Ancient Maya art is the
visual arts
The visual arts are Art#Forms, genres, media, and styles, art forms such as painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics (art), ceramics, photography, video, filmmaking, design, crafts and architecture. Many artistic disciplines such as ...
of the
Maya civilization
The Maya civilization () of the Mesoamerican people is known by its ancient temples and glyphs. Its Maya script is the most sophisticated and highly developed writing system in the pre-Columbian Americas. It is also noted for its art, ar ...
, an eastern and south-eastern
Mesoamerican
Mesoamerica is a historical region and cultural area in southern North America and most of Central America. It extends from approximately central Mexico through Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and northern Costa Rica. Withi ...
culture made up of a great number of small kingdoms in present-day Mexico,
Guatemala,
Belize
Belize (; bzj, Bileez) is a Caribbean and Central American country on the northeastern coast of Central America. It is bordered by Mexico to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and Guatemala to the west and south. It also shares a wa ...
and
Honduras. Many regional artistic traditions existed side by side, usually coinciding with the changing boundaries of Maya polities. This civilization took shape in the course of the later Preclassic Period (from c. 750 BC to 100 BC), when the first cities and monumental architecture started to develop and the hieroglyphic script came into being. Its greatest artistic flowering occurred during the seven centuries of the Classic Period (c. 250 to 950 CE).
Maya art forms tend to be more stiffly organized during the Early Classic (250-550 CE) and to become more expressive during the Late Classic phase (550-950 CE). In the course of history, influences of various other Mesoamerican cultures were absorbed. In the late Preclassic, the influence of the
Olmec
The Olmecs () were the earliest known major Mesoamerican civilization. Following a progressive development in Soconusco, they occupied the tropical lowlands of the modern-day Mexican states of Veracruz and Tabasco. It has been speculated that ...
style is still discernible (as in the
San Bartolo murals), whereas in the Early Classic, the style of central Mexican
Teotihuacan
Teotihuacan (Spanish: ''Teotihuacán'') (; ) is an ancient Mesoamerican city located in a sub-valley of the Valley of Mexico, which is located in the State of Mexico, northeast of modern-day Mexico City. Teotihuacan is known today as the ...
made itself felt, just as that of the
Toltec
The Toltec culture () was a pre-Columbian Mesoamerican culture that ruled a state centered in Tula, Hidalgo, Mexico, during the Epiclassic and the early Post-Classic period of Mesoamerican chronology, reaching prominence from 950 to 1150 CE. Th ...
in the Postclassic.
After the demise of the Classic kingdoms of the central lowlands, ancient Maya art went through an extended Postclassic phase (950-1550 CE) centered on the Yucatan peninsula, before the upheavals of the sixteenth century destroyed courtly culture and put an end to the Maya artistic tradition. Traditional art forms mainly survived in weaving, pottery, and the design of peasant houses.
Maya art history
The nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century publications on Maya art and archaeology by
Stephens
Stephens is a surname. It is a patronymic and is recorded in England from 1086.
Notable people with the surname include:
*Alexander H. Stephens (1812–1883), Vice President of the Confederate States of America
*Alison Stephens (1970–2010), Brit ...
,
Catherwood,
Maudslay,
Maler and
Charnay for the first time made available reliable drawings and photographs of major Classic Maya monuments.
Following this initial phase, the 1913 publication of Herbert Spinden 'A Study of Maya Art' (now over a century ago ) laid the foundation for all later developments of Maya art history (including iconography). The book gives an analytical treatment of themes and motifs, particularly the ubiquitous serpent and dragon motifs, and a review of the 'material arts', such as the composition of temple facades, roof combs and mask panels. Spinden's chronological treatment of Maya art was later (1950) refined by the motif analysis of the architect and specialist in archaeological drawing,
Tatiana Proskouriakoff, in her book 'A Study of Classic Maya Sculpture.
Kubler's 1969 inventory of Maya iconography, containing a site-by-site treatment of 'commemorative' images and a topical treatment of ritual and mythical images (such as the 'triadic sign'), concluded a period of gradual increase of knowledge that was soon to be overshadowed by new developments.
Starting in the early 1970s, the historiography of the Maya kingdoms – first of all, Palenque – came to occupy the forefront. Art-historical interpretation joined the historical approach pioneered by Proskouriakoff as well as the mythological approach initiated by
M.D. Coe, with a professor of art,
Linda Schele, serving as a driving force. Schiele's seminal interpretations of Maya art are found throughout her work, especially in ''The Blood of Kings'', written together with art historian
M. Miller. Maya art history was also spurred by the enormous increase in sculptural and ceramic imagery, due to extensive archaeological excavations, as well as to organized looting on an unprecedented scale. From 1973 onwards, M.D. Coe published a series of books offering pictures and interpretations of unknown Maya vases, with the Popol Vuh Twin myth for an explanatory model. In 1981, Robicsek and Hales added an inventory and classification of Maya vases painted in codex style, thereby revealing even more of a hitherto barely known spiritual world.
As to subsequent developments, important issues in Schele's iconographic work have been elaborated by
Karl Taube. New approaches to Maya art include studies of ancient Maya ceramic workshops, the representation of bodily experience and the senses in Maya art, and of hieroglyphs considered as iconographic units.
[Stone and Zender 2011] Meanwhile, the number of monographs devoted to the monumental art of specific courts is growing. A good impression of recent Mexican and North American art historical scholarship can be gathered from the exhibition catalog 'Courtly Art of the Ancient Maya' (2004).
Architecture
The layout of the Maya towns and
cities
A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be def ...
, and more particularly of the ceremonial centers where the royal families and courtiers resided, is characterized by the rhythm of immense horizontal stucco floors of plazas often located at various levels, connected by broad and often steep stairs, and surmounted by temple pyramids. Under successive reigns, the main buildings were enlarged by adding new layers of fill and stucco coating. Irrigation channels, reservoirs, and drains made up the hydraulic infrastructure. Outside the ceremonial center (especially in the southern area sometimes resembling an
acropolis
An acropolis was the settlement of an upper part of an ancient Greek city, especially a citadel, and frequently a hill with precipitous sides, mainly chosen for purposes of defense. The term is typically used to refer to the Acropolis of Athens, ...
) were the structures of lesser nobles, smaller temples, and individual shrines, surrounded by the wards of the commoners. Dam-like causeways (
sacbe
Sacbe at Dzibilchaltun in the Yucatán
Arch at the end of the sacbé, Kabah, Yucatán
A sacbe, plural sacbeob ( Yucatec Maya: singular ''sakbej'', plural ''sakbejo'ob''), or "white way", is a raised paved road built by the Maya civilization of p ...
ob) spread from the 'ceremonial centers' to other nuclei of habitation. Fitting in with the concept of a '
theatre state', more attention appears to have been given to aesthetics than to solidity of construction. Careful attention, however, was placed on directional orientation.
Among the various types of stone structures should be mentioned:
*Ceremonial platforms (usually less than 4 meters in height)
*Courtyards and palaces
*Other residential buildings, such as a writers' house and a possible council house in Copan
*Temples and temple pyramids, the latter often containing burials and burial chambers in their base or fill, with sanctuaries on top; outstanding example are the many clustered dynastic burial temples of Tikal
North Acropolis
*
Ball courts
*Sweat baths, particularly those of
Piedras Negras and
Xultun Xultún is a large Maya archaeological site located 40 km northeast of Tikal and 8 km south of the smaller Preclassic site of San Bartolo in northern Guatemala.
