🕳️ Cave emergence imagery appears on La Venta and San Lorenzo altars despite no caves in the swampy heartland. Altars 4 and 5 at La Venta show humans emerging from an earth-monster cave-mouth. Western sites like Chalcatzingo and an Oxtotitlan mural, redated in 2017 to 1200-900 BCE, may be the true origin of this tradition.
Olmec cave emergence iconography traced to western Olmec sites
MexicoArt
Key facts
- Cave emergence iconography appears on megalithic altar stones at La Venta and San Lorenzo despite no caves existing in the Olmec lowland swamp heartland
- Altars 4 and 5 at La Venta are the best-preserved examples, showing humans emerging from a cave forming the mouth of the earth monster with eyes and fangs above
- Altar 5 depicts a swaddled baby being carried out of the cave with jaguar transformation marks linking to shamanism
- Monument 14 at San Lorenzo, dating to at least 1000 BCE, also shows cave emergence iconography with a swaddled baby
- The Tuxtla Mountains, source of Olmec basalt, are volcanic with no deep caves
- Western Olmec sites at Chalcatzingo and Teopantli quantitlan in Morelos and Guerrero states feature cave imagery and earth monster motifs
- Chalcatzingo Monument 1, carved inside a cave mouth on the mountainside, dates to 900-500 BCE
- Oxtotitlan cave mural 1, redated in 2017 to 1200-900 BCE, shows a figure on a throne-like altar with the earth monster face matching La Venta Altar 4, providing earlier cave imagery than the heartland sites
Site mentioned
Sources
Offering #4, La Venta - Smarthistorysmarthistory.org
Offering #4 from La Venta is perhaps the most dramatic assemblage of Olmec small stone figures yet discovered.
Altar 4 from La Venta - Olmec - BIG BANGbigbangmex.unam.mx
The whole sense of what is represented in the frontal part of this Altar 4 of La Venta becomes evident: out of the aquatic mass is born the human figure, to ...
Altar 4 at La Venta, Spirituality and Art - Alex in Wonderlandalexinwonderland751037025.wordpress.com
Altar 4 is one of 7 basalt altars found at La Venta in Tabasco, Mexico. It was created by the Olmec's, the oldest civilization in Mexico.
Altars (Thrones) - La Venta Park, Tabasco, Mexicohomepages.bluffton.edu
According to Nick Rider, the recurrent image of a figure, emerging from a cave, represents "Olmec priests or priest-lords emerging from the Underworld, the ...
La Venta - Wikipediaen.wikipedia.org
The figure on Altar 4 is sitting inside what appears to be a cave or the mouth of a fantastic creature, holding a rope which wraps around the base of the altar ...
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