This striking black jade hacha (adze/axe head) is carved to represent the head of a ruler of one of the many polities within the vast Maya Empire. The back of the piece is rough and wedge-shaped to fit into a wooden handle. The “blade” of the piece is carved as a man’s face, with a prominent chin and nose, “coffee-bean” slit eyes, short hair and a headdress carved in the semblance of a bird (perhaps a duck?) that stretches from the tip of his nose to a scroll design over each ear, which are decorated with large shell pendants. The whole piece has been polished to a high sheen; given the evident luxury and comparative bluntness of the piece, it is likely to have been wholly ceremonial. Pieces of this quality were not designed to be used; it is likely to have been part of the regalia for a high-ranking member of the royal court, or perhaps the ruler himself. We shall return to this piece later; it behoves us to further examine the history of the nation states that produced it.

The Maya civilisation is arguably the most important cultural unit in the Prehispanic Americas. Their imperial potency was unrivalled in its time, but they are better remembered for the astounding steps made in all forms of “civilised” characters, including architecture, art, astronomy, mathematics, calendrical systems and the only comprehensively expressive written (logosyllabic) language to have evolved in the Americas. The culture went through a series of highs and lows, attributed primarily to the dynamic and changeable environment in which they lived; droughts, floods, El Nino events and anthropocentric environmental change all played their part in Maya fortunes. The varied landscape gave rise to three largely notional referential groups: the southern and northern Maya lowlands, and the southern Maya highlands.

Founded in the early 2nd millennium BC, what would go on to form the Maya superstate was originally an agglomeration of sedentary agriculturists with unusual ceramic figurines, vessels and other material culture on the Pacific Coast region. This gave rise to monumental architecture by the early first millennium BC, which burgeoned in size and complexity as the culture came to control trade routes, and to import and export produce around Mesoamerica. The emergence of social elites is indicated by prestige burials and tombs (tumuli that were in turn replaced by the enormous stepped pyramids that were the largest buildings in the Americas until the 19th century AD.

The height of Maya productivity was in the so-called “Classic” period, at which point it was the world’s largest and most densely-packed society, distributed throughout the South of Mexico and into El Salvador, Belize, Honduras and Guatemala. It is to this period that most inscriptions, histories and monumental architecture can be attributed. Society was based around agriculturally-supported city states, into which tributes and trade poured from thousands of square miles of Maya controlled territory. This wealth fuelled social stratification and the paraphernalia that is used to validate it, including palaces, temples and pyramids on an unprecedented scale. The luxury items that were imported – mainly cacao, jade (technically nephrite), obsidian, salt and shells – found their way into the grave furniture of an increasingly rarefied aristocracy who had absolute power over their minions. They are distinguished pictographically as demigods, and archaeologically by some of the most remarkable regalia ever to have been produced in the Americas. Devotion to the monarchs was absolute, and was usually expressed through self-mortification in the form of blood-letting on such a huge scale that whole communities are said to have been anaemic for months afterwards. The collapse of a royal court – for whatever reason – spelled the end for the associated settlement.

In the 9th and 10th centuries AD, the productivity of the southern regions went into decline for reasons that are still uncertain (although ecological causes are the likeliest option), although the northern areas continued to flourish on a reduced scale until the arrival of European forces and the subsequent decimation of Native American cultures across both continents. What is left, however – particularly dating to the Classic Period – includes art and other achievements that many consider to be the most refined and beautiful of the ancient New World. Stucco, mural painting (notably with the use of “Maya Blue”, the secret of which has been lost since the 16th century) and sculpture were all of an astounding quality and naturalism, with some sophisticated expressionistic tendencies. Their artworks were highly influenced by Teotihuacan and the Aztecs, in contrast to the Pre-Classical period who owed more of their stylistic heritage to the Olmecs. Classical Period works are renowned for their restraint, yet also for their virtuoso paintwork and sense of style.

Their artistic heritage was accompanied by modern-style grid systems and astonishingly ornate public buildings, usually linked to the aristocracy, which were decorated with reliefs documenting the real or imagined achievements of the city state’s rulers. A major component of this tendency was the ball court, which seems to have been something of a hub for Maya social life. Originating with the Olmecs in the first millennium BC, the ballgame was akin to squash combined with rugby, played with a hard rubber ball on a rectangular court with sloped sides. The price of failure was very high – the losing team was out to death and their heads displayed on “tzompantli” – stakes driven into the top of centralised ceremonial platforms.

This hacha is a ceremonial piece that was used as a staff of prestige, and is believed to have been linked to the ballgame. The regalia associated with the game are linked to the power and authority of winners, and the power of the ruler who has the right of life and death over the losers. The trophies seem to have included palmas and other stonework with portraits of prominent personages (perhaps the victors themselves). Pieces such as this were probably wielded – ceremonially, as they are unlikely to have been particularly effective in usage – by a high-ranking member of the aristocracy, or the ruler himself. They were often decorated with depictions of deities such as Chaac (the Rain God) or Kukulcan (the Creator God), and may also have served as validation for other social functions such as child sacrifice (usually carried out by ripping out the heart while the person was still alive).

This is a beautiful piece of Maya history, and an imposing piece of ancient art in its own right.