Maya ball court architecture

The archaeology of ball courts of Mayan-speaking cultures has been a major theme of research at FLAAR since the 1990's. We have a significant photo archive of ballcourt architecture of Mesoamerica and a dozen publications.

We are working on turning the 1990's publications into electronic format so all will be available (at no cost) to students, scholars, and interested lay people.

Photograph of the main ballcourt of Copan, Honduras, with a 21 megapixel Canon EOS 1Ds-Mark III, showing the steps. This wide-angle view is with an ultra-wide angle 17mm tilt-shift lens. We will explain the natural distortion and discuss which lenses are good for photographing ballcourts. All these photographs will be donated to the Instituto Hondurano de Antropologia e Historia (IHAH).

Gradually we will showcase the key part of the rubber ballgame courts, which are the stepped areas. We all tend to focus on the sloping sides of the courts (since probably 90% of the Maya ballcourts have sloping sides under the goal stones). But in reality the an additional focus of most of the action and ceremonies was in association with the steps.

probably 90% of the Maya ballcourts have sloping sides under the goal stones

So this weekend we have initiated additional photography of the steps of the main ballcourt of Copan, Honduras, since this court has one of the nicest sets of steps of the entire Maya region.

But there are also steps on courts of Maya archaeological sites of Guatemala, Mexico, and Belize, and we will be checking El Salvador ballcourts also.

As we have time we will also be utilizing the high-quality architectural drawings of Maya ballcourts by David Morgan.

Year 2012 Prophecy about Mayan calendrical end of the world disaster

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Mayan languages, Mayan hieroglphic writing, and the calender cycles of the Maya civilization is a great way to delve into another culture. But here at FLAAR we feel there is so much more in Maya archaeology which is of interest: pyramid temple architecture, the infamous rubber ball games of the Maya, an agriculture based on far more

diverse plants that merely maize, beans and squash.

The religion and deities of the ancient Maya are a fascinating study: I spent eight years researching and writing my PhD dissertation on this topic. Maya cosmology (world view) is so remarkable that I am still researching their Underwaterworld: most of their mythology is based on actual rivers, lakes, swamps, and coastal reef eco-systems.

So here at www.maya-archaeology.org our staff work hard to bring you much more than discussion of the year 2012 prophecy about the Mayan calender ending (and hence bringing end of the world disasters).

We planted the seeds four or five years ago. Even though semi-abandoned by the then staff biologists (who seemingly did not understand the importance of mothering the baby seedlings), about 10% of the seeds survived infancy.

Now, several years later, two of the former seedlings are now bearing flowers. After flowering for several months, they are evidently self-pollinating (because at 1500 meters above sea-level there are unlikely any of the special cacao pollinating insects (midges) in our Mayan ethnobotany garden).

If we get enough fruit that survives to maturity, we will have to start learning how to make chocolate out of our cacao seeds.

The tree trunk is not even 2 inches in thickness. At first the "fruits" were not even one centimeter in length. They grew very quickly since a week ago I checked to see if there were any fruits and the trunk had only flowers. But the rainy season started recently. Maybe this is what got the fruits developing?

It is very exciting to be a father, even if the offspring are cacao pods!

We thank John Lorusso, Parrot Digigraphic, for providing the 21 megapixel Canon camera equipment used to take these macro photographs. Photos are by Juan Luis Sacayon, who in addition to working at FLAAR is also an instructor at one of the good universities here in Guatemala City.

Sacred flowers in ancient Maya civilization: Mayan ethnobotany

The Maya world was filled with sacred flowers. Flowers with gorgeous visual impact. Flowers with potent chemical impact. And some flowers which were simply edible (yes, we eat flowers in Guatemala, several species such as isote; I grow them in my garden).

Indeed there are so many Maya artifacts that show flowers that to understand Maya religion and culture we have been doing research on flowers now for several years.

Over the last 18 months we have focused on sapoton, morro, jicaro, cacao, and pataxte (there are over 400 other plants we are studying; you can download the entire list).

Mayan ethnobotany is a focus of our research RE: Maya archaeology

Our long-range goals are to build up a photographic trove of images of all the plants and flowers that were of interest to the Classic Maya (and still to Maya peoples today). I would bet you could find several hundred plants in a full list. To be realistic we are initially concentrating on sacred plants and flowers, trees used in house construction, plants used for colorants, and the most remarkable edible plants.

We differ from the many excellent web sites on botany by concentrating on providing professional quality digital images. You can see our Maya ethnobotanical studies on the new www.maya-ethnobotany.org.

