Yaxchilán Lintel 24
by Ancient Maya (Unknown), 725
Artwork Details
Details
- Year
- 725
- Medium
- Limestone
- Size
- 109 cm × 78 cm (43 × 31 in)
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Yaxchilán Lintel 24 depicts a bloodletting ritual performed by Lady Xook and her husband Shield Jaguar II, ruler of the Maya city of Yaxchilán. Carved around 725 CE, the limestone relief shows Lady Xook pulling a thorn-studded rope through her tongue while her husband holds a flaming torch. The blood-soaked paper in the basket below would be burned to communicate with ancestor spirits.
Maya elites performed bloodletting rituals to access supernatural power and communicate with the dead. The pain and blood loss induced visions, depicted in related lintels showing a serpent emerging from the smoke. Lady Xook was Shield Jaguar's most powerful wife, and these lintels decorated her personal temple. The scene commemorates a ritual performed on the king's accession in 681 CE.
The lintel is at the British Museum.
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About Yaxchilán Lintel 24
The lintel is at the British Museum in London. Other Yaxchilán lintels are in Mexico and Guatemala.
Lady Xook pulls a thorn rope through her tongue, a bloodletting ritual that induced visions and allowed communication with ancestors.
Royal blood was sacred to the Maya, carrying spiritual power that sustained the cosmos. Elite bloodletting maintained cosmic order and invoked ancestor spirits.
The limestone relief measures 109 × 78 cm (43 × 31 inches). It originally spanned a doorway in Lady Xook's temple at Yaxchilán.
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