Posted January 2, 2013
Already in 1994 Nikolai Grube and Werner Nahm brought up the idea of centipedes being a model for mythical Late Classic Maya creatures which had previously been accepted as skeletalized serpents. Then Erik Boot produced an unpublished manuscript on centipedes and serpents in 1999. Harri Kettunen and Bon V. Davis II have argued that the Maya creatures are a mixture of snake, centipedes, crocodiles, and even sharks (2004). Although published in 2004 this was a lecture presented in 2000, so they were not able to cite Taube's study of centipedes and serpents of 2003.
During 49 years in Mesoamerica I have learned that studies of the creatures represented in Maya art, in-person, can offer insights not available in even a peer-reviewed journal. For example, after finishing my PhD dissertation which included considerable discussion of water lilies in Maya art, I then spent a total of six years of seasonal field trips to Peten and Monterrico and my knowledge of water lilies is significantly improved. Fortunately my PhD dissertation was also based on field trips in the 1970's and early 1980's.
In other words, if you have the snakes, crocodiles, and centipedes available, in front of you, literally, it is easier to understand their features (in this case especially their dentition, which I assure you is painfully visible when you are physically inside the crocodile or caiman pen at the zoo). The snakes are put on our portable studio table by the helpful herpetologists. And to answer the logical question, yes, the snakes do (rarely) strike at us. Sophia almost got bitten last year. And twice I have woken up with a scorpion on my body (one in a hotel in Mexico; once again while doing field work at Nim Li Punit, Belize).
Images of two different scorpions, near Rio Dulce, Izabal, Guatemala. The centipedes and millipedes we will show later. We have also found another creature that was missed in all the articles about these multi-legged creatures.
Because experience has taught me that library and Internet research (for flora and fauna in Maya art) is not fully adequate, you will see that we are investing in more and more photo sessions with reptiles, centipedes, and scorpions during 2013. Our primary goal is to find the venomous centipedes. Every single person we speak with in Guatemala says they know of large centipedes, but until we have each species on our portable studio table, we are unable to further comment.
All our photographs will be made available to iconographers, epigraphers, zoologists, and students who are interested in these subjects. Please excuse the fact that due to the world economic situation, our budget is rather non-existent, and until a kind benefactor or foundation can assist our field trip research, we may be a tad slow processing the 21-megapixel digital images.
