ANCESTOR DEIFICATION IN ANCIENT MAYA RITUAL AND

RELIGION

LATE POSTCLASSIC COMMUNITY SHRINES AND FAMILY ORATORIES

Karl James Lorenzen

University of California, Merced

Abstract

This paper addresses the need for a deeper understanding of the function and
meaning of miniature masonry shrines in Late Postclassic period Maya ritual and
religion; particularly, their use in public versus private religious contexts and their
proposed importance as sacred loci for the deification of ancestors in ancient shrine rites.
New archaeological research carried out at the Late Postclassic center of El Naranjal,
located in northern Quintana Roo, Mexico, treats these issues noted above. Findings from
research in 1999 and 2001 address ritual shrine use in both public civic-ceremonial
precincts and private domestic compounds. Twelve miniature shrine complexes (each
composed of a single shrine and stairway set on a substructure, with a series of associated
altars) are reported within the two square-kilometer core of El Naranjal. Functional
interpretations are presented in the context of early historical accounts, recent
ethnographic reports, previous archaeological description, and current research at El
Naranjal and other sites. Using an ethnoarchaeological perspective, the author posits that
the nature and significance of ritual evidence excavated from shrine complexes indicates
their intensive use as religious loci for the performance of agricultural fertility-based
ceremonies – rites and rituals tied to ancestor veneration that involved the actual
deification of particularly revered familial lineage heads and esteemed community
leaders.

Minature Masonry Shrines

LATE POSTCLASSIC PERIOD MINIATURE SHRINES are diminutive structures less than two
meters square in each dimension and too small to accommodate a person of even the most modest
stature (as it is implicit, on occasion in the remainder of the text, the term “period” is omitted
from Late Postclassic and other similar temporal designations) (Figure 2). Most commonly, these
buildings are one-room constructions that feature single entrances, made of masonry and mortar
covered with a thick layer of limestone stucco plaster. Shrine roofs are either masonry vaulted of
cut stone or flat, consisting of wood-beams capped heavily with mortar. Variations on the more
formal all-masonry version include shrines that exhibit walls and ceilings of wood-pole and palm-
thatch (Figure 1). Miniature shrines of all sorts are typically founded on bedrock, very low single-
course cut-stone footings, formal raised masonry platforms, or atop recycled earlier-period
architecture (Figure 2; Lorenzen 1995, 1999, 2003). Though not treated in this discussion, a less
common type of miniature shrine, composite shrines, are larger structures containing a series of
progressively smaller shrines, one within the other (see Andrews and Andrews [1975] for a
general discussion of Late Postclassic shrine construction and architectural variation). Almost
always found directly associated with miniature shrines, are multiple stone altars set in front of
and off the sides of shrine entrances and/or arranged at the base of stairways. Altars are made of
four vertically set skirt-stones veneering each side of a well-dressed square plug stone, and are at
times found stacked in two or three tiers that closely resemble stepped-pyramids in miniature
(Lorenzen 1995).
Although diminutive shrines occur widely in both civic-ceremonial and residential contexts
at Late Postclassic sites throughout the northern Maya lowlands, relatively little is known
regarding their actual function and significance in ancient Maya society. The near ubiquitous
presence of smashed ceramic human-effigy censers (called Chen-Mul Modeled) used to burn
copal incense at shines, as well as stone idols and ritual caches found with altars and shrines,
obviously identify these structures as oratories or temples in miniature to house diminutive
representations of gods and deified ancestors made of ceramic, wood, and stone (Figures 5-6).
Archaeologists agree that at least for elite residential compounds, shrines were ritual areas for the
performance of private, lineage-based religious rites (Smith 1962, 1971a-b; Freidel and Sabloff
1984; Chase 1986, 1988; Masson 1997). Identical structures in exclusively nonresidential public
precincts have for the most part been ignored, primarily because of their diminutive size,
overshadowed by associated monumental architecture (Lothrop 1924; Proskouriakoff 1955, 1962;
Andrews and Andrews 1975, 1980; Miller 1982). This lack of archaeological attention is directly
attributed to our poor understanding of miniature shrines in public architectural contexts and thus,
their central role in Postclassic Maya religion remains widely underestimated.