Site
The site, which once supported a considerable population, has a 35 m ...
, the latter one with remains of stucco decoration.
Among the structural ensembles are:
*'
Triadic pyramids' consisting of a dominant structure flanked by two smaller inward-facing buildings, all mounted upon a single basal platform;
*'
E-groups
E-Groups are unique Maya architecture, architectural complexes found among a number of ancient Maya civilization, Maya settlements. They are central components to the settlement organization of Maya sites and, like many other civic and ceremonial ...
' consisting of a square platform with a low four-stepped pyramid on the west side and an elongated structure, or, alternatively, three small structures, on the eastern side;
*'
Twin pyramid complexes', with identical four-stepped pyramids on the east and west sides of a small plaza; a building with nine doorways on the south side; and a small enclosure on the north side housing a sculpted stela with its altar and commemorating the king's performance of a
k'atun-ending ceremony.
In the palaces and temple rooms, the '
corbelled vault
A corbel arch (or corbeled / corbelled arch) is an arch-like construction method that uses the architectural technique of corbeling to span a space or void in a structure, such as an entranceway in a wall or as the span of a bridge. A corbel v ...
' was often applied. Though not an effective means to increase interior space, as it required thick stone walls to support the high ceiling, some temples utilized repeated arches, or a corbelled vault, to construct an inner sanctuary (e.g., that of the Temple of the Cross at Palenque).
The northern Maya area (Campeche and Yucatan) shows characteristics of its own. Its Classic
Puuc, Chenes, and
Rio Bec architecture is characterized by ornamentation in stone; geometrical reduction of realistic decoration; stacking of rain god snouts to build facades; use of portals shaped like serpent mouths; and, in the Rio Bec area, the use of solid pseudo temple-pyramids. The most important Puuc site is
Uxmal
Uxmal ( Yucatec Maya: ''Óoxmáal'' ) is an ancient Maya city of the classical period located in present-day Mexico. It is considered one of the most important archaeological sites of Maya culture, along with Palenque, Chichen Itza and Calakmul ...
.
Chichen Itza
Chichen Itza , es, Chichén Itzá , often with the emphasis reversed in English to ; from yua, Chiʼchʼèen Ìitshaʼ () "at the mouth of the well of the Itza people" was a large pre-Columbian city built by the Maya people of the Termi ...
, dominating Yucatán from the Late Classic to well into the Post-Classic, features Classic buildings in Chenes and Puuc style as well as Post-Classic building types of Mexican derivation, such as the radial four-staircase pyramid, the colonnaded hall, and the circular temple. The latter features were inherited by the succeeding kingdom of
Mayapan.
Far to the South, the Guatemalan Highlands had their own longstanding building traditions. However, by the Classic period, settlements did by and large not participate in the great artistic traditions of the Lowland area. In the Postclassic period, the architecture of relatively young hilltop sites, such as the Quiché capital
Q'umarkaj, shows strong Toltec influences, not unlike the architecture of Chichén Itzá and Mayapán to the north. No significant murals or sculptures have been preserved from the Postclassic Highlands.
MayaHouse.JPG, Chichen Itza, traditional Maya house
0150 Palenque.JPG, Palenque, Temple of the Inscriptions, Late Classic
File:Tikal Temple II.jpg, Tikal Temple II, Late Classic
Sayil Palacio.jpg, Multistoried palace, Sayil, Yucatan, Late Classic
File:Uxmal - Nunnery - panoramio.jpg, Uxmal, ''Nunnery'' building, frieze with stacked rain god snouts at corner, Late Classic
File:Copán Ballcourt.jpg, Ball court, Copan, Late Classic
Chichen Itza 3.jpg, Chichen Itza, radial pyramid '' El Castillo'', Postclassic
Stone sculpture
The main Preclassic sculptural style from the Maya area is that of
Izapa
Izapa is a very large pre-Columbian archaeological site located in the Mexican state of Chiapas; it is best known for its occupation during the Late Formative period. The site is situated on the Izapa River, a tributary of the Suchiate River, ...
, a large site on the Pacific coast where many stelas and (frog-shaped) altars were found showing motifs also present in
Olmec
The Olmecs () were the earliest known major Mesoamerican civilization. Following a progressive development in Soconusco, they occupied the tropical lowlands of the modern-day Mexican states of Veracruz and Tabasco. It has been speculated that ...
art. The stelas, mostly without inscriptions, often show mythological and narrative subjects, some of which appear to relate to the Twin myth of the
Popol Vuh
''Popol Vuh'' (also ''Popol Wuj'' or ''Popul Vuh'' or ''Pop Vuj'') is a text recounting the mythology and history of the Kʼicheʼ people, one of the Maya peoples, who inhabit Guatemala and the Mexican states of Chiapas, Campeche, Yucatan a ...
. However, next to nothing is known about the settlement's former ethnic composition. Artistically, Izapa is closely related to
Kaminaljuyú, a huge and almost completely destroyed site once dominating the Guatemalan Highlands. Among its scattered remains are highlights of Late Preclassic sculpture, such as an altar with an intricate figural relief accompanied by a long inscription (Monument 10).
For the Classic Period of the Mayas, the following major classes of stone sculpture (usually executed in limestone) may be distinguished.
*Stelas. These are large, elongated stone slabs usually covered with carvings and inscriptions, and often accompanied by round altars. Typical of the Classical period, most of them depict the rulers of the cities they were located in, often disguised as gods. Although the rulers' faces, particularly during the later Classic Period, are naturalistic in style, they usually do not show individual traits; but there are notable exceptions to this rule (e.g.,
Piedras Negras, stela 35). The most famous stelas are from
Copan and nearby
Quirigua. These are outstanding for their intricateness of detail, those of Quirigua also for sheer height (stela E measuring over 7 metres above ground level and 3 below). Both the Copan and
Tonina stelas approach sculptures in the round. From
Palenque
Palenque (; Yucatec Maya: ), also anciently known in the Itza Language as Lakamhaʼ ("Big Water or Big Waters"), was a Maya city state in southern Mexico that perished in the 8th century. The Palenque ruins date from ca. 226 BC to ca. 799 AD. Af ...
, otherwise a true Maya capital of the arts, no significant stelae have been preserved.
*
Lintels, spanning doorways or jambs. Particularly
Yaxchilan is renowned for its long series of lintels in deep relief, some of the most famous of which show meetings with
ancestors
An ancestor, also known as a forefather, fore-elder or a forebear, is a parent or ( recursively) the parent of an antecedent (i.e., a grandparent, great-grandparent, great-great-grandparent and so forth). ''Ancestor'' is "any person from w ...
or, perhaps, local deities.
*Panels and tablets, set in the walls and piers of buildings and the sides of platforms. This category is particularly well represented at
Palenque
Palenque (; Yucatec Maya: ), also anciently known in the Itza Language as Lakamhaʼ ("Big Water or Big Waters"), was a Maya city state in southern Mexico that perished in the 8th century. The Palenque ruins date from ca. 226 BC to ca. 799 AD. Af ...
