Th e concept of wrapping and its ontological character among the Maya

A textile with its threads, its weft , and warp, for the western ontology, is a simple utilitarian object or a body adornment. Th is study will discuss the wrapping among the Maya, starting from concepts present in ancient and contemporary Maya thought to identify the ontological character of some ceremonial textiles present in these societies. Based on an approach proposed by the ontological archaeology, I will discuss the conceptual proximity between the terms pix (to wrap, to cover) and pixan (soul, or something that is received from the other world), to think of the wrap as an element of articulation between the two ontological spaces, allowing the presence of beings and entities of the cosmos in Maya cities of the Classic and contemporary periods. By generating the materialization and performance of these beings, wraps create relational fi elds that activate these entities temporarily in ordinary space, establishing eff ective contact with the Maya cosmos. A brief analysis of these Textile Beings present during the Classic Period will be discussed as a case study, in order to consider such a conceptual proposal.


Introduction
Textiles have been present among the diff erent Mesoamerican peoples since the most ancient times, with the earliest date around the year 8000 B.C. for textile remains collected in a cave at the Guilá Naquitz site in Oaxaca, Mexico. Th e oldest evidence of the presence of unspun cotton dates back to before 5000 B.C. and it was found in another cave in Coxcatlán, in the Tehuacán Valley, south of Puebla, Mexico (Anawalt 2000: 206).
Th e antiquity and the wide presence of the Maya and Mesoamerican textiles contributes to the understanding that fabrics and yarns in these worlds are much more than elements used for body adornment, transport, and wrapping objects and food. In fact, they are present in the very conception of the creation of the cosmos and its inhabitants. Th is article aims to discuss this fundamental element of Maya cosmology and ontology, namely objects wrapped in textiles. Commonly called "sacred bundles", such objects are present at diff erent times in diff erent sources relating the Maya and Mesoamerican. But why are some types of objects wrapped? What does such a bundle mean? How do the wrapped objects participate in relations between the diff erent ontological spaces? Th ese are some of my research questions that will direct this study.
To answer these questions, I will discuss the concept of wrapping among the Maya, based on the theoretical and methodological approach called ontological archaeology in an attempt to consider a concept from the ontology of the current Maya peoples themselves. By following such a theoretical proposal my objective is to approach the study of the ontologies of the peoples of the past from an ethnographic refl ection to consider material elements of the Maya of the past.
My approach seeks to go beyond traditional approaches that are of representational character and based on the idea that things can exist and be understood by themselves, and not just a refl ection of the representation of something else (Henare et al. 2007;Alberti, Jones, Pollard 2013;Alberti 2016). Th ings can be social actors and have an important role in the social dynamics of diff erent groups in the past and in the present (Olsen 2010). By proposing to work with the concepts and philosophies of the Maya peoples to refl ect on the performance and materiality of ceremonial wrappings, I move away from traditional approaches that consider such sets of objects as being simple powerful objects, artefacts that represent the power of the ajaw, transformative objects, relics of ancestors, objects related to the maintenance of purity. All of these interpretations come from a representational perspective.
My study represents a diff erent proposal. I seek to identify the ontological aspect of Maya bundles. Th ese ideas come from the study of the lexicon of contemporary Mayan languages and the pre-Hispanic and colonial periods, to identify the conceptual proximity between the terms used for "thing wrapped" or "wrap" and "soul" or "something that is off ered or received from the other world" (Barrera 1980: 658). In addition, my interpretation attempts to integrate contemporary Maya knowledge, especially of the Tz'utujil communities of Santiago Atitlán, Guatemala, where it is possible to identify the ontological character of Maya textiles.
