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List of illustrations

  • Map of Mexico
  • Map of Central America
  • Map of Central America
  • Map of Peru
  • Map of Peru
  • Camelid sacrum in the shape of a canine's head
  • Cuicuilco, pyramid, after 500 BC, plan and section
  • Two-Headed Female Figurine (Two views)
  • Pottery figurine of human seated in jaguar pose, wearing a serpent-headed cloak
  • Teotihuacán, the temples, before 700
  • (A) Teotihuacán, Pyramid of the Moon, before 200, perspective diagram; (B) Kaminaljuyú, Mound B4, after 400, perspective diagram
  • Ciudadela court, from the south
  • Pyramid of the Plumed Serpent
  • Teotihuacán, Ciudadela, inner core of the central platform, before 300, diagram of assembly and section of tablero
  • Northern ("Moon") pyramid and plaza, from the south
  • Atetelco, near Teotihuacán, dwelling group, c. 500, plan
  • Atetelco, near Teotihuacán, dwelling group, c. 500, elevation
  • Piers carved with quetzal and owl figures surrounding court of Quetzalpapálotl building
  • Cholula, main pyramid, c. 900, sections, plan, and tablero profiles of nucleus
  • Cholula, Court of the Altars, general view rom the south
  • Cholula, Court of the Altars, detail of talus and tablero
  • Water Goddess
  • Jaguar-vessel from the foot of the Pyramid of the Sun
  • Face panel
  • Teotihuacán figurines, periods I–V
  • Cholula, inner pyramid, detail of wall painting of drinkers
  • Cylindrical tripod vessel
  • Wall painting from the Temple of Agriculture
  • Tepantitla, wall painting
  • Tepantitla, wall painting, detail of lower wall
  • Xochicalco, general plan, before 900
  • Xochicalco, south-west group with ball-court, before 900
  • Xochicalco, main pyramid, angle of lower platform
  • Xochicalco, platform temple, east, north, and south façades, before 900
  • Group of stelae
  • Cacaxtla, before 900, plan of temple (1) and talus (2) bearing murals
  • Cacaxtla, section of battle mural, east of stairway
  • Cacaxtla, mural panel on south wall of temple doorway, showing a bird-hemmleted personage standing on a feathered-serpent body
  • Tula, before 1200, general plan
  • Tula, before 1200, detail of south group
  • Tula, north pyramid facing
  • Tula, "coatepantli" (serpent wall)
  • Tula, Atlantean figures
  • Tula, Atlantean figures
  • Tula, Atlantean figures, detail of feet
  • Tula, pier relief of Toltec warrior
  • Tula, Chacmool
  • Tula, Cerro de la Malinche, rock carving of Ce acatl
  • Tenayuca, pyramid, plans and elevations showing enlargements of c. 1300–1500
  • Calixtlahuaca, round pyramid
  • Tenochtitlan, detail from a plan of a pre-Conquest portion
  • Tenochtitlan, plan c. 1510 showing relation of the Aztec capital to the present center of Mexico City
  • Malinalco, rock-cut temple, from the south-west
  • Texcoco, palace court
  • Chiconauhtla, plan of upper-class dwelling, c. 1500
  • Cylindrical stone of Tizoc
  • Cylindrical stone of Tizoc (detail)
  • Stone slab commemorating Tizoc and Ahuitzol
  • Calendar stone
  • Model of a Pyramid of Sacred Warfare
  • Model of a Pyramid of Sacred Warfare (detail)
  • Vessel for heart sacrifices
  • Vessel for heart sacrifices
  • Drum
  • Drum
  • Drum
  • Statuette of Xipe Totec
  • Statuette of Xipe Totec
  • Statue of Coatlicue
  • Birthing FIgure
  • Jaguar-vessel for blood sacrifices
  • Drawing of the monolith portraying Coyolxauhqui
  • Head of a dead warrior
  • Figure of a kneeling woman
  • Malinalco, mural representing warriors or hunting deities
  • Tizatlán, altar painting showing Mictlantecuhtli
  • Tizatlán, altar painting showing Tezcatlipoca
  • Codex Borbonicus: The eleventh "week" of thirteen days and nights ruled by the deity Patecatl
  • Codex Xolotl: The Tlailotlac
  • La Venta, plan before 400 BC
  • La Venta, mosaic floor beneath east platform at entrance to northern court
  • Tres Zapotes, Stela C, relief carving of figure seated on jaguar-mask and reverse
  • Stone celt
  • Votive axe with ritual mask ("Kunz" axe)