Historical Interpretations
Miniature shrines were first recorded pictorially by the ancient Maya themselves in screen-
folding divinatory almanacs called codices, considered masterpieces of indigenous art and
primary sources of native history and religion. As a result of the famous auto de fe enacted at the
Maya city of Mani by the infamous Diego de Landa, appointed Bishop of Yucatan by the Spanish
Catholic church in the late sixteenth century, all illustrated native texts were deemed satanic and
burned in a great pyre with other idolatrous material. Only four of these books are known to have
survived, including the Dresden, Madrid, Paris, and Grolier codices. Each of these manuscripts
date to either the Late Postclassic or shortly following Spanish contact in AD 1521 and except for
the Grolier, depict examples of miniature shrines that reveal aspects of architectural form,
technique of manufacture, and materials of construction (Figure 1).
These depictions are in many instances, consistent with information gathered from
contemporary and later ethnohistorical accounts, archaeological examples and modern
ethnographic descriptions of Maya miniature shrines and oratories. In codical imagery, miniature
shrines resemble small houses, associated with Maya deities such as Itsamnaj (considered the old
creator god, a sorcerer coupled with agricultural fertility and plant regeneration) and Chaak (the
supreme sky god of rain, thunder, and lightning, who is also closely allied with verdant growth
and agricultural abundance) engaged in various ritual activities, shown standing in front of shrine
entrances or seated inside the oratory itself as participant observers (Figure 1). Seated deities
shown inside shrines with legs crossed and arms folded likely depict idols of wood, stone, and
probably ceramic human-effigy censers, so frequently recovered archaeologically from miniature
shrine contexts. Many of these images, both in material and pictographic form, represent deities
characteristically associated with miniature shrines referred to in later Yucatec Maya historical
accounts as the k’u na or “god house” (a term also given to larger temple-shrines) (Figures 1-2).
The earliest known western record of Late Postclassic miniature shrines comes from the
well-known sixteenth century Spanish historian, Bernal Díaz del Castillo, chronicler of the
discoverer Hernando Cortez, who wrote of an excursion led by Juan de Grijalva in 1518 to
circumnavigate the Yucatan Peninsula. Díaz (1982:23; Tozzer 1941: 14 – 16) described the
discovery of numerous isolated shrines along the Campeche coast at Boca de Términos, an
extensive natural port and bay (Figure 3). In this account, Díaz reported many ceramic and wood
idols (figures of women and serpents), and numerous deer antlers littering shrine fronts. Díaz
further commented that Maya merchants and game hunters passing the coast in canoes entered the
bay and made these remote shrines a stopping point for offertory sacrifices.
This early account directly contributes to the idea presented here that miniature shrines were
ritual-use areas for the performance of ancestor-based subsistence rites. And in this case,
considering the extensive presence of deer antlers, were also ritual locations specifically used to
invoke the gods of the hunt (called yumtzils as defined further on) and for making petitions to
deities who controlled the availability of fish and game. The great Mayanist, Alfred M. Tozzer
(1941: 9; Note 44), states these and other human and animal effigy idols of clay and wood give
“…reason to believe that in a few cases, at least, these gods were Tribal gods.” Another highly
regarded Maya ethnohistorian, Ralph L. Roys (Roys 1933, 1934; Scholes and Roys 1938: 609),
noted these were “…gods of the different lineages or name groups.” Regarding one specific Maya
lineage god called Sacal Puc, Scholes and Roys (1938: 609) state,
We know him as one of the early Mexican conquerors of Yucatan and as the
head of one of four lineages which came from heaven. Indeed, he still figures in
the Maya prayers of modern yerbateros [folk curers] as the first man to offer
posole [corn gruel] to the Chacs [likely during an agricultural rite or rain ritual].
Scholes and Roys (1938: 609) conclude their report on Maya ancestor veneration by stating that
each are “dedicated to these family or lineage deities.”
We can be fairly certain that these structures referenced by Díaz were miniature shrines and
not small temples, given that he specifically refers to them as casas de adoratorios de idolos
(oratory houses of idols) rather than templos or “temples,” which is consistent with traditional
Yucatec Maya terminology for these structures. In addition, Díaz made no mention of entering
inside these shrines or of interior details such as altars or wall murals, which are strikingly present
in the majority of larger ceremonial structures and would have surely been noted if encountered.
Moreover, in describing the location of these shrines Díaz stated that they were built directly on
the ground (a common characteristic of miniature coastal shrines), as opposed to more substantial
Late Postclassic temple-shrines frequently set on high substructures.
Shortly following Spanish contact, Bishop Diego de Landa, the sixteenth-century chronicler,
referred to miniature shrines in his invaluable account of Yucatec Maya history and religion
(considered his saving grace). As noted in the opening quote, Landa (Tozzer 1941:108) reports
the presence of shrines particularly in elite domestic settings exemplified at Mayapan,
distinguishing them from larger public temples and isolated examples in radically different spatial
contexts. Restricted to Maya nobility, Landa (Tozzer 1941) emphasized the function of these
same adoratorios in elite residential compounds as being family idol-houses and places for the
performance of private rituals, rather than general-use religious areas for traveling merchants,
hunters far from home, and the wider community as described by Díaz. In this report, Landa
(Tozzer 1941:131) details the very careful preparation of the dead and reveals that lineage shrines
were used as reliquaries, for the veneration of ancestral remains,
They used to cut off the heads of the old Lords of Cocom [rulers of
Mayapan], when they died and after cooking them, they cleaned off the flesh, and
then sawed off half the crown on the back, leaving the front part with the jaws
and teeth. Then they replaced the flesh which was gone from these half skulls by
a kind of bimuten [asphalt], and gave them a perfect appearance characteristic of
those whose skulls they were. They kept these [human skulls] together with the
statues with the ashes, all of which they kept in the oratories of their houses with
their idols, holding them in very great reverence and respect.
Landa (Tozzer 1941: 18-19; Note 109) further notes,
While the friar, the author of this book, was in this country, they discovered
a building, which they destroyed, a great urn with three handles with silver-
colored flames painted outside and enclosing the ashes of a burned body with
some arm and leg bones of a marvelous size and three fine beads of a fine stone
[blue jade] of the same kind which the Indians use for money [identifying them
as human cremations]…These buildings of Izamal were eleven or twelve in all…
These accounts by Landa grant a different perspective on the use of miniature shrine
complexes and add a new facet to our understanding of their significance in Late Postclassic
Maya society, principally, as multi-functional religious structures. These historical sources
indicate that miniature shrines served not only as private ceremonial areas for elite Maya families
in domestic contexts, but also functioned as public religious space in nonresidential locations for
the performance of general rites by the wider populace. The versatility of these diminutive
structures as multi-purpose ritual loci is extended to include those present in civic-ceremonial
precincts as well, as demonstrated later for the performance of community-based rites. In 1601,
Antonio de Herrera (Tozzer 1941:219) substantiated reports by Díaz and Landa of the widespread
existence of adoratorios or miniature shrines, making specific mention of their proliferation in
many post Spanish-contact Maya communities and households. Given that a number of early
chroniclers of Yucatec history including Cogolludo (1867-1868), Lizana (1632), and Villagutierre
(1983) described various temple/shrine types in their discussion of Native idolatry, only
diminutive structures specifically referred to as adoratorios are considered here.