Th e cult of beings wrapped in cloth is still present in the brotherhoods (cofradías) in Santiago Atitlán. From previous studies carried out by Michael Mendelson (1958), Robert Carlsen (2011, and especially from the ethnographies carried out by Allen Christenson (2006), come important elements and ideas that contributed to my fi rst observations about the concept of wrapping. For example, Martín is a wrapped being present in the Brotherhood of San Juan Bautista, in Santiago Atitlán. Martín's body is considered a "sacred" bundle called Yol Jap, "navel of the rain" (Vallejo Reyna 2005: 108). Th is being is responsible for incorporating positive and generative aspects of life, and according to the Tz'utujil ontology, Martín is the "face of the earth", the fi eld where plants grow. He is the patron of maize crops, of the land, of the mountains, of the volcanoes that surround the community, of the ancestral spirits (Christenson 2006: 232). Th e bundle of textiles and animal skins gives it a physical corporeity. And he allows the presence of these intangible beings, like the beings of the cosmos in our ordinary world.
Another important set of observations comes from the work carried out by Martin Prechtel and Robert Carlsen (1988) connecting the manufacturing of a textile with the process of birth. Maya textile manufacturing is an ontological event, an act of creation of a new Being. Th is processing is carried out through an animated loom, with diff erent parts of the body, connected to the tree of life. Maize brings consistency to threads, the body of the Textile Beings. When the weaver connects to the loom at the waist, she shapes this new being from her corporality, from a bodily movement, which gives birth to the new being.
Th inking about these cases as well as the recent studies carried out by Pedro Pitarch (2020) about Maya textile metaphors as elements of contact with the other ontological space, I decided to work with the approach of the recursive ontological archaeology to think about the concept of wrapping between the Maya with the focus on their ontological aspect. Such an approach seeks to recognize the existence of multiple ontologies in the past and allows for diff erent possibilities of understanding these other ways of thinking and contributing to the recognition of the existence of other modes of existence beyond the human, such as alterities, beings, and subjectivities, that are not part of the modern ontology (Alberti 2016). With this in mind, I propose to use the concept of ontology as a possibility to reconsider other worlds and to enable the creation of new concepts of materiality (Alberti and Marshall 2009).

Wrapped objects
Weaving plays a fundamental role among the Maya and throughout Mesoamerica, where it is widely believed that the cosmos is formed by a great interlacing of threads that form a woven fabric, in a weave that unites heaven and earth in a huge seam (Klein 2015: 235). Th e presence of wrapped objects has an ancient origin in Mesoamerica, dating back to the Preclassic Period (2000 B.C. -250 A.D.) with the Olmecs. Th e practice and importance of wrapping certain types of objects is a tradition popular throughout Mesoamerica and in other parts of the world, especially among the indigenous peoples of the Abya Yala 1 , such as the Andean peoples (Brown Vega 2015) and the indigenous peoples of North America (Zedeño 2008). In Mesoamerica, according to Fray Andrés del Olmos, who participated in the intellectual conquest of the indigenous groups of this region, textile wrappings would be the main objects of worship and reverence for these peoples (Olivier 2007: 281).
In addition, another material piece of evidence confi rming that there is a large presence of images of objects wrapped in textiles between the Maya are, on one hand, stone objects such as panels and stelae, and on the other, ceramic objects, in contexts of scenes related to the other Maya ontological space, known as the Underworld, which is dominated by "fantastic" beings such as "gods", ancestors, and other non-human entities. In other images present especially in the lowland sites of the Classic Period (250 -950 A.D.), we fi nd bundles associated with scenes of rulers ascending to power as well as self-sacrifi ce, for example in the Palace Tablet of Palenque, which shows a scene with the ruler K'inich K'an Joy Chitam accompanied by his father, K'inich Janab Pakal, and his mother Ix Tz'akbu Ajaw, who hands him an open bundle with a lithic eccentric and a shield (Grecco Pacheco 2019).
Textile wraps are associated with diff erent elements and objects such as images of divinities or forces of nature, effi gies, lithic material, objects used for the performance of self-sacrifi cing ceremonies, and mortal remains of important ancestors. From the analysis of the archaeological material, it is possible to fi nd two types of wrappings: the important and powerful wrapped objects deposited in off erings, caches, or tombs, and wrapped people, such as mortuary packages. Some wrapped objects found in archaeological assemblages are feathers, fl int, jade (green stones), wood, ashes, self-sacrifi ce paraphernalia, small objects used for the extraction of blood, such as eccentrics or striped thorns, small stones, leather, animal parts, and bones.
