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http://www.wayeb.org/download/emc06_abstracts.pdf.

Recapturing Mayan Memories: Historical Representation in Text, Image and
Ritual *Sixth European Maya Conference - Abstracts *

*Hamburg, December 8-9, 2001 *

*Marc Zender *(University of Calgary):

Lords of La Corona: Reconstructing the Historical Documents of ‘Site
Q’

Epigraphers regularly deal with an eroded or abraded, shattered and
sometimes scattered corpus of documents; documents which require a good
deal of labour-intensive reconstruction before the work of historiography
can even begin. It is therefore surprising that little of this work is
made explicit in print, and the field as a whole is often left in the dark
about the exact process and methodology followed in epigraphic
reconstruction.

This paper aims to redress this unfortunate imbalance with a case study of
the largely unprovenanced, battered and eroded "Site Q" panels. Their
careful reconstruction proceeds from the patterned repetitions common to
Mayan monumental rhetoric, bound by the limitations of monument size and
preserved glyph-outlines. Further, the network of toponyms and
anthroponyms, combined with a measured appreciation of script
palaeography, is shown to securely tie these documents into the
recently-discovered site of La Corona, Guatemala, whose own monuments
confirm and amplify the reconstructions proposed herein.

*Thomas H. Guderjan *(Texas Christian University) & *C. Colleen Hanratty*
(Southern Methodist University):

A Thriving Non-Royal Lineage at Blue Creek: Evidence from a sequence of
burials, caches and architecture

No abstract available.

*Erik Boot *(Leiden University):

Mul tepal - ’Joint Rule or Government’ at Chichen Itza, Yucatan,
Mexico: Historic Reality, or not?

When one wants to capture "Mayan memories", it is of the utmost importance
that the basic groundwork is done satisfactorily. This is specifically the
case in epigraphic and iconographic studies. If a set of inscriptions and
images provides the historical representation of such "Mayan memories",
especially when it is recorded once and thus only represents a single
indigenous perspective, a change in decipherment and/or analysis of
accompanying images may alter the basic meaning drastically.

In this paper I will discuss the validity of the 16th century Yucatec Maya
word mul tepal as found in the Books of *Chilam* *Balam*, commonly
translated as "joint rule or government", and used to describe Late
Classic to Terminal Classic political organization at Chichen Itza in the
9th century. Through a step-by- step analysis of the pivotal elements that
constitute the original and adapted proposal of mul tepal as Chichen Itza,
I will show that mul tepal as defined originally can no longer be applied
to the case of Chichen Itza.

Mul tepal can only be found in three short passages in the Books of
*Chilam* *Balam*, written predominantly in Yucatec Maya, which describe
the circumstances of the fall of Mayapan in a k'atun 8 Ahaw at circa AD
1441-1461. In other sources, mostly written in Spanish (with the aid of
native informants) and never using the word mul tepal, the fall of Mayapan
is associated with the oppostion between the families named Cocom and Xiu,
who contest each other for the domination and supreme lordship of the
city. None of the sources ever states that lordship at Mayapan was shared
as the most common translation of mul tepal as "joint rule or government"
would suggest. Based on dictionary sources and ethnohistoric accounts I
arrive at an alternative definition of mul tepal as "unification,
incorporation, or congregation of lordships" which would imply singular
paramount lordship.

The inscriptions at Chichen Itza cover a short span of AD 932-998, with
most inscriptions dated to the period of circa AD 870-890. None of the
inscriptions records birth, accession, or death events and according to
Schele and Freidel (1990) the hieroglyphic texts seem to record dedicatory
ceremonies performed by groups of related actors. The relationship between
these actors in many cases is described as y-itah, first interpreted as
"his sibling", but later as "his companion" (Schele and Mathews 1998).

While none of the events recorded involved events of direct political
importance, Schele and Freidel proposed a mul tepal "joint rule or
government" model, simply because the actors were "related". Recent
epigraphic research by the present author further indicates that several
of the suggested "siblings" or "companions" are actually gods and not
human beings.

