[Aztlan] Sexuality in Mesoamerica

[Justin Kerr]

This question poses a problem in that aside from the few comments in Landa
and the Florentine Codex there is a dearth of information.

We can however rely on the visual information presented in the ceramic
figures and the illustration on the vases and the few murals that exist.
There seem to be very few images of erotic behavior and in many cases they
are open to interpretation. In terms on nudity there is the very beautiful
lady from Calakmul in her transparent  huipil and many figures from Western
Mexico where nudity above the waist is ubiquitous. There also seems to be a
class of female figures from Western Mexico, who, I would suggest are
prostitutes. However, to my knowledge there are no real images of sexual
intercourse in any part of Mesoamerica. (I have seen a number of fakes)
I exclude the West Mexican figures of masturbating males since most of them
seem to be afflicted with Down's Syndrome and therefore cannot be classified
as erotic. 
It may be of interest to note that in "palace" scenes women are wearing
hupils from the neck to the floor. However the mythological ladies such as
in the "dressing" scenes of the Maize God are nude.
The studies of erotic behavior are generally based on the depiction of God L
and the Moon Goddess in Jaina figures and the snake lady vases. But again,
the interpretation is from Western eyes and may not reflect the thinking of
the ancient Maya.
Justin Kerr   


-----Original Message-----
From: aztlan-bounces at lists.famsi.org [mailto:aztlan-bounces at lists.famsi.org]
On Behalf Of Rodrigo Garcia
Sent: Friday, October 16, 2009 12:29 PM
To: aztlan at lists.famsi.org
Subject: [Aztlan] Sexuality in Mesoamerica

Hi everyone, 

 

I have a few questions which I can't seem to find much information about
anywhere and I would appreciate any help you can give me on this.

 

What do we know about sexuality in Mesoamerica? 

Did people carry the same taboos and negative associations about sex that
we do today? 

Was sex repressed by Mesoamerican religions like it has been repressed by
many other religions all over the world? 

Was nudity accepted in public and if so was sex also accepted in public or
was it something to be strictly practiced only in private areas?

Was sex restricted only to married couples?

What was considered wrong sexual behavior?

 

And I read somewhere that the Totonacs were more "free", open and tolerant
about sexuality and that they had a lot of sculptures of genitalia. I
wonder if anybody can direct me to where I can find examples of this. Also
I tried searching on the Justin Kerr vase collection for "sex",
"sexuality" and nothing comes up. Does this mean that sexual practices
were never depicted in Maya art? If this is not true could somebody direct
me to art where sexual practices are depicted in Maya or Mesoamerican art?
I know there are at least a few examples of this because a friend of mine
told me he visited a famous painters house in Mexico and he supposedly had
many prehispanic clay figurines of couples engaging in sex, something I
had never heard of before. So I am wondering if the church destroyed a lot
of these or if they have been kept from the public because of our own
taboos against sex?    

 

Thanks for any help on this!

 

Rodrigo 

 

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