, with the large tablets adorning the inner sanctuaries of the Cross Group temples, and with refined masterworks such as the 'Palace Tablet', the 'Tablet of the Slaves', and the multi-figure panels of the temple XIX and XXI platforms. King
Pakal's carved sarcophagus lid - without equal in other Maya kingdoms - might also be included here.
*Relief columns flanking doorways in public buildings from the
Puuc region (northwestern Yucatan) and similar in decoration to stelas.
*Altars, rounded or rectangular, sometimes resting on three or four boulder-like legs. They may be wholly or partly figurative (e.g., Copan turtle altar) or have a relief image on top, sometimes consisting of a single ''
Ahau'' day sign (Caracol, Tonina).
*Zoomorphs, or large boulders sculpted to resemble supernatural creatures and covered with highly complicated relief ornamentation. These seem to be restricted to the kingdom of
Quirigua during the Late Classic period.
*Ball court markers, or relief roundels placed in the central axis of the floors of ball courts (such as those of Copan,
Chinkultic, Tonina), and usually showing royal ball game scenes.
*Monumental stairs, most famously the giant hieroglyphic stairway of Copan. The hewn stone blocks of hieroglyphic stairways together constitute an extensive text. Stairways can also be decorated with a great variety of scenes (
La Corona), particularly the ball game. Sometimes, the ball game becomes the stairs' chief theme (
Yaxchilan), with a captive depicted inside the ball, or, elsewhere (
Tonina), a full-figure captive stretched out along the step.
*Thrones and benches, the thrones with a broad, square seat, and a back sometimes iconically shaped like the wall of a cave and worked open to show human figures. Benches, covered with relief on the front, tend to be incorporated into the surrounding architecture; they are more elongated, and lack a back support. Examples from Palenque and Copan have supports showing cosmological carriers (
Bacab
Bacab () is the generic Yucatec Maya name for the four prehispanic aged deities of the interior of the earth and its water deposits. The Bacabs have more recent counterparts in the lecherous, drunken old thunder deities of the Gulf Coast regions. ...
s,
Chaaks).
*Stone sculpture in the round is especially known from Copan and Toniná. It is represented by statuary, such as a seated Copan scribe as well as captive figures and small stelas from Toniná; by certain figurative architectural elements, such as the twenty maize deities from the façade of Copan Temple 22; and by giant sculptures such as the symmetrically-positioned jaguars and simian musicians of Copán, that were integral parts of architectural design.
Yaxchilan Lintel 24.jpg, Yaxchilan lintel 24, king holding torch and queen letting blood, 723–726 CE (British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docume ...
)
Maya Presentation of Captives Kimbell.jpg, Yaxchilan lintel, war chief presenting captives to the king, 783 CE (Kimbell Art Museum
The Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, Texas, hosts an art collection as well as traveling art exhibitions, educational programs and an extensive research library. Its initial artwork came from the private collection of Kay and Velma Kimbell, w ...
)
Column, Costumed Figure MET DP250922-Gallery358.jpg, Relief column, Late Classic (Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 100 ...
)
Piedrasnegrastrono.jpg, Piedras Negras throne 1, with heads restored, Late Classic (Museo Nacional de Antropología e Historia de Guatemala)
Itzamna e Ixchel.JPG, Back of throne, Late Classic ( Museo Amparo)
Monument 151 de Tonina, prisonnier, exposition "Mayas", Musée du Quai Branly, Paris.jpg, Tonina monument 151, bound prisoner, Classic
Wood carving
It is believed that carvings in wood were once extremely common, but only a few examples have survived. Most 16th-century wood carvings, considered objects of idolatry, were destroyed by the Spanish colonial authorities. The most important Classic examples consist of intricately worked lintels, mostly from the main
Tikal
Tikal () (''Tik’al'' in modern Mayan orthography) is the ruin of an ancient city, which was likely to have been called Yax Mutal, found in a rainforest in Guatemala. It is one of the largest archeological sites and urban centers of the pre-Co ...
pyramid sanctuaries, with one specimen from nearby
El Zotz. The Tikal wood reliefs, each consisting of several beams, and dating to the 8th century, show a king on his seat with a protector figure looming large behind, in the form of a Teotihuacan-style 'war serpent' (Temple I lintel 2), a jaguar (Temple I lintel 3), or a human impersonator of the
jaguar god of terrestrial fire
The jaguar (''Panthera onca'') is a large cat species and the only living member of the genus ''Panthera'' native to the Americas. With a body length of up to and a weight of up to , it is the largest cat species in the Americas and the th ...
(Temple IV lintel 2). Other Tikal lintels depict an obese king wearing a jaguar dress and standing in front of his seat (Temple III lintel 2); and most famously, a victorious king, dressed as an astral death god, and standing on a palanquin underneath an arching feathered serpent (
Temple IV lintel 3). A rare utility object is a tiny lidded box from
Tortuguero with hieroglyphic text all around it. Free sculpture in wood, dating back to the 6th century, is represented by a dignified seated man possibly functioning as a mirror bearer.
Stucco modeling
At least since Late Preclassic times, modeled and painted stucco plaster covered the floors and buildings of the town centers and provided the setting for their stone sculptures. Often, large mask panels with the plastered heads of deities in high relief (particularly those of sun, rain, and earth) are found attached to the sloping retaining walls of temple platforms flanking stairs (e.g.,
Kohunlich). Stucco modeling and relief work can also cover the entire building, as shown by Temple 16 of
Copan, in its 6th-century form (known as 'Rosalila'). Dedicated to the first king,
Yax K'uk' Mo' Yax, yax or YAX may refer to:
* Angling Lake/Wapekeka Airport (IATA airport code: YAX), in Ontario, Canada
* Mbunda language (ISO 639 language code: yax)
* Yax Lizard, an urban legend lizard
* Hugo Alfredo Tale-Yax, a notable victim of the bystan ...
, this early temple has preserved plastered and painted facades. The stuccoed friezes, walls, piers, and roof combs of the Late Preclassic and Classic periods show varying and sometimes symbolically complicated decorative programs.
Several solutions for dividing up and ordering the stuccoed surfaces of buildings were applied, serialization being one of them. The Early Classic walls of the 'Temple of the
Night Sun
Night Sun were a German hard rock/ heavy metal band consisting of Bruno Schaab (vocals, bass), Walter Kirchgessner (guitar), Knut Rossler (organ, saxophon) and Ulrich Staudt (drums).
Their one and only album, '' Mournin, was released in 19 ...
' in
El Zotz consist of a series of subtly varied deity mask panels, whereas the frieze of a
Balamku palace, also from the Early Classic, originally had a series of four rulers enthroned above the open ophidian mouths of four different animals (a toad among them) associated with symbolic mountains. Conversely, friezes may be centered on a single ruler again sitting on a symbolic (maize) mountain, such as a frieze from
Holmul, with two feathered serpents emanating from below the ruler's seat, and another one from
Xultun Xultún is a large Maya archaeological site located 40 km northeast of Tikal and 8 km south of the smaller Preclassic site of San Bartolo in northern Guatemala.
Site
The site, which once supported a considerable population, has a 35 m ...
