The Madrid Codex -- once known as the Tro-Cortesiano Codex -- is one
of the four surviving codices from the ancient Maya civilization. It
was rediscovered in Europe in the 19th century, and is now in the
possession of the Museo Arqueológico, in Madrid.
Physical Features
The
codex is a 56 “page” work that was possibly produced by about 8 Mayan
scribes in the Postclassic period. It is page size measures about 5.72
by 9.44 inches, and when unfolded completely it reaches about 21.98
feet in length.
History of Rediscovery
Taken from
the Maya and ending up in Spain, rediscovery of the Madrid Codex
occurred in the mid to late 1800s. A man named Juan de Tro y Ortolano
once came possessed a manuscript, known as the Troano Codex. This codex
ended up in the Museo de América de Madrid when he died. Another man
named José Ignacio Miró bought another codex in 1872 that was known as
the Cortesiano Codex, and this too ended up in the museum. A third man,
Léon de Rosny went to see the Cortesiano Codex in the museum, and
discovered that these codices were in fact two parts of the same codex.
(This is why the Madrid Codex used to be known as the Tro-Cortesiano
Codex.)
However, the Madrid Codex may not be what it
seems. In 1999, an archaeologist -- also an author of books on the
ancient Maya -- named Michael Coe questioned the total authenticity of
the codex. Coe believes that page 56 has a piece of European-style
paper dating from 1600s. Despite this, the codex is still generally
understood to have been created before theConquest.
Contents
And what does the Madrid Codex contain?It has religious writing that ranges from information on divination and rituals (such as rituals to complete on New Year’s) to information on the beings called Pauahtuns -- gods of the cardinal directions. Astronomical information in the Madrid Codex includes astronomical tables, though it does not have as many as the Dresden Codex. It has almanacs on things such as marriage, weaving, deer trapping and hunting, beekeeping and how to make it rain.
References:
University of Arizona Libraries: Mayan Codex Facsimilies
"The Ancient Maya"; Robert J. Sharer, Loa P. Traxler; 2006
"Handbook to Life in the Ancient Maya World"; Lynn V. Foster; 2005
Monday, April 30, 2012
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Cacao (Chocolate)
Author’s note: A lot of the information on how the Maya viewed and
ate and drank cacao comes from the Classic period. This is because
this period has the most text information from painted texts and
pictures on ceramics, which come from the context of what is
understood to be the elite class. The Maya codices, understood to be
from the Postclassic period, are another source of information on the
Maya view of cacao.
Other than corn, one of the foods most talked about when it comes to Maya cuisine is cacao. It comes from the cacao tree (Theobroma cacao), also known as the chocolate tree. The ancient Maya cultivated the cacao tree for its fruit as well as for the fruit's seeds, which are the basic item required to make cacao. The ancient Maya viewed cacao as a precious substance, and used it as food as well as for religious and economic purposes.
The Tree
Found only in wet, tropical lowlands, the cacao is found in Mesoamerica and the Amazon Basin. The tree has leathery and long leaves and a wide trunk. The tree produces pink flowers on its trunk and branches—flowers whose smell repels human noses. After these bloom, the tree produces its edible, red-brown fruit pods with sweet flavored flesh and twenty to fifty seeds.
The ancient Maya, who in the Yucatan Peninsula at least, grew plantations of cacao trees, possessed methods to grow the trees well. They pruned the trees to make them grow more seedpods (this happens with some other plants as well), and they had to keep the trees out of direct sunlight.
History
It is understood that the ancient Maya began using cacao seeds as a food source 2,000 years ago or so. Based on a vessel with a spout that comes from Belize, cacao consumption started somewhere around 600 BC to around 400 BC.
Cacao usage has been found throughout the Classic period in the southern lowlands of the Maya world. But in the northern area of the Maya world, the Yucatan Peninsula, archaeologists have only found cacao consumption as far back as the Late Classic.
The Process
To begin the process of making cacao, the Maya first opened the seedpod and removed the seeds, which were white in color and bitter. Then they fermented the seeds for several days, decreasing the bitterness and bringing out the chocolate flavor. After fermentation, the seeds were roasted and shelled. The ancient Maya then mashed the seeds into a paste and it was this paste that they used for in food.
Four hundred seeds makes a pound of chocolate -- a bag of baking chips is about twelve or fourteen ounces, four to two less ounces than a pound. This means it takes about 10 to 20 pods to make a pound of chocolate.
