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Birds and Beasts of Ancient Mesoamerica links Precolumbian animal imagery with scientific data related to animal morphology and behavior, providing in-depth studies of the symbolic importance of animals and birds in Postclassic period Mesoamerica. Representations of animal deities in Mesoamerica can be traced back at least to Middle Preclassic Olmec murals, stone carvings, and portable art such as lapidary work and ceramics. Throughout the history of Mesoamerica real animals were merged with fantastical creatures, creating zoological oddities not unlike medieval European bestiaries. According to Spanish chroniclers, the Aztec emperor was known to keep exotic animals in royal aviaries and zoos. The Postclassic period was characterized by an iconography that was shared from central Mexico to the Yucatan peninsula and south to Belize. In addition to highlighting the symbolic importance of nonhuman creatures in general, the volume focuses on the importance of the calendrical and astronomical symbolism associated with animals and birds. Inspired by and dedicated to the work of Mesoamerican scholar Cecelia Klein and featuring imagery from painted books, monumental sculpture, portable arts, and archaeological evidence from the field of zooarchaeology, Birds and Beasts of Ancient Mesoamerica highlights the significance of the animal world in Postclassic and early colonial Mesoamerica. It will be important to students and scholars studying Mesoamerican art history, archaeology, ethnohistory, and zoology.

This volume explores how visual arts functioned in the indigenous pre- and post-conquest New World as vehicles of social, religious, and political identity. Twelve scholars in the field of visual arts examine indigenous artistic expressions in the American continent from the pre-Hispanic age to the present. The contributions offer new interpretations of materials, objects, and techniques based on a critical analysis of historical and iconographic sources and argue that indigenous agency in the continent has been primarily conceived and expressed in visual forms in spite of the textual epistemology imposed since the conquest. Contributors are: Miguel Arisa, Mary Brown, Ananda Cohen-Aponte, Elena FitzPatrick Sifford, Alessia Frassani, Jeremy James George, Orlando Hernández Ying, Angela Herren Rajagopalan, Keith Jordan, Lorena Tezanos Toral, Marcus B. Burke, and Lawrence Waldron.

Landscape has been a key theme in world archaeology and trans-cultural art history over the last half century, particularly in the study of painting in art history and in all questions of human intervention and the placement of monuments in the natural world within archaeology. However, the representation of landscape has been rather less addressed in the scholarship of the archaeologically-accessed visual cultures of the ancient world. The kinds of reliefs, objects, and paintings discussed here have a significant purchase on matters concerned with landscape and space in the visual sphere, but were discovered within archaeological contexts and by means of excavation. Through case studies focused on the invention of wilderness imagery in ancient China, the relation of monuments to landscape in ancient Greece, the place of landscape painting in Mesoamerican Maya art, and the construction of sacred landscape across Eurasia between Stonehenge and the Silk Road via Pompeii, this book emphasises the importance of thinking about models of landscape in ancient art, as well as the value of comparative approaches in underlining core aspects of the topic. Notably, it explores questions of space, both actual and conceptual, including how space is configured through form and representation.

The sensitive perception of a society's artistic expressions facilitates our comprehension of its ethos, enabling the meaningful communication between individuals and communities, which is the fundamental link that connects human beings.This book explores the spirit of the Mesoamerican civilization from pre-history until the 20th century, interpreting its architectural legacy, both in the planned environments of the public plazas, and in the art that is integrated into structural designs, exemplified by the Mexican mural paintings. The first part studies the open areas defined by substantially symbolic architecture, providing the spatial forum for the spiritual and consequential collective manifestations of the native population throughout the history of Mesoamerica, linking past, present, and future generations. The second part focuses on mural painting, which has been a consistent universal medium for eloquent cultural interaction among Mesoamericans.

Discussions on the illicit trafficking of precolonial cultural heritage itemsPre-Columbian artifacts are among the most popular items on the international antiquities market, yet it is becoming increasingly difficult to monitor these items as public, private, and digital sales proliferate. This timely volume explores past, current, and future policies and trends concerning the sales and illicit movement of artifacts from Mesoamerica to museums and private collections. Informed by the fields of anthropology, economics, law, and criminology, contributors critically analyze practices of research and collecting in Central American countries. They assess the circulation of looted and forged artifacts on the art market and in museums and examine government and institutional policies aimed at fighting trafficking. They also ask if and how scholars can use materials removed from their context to interpret the past. The theft of cultural heritage items from their places of origin is a topic of intense contemporary discussion, and The Market for Mesoamerica updates our knowledge of this issue by presenting undocumented and illicit antiquities within a regional and global context. Through discussion of transparency, accountability, and ethical practice, this volume ultimately considers how antiquities can be protected and studied through effective policy and professional practice. Contributors: Cara G. Tremain | Donna Yates | Martin Berger | Allison Davis | James Doyle | Rosemary Joyce | Nancy L. Kelker | Guido Krempel | Christina Luke | Sofia Paredes Maury | Adam Sellen A volume in the series Maya Studies, edited by Diane Z. Chase and Arlen F. Chase

