Tripod plate with mythological scene Maya 7th–8th century Three hollow feet support this exceptionally large, polychrome feasting plate. The outer cream walls of its sloping rim are painted with watery motifs in black, including swirls, registers of droplets, and waterlily vegetation. The three feet of the vessel feature vertical rows of dotted lines. Each foot evokes a vertical deluge, and columns of rain appear to emerge from the plate itself and spill out of the watery milieu on its exterior. The delicate main scene on the upper surface would only have been visible at close range by those p

Tripod plate with mythological scene Maya 7th–8th century Three hollow feet support this exceptionally large, polychrome feasting plate. The outer cream walls of its sloping rim are painted with watery motifs in black, including swirls, registers of droplets, and waterlily vegetation. The three feet of the vessel feature vertical rows of dotted lines. Each foot evokes a vertical deluge, and columns of rain appear to emerge from the plate itself and spill out of the watery milieu on its exterior. The delicate main scene on the upper surface would only have been visible at close range by those positioned directly above the plate. It features the Maya Rain God, Chahk, waist-deep in a register of watery motifs and hieroglyphs for nahb, “sea.” From him grows three vegetal branches that morph into deities and other beings such as a roaring jaguar. Hieroglyphic texts and other motifs on the inner slope of the plate’s wide rim surround the Rain God. This plate was painted in what is known as the codex style, a hallmark of the royal courts and loyal local palaces around the great city of Calakmul, straddling the border between southern Campeche and northern Guatemala. The unrecorded artist fused the mythic and the historical to form a microcosm on the plate’s inner surface. The mythic frame of the narrative describes the context of the sprouting rain god, named as Chahk in the text, in deep time and in a primordial place. Three Venus signs as well as the frontal and rear parts of the body of the celestial “starry Deer Crocodile” appear on either side of the upper scene, signifying the sky as the upper part of the composition. A celestial bird at the top of the scene carries what appears to be the month name, 4 Ceh, on its head as it seems to survey the scene below. The hieroglyphic text begins with the fictive date of 13 Ok 8 Zotz. The scribe signaled the mythological time to the reader with an imaginary day-month combination. It could refer to a celestial mome

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