Iconography and Art (Other Keyword)
26-50 (223 Records)
This is an abstract from the "Sculpture of the Ancient Mexican Gulf Coast, Part 2" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. As part of a larger study on Classic Veracruz fragmented bodies and sculptures, I sketch two case studies of contexts in which fragmented yokes, decapitated heads, and figurine body fragmentation come together in Protoclassic and Early Classic Tres Zapotes and Cerro de las Mesas.
Classic Veracruz Tuxtlas Polychrome Ceramics (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Tuxtlas Polychrome ceramics of south-central Veracruz, Mexico occupy a visible presence in precolumbian museum collections. Boldly rendered deities and zoomorphic figures are the focal point of bowls, plates, and vases, their images alluding to a complex supernatural world. While well represented among the corpus of Classic Veracruz artifacts, these vessels...
Color Me Red: A Preliminary Examination of Pigments in the Moquegua Valley, Peru (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Exploring Culture Contact and Diversity in Southern Peru" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This preliminary study explores how pigments were sourced and manufactured in the Moquegua valley of southern Peru. The ethnohistoric and archaeological records provide ample evidence of the economic, religious, and social significance of colors and pigments in the pre-Columbian Andean world; however, there currently exists little...
Common Sense and the Distribution of the Sensible in Ancient Tiwanaku, AD 500–1100 (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper will examine the aesthetic and affective construction of political subjectivities within the Tiwanaku state (AD 500-1100). Based on evidence for feasting within the ceremonial core of Tiwanaku and a detailed analysis of the polychrome serving wares that were consumed at these events, I will argue that large-scale rituals were sites at which “common...
Connecting Hohokam Art and Iconography (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. All cultures use symbols to convey ideas. In archaeological contexts those symbols have become ways to define and differentiate archaeological cultures. But what did the symbols mean to the artisans who created them? The art that Hohokam craftspeople produced embodied the world (seen and unseen) as they understood it. They were influenced by weather, animals...
Considerations Regarding the Sculptures Commonly Called "Standard-Bearers" (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Crossing Boundaries: Interregional Interactions in Pre-Columbian Times" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Many images in the iconographic corpus from Pre-Hispanic Basin of Mexico belong to forms which were created and reproduced either in codices, mural painting, ceramics, and sculpture. Some examples are the attires of deities, specific icons used to represent natural elements, like rain, comets, even the Sun, and...
Constructing Identity in the Swabian Aurignacian (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Culturing the Body: Prehistoric Perspectives on Identity and Sociality" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The human body plays a significant role in constructing identity. According to Bourdieu (1974, 1976), the habitus, displays the social status and the role of the individual within a society. Group membership manifests itself with symbols like personal ornaments, the choice of emblematic objects, and their...
Contributions of Richard G. Cooke, PhD, MBE, to the Study of Isthmo-Colombian Iconography (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Unraveling the Mysteries of the Isthmo-Colombian Area’s Past: A Symposium in Honor of Archaeologist Richard Cooke and His Contributions" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Richard Cooke's pioneering studies in zooarchaeology of the Neotropics have redefined the way that archaeologists, art historians, ethnohistorians, and ethnographers utilize data from faunal remains, not only in the reconstruction of past environments,...
Coyolxauhqui’s Serpents (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Animal Symbolism in Postclassic Mesoamerica: Papers in Honor of Cecelia Klein" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This study focuses on questions about serpents and gender associations in Aztec art--questions raised by a ceramic fragment located in storage in the Brooklyn Museum. On it Coyolxauhqui, the enemy of the Aztecs’ supernatural patron, Huitzilopochtli, is depicted with two different types of imaginary serpents, a...
Cups for the King: Ajnumsaaj Chan K’inich of Naranjo and the Emergence of Regional Styles of Classic Maya Elite Serving Vessels (2024)
This is an abstract from the "The Rollout Keepers: Papers on Maya Ceramic Texts, Scenes, and Styles in Honor of Justin and Barbara Kerr" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Distinct regional styles are a hallmark of Lowland Maya elite polychrome ceramic vessels during the Late Classic period (550–820 CE). However, our understanding of the phenomenon has not advanced beyond its mechanics - the presence of attached craft workshops at the courts of...
"A Curious Ambivalence": The Iconography of Long-Distance Trade Goods in Postclassic Mexico (2018)
The Postclassic Mexica maintained what Sophia and Michael Coe (2005) refer to as a "curious ambivalence" regarding cacao: despite its prevalence in everyday life as currency, the plant rarely appears in artistic programs and consumption was highly restricted via sumptuary laws that controlled social behavior. The visual scarcity of this crop extends into divine imagery – for instance, cacao remained an important aspect of Ek’ Chuah, the Postclassic Maya merchant god, but does not appear among...
A Dark Horse of the Early Postclassic: The Site of El Cerrito (Querétaro, Mexico) and Its Relationship to Chichen Itza and Tula (2018)
Ever since the first attempts to explain the close correspondences (in iconography, architecture, and writing) between Chichen Itza and Tula in the Early Postclassic it has been assumed that it was mainly between these two cities, sometimes even called "twin Tollans", that the extended and intense contact between Northern Yucatan and central Mexico took place. A tendency among Mesoamericanists not to look further to the north and west, to present states such as Guanajuato and Querétaro, have...
Dating Islamic Ceramics from Nәsiri Kolat and Şәğolhoni (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The mortuary site Nәsiri Kolat in the Lerik region of Azerbaijan was occupied from the Antik through the Middle Islamic Periods (11th-16th centuries), a fact further supported when the site is considered with the midden site Şәğolhoni. Ceramic analysis from these sites permit us to better understand how people in the Lerik region interacted with more...
