Thursday, July 3, 2008

Maya arrows, Yucatan

I saw these listed on eBay today:





I will update the post with the closing bid.

They are identified as South American, Amazon region, but they are definitely from southern Mexico/Guatemala. Lacandona and other Quiche speaking Maya peoples in that region make these arrows for the tourist market. The bows are made of chicle wood, but they were formally made of more substantial hardwood. They resemble other Central American and NW South American bows in that they are retangular-segment D bows. Strings are twisted inner bark (maybe bromeliad fiber? I can't remember).

Generally speaking, they resemble other SA arrows. The arrows have simple tangential fletchings. The flights and points are bound with dark-colored natural fibers, or cotton or nylon commercial string. The serving is not continuous but is typically spiraled loosely for an inch or more.

The arrows are unique in that some utilize simple retouched chert or glass flakes as points. Sets made for tourists are typically uniform length and include several chert points, barbed bodkin-type points, and one or more blunts. The wood points are often warped pretty badly from hasty curing.

I haven't seen any really good sets of Lacandon arrows. There were a couple auctioned last week; they were better quality and may have been made-for-use. The Grayson Collection has some older sets, but even those have some of the characteristics of contemporary tourist arrows. Whittaker describes a set he bought in Cancun (I think) in the 1990s in his first book, Flintknapping.

Sets are typically available at various sites on the Internet for reasonable prices. Several sizes are offered, ranging from tiny to about the correct size for actual use.

No comments: