a ae Res 45 Spring 2004 10 a 6 13 144 161 186 209 nas 29 256 23 Anthropology and aesthetics Contents EDITORIAL ROBERT HULLOT-KENTOR ‘Adorno without quotation MICHAEL OPPITZ Ritual objects of the Qiang shamans REBECCA STONE-MILLER Human-animal imagery, shamanic visions, and ancient American aesthetics KARL A. TAUBE Flower Mountain: Concepts of life, beauty, and paradise among the Classic Maya JULIA GUERNSEY KAPPELMAN Demystifying the late preclassic Izapan-style stela-altar “cult” ANTHONY F. AVENI, SUSAN MILBRATH, CARLOS PERAZA LOPE Chichén Itz4’s legacy in the astronomically oriented architecture of Mayapén FEDERICO NAVARRETE ‘The hidden codes of the Codex Azcatitlan RENATO GONZALEZ MELLO Manuel Gamio, Diego Rivera, and the politics of Mexican anthropology SUZANNE PRESTON BLIER The art of assemblage: Aesthetic expression and social experience in Danhomé (CLEMENTE MARCONI Kosmos: The imagery of the archaic Greek temple BISSERA PENTCHEVA Visual textuality: The Logos as pregnant body and building (CHARLES BURROUGHS Greening Brunelleschi: Botticelli at Santo Spirito ANGELA VANHAELEN Local sites, foreign sights: A sailor's sketchbook of human and animal curiosities in early modern Amsterdam DOCUMENTS AND DISCUSSIONS (CUAUHTEMOC MEDINA Architecture and efficiency: George Maciunas and the economy of art= Flower Mountain Concepts of life, beauty, and paradise among the Classic Maya KARL A. TAUBE Introduction In an important, pioneering study, Jane Hill (1992) defined the extremely widespread concept of a floral paradise present among native peoples of Mesoamerica and the American Southwest. Terming it Flower World, Hill noted that this ancestral place of origin and return is closely related to the sun, heat, music, and brilliant or iridescent colors. In fact, Flower World is commonly identified with the path of the sun: “The image of the flowery road, with its prototype in the path of the sun across the heavens, is one of the most widely diffused Flower World metaphors” (ibid.:215). According to Hill, the paradisal Flower World is especially developed among Uto-Aztecan-speaking peoples, including the ancient Aztec, the contemporary Huichol, Tarahumara, and Yaqui of western Mexico, and the Hopi and O'odham of the American Southwest. In addition, Hill (ibid.:123, 134-135) noted that the Flower World complex also appears in contemporary beliefs of the Tzotzil Maya of highland Chiapas. More recently, Kelley Hays-Gilpin and Jane Hill (1999) described the presence of Flower World symbolism in ancient Puebloan art, suggesting considerable antiquity for this belief in the ‘American Southwest. In her initial study of Flower World, Hill (1992:136) provided a number of scenarios to explain the distribution of this floral paradise among ancient and contemporary peoples of Mesoamerica and the ‘A great deal ofthis study was writen when I was a Resident Fellow ofthe Cente for Ideas and Saciety atthe University of California, Riverside. ar grateful tothe Center for Ideas and Society for Providing me institutional suppor to conduct this research, During the Process of writing this stud, | benefited greatly by the comments and insights rom a number of colleagues, especialy Stephen Houston, Francesco Pellizzi, and David Stua. 1 also wish to thank Claudia Carcia-des Lauries fr calling my attention to a number of Nahuatl texts | am indebted to Nuit Banal, Francesco Pelli, and an anonymous reviewer for their careful editorial comments concerning an earier version of this text. ‘American Southwest, According to Hill, the Flower World complex probably derived from an ancient Uto- Aztecan speech community and then spread into the more distant Hopi and Maya areas. However, Hill (ibid.) also suggested that Flower World may have been introduced into other areas from southern Mesoamerica during the early dissemination of agriculture. The present study finds a good deal of support for the latter scenario. The Flower World complex is very ancient in Mesoamerica and can be traced to the Middle Formative Olmec as well as the Late Preclassic and Classic Maya. ‘Among the ancient Maya, Flower World concerned a floral mountain that served both as an abode for gods and ancestors and as a means of ascent into the paradisal realm of the sun. The floral paradise closely related to the concept of the breath soul, a vitalizing force frequently symbolized by flowers or jade. This breath soul is also expressed by music and sweet- smelling aroma, both carried by air and wind. It will also be noted that some of the secondary traits found with the Classic Maya Flower World, such as Flower ‘Mountain and the floral breath soul, can be found with Uto-Aztecan speaking peoples, including the Aztec and Hopi. In our studies of the ancient Maya, it has become increasingly clear that they were profoundly aware of their surrounding world, However, although we have a great deal of detailed knowledge concerning pre- Hispanic horticultural methods and beliefs, there has been relatively little discussion of how the ancient Maya perceived their relation to the surrounding environment. Based on modern ethnographic accounts and Classic period writing and art, Andrea Stone (1995) and | (Taube 2003a) have argued that the pre-Hispanic Maya had two ‘opposite