What Lies Beneath: Carving on the Underside of Aztec Sculpture

Abstract

Not all ancient art was made to be seen. Consider, for example, a sculpture of a rattlesnake, today in the British Museum. Its visible body is smooth and simple, coiled into three highly polished circuits. The mouth is daubed with red paint, open to reveal fierce fangs and an elongated forked tongue; the body terminates in thirteen rounded rattles. In between, the only decoration is the varied coloration of the gleaming stone. On the underside, the carving is far more elaborate. The rattles and then the ventral scales of the serpent are lavishly detailed as they spiral upwards. At regular intervals, dots of red pigment have been added to these hidden coils, ornamenting the rattlesnake’s belly. The three-dimensionality of this sculpture challenges display; photographs, casts, or ingeniously rigged mirrors can simultaneously make both the top and bottom of the sculpture visible for modern audiences, but it is likely that in Aztec times the serpent’s coils were invisible, only hinted at by the rounded forms at the base of the sculpture. One of over one hundred Aztec sculptures with documented carving on its underside, this coiled serpent was not an isolated caprice but part of a coherent and meaningful practice. Much ancient art was difficult to see in its original context. From the dedicatory inscription on the back of a Neo-Assyrian sculpture such as the Lamassu in Chicago’s Oriental Institute to the surface of the Column of Trajan spiraling out of sight or the gargoyles on medieval cathedrals, ancient art frequently thwarted the gaze. Many objects alternated between moments of visibility and concealment: displayed briefly, but crucially, at a funeral ceremony before being sealed within a tomb, for example; or stored in darkness between moments of exposure in procession or performance. Other images ended up hidden after complex histories of reuse and recycling. Still other examples hovered at the edge of a gradient of diminishing visibility—possible to see, perhaps, if only one’s gaze were powerful enough.