During the colonial period, the main records of the presence of wrapped objects point to two main characteristics. Th e fi rst is body wrapping in mortuary practices. Th e second is items wrapped as relics of lineage founding chiefs (Carmack 1981)

Investigating the ontologies of the past
One of the goals of this research was to develop an approach in archaeology that investigates the ontologies of the past. Th e starting point for these refl ections has been the application of the concept of relational ontologies, and the development of local theories for archaeological studies (Holbraad and Pedersen 2017;Henare et al. 2007;Alberti 2016;Haber 2006).
Th e main idea of the concept of ontology off ered by this approach is related to other worlds, other ways of thinking, and acting diff erently than expected by the western world (Venkatesan et al. 2010). It proposes to discuss the constitution of Beings and elements of other ontologies besides the Western one. It recognizes the existence of multiple ontologies in the past and allows diff erent possibilities of understanding these other ways of thinking, helping to recognize the presence of other modes of existence beyond the human (Alberti and Marshall 2009). Th ese approaches use ethnographic concepts to reconfi gure archaeology theoretically and conceptually, thinking about materiality. Th e recursive ontological archaeology is an approach proposed by Benjamin Alberti (2016) based on the work of Martin Holbraad and Morten Axel Pedersen (2017); an approach that was infl uenced by the idea of "methodologies that think through things".
Another important point discussed by this archaeological approach is the idea of conceptualization, to access other worlds and other ways of thinking. Or, like it was proposed by Amiria Henare, Martin Holbraad and Sari Wastell, "we need to seize on a methodology that allows for concept production that makes worlds" (Henare et al. 2007: 19). Th ese concepts can be discussed through the use of ethnographic data from societies associated with the archaeological material studied, or concepts that come from the material analysis of things. Benjamin Alberti's proposal for a recursive ontological archaeology (2016) is an attempt to identify the intrinsic ontological diff erences present in things for the proposition of concepts from the materials themselves and from indigenous theories.
From such theoretical bases, an approach was developed to think about the concept of wrapping among the Maya. My main proposal is to think about wrapping based on Maya thought and philosophy. To current Maya communities and also to the ancient Maya, the cosmos is divided into two ontological spaces or states of being: the ordinary world and the other side of something, also called the Underworld, a space composed of the presence of unstable substances, essences, soul entities, ancestors, entities of the cosmos, and "gods". Ceremonial wraps are the result of a relation between these two ontological spaces (Pitarch 2020).
Based on this proposal, a method was developed for the creation of a refl ection on the concept of wrapping among the Maya, to work with the archaeological material related to this topic. Th e fi rst step was to think of the thing as a heuristic phenomenon, removing their previous Western meanings from Maya wrappings, such as the idea of "sacred objects", or "sacred bundles", or the idea that they are simply objects to carry something. Th e next step was to transform things into concepts by the use of ethnographic, ethnohistoric, linguistic, and epigraphic data from diff erent Maya peoples to "fi ll in" the blanks.
From my investigation of the lexicon of diff erent Mayan languages in different temporalities, I have identifi ed that the word pix, used for "wrapping, binding, covering", in many of the Mayan languages has the same linguistic root and is related to pixan, which is used to designate "the soul or something that is off ered or received from the other world" ( Barrera 1980: 658). In two of the dictionaries studied, the Calepino de Motul, from Yucatán from the 16th century, and the Maya Cordemex, from contemporary Yucatecan, indicate that the same word pixan can be used both for "soul that gives life to the body of man" and for "thing that is covered, and thing tangled" (Arzápalo Marín 1995: 643; Barrera 1980: 658).
Th is linguistic and conceptual proximity between the terms can also be seen in other contemporary Yucatecan dictionaries and in other Mayan languages, such as Ch' ol, Ch'uj, Itza, Jakaltek, Q'anjob'al, and also the Tsotsil and Tzeltal.
Th e proximity of these words leads me to agree with Pedro Pitarch who argues that what defi nes the soul is not its substance, but its fold condition (2020). In this way, it is possible to think of the wrap and non-tangible beings of the other space as the same element, made up of the same essence and to fi nd their possible distinction in their change of shape.