conceptions of space, the ordered human environments of the house, community, and fields, and the primordial world of the forest and bush. Whereas the house, town, and milpa are socially constructed spaces of staight lines and right angles, the forest is a chaotic realm of twisted paths and tangled growth. In addition,70 RES 45 SPRING 200 ‘whereas the human spheres of the town and field are symbolically bright, diurnal regions of the sun, the forest wilds are related to darkness, caves, and the underworld. In Maya thought, the relation of people to the environment is more complex than simply a contrast between a positive world of humans and a negative world of nature. It is abundantly clear that the ancient Maya regarded certain aspects of the natural world, such as flowers and tropical birds, as things of beauty and ‘admiration. Aside from the constructed human world of toil and effort and the threatening forest wilds, there was also a paradisal realm of flowers and beauty. Maya concepts of paradise Diego de Landa mentions that the sixteenth-century Yucatec conceived of two distinct afterlife regions, the dark underworld known as Metnal and a paradisal garden of plenty: the delights which they said they were to obtain, if they ‘were good, were to goto a delightful place, where nothing Would give them pain and where they would have an abundance of foods and drinks of great sweetness and a tree which they call yaxche, very cool and giving good shade, which isthe ceiba, under the branches and the shadows they would rest and forever cease from labor (Fozzer 1941:131), Similarly, there is the contemporary Yucatec belief that at {ve end of the present creation there will be a gentle place of beautiful flowers and plants: “On this new surface of the earth there will be no useless trees or spiny plants but only a pleasant, lovely vegetation and fragrant flowers” (Villa Rojas 1945:151). Among contemporary Yucatec Maya, the souls of the dead are also believed to follow the road of the sun (Sosa 1985: 430, 442). On this road, the sun and the accompanying, souls travel in shade, recalling the sixteenth-century description of paradise supplied by Diego de Landa (ibid:442; Tozer 19412131). The concept of a solar paradise is well documented among the contemporary Tzotzil of highland Chiapas. A Creation myth from Chenalhé describes the newly born sun rising into a celestial paradise: “there were many fruit trees, many sweet smelling flowers, ...it was much better up there” (Guiteras-Holmes 1961:186). The myth further relates that the sun and moon ascend to this realm, never to return to earth. This region is Winahel, the celestial paradise that follows the path of the sun: "it is not in the same place, because it moves with the sin, because itis the sun" (ibid.:258). For the Tzotzil of San ‘Andres Larrainzar, the sun travels a road covered with flowers (Holland 1961:168). Similarly, among the Tzotzil Maya of Zinacantan, there is the flower paradise known as nichimajel, nichim being the term for flower (Laughlin 2000:104), Although the notion ofa floral paradise recalls Christian ideas of the original garden of Eden and the afterlife, the solar component is wholly Mesoamerican, In addition, the concept of a solar paradise of flowers i, also a very ancient belief in Mesoamerica and the ‘American Southwest Maya souls and flower paradise ur recent understanding of ancient Maya concepts of the afterlife have been dominated by the dark and threatening underworld. The Quichean Popo! Vuh provides detailed descriptions of Xibalba, or “place of fright,” a realm of death, disease, and corruption. The frequently macabre way spirits of Late Classic vessel scenes also relate to night and the underworld (see Houston and Stuart 1989; Grube and Nahm 1994). In a number of Maya languages, versions of the term way can refer to a specific soul spirit or “co-essence” of a person. Called the wayhel or chanul among the Tzoztil Maya, this sprit closely relates to the character, wellbeing and fate of the individual. According to Evon Vogt (1976:33), the Tzotzil of Zinacantan consider such beings forest spirits who embody “the unruly, uncontrollable ‘wild’ and impulsive side of their behavior.” Similarly the Tzotzil of Chenalhé regard the wayhel as a wild anirhal related to the forest and the night (Guiteras-Holmes 1961:270, 288, 299, 301-302. The Tzotzil concept of the wild animal soul is consistent with the frequently frenetic behavior of way characters in Classic Maya vessel scenes, where they often tussle, gesticulate, or writhe in contorted poses. In addition, they commonly hold bowls of eyeballs, severed hands, and bones as their food, offerings more consistent with rituals of curing and witchcraft than with the honored ancestors. ‘The ancient vessel scenes and contemporary Maya ‘ethnography suggest that way are beings of the forest, darkness, and the underworld (Taube 2003a). Whereas the bestial way spirits directly relate to one’s personal behavior and fate in the mortal world, there is another spirit that continues after death. Thus for the Tzotzil of CChenalh6, the wayhel dies with the individual, but the soul known as the ch’ulel ascends to the solar paradise of Winahel (Guiteras-Holmes 1961:150, 176, 270). Evon