Yaxchilan: The Design of a Maya Ceremonial City
Among the great urban relics of the Classic Maya period, few surpass Yaxchilan in its visual expression of the notion of ritual kingship. Tate's iconographic analysis provides convincing affirmation of this complexly elaborated theme in the site's numerous relief-carved lintels, stelae, and altars. She also convincingly advances the idea that these sculptures are, in turn, part of cosmically aligned ceremonial structures. Tate develops her thesis that the monuments are an intertwined articulation of social, dynastic, and religious functions through ethnographic evidence, archaeoastronomical calculations, hieroglyphic translation, and the meticulous scrutiny of the works' visual elements and principal themes. While the sculpture requires additional consideration in purely formalistic terms, Tate has made a significant beginning in formulating a notion of the Maya aesthetic. A very important addition to advanced subject collections.-Robert Cahn, Fashion Inst. of Technology, New YorkCopyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.