  • La Venta, sarcophagus (Monument 6)
  • Colossal head No. 1
  • Colossal head
  • Tres Zapotes, colossal head
  • Colossal head No. 2
  • Colossal head No. 5
  • Stela D
  • Altar 5, side
  • Petroglyph 1
  • Stela 3
  • Monument 2, Olmec Atlantean table
  • Pottery figurine heads
  • Olmec pottery figurine
  • Seated woman
  • Head and shoulders of a woman (fragment)
  • Transformation figure
  • Seated athlete
  • Seated athlete
  • Incised plaque
  • Oxtotitlán, cave painting of figure seated on jaguar-mask
  • Tajín, general plan, as in c. 1000
  • Tajín, principal pyramid, before 600, elevation and plan
  • Tajín Chico, Platform A, seventh century(?)
  • Tajín Chico, columnar building
  • Cerro de las Mesas, Stela 6
  • Crested head
  • Blade (hacha)
  • Palmate stone
  • Yoke
  • Stela showing the dressing of a ball-player
  • Tajín, south ball-court, north-east panel with sacrifice scene
  • Tajín, south ball-court, south-west panel with eagle warrior ritual
  • Standing Female Figurine
  • Pottery figurine head
  • Zapotal, death deity
  • Tamuín, wall paining representing Huastec figures
  • Huastec gorget
  • Huastec statue
  • Huastec statue
  • Huastec "apotheosis" statue (front)
  • Huastec "apotheosis" statue (rear)
  • Monte Alban, plan before 900
  • Monte Alban, Mound X, showing rubble columns set in entrances
  • Monte Alban, Group M
  • Monte Alban, house group and Tomb 105, after 600(?), plans and section
  • Model of a temple
  • Dainzú (Oaxaca), facing-slab relief
  • Monte Alban, architectural facing slabs on the pyramid base, Mound L
  • Monte Alban, architectural facing slabs on the pyramid base, Mound J
  • Monte Alban, architectural facing slabs on the pyramid base, Mound J, drawing
  • Monte Alban, Stela 2, representing a warrior in jaguar costume
  • Monte Alban, the Bazán stela, commemorative relief sculpture
  • Pottery urn
  • Pottery urn
  • Monte Alban, Tomb 104, end wall and niches with wall painting
  • Monte Alban, Tomb 104, perspective drawing
  • Monte Alban, Tomb 105, wall painting (replica)
  • Zaachila, Tomb 1, relief of Lord Nine Flower
  • Mitla, plan as in the tenth century(?)
  • Mitla, Quadrangle F, tombs, before 900(?), section of north building and plan of court
  • Mitla, Hall of the Columns, façade, as of before 900(?)
  • Mitla, façade mosaics, typical forms, c. 800–1000(?)
  • Stone slab
  • Mitla, painting on lintels in Arroyo and Church Groups: (A) Arroyo north; (B) Church east; (C) Church north; (D) Church west
  • Codex Zouche-Nuttall: Dynastic Couples
  • Vienna Codex: Heavenly Couple and Messengers
  • Vienna Codex: The Marriage and Death of Eight Deer (eleventh century)
  • Eight Deer receiving honors of rank, according to Codex Zouche-Nuttall (left) and Codex Bodley (right)
  • Codex Colombino: Travelers crossing a Body of Water
  • Codex Fejérváry-Mayer: Cosmological diagram
  • Codex Borgia: The Five Venus Periods
  • Pottery urn
  • Polychrome pottery vessel
  • Drum
  • Mosaic disk
  • Pendant, the "Death Knight"
  • Zaachila, pendant, Tomb 1
  • Pendant
  • Pottery figurine group
  • Model of a temple
  • Standing human figure
  • Stone Face Panel
  • Pottery group of dancers
  • Fragment of a head
  • Ceremonial Village Scene with a Flying Figure
  • Pottery "Chinesca type" figures
  • Woman with a Baby
  • Polychrome pottery figure, round-headed type
  • Pottery figurines, H 4 types
  • Spherical polychrome pottery vessel
  • Tzintzuntzan, "yácatas," after 1200, perspective
  • Painted pottery bowl from Guasave
  • Las Ranas (A) and Toluquilla (B), 700–1000, plans and profiles of walls
  • Regional types of Maya vaulting technique: plans, sections, elevations
  • Quiriguá, Stela F, with transcription of Initial-Series and Supplementary-Series dates
  • Dresden Codex: 260-day ritual calendar
  • Tikal, plan as in c. 900
  • Radially symmetrical platform plans, with elevations
  • Tikal, Structure 5D–34, before 700, restoration drawing
  • Tikal, twin-pyramid complex, erected 771
