Ancient Maya art

Maya civilization
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History
Preclassic Maya
Classic Maya collapse
Spanish conquest of Yucatán
Spanish conquest of Guatemala
Spanish conquest of Petén

Ancient Maya art refers to the material arts of the Maya civilization, an eastern and south-eastern Mesoamerican culture that took shape in the course of the later Preclassic period (500 BC to 200 AD), saw its greatest flowering during the seven centuries of the Classic period (c. 200 to 900 AD), and went through an extended Postclassic phase before the upheavals of the sixteenth century destroyed courtly culture and put an end to the Mayan artistic tradition. Many regional styles existed, not always coinciding with the changing boundaries of Mayan polities. Olmecs, Teotihuacan and Toltecs have all influenced Maya art. Traditional art forms have mainly survived in weaving and the design of peasant houses.

Maya art history

Following the nineteenth and early-twentieth century publications on Maya art and archaeology by Stephens, Catherwood, Maudslay, Maler and Charnay that for the first time made available reliable drawings and photographs of major Classic Maya monuments, the 1913 publication of Herbert Spinden´s 'A Study of Maya Art' 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'. George 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'), was soon to be overshadowed by new developments starting around 1970.

These developments related chiefly to dynastic history and mythology. Under the impetus of the work of Proskouriakoff, the history of the Mayan kingdoms - first of all Palenque - came to occupy the forefront. Linda Schele, a professor of art, became the driving force in this development. Her seminal interpretations of Maya art are found throughout her work, more particularly in 'The Blood of Kings', written together with art historian Mary 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. On from 1973, M.D. Coe published a series of books offering pictures and interpretations of unknown Maya vases, while taking his explanatory model from the Popol Vuh Twin myth; in 1981, Robicsek and Hales came with an inventory and classification of Maya vases painted in codex style, thereby revealing even more of a hitherto unknown spiritual world.

Later, important issues in Schele's iconographic work were 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 art motifs. A good impression of recent Mexican and North American art historical scholarship can be gathered from the exhibition catalogue 'Courtly Art of the Ancient Maya' (2004).

Architecture

Main article: Maya architecture

Copan, 'Reviewing Stand' with simian musicians

Labna, Palace, vaulted passage

The lay-out of the Maya towns and cities, 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. Outside the ceremonial center (especially in the southern area sometimes resembling an acropolis) were the structures of lesser nobles, smaller temples, and individual shrines, surrounded by the wards of the commoners. Dam-like causeways (sacbeob) spread from the 'ceremonial centers' to other nuclei of habitation. Under successive reigns, the main buildings were enlarged by adding new layers of fill and stucco coating. Fitting in with the concept of a 'theatre state', more attention appears to have been given to aesthetics than to utilitarian functionality and solidity of construction. Careful attention, however, was placed on directional orientation.

Among the various types of 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.
• Pyramids, often containing burials in their base or fill, with sanctuaries on top. The outstanding example are the many clustered dynastic burial temples of Tikal's North Acropolis. The chief Post-Classic temple pyramids of Chichen Itzá and Mayapán evince a radial four-staircase structure.
• Ball courts.

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' 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' 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 Classic Puuc, Chenes and Rio Bec architecture of Yucatán is characterised by the geometrical reduction of realistic decoration, the stacking of rain god snouts to build facades, and the use of portals shaped like serpent mouths; the Rio Bec style includes the use of solid pseudo temple-pyramids.

Stone sculpture

See also: Maya stelae

Cancuen, panel 3, seated king with two subordinates. Second half 8th century.

Copan stela A, Maudslay cast

The main Preclassic sculptural style from the Maya area is that of Izapa, a large settlement on the Pacific coast where many stelas and (frog-shaped) altars were found showing motifs also present in Olmec art. The stelas, usually without inscriptions, often show mythological and narrative subjects, some of which appear to relate to the Twin myth of the Popol Vuh. Nonetheless, it remains uncertain if the inhabitants of Izapa were ethnically Mayan. For the Classic Period of the Mayas, the following major classes of stone sculpture may be distinguished.