Research by other epigraphers indicates that the yi-ta-hi collocation,
orginally leading to y-itah, actually contains the root il(t)a, a
disyllabic (secondary) transitive verb with the possible meaning "to
observe" or "to look at".

These results provide the first tangible indications that the proposed
model of mul tepal at Chichen Itza may be non-existent. An analysis of
titles, generally accepted among epigraphers as indications of position
and rank, furher indicates that the paramount position among the Late
Classic Maya called k'uhul ahaw "god-ly or god-like lord" was also used to
refer to K'ak'upakal, the most mentioned individual between circa AD
870-890.

While mul tepal as applied to Chichen Itza may once have described the
"correct" historical representation of a "Mayan memory", more recent
ethnohistoric and epigraphic research provides sufficient grounds to alter
this conception and to adjust the theoretical framework accordingly.

*Lorraine Williams-Beck *(Universidad de Campeche):

Toward resolving historical document conundrums: An archaeological
interpretation of the Calkiní title

No abstract available.

*Inés de Castro *(Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn):

Eugenio Arana, Comandante General of the Pacíficos del Sur, 1868-1905

During the Caste War of Yucatán (1847-1901) a group of Maya decided to
give up the war by separating from the main indian party of the Cruzoob
and signing a peace treaty with the yucatecan administration in 1853. This
group, that was called Pacíficos del Sur because of their “peaceful”
behaviour, settled in the southern parts of the modern state of Campeche
around the main centers of Mesapich, Lochhá, Noh-Ayin, Xkanhá and
Chichanhá/Icaiché.

As a result of the peace arrangements the Pacíficos del Sur became a de
facto independent buffer-zone between the two spheres of control.
Considered as enemies by the Cruzoob because of their subordination under
the yucatecan rule and still seen as a threat to yucatecan authorities
despite the peace agreements, they were forced to adopt interesting
strategies of survival.

Based on archival documentation from Campeche and Mérida state and church
archives this talk would like to concentrate on one of the main leaders of
the Pacíficos del Sur, the “ comandante general” Eugenio Arana, head
of the group from 1868 to his death in 1905. His life and actions not only
exemplify important aspects of the political organization of the
Pacíficos del Sur. It also shows the juggling strategies between the
different parties involved in the Caste War underlying a pragmatic
behaviour outside ethnic or ideological aspects.

*Guillermo Velázquez Ramírez *(Universidad de Quintana Roo):

Restauración arqueológica y reconstrucción de la memoria

No abstract available.

*Marcus Kuhnert *(Universität Hamburg):

The Representation of Mythology and History in Late Preclassic and Early
Classic Architecture

The architecture of the ancient Maya is one of the major sources for the
reconstruction of Mayan history but it is also a very difficult one. The
main problem is to find out “why” and “what for” this buildings
have been constructed. Apparently they have been erected with a special
intention or purpose, e.g. they functioned as profane and/or sacred
buildings and they were used by the nobility, the priests and the kings in
various aspects and religious ideology (as well as political) was (re-)
presented on them and through them. Sometimes the written texts on lintels
or stelae that are associated with a building can give evidence about the
use and intention of this special building. But often there are no texts
or other related items like cache offerings or burials and then the
building or its architecture has to speak for itself.

The buildings that have been constructed during the Preclassic Period in
the lowlands lack glyphic texts that could help interpreting them but some
bear very special features that could give hints to one very important
role architecture might have had during that time.

Recent research in the northern Peten has brought to light that during the
Late Preclassic in a relatively short period of time massive constructions
with elaborate facade decorations have been constructed at several sites.
This monuments are very similar or even uniform in style and shape and it
will be shown by the author that this type can be found spread all over
the Maya lowland. These special buildings were decorated with stucco masks
or panels flanking the stairways and were often arranged in a triadic
style and it can be argued that these motifs refer to a mythological
history.

The masks show deities and other religious motifs and the ideology behind
it must have been common to nearly all the ancient community because a
great labour was needed to realise this massive and elaborate buildings.

