Lintels above the room entrances record related dynastic and martial themes (including scenes of capture), anchoring the painted narrative within Bonampak’s political world and its ties to stronger neighbors such as Yaxchilán.
During the reign of Bonampak’s ruler Chan Muwan II, a three-room building (Structure 1, later called the Temple of the Murals) was prepared to carry an extensive painted program depicting court ceremony, warfare, and ritual.
The murals were executed as painted plaster wall scenes in all three rooms, dated to about 790 CE (Late Classic Maya). They preserve unusually detailed imagery of elite dress, music, conflict, captivity, and ceremonial performance.
In 1946, photographer/explorer Giles G. Healey was guided by Lacandón Maya (including Acasio Chan and José Pepe Chambor) to the ruins, where he encountered the mural-filled rooms of Structure 1.
Healey produced early photographic documentation of the murals soon after the 1946 discovery, creating an initial visual record that later researchers and institutions could reference as the paintings began to change after exposure.
Between 1946 and 1948, the Carnegie Institution’s early scientific expeditions commissioned Antonio Tejeda and Agustín Villagra to make the first full copies of the murals, working despite heavy carbonate/salt deposits that obscured the paint.
Carnegie-sponsored mural reproductions by Antonio F. Tejeda (dated 1948) entered major research collections, providing durable study surrogates for a fragile tropical-site painting program.
After discovery, stabilization efforts included erecting a protective roof and consolidating Structure 1. Keeping walls dry contributed to salts forming an opaque crust, making many painted details difficult to see until later conservation and imaging work.
In 1984, Mexico’s INAH restored the murals after extended deliberations, removing obscuring deposits and recovering much of the paintings’ legibility and brightness for renewed study.
Following mid-1980s cleaning/restoration, infrared photography (notably associated with National Geographic projects) helped clarify carbon-based outlines and texts, bringing out details and glyphic elements hard to distinguish in visible light.
In the 1990s, new scholarly studies included a project led by UNAM’s Institute for Aesthetic Research that culminated in publication of two volumes presenting complete photographic coverage of the murals, consolidating access for researchers.
In 1996, Mary E. Miller (Yale) began the Bonampak Documentation Project, creating a more detailed study and photographic record and supporting digital reconstructions that recovered information no longer visible to the naked eye.
Bonampak murals: creation, discovery, and study (creation c. 790 CE; discovery & research 1946–1980s)
