[WIP 2] Late Postclassic Maya Lady

This is the final WIP before posting the finished drawing. I had refined the clothing, tattoo, and the background. This was supposed to be a simple one-character pinup with no background, but I got carried away while drawing it!

Her skirt's stepped fret pattern is based on Codex Madrid, and her top's flower pattern is based on Codex Dresden. Because most of the clothes depicted in these codices has simple cross stripes, it was difficult to find more fancy ones.

The tattoo and ornaments are also based on the aforementioned codices. Fray Diego de Landa describes the ornaments worn by coastal Maya women as follows:

"They pierce the cartilage of the nose within, to take a stone of amber for adornment. They also pierce the ears for rings, (...) they tattoo the body from the waist up, leaving the breasts for nursing reasons, the patterns being more delicate and beautiful than those of the men. (...) Their custom is to rub themselves with a red ointment (...) which they call istahté. This ointment they apply to a sort of briquet like soap, decorated with fancy designs, rubbing it on their breasts, arms and shoulders (...) They wear the hair very long, which they used to and still do arrange in very fine tresses, parted in two parts, and made use of to build up the coiffure." -From Relación de las cosas de Yucatán (1566)

The background is inspired by murals in Tulum, Mexico. Tulum is situated on 12m-high cliffs along the east coast of the Yucatán Peninsula on the Caribbean Sea. Tulum was built in the early Postclassic period, and thrived until the Spanish invasion. By the end of the 16th century, the city had been abandoned.

The mural is not drawn in the traditional Maya style seen in codices, but in a Pan-Mesoamerican style (which was called Puebla-Mixteca style by the older academics). It demonstrates that by the Postclassic period, cultural exchange between the Maya region and other parts of Mesoamerica -particularly Central Mexico- had grown significantly. The iconic blue-dominated mural appears to be very unique, as most Mesoamerican murals use warmer colors such as red and yellow. This blue mural can also be found in other coastal Yucatan sites, such as La Casa Azul at Rancho Ina.

The T-shaped window is a distinctive feature of Maya architecture (the photo above is from Palenque). Because most Mesoamerican buildings lacked windows, most light came in through the front entrance. Some Maya palaces, on the other hand, had windows in various shapes such as T-shaped, cross-shaped, and rectangular shaped ones.

The flower placed at the window is from a ziricote tree (Cordia dodecandra), which is native to southern Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. This flower is the state flower of Quintana Roo, the state in which Tulum is located.