| Object Name: | Lintels 17 and 15 |
|
|---|---|---|
| Creation Date: | c.770 AD | |
| Culture: | Maya | |
| Site: | Yaxchilan, Chiapas | |
| Material: | limestone, 69.2 x 76.2 cm | |
| Repository: | British Museum, London | |
| Image source: | Photo by Dr. Manuel Aguilar from book "Blood of Kings". | |
| Lintel 15 depicts the vision stage of the bloodletting rite. The kneeling woman - neither the mother of Shield Jaguar II nor Lady Balam Ix - is yet another of Bird Jaguar's wives. She wears a huipil woven in the same pattern as that of Lady Xoc on Lintel 24. Jade jewelry decorates her wrists, ears, hair and neck. The collar characteristic of this rite binds her throat. Her vision Serpent rears through a beaded blood scroll out of a clay bowl lined with bloody bark paper that is set on the floor before her. The Serpent is the most naturalistic of all known examples; it is bearded, and from its mouth emerges the ancestor the lady has contacted in the rite. The woman depicted on Lintel 17 is Lady Balam Ix, another of Bird Jaguar's wives. Although she doesn't have to suffer added damage from thorns, as did Lady Xoc a generation earlier, she wears the same tasseled headdress as that lady does on Lintel 24. | ||
