Distinctions between the left and
right in spatial orientation and the body are commonplace in contemporary Maya
cultures (see Earle 1986:163; Gossen 1974; Hunt 1977:95-115; Palka 2000). There
is frequently a hierarchy (or ranked complementarity) in these paired
distinctions with a pre- eminence of the right for the Maya, which now can be
linked to the distant past. In modern and colonial Mayan language dictionaries,
for instance, the word for "right signifies right hand, great, large,
principal and true, while "left" means lame, subordinate,
left-handed, and untrue. There may have been similar meanings of left and right
and the body in the Classic period and long before Colonial influences.
. . .
The primacy of the right and the
use of the right hand by superordinate persons and central figures in the
images appear to be of critical importance in Classic Maya iconography.
Moreover, the heightened significance of the right side of the body and right-
handedness apparently reflects cultural meanings, symbolism, and values in
ancient Maya society or at least in elite culture. In fact, the percentage of
right- oriented figures in ancient Maya art is so high that forgeries
(especially left-handed figures in contemporary tourist art), accidentally
reversed images in publications (see Kerr 2000:957, File no. K6294, for
reversed figures and text; Miller 1999:165, No. 143, for incorrect left-handed
scribe), pieces from particular artists or workshops (see Reents-Budet
1994:294-309 for distinctive left-oriented Holmul ceramics), together with
low-quality objects (no hieroglyphs and more crudely executed designs) presumably
made by nonelites (see Kerr 2000:922, File no. KS 103), can be easily spotted
since the standards of Maya right orientation, hand use, and preeminence of the
right are violated. In the predictable left/right structure in the Classic
period images, the Maya elite presented the expected order of their world and
proper patterns of human behavior. (Joel W. Palka, “Left/Right Symbolism and
the Body in Ancient Maya Iconography and Culture,” Latin American Antiquity 13,
no. 4 [December 2002]: 420, 429-30)