Another important contribution to my analysis of the concept of wrapping comes from epigraphy, the analysis of ancient Maya writing. Th e k' al glyph, a word found in ceramics and stone monuments, refers to ceremonies of wrapping certain dedicated objects with cloth, the k' altuun, which is associated with the concept of "wrapping something, tying" (Boot 2009: 231;248). Th ose ceremonies were performed to celebrate a k' atun ending among the ancient Maya. Another glyph related to the concept of wrapping is the joy glyph, represented graphically by a wrap and which means "to be surrounded, and bound" (Calvin 2004: 17). Linda Schele and Nikolai Grube in their studies about the pih glyph present in the city of Palenque, also added an important contribution to the refl ection of the notion of wrapping present in the Classic Period (1993).
Th e last step of my process of rethinking the idea of wrapping is when the thing becomes a concept, from the ethnographic, linguistic, ethnohistorical data, and the philosophical elements of the theories of relationality, so we can have the concept of pix to refer to Maya textile wrapping.
Th e main role of the pix is to retain elements of the other ontological space in the ordinary world. Th ey surround virtual objects that have their activation in the other world, the presence of this thing in a temporary way, with a virtual content, which belongs to the other side, updated through a wrap; a bundle that materializes those movements of the cosmos; instable elements in the ordinary world, whose conceptual feature can be thought of as similar to its physical feature; the textile's fragility.
Manifestations of the pix in objects present among the Maya of the Classic Period, appear in certain important moments that are related to the Underworld. It seems to be managed by the entities of the cosmos and also by the ancestors, as elements of contact between these two ontological spaces.
Th e fi rst practice emphasized by this research is the performance of the wrappings through which diff erent types of beings gain life. Th e wrap and the intangible beings of the other space become the same element, constituted of the same essence and fi nding their possible distinction in their change of form. By wrapping certain types of objects, or beings, these textiles become the being or the wrapped object itself. Th e two elements become one. Th e conceptual characteristics of the pix also merge with its own materiality.
Th e second manifestation related to pix is its role in creating relational fi elds between elements of diff erent ontologies, within a meshwork (Ingold 2015). Fields that unite diff erent classes of objects such as stones, powerful objects for the extraction of blood in sacrifi ces, bones such as parts of ancestors, parts of gods, and non-tangible beings, among others, that are wrapped under the same fi eld of relations. When using the concepts of relational fi eld and relational ontologies in archaeology, a detailed analysis of the archaeological assemblage in which the analyzed materials are located is essential. To identify the elements of this meshwork (Ingold 2015) or assemblage (Deleuze and Guattari 1999;Laguens 2013;Fowler 2013;Edgeworth 2012), the study of objects and their relations with other kinds of objects is an essential element. Th is includes architectural structures, people, remains of fauna and fl ora, the groupings of vibrating materials, fl ows, forces and agents of all kinds, both human and non-human, material and cognitive (Edgeworth 2012: 86).
According to Tim Ingold, the social is composed of dynamic and continuous lines of life that fl ow through and in relation to other processes (Ingold 2015: 115). Th us, members of some groups, whether they are human or non-human, are part of a great meshwork of relations established where life and action emerge from the interaction of forces and contacts conducted along the lines of this mesh (Ingold 2015: 148). Th e identities and properties of material entities are constituted from and defi ned by physical, biological, and social relations. Th ey are contextual elements that are generated continuously, and which remove the dualism between subject-object, a characteristic of Western thought, as well as the fi xed border between the organism and its environment.
Th is presupposes that humans, non-human beings, objects, landscapes, and natural phenomena can interact with each other in a meshwork of relations, to form an exchange and expanded sociability. Th ey are elements endowed with an agentive potential, that are created and that gain an action from relations.
Th e diff erent classes of beings are formed from their existence in the world, with the creation of diff erent types of relations. In a relational ontology, relations are bidirectional with things in the world and with materiality, being both constituted jointly. Th is continuity between humans and objects, animals, and intangible beings emphasizes a relational perspective of interdependence with the cosmos (Harrison-Buck 2020: 425).
