I, the King

Have you seen lanky King Phillip IV of Spain in his parade armor? Gaspar de Crayer’s portrait of the 17th century king is a familiar sight these days in Mexico City’s Historical Center. Phillip IV is portrayed on long colorful banners advertising the exhibit “Yo, el Rey, la monarquía española en el arte” (“I, the King, the Spanish monarchy in art”), currently on exhibit at the National Museum of Art.

In his right hand Phillip IV holds a scepter, his left hand rests on his sword — a standard way of portraying 16th and 17th century Spanish monarchs. His helmet is on a nearby table. The exhibit explains, Spanish kings do not wear a crown — they are sworn-in on the crown.

Early this year while visiting Madrid’s Prado Museum, I found myself running back and forth between rooms trying to compare paintings of Spanish monarchs and to see if different artists’ portrayals of kings and queens were indeed of the same individuals. If so, in which painting is the subject younger or older? All the while I wondered, “Why aren’t these portraits in the same gallery?”

I therefore found it refreshing to experience “I, the King,” curated to follow in chronological order. It is particularly interesting since many of the paintings in this show had never been exhibited together.

In the case of some kings it is possible to compare portraits painted at different ages during their very own lifetime — each by a different artist, loaned by different museums and collections. When exhibited chronologically side-by-side it’s easy to pick out physical traits and verify that the different paintings are indeed of the same person.

A homely portrait of Ferdinand and Isabella standing together is the first of the chronologically exhibited portraits. Fitting. It was Isabella who financed the first of Spain’s incursions into the western hemisphere. It was the union of Ferdinand and Isabella’s kingdoms that created Spain as a political unit.

“I, the King” is focused on Spanish monarchs who ruled New Spain, but it is bracketed with Mexico’s own monarchs. You’ll see Aztec Emperor Moctezuma II, a contemporary of Isabella and Ferdinand and the 19th-century short-lived emperors — Agustín de Iturbide (1822-23) and Maximilian of Habsburg (1864-67).

An anonymous oil on copper painting from 1698 depicts Moctezuma II, naming the king of Spain as successor to his empire and promising him obedience and tribute. This is likely a late 17th century attempt to legitimize the conquest.

Another — from an undisclosed private collection by an unknown European artist — depicts a stocky, full-bearded Moctezuma II as a discouraged Spanish vassal. Moctezuma’s right hand cedes a scepter and his left hand is over his heart. From his belt hangs an obsidian club. In the lower left corner of the painting the Aztec crown with an eagle atop a cactus sits on a tray on the floor.

In fact, Moctezuma II was most likely a lean-muscled warrior with no facial hair. But, as always, to the victor goes the recording of history. I suggest you take this portrait with a large grain of salt.

Physical characteristics of Moctezuma II were not recorded by conquering Spaniards and the Aztecs had yet to develop an interest in portraiture. However the Maya had taken portraiture to the heights of “carving in stone.” While visiting “I, the King,” my mind kept traveling to an exhibit at the Lithic Museum in Tikal, Guatemala, which owes its fame to portraying rulers in chronological order — Maya kings of Tikal carved on stelae.

When a stela is discovered at an archeological site it’s given a number or a letter — which becomes its name. Stelae are numbered in the order in which they are found — an order that has nothing to do with the order in which they were carved.

They are arranged in chronological order in the Lithic Museum, a marvelous repository of magnificent stelae and altars protected in a roofed open-space. Their places in the archeological site have been filled with accurate, well-rendered copies.

In these stone portraits, Tikal’s rulers carry a ceremonial serpent bar. They hold it in the crook of their arms, against their chests, with the palms of their hands turned outward. As Linda Schele and Peter Mathews explain in The Code of Kings, “The serpent bar’s original function was to symbolize ‘sky’ based on the homophony in Maya languages between Kan, ‘sky,’ and Kan, ‘snake.’ The bar also symbolized the ‘sky umbilicus that connected kings to their sources of supernatural power and the ecliptic path across the sky. Gods and ancestors materialized in the open mouths of the serpents.”

Good thing this was all discovered relatively recently. I’m sure the Spanish monarchs would all have wanted similar scepters with which to solidify their concept of divine right.

