[Aztlan] GIANT STONE CARVING EXCAVATED IN VERACRUZ

[michael ruggeri]

Listeros,

Erik Boot has posted an exclusive report on a huge stone carving  
excavated in Las Choapas, Veracruz with photos on his Mesoamerican  
news page; The story is below;

Mike Ruggeri



In Ancient MesoAmerica News Updates 2008, No. 29 (April 5, 2008), the  
report by the Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia of April  
4, 2008, was posted on the recent discovery of a monolithic stone  
fragment depicting a skeletal personage, putatively associated with a  
dot-and-bar numeral. Ancient MesoAmerica News Updates is honored to  
present the following report, posted upon request by archaeologist  
Carlos Pallán, AGIMAYA-INAH glyphic documentation project director,  
Coordinación Nacional de Arqueología, Mexico City, dated April 15th,  
2008 (nota bene: rubbing elaborated by Proyecto Arqueologico Las  
Choapas INAH-Comesa-Pemex, Jaime Cortés-Hernández, Director; image  
courtesy of AGIMAYA-INAH/Archivo Técnico Image Database, Coordinacion  
Nacional de Arqueologia, Mexico, 2008; for research purposes only,  
any other uses strictly prohibited):

A stone carving of considerable size was recently found at an  
archaeological site in Veracruz (tentatively referred to as “Las  
Choapas” here) which precise location is being deliberately concealed  
in order to avoid further damage to the vestiges or the risk of  
looting. Suffice it to say that it is located near kilometer 47 of  
the highway that goes from Raudales, Chiapas, to the main  
municipality of Las Choapas, Veracruz, inside the ejido San Miguel de  
Allende, comprising an extension of 60 hectares. The terrains border  
the municipalities of Huimanguillo, Tabasco and Ostuacán, in Chiapas.  
The archaeological project responsible of the important findings to  
be discussed is affiliated to Centro INAH Veracruz, and was directed  
by archaeologist Jaime Cortés Hernández, in collaboration with  
archaeologist Raúl Jiménez Huerta. This extensive project involved  
the topographic mapping and delimitation of over 120 sites and was  
performed in collaboration with Compañía Mexicana de Exploraciones  
(Comesa), as well as partially financed by Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex).


Preliminary commentary on the iconographic motif depicted - Given  
that for the time being any information about associated  
archaeological materials is extremely scant and that the majority of  
sites found within the Ejido San Miguel de Allende present vestiges  
that were initially described as “Preclassic” by the archaeological  
team that first reported them –led by archaeologist Cortés- it would  
seem reasonable to start exploring the associations of this  
remarkable carving with other known motifs dating from the Middle to  
Late Preclassic to the Protoclassic and Early Classic.
This large stone carving was apparently intended to be understood  
from a right to left perspective, given that the main head-variant  
sign and other discernible elements are facing to the right. The main  
sign is clearly the representation of a skull which I shall describe  
as “anthropozoomorphic” in order to avoid any premature  
identifications with a particular entity or animal. It shows a  
noticeably defleshed jaw articulation and an opened eye which tends  
to discard straightforward associations with known Mesoamerican  
‘death gods’ (i.e. Schellhas’ God A or other Maya skeletal  
supernaturals). That the entity depicted had a supernatural character  
seems to be indicated by the presence of an earflare. Additionaly, it  
shows a ‘bracket’ element in the upper head not unlike those of some  
Maya signs such as T1016 (God C’s head) and sign SNA in (Macri and  
Looper 2003: 164).
A ‘fire’ volute extends forward from the supernatural’s brow or nose.  
It can be compared with sign T122, although its shape is more  
symmetric. It could be said at this point that the motif of a ‘fire’  
or ‘breath’-exhaling skull is not completely unknown within Maya  
iconography and writing. Some of its most common occurrences can be  
found as part of the Dedicatory Formula (PSS) on vessels represented  
by the sign T1049 (or SCE in Macri & Looper 2003: 158).  
Unfortunately, we still lack –to my knowledge- sufficient Early  
Classic and sculptural examples to make a more productive comparison  
with the stone relief from Las Choapas.

Above the crown of the head, an apparent ‘sprouting’ or ‘tufting’  
vegetal motif can be discerned, perhaps reminiscent of semi-arid  
plants more common towards the Central Mexican plateau (cf. Taube  
2000: Fig. 17a,b). It bears a certain resemblance with some  
depictions of Panmesoamerican day-signs ‹REED› or ‹FLOWER› (see for  
example Xochicalco St. 1; Los Horcones St. 2). Almost touching the  
occipital region behind the head there is an element which arguably  
could correspond to a bar-and-dot coefficient. If this is so, and  
Judging from the length of both the bar element and the relative  
spacing between the dot elements, the intended value could have been  
originally ‹EIGHT›, instead of ‹SEVEN›. Immediately behind this  
purported numeral, although unaligned with it or any of the other  
signs, another ‘scroll’ appears, only this time closely resembling  
the Maya sign T126.
The overall composition strongly gives the impression of being  
either: 1) fully iconographic in nature, with no associations to a  
particular language or perhaps: 2) a particular toponym, anthroponym  
or theonym rendered through an ‘emblematic’ writing tradition, a  
trait that, despite being more common amongst central Mexican Early- 
Classic to Late-Postclassic civilizations (cf. Taube 2000: Fig. 20),  
it was also readily adopted and/or emulated by some cultures that  
interacted with the former. Less likely, it could also involve 3) a  
compound where iconographic motifs were intertwined with glyphic  
signs (i.e. headdresses containing elements of glyphic proper names  
in Zapotec or Mayan traditions, etc.). However tempting, I shall  
avoid for the time being to establish premature associations between  
the purported coefficient of ‹EIGHT› with the vegetal-like motif that  
might produce misleading calendric dates (i.e. ‹EIGHT-REED›), given  
that no clear reading order, alignment or indication exists between  
these two elements to suggest that they were intended to be read  
together.
A preliminary official INAH’s pronouncement about the stone carving  
and cultural affiliation can be consulted at CONACULTA).


Erik Boot's Ancient  Mesoamerican News Updates
http://ancient-mesoamerica-news-updates.blogspot.com/

Mike Ruggeri's The Ancient Americas Breaking News
http://web.mac.com/michaelruggeri