Expanded and revised in its sixth edition, The Art of Mesoamerica surveys the artistic achievements of the high prehispanic civilizations of Central America Olmec, Maya, Teotihuacan, Toltec and Aztec as well as those of their lesser-known contemporaries. Providing an in-depth examination of central works, this book guides readers through the most iconic palaces, pyramids, sculptures and paintings. From the Olmec Colossal Head 5 recovered from San Lorenzo to the Aztec Calendar Stone found in Mexico Citys Zócalo in 1790, this book reveals the complexity and innovation behind the art and architecture produced in prehispanic civilizations. This new edition incorporates new lavish colour images and extensive updates based on the latest research and dozens of recent discoveries, particularly in Maya art, where excavations at Teotihuacan, the largest city of Mesoamerica, and Tenochtitlan, the capital of the Aztecs, have yielded new sculptures.

In this thought-provoking book, preeminent scholar Stephen Houston turns his attention to the crucial role of young males in Classic Maya society, drawing on evidence from art, writing, and material culture. The Gifted Passage establishes that adolescent men in Maya art were the subjects and makers of hieroglyphics, painted ceramics, and murals, in works that helped to shape and reflect masculinity in Maya civilization. The political volatility of the Classic Maya period gave male adolescents valuable status as potential heirs, and many of the most precious surviving ceramics likely celebrated their coming-of-age rituals. The ardent hope was that youths would grow into effective kings and noblemen, capable of leadership in battle and service in royal courts. Aiming to shift mainstream conceptions of the Maya, Houston argues that adolescent men were not simply present in images and texts, but central to both.

Crystal skulls, imaginative codices, dubious Olmec heads and cute Colima dogs. Fakes and forgeries run rampant in the Mesoamerican art collections of international museums and private individuals. Authors Nancy Kelker and Karen Bruhns examine the phenomenon in this eye-opening volume. They discuss the most commonly forged classes and styles of artifacts, many of which were being duplicated as early as the 19th century. More important, they describe the system whereby these objects get made, purchased, authenticated, and placed in major museums as well as the complicity of forgers, dealers, curators, and collectors in this system. Unique to this volume are biographies of several of the forgers, who describe their craft and how they are able to effectively fool connoisseurs and specialists. An important, accessible introduction to pre-Columbian art fraud for archaeologists, art historians, and museum professionals alike. A parallel volume by the same authors discusses fakes in Andean archaeology.

In Memory Traces, art historians and archaeologists come together to examine the nature of sacred space in Mesoamerica. Through five well-known and important centers of political power and artistic invention in Mesoamerica—Tetitla at Teotihuacan, Tula Grande, the Mound of the Building Columns at El Tajín, the House of the Phalli at Chichén Itzá, and Tonina—contributors explore the process of recognizing and defining sacred space, how sacred spaces were viewed and used both physically and symbolically, and what theoretical approaches are most useful for art historians and archaeologists seeking to understand these places. Memory Traces acknowledges that the creation, use, abandonment, and reuse of sacred space have a strongly recursive relation to collective memory and meanings linked to the places in question and reconciles issues of continuity and discontinuity of memory in ancient Mesoamerican sacred spaces. It will be of interest to students and scholars of Mesoamerican studies and material culture, art historians, architectural historians, and cultural anthropologists. Contributors: Laura M. Amrhein, Nicholas P. Dunning, Rex Koontz, Cynthia Kristan-Graham, Matthew G. Looper, Travis Nygard, Keith M. Prufer, Matthew H. Robb, Patricia J. Sarro, Kaylee Spencer, Eric Weaver, Linnea Wren

Cet ouvrage met en lumière l'importance fondamentale du rituel chamanique dans la formation de l'élite et sa perception du monde, à une époque où s'épanouissait sans censure un usage très encadré de psychotropes. Reflet de phénomènes hallucinatoires bien réels, ce rituel a subi de plein fouet les interdits coloniaux imposés par la Conquête. L'art précolombien illustre largement ces pratiques.

Tula es famosa por su historia, sus tradiciones, sus mitos y su arquitectura. El culto a Quetzalcóatl toma importancia en este trabajo, en el que se describen los edificios que conforman actualmente la zona arqueológica, mientras se revisa el avanzado conocimiento de algunos oficios, consecuencia de la asimilación de culturas que se desarrollaron en el Altiplano y motivo de su espléndido desarrollo.

Desde sus primeros pobladores, pasando por los Olmecas y hasta el gran apogeo del Posclásico, este trabajo revisa el desarrollo de Veracruz y la relación de los grupos que habitaron esa región con las diferentes áreas de Mesoamérica. La cerámica es uno de los temas principales de este trabajo, ya que resulta muy variada en formas, diseños y tipos de barro.

