et al. 1940: 5). Diego de Contreras Duran, who inherited the island in encomienda from his father wrote in 1579 that the Maya journeyed in great numbers from Tabasco, Xicalango, Champoton, and Campeche in adoration of the Maya goddess Ix Chel, in order to “see and worship the said idol and shrine” on the island.14

13 Thompson, Maya History and Religion, p. 183. 14 Diego de Contreras, Relación de Nabalam, Tahcabo y Cozumel, 1579, pp. 186–187 in Mercedes de la Garza (ed.),

Figure 3. Two unidentified figures conduct a cave ritual on the edge of a “cenote” represented by T591 (Source: Dresden Codex almanach 33a).

These sacred places on the island of Cozumel included caves and cenotes that, like their counterparts on the mainland, the Maya extensively modified by the building of stairways, shrines, and altars (Patel 2005: 101–104). The Maya connected many of the cave and cenote shrines by means of paved roadways, or sacbeob. For example, the pilgrimage center at Cozumel was so important that Spanish sources suggest that sacbeob on the mainland were constructed expressly to accommodate religious traffic to the island. The Franciscan Friar Diego López de Cogolludo noted that: There are remains of paved highways which traverse all this kingdom and they say they ended in the east on the seashore where it crosses an arm of the sea for the distance of four leagues which divides the mainland from that island. These highways were like the caminos reales, which guided them with no fear of going astray so that they might arrive at Cozumel for the fulfillment of their vows, to offer their sacrifices, to ask for help in their needs, and for the mistaken adoration of their false gods ...15

As early as 1545, a relative of a high ranking nobleman from the island of Cozumel was caught worshipping idols in a cave near the town of San Miguel on the island of Cozumel, and he was whipped by Juan de Contreras, the first encomendero of Cozumel.16 In response to his punishments the Maya reportedly stated, “I received the baptism señor, but you did not Relaciones Histórico-Geográficas de la Gobernación de Yucatán, Vol. II, pp. 186–187. 15 Fray Diego de López de Cogolludo, Historia de Yucathan compuesta por Fray Diego Lopez de Cogolludo, Madrid: por Juan García-Infanzón, 1688, Libro IV, Capítulo VII, folio 193. 16 See Probanza de los méritos y servicios de Juan de Contreras y Diego de Contreras en la conquista y pascificacion de Yucatán, Abril, 1654, AGI, Patronato 56.

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Figure 4. Map of major cave rituals uncovered by Ecclesiastical Extirpators Source. Drawn by the author based on surviving archival evidence of cave rituals.

order me to abandon my old faith; therefore your punishment is unjust ...”17 The Maya noble could not conceive of his people abandoning the pilgrimages, regardless of their baptism and conversion to Christianity. Apparently, the Maya continued to make pilgrimages to Cozumel’s sacred shrines, caves, and cenotes. Moreover, as Patel (2005) has shown, the pilgrimage route was laid out in relation to the island’s caves and cenotes. The principal religious site was San Gervasio in the interior of the island, with its three caves, accessible from the temple (Patel 2005: 101–102). Offerings of human bones, ceramics and conch shells were evident in the archaeological record. So numerable were the number of cases of idolatry in the Vicaria of Cozumel, that even the Governor Francisco de Solis complained of it in a letter to the crown. The governor remarked that countless numbers of Maya even from as far interior villages of the province went on idolatrous pilgrimages to the island shrines on Cozumel.18 The Governor even went so far as to advocate for the forced abandonment of the island as a measure to stop these pilgrimages, writing:

The island of Cozumel has so few Indians, and they are all idolaters, and this island has since the time of their gentility served among them as a pilgrimage shrine just as venerated among them as Christians have in going to Jerusalem, and it appears to me that Your Majesty should order the island depopulated to put an end to these things ...19

All throughout the coast many other caves and shrines existed and some of the shrines in these caves were built around speleothems which were occasionally painted and often accompanied by carved faces, similar to the one described by Fray Geronimo de Porras in Chalante (Griffith and Jack 2005: 2–3). The Maya associated these speleothems with rain, fertility, and the production of their Suhuy ha, or virgin or pure water, necessary for all ritual libations offered to the gods (Chládek 2011: 39). Many of these Cave shrines were built around thrones or benches that were originally used to house or place idols, most of which have long disappeared due to the campaigns of extirpation conducted by the clergy, such as the one that occurred in Chalante in 1621. For example, at the postclassic site of Tancah, a stela with a carved face stands next to a

17 Cogolludo, Historia de Yucathan.

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18 See Carta del gobernador Don Francisco de Solis sobre los ydolatrias de los indios de la ysla de Cozumel, 1584, AGI, Audiencia de Mexico, 283, 4 folios.

19 Carta del gobernador Don Francisco de Solis sobre los ydolatrias de los indios de la ysla de Cozumel, 1584, AGI, Audiencia de Mexico, 283, folio 3r-v.

Caves of Life and Caves of Death: Colonial Yucatec Maya Rituals and Offerings in Caves and Cenotes, 1540–1750

stairway leaving to the water in a cenote (Chládek 2011: 39). Early archaeologists and explorers often described similar altars and structures that were built in, over, or next to caves (Patel 2005: 101; Arnold and Frost 1909; Mason 1927). In the 17th century the English Catholic Friar Thomas Gage reported an encounter with a Maya wooden idol inside of a cave in the Alta Verapaz region of Guatemala: “At the entrance the cave was broad, and went a little forward, but when we were in, we found it turn on the left ... and not far ... we found the Idol standing upon a low stool covered with a linen cloth. The substance of it was wood, black and shining like jet, as if it had been painted or smoked; the form was a man’s head down to his shoulders, without either beard or mustachios. His look was grim with a wrinkled forehead and broad startling eyes ... and as we lifted him up we found under him some single real [coins], which his favorites had offered unto him ...”20

As the archaeologist Shankari Patel illustrated in her own work, the pattern of building miniature temples, platforms and altars in caves and cenotes on Cozumel has counterparts at other sites along the east coast (Patel 2005). Although she notes that only a fraction of the site has been excavated, there are three prominent caves in the restored section of the site (Patel 2005: 101–105). As she noted, during the restoration, archaeologists collected “human bones, ceramics, and conch shells from the floors of these caves” (Patel 2005: 102; Sierra Sosa 1994: 80). Earlier, Herbert Spinden and Ludlow Griscom described the cenote shrine in 1926 as “a temple built over the entrance to a cave which contained a permanent fresh pool and stairs from the doorway descended to the cavern” (Patel 2005: 104: Mason 1927: 278). Religious activity persisted on the island post conquest, and apparently even after the island was forcibly abandoned. Evidence exists that the Maya continued to conduct rituals at cenotes on Cozumel even after they resettled the island in the 1850s. A female statue situated at a cenote near the island’s Late Classic center received offerings up until its removal in the 1940s for display at the museum in San Miguel (Patel 2005: 105). The idol described variously as “La Xnuc,” “La Vieja,” and “La Virgen de Santa Rita,” held a special place of veneration among the Maya of Cozumel (Fig. 5). According to archaeologists, local informants recorded that the cenote had received patrons for at least fifty years before the idol’s removal from the site (Escalona Ramos 1946: 559–560; Patel 2005: 105).

Other Examples of Colonial Maya Cave Rituals As in the case of the cave and cenote shrines on the island of Cozumel, many Colonial Maya “idols” continued to be housed within secret “templos o adoratorios” which they managed to keep hidden well into the Colonial period (Chuchiak 2000: 419–426). Many other images of their traditional gods 20 Thomas Gage, Travels in the New World, p. 281.

