Berlin No. 31 / Tonina

An illustration of a bucket-shaped object covered in profuse pre-Columbian(?) decoration appears in the chapter 'Establishing and Translating Maya Spaces at Tonina and Ocosingo' by Travis Nygard, Linnea Wren and Kaylee Spencer, in Memory Traces: Analyzing Sacred Space at Five Mesoamerican Sites (Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2015: pp.169-202) is captioned: "An Aztec cuauhxicalli (container to hold the hearts of victims of human sacrifice) that was likely used as a baptismal font during the colonial era. Now in the Staatliche Museen, Berlin (Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz / Art Resource, NY)." Although the chapter mentions the re-purposing of some pre-Columbian objects as liturgical vessels and furnishings in the colonial period, we could not find evidence that this was the case with the cuauhxicalli from Tonina. [NB: see also Karl Taube's The Womb of the World: The Cuauhxicalli and Other Offering Bowls of Ancient and Contemporary Mesoamerica [Taube2009-1.pdf] [accessed 30 September 2023] for details on these vessels].