Stone Artifact with Incised Hieroglyphs
THIS REMARKABLE INCISED stone object from the Guatemalan Lowlands dates to AD 489. Recent scholarship indicates that the artifact may have been attached to the top of a staff and used in the Classic Maya ballgame. The nine encircling hieroglyphs mark the object's owner “Hul[el] Te',” a high-ranking member of his family and perhaps the heir apparent of his dynasty. The text reads as follows: “The xik'ab of Hul[el] Te', [the] great prince, is here[by] presented on 1 Caban . . . 0 Yaxk'in.”
Guatemalan Lowlands. Early Classic Maya, AD 489. Limestone. K6631. Jay I. Kislak Collection, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress
Translation
“The xik'ab of Hul[el] Te', [the] great prince, is here[by] presented on 1 Caban . . . 0 Yaxk'in.”
