Ancient Americans had own Jayhawk-type figures

Tue, 01/25/2022

Rick Hellman

These four birdlike pendants, carved from stone, were uncovered in Costa Rica. Credit: John Tsantes, courtesy of Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection.

LAWRENCE — Anyone affiliated with the University of Kansas who leafs through the richly illustrated new catalog of pre-Columbian art from Central and South America co-edited and co-written by John Hoopes, KU professor of anthropology, might notice that several of the objects resemble the Jayhawk, the university’s mythical bird mascot.

John Hoopes, KU professor of anthropology “Many of them do,” Hoopes said. “It's something I talk about in my class. I tell my students that we have our own power animal that we invoke. It happens to be mythological, but it has particular qualities to it. The parallels are sort of never-ending. ... It's worn and used by elites but also by the common population.

“I use the Jayhawk as an example of how these ancient peoples probably viewed the animals that they were reproducing in jade and in gold. ... It’s about wearing a bird to indicate your status and your affiliation and your beliefs, and to gain inspiration from it. There you go.”

Some of the birdlike archaeological finds in the catalog were used as decorative wear, such as jewelry, and others as funerary objects, buried with the dead.

Another parallel Hoopes sees between the Jayhawk and many of the objects in the catalog is the conjoining of human and animal forms.

“One of the themes that we see in this artwork is representations of beings that are part human and part animal,” Hoopes said, “and the Jayhawk is also an example of an anthropomorphized bird. You know, birds don't really wear shoes. There's no question that the Jayhawk has human qualities. It's not just a bird. So the idea of something that’s part human and part bird actually does invoke things very similar to what these ancient people were probably believing.

“And we also use it as a very actively in metaphors. I can't tell you how many commencement exercises I've been to when the chancellor gets up and says, ‘You are all Jayhawks, think of yourself as a Jayhawk. You will be a Jayhawk henceforth.’ And so the metaphor of being an aggressive, anthropomorphic bird, that's really not so different for us from the way it was for these ancient people.”

Images: These four birdlike pendants, carved from stone, were uncovered in Costa Rica. Credit: John Tsantes, courtesy of Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection.