We headed out early to the Fuerte San Miguel, arriving 5 minutes before it opened. But I had just barely begun my introduction when they opened the gates and we crossed the drawbridge over the dry moat into the fort-as-museum.
The museum visit game me a chance to show students not only the style of stela covered in the previous course, but also two of the important subjects for the next art history course: clay figurines and painted ceramic vessels. We looked at the differences between hand-modelled figurines, usually representing males, and mould-made figurines, usually representing women, couples, and animals, and frequently modified to be played as a two-stop ocarina.
The most extravagant of the painted ceramics is a large deep and lidded plate, probably used for tamales, dating from the early classic period and found in Structure IX, the steep pyramid at Becán. We discussed possible cosmogenesis imagery on this plate, as related to the miniature stela in the Hauberg collection.
We also were able to see sculptures from Edzna, Xcalumkin, and other sites in northern Campeche. In some of these, the dance posture was clearly evident, even when the feet were shown flat on the ground.
Two tombs from Calakmul structure II are recreated in this museum, both dating to the early part of the late classic. The male in tomb 4 of this structure is thought to have been the ruler Yich’ak K’ak’, Great Fiery Jaguar Paw, who was laid to rest on a carved wood bier, draped in jade jewelry and with a large headdress of cloth pieces. I was more impressed by the adjoining tomb 6, which contains a woman and an older child. The woman is buried with a series of pottery stamps that would have been used to decorate textiles and are thus appropriate to a woman’s burial.
After the museum we stopped at a supermarket and then headed to Edzna for a tour of the site and picnic lunch. The lunch came first, and then I took students through the ball court to the small acropolis, then through the Great Acropolis to the Group of the Knives and Ambassador group. On the Great Acropolis, students immediately began identifying typical layouts and styles. They recognized the quadrangular form of the Acropolis, as well as the open public space below with a ball court at its edge. Rhett recognized the Puuc style features of the buildings forming the main acropolis quadrangle. When we went to the smaller, adjoining and private quadrangle, Jennifer recognized that one of the buildings is in Rio Bec style.
In the Group of the Knives, we talked about different models for explaining the difference between the main quadrangle on the Great Acropolis and the smaller, more private adjoining crocodile. These models define the difference on the basis of function (ritual versus residential), class (elite versus commoner), or gender (male versus Female). The Ambassador Group was given this name because the labour of reconstruction was accomplished by refugees of the Guatemalan genocide (early 1980s). But while this may sound comforting, a Maya couple in Vancouver has talked about how they were taken from the Chiapas refugee camps to Campeche against their will. She talks about the difficulty of adapting to the hot climate, and the prison-like conditions of the camp.
Then came the long drive to Palenque, where we arrived at 8 pm.
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