Barbier, Jean Paul (Editor)

1999, hardcover, 98 pages, 0.38 x 8.31 x 6.07 inches. Skira, ISBN: 8881182521.

Proskouriakoff, Tatiana

1977, paperback, 0.55 x 7.74 x 9.93 inches. Norman: Univ of Oklahoma Press. ISBN: 0806113510. Our Price: $25.95

Lister, Robert H. and Florence Cline Lister

Format: 1986, paperback, 94 pages, ISBN: 0826304737, University of New Mexico Press. Our Price: $15.25, Retail Price: $16.95, You Save: $1.70 (10%)

Describes and illustrates ten centuries of prehistoric southwestern pottery, most of it from the Four Corners country.

This illustrated volume includes the results of the most up-to-date research on a wide range of social practices, cultures, and time periods. Among the subjects addressed are social, economic, and political organization, as well as religion and ideology. The readings are arranged thematically rather than by region in order to compare the main characteristics of Mesoamerican city and rural life, and to bring out both the unity and diversity of these ancient peoples.

Litvak King, J.

Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1999, paper, 134 pages. ISBN 0-8263-0817-1.

This book begins with the arrival of man in the new world and continues through time, paying particular attention to the religious art and architecture. Litvak King focuses on the importance of trade in the development of the Olmec--and to its role in the decline of the Aztec empire.

Blanton, R. E., et al,

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999, cloth, 153 pages. ISBN 0-521-57114-6. Paper, ISBN 0-521-57787-X.

This book investigates the emergence of social complexity and state formation in a New World region. Drawing on the abundance of excavated remains and a survey of regional archaeological settlement patterns, a succinct account of the causes and consequences of political change in the region is provided.

Richard F. Townsend (editor) and Robert B. Pickering

1998, hardcover, 1st ed., 308pp. Thames & Hudson, Inc., ISBN: 0500050929. Our Price: $60.00 

Encompassing the modern states of Jalisco, Colima, and Nayarit, the archaeological region of ancient West Mexico is renowned for its spectacular earthenware tomb sculpture, the legacy of societies that flourished there between 200 B.C. and A.D. 800. This book and the major exhibition it accompanies document the splendid accomplishments of the region, bringing together more than 220 of the finest examples of its sculpture from both public and private collections worldwide. The essays are supplemented by maps, archaeological site plans, tomb reconstructions, and photographs of the West Mexican landscape.

Griswold Morley, Sylvanus

1975, paperback, 284 pages, 0.75 x 8.44 x 5.36 inches.
Dover Publications, ISBN: 0486231089. Our Price: $8.95

Ramon Dacal Moure and Manuel Rivero-De-La-Calle

1997, hardcover, 134 pages. University of Pittsburgh Press, ISBN: 082293955X. Our Price: $35.00

Art and Archaeology of Pre-Columbian Cuba from the Pitt Latin American Series presents a number of works, sixteen reproduced in color, by pre-Columbian artists from the archipelago, covering three millennia of human life in Cuba. Ramon Dacal Moure and Manuel Rivero de la Calle describe and interpret the two kinds of prehistoric art found on the island: that of original settlers, the Ciboneys, and that of the Tainos, who had largely replaced the Ciboneys by the time of Columbus. More than 100 photographs reveal the superb artistry of the Ciboney and Taino cultures. The project began when Thor Heyerdahl was asked to suggest a translator for a scientific manuscript. He recommended Daniel H. Sandweiss, an archaeologist then working with Heyerdahl on a site in Peru. David Watters, an archaeologist joined Sandweiss in editing the material. Through Art and Archaeology of Pre-Columbian Cuba, archaeologists and other professionals as well as general readers will come to admire and respect the talent visible in these examples of aboriginal art.

Cawthorne, Nigel

1999, hardcover, 96 pages, 0.89 x 9.79 x 9.35 inches. Laurel Glen, ISBN: 1571456392.

A magnificent overview of the art and culture of the Aztecs. Examines their sculpture, jewelry, pottery, and more. Exquisitely executed with over 70 color photographs and illustrations and metallic inks and printed trace-paper inserts. Also in The Art Of series: India, Medieval Manuscripts, Ancient Egypt, Celts, Japanese Prints, and Native North America.

