The Jolja’ Cave Project

Site Location and Name

The site of Jolja’ is located on Misopa’ Mountain in a river gorge at the headwaters of the Ixtelja River (N 17 20.916’ W92 19.509’) (Figure 1). The site is at an altitude of 900 m on this 1,650 meter high mountain. All three caves are on property owned by the community of Joloniel which is an ejido within the district of Tumbalá. Joloniel’s community center is located 1.45 km below the caves at an elevation of 600 m.

The caves of Jolja’ are situated adjacent to one another on a white cliff face. When facing the cliff, Cave #1 (which contains the paintings) is located to the upper left, Cave #2 is near the center, and Cave #3 is at the upper right. The headwaters of the Ixtelja River flow from the mouth of Cave #2, and cascade down a steep, boulder-strewn gorge to the Ixtelja Valley below (Figure 2). In addition, water spills down the cliff face from springs located higher on the mountain. The Joloniel community refers to the site as Jolja’, and we defer to their choice. The term Jolja’ is a compound term meaning "head of the water" in Ch’ol, and this phrase is commonly used to describe the headwaters of a river. For example, the settlement at the headwaters of the Tulijá River is called Joltulija.

Cave #1 is also referred to as the cave of Don Juan by the local Ch’ol Maya. The published accounts of Jolja’ refer to it as Cueva de Don Juan, Cueva de Joloniel or Cueva de Ixtelha (Blom Museum Catalogue; Thompson 1975; Riese 1981; Graham 1982:185; Miguel Meneses López 1986, 1997; Bonor Villarejo 1989; Alejos García 1994; Stone 1995; Pincemin Deliberos 1999). Joloniel is a Ch’ol word that means "where it ends", "the end" or "termination" (Aulie and Aulie 1978:75; Meneses 1986, 1997:206). In a story about rain ceremonies at Jolja’, Miguel Meneses Peñate stated that the cave was called Joloniel because it was the final stop on the ritual circuit that was made to sacred locations to petition for rain (Miguel Meneses López 1986, 1997). This explanation of the name suggests that the cave was not named after the community of Joloniel, but rather that the community got its name from the cave (Alejos García 1994:34-37).

The name Joloniel is intriguing because the paintings in the cave refer to Early Classic rituals that ended important time periods in the ancient Maya calendar. Establishing a link between these rituals and the name Joloniel is highly speculative, but it is not as improbable as it might sound. Without an in-depth archaeological survey of Jolja’, it is impossible to ascertain how the caves were utilized from the time the paintings were produced in the Early Classic until the twentieth century. Nevertheless, the Jolja’ area was inhabited by Postclassic Ch’ol Maya who were still literate at the time of the Spanish conquest, and even a semi-literate Maya would have been able to grasp the calendrical significance of the cave texts. The Early Classic Maya did not call this cave Joloniel, but it is possible that the contemporary name arose from the cave’s use as a place of ancient termination rituals.

Previous Page  |  Table of Contents  |  Next Page

Return to top of page