  • Uaxactún, Structure A V, showing eight stages of enlargement, c. 200–900
  • Tikal, Temple I (Giant Jaguar)
  • Uaxactún, Platform E VII sub
  • Copán, plan as in c. 900
  • Copán, main ball-court, as in c. 800
  • Quiriguá, c. 550–850, general plan as in c. 900
  • Palenque, general plan as in c. 900
  • Palenque, palace tower, eighth century(?), section and plan
  • Palenque, Temple of Inscriptions with section showing crypt, c. 700
  • Yaxchilán, general plan before 900
  • Yaxchilán, Structure 33, c. 750, elevation, section, and plan
  • Piedras Negras, general plan as in c. 900
  • Piedras Negras, acropolis, as in c. 900
  • Calakmul, Structure III, before 700(?), plan and elevation
  • Bécan, plan, showing moat as after 450, buildings as in c. 900
  • Bécan, Structure I, before 900(?), plan, elevation, and section
  • Xpuhil, Structure I, before 900(?), plan and elevation
  • Hochob, main building
  • Edzná, Acropolis, Structure 19, before 800(?), elevation, plan, and sections
  • Sayil, palace, as before 1000
  • Uxmal, general plan c. 1000
  • House of the Pigeons, Uxmal
  • Uxmal, Nunnery, before 1000, isometric view and plan
  • Uxmal, north-east pyramid ('Magician'), after 600, elevations and plan, and section and plan of structure at ground level
  • Uxmal, view of Nunnery (left) and Magician (right)
  • Nunnery quadrangle: north building, Uxmal
  • Nunnery quadrangle: east building, Uxmal
  • Nunnery quadrangle: west building, Uxmal
  • House of the Governor, east façade, Uxmal
  • Uxmal, House of the Governor, elevation and plan, c. 1000
  • Altun Ha, Structure A–6 B, c. 465, perspective reconstruction drawing and plan
  • Copán, Stela N
  • Quiriguá, Stela E
  • Lintel 3
  • Quiriguá, Boulder (Zoomorph O) and altar
  • Quiriguá, rear of Boulder P
  • Lintel 3
  • Stela 12
  • Stela 40
  • Yaxchilán, Stela 11, Bird-Jaguar and contemporaries (rear)
  • Yaxchilán, Stela 11, Bird-Jaguar and contemporaries (front)
  • Lintel with a bloodletting rite (Lintel 25)
  • Palenque, Tablet of the Slaves, showing presentation of regalia to the new ruler
  • Head
  • Throne back
  • Palenque, House C, relief
  • Palenque, House C, relief
  • Plaque
  • Carved pottery vase
  • Painted pottery whistle figurine
  • Holmul, Building A in Group II, façade, before 535
  • Structure 22
  • Uxmal, north-east pyramid, House of the Magician, serpent-mask façade
  • Uaxactún, Structure B XIII, wall painting
  • Bonampak, Temple 1, c. 800, perspective view, elevation, and plan
  • Bonampak, Room 1, showing procession (lower register)
  • Bonampak, Room 3, wall 10, the ruler performing penance with his family (detail)
  • Bonampak, Room 3, wall 11, showing dancers
  • Bonampak, Room 2, showing a battle
  • Bonampak, Room 2, wall 6, warriors in battle
  • Bonampak, Room 2, wall 5, ruler, officers, and victims
  • Cylinder tripod vessel
  • Palenque sarcophagus lid, rubbing
  • Cylinder vase, showing litter bearers and a princely person
  • Cylinder vase showing dancers
  • Black-background cylinder vase showing a ruler in a mythological setting flanked by deities
  • Black-background cylinder vase showing a ruler in a mythological setting flanked by deities (detail)
  • Tepeu 1 tripod bowl showing a priestly dancer
  • Copador pottery vessel
  • Chichén Itza, general plan as in c. 1200
  • Chichén Itza, Caracol, before 800(?), section and plan
  • Chichén Itza, Castillo, before 1050, section, elevations, and plans
  • Chichén Itza, Temple of the Warriors (before 1050), containing Chacmool Temple in platform, sections and plans
  • Chichén Itza, the Mercado, before 1200, plan and elevation
  • Chichén Itza, ball-court, before 1200, plan and elevations
  • Chichén Itza, Platform of the Eagles
  • Chichén Itza, upper Temple of the Jaguars
  • Mayapán, Castillo, after 1250, elevation and plan
  • Tulum, Temple of the Frescoes, Classic and later periods, section and plan
  • Chichén Itza, jaguar throne from the Castillo substructure