Figure 5. Carved column at the site of Miramar on Cozumel island (Holmes 1895: Plate IV).

were kept in sacred places; in underground cenotes or caves, or even ensconced deep within the forest, or monte as the Spaniards termed it, or in cornfields, or milpas, of the local Maya (Chuchiak 2009). Colonial evidence suggests that the Maya considered caves such an important part of the sacred landscape that regardless of fears of being apprehended they continued to use them for public rituals. Colonial sources attest to the Maya holding large scale public rituals in caves and cenotes throughout the colonial period. While the colonial Maya began to abandon public worship even in distant milpas for fear of discovery, they refused to abandon larger ceremonies in caves. In truth, Maya cave rituals actually increased in frequency as the colonial period progressed, suggesting that caves became even more important in colonial times than they had been in pre-hispanic times. Out of a sample of 4,732 cases/trials of Maya Idolatry discovered from the 1550s to the 1850s, an increasing percentage of discovered acts of Maya idolatry occurred in conjunction with caves and cenotes during this period (Chuchiak 2000). Some later Colonial Maya cave rituals may have even witnessed possible human sacrifice in cave context. For instance, on May 10, 1601, the local Alcalde Ordinario of Valladolid, Don Antonio Maza, received news about a shocking case of a reported ritual sacrifice or murder of several Maya in a distant cave from two letters; one from the Maya batab of Chancenote, Don Juan Chan; and the second from the cacique of Tixmukul, Don Juan Uc.21 The two caciques informed the 21 Notificación del Alcalde Ordinario de Valladolid, Don Antonio Maza, de las noticias de una idolatría y asesinato en el pueblo de Tixmukul, 10 de mayo, 1601, AGI, Audiencia de México, 140, folios 18–19.

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Figure 6. Unprovenanced cave painting, Guatemala, showing three persons dressed in jaguar skirts performing an incense scattering ritual. A calendar date accompanying the scene places the depicted ritual on February 1, 426 A.D. (La Ruta Maya Foundation, Registry No.: 16.2.5.998; Photograph by Ricky López Bruni).

alcalde that three unbaptized Maya priests, or Ah Kines, had ritually murdered two men from the village of Tixmukul in an apparent human sacrifice. Apparently, Na Pul Canche, Na Batun Cauiche and Na Dzib Ek murdered two Christian Indians from the villages of Tixmukul and Yalcoba.22 The victims, Francisco Uc, the husband of Ana Dzul from Tixmukul, and Diego Dzib, husband of Magdalena Ku, where ceremonially sacrificed in a local cave. According to the wives of the murdered men who testified through the interpretation of Alonso Diaz de Alpuche the three pagan priests had murdered the two men on the island of Nitzuc and had then thrown their bodies into a cave in a sort of ritual offering.23 According to the two women who had lived in the apostate communities, there were a large number of apostate and idolatrous Maya in the unpopulated region to the east of Chacenote in hamlets called Tequiceh and Xamanake.24 More than thirty Maya idolaters lived in the town of Tequiceh in open idolatry. Another one hundred or more Maya lived in the town of Xamanake along the coast under the leadership of a Batab Juan Ye.25 22 Ibid., folio 18. 23 Testimonio de Ana Dzul en la averiguación de la susodicha idolatría del caso, 10 de mayo, 1601, AGI, Audiencia de México, 140, folio 19. 24 Testimonio del Capitán Don Francisco de Villalobos Cárdenas en la probanza de los méritos y servicios del Indio Principal Don Juan Chan, 17 de mayo, 1617, AGI, Audiencia de México, 140, 6 folios.

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25 Testimonio de Magdalena Ku en la averiguación de la

One of the suspected murderers, Na Pul Canche, was quickly apprehended near the village of Tixholop and under torment confessed. Being a case involving homicide, the jurisdiction over the case reverted to the civil authorities according to a royal law that reserved cases of idolatry and witchcraft involving murder to the secular justices.26 Receiving news of the whole affair, Governor Diego Fernandez de Velasco commissioned the cacique of Chancenote Don Juan Chan to undertake an expedition against the apostate Maya.27 Other 17th century accounts reported that cave shrines and cave worship were important factors in both pre-Hispanic and colonial Maya religion. For example, in 1605, while on a hunting expedition in the woods, Juan Cansino, a Spaniard from the village of Valladolid stumbled across a cave filled susodicha idolatría del caso, 10 de mayo, 1601, AGI, Audiencia de México, 140, folio 16. 26 See Ley XXXV: Que los ordinarios eclesiásticos conozcan en causas de Fe contra los indios; y en hechizos y maleficios las justicias reales, 1575, in Recopilación de las Leyes de Indias, Libro VI, Tit. I, Ley XXXV, Tomo II, folio 192r. This law stated that it was the right of the secular justices to punish “...hechiceros que matan con hechizos y usan de otros maleficios, procederan nuestras Justicias Reales . . “ 27 Comisión del Gobernador de Yucatán Don Diego Fernández de Velasco al Capitán Don Juan Chan para la reducción de los pueblos de Tequiceh, Xamanake, Ticcoch, Cucumahaz, Muchicu, Tikik y Ticancaba y la aprehensión de los matadores de los dos indios fieles, 30 de mayo, 1601, AGI, Audiencia de Mexico, 140, folios 19–21.

Caves of Life and Caves of Death: Colonial Yucatec Maya Rituals and Offerings in Caves and Cenotes, 1540–1750

with idols and recent offerings from the Maya of the village of Tihotzuco.28 While looking for rabbits and iguanas, Cansino stumbled across a cave and when he went inside, he discovered a large quantity of stone and clay idols. He found copal incense still burning and several fresh offerings of animal meat. Immediately he went to the Vicario of the parish, Francisco Ruiz Salvago and the Vicario accompanied him back to the cave with a group of Maya porters.29 The next year 1606, Dr. Pedro Sánchez de Aguilar discovered that the Maya of the village of Cehac had a cave filled with idols. Even worse was the fact that the cave was not very far from the church!30 Accompanied by the cacique Don Juan Chan, Dr. Sánchez de Aguilar went into the cave and to his horror the cave was filled with idols and there were fresh offerings of copal and other animal sacrifices. With the aid of the cacique, Aguilar smashed the idols upon the stone altars that were there in the cave.31 Earlier in 1605, the King of Spain, issued a royal cedula informing the bishop of the great idolatry that engulfed his province, and the need to be vigilant in rooting out the use of caves in Maya rituals. The Crown wrote: “By means of a letter from Doctor Pedro Sánchez de Aguilar, I have understood that in many of the villages of this bishopric there are many Indians guilty of idolatry, and even though the ministers, both clerics and friars, exercise great caution in their conversion, because this land is very rugged and mountainous, and filled with many caves where they hide and continue to conduct their idolatries.”32

During the decade of the 1640s, the Bishops of Yucatan marveled at the tenacious resistance of the Maya towards leaving behind their ceremonies, especially those dedicated to Chac which they continued to conduct in caves and cenotes throughout the peninsula. For example, during a pastoral visitation of the province, the bishop Juan Alonso Ocón was horrified to find that the Maya continued in their idolatrous rituals in caves, not out of ignorance of Catholicism, but in resistance to it. Many of his clergy attempted to convince him that this was caused by their lack of religious education and training. The bishop himself examined a countless number of

28 Cogolludo, Historia de Yucatán, Tomo II, Libro VIII, capitulo X, p. 319. 29 Carta del obispo de Yucatán sobre su visita pastoral y el estado de las idolatrías y reducciones de los indios, 1 de junio, 1606, AGI, Audiencia de México, 369, 3 folios. 30 See Pedro Sánchez de Aguilar, Informe contra idolorum cultores, p. 38. 31 Información hecha ante su Señoría Reverendísimo Don Diego Vásquez de Mercado, obispo de estas provincias de Yucatán, a pedimento del Doctor Pedro Sánchez de Aguilar, beneficiado de Chancenote y Vicario General de esta Villa de Valladolid, 4 de Diciembre, 1608, AGI, Audiencia de México, 299. 32 See Pedro Sánchez de Aguilar, Informe contra idolorum cultores.