Coe, Michael D. and Justin Kerr (photopher)

1998, hardcover, 240 pages, 1.22 x 13.04 x 9.97 inches. Harry N. Abrams; ISBN: 0810919885.

Whitley, David S.

Pasztory, Esther and Patricia Egan (editor)

1993, hardcover, 335 pages. New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., ISBN: 0810906872. Our Price: $49.50. 1998 reprint, paperback, 1st ed., 335 pages. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, ISBN: 0806125365. Our Price: $29.95

Aztec—the name evokes one of history's cultural enigmas. That fabled empire in the New World, with its towering golden culture, its bloody human sacrifices, and its terror-inspiring idols, was yet a hopeless loser when Cortes and his small Spanish forces collided with Motecuhzoma's army. The Aztec's capital of Tenochtitlan was leveled and their whole world destroyed.

Benson, Elizabeth P.

1997, hardcover, 184 pages. University Press of Florida, ISBN: 0813015189. Our Price: $39.95

Elizabeth P. Benson provides an engaging overview of the depiction of animals in the pre-Columbian art of Latin America. Drawing on an extensive set of images (many of them previously unpublished) from the collections of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, and the Florida Museum of Natural History, she examines the practical, ritualistic, and mythic importance of animals in pre-Columbian life as well as the meanings that animals still have for the modern descendants of those indigenous peoples. Conveniently arranged by animal groups and beautifully illustrated, Benson's survey encompasses all artistic media and spans the pre-Columbian cultures of Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. Providing information on animals and the beliefs surrounding them, the cultural contexts of their depiction, and the cultures to which they were important, Birds and Beasts of Ancient Latin America will appeal to archaeologists, cultural hisorians, and anthropologists; to anyone interested in pre-Columbian art and mythology; and to modern-day bird and animal lovers.

Miller, Mary Ellen and Linda Schele

1992 reprint, paperback, 335 pages. Braziller, George, Inc., ISBN: 0807612782. Our Price: $28.00, Retail Price: $35.00, You Save: $7.00 (20%)  

A comprehensive guide to the Maya which reveals kingship rites, ritual warfare, with a vast array of color plates and drawings. This book was designed to accompany a 1986 exhibition of the same name. With one exception all the objects in the exhibition, as well as several unexhibited works, are illustrated with colour pages.

Coe, Michael D.

1999, revised, paper, 304 pages. New York: Thames and Hudson, ISBN 0-500-28133-5. Our Price: $17.05, Retail Price: $18.95, You Save: $1.90 (10%).

Breaking the Maya Code tells the story of the last great decipherment of an ancient script. Twenty years ago the ruined monuments of Maya civilization were mute, the hieroglyphic inscriptions on magnificent stelae, temples and palaces largely unread. Today, thanks to an extraordinary scientific breakthrough, these inscribed remains are revealing a history lost to humanity for a millennium.

Martin, Simon and Nikolai Grube

2000, hardcover, 240 pages

For a thousand years the dense rain forests of Central America concealed the ruins of one of the world's great civilizations, that of the ancient Maya. Early explorers found themselves in cities dominated by steep temple pyramids and fallen idols covered in unfathomable hieroglyphs. Since the mid-nineteenth century, scholars have tried to understand the mysterious people who produced one of the greatest flowerings of art and culture in the New World. Behind the ruined Maya cities and their abandoned artworks--the superb sculptures of Copan, the fine vase painting of Naranjo, the mighty pyramids of Tikal and Calakmul—lie the turbulent stories of their ruling dynasties. The recent tremendous progress in reading Maya hieroglyphs is now bringing this story into focus. Here is the first book to bring together and examine the greatest Maya dynasties in a single volume. Two of the world's leading experts in Maya hieroglyphic decipherment reveal the latest thinking on the nature of Maya divine kingship, statehood, and political authority, and describe the most recent readings and archaeological finds, including their own discoveries.

