Maya Limestone Effigy Carving, Late Classic/Early Postclassic, ca. A.D. 800-1200

the dramatic face transitioning to a skeletal form with bulging eyes, high rounded cheeks, fleshless nose and grinning teeth, adorned with triple pendant ornament beneath the chin, and emerging overall from a semi-columnar form .



 

Kalamazoo, 3000 Years of Pre-Columbian Art, Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, December 3, 1964-January 3, 1965, checklist no. 76, illus.

Baltimore, The Walters Art Museum, 2002-2010

The daunting and powerful images of the tzompantli, or skull racks, were prominent features of Late Classic and Postclassic architecture such as the well known example at Chichen Itza. Despite the fearsome effect of the repeated imagery, skeletal forms are closely associated with fertility and renewal in the Mesoamerican worldview. In the later Aztec era, Mictlantecuhtli is often shown with rounded lively eyes as if reborn; see Moctezuma and Olguin (2002: cat. no. 141)  for a vessel of the deity; see also the clay model and a drawing of one of the twin pyramids of Tenochtitlan showing the roof comb lined with skulls (Pasztory 1983: 291, Pl. 305; and pg. 113, Pl. 55).