Abstract
The region of Mayan culture has a lot of caves with ritual activity, that many modern communities of mountainous Guatemala and the state of Chiapas, Mexico continue to display. However, not all of them have traces of Maya rock art. Mayan caves contain a variety of images and scenes, which can almost always be identifi ed thanks to the wealth of archaeological material and stable iconographic forms in Mesoamerican art. A large number of Mayan cave paintings are found in the caves of the Yucatán, mainly from the Puuc region. The rock paintings appear here rather early and correspond to the time of the fi rst major cities of Maya culture (the 1st – 3rd cc. AD). A few plots of rock paintings can be traced in the monumental carving of mountainous Guatemala and the Pacifi c coast, where the fi rst complex chiefdoms of the described area were formed. Rock art in the Mayan caves includes world-famous handprints, geometric fi gures and ornamental forms, and plots associated exclusively with local traditions. These include images of large heads, skulls and skeletons, divinities, calendar dates, and complex multi-fi gurative compositions, which are also found on ceramic vessels. It consists of captive scenes, palace scenes, ball games, mythological scenes, images of dancers and musicians. However, there are caves where, along with images that undoubtedly belong to the Mayan culture, there are images that are iconographically and stylistically diff erent from the canons of Mayan art.
Keywords
Mesoamerica, rock art, cave paintings, ancient Maya, Mayan art.
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