Christopher B. Donnan

1992, hardcover, 128 pages, ISBN: 0930741218, University of California Los Angeles, Fowler Museum. Our Price: $40.00

Schele, Linda, Peter Mathews, Justin Kerr (Photographer), MacDuff Everton (Photographer)

1998, Our Price: $40.00, Hardcover, 431 pages, ISBN: 068480106X, Simon & Schuster Trade. 1999, paperback, 432 pages. Our Price: $16.00

Linda Schele and Peter Mathews were pivotal in discovering the Maya use of hieroglyphs to cover their public spaces with the story of their history and belief system. All of their work culminates in The Code of Kings, an extraordinary guided tour through the lost civilization of the Maya, using as a prism seven buildings renowned for their beauty and sacred power. The seven sites - three in present-day Mexico, three in Guatemala, and one in Honduras - contain all the elements the ancient Maya considered necessary to charge a building with religious and political meaning.

Gisele Diaz and Alan Rodgers

1993, paperback, 77 pages, ISBN: 0486275698, Dover Publications, Inc. Our Price: $16.15, Retail Price: $17.95, You Save: $1.80 (10%)

An excellent source book for anyone looking for authentic reproductions of the original that is housed in the Vatican Libray. This is a reproduction of an ancient document from the Mixtecs, around 1400 AD, from the area today known as Puebla or Oaxaxa. The project took seven years to complete as they painstakingly reproduced the Codex with accuracy and authenticity. The color plates are a delight to the eye as they depict kings, mythical warriors and the Mixtec belief system. Each plate is explained, in great detail, in the beginning of the book for your convevience. The colorful plates are intricate and exact on thick high quality paper. This is great stuff for an artist working in any medium that needs inspiration or just wants to reproduce. A good book for history buffs too. An original work by Dover. The codex is in the Vatican Library. Other reproductions are scarce. A very good (9x12") reproduction.

Zelia Nuttall  

Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology
1991, paperback, 96 pages, ISBN: 0486231682, Dover Publications, Incorporated. Our Price: $16.95.

Color hand-painted facsimile of a Mixtec picture book; the only pre-Columbian codex in an easily affordable edition.

REVIEW: "The 16th-century Codex Telleriano-Remensis was a rare colonial enterprise: an intercultural exchange between Indian artists and Spanish overseers. It was created in an attempt to understand Aztec culture in light of its transformed present. The result was a well-organized manuscript with invaluable information about the Aztec calendar, mythology, rituals, history, and politics. Through the centuries, the Codex has been a fruitful source of knowledge for academics and a source of cultural identity and power for the diminishing Aztec (Nahua) survivors. This new edition includes a full-color photographic facsimile of the entire Codex as well as an English translation of the Spanish commentaries that explain the work's intense visual imagery. It contains over 100 pages of brilliant visions of bellicose earth-mother goddesses and other mythical creatures. [Quiñones] Keber is professor of art history at Baruch College and The Graduate School and University Center of the City University of New York. She provides a comprehensive text that complements these images with core information about Aztec culture and gives the reader a deeper appreciation for the art of Aztec manuscript painting. Most people will never see the original manuscript, now well guarded at the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, but [Quiñones] Keber provides the immediacy and excitement of actually holding a copy of the ancient text. She has opened a window onto a unique cultural fusion born of the encounter between old and new worlds." Silvia Heredia

Jones, Grant D.

1999, paperback, 550 pages, 1.26 x 9.01 x 6.05 inches.
Stanford Univ Press, ISBN: 0804735220. Our Price: $19.96.

Eubanks, Mary W.

Gainesvile: University Press of Florida, 1999. Cloth, 249 pages. ISBN 0-8130-1669-X. Our Price: $49.95 

Combining botany, archaeology, and art history, Corn in Clay explores contact between ancient American cultures. Eubanks integrates evidence from replicas of maize on ancient pottery vessels with other biological, archaeological, and geographic evidence to establish a considerable degree of contact between Mesoamerica and the Andean region in pre-Columbian times.

Pohl, J.

New York: Oxford University Press, 1999, cloth, 231 pages. ISBN 0-19-510887-6

Part of the Places in Time series, Exploring Mesoamerica opens to a map/timeline, providing a reference point from which to begin a journey through time. Pohl acts as tour guide, ushering the reader from La Venta, where the expedition starts, through Tenochtitlan (present-day Mexico City). Pohl pulls together myth, fact, theory, and discovery in his tour of the Mesoamerican world. Detailed accounts from explorers, linguists, archaeologists, art historians, and scientists make the expedition a well-rounded and interesting overview of what present day Mexico and Central America once were.

