Newswise — This clay vessel depicts a Hueheuteotl ("way-way-TAY-oh-tuhl"), a Mesoamerican deity represented as an old man and associated with fire.
The Hueheuteotl are found mostly in Aztec mythology of the Central Mexico region, yet this vessel was found in El Salvador. This is no surprise as archeologists have discovered that peoples native to Central Mexico migrated down the Pacific coast of Central America as far south as Nicaragua. These settlers created new local identities while also maintaining long-distance commercial and political ties with their Mexican-descendant relatives.
Explore this and many other samples of Central American ceramics in the exhibition “Cerámica de los Ancestros: Central America’s Past Revealed,” on view at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian through February 2015.
To find out about other exhibits, programs and events celebrating Hispanic heritage throughout the Smithsonian, visit our Hispanic Heritage Month calendar.
RSS