Maya villagers on their knowledge of Christianity and found that this was not the reason. He wrote to the King of Spain: Many here tried to persuade me to believe that the cause [of their idolatries] is born from their lack of proper doctrine ... but during my pastoral visitation that I undertook in all of my bishopric ... I examined in each and every village a large number of Indians of all ages and stations ... and I found them to be sufficiently instructed in the things of our faith ... thus it is not from lack of instruction that such a great sin arises ... it is out of their desire to preserve their idolatries that they persist in these abominations ... seeking the devil out in the many caves and forests of this province ...”33

Moreover, caves and cenotes apparently not only served as the focal point of rituals of resistance to Christianity, but in some case, the first acts of syncretism and the blending of Maya and Christian imagery occurred in rituals that the Maya conducted in caves. For instance, as early as 1605, Bishop Diego Vásquez de Mercado complained: “... moreover, in several caves in the region of Valladolid, more than eighty natives were discovered to have committed idolatries in those caves with clay idols that they had fashioned with horrible shapes, with each one of them called by their own names…they even gave some of these idols blasphemous names, calling them god the Father, another one god the Son, and yet another one god the Holy Spirit, and another Santa Maria, and giving still other idols the names of many other saints ...”34

As late as 1807 the local Vicario of Motul, Gregorio José Palomo, received reports on superstitious acts committed by more than twelve Maya men and women in the forest around the town. Palomo went to investigate the reports and found that eight Maya men and four women were guilty of committing routine rituals in several caves and cenotes in the region. According to his investigations, Palomo discovered that the Maya of the region worshipped the “Owners of those forests” and the “gods of the wind” whom they believed dwelled within the caves and cenotes of the region.35

Caves of Life, Caves of Death: Caves as Places for Colonial Curing and Medicinal Practices Caves remained so significant for the Maya because they believed that they served as places to access the death gods who 33 Carta del obispo Juan Alonso Ocón al rey sobre las idolatrías y borracheras de los indios de Yucatán, 24 de febrero, 1643, AGI, Audiencia de México, 269, folios 447–450. 34 Testimonio del obispo de la visita pastoral de este obispado de Yucatán, 14 de julio, 1642, AGI, Audiencia de México, 369, folios 462–464. 35 Información sobre los ritos y idolatrías cometidos por algunos indios del partido de Motul, 1 de enero, 1807, AHAY, Asuntos, Box # 1, 10 folios.

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dwelled in the underworld. The Maya believed that caves were the entranceway into the underworld and therefore the cult of the Death God was closely associated with caves and dry cenotes. Dry caves, associated with death and the absence of water, were seen to be the entranceways into the underworld and the land of the death gods. Caves and cenotes with water in them were reserved for the cult of the Rain God Chac.

vala was arrested and taken into custody by the Holy Office of the Inquisition.40 As a mulatto he would be tried by the Inquisition for using native Maya remedies and rituals in his curing practices.

Pre-Hispanic and Colonial Maya priests and healers continued to offer sacrifices to the Death God Ah Puch in his aspect of a god of illness in and around caves in order to remove an illness suffered by a patient. For example, in 1748, a group of Maya from the region of Campeche offered incense and other offerings to Ah Puch in order to cure the illness of a Maya farmer.36 In their incantations they offered Ah Puch, whom they called the “bringer of disease, the spoiled one” three gourds of a ritual maize drink called Saca and copal incense, which they left at the entrance of a local dry cave, in order to take away the illness.37

“A little colored stone that the Indians call Sastun, a stone of their idolatries, and he also uses the ritual beverage balché and other implements such as copal incense to discern the causes of the illnesses ...”41

In an 18th century copy of a Maya medicinal book, the Ritual of the Bacabs, there are several incantations similar to those used by the Maya healers near Campeche in 1748. In these incantations Ah Puch, the Lord of Hell [metnal] and the “spoiled one” is said to have come from the mouth of a dark cave. Notice the reference to the underworld and the death gods as the originators of disease and caves in this incantation: “... Where came you, when you came? From the heart of Metnal, from the heart of the water. Where came you forth? From the mouth of the dark cave. There came your cry from Metnal; there came your cry from the horizon. Then you hung there, the spoiled one of creation, the spoiled one of bursting flowers, the spoiled one of birth.”38

Other cases of Maya offering sacrifices to Ah Puch, as the god of death and the origin of diseases occurred throughout the colonial period. For instance, earlier in 1724, a practicing Maya curer, the Mulatto José de Zavala, invoked the god Ah Puch in a nearby cave and offered him copal incense in order to divine the cause of a patient’s disease.39 He said that a Maya curer had shown him how to offer sacrifices in that cave to the god of death in order to cure diseases and find the causes of his patients’ ills. Shortly afterward José de Za36 Proceso del Santo Oficio contra el español Francisco Pantoja, por sospechas de idólatra, 1748, AGN, Inquisición, Vol. 908, Exp. 14, folios 166–193. 37 Testimonio de los indios idólatras reos, contra la idolatría del español, Francisco Pantoja, 1748, AGN, Inquisición, Vol. 908, Exp. 14, folio 168v.

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According to later testimony against him, José de Zavala, divined the cause of the diseases of his patients by using:

The mulatto told the witnesses that he conducted these ceremonies and others in caves in order to expel the cause of those illnesses, which was “an evil air called Ix Hunyopolik.” The mulato curandero furthermore chanted incantations to the Maya Lord of Death, Yum Cimil, who he believed was the origins of all diseases and evil airs. His rituals involved calling him at the entrance to a certain cave to come and receive the food and drink offerings in order to cure the diseases.42 The prisoner also admitted to conducting ceremonies at the entrances to other caves and cenotes, calling forth both Yum Cimil and Ah Puch, the lords of death and disease, to take back the evil winds they had sent. Central to all of these colonial healing rituals were offerings and rituals conducted inside or near the entrances to caves.

Conclusion In conclusion, the Colonial evidence reveals that many offerings and idols continued to be discovered in caves, and pilgrimages to certain caves continue to this day. Both caves and cenotes served as important sacred spaces where the Maya could come in contact with their gods throughout the Colonial period. Similarly, as we have seen, Maya temples and shrines were also built in close proximity to caves or cenotes, further emphasizing the sacred nature of caves in Colonial Maya ritual. This chapter has examined the nature of Colonial Maya cave worship and illustrated how caves and cenotes remained important sacred spaces in which Colonial Maya rituals continued to be performed. Numerous reports of cave rituals and what the Colonial clergy called acts of “idolatry” occurring in caves signal the central importance of caves and cenotes to the Colonial worship of the Maya Rain God Chac. 

40 Denuncia de Tomas Ordóñez en contra del curandero Joseph Zavala por hechicería y idolatría, 1724, AGN, Ramo de Inquisición, Vol. 1164, ffs. 276–279.

38 See Ramón Arzápalo Marín, El Ritual de los Bacabes (México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 1987), pp. 346–347.

41 Proceso contra Joseph Zavala, de color pardo, vecino del pueblo de Xecelchakan, curandero, por maleficio, hechicería y idolatría, Yucatán, 1724, AGN, Ramo de Inquisición, Vol. 1164, ffs 273–298.

39 Proceso contra Joseph Zavala, de color pardo, vecino del pueblo de Xecelchakan, curandero, por maleficio, hechicería y idolatría, Yucatán, 1724, AGN, Ramo de Inquisición, Vol. 1164, ffs 273–319.

42 Sentencia con méritos, contra Joseph Zavala, reo que fue traído de Yucatán a México, sentenciado a la pena de azotes, y desterrado de Yucatán por ocho años, 1724, AGN, Ramo de Inquisición, Vol. 1164, Exp. 23 A, 316–319.