Proposed Interpretations
As part of a larger research project directed by Fedick and Taube (1995), focused on the
human ecology of the Yalahau region in northeast Quintana Roo, Mexico, I began an intensive
investigation of the ancient Maya center of El Naranjal to address concerns regarding the function
and meaning of diminutive shrines as well as to answer questions related to architectural
recycling and reuse (Lorenzen 1995). Field research continued at El Naranjal and surrounding
sites in the summers of 1996 and 1998 (Lorenzen 1999). In 1999, Proyecto El Naranjal
commenced and concluded with a final archaeological expedition in 2001 (Lorenzen 2003). This
program of research was intended to comprehend the ritual significance and role of these poorly
understood structures in Late Postclassic Maya religion. As a result, excavations were carried out
around the base and at the summit of Structures 2, 7, 9, 14 and 21 (Figure 4). Each of these
structures – collapsed basal platforms dating to the Early Classic (AD 300 – AD 600) – served as
recycled substructures, reused during the Late Postclassic to support shrine additions and
associated stairways and basal altars (Lorenzen 1995, 1999).

Structure 7 – Lineage Shrine

Excavation results from the 1999 field season at El Naranjal revealed the fact that ceramics
and other ritual remains were not removed from shrine areas and cleaned off Structure 7, but
instead were carefully stockpiled in front of and on either side of the miniature shrine in antiquity,
suggesting an ancient act of curation. Evidence of post-breakage sherd burning was evident on
the broken surfaces of many ceramic fragments. This, coupled with the fact that very few sherds
(pieces of broken fired ceramics) were recovered from excavations around the basal platform of
Structure 7, is remarkably similar to contemporary material remains reported by Barbara Tedlock
in Highland Guatemala at important Quiché Maya lineage shrines (Tedlock 1992: 76-82). The
contemporary ritual curation of ceremic sherds is well-documented ethnographically by Tedlock
(1992: 76-82). The modern Quiché stockpile ritually smashed vessels next to public and special
lineage oratories called “mountain-place” and “water-place” shrines to venerate ancestral deities
who control human, animal, and plant fertility (ibid). These sherds are used as incense burners
and in their “curated” context also note the passage of time (a possible explanation for the high
density of sherds found accumulated around the shrine atop Structure 7). In essence, intentionally
shattered vessels become a readable history of previous family rituals, reflected in the words of a
Quiché lineage-priest “these shrines [and sherds] are like a book where everything – all births,
marriages, deaths, successes and failures [in planting and harvest] – is written down (Tedlock
1992 177).”
Sherd caches also work to increase progressively the collective power and importance of
individual shrines with successive shattering and curation rituals. Closely linked to water, caves,
mountains and family-owned land, continually maintained lineage shrines serve as
representations of solidarity and ancestry by extended Quiché descent groups. Incidentally,
massive sherd dumps similar to stockpiled sherds at modern Quiché shrines as well as the Late
Postclassic shrine on Structure 7 at El Naranjal, have also been recorded in numerous caves
throughout the Maya area, most notably by Thompson (1959: 129) and later by Pendergast (1966,
1969). In these examples, archaeological sherd deposits represent deity offerings that involved the
ritual shattering of ceramic vessels as a constituent part of religious sacrifice.

Structure 21 – Community Water Shrine

Structure 21 is located at the northern tip of the civic-ceremonial center at El Naranjal,
resting on a low rubble mound set at the margin of a seasonally inundated wetland and linked to
the site core by a kilometer-long sakbeh or raised stone road (Figure 4). This shrine features two
altars placed at plaza-level, between the stairway and terminus of the causeway. Structure 21
exhibits the most complete evidence from which we may draw a conclusive interpretation
regarding the Prehispanic practice of water, rain, and agricultural fertility rites performed at
miniature masonry shrines. Archaeological data from Structure 21 indicate that this shrine
functioned as a community water shrine. This proposal is based on a number of key factors:
1. The intentional placement of Structure 21 on the wetland margin, revealing the
direct connection of the site center to a significant onsite sacred water-source;
2. The relative isolation of Structure 21 from other monumental structures, indicating a
specific and unique ritual purpose;
3. Smashed human-effigy censers of both the “generic ancestor” variety as well as
depictions of the fertility-related gods Chaak and/or Itsamnaj. I contend that at least
for Postclassic Yucatan, important and highly revered ancestors were depicted
generically (as opposed to in portrait) on Chen Mul Modeled ceramic human-effigy
censers (Figure 6) – distinct from censers that clearly represent well-known Maya
gods such as Chaak and Itsamnaj (Figure 5; see Thompson 1957 and Rice 1999 for
examples of ceramic censer deity representations); and
4. The ritual use of speleothems (cave flow-stone) at Structures 2 and 21, linked
explicitly with rainmaking, the conjuring of rain deities, and regenerative forces
associated with sacred caves (see Lorenzen [N.D., 2003] for a detailed explanation
of the ritual significance of speleothems, their incorporation in ancient and
contemporary rain rites, and their connection to agricultural fertility).