  • Chichén Itza, Atlantean figures from the Temple of the Tables
  • Chichén Itza, Atlantean figures from the Temple of the Warriors
  • Atlantean figure from the upper Temple of the Jaguars
  • Chichén Itza, Temple of the Warriors, cella entrance
  • Chichén Itza, Caracol platform, processional disk relief with Maya and Toltec figures
  • Chichén Itza, column reliefs: Chacmool Temple
  • Chichén Itza, column reliefs: Temple of the Warriors
  • Chichén Itza, column reliefs: north colonnade
  • Chichén Itza, north colonnade, reconstruction view of dais and Chacool, c. 1200
  • Chichén Itza, Mercado gallery, processional relief on dais
  • Chichén Itza, south temple, ball-court, pier base with jaguar-serpent-bird relief
  • Chichén Itza, ball-court bench, east face, processional relief
  • Chichén Itza, lower Temple of the Jaguars, processional reliefs on interior walls
  • Processional reliefs and narrative scenes from the ball-court of the North Temple, Chichén Itza
  • Chichén Itza, upper Temple of the Jaguars, reliefs of Toltec warriors on door-jambs
  • Chichén Itza, skull-rack platform, general view from the east
  • Disk (D) with battle scene
  • Disk (L) with eagle warrior
  • Disk (G) showing a battle at sea
  • Mural from the Temple of the Warriors (Maya coastal village)
  • Chichén Itza, upper Temple of the Jaguars, south-west wall, wall painting of a battle scene
  • Chichén Itza, upper Temple of the Jaguars, inner room, south wall, painting of siege operations during a battle
  • Santa Rita, Belize, wall painting with gods and calendar glyphs
  • Deity with calendar glyphs
  • Tulum, Temple of the Frescoes, west passage, wall painting
  • Dresden Codex: Pages treating of the combination of 8 solar years with 5 Venus years in a cycle of 2920 days
  • Codex Peresianus: Calendrical pages
  • Madrid (Tro-Cortes) Codex: Augural divisions of the 260-day ritual calendar, illustrated with figures of traps for deer and armadillo (p. 48)
  • Kaminaljuyú, Mound A 7, reconstruction view and plan of appearance during Early Classic period, c. AD 300
  • Cahyup, restoration view, after 1300
  • Cahyup, general plan as in c. 1300
  • Izapa, Stela 1
  • Stela 11
  • Cylindrical tripod vessel
  • Monument 3
  • Monument 21
  • Pyriform vase
  • Head vessel
  • Vase
  • Vase
  • Food-grinding table
  • Stone slab figure
  • Monkey woman
  • Food-grinding table
  • Man-jaguar vessel
  • Axe God Pendant
  • Zapatera Island, Lake Nicaragua, stone pedestal statue of a guardian spirit
  • Effigy pendant
  • Effigy pendant
  • Polychrome pottery
  • San Andrés, Tierradentro province, Colombia, Tomb 8, after 800(?), perspective view, sections, and plan
  • Shrine and tomb figure
  • Shrine and tomb figure
  • Shrine and tomb figure, female
  • Shrine and tomb figure
  • Pectoral
  • Pin-head showing a monkey eating a snake
  • Man with bat attributes
  • Zoomorphic knife
  • Seated figure
  • Pottery figure
  • Amulet
  • Dignitary and companions on raft
  • Solid pottery figurines (frontal)
  • Solid pottery figurines (dorsal)
  • Whistle figurine
  • Pottery figurine
  • Seat
  • Stone slab carved in low relief
  • Kotosh, Templo de las Manos Cruzadas (above) and Temple Blanco (below), c. 1450 BC
  • Huaca de los Reyes, Moche Valley, plan, before 850 BC
  • Excavations in house remains of c. 800 BC, showing wall of conical adobes overlying one of cylindral adobes, near Huaca Prieta, Chicama Valley
  • Cerro Sechín, temple platform, before 900 BC (?), perspective section and plan
  • Cerro Sechín, temple platform, before 900 BC (?), orthostatic reliefs re-used in the revetment
  • Sculptured panel LIX, revetment
  • Diagrams for wall construction using conical adobes, first millennium BC
  • Moxeke, platform-temple, ninth-century BC (?), plan
  • Moxete, figures I, IV, nd V on third stage riser
  • Punkurí, jaguar on stairway landing
  • Chavín de Huántar, plan of temple platforms, as in 700 BC
  • Chavín de Huántar, temple platform, north-east corner, cornice soffit with incised slabs showing condors