, on which the ruler carries a large ceremonial bar with emerging jaguar-like figures. An Early-Classic temple frieze from Placeres, Quintana Roo, has the large mask panel of a young lord or deity in the middle, with two lateral
'Grandfather' deities extending their arms.
Often, a frieze is divided into compartments. Late Preclassic friezes of
El Mirador
El Mirador (which translates as "the lookout", "the viewpoint", or "the belvedere") is a large pre-Columbian Middle and Late Preclassic (1000 BC - 250 AD) Mayan settlement, located in the north of the modern department of El Petén, Guatem ...
, for example, show the intervening spaces of an undulating serpent's body filled out with aquatic birds, and the sections of an aquatic band with swimming figures. Similarly, a Classic palace frieze in
Acanceh is divided into panels holding different animal figures reminiscent of
wayob, while a wall in
Tonina has lozenge-shaped fields suggesting a scaffold and presenting continuous narrative scenes that relate to human sacrifice.
Plastered roof combs are similar to some of the friezes above in that they usually show large representations of rulers, who may again be seated on a symbolic mountain, and also, as on Palenque's Temple of the Sun, set within a cosmological framework. Further examples of Classic stucco modeling include the piers of the Palenque Palace, embellished with a series of lords and ladies in ritual dress, and the 'baroque', Late-Classic
Chenes-style stucco entrance, beset with naturalistic human figures, on the Acropolis (Str. 1) of
Ek' Balam.
Unique in Mesoamerica, Classic Period stucco modeling includes realistic portraiture of a quality equalling that of Roman ancestral portraits, with the lofty stucco heads of Palenque rulers and portraits of dignitaries from
Tonina as outstanding examples. The modeling recalls that of certain Jaina ceramic statuettes. Some, but not all, of these portrait heads were once part of life-size stucco figures adorning temple crests. In the same way, one finds stucco glyphs that were once a part of stuccoed texts.
Fries von Balamk.JPG, Balamku, part of a frieze, toad seated on mountain icon and belging forth king, Classic
DetailPalacioPalenque.JPG, Palenque Palace, House D, detail of stucco relief showing water lilies, long-nosed deity head and legs of seated figure, Classic
Glyphes calendaires, temple oublié, Palenque, Mexique.jpg, Palenque ''Templo Olvidado'', calendrical glyphs detached from stucco text on pillar, Classic
Stuc Figure with Headdress ... Hormiguero, Late Classic (600-800 AD).jpg, Hormiguero, stucco head ("Maya Akhenaten
Akhenaten (pronounced ), also spelled Echnaton, Akhenaton, ( egy, ꜣḫ-n-jtn ''ʾŪḫə-nə-yātəy'', , meaning "Effective for the Aten"), was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh reigning or 1351–1334 BC, the tenth ruler of the Eighteenth ...
"), Late Classic (Museo arqueológico Fuerte de S. Miguel, Campeche)
Mural painting
Although, due to the humid climate of
Central America
Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...
, relatively few Maya paintings have survived to the present day integrally, important remnants have been found in nearly all major court residences. This is especially the case in substructures, hidden under later architectural additions. Mural paintings may show more or less repetitive motifs, such as the subtly varied flower symbols on walls of House E of the Palenque Palace; scenes of daily life, as in one of the buildings surrounding the central square of
Calakmul
Calakmul (; also Kalakmul and other less frequent variants) is a Maya archaeological site in the Mexican state of Campeche, deep in the jungles of the greater Petén Basin region. It is from the Guatemalan border. Calakmul was one of the larg ...
and in a palace of Chilonche; or ritual scenes involving deities, as in the Post-Classic temple murals of Yucatán's and Belize's east coast (
Tancah,
Tulum
Tulum (, yua, Tulu'um) is the site of a pre-Columbian Mayan walled city which served as a major port for Coba, in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo. The ruins are situated on cliffs along the east coast of the Yucatán Peninsula on the ...
, Santa Rita). The latter murals betray a strong influence of the so-called 'Mixteca-Puebla style' once widely spread across Mesoamerica.
Murals may also evince a more narrative character, usually with hieroglyphic captions present. The colourful
Bonampak murals, for example, dating from 790 AD, and extending over the walls and vaults of three adjacent rooms, show spectacular scenes of nobility, battle and sacrifice, as well as a group of ritual impersonators in the midst of a file of
musicians
A musician is a person who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate one who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters who ...
. At
San Bartolo, murals dating from 100 BCE relate to the myths of the
Maya maize god
Like other Mesoamerican peoples, the traditional Maya recognize in their staple crop, maize, a vital force with which they strongly identify. This is clearly shown by their mythological traditions. According to the 16th-century Popol Vuh, the Hero ...
and the hero twin
Hunahpu, and depict a double inthronization; antedating the Classic Period by several centuries, the style is already fully developed, with colours being subtle and muted as compared to those of Bonampak or Calakmul. Outside the Maya area, in a ward of East-Central Mexican
Cacaxtla, murals painted in a predominantly Classic Maya style, with often stark colors, have been found, such as a savage battle scene extending over 20 meters; two figures of Maya lords standing on serpents; and an irrigated maize and cacao field visited by
the Maya merchant deity.
Wall painting also occurs on vault capstones, in tombs (e.g.,
Río Azul), and in caves (e.g.,
Naj Tunich), usually executed in black on a whitened surface, at times with the additional use of red paint. Yucatec vault capstones often show a depiction of the enthroned
lightning deity (e.g.,
Ek' Balam).
A bright turquoise blue colour - '
Maya Blue' - has survived through the centuries due to its unique chemical characteristics; this color is present in
Bonampak,
Cacaxtla, Jaina,
El Tajín
El Tajín is a pre-Columbian archeological site in southern Mexico and is one of the largest and most important cities of the Classic era of Mesoamerica. A part of the Classic Veracruz culture, El Tajín flourished from 600 to 1200 CE and duri ...
, and even in some Colonial convents. The use of Maya Blue survived until the 16th century, when the technique was finally lost.
Writing and bookmaking
The Maya writing system consists of about 1000 distinct characters or hieroglyphs ('glyphs'), and like many ancient writing systems is a mixture of syllabic signs and
logogram
In a written language, a logogram, logograph, or lexigraph is a written character that represents a word or morpheme. Chinese characters (pronounced ''hanzi'' in Mandarin, ''kanji'' in Japanese, ''hanja'' in Korean) are generally logograms, as ...
s. This script was in use from the 3rd century BCE until shortly after the Spanish conquest in the 16th century. As of now (2021), a considerable proportion of the characters has a reading, but their meaning and configuration as a text is not always understood. The books were folded and consisted of bark paper or leather leaves with an adhesive stucco layer on which to write; they were protected by jaguar skin covers and, perhaps, wooden boards. Since every diviner probably needed a book, there must have existed large numbers of them.
Today, three
Maya hieroglyphic books, all from the Post-Classic period, are still in existence: the
Dresden
Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label=Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth ...
,
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. ...
, and
Madrid
Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), an ...
codices. A fourth book, the
Grolier
Grolier was one of the largest American publishers of general encyclopedias, including '' The Book of Knowledge'' (1910), '' The New Book of Knowledge'' (1966), ''The New Book of Popular Science'' (1972), '' Encyclopedia Americana'' (1945), '' A ...
