Maya Squared Vessel in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, December 2022

Title: Squared vessel

Artist: Lo’ Took’ Akan (?) Xok (Maya, active 8th century)

Date: 755–780

Geography: Guatemala, Naranjo or vicinity, northern Peten

Culture: Maya

Medium: Slip-painted ceramic with post-fire stucco

Dimensions: H. 9 5/8 × W. 6 1/2 × D. 6 3/8 in. (24.45 × 16.51 × 16.19 cm)

Classification: Ceramics-Vessels

Credit Line: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Anonymous gift

Accession Number: SL.2.2022.11.2

Seated on a throne covered by a jaguar pelt, an old, cigar-smoking, jaguar-eared god presides over an assembly of ten deities. The associated hieroglyphic caption is brief: groups of named gods were aligned at K’inchil, or Great Sun Place, on August 11, 3114 b.c. The consequences of the gathering are unclear, but this mythical event was among those that set the world in order and created the conditions for the advent of people, cities, and kingdoms.

Text from: www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/820275