Th ereby, the wrap creates diff erent relational fi elds with beings and elements belonging to diff erent ontologies that act and interrelate under the same space defi ned by these entangled agencies. Th at would be something closer to the way the ancient Maya thought of their world, as an intertwining of diff erent ontological elements in constant relations with each other; a world where the division between subject-object was not present in its relations with the material world, where certain objects were treated as people with a soul and with agentive powers (Vogt 1993).
For the Maya, the relations that exist between subject and object, human and non-human, can produce a variety of identities and commitments. According to Eleanor Harrison-Buck, such relations would be "conversational", incorporating a relational ontology or a way of being in the world where there is no separation between the subject (as an informed observer) and the object (as an unknown inert material) (Harrison-Buck 2020: 424).
In this way, I think that in the case of the pix, especially those that are entities and beings of another nature, they are activated and gain life from their presence in the mesh of fi elds of relations between elements of diff erent ontologies, where action and sociability emerge through the interaction of contacts and movements present in the entanglement of the lines of this meshwork. In other words, the actions and the relations established throughout this entanglement are due to contextual and positional issues where, from a certain position, it is possible to activate certain entities and beings.

Th e pix materiality
Just as the beings from the other space are unstable and fragile when they are in our ordinary world, the textiles that make up these wraps are also unstable. Th ey are made of perishable materials, their materiality also indicates an instability, a temporary and limited existence. Th ey are materials with low durability.
Its conceptual characteristic indicates its unstable, fragile and temporary condition when it is in contact with the ordinary world and when it merges with the materiality of the fabrics that make up these bundles, that is, its instability and its ephemeral condition of duration. Such refl ections were produced from an exercise proposed by Martin Holbraad and Axel Morten Pedersen (2017) who propose that things can contribute to their own analysis based on studies and refl ections of their properties, uniting material and conceptual issues in each object analyzed and giving these attributes a leading role in the archaeological analysis. In such analyses, beyond discursive questions, the importance of aff ective character is emphasized from the relations established between people and things through experimentation with what is heard, seen, tasted, touched, and experienced.
Th inking about the things from their own matter (Henare et al 2007), and the matter as something relational, it is possible to identify a constant becoming, a transformation that is part of their own constitution. In other words, a matter that is formed through and from its practical activity, an active component of the world (Ingold 2015: 61). In addition, such an active characteristic of the matter is also related to the way the ancient Maya thought of it, as something that stores energy, "spirits" and forces of nature, with a latent potential (Houston 2014: 5).
Th e constituent material of textile wrappings, thought of as constructed stories, enables us to identify that the weaves of the fabric become entangled and unraveled through time. Th ey fi nd a parallel in the temporal presence of the pix in our ontological space. A presence marked by the durability of the material that constitutes it, the vegetal threads that fl ow and are in constant change throughout its entire existence. Th e spun weft s of textiles are formed like a mesh, like a spider web with its interlaced threads that constitute a living space for spiders and at the same time it is part of their own being.
Th e movements of entangling and untangling, the wrapping and the "unwrapping" erase the reckoning of time, inside these wrappings time is annulled, past, present, and future are mixed in disordered positions. Th e beings retained by these meshes come from distant temporal spaces, from distant pasts, such as the ancestors, or the entities from the creation of the Maya cosmos. By wrapping any kind of being, its space-time presence is canceled. Th e being remains wrapped, covered, hidden, and in a certain way forgotten by time.
Th e pix have their relations beyond themselves because, they are in a constant process of becoming, a visible characteristic in their meanings and in their changes of matter. In the case of the fabric, these changes are made by the perishable nature of the fi bers that compose it, because they have vegetable elements with ephemeral durability as their main material. Th is matter is constantly evolving, mainly due to the action of two types of agents, non-human beings that are present in plant fi bers, such as bacteria, fungi, and other organisms, and also due to the action of climatic agents. Th ese sets of elements act decisively for the process of becoming of the vegetable matter that makes up the textiles.