Schele, Linda, et al

1998, hardcover, 1st ed., 184 pages. A L T I Publishing, ISBN: 1883051169. Our Price: $39.96, Retail Price: $49.95, You Save: $9.99 (20%)

Utilizing recent scientific advances and superb photography, this book reveals the hidden Maya in a wholly different light: knowledge unavailable even a few years ago.

Brennan, Martin

1998, paperback, 273 pages, 0.66 x 9.04 x 6.97 inches.
Bear & Co; ISBN: 187918124X. Our Price: $16.00. You Save: $4.00 (20%)

Elliot M. Abrams

1994, paperback, 1st edition, 0.59 x 9.02 x 6.04 inches. Austin: Univ of Texas Press, ISBN: 0292704623. Our Price: $15.95

Saunders, Nicholas J. (editor)

1998, hardcover, 272 pages, 1.03 x 9.49 x 6.46 inches. Routledge, ISBN: 0415153271.

Felines have had a profound effect on human sensibilities since the beginning of time. Throughout history, they have inspired fear, respect and emulation as the embodiment of supernatural power. In the Americas the jaguar and the puma were invoked in art, religion and mythology of Amerindians, from Amazonia and the Andes, to Meso- America and North America. Depicted in gold, pottery and stone, and conjured up in shamanistic visions, they were associated with sacrifice, cannibalism and war, and employed in the subtle symbolism of metaphor as icons of power and prestige.
In Icons of Power, contributors from the fields of anthropology, archaeology and art history discuss the role and meaning of the feline symbol in North, Central and South America. This volume not only advances our understanding of how different societies retained and adapted such symbols in a varied contexts, it offers to the reader critical insights into the issues of representation and identification.

Harrison, P. D.

London: Thames and Hudson, 1999, cloth, 208 pages. ISBN 0-500-05094-5. Our Price: $48.00, Retail Price: $60.00, You Save: $12.00 (20%).  

The Maya metropolis of Tikal was once one of the greatest cities in the world. At its peak around A.D. 750 over 100,000 people lived here, in the heart of the Guatemalan rainforest. Huge temple-pyramids dominated the skyline. Today Tikal has become one of the most visited sites on the Maya tourist itinerary. Drawing upon over 30 years of excavation and research, some of it his own, Peter D. Harrison gives a vivid account of the turbulent story of Tikal over 1700 years, from 800 B.C. to the late 9th century A.D. Harrison offers a cogent, detailed summary of what is known to date of this romantic, mysterious city and its rulers.

Drew, David

2000, hardcover, 384 pages

Over the last two centuries explorers have made the most remarkable discoveries in the tropical forests of Central America. Across much of present-day Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, and Honduras, dozens of cities--some with populations of well over 100,000--have been unveiled, and every year fresh reports emerge of the findings of unknown Maya ruins--great temples, palaces, towering stone pyramids, and the tombs of the Maya kings. What these spectacular discoveries indicate is the former presence of an exceptionally advanced, sophisticated, and complex society.
Recent major developments in the decipherment of Maya hieroglyphics have revealed that alongside the material achievements of the Maya ran intellectual accomplishments in astronomy, math, and calendrics. Seemingly tied to the complexities of Maya religion, these achievements were remarkable for a society technically in the Stone Age. The Chronicles of the Maya Kings are the histories recorded on the reliefs of temple walls, on magnificent hieroglyphic stairways, and on stone stelae planted by Maya rulers in the plazas of their cities.
In this fascinating book, David Drew brings to life this extraordinary civilization. He answers questions about why the Mayas constructed their cities in the hostile setting of the jungle, the exact age of their ruins, and the strange human images depicted in elaborate costume at so many Maya sites. He asks why at the time of the Spanish conquest all knowledge of the Mayas was lost. He looks at their history, art, architecture, political systems, religion, and, finding that the Maya are not in fact a lost or dead people—there are five million descendants living in Mexico—considers the ways in which their society today illuminates that of their ancestors

Coe, Michael D.

