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| View Original: | Quiché - Burial Urn - Walters 20092041 - Three Quarter Left.jpg (1800x1774) | |||
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| Keywords: Quiché - Burial Urn - Walters 20092041 - Three Quarter Left.jpg Large lidded urns were unique to the K'iché Maya of southern Guatemala The urns contained the remains of important individuals who either were placed in the urn as a tightly wrapped bundle or as a secondary burial of the remaining bones A few have reportedly been found buried in the pyramidal platforms of ritual buildings but the majority come from sacred caves where descendants would make pilgrimages to give offerings and seek advice from their revered ancestors The front of this urn is adorned with the image of what is likely an ancestor who at death was transformed into a spirit embodiment of a deity This deity/ancestor combines features of K'inich Ajaw the sun god and GI a patron god at Palenque Mexico He emerges from the open maw of the xoc shark saurian which symbolizes the watery underworld the deified personage ready to interact with his prayerful descendants The special connection with the supernatural and particularly with such deities as the maize god and K'inich Ajaw was the ideological foundation of royal authority figures among the Maya a Mesoamerican trait with its origins in the Formative Period among the Olmecs AD 550-850 Late Classic earthenware post-fire paint cm 55 8 67 4 57 9 accession number 2009 20 41 80196 Stendahl Galleries Los Angeles date and mode of acquisition unknown John G Bourne 1970s by purchase Walters Art Museum Gift of John Bourne 2009 place of origin Southern Highlands Walters Art Museum license Pre-Columbian art in the Walters Art Museum K'iche' Media contributed by the Walters Art Museum needs category review Maya ceramic vessels | ||||
