Lost Civilization Maya 4 of 6

some of these guys are are very very

gruesome

the god of decapitation for example is a

skeletal god

he very often uh is holding a

decapitated head either by its hair

or he has them the head in his palms

he is generally portrayed with having

large volutes of stench

coming out of him

for the maya the underworld was an

ominous place

but to our eyes many customs and rituals

in their daily lives

seem equally unsettling and bizarre

children's skulls were deliberately

deformed to create the flattened brow

line the maya found so pleasing

maya women had their teeth drilled

without known anesthetics

and then set with precious stones

the use of mind-altering drugs was

encouraged and condoned

powerful intoxicants were smoked

the maya got high the maya took

lots of drugs but i think their drug of

preference was fundamentally alcohol

and when they were so drunk that they

were throwing up

they were then taking it as an enema

which would be a

very intensive even more intoxicating

effect

to take balche or some kind of fermented

drink

as an enema they were getting incredibly

drunk

eric thompson was aware of such

grotesque and bizarre practices

but he refused to let them alter his

idealized vision of the maya

then american filmmaker giles healey

ventured into the jungles of mexico

in 1946 healy was led to a secret ruin

by a la condon indian named chan bore

there he made a discovery that would

expose a savage truth

and alter forever the world's utopian

vision of the ancient maya

chan brought healy and his camera to a

maya ruin the outside world knew nothing

about

when giles healey walks into this room

he's got a

whole form notion of what the maya are

like

he's imagining that they were priestly

time

keepers a few wonderful noble men maybe

like the

very yeah himself giles healey class

24 he imagines that they are going to be

men like him instead what healy found

painted on the temple walls was a

detailed depiction of the maya not as

peaceful stargazers

but as fierce warriors

devout believers and bloodthirsty

deities

devotees of bloodletting and sacrifice

it was a portrait of the maya that up

until that moment

seemed unimaginable

i think in fact there is probably no

more single

powerful painting of warfare and

bloodletting in the world

than this battle it's full of sound and

trumpets and screaming and guys who are

all painted and pumped up

some of them are already slaying the

decapitated head

this other hunk of flesh

and the key point is right over in the

corner of the paintings

where this guy is ripping out the

fingernails

of that particular captive and his face

is collapsing

he seems to be almost burbling something

out of his mouth

maybe it's blood dripping from where

they've ripped out a tooth or two

and the rest of these captives seem now

sunk right into their

labs their haunches they look at their

fingers

blood is spurting right out of them

this was an image of the maya neither

eric thompson nor the world at large

could easily accept

even these shocking scenes didn't

immediately overturn the cherished ideal

of the peaceful maya

it was like a parent overlooking some

obvious flaw in a child

when giles healey walked into this room

i'm not sure that he knew what to make

of it

but when thompson walked into this room

he didn't see warfare

he saw a nasty little raid in fact he

even wondered

what was going on the maya wouldn't rip

out fingernails he thought perhaps there

was some pot of red paint over here

that people were dipping their hands

into he was that

unhappy with it

giles healey eventually finished his

film

he focused on the lachondon indians who

had been his guides

descendants of the maya they too were

portrayed as peaceful people in total

harmony with nature

about the eerie scenes of violence not a

word

kyle's healey had cleaned the grime of

centuries from the bonham pack murals

but he could not bring himself to reveal

the truth

it would take years before thompson

would acknowledge his mistake

but a continent away another discovery

provided a new set of clues

by pure accident in a most unlikely

setting

a new chapter in maya history would

begin

may 1945 berlin has been invaded by the

russians

the national library is on fire

hitler would soon be dead and germany

defeated

from the thousands of books burning in

the ruins a soviet officer

casually plucks a random souvenir from

the flames

his name is yuri konorosov the book

reproductions of surviving maya codices

immerses himself in maya studies and the

alphabet bishop lander had attempted to

transcribe his great breakthrough

was realizing maya hieroglyphs were much

more than a simple system of numerical

signs

his work was amplified by another

russian

tatiana proskoryakov a superb

illustrator and archaeologist

her keen eye detected patterns and the

dates carved in stone

where others had seen only numbers and

signs

tatiana read the entire span of human

lives

based on her findings the code breakers

went to work

they began to read the carvings on

temple walls like tombstones in a

cemetery

much more than mere calendars the images