New York: Thames and Hudson, 1999. Paper, 256 pages. ISBN 0-500-28066-5. Our Price: $18.95 

The Maya has long been established as the best and most readable introduction to the New World's greatest ancient civilization. In these pages Professor Coe distills a lifetime's scholarship for the general reader and student. Now, for the sixth edition, Professor Coe incorporates the latest ideas and research in a fast-changing field. Spectacular tomb discoveries at the city of Copan reveal some of the early artistic and architectural splendors at this major site. New finds here and elsewhere entail a complete reinterpretation of the relationship between the warrior-kings of the Classic Maya lowlands and Teotihuacan, the greatest city of pre-Conquest America. Continuing epigraphic breakthroughs - decipherments of Maya inscriptions - demonstrate vividly the shifting power blocs among the competing Maya city-states.

Miller, Mary Ellen

1999, 240 pages, paperback, 0.61 x 5.91 x 8.26 inches. London: Thames and Hudson, ISBN 050020327X. Our Price: $13.45, Retail Price: $14.95, You Save: $1.50 (10%)

Miller vividly takes the reader into the art of one of the world's most enigmatic ancient civilizations. From temple to tomb, she explains how and why the Maya made their greatest works. New archaeological discoveries at Copan, Tikal, and Palenque—to name but a few—are included, and the author draws on recent decipherments in Maya writing to provide fresh interpretations of Maya sculpture and ceramics. For the art historian, student, and traveler, Maya Art and Architecture will prove indispensable. Chapters on Maya architecture and the materials of Maya art set the stage for discussions of the sculpture of different time periods and regions, the famous murals at Bonampak, the dramatic new findings at Cacaxtla, and the painted Maya ceramics of the first millennium A.D.

Kowalski, Jeff Karl (editor)

1999, cloth, 416 pages. New York: Oxford University Press, Inc., ISBN 019507961-2. Our Price: $75.00

This book considers the ways in which the built environment in Mesoamerica functioned as a carrier of cultural meanings. Mesoamerican architecture is closely related to the social structure of the community, and the design and spatial distribution of pyramid-temples, palaces, ballcourts, shrines, sweatbaths, and ordinary dwellings at such sites reflected and reinforced the codes of behavior within particular societies. In this collection, a number of prominent scholars provide new interpretations and useful syntheses of many of the most significant Mesoamerican architectural traditions from the Preclassic to the Postclassic periods. It should appeal to a broad readership of archaeologists, Mesoamerican specialists, and to those interested in ancient art, society, and history.

Bawden, G.

1996, cloth, 375 pages. ISBN 1-55786-520-5; paper, ISBN 0-631-21863-7. Malden: Blackwell Publishers Inc. Our Price: $62.95

The Moche civilization was created by the people who lived in the arid coastal regions of Northern Peru from around A.D. 100 to A.D. 700. At the end of the 1980s understanding of Moche society was suddenly and irrevocably altered. A series of discoveries on the North coast of Peru revealed stunning artistic and technological achievements and caused a dramatic revision of the sophistication and power of Moche society. This is the first book to describe this ancient civilization in the light of the new evidence.

Love, Bruce

1994, hardcover, 176 pages, ISBN: 0292746741, University of Texas Press. Our Price: $37.50,

The Maya Civilization left many records carved in the stones of its cities, but only four handpainted books, or codices, are known to have survived from the pre-Columbian era. The Paris Codex is one of these and this groundbreaking study is the first comprehensive treatment of this codex since 1910. The Paris Codex consists of twenty-two screen-folded pages of hieroglyphs, painted figures, and calendrical calculations, which are reproduced in this volume. Bruce Love takes an ethnographic approach to the codex, analyzing its use by Maya priests as a handbook of divination, prophecy, and history.

Pasztory, Esther

1999, paperback, 176 pages. Cambridge University Press, ISBN: 0521645514. Our Price: $17.05, Retail Price: $18.95, You Save: $1.90 (10%)

When, in the sixteenth century, the Spanish conquistadors defeated the Aztec empire in Mexico and the Inca empire in Peru, their dreams of finding treasure in the New World were amply fulfilled. What they also found was that the Aztecs and the Incas were the latest in a long line of highly civilized peoples to have occupied Mesoamerica and the Andes. In this engaging book, Esther Pasztory describes the very different cultural traditions of these two areas, placing them within their historical and social contexts.