Caves of Life and Caves of Death: Colonial Yucatec Maya Rituals and Offerings in Caves and Cenotes, 1540–1750

By examining the ethnohistorical and archival evidence for Maya cave rituals and the information on Colonial Maya ritual specialists who officiated in these cave ceremonies, the continuities and changes that occurred in Maya cave worship throughout the colonial period can be better understood. The number of incidents of cave rituals and idolatry occurring in caves and their increasing frequency throughout the Colonial period signals the pivotal significance of caves and cenotes to the worship of colonial Maya religion. The sacred nature of caves remained important enough during the Colonial period, that there appears to have been an increase in the number of cave rituals. As the Colonial evidence from a database of more than 4,732 cases suggests, the Yucatec Maya, out of necessity, had to adapt a changing nature of sacred space, transforming their religious ceremonies and ritual spaces in the later Colonial period in order to avoid persecution from the Catholic Clergy.43 This suggests that regardless of persecution, the Maya continued to resist repression and utilize their traditional sacred landscapes for the conducting of their colonial rituals. Although they came constantly under attack by the officials of the ecclesiastical courts, the Maya priesthood survived well into the Colonial period. Along with their allies among the Maya cacique and noble classes, the Ah Kinob helped to preserve the religion of the “old gods” well into the 18th century and even beyond by clandestinely expanding their usage of secret rituals and offerings in caves and cenotes throughout the peninsula (Chuchiak 2001: 135–160). References Arnold, Channing and Frederick J. Tabor Frost 1909 American Egypt: A Record of Travel in Yucatán. London: Hutchinson and Row. Arzápalo, Ramón ­1987 El ritual de los Bacabes. Mexico D.F: Universidad Autónoma Nacional de Mexico. Bassie-Sweet, Karen 1991 From the Mouth of the Dark Cave. Boulder: University of Oklahoma Press. Brady, James E. 2012 The Architectural Cave as an Early Form of Artificial Cave in the Maya Lowlands. In: James E. Brady (ed.), Heart of Earth: Studies in Maya Ritual Cave Use, pp. 61–68. Bulletin 23. Austin: Association for Mexican Cave Studies. Brady, James E. and Wendy Ashmore 1999 Mountains, Caves, Water: Ideational Landscapes of the Ancient Maya. In: Wendy Ashmore and Bernard Knapp (eds.), Archaeologies of Landscapes: Contemporary Perspectives. Malden: Blackwell. Brady, James E. and Keith M. Prufer (eds.) 2005 In the Maw of the Earth Monster. Studies of Mesoamerican Ritual Cave Use. Austin: University of Texas Press

43 See Chuchiak, Digital Database of Idolatry Cases, 1545– 1850, n.d.

Cárdenas Valencia, Francisco de and Federico Gómez de Orozco (eds.) 1639[1937] Relación historial eclesiástica de la provincia de Yucatán de la Nueva España: escrita el año de 1639. México: Antigua Librería Robredo, J. Porrúa e Hijos. Chuchiak IV, John F. 2000 The Indian Inquisition and the Extirpation of Idolatry: The Process of  Punishment in the Ecclesiastical Courts of the Provisorato de Indios in Yucatán, 1563–1812. PhD thesis, Tulane University. 2001 Pre-Conquest Ah Kinob in a Colonial World: The Extirpation of Idolatry and the Survival of the Maya Priesthood in Colonial Yucatán, 1563–1697. In: Ueli Hostettler and Matthew Restall (eds.), Maya Survivalism, pp. 135-160. Acta Mesoamericana 12. Markt Schwaben: Verlag Anton Saurwein. 2002 Toward a Regional Definition of Idolatry: Reexamining Idolatry Trials in the Relaciones de Méritos and their role in defining the Concept of Idolatria in Colonial Yucatán, 1570–1780. Journal of Early Modern History 6 (2): 1–29. 2003 “It is their Drinking that Hinders Them”: Balché and the Use of Ritual Intoxicants among the Colonial Yucatec Maya, 1550– 1780. Estudios de Cultura Maya 24: 137–171. 2004 The Images Speak: The Survival and Production of Hieroglyphic Codices and Their Use in Post-Conquest Maya Religion, 1580–1720. In: Daniel Graña Behrens, Nikolai Grube, Christian Prager, Frauke Sachse, Stefanie Teufel and Elisabeth Wagner (eds.), Continuity and Change: Maya Religious Practices in Temporal Perspective, pp. 165–183. Acta Mesoamericana 14. Markt Schwaben: Verlag Anton Saurwein. 2006a The Medicinal Practices of the Yucatec Maya and their Influence on Colonial Medicine in Yucatán, 1580–1780. Acta Americana 10 (1-2): 32–57. 2006b Yaab Uih Yetel Maya Cimil: Colonial Plagues, Famines, Catastrophes and their Impact on Changing Yucatec Maya Conceptions of Death and Dying, 1570–1794. In: Pierre Robert Colas, Geneviève LeFort, Bodil Liljefors Persson (eds.), Jaws of the Underworld: Life, Death and Rebirth among the Ancient Maya, pp. 3-19. Acta Mesoamericana 16. Markt Schwaben: Verlag Anton Saurwein. 2009 De Descriptio Idolorum: An Ethnohistorical Examination of the Production, Imagery, and Functions of Colonial Yucatec Maya Idols and Effigy Censers, 1540–1700. In: Leslie G. Cecil and Timothy W. Pugh (eds), Maya Worldviews at Conquest, pp. 226–285. Boulder: University Press of Colorado. 2014a La Iglesia Evangelizadora: el Provisorato de Indios y la extirpación de las idolatrías en Yucatán, 1571–1761. In: Sergio Quezada, Inés Ortiz Yam and Jorge Castillo Canché (eds.), Historia General de Yucatán, pp. 177–263. Mérida: Universidad Autónoma de Yucatán. 2014b Colonial Maya Religion and the Spanish World: The Role of “Idolatry” in Inter-Ethnic Relations in Colonial Yucatán, 1545–1820. Axis Mundi: Journal of the Slovak Association for the Study of Religion 9 (1): 47–66. Chládek, Stanislav 2011 Exploring Maya Ritual Caves: Dark Secrets from the Maya Underworld. Lanham: AltaMira Press. Escalona Ramos, Alberto 1946 Algunas Ruinas Prehistóricas en Quintana Roo. Boletin de la Sociedad Mexicana de Geografía y Estadística 61(3): 513–628. Gage, Thomas and J. Eric S. Thompson 1958 Thomas Gage’s Travels in the New World. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. Griffiths, Cameron B. and Sarah M. P. Jack 2005 Monumental Modified Speleothem Sculpture: New Patterns

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Isla de Cozumel. México D.F.: Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia. Stone, Andrea J. 1987 Rock Art: Cave Painting in the Maya Area. Latin American Indian Literatures Journal 3(1): 95–108. 1988 Sacrifice and Sexuality: Some Structural Relationships in Classic Maya Art. In: Virginia E. Miller (ed.), The Role of Gender in Pre-Columbian Art and Architecture, pp. 75–103. Lanham: University Press of America. Thompson, J. Eric S. 1959 The Role of Caves in Maya Culture. Mitteilungen aus dem Museum für Völkerkunde in Hamburg 25: 122–129. 1970 Maya History and Religion. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press. Tiesler, Vera 2005 What Can the Bones Really Tell Us? The Study of Human Skeletal Remains from Cenotes. In: Keith M. Prufer and James E. Brady (eds.), Stone Houses and Earth Lords. Maya Religion in a Cave Context, pp. 341–363. Boulder: University of Colorado Press. Tozzer, Alfred M. (ed.) 1941 Landa’s Relación de las cosas de Yucatan. A Translation. Papers of Peabody Museum of American Anthropology and Ethnology, Vol. 18. Cambridge: Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University. Vail, Gabrielle and Christine Hernández 2013 The Maya Codices Database, Version 4.1. A website and database available at http://www.mayacodices.org/. Villagutierre y Soto-Mayor, Juan de 1701 Historia de la conquista de la provincia de el Itza, reduccion, y progressos de la de el Lacandon y otras naciones de Indios barbaros, de la mediacion de el reyno de Guatimala, a las provincias de Yucatan. Marcus Ozozco. Villaguitierre y Soto-Mayor, Juan de and Frank Comparato (ed.) 1983 History of the Conquest of the Province of the Itza. Culver City: Labyrinthos. Vogt, Evon Z. and David Stuart 2005 Some Notes on Ritual Caves among the Ancient and Modern Maya. In: James E. Brady and Keith M. Prufer (eds.), In the Maw of the Earth Monster: Mesoamerican Ritual Cave Use, pp. 155–185. Austin: University of Texas Press.

How the Hell? Thoughts on the Colonial Demonization of the Maya Underworld Jesper Nielsen University of Copenhagen

Abstract This paper discusses how the 16th century application of Euro-Christian and Classical models upon Mesoamerican cosmology has influenced some of our most important descriptions of the underworld of the Maya. Michael Coe (1975) first pointed out that the formation of the Maya Hell was a result of preconceived ideas in the minds of friars like Diego de Landa, but here I delve deeper into the process of the transformation of an originally ambiguous Maya underworld into a Judeo-Christian scheme centered on sin, punishment and the abode of evil. Looking beyond the dialectic perception of the underworld as a diametrical opposition to the heavenly sphere, we may grasp new aspects of the pre-Columbian Maya understanding of the world below.