Ethnographic Referents
 Modern ethnographic research among various Maya groups over the last century
demonstrates the continuity of miniature shrine function as shelters for religious images, today
referred to as santos, and ritual loci for the performance of private family religious rites (Aguilera
2000a, 2000b). Apart from modern cemetery “shrines” seen throughout the Yucatan Peninsula,
contemporary indigenous miniature shrines in the bush for the most part are no longer made of
masonry and are principally relegated to domestic rural settings rather than public contexts;
however, their general form, appearance, religious significance and purpose have remained
relatively unchanged since prehispanic times. During the Yucatan Medical Expedition mounted
by the Carnegie Institution of Washington from 1929 to 1931, private family shrines of this
perishable nature (though somewhat larger than their Late Postclassic equivalent) are reported
being present in nearly every residential compound among the Santa Cruz Maya of Xpichil and
Xyatil in Quintana Roo (Shattuck 1933:74, 174-180, Plates 47: B-C, 48:C-D).
Miguel Aguilera (2000a-b), as part of a more comprehensive ethnographic study in Maya
ritual and religion, documented the contemporary use of private religious structures among the
Chan Santa Cruz of central Quintana Roo. According to Aguilera (personal communication
2000), freestanding family shrines, referred to as santuarios and chan iglesias, literally “little
churches,” house wooden santos in human effigy, painted green and ritually adorned with plain
white cotton cloaks (the traditional dress of Maya men). Many of these are found embroidered
with brightly colored floral designs identical to those on huipiles (formal dresses worn by Maya
women). Regional variants of these shrines and their different ritual uses have been documented
ethnographically among other Maya groups such as the Lacandon, Quiche, Chorti, Tzotzil and
Tzeltal (Girard 1949, 1962; Gossen 1974; McGee 1990; Tedlock 1992; Tozzer 1907; Vogt 1990,
1993; Wisdom 1974). In a clear demonstration of continuity in religious practice from the
prehispanic period to the present, Diaz (1982: 25) records that the Spanish conquistador Pedro de
Alvarado wrote, following a visit to the deserted Maya settlement of Santa Maria during the early
1500’s, “in an Idol house there were some altar ornaments made of old clothes and some little
chests containing diadems, Idols, beads and pendants of gold [likely to adorn the idol].”
Chan Santa Cruz santos are highly esteemed possessions, watched over and venerated on
special table-top altars, passed down as heirlooms to family descendants (Miguel Aguilera,
personal communication 2000). In many ways these santos share striking similarities to private
family idols made of cedar mentioned by Landa: “The wooden idols were so much esteemed that
they were considered as heirlooms and were (thought of) as the most important part of the
inherited property” (Tozzer 1941:111) . This was likely due to the fact that prehispanic wooden
idols held the cremated remains of deceased relatives venerated in effigy (Tozzer 1941:110-111,
131). Landa (Tozzer 1941: 131), writing of the deceased, says:
The rest of the people of position made for their fathers wooden statues of
which the back of the head was left hollow, and they then burned a part of the
body and placed its ashes there, and plugged it up; afterwards they stripped off
the dead body the skin of the back of the head and stuck it over this place and
they buried the rest as they were wont to do. They preserved these statues with a
great deal of veneration among their idols.