, is Maya-
Toltec
The Toltec culture () was a pre-Columbian Mesoamerican culture that ruled a state centered in Tula, Hidalgo, Mexico, during the Epiclassic and the early Post-Classic period of Mesoamerican chronology, reaching prominence from 950 to 1150 CE. Th ...
rather than Maya and lacks hieroglyphic texts; fragmentary and of very poor workmanship, it shows many anomalies, reason for which its authenticity has long remained in doubt. These books are largely of a divinatory and priestly nature, containing almanacs, astrological tables, and ritual programs; the Paris Codex also includes
katun-prophecies. Great attention was paid to a harmonious balance of texts and (partly coloured) illustrations.
Besides the codical glyphs, there existed a cursive script of an often dynamic character, found in wall-paintings and on ceramics, and imitated in stone on panels from Palenque (such as the 'Tablet of the 96 glyphs'). Often, written captions are enclosed in square 'boxes' of various shapes within the representation. Wall paintings may also entirely consist of texts (
Ek' Balam,
Naj Tunich), or, more rarely, contain astrological computations (
Xultun Xultún is a large Maya archaeological site located 40 km northeast of Tikal and 8 km south of the smaller Preclassic site of San Bartolo in northern Guatemala.
Site
The site, which once supported a considerable population, has a 35 m ...
); sometimes, written on a white stuccoed surface, and executed with particular care and elegance, these texts are like enlargements of book pages.
Hieroglyphs are ubiquitous and were written on every available surface, including the human body. The glyphs themselves are highly detailed, and particularly the
logogram
In a written language, a logogram, logograph, or lexigraph is a written character that represents a word or morpheme. Chinese characters (pronounced ''hanzi'' in Mandarin, ''kanji'' in Japanese, ''hanja'' in Korean) are generally logograms, as ...
s are deceivingly realistic. As a matter of fact, from an art-historical point of view, they should also be viewed as art motifs, and ''vice versa''.
Sculptors at Copan and Quirigua have consequently felt free to convert hieroglyphic elements and calendrical signs into animated, dramatic miniature scenes ('full figure glyphs').
Ceramics and 'ceramic codex'
Unlike utility ceramics found in such large numbers among the debris of archaeological sites, most of the decorated pottery (cylinder vessels, lidded dishes, tripod plates, vases, bowls) once was '
social currency' among the Maya nobility, and, preserved as heirlooms, also accompanied the nobles into their graves. The aristocratic tradition of gift-giving feasts and ceremonial visits, and the emulation that inevitably went with these exchanges, goes a long way towards explaining the high level of artistry reached in Classical times.
Made without a potter's wheel, decorated pottery was delicately painted, carved into relief, incised, or - chiefly during the Early Classic period - made with the Teotihuacan
fresco technique of applying paint to a wet clay surface. The precious objects were manufactured in numerous workshops distributed over the Maya kingdoms, some of the most famous being associated with the
'Chama-style', the
'Holmul-style', the so-called
'Ik-style' and, for carved pottery, the 'Chochola-style.'
Vase decoration shows great variation, including palace scenes, courtly ritual, mythology, divinatory glyphs, and even dynastical texts taken from chronicles, and plays a major role in reconstructing Classical Maya life and beliefs. Ceramic scenes and texts painted in black and red on a white underground, the equivalents of pages from the lost folding books, are referred to as being in '
Codex Style' (e.g., the so-called
Princeton Vase). The hieroglyphical and pictural overlap with the three extant books is (at least up to now) relatively small.
Sculptural ceramic art includes the lids of Early Classic bowls mounted by human or animal figures; some of these bowls, burnished black, are among the most distinguished Maya works of art ever created.
Ceramic sculpture also includes
incense burners and burial urns. Best known are the profusely decorated Classic burners from the kingdom of Palenque, which have the modeled face of a deity or of a king attached to an elongated hollow tube. The deity most frequently depicted, the
jaguar deity of terrestrial fire, also adorns large Classic burial urns from the Guatemalan department of El Quiché. The elaborate Post-Classic, mold-made effigy incense burners especially associated with
Mayapan represent standing deities (or priestly deity impersonators) often carrying offerings.
Finally, figurines, often mold-made, and of an amazing liveliness and realism, constitute a minor but highly informative genre. Apart from deities,
animal persons, rulers and dwarfs, they show many other characters as well as scenes taken from daily life. Some of these figurines are ocarinas and may have been used in rituals. The most impressive examples stem from
Jaina Island
Jaina Island is a pre-Columbian Maya archaeological site in the present-day Mexican state of Campeche. A small limestone island on the Yucatán Peninsula's Gulf coast with only a tidal inlet separating it from the mainland, Jaina served as an elit ...
.
Codex-Style Vase with Mythological Scene MET DP-579-002.jpg, Codex-style vase with mythological scene, 7th–8th century (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Vessel, Throne Scene MET DT4514.jpg, Vessel with throne scene, Chamá style, late 7th–8th century (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Vase - Classic Maya - Ethnological Museum, Berlin - DSC00742.JPG, Relief vase with head of aquatic serpent, Chocholá style, Yucatan, Late Classic (Ethnologisches Museum, Berlin)
Recipient amb tapa amb el déu Itzamnaaj com a au, museu Nacional d'Arqueologia i Etnologia de Guatemala.jpg, Lidded basal flange bowl, El Peru, Guatemala
EL, El or el may refer to:
Religion
* El (deity), a Semitic word for "God"
People
* EL (rapper) (born 1983), stage name of Elorm Adablah, a Ghanaian rapper and sound engineer
* El DeBarge, music artist
* El Franco Lee (1949–2016), American ...
, Early Classic (Museo Nacional de Arqueología y Etnología de Guatemala)
Tripod Bird Bowl MET DT4867.jpg, Tripod bowl with heron lid, Early Classic (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Mayan - Incensario (Incense Burner) - Walters 482770.jpg, Lower part of incense burner, Palenque style, Late Classic (Walters Art Museum)
Mayan - Maya Polychrome Lidded Urn with Seated Figure - Walters 482793.jpg, Urn with jaguar deity lid, Late Classic (Walters Art Museum)
Costumed Figure MET 1979.206.953 a.jpeg, Costumed figure, 7th–8th century (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Young Corn God MET DT9946.jpg, Young nobleman as a flower, Jaina style, 8th century (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Precious stone and other sculpted materials
It is remarkable that the Maya, who had no metal tools, created many objects from a very thick and dense material, jade (
jadeite
Jadeite is a pyroxene mineral with composition Na Al Si2 O6. It is hard (Mohs hardness of about 6.5 to 7.0), very tough, and dense, with a specific gravity of about 3.4. It is found in a wide range of colors, but is most often found in shades ...
), particularly all sorts of (royal) dress elements, such as
belt plaques - or celts - ear spools, pendants, and also masks. Celts (i.e., flat, celt-shaped ornaments) were sometimes engraved with a stela-like representation of the king (e.g., the Early-Classic
'Leyden Plate'). The best-known example of a mask is probably the death mask of the Palenque king
Pakal, covered with irregularly-shaped marble plaques and having eyes made from
mother-of-pearl
Nacre ( , ), also known as mother of pearl, is an organicinorganic composite material produced by some molluscs as an inner shell layer; it is also the material of which pearls are composed. It is strong, resilient, and iridescent.