  • Chavín de Huántar, carved monolith ("lanzón") in interior gallery of the pyramidal platform
  • Tello Obelisk
  • Diagrams of the incised relief panels of the Tello Obelisk from Chavín de Huántar
  • Raimondi Monolith
  • Cerro Blanco (Nepeña Valley), carved clay platform
  • Reconstruction of Cerro Blanco (Nepeña Valley)
  • Resist-painted pottery vessel
  • Painted pottery effigy vessel
  • Aija, figure
  • Huaca Prieta, incised gourds
  • Pottery house vessels
  • Virú Valley, incised wall decoration with rectilinear serpent motifs, before 350 BC(?)
  • Pottery vessel
  • Pyramid of the Sun, south half of the east side
  • Pyramid of the Sun, south side seen from ground level
  • Pyramid of the Sun, Middle and Late Mochica periods, c. 100–600(?), plan
  • Vessel depicting cultivated landscape or pyramid
  • Mochica house group of the first century BC(?), reconstuction drawing
  • Stirrup spout profiles: (A) House-vessel; (B) Tiger-vessel; (C) Painted vessel; (D) Painted vessel; (E) Painted vessel
  • Vessel
  • Vessel
  • Pottery vessel
  • Portrait vessel
  • Portrait vessel
  • Portrait vessel
  • Mountain sacrifice vessel
  • Desert landscape with foxes
  • Shallow-handled pottery dipper with painted deer-hunting scene
  • Runners wearing animal attributes
  • House and occupants, centipede, and jaguar-fang deity
  • Dancing deer, relief scene on Mochica III–IV pottery vessel
  • El Purgatorio, Leche Valley, thirteenth–fourteenth centuries, general plan
  • Huaca Dragón, near Chanchan, carved adobe wall decoration
  • Ceremonial knife with figure Naymlap(?), front
  • Ceremonial knife with figure Naymlap(?), back
  • Openwork ear-plugs
  • Chanchan and environs, air view
  • Chanchan, general plan, thirteenth–fifteenth centuries
  • Chanchan, Rivero and Tschudi Compounds, main enclosures, 13th–15th centuries, plans
  • Chanchan, Uhle Group, thirteenth–fifteenth centuries, plan
  • Chanchan, Huaca La Esmeralda, wall decoration at ramp
  • Chanchan, wall with decoration
  • Viracochapampa, general plan c. 750–800
  • Tapestry fragment representing a condor-feline figure
  • Polychrome pottery showing bird and serpent
  • Polychrome pottery vessel
  • Corbel-roofed stone houses in Cantamarca province, after 1000(?), sections
  • Pachacamac, mostly after 700, general plan
  • Pachacamac, Inca platform (left) and platform of the Tiahuanaco period (right)
  • Paracas Peninsula, underground burial structures of Cavernas and Necropolis types, c. 200 BC
  • Markings on the pampa above the Palpa river
  • "Crust-painted" pottery
  • White-slipped pottery
  • Vessel with Marine Beings
  • Polychrome pottery vessel
  • Ground drawings, possibly processional paths, outlining a bird and a monkey
  • Bird designs with (A) killer-whale and trophy head substitutions, and (B) killer-whale design with feathers and trophy head substitutions
  • Double cloth
  • Embroidered Paracas mantle, with details of recurrent design
  • Embroidered Paracas mantle, with enlargement of of rectilinear motif
  • Personages in animal costumes on painted cotton cloth
  • Detail of Paracas embroidery with overlapping planes
  • Detail of Paracas embroideries with tentacled extensions
  • Personage wearing killer-whale attributes, cotton embroidery
  • Embroidered Paracas mantle, black ground
  • Large polychrome pottery tub
  • Modelled-face pottery vase
  • Face-and-scroll theme tapestry
  • Painted pottery bowl, textile themes
  • Wooden implement
  • Tambo Colorado, Pisco Valley
  • Tambo Colorado, Pisco Valley
  • Pucará, pedetsal figure holding trophy head
  • Incised polychrome pottery vessel
  • Incised polychrome pottery vessel
  • Pokotia, statues
  • Tiahuanaco, general plan c. 900
  • Tiahuanaco, dressed stones at Puma Puncu, after 400
  • Tiahuanaco, underground stone chamber west of Calasasaya enclosure, after 400
  • Tiahuanaco, flat stone idol
  • Stone slab with two figures
  • Gateway of the Sun
  • Tiahuanaco monolithic figures
  • Pottery bowl