De la mano de Michael Coe a las manos de los artistas estilo códice: Cincuenta años de estudios (2023)
This is an abstract from the "A Celebration and Critical Assessment of "The Maya Scribe and His World" on its Fiftieth Anniversary" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Grolier exhibition commissioned by M. Coe in 1973 came to researchers as an inescapable reference that remains today. His studies on codex-style vessels, so defined by him, opened the door to new studies from different perspectives and approaches that are reviewed here. This study...
Deciphering Social Structure: A Cognitive Approach in Examining Casma and Chimú Ceramic Iconography (2018)
The choices groups make in the type of decorative techniques and styles on ceramics are referential to key components of a group’s social structure. This research examines social aspects of the Casma and Chimú using a cognitive approach in analyzing iconographic elements on elite ceramics from Pan de Azucár, located in the Nepeña Valley, Peru. Casma ceramics are locally made vessels where no two are alike and are characteristically defined by the presence of circle-and-dot and serpentine...
A Decorated Bone Pendant from Patipampa (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Seeing Wari through the Lens of the Everyday: Results from the Patipampa Sector of Huari" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The 2018 Patipampa excavations at Huari resulted in the discovery of a wealth of remarkable artifacts with potentially far-reaching implications for our understanding of Middle Horizon iconography, including a small bone pendant from a possible gallery space. This bone pendant was noted for a...
Designing Influence: Aesthetic Choices and Group Identity in Decorated Ceramics of Late Postclassic Etlatongo, Oaxaca, Mexico (2018)
During the Late Postclassic (A.D. 1200-1520) in the Mixteca Alta of Oaxaca, Mexico, aesthetic qualities of ceramics were utilized as both decorative values and tools for negotiating the creation of group identities and ideologies within communities. Through a stylistic analysis of Yanhuitlan Red on Cream type ceramics recovered from excavations at the site of Etlatongo, in the Nochixtlán Valley, I explore how these vessels and the motifs depicted on them were used during the creation of...
Diamonds in the Rough: Olmec and Olmec-Related Occurrences of the Rhombus Motif and Its Variations (2021)
This is an abstract from the "The Precolumbian Dotted-Diamond-Grid Pattern: References and Techniques" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. As ancient cultures throughout the world developed textiles, knotted and woven fabrics lent themselves to the development of geometric rhombus patterns, first as the diamond-shaped mesh of knotted nets and later as square patterns in twined gauze and plain-weave cloth. Further early experimentation in basketry and...
Digital Connoisseurship: Applications of Machine Learning to Moche Iconography (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the absence of a written language, the study of the complex narrative iconography of the Moche or Mochica culture of the North Coast of Perú (250-900CE) forms an important foundation of our understanding of the cultural dynamics and ritual traditions of this Pre-Columbian society. Fineline iconography on Moche ceramic vessels in museum and private...
Dioses de Agua y Montaña. El paisaje ritual y las deidades enmascaradas de la costa este de Los Tuxtlas (2018)
El corredor costero al este de Los Tuxtlas, delimitado por los Volcanes de Santa Marta y San Martín Pajapan, el mar del Golfo de México y las Lagunas de Sontecomapan y del Ostión, es una zona que se caracterizó por la multiculturalidad y la variedad de patrones debido a la presencia de un sistema portuario que estuvo activo desde el periodo Formativo medio hasta el Clásico tardío (1200 aC-1000 dC). Así mismo, la presencia de estos elementos naturales que lo delimitan fue y sigue siendo el...
Domestic vs. Elite Religious Cults: Revisiting the Huastec Tlazolteotl-Ixcuina Deity Complex (2018)
Pre-Columbian Huastec stone sculptures and clay figurines for the most part have been interpreted as deities and assumed to belong to the same religious cult. They also have typically been interpreted through a central Mexican lens and been identified as and associated with Late Postclassic central Mexican deities. Female figures in particular have been interpreted as Tlazolteotl, the central Mexican goddess of parturition, sexuality, and purification—a deity thought to be closely related to the...
Dorset Through Their Own Eyes (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Dorset PalaeoInuit (Tuniit in Inuit traditional knowledge) are a culturally extinct group who lived throughout much of the eastern North American Arctic between about 2500 and 700 years ago. They are best known for their art, primarily two- and three-dimensional carvings, which range from highly naturalistic to highly abstract. Ubiquitous amongst the...
Duck. Duck. Goose? A Ceramic Survey Grows into a Primer on Variability (2019)
This is an abstract from the "How to Conduct Museum Research and Recent Research Findings in Museum Collections: Posters in Honor of Terry Childs" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. A systematic survey of archaeological vessels in the collections of the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture in Santa Fe revealed almost 100 bird form jars, frequently referred to as duck pots or shoe jars, from New Mexico and its border environs. The survey found, among other...
Eagles, Falcons, and Vultures: The Birds on the Platform of the Eagles and Jaguars at Chichen Itza (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Animal Symbolism in Postclassic Mesoamerica: Papers in Honor of Cecelia Klein" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. All sixteen birds carved on the sides of the Platform of the Eagles and Jaguars at Chichen Itza have been traditionally identified as eagles. Because each pair of birds flanks a large relief of a seated jaguar holding a heart, it has been assumed in the past that the platform celebrated military orders like...
Early Formative Figurines from Tlatilco - Understanding the Diversity and Individuality (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Mesoamerican Figurines in Context. New Insights on Tridimensional Representations from Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Early Formative site of Tlatilco, has like so many other ancient sites, been covered by modern-day urbanization. Many of these sites suffered a fate of early exploitation and looting leaving the archaeologists with puzzles that often lack many pieces. With resilience and patience, and...