The ballgame played in Mesoamerica from around 1200 BCE until the 16th century CE was sport, pageantry, and religious ceremony all in one. Among the Maya, the ballgame re-created the exploits of the mythic Hero Twins and their dangerous encounters with the Lords of the Underworld. Worn around the waist, stone yokes like this one were ceremonial versions of the leather padding used during the game to propel the rubber ball through rings attached to the court walls. This one depicts a skeletal toad, symbol of the Underworld.
Stone
14 1/2 x 4 5/8 in. (36.83 x 11.75 cm)
L.: 15 3/4 in.
Girth: 14 5/8 in.
Eugene Fuller Memorial Collection
50.118
Now on view at the
Seattle Art Museum
Resources
Exhibition HistorySpokane, Washington, Eastern Washington State Historical Society Cheney Cowles Memorial Museum, America Del Sur, 1971.
Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Art of the Ancient Americas, July 10, 1999 - May 11, 2003.
Seattle, Washington, Seattle Art Museum, Cosmic Beings in Mesoamerican and Andean Art, Nov. 10, 2018 - ongoing.
Published ReferencesHandbook, Seattle Art Museum: Selected Works from the Permanent Collections, Seattle, WA: Seattle Art Museum, 1951, p. 102 (b&w)
Seattle Art Museum respectfully acknowledges that we are on Indigenous land, the traditional territories of the Coast Salish people. We honor our ongoing connection to these communities past, present, and future.
