Category: Blog

The Neria Collection, Uaxactún, Guatemala: Volume 2

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research

In March, 2022, almost three years after photographing the first half of the Neria ceramic collection (see: Research Contribution 11: La Colección del Museo Dr. Juan Antonio Valdes, Vol. 1, Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein), I returned to El Chiclero, Neria and Tono’s rustic tourist lodgings in Uaxactun, to shoot the second half of her stunning collection. If you missed the introduction to Volume I, published in 2021, we repeat part of it here:

“The story behind her collection is fascinating, and well-told in Night Fire Film’s Out of the Maya Tombs (available at https://nightfirefilms.org/films/). The producers at Night Fire Films, David Lebrun and Rosie Guthrie, made a clip especially for this blog to introduce our readers to the museum and its founder. You may see the film clip by clicking here https://vimeo.com/589143884.”

-Bruce Love

Research Contribution 13: La Colección del Museo Dr. Juan Antonio Valdes, Vol. 2, Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

A Catalog of Non-Maya Glyphs at Chichen Itza: Second Edition

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research

The second edition of A Catalog of Non-Maya Glyphs at Chichen Itza includes twenty-two glyphs from the Northwest Colonnade that were inadvertently omitted from the first edition and an additional eleven glyphs from the Caracoles Mesa, recently discovered by site archaeologists José Francisco Osorio and Francisco Pérez in the Temple of the Snails (Caracoles) building in the Initial Series Group.

As with the previous version shared in June 2021, this catalog is offered without interpretation with the focus on the data themselves. We hope the updated catalog, presented in the same digital format, will allow for wide distribution and easy navigation of these hieroglyphs.

-Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

Research Contribution 12: A Catalog of Non-Maya Glyphs at Chichen Itza: Second Edition, assembled by Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

Santa Elena Monuments in Balancan Museum, Tabasco

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research

Corpus Volume 12 presents four monuments from the Classic Maya site of Santa Elena, Tabasco, Mexico. The monuments are unusual in that their shapes are somewhere between stelae and panels. They are as thick as stelae but quadrangular like panels. Could they have been ballcourt panels? The details of their discovery and removal to the town of Balancan are unknown to the authors of this Corpus Volume. Photos are by Bruce Love and drawings are by Sergei Veprestkii.

-Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

Corpus Volume 12: Santa Elena Monuments in Balancan Museum, Tabasco

The Neria Collection, Uaxactún, Guatemala: Volume 1

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research

We end 2021 and begin 2022 with an exciting new Research Contribution: the first volume of La Colección del Museo Dr. Juan Antonio Valdes, Uaxactún, Guatemala, which provides photo documentation and data for nearly half of the almost 600 Maya objects in the Dr. Juan Antonio Valdes Museum. David Lebrun and Rosie Guthrie have created a film clip for the blog to share the story of the museum’s founder and caretaker, Neria Herrera, which we hope you will enjoy as well.

-Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

Research Contribution 11: La Colección del Museo Dr. Juan Antonio Valdes, Vol. 1, Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

A Catalog of Non-Maya Glyphs at Chichen Itza

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research

The most recent contribution is a catalog of non-Maya glyphs from the site of Chichen Itza in Yucatan, Mexico. It is the second iteration of a project began by Bruce in 2010, with the assistance of the late Peter Schmidt. This updated version, like the original, is offered without interpretation so that it can be of use to a range of researchers. We hope the digital format will allow for wide distribution and easy navigation of this unusual body of hieroglyphs.

-Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

Research Contribution 10: A Catalog of Non-Maya Glyphs at Chichen Itza, assembled by Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

Petén Miscellanea: Monuments from Five Sites

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research

Corpus Volume 11 presents 10 monuments from around Lake Petén Itzá, only one of which is in situ. Three of the monuments are in the central park or plaza on the island of Flores, three are in front of the town hall of San Andrés on the western edge of the lake, three are in a rustic wooden enclosure at a highway intersection (entronque) in the town of Ixlu on the eastern edge of the lake (where the north-south road to Tikal meets the east-west road from Belize), and one is in the site of Ixlu itself, near to that intersection.

-Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

Corpus Volume 11: Petén Miscellanea: Monuments from Five Sites

Kaminaljuyu, Sculptures 10 and 65, MUNAE, Guatemala

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research

Corpus Volume 10 consists of two monuments from Kaminaljuyu that are currently on display at the National Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology (MUNAE) in Guatemala City. The photographs were made by Bruce Love and illustrations by Lucia R. Henderson.

-Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein

Corpus Volume 10: Kaminaljuyu, Sculptures 10 and 65, MUNAE, Guatemala

Additional Sources for the Ichmul de Morley Panels

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research

Dear readers,

Shortly after publishing Research Contribution 9, follower and supporter Karl-Herbert Mayer brought to our attention that Teobert Maler had visited Ichmul and photographed Panel 1 and Panel 2 in the late 19th and/or early 20 century, quite some time earlier than Sylvanus Morley. Thanks to Karl’s lead, and with Bill Ringle’s help, Maler’s photographs of the Ichmul panels have been found and are, in fact, available to download at https://digital.iai.spk-berlin.de/viewer/image/1049600878/1/LOG_0003/. Greg Smith’s revised Research Contribution 9 is now posted in place of the original.

Bruce Love and Meghan Rubenstein, Publishers
Contributions to Mesoamerican Studies

Research Contribution 9: The History of the Ichmul de Morley Ballplayer Panels, by J. Gregory Smith

 

 

Ichmul de Morley, Panels 1 and 2

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research1 Comment

Research Contribution 9 and Corpus Volume 9 are here published simultaneously; both are about the carved stone panels known as Ichmul de Morley Panels 1 and 2. The Research Contribution, by Gregory Smith, details the early history of the discovery of the panels by Sylvanus Morley and their subsequent documentation, while the Corpus Volume presents recent photographs and drawings of them by Bruce Love.

Corpus Volume 9: Ichmul de Morley, Yucatán, Mexico

Research Contribution 9: The History of the Ichmul de Morley Ballplayer Panels, by J. Gregory Smith

Planchón del Rey (San Diego Cliff Face), Petén, Guatemala

Published on by Contributions to Mesoamerican Research

Corpus Volume 8 presents a single monument, an Early Classic period relief carving, three meters tall, high on a limestone escarpment that overlooks a major (though unrecorded) archaeological site about halfway along the paved highway connecting La Libertad and El Ceibo, Petén. The project was facilitated by the alcalde of the municipio of La Libertad, where I had photographed the Itzimte stelae in 2016 that constituted our Corpus Volume 7.

When I returned to La Libertad in April 2019, again with Bernie Mittelstaedt as my guide and co-worker, I brought two plaques showing the Itzimte stelae as gifts and tokens of appreciation to alcalde Benjamín Ipiña. These plaques were made of metalized material suitable for hanging outdoors. Mr. Ipiña then made phone calls for us that paved the way for us to photograph Planchón del Rey.

two men holding signage and shaking hands

-Bruce Love

Corpus Volume 8: Planchón del Rey (San Diego Cliff Face), Petén, Guatemala