Nacre is ...
and obsidian; another death mask, belonging to a
Palenque queen, consists of malachite plaques. Similarly, certain cylindrical vases from Tikal have an outer layer of square jade discs. Many stone carvings had jade inlays.
Among other sculpted and engraved materials are
flint
Flint, occasionally flintstone, is a sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as the variety of chert that occurs in chalk or marly limestone. Flint was widely used historically to make stone tools and sta ...
,
chert
Chert () is a hard, fine-grained sedimentary rock composed of microcrystalline or cryptocrystalline quartz, the mineral form of silicon dioxide (SiO2). Chert is characteristically of biological origin, but may also occur inorganically as a ...
, shell, and bone, often found in caches and burials. The so-called '
eccentric flint
An eccentric flint is an elite chipped artifact of an often irregular ('eccentric') shape produced by the Classic Maya civilization of ancient Mesoamerica.SFU Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. Although generally referred to as "flints", they ...
s' are ceremonial objects of uncertain use, in their most elaborate forms of elongated shape with usually various heads extending on one or both sides, sometimes those of the
lightning deity, but more often of an anthropomorphic lightning probably representing the
Tonsured Maize God. Shell was worked into disks and other decorative elements showing human, possibly ancestral heads and deities;
conch
Conch () is a common name of a number of different medium-to-large-sized sea snails. Conch shells typically have a high spire and a noticeable siphonal canal (in other words, the shell comes to a noticeable point at both ends).
In North Am ...
trumpets were similarly decorated. Human and animal bones were decorated with incised symbols and scenes. A collection of small and modified, tubular bones from an 8th-century royal burial under
Tikal Temple I contains some of the most subtle engravings known from the Maya, including several scenes with the
Tonsured maize god in a canoe.
Flower-Shaped Earflares LACMA M.2007.85.1-.2.jpg, Flower-shaped jadeite earflares, Late Classic (Los Angeles County Museum of Art
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits (George C. Page Museum).
LACMA was founded in 196 ...
)
Deity Face Pendant MET DP148420.jpg, Jadeite deity face pendant, 7th–8th century (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Deity Figure MET h2 1979.206.1069.jpg, Jadeite rain deity with arms in royal posture, Early Classic (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
File:Possibly Guatemala, Maya Culture, Early Classic period (A.D. 250–600) - Royal Belt Ornament - Google Art Project.jpg, Jade belt plaque with ruler, Early Classic (Kimbell Art Museum)
File:Palenque - Rote Königin 1.jpg, Funerary mask of a Palenque queen covered with pieces of malachite
Malachite is a copper carbonate hydroxide mineral, with the formula Cu2CO3(OH)2. This opaque, green-banded mineral crystallizes in the monoclinic crystal system, and most often forms botryoidal, fibrous, or stalagmitic masses, in fracture ...
, 7th century (site museum)
Applied arts and body decoration
Textiles from the Classic period, made of cotton, have not survived, but Maya art provides detailed information about their appearance and, to a lesser extent, their social function. They include delicate fabrics used as wrappings, curtains and canopies furnishing palaces, and garments. Among the dyeing techniques may have been
ikat
''Ikat'' (in Indonesian languages means "bind") is a dyeing technique originating from Indonesia used to pattern textiles that employs resist dyeing on the yarns prior to dyeing and weaving the fabric.
In ''ikat'', the resist is formed by b ...
. Daily costume depended on social standing. Noblewomen usually wore long dresses, noblemen girdles and breechcloths, leaving legs and upper body more or less bare, unless jackets or mantles were worn. Both men and women could wear turbans. Costumes worn on ceremonial occasions and during the many festivities were highly expressive and exuberant; animal headdresses were common. The most elaborate costume was the formal apparel of the king, as depicted on the royal stelae, with numerous elements of symbolic meaning.
Wickerwork, only known from incidental depictions in sculptural and ceramic art, must once have been ubiquitous; the well-known ''pop'' ('mat') motif testifies to its importance.
Body decorations often consisted of painted patterns on face and body, but could also be of a permanent character marking status and age differences. The latter type included artificial deformation of the skull, filing and incrustation of the teeth, and tattooing of the face.
Museum collections
There are a great many museums across the world with Maya artifacts in their collections. The
Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies lists over 250 museums in its Maya Museum database, and the
European Association of Mayanists lists just under 50 museums in Europe alone.
In
Mexico City
Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley of ...
, the
Museo Nacional de Antropología contains an especially large selection of Maya artifacts.
[Wagner 2011, p. 451.] A number of regional museums in Mexico hold important collections, including
Museo Amparo in Puebla, with its famous throne back from Chiapas; the
Museo de las Estelas "Román Piña Chan" in
Campeche
Campeche (; yua, Kaampech ), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Campeche ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Campeche), is one of the 31 states which make up the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. Located in southeast Mexico, it is bordered by ...
;
the
Museo Regional de Yucatán "Palacio Cantón" in
Mérida; and the
Museo Regional de Antropología "Carlos Pellicer Camera" in
Villahermosa
Villahermosa ( , ; "Beautiful Village") is the capital and largest city of the Mexican state of Tabasco, and serves as the municipal seat (governing county) of the state. Located in Southeast Mexico, Villahermosa is an important city because of ...
, Tabasco.
[Wagner 2011, p. 452.]
In Guatemala, the most important museum collections are those of the
Museo Popol Vuh
The Museo Popol Vuh (''Popol Vuh Museum'') is home to one of the major collections of Maya art in the world. It is located on the campus of the Universidad Francisco Marroquín in Zone 10, Guatemala City and is known for its extensive collection ...
and the
Museo Nacional de Arqueología y Etnología, both in
Guatemala City
Guatemala City ( es, Ciudad de Guatemala), known locally as Guatemala or Guate, is the capital and largest city of Guatemala, and the most populous urban area in Central America. The city is located in the south-central part of the country, ne ...
,
with many smaller pieces on display in the "El Príncipe Maya" museum,
Cobán. In Belize, Maya artefacts can be found in the
Museum of Belize and the
Bliss Institute; in Honduras, in the Copan Sculpture Museum and in the Galería Nacional de Arte,
Tegucigalpa
Tegucigalpa (, , ), formally Tegucigalpa, Municipality of the Central District ( es, Tegucigalpa, Municipio del Distrito Central or ''Tegucigalpa, M.D.C.''), and colloquially referred to as ''Tegus'' or ''Teguz'', is the capital and largest city ...
.
In the United States, almost every major art museum has a collection of Maya artifacts, often including stone monuments. Among the more important east coast collections are those of the
Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 100 ...
in
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
; the
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The Museum of Fine Arts (often abbreviated as MFA Boston or MFA) is an art museum in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the 20th-largest art museum in the world, measured by public gallery area. It contains 8,161 paintings and more than 450,000 works ...
; the
Princeton University Art Museum
The Princeton University Art Museum (PUAM) is the Princeton University gallery of art, located in Princeton, New Jersey. With a collecting history that began in 1755, the museum was formally established in 1882, and now houses over 113,000 works o ...
; the
Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology
The Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology is a museum affiliated with Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1866, the Peabody Museum is one of the oldest and largest museums focusing on anthropological material, wit ...
in
Cambridge
Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge beca ...