With examples from different sites from the Maya lowlands this talk would
like to show that this tradition underwent slightly changes over the time
so that at the end of it in the Classic Period stands a mixture of
religious and profane motifs. The formerly pure religious motifs were
transformed by exchanging the representations of deities through portraits
of rulers. So myth history and real history were combined and a
mythological history was created which could be used by the elite to
legitimise the own authority and power to rule.

*Megan O’Neil *(Yale University):

Lacanja Stela 7: The Juxtaposition of Past and Present for an Image of the
Future

Although cut into pieces and scattered across the globe by looters in the
late 1950s, a Maya stela from the acropolis of Lacanja in the Lacandon
Jungle of Chiapas once stood 2.5 meters high. Lacanja Stela 7 comprises a
significant moment in the history of art of the ancient Maya, a history of
art that is not only based on our external perspective, but also one that
is internal to the ancient Maya, with artists and monuments essentially in
interaction in the ancient past.

One of the first dated monuments of the Late Classic period, Lacanja Stela
7 of AD593 is a sculpture that bridges the transition from Early to Late
Classic sculptural representation. Furthermore, through its use of
artistic archaism in dialectical opposition to artistic innovation,
embodied in the represented images of each of its two male figures, this
monument provides a rich opportunity for exploration of Maya
conceptualizations of the past and exploration of what the recording and
use of history may have meant in ancient Mayan art.

Its composition consists of a robust ruler in movement whose sculptural
articulation breaks traditional art-making paradigms established in the
Early Classic. This primary figure contrasts dramatically with the static
figure on the rectangular shield he holds to his chest. This second image
depicts a warrior whose costume and accoutrements allude to a Teotihuacan
or ”foreign” style. Simultaneously, this figure is sculpted in an
archaic style and body position clearly quoted from Early Classic Maya
sculpture of the central Peten. With this juxtaposition of past and
present in which the manner of sculptural depiction carries a series of
connotations and commentary of cultural and temporal difference, this
monument—both intellectually and materially—claims to exist in a
present that is distinct from its past.

Through this juxtaposition and the violations of earlier artistic
paradigms, Lacanja Stela 7 and its creators challenged the art of the past
and offered alternatives for art-making of the present. Subsequently,
these new paradigms became the future of Late Classic Maya sculpture of
the western realm at sites such as Piedras Negras.

With this investigation, as opposed to debating whether or not what the
Maya recorded in their images and texts is real ”history” in our
current definition of the term, I want to examine how the Maya USED the
recording of the past for their present purposes. The process of
history-making is the manipulation of historical facts and figures in a
context of reference to the present, and any object is the material,
viable manifestation of this procedure. By focusing on detailed analyses
of particular works of ancient Maya art and probing beyond their clean,
smooth surfaces, we may begin to crack them open and tease out various
ways that, for example, the Maya conceptualized and represented their past
in a discourse related to their past, present, and future.

*Carlos Flores *(London):

From Stone to Video: Postwar Inscriptions of La Violencia among
Q’eqchi’ Mayas of Guatemala

This paper examines the cultural effects of social change, political
violence and militarisation, and the process of identity reconstruction
among Maya-Q’eqchi’ communities in Alta Verapaz, Guatemala, following
an extended period of armed conflict. The main aim is to explore the role
that monuments and collaborative video production played in this process.
Analysis focuses on the construction of a memorial in the community of
Sahakok to commemorate 916 victims of the violence.

I argue that the construction of the memorial was part of a larger process
whereby the experience of the ‘great suffering’ or ‘la violencia’
of the 1980s was reframed within community traditions. This reframing both
contested official histories and repaired fractured local narratives,
strengthening in turn the reconstruction of local identities. The
collaborative production of a film (Rub’el Kurus/Beneath the Cross)
about the event was another extension of this historical process of memory
recovery and social healing, which articulated a narrative of self-
representation saturated with cultural and historical significance.

