One of the activities shown in the Madrid Codex is the manufacture of
wooden
idols. Bishop Diego de Landa left us a detailed description of
this work,
which the Maya called "making gods." Ms. Ciaramella matched the
illustrations and the texts in the Codex with passages in Landa's Relacion
de las cosas de Yucatan and showed ethnographic parallels with some
contemporary wood-carvers.
She also presented evidence for reading T186 as phonetic 'le,' T159
as
phonetic 'lo,' and T62 as logograph for HOK'.
Mary Ciaramella is a retired librarian and determined glypher who lives
in
New Jersey. Her interest is the work of the Maya as shown in
the codices.
She has previously dealt with weaving (“The Weavers in the Codices,”
in
Research Reports on Ancient Maya Writing, 44, August, 1999), bee-keeping
(in
press), idol-making (the subject of her talk), and is now researching
pottery-making.