The Tuxtla Statuette is a small rounded nephrite figurine about 6.5" high, and carved to resemble a squat, bullet-shaped human with a duck-like bill and wings. It is incised with glyphs of the Epi-Olmec or Isthmian script, two columns in the front and two in the back, one of the few extant examples of this very early Mesoamerican writing system. The front of the statuette is somewhat defaced and the glyphs there are only partially readable.
The human face carved into the stone is unremarkable except for the long bill that extends down to chest level. This bill has been identified as belonging to the boat-billed heron, a locally abundant bird along the Tabasco and southern Veracruz Gulf Coast. (2001) Epi-Olmec Hieroglyphic Writing and Texts , Austin, Texas. Raised wings or a wing-like cape envelop the body while feet have been incised into the base.
The Tuxtla Statuette is particularly notable in that its glyphs include the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar with a possible date of March 162 CE, which at its discovery in 1902 was the oldest Long Count date yet found. The glyphs are not fully readable. Initially a long count date of "8. 6. 2. 4. 17" (March 13th, 162 CE) was proposed. A product of the final century of the Epi-Olmec culture, the statuette is from the same region and period as La Mojarra Stela 1 and may refer to the same events or persons. Similarities between the Tuxtla Statuette and Cerro de las Mesas Monument 5, a boulder carved to represent a semi-nude figure with a duckbill-like buccal mask, have also been noted.
The Tuxtla Statuette was discovered in 1902 by a farmer, Pedro Mimendi, plowing his field in the west foothills of the Santiago Tuxtla in the Hacienda de Hueyapan de Mimend, Mexican state of Veracruz near Tres Zapotes.Justeson, John, et al., "The Environs of Tres Zapotes as the Find-Spot of the Tuxtla Statuette", Latin American Antiquity 31.4, pp. 747-764, 2020 It was acquired by the Smithsonian Institution shortly thereafter, reputedly smuggled into New York hidden in a shipment of tobacco leaf. At the time, several Mayanists including Sylvanus Morley, could not believe that the statuette pre-dated the Maya and suggested that the date and text were inscribed much later than 162 CE. However, later discoveries, such as La Mojarra Stela 1 and Tres Zapotes Stela C, confirmed the antiquity of the statuette.
The Tuxtla Statuette is in the collections of the Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History.
It has been proposed that there is a Tuxtla script, encoding the Tuxtlatec language, a branch of the Mixe–Zoque languages. This is based on 16 exemplars of which La Mojarra Stela 1 is the longest.Méluzin, Sylvia. "The Tuxtla Statuette: An Internal Analysis of Its Writing System in The Periphery of the Southeastern Classic Maya Realm." UCLA Latin American Studies 61 (1987): 67-113Méluzin, Sylvia. "The Tuxtla Script: Steps Toward Decipherment Based on La Mojarra Stela 1." Latin American Antiquity 3.4 (1992): 283-297 A proposed decipherment of Epi-Olmec has the statuette dating to within 3 years before the Stela and referring to the same ruler and "The rites described on the statuette were performed on the sixth anniversary of the ruler's last recorded battle before accession".Justeson, John S., and Terrence Kaufman, "A decipherment of Epi-Olmec hieroglyphic writing", Science 259.5102, pp. 1703-1711, 1993
References
Further reading Herrera, Jack, "Key to a Lost Language: How an 1,800-year-old statuette illuminates an endangered Latin American culture", Smithsonian 52.6, pp. 24–27, 2021 Kelley, David H., "A Cylinder Seal from Tlatilco", American Antiquity, vol. 31, no. 5, pp. 744–46, 1966 Washington, Henry Stephens, "The jade of the Tuxtla statuette", US Government Printing Office, 1922
External links
Photo of boat-billed heron looking quite similar to the Tuxtla Statuette Tuxtla statuette online record in artifact catalogue database of Department of Anthropology, Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Natural History