Bar Pendant Engraved with Glyphs and Figure

690–725 CE
Not on view
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.
This necklace’s long, rectangular bead is one of the largest recovered from the Sacred Cenote. One side features a portrait of a Maya ruler wearing a horizontal bar pendant with dangling cylindrical and round beads, perhaps the very pendant on which he is depicted. The incised glyphic text records three dates from the late seventh century, during the reign of K’inich Kan Bahlam II, son of Pakal the Great and ruler of Palenque. Kan Bahlam may have worn this bar pendant before it was offered to the cenote.



Esta es una de las cuentas más grandes halladas en el Cenote Sagrado. Uno de sus lados retrata a un gobernante maya con un pendiente horizontal en forma de barra con cuentas cilíndricas y circulares suspendidas, quizás el pendiente mismo en el que está representado. El texto con incisiones de glifos marca tres fechas de finales del siglo VII, durante el reino de K’inich Kan Bahlam II, hijo de Pakal y soberano de Palenque. Kan Bahlam podría haber llevado puesto él mismo este pendiente de barra antes de ser eventualmente ofrecido al Cenote.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Bar Pendant Engraved with Glyphs and Figure
  • Date: 690–725 CE
  • Geography: Mexico, Chiapas; Mexico, Yucatan
  • Culture: Maya
  • Medium: Jadeite
  • Dimensions: H. 16 1/8 × W. 16 1/8 in. (41 × 41 cm)
  • Classification: Stone-Ornaments
  • Credit Line: Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, Peabody Museum Expedition 1907–1910 (10-71-20/ C6318, 10-71-20/C6331, 10-71-20/C6170, 10-71-20/C6200, 10-71-20/C6212, 10-71-20/C6216, 10-71-20/C6269, 10-71-20/C6275, 10-71-20/C6153.1, 10-71-20/C6155, 10-71-20/C6168, 10-71-20/C6335.1, 10-71-20/C6342.1); Museum Purchase, 1919 (19-37-20/C9258.1, 19-37-20/C9257.1, 19-37-20/ C6263); Gift of Charles Peabody, 1910 (10-56-20/C5969.1, 10-56-20/ C5970); Gift of C. P. Bowditch, 1910 (10-70-20/C6048.1, 10-70-20/C6064)
  • Curatorial Department: The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing