Giving Back: Debt in Classic Maya Narratives

Summary

This paper considers textual and visual evidence of debt among Classic Maya nobles. It begins with an overview of lexical data and summarizes specific references to payment and accounting. The argument proceeds to some less obvious contexts such as ‘just-so’ myths, which reveal a notion of primordial transactions and gifts to be repaid in perpetuity. Finally, the paper considers the movement of inscribed objects. The argument is that giving those essentially inalienable possessions marked unredeemable obligations, which, nonetheless, could be transferred further down the social ladder along with the inscribed items.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 21956