Mesoamerican stairs

While climbing Mesoamerican pyramids I'm frequently asked, "Why are the stairways so steep?", followed by “The ancient Mesoamericans weren't exceptionally tall people, were they?"  In our modern architecture we think of stairways as routes to quickly ascend or descend.  We expect them to be easy to climb when approached straight-on; with a hand-rail as an integral part of the stairway. Not so for ancient Mesoamericans. 

In aswering the first question I usually refer to the Pyramid of the Niches in El Tajin, an archeological site on the Gulf coast of northern Veracruz. Besides being an important religious center, El Tajin was probably a staging area for merchants setting off on the daunting five-day trip from the coastal plain to Teotihuacan, gateway to the Valley of Mexico at 2,200 meters (7,200 feet) above sea level.  

El Tajin's emblematic Pyramid of the Niches has 365 niches equally spaced around all four sides of the seven-tiered pyramid -- very probably one for each day of the solar year.  However, in order to count 365, we need to imagine there are niches obscured by the stairs going up to the top of the pyramid.

With the passage of time portions of the stairway have collapsed, and sure enough there are niches underneath the stairs!  These niches were never meant to be seen again once the stairway was built.  It is as if the builders thought of the stairway more as a ladder leaning up against the building.  Indeed throughout Mesoamerica the angle of the stairs on many buildings is similar to the angle at which a ladder would be leaned against the building.

It is not unusual for the steps to be higher than they are deep -- making for a strenuous climb.  I find it more comfortable to climb or descend in a long zig-zag. An added benefit is that the steps above can become the handrail.  

Renowned archeologist David Pendergast tells us "temples were . . . . sacred places to be visited and used by the priests and perhaps their retainers.  The priests themselves almost certainly did not dash up and down the stairs, but rather used the steps almost as a stage for ceremonial processions, moving with great pomp and dignity upward a stair at a time."  He adds, with humor,  "Priests, and their retainers perhaps retreated from the altar much as visitors do today, stern first and slowly." 

Occasionally you'll come across stairways that probably served a double duty as steps and bleachers -- with steps that are deep enough to sit on cross-legged while comfortably leaning against the riser as a backrest.  On those stairways I like to think of priests and nobles gathered to listen to a speaker sitting on the ceremonial platform in the middle of the courtyard.

Jaime Awe, Belize’s Commissioner of Archeology, believes that steep stairways provide "architectural economy."  They also preserve the maximum amount of space in the plazas in front of ancient Mesoamerican buildings.  A few years ago he showed me a most unusual step at Cahal Pech archeological site, near San Ignacio, Belize.  

The step blends in with all the others but it is a 20th century addition.  He called it a "Queen's step" splitting a very high step into two.  It was added for Queen Elizabeth II's visit to that site, allowing Her Majesty a more graceful entrance to a housing compound at the ruins.  My mind took me back to Dr. Pendergast's reference to priests, with their retainers helping them up the stairways.  Some things never change. 

And what about that follow-up question about the physical stature of the Mesoamerican people using the stairways?  In "Forest of Kings", Linda Schele writes about Aw-Cacaw who inherited the throne of Tikal in northern Guatemala in May of 682.  Tikal's emblematic Temple 1 is built over his tomb.  Dr. Schele writes: "Ah-Cacaw was a large man for his times.  He would live into his fourth katun [a period almost twenty years long], and be over sixty years old when he died.  At 167 cm (5 feet 5 inches) he was a veritable giant standing ten centimeters above the average height of the men in his kingdom."  

Dr. Pendergast was certainly right.  Given their relative stature it would have been a slow ascent and descent for ancient Mesoamericans who must have struggled even more than we do getting up and down the pyramids.  However they probably weren't in as much of a hurry as we seem to be.

A trio of Mayan Linguists

Yuri Knorosov’s Egyptology studies were interrupted by World War II service in the Red Army.   During the last days of the war he rescued a book from a burning German library.  Serendipitously, it was a book about the surviving ancient Maya codices and sparked a lifetime interest in Maya linguistics.   In the early 1950’s Knorosov published a translation of portions of the Dresden Codex, some of it based on information gleaned from Fray Diego de Landa's Alphabet (referred to in last week's Digs).   The preface of the publication said the reader might be surprised a Soviet linguist published this first translation, but explained it was because he lived in a socialist society -- more conducive to intellectual activity than capitalism.  