Ancestor Veneration and Rain Making

Given the fact that many Classic Maya building mounds contain dynastic and lineage-related
burials, in light of the ancient Maya belief that pyramids are mountains and the home of
ancestors, and the likelihood that Chen Mul Modeled human-effigy censers (the most
characteristic artifact recovered from Late Postclassic miniature masonry shrines) depict deified
ancestors, makes certain that many deities venerated at diminutive shrines were ancestral and
directly tied to prominent lineages in the Yucatan peninsula. This is particularly apparent at
residential shrines where evidence indicates the adoration of lineage founders deified at death. As
stated earlier, osteological evidence from Mayapan suggests that at least for household shrines,
small family oratories served as ritual loci for ancestor veneration (Smith 1962: 221; 1971a: 107-
108). This practice was corroborated by Landa (Tozzer 1941: 131) in his detailed account of the
interment and adoration of bones and fleshy parts from dead relatives, among both elite and
lower-class Maya in contact-period Yucatan – little more than 100 years after the fall of
Mayapan. Moreover, Landa tells us of the Cocom family elite whose crania were preserved at
death, made life-like for display and venerated in residential shrines,
. . . on all the days of their festivals and rejoicing, they made offerings of
foods to them [dead relatives], so that food should not fail them in the other life,
where they thought that their soul reposed and where their gifts were of use to
them [Tozzer 1941: 131].
This reference by Landa relates directly to the contemporary observance of the Days of the
Dead, particularly evident in its focus on the veneration of family ancestors (Aguilar 2001;
Morrison 1998; Romero 1949). As in central Mexico where extensive research regarding the
Days of the Dead has been carried out, the ancient and contemporary practice of venerating the
dead serves to preserve the memory of ancestors (Nutini 1988, 1991). As with many modern rites
and rituals in Middle America, more current research on this celebration of the dead has traced
the continuity and origin of its practice to prehispanic times (Brandes 1998; Carmichael and
Sayer 1991; Nutini 1988, 1991; Scheffler 1976, 1999). For instance, the Yucatec Maya of Chan
Kom and Tusik, as most traditional Maya today, refer to the annual celebration of the dead as
hanal pixan or “the dinner of the souls,” carried out partially at gravesites and home shrines on
All Souls Day (Aguilar 2001; Morrison 1992; Redfield and Villa Rojas 1934: 119, 202-204, 322-
324; Villa Rojas 1945: 104, 151-152; Romero 1949).
As already noted for the prehispanic Maya, contemporary Yucatec Maya still venerate the
remains of their ancestors by placing the bones of dead relatives, particularly the cranium and
long bones, in miniature house-like shrines modeled after modern residences and brought out for
display and adoration during certain celebrations such as the Days of the Dead. This practice has
been recorded at Maya communities throughout the peninsula such as Dzibalché, Dzodzil,
Calkini, Chan Kom, Pomuch, and Tenabo (Redfield 1941; Redfield and Villa Rojas 1934;
Repetto-Tio 1995: 429-489; Tiesler-Blos 1999: 202-207; Tiesler-Blos et al. 1999).
In like fashion, contemporary Lacandon Maya maintain ossuary shrines in caves and rock
alcoves for the deposition of not only family skeletal remains but also “dead” ancestral-deity
censers (the broken pieces of which are considered the “bones” of the vessel). The Lacandon
Maya are direct descendants of the prehispanic Yucatec Maya and are considered the most
isolated, ethnically and culturally, of all Maya groups today. These and other cave shrines
dedicated to mensabak – the Lacandon god of rain; itsanok’uh – the god of hail and lakes; and
kanank’ax – lord of the bush, reveal the affiliation of ancestors to rain deities and spirits who
control agricultural plots and the release of game (McGee 1990: 57-59, Figure 5.4; Soustelle
1966: 94, Figure 58). Likewise, modern Chorti also closely associate rainmakers with ancestors,
reflected in altars used exclusively for the performance of rain ceremonies and ancestor
veneration rituals (Wisdom 1974: 383).
Cross-culturally, the Aztec believed that certain dead were transformed into cloudmakers
and allowed to live in the paradise of Tlalocan, accompanying the rain tlalocs (Furst 1983; Lopez-
Austin 1988a: 1: 331-340, 1998b; Parsons 1939: 1018). This concept also existed in Pre-conquest
Tlaxcalan ideology, where deceased nobility were thought to return to living descendants as
water-bearing clouds (Mendieta 1970, 1971: 97). This idea is equally seen in Mixtec thought,
where dead relatives are perceived as ancestral deities who play a crucial role in bringing rain
(Monaghan 1995). In greater Mesoamerica, Tewa, Hopi and other Puebloan peoples in the
American Southwest, believe that at death, ancestors return to the place of emergence and
dependent on their actions in life, become rain bringers in the form of ancestral katchina spirits,
returning to their living descendants during annual rain ceremonies (Schaafsma 1999: 184-187).
As we see, the perception of ancestors as rain bringers was and is a widely held
Mesoamerican tradition, if not Pan-American among New World societies. Given similarities in
cross-cultural rain symbolism and water lore, a like analogy may be proposed for the role of
Yucatec Maya rain gods, the lesser chaaks. These rain bringers are believed by contemporary
Maya from the village of Chan Kom to assemble at the ancient site of Koba when summoned by
the supreme Chaak who sits in the eastern corner of the sky, the place where all rain clouds and
storms collect and move across the Yucatan peninsula (Redfield 1941; Redfield and Villa Rojas
1934). As the chaaks congregate in the skies above the massive lakes of Koba, they are thought to
disperse throughout the land upon receipt of their orders, flying the clouds on celestial horses as
they pour out rain from “inexhaustible” water gourds (Redfield 1941; Redfield and Villa Rojas
1934). Generally, most Maya believe, as in ancient times that chaaks also inhabit cenotes
(limestone sink holes), lakes, wet caves, wells, and likely wetlands. Likewise, contemporary
Tzotzil Maya associate the great Earth Lord Yahual Balamil with rain, thunder, lightning, clouds,
caves, mountains, and fertility (Gossen 1984:21; Vogt 1993:17, 58), which in many ways, are
aspects identical with Yucatec Maya and Central Mexican rain deities (chaaks and tlalocs) who
are closely tied to earth, field, caves, mountains, and ancestors.
The connection of Maya rain gods or chaaks with deified ancestors is reflected in their
classification as yumtzil(s) – spirits referred to in lineage-related terms such as “fathers,
protectors, or lords” (Barrera-Vasquez 1995; Redfield 1941; Redfield and Villa Rojas 1934). As
the highest order of yumtzil(s), chaaks serve as rainmakers and distributors of agricultural fertility
and game. And as I believe, in their prehispanic function, yumtzil(s) were ancestors deified at
death by venerating descendants. As such, chaaks or more generally ancestral yumtzil(s), served
as intermediaries between principal deities and the living, facilitating the petitions of descendants
during various rites and rituals.