Este análisis histórico de la tradición cultural de Cholula invita a conocer las razones por las que tantos pueblos mesoamericanos adoptaron el estilo, las tradiciones y parte de la cosmovisión de esta civilización multicultural.

Los Mixtecos produjeron una de las cerámicas más codiciadas en la época prehispánica. En este título se describen el origen y las creencias de este pueblo, el entorno y el territorio que vieron nacer una tradición alfarera sin precedentes.

La relación del hombre con el medio ambiente es una constante en los diseños textiles y cerámicos de los pueblos antiguos. Este trabajo aborda la relación del hombre de la etapa lítica con la fauna que lo rodeaba, visible tanto en sus creaciones de gran sensibilidad artística como en la construcción de los mitos y las leyendas religiosas que fueron la base que dio pie al desarrollo de las civilizaciones prehispánicas.

El esplendor de Monte Albán, producto de su mosaico multiétnico, es hoy una de las herencias más importantes del mundo mesoamericano. Los orígenes del pueblo zapoteco, su economía basada en la alfarería y su relación comercial con Teotihuacán son el fundamento de esta producción.

La tradición del juego de pelota es quizás uno de los rituales más estudiados del mundo prehispánico. En este título se desarrolla el tema explicándolo desde los posibles orígenes hasta las reglas que enmarcaban su práctica. La teoría que estudia la posibilidad de asimilar la cancha de juego al cosmos trajo consigo una posible explicación a la diversidad de formas y variables en las construcciones. En el juego de pelota, ganar significaba la gloria, perder tenía implicaciones vitales.

Este título explica la relación del glifo con el lenguaje, sus características y su estructura. Examina los grifos en los códices, en la cerámica y en las rocas talladas así como los glifos toponímicos que se usaron en el Altiplano Central. Incluye una entrevista a Ulises Valiente, especialista en escritura azteca.

De manera general este trabajo revisa aspectos relacionados con la organización política, económica y social de toda la región maya. Se pretende dar a conocer la iconografía maya utilizada en sus objetos cerámicos, en este caso estudiando algunas piezas del acervo resguardado por la Fundación Cultural Armella Spitalier.

Las creaciones en piedra tuvieron diversos usos domésticos, laborales y rituales. En este trabajo se mencionan la materia prima, las técnicas y las herramientas empleadas en la creación de los objetos líticos que elaboraban las culturas prehispánicas.

Se tocan temas relativos a los elementos que conformaban las ofrendas. En cada sitio fueron diferentes pero mantenían cierta relación ritual. Se muestra las diferentes etapas en cada horizonte cultural.

Constituye una descripción del sitio, desde su arquitectura y planeación urbana, hasta su organización social y política. Se relaciona la cerámica con la de otras regiones, mostrando la abundancia de motivos Olmecas Xicalancas. La pintura mural de Cacaxtla es descrita con la ayuda de imágenes. Incluye una entrevista con la Arqueóloga Rosalba Delgadillo, especialista en cerámica de Cacaxtla.

La auto representación del hombre mesoamericano y la relación del cuerpo humano con el universo conforman un testimonio imprescindible en el estudio de las culturas prehispánicas. Las deformaciones, la mutilación dentaria, los ornamentos o la pintura facial fueron indicadores del rango social. Este trabajo se basa en las investigaciones del historiador Alfredo López Austin.

Esta producción muestra el proceso de restauración de las piezas que la Fundación Cultural Armella Spitalier tiene bajo su resguardo, además de servir como un manual de trabajo.

Acercamiento al significado de las diferentes etapas de la vida de la mujer en la época prehispánica: la niñez, la edad adulta, el embarazo y la vejez. Detalle de algunos usos y costumbres de carácter social, así como de los oficios que ejercían. La divinidad femenina fue una parte importante en la explicación de la dualidad del cosmos.

La extensión territorial de Teotihuacán es uno de los aspectos más representativos de la organización social que existía en la época, accesible hoy por medio de los vestigios murales, arquitectónicos y arqueológicos que quedaron como único testimonio de una gran civilización. En este trabajo se aborda una teoría sobre la decadencia y el abandono de la ciudad.

Se describe el panorama general del periodo agrícola aldeano en los diferentes periodos del Horizonte Preclásico o Formativo. Se revisan las principales características de la cerámica que prevaleció en el Preclásico hasta convertirse en las primeras formas de utensilios de barro.

Muestra de qué manera los objetos prehispánicos expresan el pensamiento de las sociedades que los fabricaron. Examina las cualidades de la cerámica como son su estilo, cronología y estado de conservación. Explica de manera detallada el proceso de manufactura, desde la apariencia de la arcilla hasta algunas técnicas de acabado.