Another important element is how the ceremonial wrappings are manufactured. Th e construction of textiles with four sides obeys the spatial arrangement of the Maya cosmos. It is a model of this cosmos, a reduced space, which nonetheless obeys the same dynamics of the cosmic space among the Maya. Such a practice is made possible by the technology called the backstrap loom, that allows the creation of textiles with four fi nished sides, something that contributes to the very model of this cosmos.
Finally, it is important to highlight another type of process related to textiles among the ancient Maya: the intentional changes of matter of certain elements. Such transformations are characterized, for example, by animal skins that go from their original context to being used in stone objects. Textiles with their weft s and warp that go from being plant tissue to becoming a vessel where it is possible to perceive all the complexity of the textile elements present on another material medium.
Th ese exchanges of materials and the condition of the wrapping are useful tools to think about refl ections on their materiality in changes oriented by ontological premises and also political practices that needed the lasting presence of such elements of contact with the beings that inhabited the other spaces. Protective entities of the Maya cities and creators of the cosmos, in many cases, needed to be present for a long time in order to participate actively in the conduct of the political practices of Maya rulers.

Th e pix of the Beings of maize
Aft er discussing the concept of pix, we can think about diff erent types of its manifestations during the Classic Period. Th e fi rst is its presence in the ajaw's power-taking acts, as part of the personhood of important ancestors. Part of their partible, divisible person (Strathern 2006), or their expanded personhood (Gell 1998), present in the ordinary world through the use of the bundle Th e second is the time involved in the k' atun ending -the wrapping of temporary animated beings during the k' altuun ceremonies. Th e third is wrapping rulers aft er their death, in preparation for their journey to the Underworld and their rebirth as the Maize God -the wrap as an element of renewal and conservation of the soul entities that made up the body of the Maya rulers. Th e last case involves the entities of the Maya cosmos and the wrapped off erings, which determined moments of contact with the other Maya ontological space -a materialization of the cosmos entities.
Th e case study that I will discuss is related to its last type of manifestation of the pix, present in the Barton Creek Cave, Belize. Th is cave is a site with ritual occupation and activity between the Early Classic Period (250-550 A.D.) and the Late Classic (550-830 A.D.). It is important to emphasize the role of the caves in Maya ontology as places connected with the Underworld, an entry point to this world of ancestors, the dead, the creators of the cosmos, and other types of beings (Stone 1995).
In their study in Barton Creek, Christopher Morehart et al. (2004) recovered a textile fragment with a great diversity of plants such as maize fragments, with intact grains, pumpkin seeds, beans, peppers, and copal. All these elements were wrapped in a textile fragment 5 cm long and 3 cm wide. Th e cloth presents technology similar to other textile remains found in the Maya lowlands in ceremonial contexts, such as tombs, caches, caves, and cenotes, that is textiles manufactured in Z and S-folded cotton, with at least three types of plain weave, brocade (plain weave with complementary weft decoration), twill, double weave, interlocking weft , and tapestry (Looper 2006: 85).
Th e letters Z and S refer to the twisting direction of the bent yarns depending on whether the spiral adjusts to the central inclination. Regarding diameter measurements, the number of twists per centimeter and twist angle for warp yarns, and weft elements are useful methods for analyzing tension elements, and diff erences in fabric textures (Morehart et al. 2004: 52).
Among the main materials used in textile production of the pre-Hispanic Maya are cotton, henequen, ceiba, yucca, palm, nettle, and diff erent types of cactuses. Th e main technique used is that of the backstrap loom, a very portable device, where one end is tied to a tree or pole, while the other end is tied to the waist of the weaver, who maintains a tension in the warp by using their bodyweight.
An analysis with scanning electron microscopy, conducted by Morehart's team, revealed long and narrow single-celled fi bers and characteristics of cotton of the Gossypium hirsutum type, a species that constitutes the majority of textile production in ancient Mesoamerica (Berdan 1987: 236). Among the Maya, the earliest record of cotton cultivation date back to the Pre-Classic period (2000 B.C. to A.D. 250), intensifying in the lowlands during the Late Classic Period with the production and exchange of tribute fabrics (Morehart et al. 2004: 53).