*Albert Davletshin *(Russian State University for the Humanities, Moscow):

The Becoming of the Maya Writing Historical Tradition

The first inscribed monuments appear throughout Mesoamerica by the
beginning of the Common Era. Most texts reveal a well-developed writing
system. The fact that it occurs independently and at different sites
suggests that the appearance of these monuments does not reflect the
emergence of the writing itself, rather it marks the becoming of the
Pan-Mesoamerican tradition to use the inscriptions on the sculptured
monuments as a vehicle for ‘political propaganda’. The earliest
inscriptions are likely to be historical in content, as there are only
unround dates up to the 4 th century AD and some of the texts use small
distance numbers (LMJ:St.1; KJU:St.10; CLC:Mon.1). A bad state of
preservation and scarcity of early inscriptions do not allow us to
interpret them and to understand the core of their ‘historicity’.

However, epigraphic and iconographic evidences point that the Stela 5 from
Abaj Takalik, dated the 6 th July of 125 AD, is dedicated to the
enthronement of a successor in the presence of secondary dignitaries
supervised by his deified ancestor depicted above. One can recognize this
text as ‘historical’ in nature because it refers to a particular
moment in time when a specified historical person participates in a
socially important action. The spellings *?AJAW-(wa) *and *HUN-(na)
*suggest that the language of the inscription is Cholan.

*Stanley Guenter *(LaTrobe University, Melbourne):

Foliated Ajaw and the Fall of El Mirador

El Mirador, in the heart of the Mirador Basin of northern Peten,
Guatemala, was the largest city the Maya ever built. However, due to the
fact that it has seen little investigation to date and was in ruins before
the Classic period even began, little is known of its history, which must
have been of the utmost importance to later kings and scribes of the Maya
lowlands. What was surely one of the most important events to the course
of Maya civilization, the fall of El Mirador, is still almost completely
unknown.

The Codex-style vases produced in the Mirador Basin in the seventh and
eighth centuries have long been known to make reference to great
mythological events involving the gods of the Classic Maya.

However, recent re-analyses of these vases indicates that a number of them
refer to great historical figures of the most remote period of Maya
history. This study examines one of these figures, Foliated Ajaw, known
presently only from Late Classic inscriptions at the southeastern sites of
Copan and Pusilja, and associated with events in the southern Maya region
in AD 159-160. To date his importance to the course of Maya history and
his connection to the Mirador Basin has not been noted, even though he is
the first historical individual known from Maya texts to be mentioned at
more than one site.

Three Codex-style vessels looted from unknown sites in the Mirador Basin
provide new evidence concerning Foliated Ajaw as they mention this lord in
connection with the northern Peten. Often described as the first king of
Copan, it will be shown that he was, in fact, one of the first great Maya
warlords and whose exploits led to his commemoration from the southern
highlands of Guatemala to the lowlands of southern Quintana Roo. In
addition to the Late Classic references to this king, much earlier sources
such as the Hauberg Stela, Stela 65 of Kaminaljuyu and the Leiden Plaque
will be examined to elucidate both the life and death of Foliated Ajaw. In
the process, a possible toponym for Kaminaljuyu will be advanced and it
will be proposed that, coming from this site on 1 February, 164, Foliated
Ajaw overthrew the last king of El Mirador, an event which culminated in
the destruction and abandonment of this great metropolis.

*Matthias Gorissen *(Universität Hamburg):

Apocalypticism and Maya History in the Book of *Chilam* *Balam* of
Chumayel: Re-thinking Time, History and Cosmology among the Maya of
Yucatan

Many historical sections in the Books of *Chilam* *Balam* are often seen
as mere transcriptions of late prehispanic hieroglyphic texts. According
to a major model of the relationship of Yucatec Maya religion and
historiography after the Conquest - developed by Nancy M. Farriss in the
mid-1980s - the early Colonial “cosmopolitan” (or culturally hybrid)
elite of Maya society experimented with central ideas of Christian
cosmology in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. These ideas included
some basic tenets of medieval Christian historiography such as
apocalypticism and “salvational history”, whose inherent theodicy is
often seen as the root of Western “linear time”. However, although at
least some parts of Maya society understood Christian cosmology “as a
system”, this system was ultimately rejected due to its outright
contradiction of late prehispanic Maya beliefs preserved in the Books of
*Chilam* *Balam*.

