Bowl; Mayan Culture, Honduras, El Salvador, 500-800 AD.

Bowl; Maya culture, Honduras, El Salvador, 500-800 AD.
Polychrome ceramic.
Attached thermoluminescence.
It presents small breakage in the area of the mouth.
Measurements: 9 x 23 cm.
Bowl made of polychrome terracotta that presents an ornamentation based on figurative motifs and geometric character. The interior zone of the eave is dominated by a fretwork of lines that follow one another creating banded forms, emphasizing the inferior one that is starred by schematized birds. The exterior zone, however, has a figurative design featuring high seated dignitaries, whose figure is repeated rhythmically.
Mayan ceramics cover a wide variety of typologies, both for use and rituals, pieces decorated with reliefs and incised motifs, monochrome engobes or with figurative polychrome motifs, later on. They were always pieces made by modeling, since this culture did not know the potter's wheel. The colors used were always engobes, with a clay base, and the vessels were fired at a low temperature of approximately 800ºC. Unlike monuments, which were intended to be seen by everyone, ceramics enjoyed great freedom among the Maya, since they were intended for private use, whether daily or funerary. Hence the multiplicity of decorative styles and typologies, including jars for storing essences and medicines, tableware, incense burners and even articulated statuettes.