Discussion
Nearly all Late Postclassic Maya ritual references a basic idea rooted in Formative
Mesoamerican thought – the concept of fertility. The earliest indication of a highly developed
rain cult, as part of a wider fertility complex in the New World, is seen particularly among the
Olmec (precursors of the Maya – considered by many to be the “mother-culture” of Middle
America) in concepts related to agricultural production and material wealth (Taube 1995, 1996)
and with numerous other Formative-period chiefdoms in the Valley of Oaxaca and Basin of
Mexico (Benson and de la Fuente 1996; Diehl and Coe 1995; Flannery and Marcus 1976, 1983;
Grove 1987; Orr 2001; Share and Grove 1989). The core of this ideological complex continued
virtually unaltered for millennia, embraced by successive cultures throughout the Americas.
Concepts basic to the fertility complex are broad in scope, incorporating cosmological referents
such as the sun, moon and stars; the natural forces of wind, lightning and rain; physical landscape
features including mountains, caves and large bodies of sacred water likened to the “primordial
sea;” and other natural phenomena such as clouds, soil, flora and fauna. The need for water, food
and procreation undoubtedly formed the impetus for these behavioral patterns in a drive to obtain,
control and ensure the most fundamental requisites of life. Because fertility in all its forms is
inextricably woven into ideological frameworks of survival, an overriding concern for rain and its
procurement among horticulturists and agriculturists worldwide and through time is not
surprising.
Much of Late Postclassic Maya ceremony may be reconstructed from archaeological data
fused with historical evidence, granting a better understanding of the types of ritual activities
carried out at shrine complexes. Very different from the highly centralized and elite-controlled
religion of the Classic period, the state of Maya religion during the Postclassic was relatively
decentralized (in using “decentralized,” I apply it to differentiate organized public or community
religious practice versus private or family rites). Decentralization came after the fall of the
Classic Maya (ca AD 900) and as one author contends, a possible scenario of this “fall” can be
attributed to the societal response of the Maya to an extended drought, which led to famine,
several other factors, and eventually death and desertion of large city-states (Gill 2000:96, 112,
119-120, 255-258, 314-318, 355-357).
This decentralization is exactly what led to the religious differentiation in the character of
Late Postclassic Maya religion: The Classic Maya were controlled primarily by the ideology of
the state, highly organized by an elite few, and administered centrally; whereas, during the Late
Postclassic religion became dependant on, involved, and revolved around the extended family
through all social strata. Although Gill (2000:112) and others (Seavoy 1986:10) suggest
economics, energy expenditure, maximization of labor, and a wide-variety of practical and logical
ways of dealing with life-threatening issues such as drought, my focus is on the ritual and
religious aspects of how the ancient Maya dealt with these annual grave and consequential issues.
Strategies included the power and ideology of belief and how Late Postclassic Maya cosmology
provided them with time-tested ways of addressing crises through specified ritual dictated by a
world view that controlled not only the universe itself, but each individual living in it.
The “secularization” of Late Postclassic Maya religion does not infer a reduction in religious
devotion, but rather transfers the burden of spiritual observance to the individual. For purposes
here, Late Postclassic ceremonial activity is divided into two categories: public and private ritual.
In this context, public ceremonies include those rites whose outcomes would perpetually affect
the entire community and require a religious specialist such as an ah-men (traditional Maya
priest, literally “he who knows”), for cyclic rain rituals like the well-known ch’a chaak ceremony
performed annually during a brief dry spell just before the final maturation of corn. On the other
hand, private ritual incorporates those rites mostly tied directly to family-owned agricultural plots
(milpas) like the u-hanli-col or “dinner of the milpa” (based on the primicia or “first fruits
ceremony”), a private harvest rite that gives back to the gods a ritual portion of what was given to
the family. Rituals such as these (as well as those carried out on more of an ad hoc basis) are and
were performed by individuals and families at domestic altars and shrines erected in and near
residences as well as in the milpa itself.
Ethnographic research and ethnohistoric information coupled with archaeological evidence
suggests that lower-status dwellings of even the most common variety likely featured informal
ritual-use areas, centered on less elaborate interior altars (i.e., wooden table altars) similar to
those in use today in many traditional Maya households. Inexpensive and easily constructed
exterior oratories made of readily available yet perishable material such as palm thatch were
likely used, modeled after more ela borate miniature masonry shrines found in elite residential
contexts as well as in public precincts. Ethnohistoric accounts of miniature domestic shrines
(Tozzer 1941: 18; Note 105) as well as those examples documented ethnographically at Xpichil,
Xyatil, and among contemporary Chan Santa Cruz and Tusik Maya in east-central Quintana Roo
(Aguilera 2000a-b; Shattuck 1933:74, 174-180; Villa Rojas 1934), parallel depictions of palm-
thatched shrines and small temples portrayed in the Dresden, Madrid and Paris codices as pointed
out at the start. In either case, diminutive oratories of pole and thatch and/or interior house-altars
of wood and stone served essentially the same ritual purpose as did freestanding miniature
masonry shrines during the Late Postclassic.
 In fact, recent discussion regarding the role of miniature shrines in ancient Maya religion
suggests that oratories or shrines of some sort were not exclusive to the Late Postclassic and as
extended into their contemporary, yet somewhat altered use today, but played an active part in
structuring the practice of ancestor veneration from its inception. Archaeological evidence traces
the presence of family shrines to Classic-period households and compounds at Barton Ramie,
Copán, Tikal, and Uaxactún as reported by Leventhal (1983). Furthermore, the assumed use is
indicated even earlier as demonstrated by McAnany (1990, 1992, 1993a, 1993b, 1995),
suggesting the practice of Preclassic ancestor veneration among the Formative Maya.