Comparison of the pachira acuatica flower with mayan iconography

We have accomplished enough breakthroughs in knowledge of flowers in art, iconography, and epigraphy that we have opened a separate web site dedicated to flowers, fruits, vegetables, nuts, and all other utilitarian plants and trees of Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, El Salvador and Mexico: www.maya-ethnobotany.org

This autumn we will be bringing to students at Tulane and in El Salvador documentation on some of our discoveries: the iconography of Maya ethnobotany. I also lectured in South Africa last week, though mainly on new printing technologies for museum exhibits and museum signage.

Whatever understanding you previously had of the role of flowers, trees, and plants in the Mayan world, be prepared to have a photogenic feast of documentation that is unparalleled in high-resolution digital imaging, with professional studio lighting (even deep in the swamps or far into the rain forest). This level of photography has been the hallmark of the FLAAR Photo Archive for over 40 years.

Mayan ethnobotany, comprehensive annotated inventory

A new opus by Nicholas Hellmuth provides a thorough list of all plants utilized by the Classic Maya, especially of Guatemala, but also of Belize, Mexico, and Honduras.

Covers fruits, vegetables, nuts, grains, spices, colorants, utilitarian plants, plants for cooking oil, and many other uses.

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This list is organized in reader-friendly themes and covers much more ethno-botany than the useful earlier work by Cyrus Lundell.

This full-color publication is the result of Nicholas having been in Guatemala since age 17, having lived for years in Peten, and is a result of his continuing interest in all the plants (and animals) which appear in Mayan art, hieroglyphs, and diet. The photographs are often of coffee-table quality though this is a basic scholarly PDF. The graphic design is the work of Josue Daniel Mazariegos Ochoa, FLAAR Mesoamerica.

This monograph is an introduction to all the themes that will be discussed on a major new web site dedicated to Mayan ethnobotany which will be opened by FLAAR during late June and early July 2011.

Our discussion of Mayan archaeology topics over the years

Mayan archaeology is the main research topic of this web site. Mayan archaeology naturally includes artifacts, pyramd-temple, palace, and ballcourt architecture. The study of Mayan archaeology includes epigraphy but our decades of research have been dedicated more to iconography.

We include Mayan linguistics when discussing plants and animals in our research on Mayan ethnobotany and ethnozoology. We are fully aware that the academic term is Mayan with an “n” only for the languages (and we are aware there are exceptions: “Yucatec Maya is a Mayan language”). But this is the year 2012 and the academic terms have evolved in popular parlance: just the way Mixe-Zoque words evolved into Mayan words! To avoid being pedantic we tend to use the word Mayan archaeology rather than Maya archaeology. But notice that the web site name is in scholarly format: Maya archaeology.

Architecture of the Maya is of special interest to FLAAR

Our photo archive of Puuc, Chenes, and Rio Bec temple architecture, palaces, interior spaces, corbel vaults, exterior decoration rival the entire decades of photography by the Carnegie Institution of Washington. The FLAAR Photo Archive images will tend to be clearer, higher resolution, and better illuminated than photographs in other archives of Campeche, Yucatan, and Quintana Roo. We used tripods, Leica, Hasselblad with Zeiss lenses, and portable Metz lighting in the final years.

Mayan ethnozoology

 

Comparison of a bufo marinus with a ceramic reproduction from Vigua Museum, Guatemala

Jaguars, monkeys, deer, peccary, turtles, fish, and venomous toads are among the creatures of tropical Mesoamerica that are most often pictured by the Classic Maya in murals, ceramics, and in other art or artifacts. FLAAR is working to improve our lists of all animals of interest to the ancient Maya. But once we have the list of creatures the next step is to undertake systematic digital photography of these species. So it is important to understand digital photography in addition to understanding iconography and epigraphy where birds, reptiles, and amphibians are pictured.

Our focus (pun included) is to provide photographs that are better (and hence hopefully more useful to botanists, iconographers, epigraphers, and ethnographers) than just snapshots. Our institute works hard to offer images that really reveal the biological details of the snakes, turtles, insects, toads, and other species.

You can see samples of our initial studies of Mayan ethnozoology on our new web site www.maya-ethnozoology.org

During recent months we have been photographing white-tailed deer, crocodiles, caimans, turtles, iguanas, venomous snakes, and insects. By late September we hope to have opened our new web site on Maya ethnozoology. Our goal is to offer to iconographers, epigraphers, art historians, zoo archaeologists, and ethnographers, pertinent data on the specific features of each creature that caused the Maya to single out each species.

