Chahk wielding a lightning axe,

400 BCE–600 CE

This small jadite sculpture exhibits strong ties to Olmec religious ideas, presented in a thoroughly Early Classic Maya style. The humanoid figure squats with his arms over his shoulders as he hoists an abstracted deity-head effigy on his back. This head, oriented upside down, seems to present an axe blade emerging from the mouth of the deity head. Specifically, the head is in the form of K'awiil, the Maya god of lightning. Among the Maya, the crack of thunder was conceptualized as a strike of an axe. The figure's large face is more animal than human--only the pierced ears, which once held detachable earrings, seem human. His mouth and nose, in contrast, are feline, indicating that he is transforming into a jaguar-like alter ego. Such ritual transformation is a common and important theme in Olmec art, from which the Maya artist for this piece almost certainly drew inspiration. In Late Classic Maya art, particularly from Palenque, the deity GI appears with the same scalloped eyebrows, large round swirling eyes, and single central tooth. In these Late Classic examples, however, fish fins consistently flank GI's mouth, and lack the feline associations so evident here.