Resumen En este artículo se analiza cómo influyó la aplicación de los modelos del cristianismo europeo y de la antigüedad clásica en la cosmología mesoamericana en algunas de las descripciones más importantes del inframundo maya. Michael Coe (1975) fue quien señaló por primera vez que la formación del infierno maya fue el resultado de ideas preconcebidas por parte de los frailes, como Diego de Landa. Sin embargo, en el presente estudio, yo profundizo con mayor detenimiento en el proceso de la transformación de un inframundo maya originalmente ambiguo, a un planteamiento judeocristiano enfocado en el pecado, el castigo y la morada del mal. Si miramos más allá de la percepción dialéctica del inframundo, en donde este está en el extremo opuesto con respecto a la esfera celestial, podremos captar nuevos aspectos acerca del entendimiento de los mayas prehispánicos sobre el mundo inferior.

In 1833, the king of Vietnam had an edict written in order to suppress Christian missionaries within his realm. The first lines read: I, Minh-Mang, the king, speak thus. For many years men from the Occident have been preaching the religion of Christianity and deceiving the public, teaching them that there is a mansion of supreme bliss and a dungeon of dreadful misery. They have no respect for Buddha and no reverence for ancestors: Could anything more contrary to reason and custom be imagined? (cited from Hughes 1968: 7)

This quote will serve to remind us that the idea of a heavenly paradise and fiery, underground hell –conceived as two diametrically opposed realms– is not universal, and when Christian missionaries attempted to impose this particular worldview onto other societies and cultures, it was not always welcome, and it was not always accepted in the first place. In this brief article I present some observations on how the 16th century application of Euro-Christian and Classical models of the cosmos upon Mesoamerican worldview and religion seem to have affected some of our most important descriptions of central concepts in Maya worldview– and in Mesoamerican

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cosmology more broadly speaking. I will concentrate on the early colonial sources, such as Diego de Landa’s Relación de las Cosas de Yucatán (Tozzer 1941) and the Popol Wuj (Christenson 2003), that provide information on the underworld, its inhabitants and its possible role in Maya concepts of the afterlife. In several cases I make comparisons with central Mexico, and the Aztec in particular. Although there may have been differences in how, for instance, Xibalba and Mictlan were perceived in these two regions of Mesoamerica, there is a general consent that Mesoamerican religious traditions shared numerous fundamental ideas and features across time and space that do in fact make such comparative studies worthwhile. As first pointed out by Michael Coe the formation of the Maya “Hell” was very much a product of the preconceived ideas about the underworld in the minds of friars like Landa (Coe 1975). Following a definition of hell as “a divinely sanctioned place of eternal torment for the wicked” (Bernstein 1993: 3), I believe a fundamental issue at play here, is the Judeo-Christian tradition’s definitive distinction between the ultimate good and evil, both in terms of supernatural entities (God / Jesus / Virgin Mary versus Satan) and locations (Paradise versus Hell) –something that cannot readily be identified in pre-Columbian Mesoamerican religions, cosmologies and ideas of the sacred landscape (see Diaz 2015). Thus, we should approach the subject of Mesoamerican cosmologies and cosmographies by questioning some of the analytical categories that tend to predispose our understanding of these otherworldly spaces –derived from a Western, Christian point of view, such as the conviction that “heaven” is always and only a fixed space above us, and the “underworld” exclusively a subterranean, dark place inhabited by dreadful and dangerous creatures (see also discussion in Graham 2011: 59–85; Somohano, this volume). As part of this we must also familiarize ourselves with the historiographical background concerning central cosmological concepts and models from medieval and renaissance Europe (see Diaz 2011; Mikulska 2015; Nielsen and Reunert 2015). This perspective is particular pertinent due to the fact that these concepts have played a major role in the way the Mesoamerican cosmos has been restructured since the first half of the 16th century. In an earlier study Toke Reunert and I have suggested that the multi-layered cosmic model that has become generally accepted to a degree of near-orthodoxy is in fact based on a limited set of colonial sources, and we suggested that the cosmological scheme of 13 layers in the heaven and 9 in the underworld was only introduced after the European conquest, rather than reflecting a genuinely pre-Columbian conception of the cosmos (Nielsen and Reunert 2009). In the following I employ a similar critical approach to our accustomed way of talking and writing about the “below” in Maya and Mesoamerican cosmology, as well as where such notions and preconceptions may have come from in the first place.

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Before turning to a more detailed discussion of the underworld and its “hellish” attributes, I will briefly place this study and some of its underlying methodological and theoretical considerations in a broader framework within the field of

Mesoamerican and early colonial studies. The growing realization and awareness that the period saw a close collaboration and mutual influence of Mesoamerican and Euro-Christian individuals, religious concepts, cultural practices and languages etc. has challenged previous views on the period and the formation of post-Conquest Mesoamerican colonial societies (e.g., Ricard 1966; Kubler 1961). A series of highly influential works have re-approached and reinterpreted the contact period and the colonial sources, asking new questions of old issues and challenging long-held views –among them are the seminal works by James Lockhart on the Nawas after the conquest (1992), those by Nancy Farriss (1984), Inga Clendinnen (1987) and Matthew Restall (1997) on the Maya in the aftermath of the Spanish invasion, as well as the new perspectives on the role of the indigenous population in the conquest recently offered by various authors (e.g., Restall 1998, 2003; Matthew and Oudijk 2007). In a similar vein, Stephanie Wood has examined how the conquest, Europeans and European material culture were perceived by the native inhabitants of central Mexico (Wood 2003). A number of studies have focused on the religious beliefs and practices of the post-Conquest period, including the reinterpretation and appropriation of Euro-Christian ideas by indigenous populations, as well as their role in the production of religious images in books and on the walls of churches and monasteries in New Spain (e.g., Peterson 1993, 1995; Schroeder and Poole 2007; and several contributions in Cecil and Pugh 2009), whereas others have investigated the increasing conflicts between the emerging bi-cultural indigenous leadership and the Inquisition (Lopes Don 2010). Furthermore, an increasing number of articles and books have been published specifically on the topic of the syncretistic process of intermingling of Old and New World religious ideas, that is, the adoption and remodeling of Christian themes and concepts that led to the creation of what can be called Mexican Catholicism(s), including what is sometimes referred to as Nawa Christianity and Maya Catholicism (Graham 2011; Christensen 2013). The important issue of conversion and the closely related question of language and religion and the transmittal of religious ideas and concepts across language boundaries was first treated in depth in Louise Burkhart’s classic book The Slippery Earth: Nahua-Christian Dialogue in Sixteenth-Century Mexico (Burkhart 1989), a milestone in the research on the evangelization process in New Spain (see also Díaz Balsera 2005) and specifically the highly complex situation of transferring Christian concepts into an indigenous language, a subject also investigated by other scholars (Anderson 1993; Christensen 2013; Kirkhusmo Pharo 2007, 2009). Descriptions of the indigenous cosmos appear in several early colonial documents from Mesoamerica, although often in a fragmented and/or contradictory fashion and it is nearly impossible to find two sources that offer the same exact version of the cosmological structure. For the late 16th century missionaries, and for most late 19th and early 20th century Mesoamericanists, the Mesoamerican universe consisted of three basic and clearly defined and differentiated spaces. Heaven was conceived of as a well-lit, diaphanous place, whereas the underworld was a dark, ominous region to which the majority of the dead were confined. Between them,

How the Hell? Thoughts on the Colonial Demonization of the Maya Underworld

the earth was seen as an intermediate, neutral space inhabited by men. Scholars have suggested that in almost all of the so-called “ancient civilizations”, such as the Egyptian, the Sumerian and ancient Greek, similar beliefs existed, indicating that they were all different versions of a universal concept and shared cosmological structure (e.g., Matos Moctezuma 2013). Although such generalizations have been criticized in recent years (see Olivier 2010; Sahlins 1996, 2008; Nielsen and Reunert 2009), the topic has not yet received the attention it deserves in Mesoamerican studies. However, it should be acknowledged that this structure is only one of many possible ways of presenting what could very well have been a much more dynamic and less static cosmological model. Although several fundamental aspects were undoubtedly held common, there was probably never one, stable pan-Mesoamerican vision of the universe from the Preclassic to the Postclassic. One way of approaching and perceiving the upperworld and the underworld is by visualizing them as multifaceted regions, as complex as many of the Mesoamerican deities and supernatural entities, and thus impossible to categorize in simplistic “light-dark”, “good-evil”, “alive-dead” opposition pairs that dominate much of the Judeo-Christian way of thinking, and –to some degree– western scholarly traditions (Graham 2011: 64–66). In her book Mexican and Central American Mythology, Irene Nicholson stated that: “From a flat cross-section of the world represented by the cardinal points and diverse colours, there rose a ladder of thirteen rungs leading to heaven; and another leading downward by nine steps to hell” (Nicholson 1967: 22).

