The Presence of Potbelly Sculptures in the Lake Atitlán Basin, Guatemala

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The sculptural style known as potbelly (“barrigón”) has been widely documented in archaeological sites in the southern Maya region, from Chiapas to El Salvador, with a few examples in the Lowlands and other areas of Mesoamerica. However, most of these monuments are concentrated in sites occupied during the Late Preclassic period on the Guatemalan Pacific Coast and Piedmont, as well as in Kaminaljuyu. In this paper, data will be presented on the poorly documented, but significant presence of this sculptural style in various areas of the Lake Atitlan Basin, which includes two fortuitous finds made in the year 2022.

The interpretation of the meaning of these sculptures is still a matter of debate among specialists, partly because their characteristics show variations between each region. Therefore, the specimens found to date in the Lake Atitlan Basin provide new data regarding their geographic distribution in the Maya Highlands, their anthropomorphic features, and symbolic and iconographic associations.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 40021.0