Fangs, feathers, flaying, five, football ...
Sunday, April 6th, 2003 11:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tamaranthWent to the Aztecs exhibition at the Royal Academy last night …
Fangs. Some of the religious statues looked quite benign. Some of them were laughing. But many of them were fanged. (As was the Christian God, after the advent of Cortez: see under Feathers).
Seems to me that the Aztecs were afraid, terribly afraid, all the time -- afraid of their gods. Blood had to flow almost every day (I've read somewhere that the flow had to be continual) in order to sustain the natural cycles of the world. Hence auto-sacrifice, the notion of the priests inflicting wounds and piercings upon themselves and never allowing them to heal, so they could 'sacrifice' a little blood all the time. Somewhere (not shown in this exhibition) there's a depiction of a woman drawing a spiked rope through her cheek.
Plus, of course, human sacrifice. The exhibition was quite straightforward about this: here is a knife, a bowl, a carved greenstone heart showing considerable knowledge of anatomy (because practice makes perfect). The deformed were cared for and looked after, according to one plaque: the next explains that they were sacrificed at times of solar eclipse.
Feathers. Feathers on animal statues. ("Serpents don't have feathers. Nor do coyotes."). Feathers on fans, shields, masks: and on a chalice-cover from the colonial days. The description of the chalice cover was surreal: it shows God as a fanged (q.v.) face, surrounded by water which is also fire and which is the Holy Spirit. That interpretation of the Christian God in terms of their own terrifying pantheon is very enlightening.
Five - For reasons never explained, and possibly inexplicable, the Aztecs held the number five to be lucky, or ritually important, or something. Five parts of the world: statues made in five parts and then assemebled: the Fifth Sun (or fifth age of the world).
Flaying: One of their god was routinely depicted as half-flayed. They were also keen on using human skin, and there's a lidded pot with a 'bubbly' texture to the outside. This, apparently, represents the way that globules of fat stick to the underside of human skin as it is removed. The container, of course, was used for storing skins post-removal.
Football. Well, OK, not actually football. Logically football. The Aztec ball game (which they inherited from one of the cultures they overthrew / overwhelmed). Two sides, two balls representing sun and moon. A court. Some rules. "At sunset," reads the caption, cheerfully, "the player who had run in the opposite direction to the 'sun' was decapitated." (Foul!)
The exhibition itself was fascinating but very poorly laid out. The Royal Academy should know better. They provided audio guides (I passed) which tend to slow people down, and also mean that they're listening to the guide rather than being aware of their surroundings. (Result: a pushy, inconsiderate crowd). The exhibits were labelled -- possibly with information not in the guide, as many headphoned people stopped to read -- but the labelling was sparse and badly positioned (a single plaque at foot level, or on one side of a huge statue).
There were far too many people in the galleries (at 8pm on a Saturday night) for comfort -- almost all the rooms were dimly-lit and claustrophobic, and the layout was geared towards the wandering viewer rather than getting the maximum number of people through.
And yet it was fascinating. The 'eagle warrior' statues are so incredibly realistic, like men caught halfway through a transformation to an eagle: their expressions are obviously modelled on real people. And the look of the human face inside the 'beak' of the eagle's head is astoundingly like the look of a Spanish face inside a helmet, no doubt adding to the confusion and fear of that first encounter.
The codices are amazing, too: bright and vibrant like comic strips, showing those complex stylised images of [person + name + date]: annotated in Spanish or Latin as a reminder that for a while the Aztecs (having suffered the 'largest peaceful mass conversion to Christianity' in history) lived alongside the Spanish.
Also impressive: the virtual model of Tenochtitlan, lake capital of the Aztec culture, with its immense Templo Mayor and plumes of smoke rising up from sacrifices. This was projected in the very first room, and I'd have liked to see it again at the end.
Best thing in the gift shop: temporary tattoos of Aztec designs. (Oh, and mealworm crisps).
Oh, and![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fishlifter? No bananas, but I'm sure the mocihuaquetzqui -- spirits of women who died in childbirth, accorded equal honours with the spirits of battle-slain warriors -- were doing a 'vampire banana'. The pose was exact.
This is quite a good essay on Aztec culture: "In doing my research, I discovered I knew a lot less than I thought I knew, which was rather difficult, since I had thought I knew hardly anything at all".
