Fiery Pool: The Maya and the Mythic Sea

Salem, Massachusetts: Yale University Press, 2010. Softcover. VG+/VG+. Gray cloth boards w/ color pictorial DJ; 328 pp.; Profusely illustrated in bw and color. Accompanied the traveling exhibition of the same name; Features nearly a hundred items and explores the power of the sea as the basis for Mayan cultural narrative. Maya art and hieroglyphs constitute one of the world's most fascinating, visually striking, and complex systems of expression. Most scholarly interpretations of Maya art and culture have emphasized that this ancient civilization was oriented toward inland centers and preoccupied with the blood of royal lineage and ritual sacrifice. Drawing on recent archaeological discoveries and developments in deciphering Maya glyphs, this groundbreaking volume presents a revisionist reading that shifts the emphasis of interpretation to the mythic power of the sea as the basis of a larger, deeper cultural narrative and history for the Maya.