,
; the
Dumbarton Oaks
Dumbarton Oaks, formally the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, is a historic estate in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. It was the residence and garden of wealthy U.S. diplomat Robert Woods Bliss and his wife, ...
collection;
[Pillsbury et al. 2012] and the
, with its famous inaugural stela 14 of
Piedras Negras. On the west coast, the
De Young Museum
The de Young Museum, formally the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum, is a fine arts museum located in San Francisco, California. Located in Golden Gate Park, it is a component of the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, along with the Legion of Ho ...
of San Francisco and the
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
The Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) is an art museum located on Wilshire Boulevard in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles. LACMA is on Museum Row, adjacent to the La Brea Tar Pits (George C. Page Museum).
LACMA was founded in 196 ...
, with its large collection of painted Maya ceramics, are important. Other notable collections include the
Cleveland Museum of Art
The Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) is an art museum in Cleveland, Ohio, located in the Wade Park District, in the University Circle neighborhood on the city's east side. Internationally renowned for its substantial holdings of Asian and Egypt ...
in
Ohio
Ohio () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Of the List of states and territories of the United States, fifty U.S. states, it is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 34th-l ...
and the
Art Institute of Chicago
The Art Institute of Chicago in Chicago's Grant Park, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the world. Recognized for its curatorial efforts and popularity among visitors, the museum hosts approximately 1.5 mil ...
.
In Europe, the
British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docume ...
in
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
exhibits a series of famous Yaxchilan lintels, and the
Museum der Kulturen
The Museum of Cultures in Basel ( German: Museum der Kulturen Basel) is a Swiss museum of ethnography with large and important collections of artifacts, especially from Europe, the South Pacific, Mesoamerica, Tibet, and Bali. It is a Swiss herit ...
in
Basel
, french: link=no, Bâlois(e), it, Basilese
, neighboring_municipalities= Allschwil (BL), Hégenheim (FR-68), Binningen (BL), Birsfelden (BL), Bottmingen (BL), Huningue (FR-68), Münchenstein (BL), Muttenz (BL), Reinach (BL), Riehen (BS) ...
,
Switzerland, a number of wooden lintels from Tikal. The
Ethnologisches Museum
The Ethnological Museum of Berlin (german: Ethnologisches Museum Berlin) is one of the Berlin State Museums (german: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin), the de facto national collection of the Federal Republic of Germany. It is presently located in t ...
in
Berlin
Berlin is Capital of Germany, the capital and largest city of Germany, both by area and List of cities in Germany by population, by population. Its more than 3.85 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European U ...
holds a broad selection of Maya artifacts, including an incised Early-Classic vase showing a king lying in state and awaiting post-mortem transformation. The
Museo de América in
Madrid
Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), an ...
hosts the Madrid Codex as well as a large selection of artifacts from Palenque.
Other notable European museums are the
Rijksmuseum voor Volkenkunde in
Leiden
Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wit ...
,
Netherlands
)
, anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, subdivision_type = Sovereign state
, subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands
, established_title = Before independence
, established_date = Spanish Netherl ...
, home to La Pasadita lintel 2 and the
Leyden Plate; the
Musées royaux d'art et d'histoire
The Royal Museums of Art and History (french: Musées royaux d'Art et d'Histoire, nl, Koninklijke Musea voor Kunst en Geschiedenis) or RMAH is a group of museums in Brussels, Belgium. It is part of the Belgian federal institute of the Belgian ...
in
Brussels
Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...
;
[Wagner 2011, p. 450.] and the
Rietberg Museum in
Zürich
, neighboring_municipalities = Adliswil, Dübendorf, Fällanden, Kilchberg, Maur, Oberengstringen, Opfikon, Regensdorf, Rümlang, Schlieren, Stallikon, Uitikon, Urdorf, Wallisellen, Zollikon
, twintowns = Kunming, San Francisco
Zürich () i ...
, Switzerland.
Maya performative arts
*
Maya dance
*
Maya dance drama
Maya may refer to:
Civilizations
* Maya peoples, of southern Mexico and northern Central America
** Maya civilization, the historical civilization of the Maya peoples
** Maya language, the languages of the Maya peoples
* Maya (Ethiopia), a populat ...
*
Maya music
See also
*
Ancient Maya graffiti
*
Pre-Columbian art
Pre-Columbian art refers to the visual arts of indigenous peoples of the Caribbean, North, Central, and South Americas from at least 13,000 BCE to the European conquests starting in the late 15th and early 16th centuries. The Pre-Columbian er ...
*
Painting in the Americas before Colonization
*
Visual arts by indigenous peoples of the Americas
Footnotes
References
*
* Coe, Michael D., ''The Maya Scribe and His World''. New York: The Grolier Club 1973.
* Coe, Michael D., ''Classic Maya Pottery from Dumbarton Oaks''. Washington: Trustees of Harvard University 1975.
* Coe, Michael D., ''Lords of the Underworld; Masterpieces of Classic Maya Ceramics''. New Jersey: Princeton University Press 1978.
* Coe, Michael D., ''Old Gods and Young Heroes; The Pearlman Collection of Maya Ceramics''. Jerusalem: The Israel Museum 1982.
* Coe, Michael D., and Justin Kerr, ''The Art of the Maya Scribe''. Thames & Hudson 1997.
* Coe, Michael D., and Stephen Houston, ''The Maya''. Thames & Hudson 2015.
* Coe, William R., Edwin M. Shook, and Linton Satterthwaite, 'The Carved Wooden Lintels of Tikal'. Tikal Report No. 6, ''Tikal Reports Numbers 5-10'', Museum Monographs, The University Museum, U. of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia 1961.
* Dillon, Brian D., and Wes Christensen, 'The Maya Jade Skull Bead: 700 Years as Military Insignia?'. In Brian D. Dillon and Matthew A. Boxt, ''Archaeology without Limits. Papers in Honor of Clement W. Meighan,'' pp. 369–388. Lancaster: Labyrinthos 2005.
* Doyle, James, and Stephen Houston, 'A Watery Tableau at El Mirador, Guatemala'. In ''Maya Decipherment'', April 9, 2012 (decipherment.wordpress.com.).
* Finamore, Daniel, and Stephen D. Houston, ''The Fiery Pool: The Maya and the Mythic Sea''. Peabody Essex Museum 2010.
* Gann, Thomas, ''Mounds in Northern Honduras''. 19th Annual Report, Smithsonian Institution, Washington 1900.
* Gendrop, Paul, Los estilos Río Bec, Chenes y Puuc en la arquitectura maya. Mexico: UNAM (División de Estudios de Posgrado, Facultad de Arquitectura) 1983.
* Guernsey, Julia, ''Ritual and Power in Stone: The Performance of Rulership in Mesoamerican Izapan Style Art''. Austin: University of Texas Press 2006.
* Halperin, Christina T., ''Maya Figurines. Intersections between State and Household.'' University of Texas Press 2014.
* Houston, Stephen, ''The Life Within. Classic Maya and the Matter of Permanence''. New Haven and London: Yale University Press 2014.
* Houston, Stephen, et al., ''The Memory of Bones. Body, Being, and Experience among the Classic Maya''. Austin: U. of Texas Press 2006.