Cacao Drinks and Foods
The ancient Maya made different kinds of drinks (hot and cold ones) via the medium of cacao. They would flavor their chocolate drinks with such things as chilies and seeds such as annatto. Another ingredient that the ancient Maya would sometimes use is honey.
Of the different kinds, a well-known kind of drink the ancient Maya made included chocolate and corn, and was a frothy/foamy drink that was savory. The foam was considered the best part of this drink.
However, drinks weren’t the only food the ancient Maya used cacao for. They also used cacao in gruels.
Containers
The vessels that the Maya used for the serving of cacao-based drinks come in a range of shapes. The most common kind of vessel the Maya used for chocolate is a basic cup. More rare is the spouted vessel that looks like a teapot.
Significance
In the ancient Maya religion, cacao seeds were a kind of offering to the gods. In the Popol Vuh – a book recording Quiche Maya myths – chocolate was something that came out of the mountain Paxil, when it broke open. Beyond mythological meaning, it is also understood that people drank the foamy chocolate drink during their wedding ceremony.
Other than having a religious significance, cacao also served a function in the ancient Maya economy: cacao seeds were used as a kind of currency.
Consideration
Some of what is known about what the Maya made using chocolate comes from chemical analysis of residues on the bottom of ceramics. Hershey Corporation was the first to discover the chemical signature of chocolate in 1990, using a lidded vessel discovered in Rio Azul.
References:
The Free Dictionary: Encyclopedia: Cacao
"Food, Farming and Hunting"; Emory Dean Keoke, Kay Marie Porterfield; 2005
"Chocolate - History, Culture, and Heritage"; Louis E. Grivetti, Howard-Yana Shapiro; 2011
Other than corn, one of the foods most talked about when it comes to Maya cuisine is cacao. It comes from the cacao tree (Theobroma cacao), also known as the chocolate tree. The ancient Maya cultivated the cacao tree for its fruit as well as for the fruit's seeds, which are the basic item required to make cacao. The ancient Maya viewed cacao as a precious substance, and used it as food as well as for religious and economic purposes.
The Tree
Found only in wet, tropical lowlands, the cacao is found in Mesoamerica and the Amazon Basin. The tree has leathery and long leaves and a wide trunk. The tree produces pink flowers on its trunk and branches—flowers whose smell repels human noses. After these bloom, the tree produces its edible, red-brown fruit pods with sweet flavored flesh and twenty to fifty seeds.
The ancient Maya, who in the Yucatan Peninsula at least, grew plantations of cacao trees, possessed methods to grow the trees well. They pruned the trees to make them grow more seedpods (this happens with some other plants as well), and they had to keep the trees out of direct sunlight.
History
It is understood that the ancient Maya began using cacao seeds as a food source 2,000 years ago or so. Based on a vessel with a spout that comes from Belize, cacao consumption started somewhere around 600 BC to around 400 BC.
Cacao usage has been found throughout the Classic period in the southern lowlands of the Maya world. But in the northern area of the Maya world, the Yucatan Peninsula, archaeologists have only found cacao consumption as far back as the Late Classic.
The Process
To begin the process of making cacao, the Maya first opened the seedpod and removed the seeds, which were white in color and bitter. Then they fermented the seeds for several days, decreasing the bitterness and bringing out the chocolate flavor. After fermentation, the seeds were roasted and shelled. The ancient Maya then mashed the seeds into a paste and it was this paste that they used for in food.
Four hundred seeds makes a pound of chocolate -- a bag of baking chips is about twelve or fourteen ounces, four to two less ounces than a pound. This means it takes about 10 to 20 pods to make a pound of chocolate.
Cacao Drinks and Foods
The ancient Maya made different kinds of drinks (hot and cold ones) via the medium of cacao. They would flavor their chocolate drinks with such things as chilies and seeds such as annatto. Another ingredient that the ancient Maya would sometimes use is honey.
Of the different kinds, a well-known kind of drink the ancient Maya made included chocolate and corn, and was a frothy/foamy drink that was savory. The foam was considered the best part of this drink.
However, drinks weren’t the only food the ancient Maya used cacao for. They also used cacao in gruels.
Containers
The vessels that the Maya used for the serving of cacao-based drinks come in a range of shapes. The most common kind of vessel the Maya used for chocolate is a basic cup. More rare is the spouted vessel that looks like a teapot.