Contrary to this model, and by comparing a number of historical texts in
the Book of *Chilam* *Balam* of Chumayel with their respective parallel
versions in the Books from Maní and Tizimín, it will be shown that the
Chumayel systematically develops an apocalyptic vision of history: Maya
history after the Conquest is described as an ever-worsening time of
crisis, culminating in Last Judgement, and to be followed by a new,
eternal age of salvation. In its more elaborate versions, this scenario
also includes a number of other European eschatological motives, such as
the reign of Antichrist, an all-encompassing expansion of Christianity,
and the resurrection of the dead prior to Last Judgement.

By manipulating metatextual passages (especially introductions) that guide
the reception of a given text, one or several succesive scribes involved
in the compilation of the Book of *Chilam* *Balam* of Chumayel cleverly
adapted ancient texts to a new intellectual environment, without making
substantial changes at the main body of these texts. A relatively new
vision of history was thus backed up by traditional texts in distinctively
indigenous genres. Yucatec Maya historiography in the Book of *Chilam*
*Balam* of Chumayel, then, remains a typically Colonial “derivative
discourse”, as it is ultimately based on a European mode of the
production of historical meaning. Together, these findings suggest that
(1) Christian universal eschatology had a much greater impact on Colonial
Maya culture than previously suggested, (2) that a rigid distinction
between (late prehispanic or early Colonial) “authors” and late
Colonial “copyists” of texts in the Books of *Chilam* *Balam* cannot
be maintained, (3) that students of the Books of *Chilam* *Balam* should
learn to make greater use of the variation between different versions of
synoptic texts (rather than eliminating variation by reconstructing a
hypothetical common original), and (4) that Maya and European visions of
historical time were, after all, neither inherently different nor entirely
incompatible, so that Maya historiography in the Colonial period could
produce more than a series of disconnected “chronicles of the
impossible”.

*Antje Gunsenheimer *(Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn):

What happens after deconstruction? Post-modern approaches to Yucatecan
Ethnohistory Postmodern perspectives on history tend to reduce our
understanding of the past.

Because postmodernists consider the representation of historical events as
a selective process, leading to differentiation and fragmentation of what
is represented and by thus memorized. As one result it turns out that,
what was formerly considered as collective memory, has now to be
understood as mere local or personal history, made by minorities,
following their own “politics of memory” (following J. Rappaport
1998).

As a case study the author will present the varying perceptions of the Ah
Itzaob in colonial documents on yucatecan history (16th to 18th century).
According to these the historical meaning of the Ah Itzaob changed from
being one of several ruling yucatecan groups in pre-colonial periods to
represent the “one” leading elite. These differences are due to the
time and place of and the personal intentions in the documentation of
historical events.

Studied as a phenomenon per se, they do reveal dynamics in colonial
yucatecan self-reflection and they present a wonderful example of
transmission processes. But they do also pose a severe problem to 20th
century efforts in reconstructing yucatecan pre-colonial history. Because
many studies have been based on late colonial ethnohistorical sources
(mainly the Books of *Chilam* *Balam*).

Accepting that colonial ideas have been copied to pre-columbian periods,
leads to a painful deconstruction of what we thought the Ah Itzaob might
have been. We are left with a rather poor corps of data and more questions
arise. Since deconstruction leads to nowhere, how do we get out of this
trap? Still intending to reconstruct the pre-colonial past and to search
for the “real” Ah Itza, we are in need for more information. Without
complete ethnohistorical records and further epigraphic enlightments to
this matter, there may be only methodological approaches to solve this
question, which will be discussed by the author.

*Geneviève Le Fort *(Bern):

Sacred versus Divine: Comments on Classic Maya Kingship

The classic Maya king was re-born to history and revealed to the academic
world when scholars established, not so long ago, the historical nature of
the hieroglyphic inscriptions. It soon appeared that the politic and
religious spheres were intimately connected, and the ruler, surrounded as
he is so often with sacred symbols, was regarded as divine. This
interpretation, refined as the advancement in epigraphic and iconographic
studies allowed in recent years, still prevails today.