This view more or less sums up the general idea of Mesoamerican cosmology, and similar views are not uncommon in textbooks on the Maya or other Mesoamerican cultures. Here it is important to emphasize that I do not argue that there is no distinction between the concept of an underworld and the celestial realm in Mesoamerican beliefs, or that there were no frightening aspects of the darkness of the world below, but we know that the sky also housed powerful and feared creatures. From the Aztecs, for example, we know that entities, phenomena and qualities normally attributed to the underworld could also be associated with the heavenly realm, such as the feared fleshless star demons of darkness tzitzime or lethal rays of Venus deities (see Miller and Taube 1993: 166, 180–181, 176). Thus, the sources quickly shatter the image of an exclusively paradisiacal heaven. However, scholars have often, perhaps unwittingly, reproduced, through their choice of words (nouns, adjectives, etc.), the Biblical worldview and the definitive distinction between two supernatural locations: One for the ultimate good and one for the ultimate evil. Karl Taube thus entitled his article on centipedes and serpents in Maya iconography “Maws of Heaven and Hell”, but never used the two terms again, except from the conclusion where he talks about “the hellish realm” and the “dark depths of Metnal” (Taube 2003: 438), contrasting it with a paradise-like garden in the heavens. Thus, the concepts of a heavenly paradise and a hellish underworld and the associated terminology that was introduced in the colonial period still

affects our way of thinking and writing about the realm of the underworld. Mary Miller and Linda Schele (1986: 267–268) stated that the Classic Maya Hell was different from Xibalba described in the Popol Wuj, and then, somewhat self-contradictory, went on to describe what Classic Maya Xibalbans looked like –describing wahy creatures and death gods. Yet, the term Xibalba is not attested in any known glyphic text. We do not have a secure term for the entire underworld in Maya inscriptions (although we do have mythological toponyms that refer to watery, dark and underworldly places, see Stuart and Houston 1994: 69–80) and we are not able to say with certainty whether wahy creatures were only to be encountered in underworld-like environments.

Other Underworlds: A Comparative Perspective In order to approach the significance and symbolism associated with the underworld or the “below” in Mesoamerica, I believe a broad comparative perspective, geographically as well as chronological, offers the most appropriate frame of understanding. In pre-industrial agricultural societies we thus often find that the underworld was morally neutral (Bernstein 1993: 8). In ancient Mesopotamia it was believed that beneath earth existed a cavernous underworld, a dry and dark place where the city of the dead was located, and where the souls of the dead, the gods of the underworld and the spirits of diseases lived (Trigger 2003: 450). In the minds of the Babylonians the underworld was essentially a storehouse of the dead. To the Greeks and Romans of the Classical world the underworld was the recipient of the dead, but equally the “[s]ource of fertile crops pushing their way upward to the sun, [and] the underworld also symbolized rebirth” (Russell 1997: 18), and conceived of as a “granary for seed […] and a warehouse for the dead” (Bernstein 1993: 22). As further pointed out by Alan Bernstein in his book The Formation of Hell there was to the Greek an overlap “between the underworld as grave (necropolis, city of the dead, catacomb) and granary, the connection between the inner earth and the fertility of its surface” (Bernstein 1993: 39). Among the Inka, the realm beneath the earth was known as hurin or ucu pacha, and was associated with the night and with the creator god known as Viracocha (Trigger 2003: 451; see also Urton 1999: 36–37). As Bruce Trigger summarized it: “Most cosmographies posited some form of counterpart of the sky located under the earth. Especially in civilizations that interred the dead, this underworld was equated with death and decay and populated with the deities, spirits, and souls of the dead. Because the surface of the earth provided food for humans, it was often concluded that the underworld was a place of regeneration, where death gave rise to new life” (Trigger 2003: 454).

We thus find a repeated pattern where the underworld is a highly ambiguous and two-sided place, containing what we would characterize as creative as well as destructive powers.

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This is also evident in the representations of the androgynous 2008). It is therefore noteworthy that in the rich corpus of Aztec earth god Tlaltecuhtli which embodies the earth and pre-Columbian inscriptions and iconography the notion of soil which receives the dead, transforms the corpses and then a blissful heaven and a horrible hell-like netherworld is not (re)produces life (Miller and Taube 1993: 167–168; López well confirmed. As for the already-mentioned wahy creatures, Luján 2010: 101–118). Tlatecuhtli is thus responsible for the we have two examples, both from Copan, that suggest that consumption of the dead and giving birth to new life, and they indeed did inhabit the underworld, or to be more precise, in this sense the underworld is best described as a place of the inside of the earth and mountains. On Copan Stela N such regenerative powers, a place of decomposing and germina- wahy beings thus appear from the maws of the underworld tion. It is certainly also a strange and dark place –unknown, –yet, they do so along with deified regal ancestors, which do unfamiliar and the home of the dead, it was comparable to not confirm their abode as a hell-like, evil place. On the fathis world, yet completely different. As such it was a place mous incised peccary skull wahy entities are shown in another that most people would fear. world, and through a quatrefoil portal we seem to be given a glimpse of the earthly realm, with two, seated human lords, If we turn to a few ethnographic monographs that have named mak’om ‘tapaderos’– probably referring to their role recorded present-day Maya concept of the cosmos, we often as the ones who keep the portal shut or decides when to open find the Euro-Christian heaven-hell opposition confirmed, it (see Helmke and Nielsen 2009: 57). What is important to including the belief that the death god Kisin is a devilish stress here, is that we are not provided with a name of their creature of the underworld who will torment liars, murderers home, and although this is apparently somewhere within and sinners, and some researchers seem to have accepted the earth, there is nothing as such to suggest that this was this as evidence of a continuity of such beliefs from pre-Co- an exclusively terrible or hellish place. Rather, the overall lumbian times until the present. This is particular clear in impression provided by the iconographic corpus is that the some studies of, or based upon, Lacandon Maya beliefs doc- underworld was as a dark and ambivalent place, and home to umented in the early 20th century (e.g., Tozzer 1907: 156; complementary forces and entities. Vail 1998: 176–177). This is evident in the myth called U K’ak’il Metla’an (‘The Fires of Metlan’) where a Lacandon man is shown the terrors of the underworld which awaits all Translating Supernatural Realms sinners. Jon McGee (1990: 108–111) who fails to recognize the obvious Christian influence in the story notes: “If a [dead] Turning now to a more narrow focus on the early colonial person is guilty of theft, lying, or murder during his or her sources, from which so many of our interpretations of Meslife, the Sukunkyum [chief lord of the underworld and of oamerican religious beliefs derive, a first and critical step is souls after death] gives the soul to Kisin (the god of death) to constantly be aware of the cultural bias and expectations for punishment” (McGee 1990: 108). Others, however, have of the friars who authored the majority of these sources. In long been viewing concepts such as sin and punishment in the the minds of most Europeans of the early 16th century Mesoaafterlife, not as indigenous, but as Christian imports. As Rob- merican peoples like the Aztec were conceived of as civilized ert Redfield commented in The Folk Culture of Yucatan, there pagans, and in order to describe and understand their heathen are several elements in Yucatec Maya religion and worldview practices, writers like Bernardino de Sahagún occasionally that can be ascribed to Catholic Christianity, among them: compared Aztec deities and rituals with those of the ancient “the devil, punishment after death, a celestial heaven and a Greeks and Romans –the civilized pagans of the Old World. subterranean hell, the Last Judgement, elements of the story Thus, Classical gods became templates for Mexica deities, of the birth of Christ and the Passion” (Redfield 1941: 91; see as when Sahagún describes Huitzilopochtli as “otro Heralso Farriss 1984: 286–319). Why so few other Euro-Chris- cules” and Tezcatlipoca as “otro Jupiter” (Sahagún 1979: I: tian concepts appear to have taken root among the Lacandon 10). Eventually, however, Huitzilopochtli became identified remains to be explained, but the notion of a separation of with the devil, and his name entered European culture as a the dead according to their deeds and behavior while they synonym for the great enemy in Christian theology (Boone were alive, and assigning sinners to a place of punishment 1989). Another example of an attempt to translate an aspect of does not seem to be of pre-Columbian Mesoamerican origin. a Mesoamerican culture is of course Landa’s famous “ABC” Apart from such hybrid forms, we also encounter narratives of Maya writing. In this particular case, the Franciscan’s opabout the underworld that may in fact reflect a larger degree tions for Old World comparisons were severely limited and of continuity from pre-Columbian times. For example, as he obviously had immense problems in understanding and described by anthropologist Timothy Knab, the underworld recording a script that was not alphabetic, and thus ended up of the present-day Nawa of the Sierra in Puebla, known as with no more than 27 hieroglyphic signs (notwithstanding Talocan, is not a hellish place, but rather a mirror image of the immense importance this list of signs has had as a “Rothe our world, yet existing in darkness and only accessible in setta Stone” in the decipherment of Maya writing) (e.g., Coe dreams through caves, streams and wells. To underscore the 1992). In the central Mexican highlands, when realizing that resemblance to the world of the living, Talocan has its own the Nawatl-speaking peoples believed that one of several afterworlds was described as a fertile and beautiful place full towns and county seats –14 of them all– connected by roads and buses (Knab 1991, 1995). Allen Christenson has docu- of rivers, springs and trees, and referred to as Tlalocan, the mented similar ideas among the Tz’utujil Maya of Santiago friars were quick to merge and equate this location with the Atitlan who describe the world of the dead as identical to Christian idea of “Paradise” (Peterson 1993: 136–137; see also Russell 1997: 12–17). In this logic, the afterworld situthis one and located within a sacred mountain (Christenson

