"Spearthrower Owl" (or Atlatl Cauac) is the name commonly given to a Mesoamerican ruler from the Early Classic period in Mesoamerican chronology, who is identified in Maya inscriptions and iconography. Although the polity over which Spearthrower Owl ruled is uncertain, some researchers and experts[1] have supposed that he was a ruler of Teotihuacan at the start of height of its influence across Mesoamerica in the 4th and 5th century. Inscriptions on the Marcador monument at the Petén Basin center of Tikal record that he ascended to the throne on a date equivalent to 4 May 374 (already an adult at the time), and the long-lived ruler died on 9 June 439. As no Teotihuacan records are deciphered, he is only known from references in inscriptions in the Maya cities of Tikal, Uaxactun, Yaxchilan, and Tonina.
Under his rule Teotihuacan armies subjected much of the central Maya area to client states. His general Siyaj K'ak' (formerly known by the nickname "Smoking Frog" prior to phonetic decipherment of the Classic Maya hieroglyphs) conquered the Petén. Nun Yax Ayin (one of his sons), was installed as king of Tikal in 379 and Siyaj K'ak' was installed as king of Uaxactun. Maya rulers were still mentioning their descent from Spearthrower Owl on monuments five generations later.
Spearthrower Owl is among the first major figures in a supposed "foreign intrusion" into the Maya heartland of the Peten beginning in the 4th century C.E. However, little evidence is presented of his actual physical presence in the region, leading to speculation that he was lord of Teotihuacan at the time of the intrusion. Much like the later Quetzalcoatl, subsequent Maya kings would claim a legitimizing descent from Spearthrower Owl; and through these later Maya Kings, many other centers such as Copan and Quirigua would begin to show Highland Mexican (that is, Teotihuacan) influence in their public iconography.
Controversy
It should be noted that the idea of direct, physical intrusion of Central Mexican personages into Tikal and other Classic Maya cities only began appearing in the late 1990s and is not universally supported. Linda Schele, for example, proposed that military technology and a "Venus-Tlaloc" ritual system of warfare were imported from Central Mexico, but the importation was done by emissaries, not invaders.[2]
Notes
References
- Stuart, David (1998). ""The Arrival of Strangers": Teotihuacan and Tollan in Classic Maya History" (Extract of October 1996 paper). PARI Online Publications: Newsletter # 25. Precolumbian Art Research Institute. Retrieved 2007-01-18.
{{cite web}}: templatestyles stripmarker in|author=at position 1 (help)CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) - Freidel, David A. (1995). Maya Cosmos: Three Thousand Years on the Shaman's Path (Reissue edition ed.). New York: Harper Paperbacks. ISBN 0-688-14069-6.
{{cite book}}:|edition=has extra text (help); Unknown parameter|coauthors=ignored (|author=suggested) (help); templatestyles stripmarker in|author=at position 1 (help); templatestyles stripmarker in|coauthors=at position 1 (help)CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) - Nielsen, Jesper and Christophe Helmke. "Spearthrower Owl Hill: A Toponym at Atetelco, Teotihuacan". Latin American Antiquity. 19 (4): 459–474.
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