Tag Archives: hieroglyphic text

El Zotz Masks Yield Insights into Maya beliefs

A team of archaeologists led by Stephen Houston has made a new discovery at the Maya archaeological site in El Zotz, Guatemala, uncovering a pyramid believed to celebrate the Maya sun god. The structure’s outer walls depict the god in an unprecedented set of images done in painted stucco. In 2010, the team uncovered a royal tomb filled with artifacts and human remains at the same site. Researchers believe the pyramid was built to link the deceased lord to the eternal sun.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — A team of archaeologists led by Brown University’s Stephen Houston has uncovered a pyramid, part of the Maya archaeological site at El Zotz, Guatemala. The ornately decorated structure is topped by a temple covered in a series of masks depicting different phases of the sun, as well as deeply modeled and vibrantly painted stucco throughout.

The team began uncovering the temple, called the Temple of the Night Sun, in 2009. Dating to about 350 to 400 A.D., the temple sits just behind the previously discovered royal tomb, atop the Diablo Pyramid. The structure was likely built after the tomb to venerate the leader buried there. (more…)

Read More

Earliest Image of Egyptian Ruler Wearing “White Crown” of Royalty Brought to Light

The earliest known image of an Egyptian ruler wearing the “White Crown” associated with Egyptian dynastic power has been brought to light by an international team of archaeologists led by Egyptologists from Yale University.

Carved around 3200 BCE, this unique record of a royal celebration at the dawn of the Egyptian dynastic period was found at a site discovered almost a half-century ago by Egyptologist Labib Habachi at Nag el-Hamdulab, on the West Bank of the Nile to the north of Aswan. (more…)

Read More