That preface eroded Western objectivity.  Scholars searched for errors in Knorosov's work -- in such an ambitious venture mistakes are easy enough to find.  One of his most severe critics was British linguist Eric Thompson, who harshly criticized anyone contesting his views on the Maya.  Knorosov's translation not only eclipsed Thompson's research but also criticized capitalism while Senator McCarthy was on his rampage in the USA.  During Thompson's reign few linguists dared incur his wrath.  A brave exception was Russian-American Tatiana Proskouriakoff who in the 1960's, venturing back to Knorosov's translation, found much of his work valid and built on his foundation, furthering the understanding of written Maya.  

Despite advances made by Knorosov and Proskouriakoff, Thompson's reputation remained undiminished and he was knighted in 1975.  Queen Elizabeth invited him to accompany her on a 1976 trip to Mexico.  Unfortunately for Thompson, he died on September 9, 1975.  Though a sad day for Sir Eric's family, friends, and admirers, for Maya linguistic scholars it opened the floodgates to discussion of many new ideas.  

The 1970's were years of other momentous events for Maya linguistics.  Foremost among them was a trip in December 1970 led by Linda Schele, an art history professor at the University of South Alabama.  She designed a Mexican study trip with the ultimate destination being Cancun.  Academic credit included!  Professor Schele and her students traveled the long way -- following the Gulf Coast.  The agent who sold them insurance at the border asked their destination and produced a spiral bound mile-by-mile trip description for their particular drive.  Palenque was not on their itinerary, but the Sanborn's Insurance guidebook said it was worth a few hours of their time.  Professors and students agreed to visit Palenque and make up for the diversion by driving later into the night.  Schele entered Palenque with an open mind.  She was an artist, not an archeologist, and had no preconceived notion of what she was seeing. Her experience as an artist, and art historian, gave her insights into Palenque's sculpture and writing that archeologists lacked.  Fascinated, she and her group of students spent twelve days at Palenque.  They never made it to Cancun.  Those twelve days transformed Maya linguistics. 

Schele, born and raised in Tennessee, was a folksy, friendly, unassuming southerner; yet a thorough academic researcher and writer.  Similar to the way she walked into Palenque with an open mind, she was oblivious to the politics of Western archeology.  Thompson exercised no sway over her except for whatever validity there was in his research.  Her unusual combination of academic rigor, friendly disposition, and enthusiasm was able to get outstanding researchers into the same room, sitting on cushions on the floor, sharing ideas and discoveries.  She praised their discoveries, diplomatically set aside what didn't seem right, and pulled together ideas which provided breakthroughs in reading written Maya.

Those sessions radically contrasted with the academic archeologists' traditional keeping of information close to their chests until a book could be published.  After face-to-face meetings she kept information flowing on floppy disks exchanged in the mail.  Schele saw dispersing information as much more important than taking credit for it -- something reflected in her many books and publications which, for the most part, she co-authored -- each with a different co-author.  Understanding of written Maya went from 15% to 50%; comprehension went up to 90% in context.During free time one afternoon at the first Palenque Round Table in December 1973 -- only three years after that trip along the Gulf coast -- Linda Schele, Peter Mathews, and Floyd Lounsbury deciphered the names of the rulers of Palenque for a 200-year period and presented them that evening at the Round Table!  Lounsbury later went on to expand the list to 500 years, including names, and even birth defects, suffered by the ruling family after so many generations of intermarriage. 
  

The University of Pennsylvania has hosted a Maya Weekend each April for a quarter century.  The meetings begin with a tribute to outstanding Mayanists who have died since the previous Maya Weekend.  1998-99 hit Maya studies particularly hard.  Linda Schele died on April 18, 1998; Floyd Lounsbury, twenty-six days later on May 14, and Yuri Knorosov on March 31, 1999.  Schele and Lounsbury were eulogized at the 1999 Maya Weekend.  When I saw that the tributes were over and the first speaker was about to be introduced, I bellowed from the back of the huge auditorium, "The Cold War is over!  We can honor Yuri Knorosov, March 31, 1999."  The master of ceremonies expressed a lame excuse for overlooking him, but tribute was paid to Knorosov in the University of Pennsylvania's Harrison Auditorium, ten days after his death.  Knorosov and Lounsbury were well advanced in years.  Linda Schele seems to have departed before her time.  I like to think the three of them needed to be together for some important reason.