Fangs. Some of the religious statues looked quite benign. Some of them were laughing. But many of them were fanged. (As was the Christian God, after the advent of Cortez: see under Feathers).
Seems to me that the Aztecs were afraid, terribly afraid, all the time -- afraid of their gods. Blood had to flow almost every day (I've read somewhere that the flow had to be continual) in order to sustain the natural cycles of the world. Hence auto-sacrifice, the notion of the priests inflicting wounds and piercings upon themselves and never allowing them to heal, so they could 'sacrifice' a little blood all the time. Somewhere (not shown in this exhibition) there's a depiction of a woman drawing a spiked rope through her cheek.
Plus, of course, human sacrifice. The exhibition was quite straightforward about this: here is a knife, a bowl, a carved greenstone heart showing considerable knowledge of anatomy (because practice makes perfect). The deformed were cared for and looked after, according to one plaque: the next explains that they were sacrificed at times of solar eclipse.
Feathers. Feathers on animal statues. ("Serpents don't have feathers. Nor do coyotes."). Feathers on fans, shields, masks: and on a chalice-cover from the colonial days. The description of the chalice cover was surreal: it shows God as a fanged (q.v.) face, surrounded by water which is also fire and which is the Holy Spirit. That interpretation of the Christian God in terms of their own terrifying pantheon is very enlightening.
Five - For reasons never explained, and possibly inexplicable, the Aztecs held the number five to be lucky, or ritually important, or something. Five parts of the world: statues made in five parts and then assemebled: the Fifth Sun (or fifth age of the world).
Flaying: One of their god was routinely depicted as half-flayed. They were also keen on using human skin, and there's a lidded pot with a 'bubbly' texture to the outside. This, apparently, represents the way that globules of fat stick to the underside of human skin as it is removed. The container, of course, was used for storing skins post-removal.
Football. Well, OK, not actually football. Logically football. The Aztec ball game (which they inherited from one of the cultures they overthrew / overwhelmed). Two sides, two balls representing sun and moon. A court. Some rules. "At sunset," reads the caption, cheerfully, "the player who had run in the opposite direction to the 'sun' was decapitated." (Foul!)
The exhibition itself was fascinating but very poorly laid out. The Royal Academy should know better. They provided audio guides (I passed) which tend to slow people down, and also mean that they're listening to the guide rather than being aware of their surroundings. (Result: a pushy, inconsiderate crowd). The exhibits were labelled -- possibly with information not in the guide, as many headphoned people stopped to read -- but the labelling was sparse and badly positioned (a single plaque at foot level, or on one side of a huge statue).
There were far too many people in the galleries (at 8pm on a Saturday night) for comfort -- almost all the rooms were dimly-lit and claustrophobic, and the layout was geared towards the wandering viewer rather than getting the maximum number of people through.
And yet it was fascinating. The 'eagle warrior' statues are so incredibly realistic, like men caught halfway through a transformation to an eagle: their expressions are obviously modelled on real people. And the look of the human face inside the 'beak' of the eagle's head is astoundingly like the look of a Spanish face inside a helmet, no doubt adding to the confusion and fear of that first encounter.
The codices are amazing, too: bright and vibrant like comic strips, showing those complex stylised images of [person + name + date]: annotated in Spanish or Latin as a reminder that for a while the Aztecs (having suffered the 'largest peaceful mass conversion to Christianity' in history) lived alongside the Spanish.
Also impressive: the virtual model of Tenochtitlan, lake capital of the Aztec culture, with its immense Templo Mayor and plumes of smoke rising up from sacrifices. This was projected in the very first room, and I'd have liked to see it again at the end.
Best thing in the gift shop: temporary tattoos of Aztec designs. (Oh, and mealworm crisps).
Oh, and
fishlifter? No bananas, but I'm sure the mocihuaquetzqui -- spirits of women who died in childbirth, accorded equal honours with the spirits of battle-slain warriors -- were doing a 'vampire banana'. The pose was exact. This is quite a good essay on Aztec culture: "In doing my research, I discovered I knew a lot less than I thought I knew, which was rather difficult, since I had thought I knew hardly anything at all".
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: Sunday, April 6th, 2003 04:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: Sunday, April 6th, 2003 03:53 pm (UTC)There were quite enough eyes in the skulls ...
*cue original and unpredictable witticisms from all and sundry, I expect