• Stelas. These are large, elongated stone slabs 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. They are outstanding for their intricateness of detail, those of Quirigua also for sheer length. Both the Copan and Tonina stelas approach sculptures in the round. From Palenque, otherwise a true Maya capital of the arts, no significant stelae have been preserved.

• Lintels spanning doorways, and panels and tablets set in the walls and piers of buildings and the sides of platforms. Particularly Palenque and Yaxchilan are renowned for this kind of art works - Yaxchilan chiefly for its long series of lintels in deep relief, some of the most famous of which show meetings with ancestors, Palenque for the large tablets adorning the inner sanctuaries of the Cross Group temples, and for 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.

• 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).

• Ball court markers, or rounded relief carvings 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, particularly the ball game (La Corona). 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, with a broad, square seat, and a back sometimes iconically shaped like the wall of a cave, and worked open to show human figures. Examples from Palenque and Copan have supports showing cosmologic carriers (Bacabs, Chaaks).

• Stone sculpture in the round, represented by statuary, such as the seated Copan scribe, by certain figurative architectural elements, and by giant sculptures, such as the symmetrically-positioned jaguars and simian musicians of Copán, that were integral parts of architectural design. The so-called 'zoomorphs' (large boulders sculpted to resemble living creatures), especially known from the petty kingdom of Quirigua, may have functioned as altars.

Wood carving

Possible mirror bearer, wood, 6th century

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 extant Classic examples include intricately worked lintels from some of the main Tikal temple pyramid sanctuaries. These 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 (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).

Stucco modeling

Stucco mask panels, Early Classic, Kohunlich

Stucco portrait of king Pakal, Palenque.

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 (referred to as 'Rosalila'). It has marvellously preserved plastered facades, all with their original colours, and is dedicated to the first king, Yax K'uk' Mo'. The stuccoed friezes, walls, piers, and roof combs of the Late Preclassic and Classic periods show varying, sometimes symbolically complicated decorative programs.

Several solutions for dividing up and ordering the stuccoed surfaces of buildings were applied, serialization being one them. The Early Classic walls of the 'Temple of the Night Sun' 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. Contrarily, an Early-Classic temple frieze from Campeche (exhibited in the Museo de Antropología e Historia of Mexico City) has been centered on the large mask panel of a young lord or deity, with two lateral 'Grandfather'-deities extending their arms.

Often, a frieze is divided into compartments. Late Preclassic friezes of El Mirador, 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, while a wall in Tonina has lozenge-shaped fields suggesting a scaffold and presenting continuous narrative scenes that relate to human sacrifice.

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. Roof combs usually show large representations of rulers, sometimes set within a cosmological framework (Palenque, Temple of the Sun). 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. Some of these portrait heads were part of life-size stucco figures adorning temple crests. The portrait modeling recalls that of certain Jaina ceramic statuettes.

Mural painting

Bonampak mural, room 1, east wall: Musicians

San Bartolo mural: The king as Hunahpu

Although, due to the humid climate of Central America, relatively few Mayan paintings have survived to the present day integrally, important remnants are 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; or ritual scenes involving deities, as in the Post-Classic temple murals of Yucatán's and Belize's east coast (Tancah, Tulum, Santa Rita).

They 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. At San Bartolo, murals dating from 100 BC relate to the myth of the Maya maize god and the hero twin Hunahpu, and depict an 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 Mayan area, in a ward of East-Central Mexican Cacaxtla, a savage battle scene as well as two figures of Mayan lords standing on serpents have been found, all painted in a hybrid Classical Mayan style.

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, and even in some Colonial Convents. The use of Maya Blue survived until the 16th century, when the technique was lost.

Writing and bookmaking

Main articles: Maya script and Maya codices

Madrid Codex

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 logograms. This script was in use from the 3rd century BCE until shortly after the Spanish conquest in the 16th century. As of now (2013), a considerable proportion of the characters has a reading, but their configuration as a text is not always understood. The books were folded and consisted of bark paper or leather leafs with an adhesive stucco layer on which to write; they were protected by jaguar skin covers or, perhaps, wooden boards. Since every diviner probably needed a book, there must have existed large numbers of them. Today, three codices (from Dresden, Paris, and Madrid), all of the Post-Classic period, are still in existence; the authenticity of a fourth one (Grolier) is doubtful. They 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. 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, astrological computations (Xultun); 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 logograms 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 animate, dramatic miniature scenes ('full figure glyphs').