So please return later this year as we begin to offer to students, scholars, and the interested lay public the results of thousands of our photographs of denizens of the diverse eco-systems of the Maya world.

Digital camera evaluations and reviews

FLAAR is known around the world for evaluations and reviews of digital cameras. We are among the few archaeology institutes or museums that provide this service. Our reviews and scores of reports, in full color, can be found on www.digital-photography.org.

Wide-format inkjet printer evaluations and reviews

Now perhaps you can understand why FLAAR works hard to understand digital printing technology. We seek the appropriate printer to print the images that result from our photography of cultural heritage.

Rollouts by the technology used by FLAAR for fourteen years are in most cases precise enough to be enlarged over one meter high by up to five meters wide. Here you see us with an enlarged print so large we had to take it outside.

This technology can help museums plan better exhibits. Exhibits help provide information and education for the general public.

Flatbed cutter evaluations and reviews

Flatbed cutters have lots of potential for museum exhibits. We have been working on this now for several years. We will be more advanced by 2012.

These samples are only a few inches high. The goal is to take our high-resolution rollouts, at life-size (human life-size) and then cut-out each figure to make a scene as though taken from actual Mayan ceremonies in the 4th to 8th centuries.

So every aspect of digital printing technology is an adjunct to our interest in Mayan art, iconography, epigraphy, and archaeology (as well as ethnobotany and ethnozoology).

This leads us back to rollout photographs

Since rollout photographs (and panoramas) are at such high resolution, they can be printed at remarkable sizes. This calls for an understanding of printers at all sizes (which is why FLAAR goes to all the digital printer trade shows: to learn about new printer technology, inks, and software).

The difference between rollout photographs done by FLAAR (and rollouts done elsewhere) is that the FLAAR Photo Archive rollouts are computer controlled. There is no guess work. The FLAAR rollouts are not made by tabulations (by hand). Our rollouts are made entirely by a computer system. We put a square grid in the scene to test that when rolled out the image is still square: and not elongated or squished. Simply compare how large a FLAAR rollout can be enlarged (up to several meters long!).

FLAAR has been beta tester for the manufacturer of this rollout system since about 1997.

The first rollout photograph of a Mayan-related fruit: pataxte in Mayan ethnobotany

Rollout cameras have been made since actually the 1890’s. Yes, over 120 years ago the first circumferential rollout cameras were made.

National Geographic made the first rollout in the Mayan area and then Justin Kerr spend several decades doing rollouts of vases in private collections. These have been used by every iconographer and epigrapher since then. These are made with a modified medium format camera, and done by tabulations based on trial-and-error in the early years. They are very pretty at 1:1 size, but don’t appear to enlarge very well.

The stretch, or compression, causes some rollouts to be iffy to use for studying Maya style, because you don’t know whether the proportions of the subjects in the scene is because of the regional or personal style of the painter, or a defect of the rollout technology.

We have extended rollout technology to fruits and vegetables. Here is the first circumferential photograph of a pataxte fruit (a relative of cacao) (using Better Light Pano/WideView). Pataxte is mentioned more often in the Popol Vuh than is cacao. We have two pataxte trees in the FLAAR ethnobotanical garden, though 1500 meters above sea level is a bit rough on them. Cacao grows much better in our garden. This is Sofia, Nicholas, Juan Luis, and Jennifer, all part of the digital imaging team of FLAAR Reports.

FLAAR was possibly the first to rollout the inside of a Mayan plate

It is a challenge to do a rollout of a Mayan plate inside. And also not easy to roll out the outside of plates either (when they are at an angle. Here we are with the set-up to rollout a Late Classic Maya plate. These images of Maya hieroglyphic writing should assist epigraphers and iconographers both.

We have also been among the first to rollout cache vessels

Since my PhD dissertation was primarily on iconography of Early Classic Mayan art and artifacts, I have always been interested in the central Peten style cache vessels. The Museo Popol Vuh has an especially nice series of examples. Here is one photographed many many years ago. Museo Popol Vuh, Universidad Francisco Marroquin, Guatemala.

First rollout of a Quiche urn by Nicholas Hellmuth and Tanja Rathjen, Universidad Francisco Marroquin; urn courtesy of Museo Popol Vuh.

Since I do not have the informative archive of other rollouts in-hand, I can’t say whether there are rollouts of cache vessels, incensarios, or burial urns in the 1990’s, but already in the first years of our digital rollouts at the Museo Popol Vuh, we successfully rolled out Early Classic cache vessels as well as Late or Terminal Classic Quiche burial urns.

