Cuerpos de piedra en la ciudad de los dioses. Idiosincrasia de la litoescultura antropomorfa teotihuacana

Abstract

The anthropomorphic sculpture of the ancient metropolis of Teotihuacan has been a topic that has attracted little interest in research, although its presence is significant in museum collections. Among the issues to deal with we find a great number of sculptures which are labeled under the rubric of "Teotihuacan" or "Teotihuacan style" that are not coming from a reliable archaeological context. Some of these sculptures were acquired by museums and are greater in number when compared with those obtained from controlled excavations. Another issue are those sculptures that were excavated in the early last century and lack of sufficient data to place them in a precise timeframe. Consequently, chronologies handled today for a non-excavated sculpture comprise a period of over 500 years. One contribution of this thesis was to gather a corpus of Teotihuacan anthropomorphic stone sculpture for a total of 343 specimens from museums, collections and archaeological projects. The purpose of this corpus is to be a reference tool and to diffuse the material that has been considered as "Teotihuacan" kept in museums and collections. Another problem that has been treated is the ambiguity of the defining features of the alleged "Teotihuacan style". So far, identification of Teotihuacan sculptures has been based on the detection of formal traits. Therefore, we have proposed a typological classification only based on specimens from archaeological context, that takes into account not only morphological aspects but also other elements such as dimensions, canon, technique or material. This proposal has generated 21 different types, with their respective subtypes in some cases. It is intended to provide a more objective framework for classifying them in qualitative and quantitative parameters. Finally and regarding the problem of chronology, our contribution has tried to outline a periodization, through placing controlled sculptures on a time axis. Our aim is to help setting the Teotihuacan anthropomorphic sculpture in a more clear and stable time frame as a reference for future studies.

Date of Award	4 Feb 2015
Original language	Spanish
Awarding Institution	Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB)
Supervisor	Moragas Segura, Natalia (Director) & Victoria Solanilla Demestre (Director)