Blake, M. (editor)

1999, paper, 223 pages. Pullman: Washington State University Press, ISBN 0-87422-166-8.

A remarkable range of ancient societies and economies flourished in the environmentally diverse coastal regions of Pacific Latin America. This first ever synthesis from a Pacific perspective describes the archaeological investigations recently undertaken in the coastal littoral. In this volume, specialists explain their latest findings in terms of archaic period adaptations, the development and spread of agriculture, the beginnings of sedentism, the formative periods of civilization, and the origins of socio-political inequality.

Pasztory, E.

1999, paper, 176 pages. New York: Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-64551-4.

This books describes the different artistic traditions of Mesoamerica and the Andes, placing them within their historical and social contexts.

Adams, R. E. W.

1999, cloth. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, ISBN 0-8061-3076-8.

In this summary, Adams integrates the findings of field archaeologists with those of the epigraphers and art historians to recreate the life of this Maya city from the Early Classic period. 238 pages.

Simmons Clancy, F.

Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1999. Cloth, ISBN 0-8263-1787-1.

The subject of this book are the freestanding relief sculptures, or stelae, carved by the ancient Maya between A.D. 278 and 514. The author explores the artistry revealed in the stelae, their aesthetic values, carving techniques, imagery, and text. 169 pages.

Labbé, A.

1999, paper. Seattle: University of Washington Press, ISBN 0-295-97755-8.

An in-depth look at symbolic ceramics and goldwork from prehispanic Columbia. 216 pages.

Boone, Elizabeth

2000, cloth, 284 pages. Austin: University of Texas Press, ISBN 0-292-70876-9.

This copiously illustrated book offers the first comprehensive analysis of the Mexican painted history as an intellectual, documentary, and pictorial genre. Elizabeth Hill Boone explores how the Mexican historians conceptualized and painted their past and introduces the major pictorial records: the Aztec annals and cartographic histories and the Mixtec screenfolds and lienzos.

Pope, M.

1999, revised, paper, 232 pages. London: Thames and Hudson, ISBN 0-500-28105-X.

The author discusses the contributions to decipherment made by theorists and practitioners, examining the intellectual developments that led to their outstanding achievements.

Cunkle, James R.

1994, paperback, 175 pages, ISBN: 0914846922, Golden West Publishers. Our Price: $14.95 

Braun, Barbara

2000, paperback, 340 pages, Abrams,Harry N Inc., ISBN: 0810929473. Our Price: $27.96, Retail Price: $34.95
You Save: $6.99 (20%).

While much attention has been given to the connection between modern art and primitive African forms, the impact of ancient American sources on the work of modern artists has been left largely unexplored. For example, Henry Moore's Reclining Figure, in a dozen variations, adorns museum galleries, corporate headquarters, and public malls around the world, yet how many people are aware that its acknowledged source is the Toltec-Maya chacmool, a Mesoamerican temple guardian and repository of sacrificial offerings? Or that Frank Lloyd Wright, America's premier modern architect, learned as much about structural design and ornamentation from a close study of Maya temples and Mixtec palaces as he did from Japanese structures? Author Barbara Braun explores these connections and more in this fascinating, in-depth study of five seminal modern artists and the Pre-Columbian forms that provided inspiration for their work. In addition to the Moore and Wright comparisons, Braun examines the ceramics of Paul Gauguin and their debt to ancient Peruvian plastic and pictorial formulas; the revolutionary murals of Diego Rivera and their ideological and visual relation to Aztec imagery; as well as the Constructivist paintings of Joaquin Torres-Garcia and their connection to ancient Peruvian textiles, ceramics, and architecture. Braun begins her discussion with a summary of the introduction and reception of Pre-Columbian images and artifacts in Europe and the United States from the sixteenth century forward, and she closes with a look at how the work of more recent artists, such as Color Field painter Alfred Jensen, Minimalist sculptor Tony Smith, earth artist Robert Smithson, and ceramists Kenneth Price and David Gilhooly, continues to be indebted to ancient American forms and ideas. Visual confirmation of these connections is given in more than 300 striking illustrations, 97 of them in color. An illustrated time chart and historical map provide the reader with easy reference points