One of the first, or at least one of the early rollouts of Quiche urn

Because of my long-term interest in Mayan ethnobotany, I am always looking for examples of Ceiba tree spikes(conical thorns) in Mayan art. You generally find these ceiba tree spines on incense burns or Quiche style burial urns (these terms are generic; the actual original use of each ceramic is not documentable in most cases).

In part because the rollout system is computer controlled, in part because the system is large-format, and mostly because the system is entirely digital and not medium-format film, the images can be a higher quality overall.

QTVR digital technology to show Mayan artifacts

For over ten years we have been doing QTVR photography of Mayan artifacts. Now we are doing this also of birds, toads, and plants (fruits).

3D scanning of archaeological artifacts and sculpture

 

We provide an entire separate web site to evaluate 3D scanning hardware and software, related primarily to 3D scanning of Mayan archaeology artifacts, sculpture, plants (ethnobotany) and animals (ethnozoology).

Mayan archaeology in other languages

We have a project to have information from the FLAAR Reports in Spanish on a new web site www.arqueologia-maya.org. By having our reports in Spanish we can assist a larger audience, especially in Guatemala, Mexico, Honduras, and El Salvador. Plus of course Spanish is spoken all over the world now (and in Spain too!).

By later in 2012 each of our web sites will also be in 36 different languages with instant translation (and better than old fashioned Babel web page translators of several years ago). So far all the languages are available on www.FLAAR.org and www.maya-ethnozoology.org. Next site to be turned multi-lingual will be our fine art photography, giclee, decor web site.

It takes months and months of computer coding to allow this kind of translation.

Our mission is to find, review, and publish information about digital imaging equipment that can assist anthropologists in Latin America. Obviously we assist students and professors and interested lay people around the world, but our focus is pre-Columbian Mesoamerica.

• Anthropology includes ethnography and archaeology.

• Ethnography includes ethno-botany, ethno-zoology, and ethno-everything-else.

• Archaeology includes iconography, epigraphy, architectural history.

• And in the case of Maya civilization, archaeology also includes their remarkable ball games with a large rubber ball: so we include sports and sports architecture (the monumental ballcourt at Chichen Itza, Yucatan, Mexico is but one example).

FLAAR is well known for the quality of its photography and known for our FLAAR Reports that assist people across the USA and around the world to improve their photography. We start with photography of plants, animals, art, architectural history, but expand to the rest of photography: such as panoramas of the landscapes.

Current anthropology projects in Latin America

Anthropology is the broadest term to cover a diverse range of scholarly disciplines that include ethnography, ethnology, archaeology, epigraphy, art and architectural history. In European universities Greek or Roman archaeology is taught either in an institute of archaeology or in art history departments. In Europe the archaeology of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica tends to be taught in a language department or department of “ancient America.” In the US, the archaeology of Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico tends to be taught in a department of anthropology.

In American departments of archaeology, or departments of art history, the studies tend to focus on Greco-Roman civilizations. Exceptions exist, but the FLAAR director has two degrees in anthropology (Harvard and then Brown University) and then an advanced degree in art history (in Europe, where pre-Columbian iconography happened to be a personal interest to the Kunstgesichte faculty of a university in Austria).

As a result of our international background, at FLAAR we are multi-disciplinary, so we don’t pigeon-hole our anthropological and archaeological research. Our current long-range programs are dedicated to encouraging higher quality digital photographic recording and utilization of higher quality photographs in publication in all fields of anthropology by means of employing advanced digital imaging technology.

Our largest on-going anthropological research is dedicated to preparing an encyclopedic inventory of the natural resources of Guatemala, Belize, and adjacent portions of Honduras and Mexico, as well as pertinent parts of El Salvador and Costa Rica that interacted with the Mesoamerican civilizations from 2000 BC through to the time of the Spanish conquest in the 15th-16th centuries.

We include under the rubric of natural resources the plants, animals, and minerals that were utilized by indigenous peoples in the daily life, rituals, religious beliefs, myths, and trading with other peoples.

We utilize digital imaging technologies including digital photography, wide-format inkjet printing, 3D scanning, 3D imaging, and related technologies to assist students, scholars and interested public during this special year of the ancient Mayan calender, the end of the calendrical cycle in December 21, 2012.

Most recently updated April 16, 2012.
Previously updated: January 17, 2012 January 4, 2012. September 9, 2011. January 17, 2011. April 25, 2005 and July 3, 2006 as well as during 2007. Updated Feb. 4, 2008, January 6, 2009. New page format posted December 2009. Updated February 2, 2010 and again in January 17, 2011. Interior pages updated month after month; see notes on each page.