The god K’awiil

From the 16th century up until the middle of the 20th century, Western countries conquered large parts of the world. In that time, numerous ‘exotic’ objects were transported to the West: sometimes they were exchanged for something else, bought or gifted, but often they were stolen. Most objects ended up in private collections or museums, without any information about their original contexts. In order to reconstruct exactly how these ancient Egyptians’ and Mayans’ burial goods were used, archaeologists and art historians study their inscriptions and styles. They then compare those to grave goods whose context we are familiar with.