  • Pottery bowls
  • Huari, near Ayacucho, slab-masonry chambers
  • Polychrome pottery effigy vessel
  • Pikillaqta, air view
  • Cuzco, general plan c. 1951, showing Inca wall remnants
  • Cuzco, terraces of Sacsahumán, air view
  • Cuzco, carved wall of Coricancha, below west end of church of Santo Domingo
  • Cellular stone slab, possibly architectural model
  • Ollantaytambo, general plan, c. 1500
  • Ollantaytambo, detail of dwelling block
  • Machu Picchu, c. 1500, view from the north
  • Titicaca Island, Palace, late fifteenth century: (A) condition in 1870; (B) plan of ground floor; (C) plan of upper storey
  • Coati Island, "Nunnery," late fifteenth century, elevation and plan
  • Cacha, Temple of Viracocha, fifteenth century, plan
  • Sillustani, burial tower
  • Cuzco, shrine at Kenko
  • Double-shell vessel
  • Figure of llama used for votive offerings
  • Polychrome pottery vessel, "aryballos" form
Free
Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Table of Contents
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.001
Free
Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The greater part of these chapters was originally prepared for lectures and seminars beginning in 1938 at Yale University, where the opportunity for studies of the art of American antiquity was first made possible by the late Dean E. V. Meeks and my colleagues in the Department of the History of Art. Other occasions to develop the treatment of the pre-Columbian past, as part of the history of art rather than as anthropology, which is the more usual treatment in American universities, were …
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.002
Free
Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The manuscript which was first published in 1962 was actually delivered to the publishers in May 1959. No significant changes were made after that time, until Sir Nikolaus Pevsner finally persuaded me in 1972 that a complete revision and aggiornamento were justified. In effect the text was then thirteen years old – years which saw intense archaeological activity and revaluation. These newer publications are now embedded in text and notes, together with the older references, which were retained …
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.003
Free
Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
In revising for the second edition during 1973, my attention was drawn more to new discoveries than now for the third, when a rising interest in inter-regional relationships is apparent. In 1973 dynastic histories were still a centre of attention, but these chronologies are now again clouded by disagreements. Today the main novelty is to use fragmentary archaeological indications to buttress ‘models’ based on Old World parallels of social and economic development. In chronological studies it …
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.004
Free
Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The tables seek to place sites and classes of objects in time: the criterion of selection is more by quality than quantity, and more by expressions than by serial events. All the placements prior to A.D. 1300 should be regarded as elastic at least in the degree required now by the margin of error used in radiocarbon measurements (± 200 years).
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.005
Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
TThe purpose of an introduction is to identify its bearer to his host in a phrase or two that solicit mutual understanding. In this book, products of aesthetic value are the principal theme. I have at all points sought to avoid the suggestion that works of art are mere illustrations to civilizations, preferring to present the artistic object itself as the unit of study. I have written about ‘cultures’ only when such topics were required to illuminate the objects, which are after all the …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.27-45
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.006

