The Bolonkin Murals, a recent discovery in Mesoamerica. A preliminary report prepared for the Maya Esteem Project.

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1 The Bolonkin Murals, a recent discovery in Mesoamerica. A preliminary report prepared for the Maya Esteem Project. by Fabian Dominguez. ( cacao_sacbe@yahoo.com) April 12, Austin, Texas. U.S.A. Here is a description of a some recently discovered Maya Murals from the site of Bolonkin in Southern Mexico. The site is located near the village of Chilon, in Chiapas. This is about 40 miles northeast of San Cristobal de las Casas. These stucco murals are a rare archaeological treasure that merits further research and funding. Only a few well-preserved Maya Murals have been discovered so far, so it is important for the readers of this essay to be properly impressed with the wonderful fact of their existence. The author of this essay has prepared a drawings based on photographs that were provided by the members of the Maya Esteem Project. The photographs were taken during the field season of the summer of The site of Bolonkin has already been identified, as the famous archaeologist Franz Blom performed excavations there in the 1950 s. The murals themselves are located underground, and could only be reached by crawling down a tunnel that had been dug by someone who has tried to loot the site. This tunnel was already present at the site when the 2003 field season had begun, and no information is available on what may have been removed. It is a sad fact that many sites in Mesoamerica have been damaged by similar unauthorized excavations. One of the goals of the Maya Esteem Project has been to protect the site of Bolonkin from this type of abuse, and to also find funds to further study the site under a controlled research project. In discovering these mural paintings, the members of the project are lucky to be among the very few people who have located such murals in such a generally good condition. Shortly after it was found, the tunnel that leads to the murals was closed so as to protect the murals. Due to limitations of time and resources, only a brief examination of the murals could be done in the 2003 field season. Thereafter, the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) of Mexico was notified of the discovery. The directors of the Maya Esteem project are currently seeking a new excavation permit, and the funding to return to the site so that they may take the necessary steps to continue the important work that desperately needs to occur to correctly protect the archaeological site. Additional funding will be needed to provide the manpower and resources to shine a new light on these murals which have seen so much darkness for many centuries. Persons who wish to make donations to this significant endeavor may contact the Project Director at the address listed at the end of this essay. This report provides only a preliminary discussion of the murals. The primary goal is to make the photographs and drawings available to the Maya Esteem Project members and to any other interested persons who may want to learn more about the project. These photographs and drawings are best that can be provided at this time, especially given the odd circumstances with how the murals were discovered. If the readers of this essay will carefully study the photographs before they look at the drawings, they will see many small details can be seen. However, the photographs are of the close-up type, and unfortunately, some details are lost in the shadows. As such, this author has had to constrain the drawings to the lines and curves that can be most easily identified. The photos shown below have been enhanced in the software Photoshop. The drawings were done by tracing the outlines in the vector based illustration software FreeHand, and CorelDraw. Beyond these issues, a study of the pre-columbian, Maya art style and writing system did assist with the interpretation of the iconography. After completing this work, this author takes complete responsibility for the accuracy of the end results, as well as any errors that may have occurred. The photographs that were taken in 2003 were not developed until after the tunnel was closed, so a second chance to take better photographs will not occur until this is re-opened with the appropriate permission or a full excavation project is funded. If better photographs become available, or direct access to the actual murals occurs, then this author will gladly make himself available to produce better drawings.

2 The first public presentation of the Bolonkin Murals occurred at the 2004 Maya Meetings conference in Austin, Texas, USA during March of the same year. The initial, un-enhanced photographs were placed on a wall in a small exhibition area, and some knowledgeable scholars did offer their opinions on the subject. The exhibit also included a written presentation of how the murals were discovered. The tunnel opening was only large enough for one person to crawl down the dark hole to see what could be found. It should be an obvious point that what was discovered could be just the tip of a iceberg. It is possible that a much larger set of murals await a better day to be seen out in the open where the sun is shining bright enough for their full glory to be appreciated. Of the several people who did see the initial photographs, the verbal opinion was offered by Elizabeth Wager (personal communication, 03/19/04), who is a doctoral candidate at Bonn University in Germany, that the style of the iconography exhibited Proto-Classic Maya characteristics. If so, then this could give a date to the murals of somewhere between zero A.D. to 250 A.D. according to the current dating schedule used by most Mesoamerican scholars. None of the current images showed any type of sign that could be used to date the murals by a calendrical system, so it seems that a stylistic analysis will have to do for now. Furthermore, if this preliminary date for the Bolonkin Murals turns out to be correct, then they would very nicely fill in an important gap in time between the Pre-Classic Maya Murals of San Bartolo in Guatemala, and the Classic Period Murals of Bonampak in Mexico. The mural drawings of Bolonkin are were made as paintings on stucco, an so the analogy to these other known murals is warranted. As with the stucco murals of San Bartolo and Bonampak, the five scenes included in this essay may have a interconnected message, but if so, the available information is insufficient to determine this at this time. The scenes must be shown separately because of how the photographs were obtained, and because the apparent relationship of each scene to the others is iconographically unique. Therefore, the scenes have been labeled as Panel Number 1, Panel Number 2, and so forth to be able to correlate the drawings to the photographs. There are probably many more words that could be written about these murals at this time. For now though, the photos and drawings presented below should speak for themselves as testimonials to the great legacy of the Maya culture. The director of the Maya Esteem project can be reached at the following address: Eric Samson 410 West Magnolia #2 San Antonio, Texas Telephone: (210) mayaesteem@ev1.net

3 Attachments: 7 photographs and 5 drawings. Software Copyrights: References: Photoshop 7.0, copyrighted by Adobe Systems, Freehand 10, copyrighted by Macromedia, CorelDraw 9, copyrighted by Corel Corporation, Jones, Tom and Carolyn 1997 Maya Hierogplyphic Workbook U Mut Maya publications. Bayside, California. Saturno William A Archaeological Investigation and Conservation at San Bartolo, Guatemala, A Report Submitted to the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies (FAMSI). Sharer, Robert J The Ancient Maya, Fifth Edition. Stanford University Press. Standford, California.

4 Bolonkin Panel Number 1 Photo by the Maya Esteem Project

5 Bolonkin Panel Number 1, detail of lower scene Photo by the Maya Esteem Project

6 Bolonkin Panel #2 Photo by the Maya Esteem Project

7 Bolonkin Panel Number 3 Photo by the Maya Esteem Project

8 Bolonkin Panel Number 3, details Photo by the Maya Esteem Project

9 Bolonkin Panel Number 4 Photo by the Maya Esteem Project

10 Bolonkin Panel Number 5 Photo by the Maya Esteem Project

11 Bolonkin Panel Number 1, line drawing based on photos by the Maya Esteem Project

12 Bolonkin Panel Number 2, line drawing based on photo by the Maya Esteem Project

13 Bolonkin Panel Number 3, line drawing based on photo by the Maya Esteem Project

14 Bolonkin Panel Number 4, line drawing based on photo by the Maya Esteem Project

15 Bolonkin Panel Number 5, line drawing based on photo by the Maya Esteem Project

FAMSI 2001: Matthew G. Looper. Documentation of Sculptures at Quiriguá, Guatemala

FAMSI 2001: Matthew G. Looper. Documentation of Sculptures at Quiriguá, Guatemala FAMSI 2001: Matthew G. Looper Documentation of Sculptures at Quiriguá, Guatemala Research Year: 1996 Culture: Maya Chronology: Classic Location: Izabal, Guatemala Site: Quiriguá Table of Contents Introduction