It is not possible to identify the warp and weft elements of the tissue fragment, but according to Morehart et al. (2004), the fabric would be a 2/2 twill. Th e cotton fi bers of both items A and B were Z-spun. Th e Z-spun yarns were then Sdoubled to create composite assemblies. A elements are looser with compound yarns of about 0.56 mm, 12 turns/cm, and a twist angle of 20°. Th e B elements have a wider diameter with 1.04 mm composite yarns and have a tighter layer with 12 turns/cm and a more pronounced 55° twist angle.
In addition to the textile fragment, fi ve sets of folded fi bers were recovered from another sampling site. Th ese sets are likely to be remnants of the same fabric because their technical attributes are identical. Th e cotton fi bers of both items A and B were Z-spun.
Th e material, technical, and contextual information regarding the objects, and the textile fragment from the Barton Creek cave suggest that it was a piece of a ceremonial textile, a pix. Such an element was used to establish contact with the entities of Maize present in the Maya cosmos, possibly as an off ering. By wrapping maize seeds, the pix permits the presence and performance of the Beings of Maize in the ordinary world; it recreates a fundamental element of Maya creation: maize.
By establishing contact with these primordial moments of the cosmos and the creation of the world and the Maya beings, the pix managed to materialize these Beings of Maize, similarly to the case of bundles that are now materializing Martín, the patron of Maize crops, of the earth, currently housed in the brotherhood of San Juan, in Santiago Atitlán. Th is being of the Maya cosmos associated with maize is materialized through a ceremonial textile wrapping.
Th is points to an ontological character of these textile wrappings, by allowing such beings and elements of the Maya cosmos to materialize and to be present in the ordinary world through this tool. A relational instrument capable of creating points of contact with the elements of the other ontological space.

Conclusions
Th is study proposed the application of the recursive ontological archaeology to a conceptualization of Maya wrapping from ethnographic, ethnohistoric, linguistic, and epigraphic data to discuss the concept of pix as an element that materializes contacts between the diff erent ontological spaces present in the Maya world.
Such elements can be considered parts of the other ontological space in the ordinary space with the function of materializing "supernatural" entities and beings, with the ability to form meshes of ontological relations within them by bringing together diff erent classes of beings under the same space. In their performances it is possible to perceive a junction of these physical and ontological characteristics that make up the materiality of the pix in the Maya area, which contributes to its multifaceted state built from these multiple categories.
Such characteristics contribute to the ontological role of these ceremonial textiles among the peoples of diff erent temporalities, with their capacities to form beings and shape intangible existences, as well as to retain parts of beings and diff erent types of entities such as ancestors and patron entities of the cities of the Classic Period. Such characteristics are also depicted in wraps in stone monuments in cities such as Palenque. Th e Palace Tablet shows the ruler K'inich K' an Joy Chitam accompanied by his father, K'inich Janab Pakal, and his mother Ix Tz' akbu Ajaw, who gives him a pix with part of the essence of those ancestors for the exercise of their political power.
From the same city, there are other examples of bundles that give shape and action to the patron beings, entities G1, G2, G3, such as those that are described in the texts of the Temple of the Inscriptions. Such practices were present especially during the ceremonies of the k' atun endings, the k' altuunes, moments of the realization of ritual off erings for the entities of the Triad, with the decoration of effi gies with ornaments, and also the ritual practice of textile wrappings (Stuart and Stuart 2008: 167).