Access to this content is only available to subscribers. If you are at an institution that currently subscribes to the A&AePortal, please login to your VPN before accessing the site. If you have already purchased an individual subscription, please sign in to your account to access the content. Learn more about subscriptions.

Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
About 2500 years ago the fertile adjoining valleys of Mexico, Puebla, Cuernavaca, and Toluca were already a metropolitan nucleus for the entire northern continent. Other regions in Oaxaca, on the southern Gulf Coast, and in Maya territory were in touch with central Mexico, giving and receiving each in its time. The dominant centre of ancient urban life eventually became the three high intermontane plateau valleys of central southern Mexico, in the quadrant bounded by Tula, Xochicalco, Cholula, …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.47-74
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.007

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Teotihuacán exemplified Classic priestly government, but Tula is a type-site for the warrior aristocracies of Middle America after about A.D. 1000. As the capital of the Toltec (‘builder’) dynasty, Tula flourished from the ninth to the thirteenth centuries, ruled by fighters rather than priests, who restricted political control to as few families as possible. Religion centred upon human sacrifice, in an aggressive, expansionist relationship to neighbouring tribes. Toltec skills included an …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.77-116
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.008

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
From south to north, the coastal plains with their dense forests can be divided into three archaeological regions. (1) The deltas of the rivers of southern Veracruz and Tabasco, on the gulf side of the isthmus of Tehuantepec. These were occupied by the main trunk of Olmec civilization, which had other manifestations from pre-Classic times onwards, in Central America, in Oaxaca, in the Guerrero and Puebla highlands, and in the Valley of Mexico. (2) Central Veracruz, including the Mistequilla …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.117-153
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.009

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The most numerous Southern Indian peoples, west of the Maya, are today the Zapotec and Mixtec, who occupy Guerrero, Puebla, Oaxaca, and Tehuantepec. Oaxaca proper is divided into the western highland, or Mixteca, and the eastern valleys, where Zapotec is spoken. Oaxaca is the most central of all the regions of ancient Mesoamerica, having neighbours to west, north, east, north-east, and south-east, and overland communications to all these regions, fixing Oaxaca as the least marginal or …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.155-186
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.010

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The hundredth meridian, or a line drawn north and south near Toluca, divides ancient Mexico into an eastern half, of high civilizations in densely populated regions, and a western half, of scattered, small, and isolated tribal groupings, whose archaeological history has been recovered only in the last twenty years. In the main, this western history comprises four principal stages: (1) an early era of Olmec style which endured many centuries in Guerrero, with sporadic manifestations farther …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.189-200
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.011

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The Classic Maya peoples produced objects both of use and of pleasure with tools of stone alone. The Marxist stereotype, that cultural behaviour is determined by the instruments of production, finds no confirmation in Maya art. Its forms, though comparable to those made by the metal-using civilizations of Mediterranean antiquity, belong technologically to much older, Neolithic horizons of prehistory. …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.201-243
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.012

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Maya sculptors of the Classic era were Stone Age professionals moving from one site to another as demand required. Their figural art displays cultural unity during a thousand-year period. Limestone [203], sandstone [199], trachyte [198], stucco [210], wood [200], clay, and jade [213] were the customary materials, worked without knowledge of metal tools. The genres were architectural decoration, commemorative reliefs, figurines, pottery, and jewellery. All large monumental sculpture obeyed …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.247-285
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.013

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Chichén Itza, the metropolitan centre of civilization in Yucatán, was under foreign domination until the thirteenth century. Foreigners, some resident there since Early Classic time as at Dzibilchaltun or Acanceh, began to rule in Yucatán perhaps as early as the eighth century. The worship of a feathered serpent god of Mexican origin, the Mexican manner of human sacrifice by heart excision, with skull racks to display the sacrificial victims, and many other Mexican highland traits support …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.287-322
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.014