* Houston, Stephen, et al., ''Veiled Brightness. A History of Ancient Maya Color''. Austin: U.of Texas Press 2009.
* Just, Bryan R., ''Dancing into Dreams. Maya Vase Painting of the Ik' Kingdom''. Yale University Press 2012.
* Kubler, George, ''Studies in Classic Maya Iconography''. Memoirs of the Connecticut Academy of Arts and Sciences, 28. New Haven: Connecticut 1969.
* Looper, Matthew, ''Gifts of the Moon: Huipil Designs of the Ancient Maya''. San Diego Museum Papers 38. San Diego: San Diego Museum of Man, 2000.
* Looper, Mathhew, ''Lightning Warrior. Maya Art and Kingship at Quirigua''. Austin: U. of Texas Press 2003.
* Love, Bruce, 'Authenticity of the Grolier Codex remains in doubt'. ''Mexicon'' Vol. XXXIX Nr. 4 (2017): 88-95.
* Lozoff Brittenham, Claudia, and María Teresa Uriarte, ''The Murals of Cacaxtla: The Power of Painting in Ancient Central Mexico.'' Austin: U. of Texas Press 2015.
* Martin, Simon, and Nicolas Grube, ''Chronicle of the Maya Kings and Queens''. Thames&Hudson 2000.
* Maudslay, A.P., ''Biologia Centrali-Americana''. Text and 4 Vols. of Illustrations. London 1889-1902.*
* Mayer, Karl Herbert, ''Classic Maya Relief Columns''. Acoma Books, Ramona, California 1981.
* McCampbell, Kathleen G., ''Highland Maya Effigy Funerary Urns. A Study of Genre, Iconography, and Function.'' MA Thesis, Florida State University 2010 (online).
* Milbrath, Susan, ''Mayapán’s Effigy Censers: Iconography, Context, and External Connections''. www.famsi.org/reports (2007)
* Miller, Arthur G., ''On the Edge of the Sea. Mural Painting at Tancah-Tulum, Quintana Roo, Mexico''. Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks 1982.
* Miller, M.E., 'The History of the Study of Maya Vase Painting'. In ''Maya Vase Book'' Vol. 1, ed. J. Kerr, New York: 128-145.
* Miller, M.E., and Megan O'Neil, ''Maya Art and Architecture''. New York and London: Thames and Hudson 2014.
* Miller, M.E., ''The Murals of Bonampak''. Princeton U.P. 1986.
* Miller, M.E., and Claudia Brittenham, ''The Spectacle of the Late Maya Court. Reflections on the Murals of Bonampak''. Austin: Texas U.P. 2013
* Miller, Mary, and Simon Martin, ''Courtly Art of the Ancient Maya''. Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco. Thames and Hudson 2004.
* Miller, Mary, and Karl Taube, ''The Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya. An Illustrated Dictionary of Mesoamerican Religion.'' London: Thames and Hudson.
* Miller, Virginia E., ''The Frieze of the Palace of the Stuccoes, Acanceh, Yucatan, Mexico''. Studies in Pre-Columbian Art & Archaeology, 39. Washington DC: Dumbarton Oaks 1991.
* O'Neil, Megan, ''Engaging Ancient Maya Sculpture at Piedras Negras, Guatemala''. Norman: U. of Oklahoma Press 2012.
* Pillsbury, Joanne, et al., ''Ancient Maya Art at Dumbarton Oaks''. Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 2012.
* Proskouriakoff, Tatiana, ''A Study of Classic Maya Sculpture''. Carnegie Institute of Washington Publication No. 593, 1950
* Reents-Budet, Doreen, ''Painting the Maya Universe: Royal Ceramics of the Classic Period''. Duke U.P. 1994.
* Reyes-Valerio, Constantino, ''De Bonampak al Templo Mayor, Historia del Azul Maya en Mesoamerica''. Siglo XXI Editores, 1993.
* Robicsek, Francis, ''A study in Maya art and history : the mat symbol''. New York: Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, 1975.
* Robicsek, Francis, and Donald Hales, ''The Maya Book of the Dead: The Corpus of Codex Style Ceramics of the Late Classic period''. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press 1981.
*
Full list from FAMSIarchived fro
the originalon 2015-06-08.
* Saturno, William; David Stuart and Karl Taube (2005). The Murals of San Bartolo, El Petén, Guatemala, Part I: The North Wall. ''Ancient America'' 7.
* Schele, Linda, and Mary Ellen Miller, ''The Blood of Kings. Dynasty and Ritual in Maya Art''. New York: George Braziller, Inc., in association with the Kimbell Art Museum.
* Schwerin, Jennifer von, 'The sacred mountain in social context. Symbolism and history in Maya Architecture: Temple 22 at Copan, Honduras.' ''Ancient Mesoamerica'' 22(2), September 2011: 271-300.
* Simmons Clancy, Flora, ''The Monuments of Piedras Negras, an Ancient Maya City''. Albuquerque: U. of New Mexico Press 2009.
* Spinden, Herbert, ''A Study of Maya Art: Its Subject Matter & Historical Development''. New York: Dover Publ., 1975.
* Stierlin, Henri, ''Living Architecture: Mayan''. Architecture of the World, 10. Benedikt Taschen Verlag, 1994.
* Stone, Andrea J., ''Images from the Underworld. Naj Tunich and the Tradition of Maya Cave Painting''. 1995.
* Stone, Andrea, and Marc Zender, ''Reading Maya Art: A Hieroglyphic Guide to Ancient Maya Painting and Sculpture''. Thames and Hudson 2011.
* Stuart, David, and George Stuart, ''Palenque, Eternal City of the Maya''. Thames and Hudson 2008.
* Tate, Carolyn E., The Carved Ceramics Called Chochola. In ''5th Palenque Round Table'', PARI, San Francisco 1985: 122-133.
* Tate, Carolyn E., ''Yaxchilan: The Design of a Maya Ceremonial City''. Austin: U. of Texas Press 1992.
* Taube, Karl; David Stuart, William Saturno and Heather Hurst (2010). The Murals of San Bartolo, El Petén, Guatemala, Part 2: The West Wall. ''Ancient America'' 10.
* Thompson, J.E.S., Deities portrayed on censers at Mayapan. ''Carnegie Institution of Washington, Current Reports'', No. 40 (July 1957).
* Tozzer, Alfred M., ''Landa's Relación de las cosas de Yucatán. A Translation''. Peabody Museum, Cambridge MA 1941.
* Trik, Aubrey S., 'The Splendid Tomb of Temple I At Tikal, Guatemala'. ''Expedition'' (Fall 1963): 3-18.
*
*
* Wren, Linnea, et al., eds. ''Landscapes of the Itza: Archeology and Art History at Chichen Itza and Neighboring Sites''. Gainesville: University of Florida Press 2018.
* Yadeun, Juan, ''Toniná''. Mexico: El Equilibrista / Madrid: Turner Libros 1993.
External links
Maya art, National Museum of the American IndianAzulmaya:Maya Blue PigmentKerr Maya Vase Data Base & Precolumbian PortfolioUNAM: Ancient Prehispanic Murals
{{DEFAULTSORT:Maya Art
Maya Preclassic Period
Maya Classic Period
Mesoamerican art
Pre-Columbian art
Mesoamerican art museums in the United States