[Aztlan] [Atzlan] Reverse glyphs

[Sam Edgerton]

Listeros: While I agree with Justin that many Maya artists, just as their 
ambitious counterparts elsewhere in the world, often trained themselves to 
create special tour de force effects in their art in hopes of gaining 
additional prestige and professional advantage - witness the "competition" 
between the carvers of those complex mat effects on the backsides of Stela 
J, Copan, and Stela H, Quirigua (perhaps plagiarized from the former by the 
latter).  Furthermore, while it's also true as Justin points out that many 
European works in particular were painted from mirror reflections. Have you 
ever noticed how many of the drinkers in those 17th Dutch depictions of 
party revelry hold their glasses in the LEFT hand? Nevertheless, those few 
European images that have written inscriptions in reverse order were 
definitely not done just for the same visual sensation. As I already posted 
to Atzlan, Jan van Eyck's Washington Annunciation, ca, 1430, is an 
outstanding example of this genre that was clearly so inscribed for 
religious reasons. I believe that ancient Maya  reverse inscriptions should 
be put in the same category,  We live today in a unique age where artists 
have all become free agents, creating their work almost entirely from their 
own inspiration, the "originality" of which  which they hope will appeal to 
modern buyers. However, this was not the case in earlier times especially 
in very religious societies like medieval Christendom and the ancient Maya. 
In both cultures, it was the patron, not the artist who determined not only 
the subject but the conventions in which it was to be represented.  While 
King Waxaklajuun U B'aah K'awiil  of Copan was surely delighted by the 
intricate carving of his Stela J, he was also desirous that the monument 
should enhance his eternal standing in the eyes of the gods. Likewise, King 
Itzamnaaj B'alam II of Yaxchilan only allowed his sculptor of Lintel 25 to 
reverse the inscription for a reason that would similarly do him favor in 
the hereafter. If the respective artists had not understood their 
subservient relationship to the wishes of patron in these matters, they 
would never have been allowed to set chisel to stone in the first place - 
whatever their individual skills and talents.
Sam Edgerton