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ated below us, Mictlan, could only be equated with hell –and thermore said to be inhabited by spirits that cause sickness. J. so it was. In some cases, the friars must have felt that their Eric S. Thompson noted that the same term for the underworld suspicions that the indigenous populations were worshipping is found in Moran’s Cholti dictionary (Thompson 1938: 595; and communicating with the devil in Hell were indeed con- see also Tozzer 1941: 132, note 617), and Taube notes that firmed. In Mesoamerican iconography (and in Aztec writing) in Colonial Yucatec: “The root xib has such connotations as caves were frequently represented as the mouth of an “earth ‘death’ and ‘fright’”, whereas xibalbail is translated as “cosa monster”, whereas a strikingly similar motif, almost identical, infernal” and xibalbayen as “cosa diabólica” (Taube 1994: in Christian iconography, the Mouth of Hell, represented the 13). Landa makes reference to a dance called “Xibalba okot” entrance to the realm of Satan and were sometimes depict- or as he translates it: “dance of the devil” (Tozzer 1941: 147). ed as a naturalistically looking cave mouth (Hughes 1968: However, friar Thomás Coto informs us that to the Kaqchikel: 175–201; Graham 2011: 265–272). For the Mesoamericans, “Xibalbay significaba demonio o los difuntos o visiones que however, caves were used for a series of varied and complex se aparecían a los indios” (cited from Mendoza 1962: 79; ritual performances, and were associated with rain, fertility, my emphasis). In other words, apart from the cultural bias emergence, the first humans and the beginning of history – expressed by the term ‘demonio’, we here see that Xibalba not the entrance to a place of eternal suffering (e.g., Heyden was also simply a place associated with the dead. These few 1975; Taube 1986; Brady and Prufer 2005; Prufer and Brady examples serve to remind us about the dubious character of 2005; Nielsen and Brady 2006; Helmke 2009). In this case, some of the colonial period translations and the subsequent then, the manner of representation was stunningly similar cosmological reconstructions based upon them (see also Nielbut the content and meaning of the imagery was far from it. sen and Fritz Hansen 2015). Words like “infernal, diabolical” and “devil” were used for very different kinds of supernatural With regard to the Maya underworld and its inhabitants, entities and locations, and we must therefore also consider the colonial sources provide us with some interesting descrip- whether Christian perceptions and values have already crept tions. Beginning with Landa’s Relación from c. 1566 we read into the Popol Wuj, which is normally considered more or the following (Tozzer 1941: 131–132, see also Coe 1975: 89): less free of Euro-Christian influence. For instance, when the Hero Twins have defeated the lords of Xibalba and tell them that they no longer will be given “the children of the light” “The penalties of a bad life, which they said that the bad as their offerings: “Only the sinner and the malevolent, the would suffer, were to go to a place lower than the other, wretch and the molester who clearly have sinned, will be which they called Metnal, which means “hell” and be torgiven to you” (Christenson 2003: 187). This description does mented in it by the devils and by great extremities of hunger, not correspond to what we know from the central Mexican cold, fatigue and grief. They maintained that there was in sources, in which we are informed that an individual’s postthis place a devil, the prince of all the devils, whom they all death destiny did not depend on one’s moral behavior while obeyed, and they call him in their language Hunhau”. alive, but rather the circumstances of his or her death (e.g, Dibble and Anderson 1978: 41–49). Assuming that comparable beliefs existed among the Late Postclassic K’iche’, this In this telling quote, we immediately recognize Landa’s Eu- passage from the Popol Wuj may reflect Christian thoughts ro-Christian bias and the influence of a Christian cosmolo- associated with Hell and underworldly punishment for those gical template. Interestingly, he notes that Metnal (or Mitnal who have been sinful in their earthly lives. It is interesting to and presumably a loanword from Aztec Mictlan) was ruled by note that the expression ”Children of the light” also appears a devil prince, named Hunhau (Hunahau), that is, Jun Ajaw or in the Bible, in Thessalonians (5:5) where Paul says: ”Ye are ‘1 Lord’. In the early 17th century Motul Maya Dictionary the all children of light, and children of the day: we are not of variant term Cumhau is translated as ‘Lucifer, prince of the the night, nor of darkness”. Thus, a sharp divide between the devils’ (see Tozzer 1941: 132; Christensen 2013: 40–41, see righteous, associated with light and the day, and the sinners, also Vail in press), a term also employed by the Franciscans in linked to the darkness of the night was used as metaphorical central Mexico for Mictlantecuhtli, the ruler of the Aztec un- means to express the two core concepts of ‘good’ and ‘evil’. derworld Mictlan (Burkhart 2000: 152). It has been suggested Although the expression “children of the light” (saqil k’ajol) that Jun Ajaw is a reference to Kisin, one of the Maya death was in use in K’iche’ before the Spanish conquest to signify gods, or to one of the Hero Twins known from Classic Maya offspring or descendants of an ancestor or the subjects of a mythology, namely Jun Ajaw. In this connection it is worth king (see Sachse, this volume), it is remarkable that it appears emphasizing that in the Popol Wuj, the Hero Twin’s father in the Popol Wuj exactly where the text describes the sepaand uncle, Jun Junajpuj and his brother Wuqub’ Junajpuj find ration of the souls of the rightful and those of sinners. This a symmetrical set of rulers in Xibalba, namely Jun Kame and would suggest that even though the expression was known Wuqub Kame, ‘One Death’ and ‘Seven Death’. The relation- and used before the introduction of Christianity in the Guaship between these two sets of brothers is poorly understood, temalan highlands, it was, in this particular case, employed but the apparent reflection of the two does suggest a deeper in order to signal a fundamental tenet in Christian theology. significance and cosmological symmetry. That Xibalba was indeed a rather complex supernatural The toponym Xibalba is translated by Allen Christenson location is revealed by the fact that even though it was considas ‘Place of Fear’ and this underworldly realm is ruled by the ered the abode of death gods, as well as supernatural entities aforementioned death lords (Christenson 2003: 114), and fur- responsible for diseases, it also fathered the daughter, the

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maiden Xkik’ or ‘Lady Blood’, who eventually became the mother of the Hero Twins, and who was partly a product of the underworld. Furthermore, it is from the underworld that maize is reborn (at least in the Classic period version of the Hero Twin myth). Thus, in the Popol Wuj we may be looking at a somewhat skewed image of the underworld, emphasizing the features that corresponded with the Christian Hell. It would seem that to the Maya Xibalba was indeed a dark, unfamiliar place of strong and powerful forces related to life and death, and as such a feared place –but it contained both malevolent as well as benevolent powers.

