A rare maya jade ornament early classic, ca. A.D. 250-450

the small pendant carved with the ominous stylized face of a deity, once associated with the Decapitator god, with distinctive feathered eyelids, and barbels curling from the openwork mouth similar to the Gods GI and GIII of the Palenque Triad, with a short ruffled bib, and forehead adorned with medallions of a four-part flower composed of shells, the reverse finely carved with six glyphs, now interpreted to refer to this jade as the ornament of a god, with the deity's names and titles, including reference to 'wind' and the 'Venus'; pierced five times along the lower perimeter and laterally through the head; in mottled bright and white, areas with cinnabar. 

New York private collection, 1981

 

T. Dickey, V. Muse, H. Wiencek, The God-Kings of Mexico, 1982, p. 63, center
Linda Schele and David Freidel, A Forest of Kings, New York, 1990, colorplate prior to pg. 254, lower left
mayavase.com, a precolumbian portfolio, K1505

For a ceramic censor depicting the Decapitator God distinguished by the wavy lids and headdress, see mayavase.com, K4884, also shown in Martin and Grube (2000:33). The fierce face of this pendant is vaguely similar to two other early jade ornaments, an ahau pendant, and the deity mask in the British Museum, see (Schele and Miller 1986: pl. 19 and pl. 15).