Th e narrative present in this temple describes the k' altuun ceremonies and the headbands of rulers wrapped with the cosmos entities. Th e text says that on 9.11.0.0.0 12 Ajaw 8 Keh (October 12, 652 A.D.), during the k' altuun ceremony per-formed by K'inich Janah'b Pakal, "it became ajaw", the main entity of the k' atun, Ich Chan Uh/Ixim, for B' olon Chan, an emblematic nomination of the ruling dynasty of Palenque (De la Garza, Bernal Romero;Cuevas García 2012: 92 In this text, it is possible to identify the presence of the wrappings of the earth and the sky, off erings, tributes with elements of the cosmos, carried by the creation entities of the Maya world. Th e second part of the text also identifi es the presence of the pix with the attributes of "gods" or entities of the cosmos; in this case, the pix of Unen-K' awiil and the pix of K'in Ajaw. In the text, objects related to the Patron "gods" of Palenque and the wrappings dedicated to them are identifi ed, such as: tup (earmuff s), sak hunal (white paper), uh (necklace), and k' ohaw (helmet) (Carrasco 2005: 72). In addition, in other passages of the temple texts, the wrapping of the altars belonging to the Triad of Palenque is described.
Th is practice of wrapping the off erings, the censers, and the patron "gods" of this city, at each k' atun ending, seems to be something common and recurrent at diff erent times in Palenque and allowed these entities to participate and be present at certain important events in the city.
In the same way, it is possible to identify the presence of these beings from the cosmos wrapped in textiles in the off ering of the Beings of Maize found in the Barton Creek cave in Belize. From the use of the theoretical refl ections on the concept of pix, it is possible to think of the presence and the materialization of these entities in the ordinary world of Barton Creek from the performance of a ceremonial wrapped textile that gave these beings an agency and performance.
From the discussions presented, my intention has not been to use an ethnographic concept as a simple analogy for archaeological interpretation, but to work with concepts that are not of Western origin to explain non-Western things and ontologies. I attempted to use an ethnographic category as a heuristic resource to understand the archaeological material and thus study the otherness present in this material (Haber 2006).
With these refl ections about the ontological character of the ceremonial textile wrappings, it is possible to think "together with the Maya peoples", and propose a change in the ideas about these elements (Atalay 2020;Haraway 1995). Th e textile object becomes a textile subject that acts in diff erent social spheres where it is involved, forming a part of the dynamics between people, diff erent beings, the landscape, and the diff erent ontological spaces.
Since pre-Hispanic times, Maya weaving has been considered beyond its practical function of covering something, dressing a person, or carrying certain types of products. It is related to an ontological and fundamental importance in the life of the members of Maya societies and associated with a lunar entity in charge of births and textiles. Th is female being was named Ix Chel during the colonial period (Milbrath 1999: 141). Th is entity is also responsible for the creation of beings among the Maya from Yucatan, according to Friar Diego de Landa (1982).
Th e association between birth and textile is also observed among contemporary Maya groups, such as the Lacandon (Boremanse 1999), the Chamulas, located in Chiapas, Mexico (Rosenbaum 1999), and also among the Tz'utujil, with the idea that the birth process and textile manufacturing merge with each other (Prechtel and Carlsen 1988).
Th e refl ections presented in this article align with the knowledge, philosophies, and concepts of contemporary Maya peoples. First, as a practice of an epistemic and ontological respect, a recognition of alterity, acknowledging the existence of such types of thoughts is a political act. Th e proposal raised here to bring and work with original concepts of the Maya peoples themselves to generate refl ections and interpretations in the archaeological research relates to refl ections of the construction of a pan-Maya concept of a Maya worldview. Th ese ideas were thought of and proposed by Maya intellectuals and activists in Guatemala as tools in the search for their community, their legal, political, cultural claims, and as an agglutination of the processes of strengthening and claiming Maya culture, years aft er the Guatemalan Civil War (Cano Contreras, Page Pliego and Estrada Lugo 2018).
Th e idea of keeping an open mind to this wisdom and knowledge forgotten by the Western world, with its deep scientifi c base, is something fundamental to the exercise of an identity, of an expression of the ontologies of the Maya, something constantly denied by Western modernity and consequently by colonialism. Th e proposal of a dialogue of this knowledge and experiences with Western structures of our modern societies becomes an important tool in the constant fi ght for their rights, undertaken by indigenous peoples globally.
I believe that only through research that develops concepts beyond Western thought is the study of ontologies of the past and the contemporary possible. I think that such approaches can constitute an important tool for democratizing knowledge, with openness to the presence of other ontologies and other ways of thinking within the academic knowledge.