Conclusion
For the archaeologist, a dichotomy in upper status versus lower status domestic religious
material-culture is expected, in part, because Maya elite enjoyed privileged access to more
elaborate and costly ritual paraphernalia, which in most cases consisted of exotic imports, made
of stone, shell, and fired ceramic. Obviously, these items tend to preserve better in depositional
contexts, and thus make the recognition of less durable, although functionally identical, ritual
objects quite difficult, particularly if they constitute reused utilitarian items (Deal 1988). If one is
cognizant of potential socio-economic differences through the anticipation of status-sensitive
ritual markers in recovered material culture, the substantiation of lower-status Maya household
religious practice is probable – the principal difference being not the practice itself, nor the
intrinsic nature of the rite, but the quality, quantity, and type of material used and its depositional
context. Contextual recognition such as this was begun with recent archaeological investigations
at Postclassic households on Cozumel, Laguna de Ón and Santa Rita (Chase 1986, 1988, 1992;
Freidel and Sabloff 1984; Masson and Rosenswig 1999; Smith 1962:220-222), and at El Naranjal
in extensive midden deposits directly associated with multi-room Late Postclassic household(s)
(Lorenzen 1997).
Most recently, research by Masson and Peraza (2004) confirmed the use of compound or
household plaza oratories and associated ritual paraphernalia outside the perimeter wall
surrounding the elite sector of Mayapan. This, in essence, demonstrates that family-based religion
was not restricted to ruling elite living within the confines of the Mayapan civic center; one of the
principal conclusions of the extensive Carnegie report on Mayapan (Pollock et al. 1962). These
findings support the premise presented here of regular and frequent family religious practice
among lower status Maya households, likely tied to ancestor deification and the veneration of
particularly revered descendants (esteemed lineage heads or similarly admired family leaders).
Since the vast majority of our knowledge regarding the use of miniature shrines and their
religious significance during the Late Postclassic derives almost exclusively from their
investigation in elite domestic contexts, ongoing and future archaeological research in El Naranjal
and major Late Postclassic centers such as Mayapan, promises to substantially further our
understanding of miniature masonry-shrine function and meaning; particularly in ancestor
deification and the veneration of esteemed descendants who likely served integral roles in Maya
ritual and religion from all periods of history: pre-hispanic, colonial, and contemporary (Lorenzen
1995, 1997, 1999, 2003, N.D.; Masson and Peraza-Lope 2004).

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Figure 1: Depiction of a K’u Na or “God House” (miniature shrine) in the Dresden Codex. Chaak,
the Maya god of rain, lightning, and agricultural fertility is shown hovering above the shrine, which holds
an idol representation of God C, a deity associated with sacredness (Dreden Codex, Page 64, Forstemann
35, Section A).
Figure 2: Miniature masonry shrine at ground-level at Xelha, Quintana Roo, Mexico (photograph
by Karl James Lorenzen).
Figure 3: Regional map of the Yucatan Peninsula (adapted from Coe 1999).
Figure 4: Site map of El Naranjal, Quintana Roo, Mexico (Drawing by Karl James Lorenzen).
Figure 5: Chaak human effigy censer sherds (Chen Mul Modeled) recovered from Structure 21, El Naranjal,
Quintana Roo, Mexico (photograph by Karl James Lorenzen).
Figure 6: Unprovienenced “generic ancestor” human effigy censer eye, face, and foot fragments (Chen Mul
Modeled) found by a Maya family of El Naranjal, Quintana Roo, Mexico (photograph by Karl James
Lorenzen).