CERAMIC CENSERS

In contr.st to the simpliciU’ of Storm God essels and Old God braziers, ceramic censers are astonishing works of layered complexim in clay. They were apparendy invented at the time the apartment compounds were built, around A. D. 250, and continued to be made until the collapse of the city. Seeral were found either in the burials of important indiiduals, perhaps e en the “founders" of the apartment compounds, or, associated with central patios and their shrines. Eidently they were associated with the rituals of the apartment compound as a whole.

The clav censers were used to burn incense. Copal was placed in the bowl of the flower-pot-shaped essel which was eleated on another inverted flower-potshaped essel. It was co ered by a conical lid: through the back rose a chimne-like tube where the smoke escaped. The emphasis is not on the function of the essel but on the scene that had been constructed on top and the images and ideas it was meant to coney.

There were a ariet)‘ of censer burner t)pes at Teodhuacan; somedmes oma-ments were added direcdy to the conical lid, or more infrequend), a standing figure was placed on top. The most common are the so-called theater npes, because in them a masked “face” hidden with nose ornament and earspools seems to be looking out from a stage surrounded by a proscenium, completely co ered by stinbols and signs. A profusion of adomos around the mask seem to ie for attention. Flowers, shells, and feathered circles with mica insets are the most common; butterflies, birds’ heads, and spear points are also frequent. Rectangular panels called mantas often border the top or bottom frame. Though symmetrical in general, the right and left sides of the censer may ha e different symbols indicating the importance of direcdons. Janet Berio and 1 have argued that the central mask represents the Teotihtiacan Goddess because of the butterflv snnbolism and die iiosebar.

Xo two censers were alike, and the purpose of the mass-produced adomos may have been to make available a lot of ss mbols put together either for a petition to a deity, at the direction of a disiner, or as some other personal choice. In its lifetime a censer may hae been set up with new and different adomos seseral times, and archaeologi-( al excavations indicate that censers also were often clisa. ssembled and placed in burials and ofl'erings.