Sacred kingship became a major issue since Frazer isolated in the late
19th century the phenomenon of the king-magician, and has proven to be, in
the studies dealing mainly so far with Africa, Asia or Europe, a very
complex matter showing various aspects. De Heusch for example,
distinguishes three types of kings: the magician, the priest, and the god.
Which one of those was the Maya ruler? Was he indeed divine, or rather
sacred? It is of course too early to offer a complete understanding of
classic Maya kingship but it is time to address these fundamental
questions. This paper takes up the important issue of the nature of
classic maya rulership by looking at how the king, historical person par
excellence, is represented in texts, images and rituals.

*Ann C. Wright *(University of Texas at Austin):

Signs of Life: Performance of Memory and Political Agency in Ancient
Mesoamerican Representations of Authenticity, Identity, and Experience

Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican artistic and literary endeavor was bound not so
much in how it reflected the people, as in how its performance produced
them – how it created and constructed authenticity, identity, and
experience. This paper investigates the manner in which the classical Maya
viewed the concept of art as experience, positing the use of contemporary
performance theory as a lens for witnessing the (re)making of meaning, and
(re)defining the ”inanimate’s” role as an active participant in the
theatricality of Maya consciousness and cultural expression of memory and
political agency.

Exploring the temporal of the performing arts within the conventionally
considered spatial of the fine arts, I interrogate issues of signification
and structure by (re)defining the art object as a process encompassing the
social and the aesthetic – defining the quality of an experience rather
than that of an object.

Recent scholarship suggests the ancients may have attempted to perpetuate
activity and approach a revivification of the past through iconographic
narrative. I speculate, however, (focusing on issues of kinesthetic
imagination, the influences of time on spatial representation, and the
impact of surrogacy and restored behavior) that universally understood
ideology, expressed through symbolic movement and gesture, allowed ancient
cultural performances of constructed memory to also serve as the rehearsal
for political change.

Alien to traditional Western thought and ideology, the manner in which the
Maya defined their existence in the cosmos is captured in their recorded
beliefs regarding the sacred nature of writing and its performative
nature. Evidence shows that the medium intentionally calls attention to
itself as a speaker – mimicking the teller of tales. The narrative
erupts performatively from the ancient scribe’s chosen mediums –
whether on painted murals, sculpted documentation on stone stelae,
incision on ceramics, graffiti, or in screen-fold codices – and
continues to perform its story today.

Ancient Mesoamerican historiography, therefore, represents the scripted
theatricality of a culture, cyclically performing its unique worldview,
with the aim of achieving deeper understandings of its position within the
universe, while creating constructed memory capable of initiating and
communicating cultural change. Artistic efforts redefined the ”real,”
and promoted cultural evolution through performances heretofore forgotten
in official discourses of theatre/performance history or Mesoamerican
studies. The phenomenon of writing and painting as gesture – text
”doing”, rather than simply ”relating,” as defined in contemporary
performance theory – allows us to posit alternative ways of viewing
performance, defining theatre as cultural evolution, and creating
methodologies for practicing the historian’s craft as it pertains to the
unique performance traditions of the indigenous Maya.

*John F. Chuchiak *(Assumption College, Boston):

Remembering the Forbidden: Colonial Yucatec Maya Perceptions and
Historical Recollections of Traditional Religion and Ritual, 1570-1700

No abstract available.

*Wolfgang Gabbert *(Freie Universität Berlin):

The Vicissitudes of Nation-Building: The Past of Yucatán in
Nineteenth-Century Elite discourse

Two topics were of special importance for Yucatán's elite in the
nineteenth century. First, elite members wondered about how economic and
social "progress", that is, among other things, a market economy,
education, and republican institutions, could be installed in a society
freed from colonial rule only in 1821. Second, they were faced with the
problem of building a nation from a socially, culturally, and
phenotypically heterogenous population. Both problems were intimately
related to the past of the Yucatán Peninsula and that part of the
population considered Indian ( indios or indígenas). The paper discusses
how the region's history was constructed in elite discourse and how this
was related to the contemporary indigenous population.