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interpret references and images related to the underworld, its layout and denizens (see also Fitzsimmons 2014). In my point of view, some of the questions I believe we need to pose ourselves are for example: Are wahy creatures truly the inhabitants of an underworld, or do we simply expect them to belong there? Is the abode of the death deities exclusively that of the underworld? We should not simply assume that supernatural creatures that look dreadful and horrible to us belonged only to an underworldly sphere, and in particular not so knowing how biased the colonial sources are on such issues. Perhaps we should rather think of the underworld as a place with different locations or sections, some good, or perhaps rather neutral and relatively safe, and others dangerous. In this sense the “below” could constitute a mirror image of the everyday world experienced by the Maya in which the kaaj or kab (‘village and associated lands’) and luum (‘agricultural lands’) contrasted with wild and dangerous k’a’ax (‘forest, uncultivated lands’) (Restall 1997: 19–40; Tokovinine 2013: 43; see also Grube 2014).

Comparing these observations with the data from central Mexico, some interesting parallels become apparent. Sahagún, in the Spanish text of the Appendix to Book 3 of the Florentine Codex, refers to Mictlan as “Infierno” and Mictlantecuhtli is described simply as a “diablo” (Sahagún 1979: III: fol. v23). In the Nawatl-Spanish part of Alonso de Molina’s dictionary the pattern is the same, and Mictlan is thus translated as “Hell” and mictlancayotl is “something hellish” (Molina 2008 [1571]: 56). However, Sahagún also 40 years ago Michael Coe wrote about: “bloodcurdling lets us know that Mictlantecuhtli and his consort Mictecaci- monsters from the depths of Xibalbá” (Coe 1978: 13), and huatl were equally referred to as “Our father and our mother” Maya deities like God A and God L were uniformly described (Dibble and Anderson 1969: 21, 27; see Mikulska 2015). as gods of the underworld. Likewise, Gabrielle Vail noted In a recent study of Aztec cosmology, Katarzyna Mikulska that several Maya deities in the codices have associations observes that there are more similarities than differences be- with “death and sacrifice, suggesting a connection to the tween the heavenly location of Omeyocan and Mictlan, since underworld” (Vail 1998: 169). Yet, only in very few cases is both are considered the residence of a creator god, and she it clear that these deities are in fact associated with this locanotes that as much in Mictlan, as in Omeyocan, the creation tion and not any other supernatural realm. Thus, the evidence and birth of human beings are accomplished (Mikulska 2015). seems limited when it comes to any fixed placement in the Thus, Mictlan ‘the place of the dead’ is, to use Mikulska’s cosmological scheme. As a skeletal or decomposing figure, description “the source of life-giving bone matter”, and the God A is certainly associated with death and the underworld bony, skeletal appearance of the ruling couple of Mictlan is undoubtedly one of his domains, but I think we should be not only indicate their quality as dead, but at the same time, careful not to lock him up down there, so to speak. Thus, he their capacity to create or recreate. I suspect that to the Maya also appears alongside other deities not normally considered Xibalba and Metnal were originally places very much like inhabitants of the underworld, and God A may in fact be a Mictlan. However, the descriptions that have come down to much more complex and nuanced entity, akin to Mictlanteus, affected in various degrees by Euro-Christian theology cuhtli in Aztec religion. The role and abode of another underand cosmology, sought, whether purposefully or inadver- world deity, God L, is equally unclear with closer scrutiny. tently, to correlate the Mesoamerican underworlds with Hell, As Taube points out, Günter Zimmermann first characterized thereby reducing or completely neglecting the complexity God L as a benevolent deity, but later Coe identified him as and complementarity of these. As Louise Burkhart (2000: “one of the principal lords of the underworld” (Taube 1994: 147) has formulated it concerning Mictlan, the underworld 79). According to Taube, God L is god of the underworld regions and: “One of the most striking images of his underwas: “no longer the cold and shadowy but morally neutral place into which the spirits of ordinary mortals had always world office occurs on the Princeton Vase” (Taube 1994: 79). This is arguably the most well-known portrait of God L, but faded away”. what qualifies this as a scene taking place in an underworld court? Thus, it is not readily apparent what qualifies the palatial scene as one situated in the underworld, and the presence Concluding Remarks of what might be the Jaguar God of the Underworld on the In a recent book on death and the Classic Maya kings, James roof comb would seem to be only an indication of God L’s Fitzsimmons notes: “While studies have been made of its established association with darkness and the underworld general properties and inhabitants, there continues to be some realm. In fact, Taube provides ample evidence that God L confusion as to what is properly an Underworld motif ver- was a highly complex figure: “having both mortuary and sus a supernatural one” (2009: 48). In this regard I agree life-giving attributes” (Taube 1994: 81), and his role as a with Fitzsimmons, because what do we actually know of deity associated with trade and riches is also well-known. In the geography, or topography, of the pre-Columbian Maya other words, we can observe some of the same dual, compleunderworld and its inhabitants? In spite of his comment and mentary roles as noted for the central Mexican underworld call for further studies, Fitzsimmons approach the subject deities. Furthermore, the narrative of the Regal Rabbit Vase within the established framework of how to perceive and (K1398) shows us that the doings of God L were by no means

How the Hell? Thoughts on the Colonial Demonization of the Maya Underworld

confined to the underworld (e.g., Helmke 2012: 181–183), and he most certainly also interacted with deities in other otherworldy realms. In conclusion, it can be said that our models for the Maya and Mesoamerican underworlds are to a great extent based upon, or influenced by, Euro-Christian colonial sources that sought to create parallels with Christian cosmology and the idea of Hell, the terrible and undesirable place of punishment. We thus seem to have inherited the notion that dangerous and evil creatures are only, or mainly, found below us –reached through caves that lead to the dark regions within earth. As phrased by Gabrielle Vail: “The categorization of Maya k’uh as demonios or dioses undertaken by the Franciscan friars led to the development of a dichotomy between the celestial and underworld regions” (Vail in press). Therefore it is problematic to describe Maya religion as permeated by a dualistic theme based on oppositions rather than complementarity, or, as one widely read textbook on the Maya puts it: “an eternal struggle between the powers of the good and the evil” (Sharer and Traxler 2006: 730). Future studies should aim to look beyond the Euro-Christian dialectic perception of the underworld as the diametrical opposition to the heavenly sphere. Again, this is not to deny that the Maya and other Mesoamerican peoples believed in dreaded and feared beings of the dark, interior spaces below us. Human experiences and observations based on venturing underground surely laid the foundation and continuously reaffirmed the notion that this is a dark, wet and unwelcoming location where ordinary human senses are challenged or suspended –as if being momentarily dead. Yet, as a place of moisture and darkness the womb-like underworld also contained the primordial and regenerative forces that would allow the creation of new life and emergence. Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the organizers of the 19th European Maya Conference in Bratislava and especially Milan Kováč. My sincere thanks also to Toke Reunert, Frauke Sachse, Allen Christenson, Christophe Helmke, James Brady, Karl Taube, Elizabeth Graham, and Gabrielle Vail for their helpful comments and suggestions on earlier versions of this paper. Any errors or misinterpretations, however, remain my sole responsibility.

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