Significance
In the ancient Maya religion, cacao seeds were a kind of offering to the gods. In the Popol Vuh – a book recording Quiche Maya myths – chocolate was something that came out of the mountain Paxil, when it broke open. Beyond mythological meaning, it is also understood that people drank the foamy chocolate drink during their wedding ceremony.
Other than having a religious significance, cacao also served a function in the ancient Maya economy: cacao seeds were used as a kind of currency.
Consideration
Some of what is known about what the Maya made using chocolate comes from chemical analysis of residues on the bottom of ceramics. Hershey Corporation was the first to discover the chemical signature of chocolate in 1990, using a lidded vessel discovered in Rio Azul.
References:
The Free Dictionary: Encyclopedia: Cacao
"Food, Farming and Hunting"; Emory Dean Keoke, Kay Marie Porterfield; 2005
"Chocolate - History, Culture, and Heritage"; Louis E. Grivetti, Howard-Yana Shapiro; 2011
Friday, April 20, 2012
Short Count
Though the ancient Maya had been using the Period Ending version of the Long Count they eventually shortened it further by the Postclassic period. This even shorter version does not count a group of katuns like Period-Ending. The Short Count -- whose dates are called katun-ending dates -- only stated the date a katun ended and used a very simplified version of the Tzolkin. This second version was a cycle that didn’t repeat until 256.25 years had passed.
Setup
Instead of the regular way of counting the Tzolkin, days were counted using the numbers 1 through 13. Each day had the name Ahau, and was paired with a number between 1 through 13. But it wasn’t just a simple matter of successively counting higher to 13 and starting over. Each day skipped two numbers in the sequence.
An example of the way the Short Count’s dates are written goes like this: katun 13 Ahau. The next katun would be written katun 11 Ahau, after that would be katun 9 Ahau and so on. Once you get to katun 1 Ahau you count down two to get katun 12 Ahau, then 10 Ahau, et cetera.
Consideration
The Short Count is the kind of time keeping that the authors of books like the Chilam Balam used. In these books, the katun date would be recorded in the u cahlay katunob or the “count of the katuns”. Katuns were named after the last day that they fell on.
References:
“The Ancient Maya”; Robert J. Sharer, Loa P. Traxler; 2006
Setup
Instead of the regular way of counting the Tzolkin, days were counted using the numbers 1 through 13. Each day had the name Ahau, and was paired with a number between 1 through 13. But it wasn’t just a simple matter of successively counting higher to 13 and starting over. Each day skipped two numbers in the sequence.
An example of the way the Short Count’s dates are written goes like this: katun 13 Ahau. The next katun would be written katun 11 Ahau, after that would be katun 9 Ahau and so on. Once you get to katun 1 Ahau you count down two to get katun 12 Ahau, then 10 Ahau, et cetera.
Consideration
The Short Count is the kind of time keeping that the authors of books like the Chilam Balam used. In these books, the katun date would be recorded in the u cahlay katunob or the “count of the katuns”. Katuns were named after the last day that they fell on.
References:
“The Ancient Maya”; Robert J. Sharer, Loa P. Traxler; 2006
Sunday, April 15, 2012
Period Ending
As time passed and the ancient Maya civilization declined, the Long Count became less used in its full form. Instead a shorter form known as Period-Ending began to be used.
Setup
The ancient Maya used the Period-Ending version of the Long Count at least since around the Late Classic period. Period-ending dates counted katuns and the day the katuns ended on. Period-ending dates still used both calendars of the Calendar Round. The period-ending dates form a cycle that does not repeat for around 19,000 years.
An example of the period-ending date format goes like this. If it was the 8th katun and it ended on 4 Ahau 13 Cumku, then it would be written katun 8 4 Ahau 13 Cumku.
Consideration
The Period-Ending version was itself eventually replaced by an even shorter version of counting katuns. This second version is called the Short Count.
References:
“The Ancient Maya”; Robert J. Sharer, Loa P. Traxler; 2006
Setup
The ancient Maya used the Period-Ending version of the Long Count at least since around the Late Classic period. Period-ending dates counted katuns and the day the katuns ended on. Period-ending dates still used both calendars of the Calendar Round. The period-ending dates form a cycle that does not repeat for around 19,000 years.
An example of the period-ending date format goes like this. If it was the 8th katun and it ended on 4 Ahau 13 Cumku, then it would be written katun 8 4 Ahau 13 Cumku.