Ceramics and 'ceramic codex'

Main article: Maya ceramics

Codex style cylinder vessel, courtly ritual

Jaina, nobleman

Unlike utility ceramics found in such large numbers among the debris of archaeological sites, most of the decorated pottery (cylinder vessels, lidded dishes, 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.

The precious ceramic objects were manufactured in numerous workshops distributed over the Mayan kingdoms, some of the most famous being associated with the 'Chama-style', the 'Holmul-style', and the so-called 'Ik-style'. Made without a potter's wheel, they were 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.

Vase decoration shows great variation, including palace scenes, courtly ritual, mythology, divinatory glyphs, or 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'; the hieroglyphical and pictural overlap with the three extant books is relatively small.

Sculptural ceramic art includes incense burners and hand or mold-made figurines sometimes used as ocarina's. The profusely decorated, elongated Classic incense burners from the kingdom of Palenque - evolved from Early-Classic models - show the modeled face of a deity (usually the jaguar deity of terrestrial fire) or of a king. The elaborate Post-Classic, mold-made effigy incense burners especially associated with Mayapan represent standing deities (or priestly deity impersonators) often carrying offerings.

Figurines, many of them mold-made, are often of an amazing liveliness and realism. Apart from deities, animal persons, rulers and dwarfs, they show many other characters and scenes taken from daily life. Some of these figurines may have been used in rituals. The most impressive examples stem from Jaina Island.

Precious stone and other sculpted materials

Jade belt assemblage with celt pendants, from the tomb of king Pakal, Palenque

It is remarkable that the Maya, who had no metal tools, created many objects from a very thick and dense material, jade (jadeite), particularly all sorts of (royal) dress elements such as belt ornaments, celts, ear spools, pendants, and also masks. Celts (i.e., flat, celt-shaped ornaments) were often engraved with a stela-like representation of the king. The best-known example of a mask is probably the death mask of the Palenque king Pakal, covered with irregularly-shaped jade plaques and having eyes made from mother-of-pearl 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, shell, and bone, often found in caches and burials. The so-called 'eccentric flints' 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, more often anthropomorphic with a lightning torch in the forehead. Shell was often worked into small disks showing human, possibly ancestral heads and deities, and into other decorative elements. 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.

Applied arts and body decoration

See also: Maya textiles

Textiles from the Classic period have not survived, but Maya art provides detailed information about their appearance and, to a lesser extent, their social function. Cloths were made of cotton; both men and women could wear turbans. Daily costume depended on social standing. 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, visible on his stelas, 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.

Maya performative arts

• Maya dance
• Maya dance drama
• Maya music

See also

• Pre-Columbian art
• Painting in the Americas before Colonization
• Visual arts by indigenous peoples of the Americas

References

• Coe, Michael D., The Maya Scribe and His World. New York: The Grolier Club 1973.
• Coe, Michael D., and Justin Kerr, The Art of the Maya Scribe. Thames and Hudson 1997.
• 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.).
• Gann, Thomas, Mounds in Northern Honduras. 19th Annual Report, Smithsonian Institution, Washington 1900.
• Guernsey, Julia, Ritual and Power in Stone: The Performance of Rulership in Mesoamerican Izapan Style Art. Austin: University of Texas Press 2006.
• 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.
• 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.*
• 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., Maya Art and Architecture. New York and London: Thames and Hudson 1999.
• Miller, M.E., The Murals of Bonampak. Princeton U.P. 1986.
• 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.
• 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.
• 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.
• 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. ISBN 978-0-292-75552-9
• 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., 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.
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• Yadeun, Juan, Toniná. Mexico: El Equilibrista / Madrid: Turner Libros 1993.

External links

• Maya art, National Museum of the American Indian
• Azulmaya:Maya Blue Pigment
• 'Authentic Maya'
• Copan Sculpture Museum: Ancient Maya Artistry in Stucco and Stone
• Kerr Maya Vase Data Base & Precolumbian Portfolio
• UNAM: Ancient Prehispanic Murals
• The Art of Precolumbian Gold: The Jan Mitchell Collection, an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Mayan art