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The Cordilleran highland region of Chiapas, Guatemala, and Salvador is a mountainous land bridge favouring east-west transit. Its volcanoes mark the southern boundaries of Classic Maya civilization. Repeated invasions of these highland valleys and Pacific plains from the Gulf Coast and from the mountains of Mexico occurred in all pre-Columbian periods, with the result that Maya culture was never dominant in the region, even if, from Chiapas to the Río Lempa, different dialects of the Maya …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.325-340
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.015

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The urban societies of the South American continent all flourished in the Andes, along a strip of mountainous coast less than a hundred miles wide, extending from the Caribbean façade of Venezuela and Colombia southward along the Pacific to northern Chile. Nomadic hunters of the southern Andes and plains and the tropical tribespeople of Amazonia, like the Indian tribes of North America, will not be treated here. In this part we deal only with those parts of the mountainous northern and western …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.341-358
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.016

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The Pacific Coast and the highlands of Peru, together with the Bolivian plateau, compose the central Andes. Cajamarca in northern Peru is isolated from southern Ecuador by several hundred miles of forested mountains and desert coast. On the east the tropical forests of the upper Amazon hem in the culture of the central Andes, and on the south the Atacama desert separates it from southern South America. From Ecuador to Chile, the central Andes extend for over 1000 miles, in a strip ranging from …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.359-377
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.017

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The modern Peruvian departments of La Libertad and Lambayeque, which extend nearly 250 miles along the Pacific Coast north of Ancash, contain the principal remains of the Middle and Late periods of central Andean archaeological history. Two civilizations dominated the region: Mochica, which flourished from about 250 B.C. until after A.D. 700, and Chimu, governed by a dynasty enduring from about 1370 until the Inca conquest of the north coast valleys before 1470. The six centuries between …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.379-410
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.018

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Before the appearance of pottery in Peru, the central coast valleys were the scene of the earliest large ceremonial architecture now known in ancient America, built between 2000 and 1800 B.C. At Chuquitanta in the lower Chillón Valley, clay walls with stone facings formed a temple upon a mound, flanked by long wings, capable of housing a thousand persons. In later periods, originality in the repertory of expressive forms is rare throughout the region between the Paramonga and Cañete Valleys. …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.411-417
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.019

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Polychrome ceramics and bright-hued textiles characterize the southern regions of the central Andes as decisively as bichrome pottery and large urban groupings do the ancient civilizations of northern Peru. Such many-coloured vessels, and the textiles, were traditional products as early as the fifth century B.C. These southern regions extend from the Cañete Valley on the Pacific Coast of Peru, east and south to Bolivia, the north-west Argentine, and northern Chile. As in the rest of Peru, the …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.419-439
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.020

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
The principal urban centres in the southern highlands occupy three major basins: the region called the altiplano, surrounding Lake Titicaca at the boundary between Peru and Bolivia; the region from Ayacucho to Jauja in the Mantaro river valley basin; and the Cuzco region near the headwaters of the Urubamba river. The basin of Lake Titicaca supported early civilizations at Pucará and at Tiahuanaco from about 500 B.C. until after A.D. 500. Thereafter the style of Tiahuanaco spread to the Mantaro …
PublisherYale University Press
Related print edition pages: pp.441-469
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.021

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
List of Principal Abbreviations
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.022
Free
Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Glossary
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.023
Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Bibliography
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.024

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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Pre-Columbian research is well served as regards both books and articles in the Handbook of Latin American Studies (H.L.A.S.). Founded in 1935, the Handbook offers critical remarks by specialists on every item mentioned. For brevity, this selection excerpts relevant works from the decade since 1980, when my writing stopped on the third edition. These items are cited by the volume of H.L.A.S and the number therein; thus XLV:542 refers to item 542 in H.L.A.S., vol. XLV, the article by P. Anawalt …
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.025
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Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
List of Illustrations
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.026
Free
Description: The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
Index
PublisherYale University Press
https://doi.org/10.37862/aaeportal.00123.027
The Art and Architecture of Ancient America: The Mexican, Maya and Andean Peoples
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