Plant and animal molecules non previously identified in Maya mural paintings: First results from Acanceh

The debate regarding the Maya painting technique has been extensive since its discovery. Initially, due to their similarity to the Pompeian frescoes, these paintings were mistakenly referred to as “Maya fresco wall paintings”. However, archaeometry studies applied to the knowledge of pre-Hispanic Maya murals have frequently detected organic binders, which indicates that Maya painters mainly applied dry techniques in their development. But what organic binders did these artists use for this purpose? After many decades of optimizing physicochemical protocols to detect them, the results are only conclusive for a few plant-based binders. Previous analytical methods applied for other authors (Magaloni, 1998a, 2001; Vázquez de Ágredos Pascual, 2006; Guasch-Ferré, 2016; Guasch-Ferré et al., 2019) have ranged from stratigraphic observation using optical microscopy to more advanced techniques focusing mainly on plant-derived sugars. This article describes the results obtained by applying a methodology for the extraction of medium polarity organic components using Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC–MS) to Maya mural paintings. This methodology has identified new molecules suggesting plant and animal origin in mural paintings remains from Acanceh, dating from the Late Classis Period (ca. 600–900). These results not only provide new evidence on pictorial binders, but also invite replication of this study on other murals from the Maya area to expand our knowledge of painting technique of these works, which are of great interest to archaeology, art history, conservation and restoration sciences.