Consideration
The Period-Ending version was itself eventually replaced by an even shorter version of counting katuns. This second version is called the Short Count.
References:
“The Ancient Maya”; Robert J. Sharer, Loa P. Traxler; 2006
Thursday, April 5, 2012
The Ballgame
Author’s note: There are several things to keep in mind when reading this article. One is that most information, on the ballgame comes from the Classic period. Another is that some facts rely on an archaeologist’s ability to interpret the meaning of an inscription/mural properly, and that interpretations are subject to change.
 |
| One of multiple views of a vase that shows a ballgame happening. It was made anywhere from the the 600s AD to the 900s AD. From LACMA. |
The ballgame -- which was a part of cultures across all of Mesoamerica -- was an important part of ancient Maya society, varying somewhat depending on the area. To the ancient Mayas, the ballgame possessed religious and political purposes as well as a possible recreational purpose, though this is not known for sure.
Ball Court
The Maya began to build ballcourts in the Late Preclassic. Two kinds of ballcourt are known to exist, the L-shaped court and the I-shaped court. Of these two the Maya more often used the I-shaped one.
In the I-shaped court, two large, solid walls or benches were built parallel to each other, forming a long space (or alley) between them (the vertical bar of the “I”.) These walls could either be sloping or vertical and tended to be built facing north-south. At each end of this long space, there was another, smaller space, the short bars of the “I”, and these usually didn’t have anything built around them. The long space was where the ballgame was played in the court.
Despite the differences in layout (which also includes the fact that some had stone hoops while others do not), ballcourts did have similar features. Such similarities included inscriptions on the ball court walls, north-south orientation and placing the ballcourt in the middle of the city.
Playing Gear
Like in football, players of the ballgame wore protective gear while playing. Players wore padding on their arms and legs, and would also wear something on their ribs and waists to protect them.
 |
| A ceramic figurine from around 550 AD to 850 AD, from the Peten region (in Guatemala.) From LACMA. |
 |
| An image of the back of thefigurine as shown on the left. Also from LACMA. |
The ball of the ballgame was made of rubber. There was no regulation standard, and balls could be as large as a soccer ball or as small as a softball.
Rules of Play
Nobody alive knows all the rules for playing. It is possible that the rules changed with time. From what the archaeologists have seen through their studies, the games goes something like this: two teams of players tried to hit the rubber ball to the other team’s open space at the end of the alley.
 |
| This is a rollout of a vessel made in Honduras between 600 AD and 900 AD. From the Yale University Art Gallery. |
Significance
How was the ballgame religious or political? The religious aspect is thus: it is understood that ancient the Maya relied on reenacting mythological events as part of their rituals for keeping the world in balance. It is possible that ritual ballgames reenacted a myth in which two figures, the Hero Twins, defeated the Lords of Death in a ballgame. The ball court itself was a bridge between Middleworld (where people lived) and Xibalba, the Underworld (where the Lords of Death lived).
The political use of the ballgame was as a medium of conflict resolve. If there was an argument between two communities, it could be settled through a ballgame. An argument inside a community could be settled with a ballgame also.
Sacrifice and the Ballgame
Human sacrifice may have been part of the ballgame. However, it is not clear and sources do not always agree. Various claims have been asserted in different publications: some state the losers were sacrificed, while others state the winners were sacrificed. Still others state that it is unknown whether or not sacrifice was really part of the game at all.
References:
Google Books: "Space and Sculpture in the Classic Maya City"; Alexander Parmington; 2011
Google Books: "Do All Indians Live in Tipis?: Questions & Answers from the National Museum of the American Indian"; Smithsonian Institution; 2007
Google Books: "Handbook To Life In The Ancient Maya World"; Lynn V. Foster, Peter Mathews; 2005
University of Maine: William Palmer III Collection: Ballgame
Library of Congress: Pre-Contact America: Ritual, Ceremonies and Celebrations
The University of Arizona Press: The Mesoamerican Ballgame
University of Nevada, Las Vegas: Marjorie Barrick Museum: Mesoamerican Ballgame
El Pilar: Nohol Trail 11
LACMA: Vessel with Ballgame Scene
LACMA: Ballplayer Figurine in Costume
Image Credits:
LACMA: Vessel with Ballgame Scene
LACMA: Ballplayer Figurine in Costume
Yale University Art Gallery: Tripod Vessel with Ballplayers (fourth view)
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