Delgado Pang, Hilda and Michael D. Coe

1992, hardcover, 1st ed., 330 pages,
Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, ISBN: 0806123796. Our Price: $70.00

This profusely illustrated, up-to-date introduction to the pre-columbian art of Mesoamerica and Andean South America examines our conceptions of the ancient high cultures, the art they produced, and how our modern-day interpretations were achieved. The book is unique in that it draws on a great variety of scholarly disciplines to interpret the art forms. Since the 1960s our understanding of the Aztec, Maya, Inca, and Andean civilizations has increased dramatically through coordinated interdisciplinary research. In this summary of new and past investigations, Hilda Delgado Pang describes previously unknown historical figures and dynasties. In a clear and entertaining style, she tells how the pre-columbian artists validated their rulers, recorded rituals, portrayed the supernatural and astronomical cosmos, and commemorated transitions from life into death. As she describes the Mesoamerican and Andean high cultures, she also explains the special role that art plays in all societies, ancient and modern. Pre-columbian artists expressed themselves in sculpture and monumental architecture, glyphic notations, weavings, and painted ceramics--beginning about 2000 B.C. and, in some areas, continuing after the Spanish conquest. This new introductory text explores the contributions of epigraphy, formal and iconographic analyses, chemical and botanical identifications, and ethnographic and ethnohistorical sources to our knowledge of the major art styles: Olmec, Toltec, Maya, Aztec, Chavin, Paracas, Nasca, Moche, Tiahuanaco-Huari, Chimu, and Inca. From this book students and general readers will gain challenging insights into both the ancient art forms described and the fast-moving disciplines that energize research in the field today.

Paz, Octavio, Henri Stierlin & Daniele Lavallee

1999, hardcover, 400 pages. Skira (IT), ISBN: 8881183269. Our Price: $67.50

"This work is divided into two parts and includes an essay by the Nobel Prize Winner for Literature Octavio Paz. The first part of the book is historical and, essentially, examines the brutal shock suffered by two worlds between 1492, the year of the discovery of America, and 1532, when Pizarro subdued and conquered the Inca empire in Peru, eleven years after Hernando Cortes had destroyed the Aztecs in Mexico." "The connection between what took place in those years is illustrated with maps, old engravings and color photographs of the various pre-Columbian archeological sites, as well as some of the background scenarios linked to the exploits of the European navigators. The second part looks at the major civilisations (Maya, Aztec, Inca, etc.), and some little-known cultures, attributed with the production of the approximately one hundred and fifty works of art from Mesoamerica, Central America, the Andean Cordillera and the Amazon Basin, shown in full page color illustrations. The authors - historians and specialists - provide in these pages a clear vision of what has often been drawn out in long-winded explanations. Most importantly, they pause on the aesthetic value of peoples that have, on many occasions, been called "primitive," without however omitting to place the sculptures, pottery and fabrics selected by the authors themselves in a precise anthropological context."

Milbrath, Susan

2000, paperback, 352 pages, 1st edition, 0.95 x 10.98 x 8.55 inches. Univ of Texas Press, ISBN: 0292752261

This pathfinding book reconstructs ancient Maya astronomy and cosmology through the astronomical information encoded in Precolumbian Maya art and confirmed by the current practices of living Maya peoples.

Susan Milbrath opens the book with a discussion of modern Maya beliefs about astronomy, along with essential information on naked-eye observation. She devotes subsequent chapters to Precolumbian astronomical imagery, which she traces back through time, starting from the Colonial and Postclassic eras. She delves into many aspects of the Maya astronomical images, including the major astronomical gods and their associated glyphs, astronomical almanacs in the Maya codices, and changes in the imagery of the heavens over time. This investigation yields new data and a new synthesis of information about the specific astronomical events and cycles recorded in Maya art and architecture. Indeed, it constitutes the first major study of the relationship between art and astronomy in ancient Maya culture.

Harris, John F. & Stephen K. Stearns

1997, paperback, 2nd edition. University of Pennsylvania Press, ISBN: 0924171413.