Linda Schele (1942-1998)

Abstract

On April 18, 1998, Linda Schele, one of the century's greatest Mayanists, died of pancreatic cancer in Austin, Texas. At her death, she was John D. Murchison Regents Professor of Art at the University of Texas. Her brilliant career in studies could never have been predicted from her childhood and upbringing. She was born in Nashville, Tennessee, to a family that she once described to me, probably with some exaggeration, as essentially redneck. Linda had always wanted to be an artist, but she had to make a living, so in 1960 she began taking commercial art courses at the University of Cincinnati, graduating in 1964. Her horizons were broadening to include literature, and after another four years in Cincinnati's graduate program, she was awarded a master's degree in that subject. In the same year, 1968, she married the architect David Schele, beginning a partnership that was to last the rest of her life. The young couple moved to Mobile, Alabama, where Linda began teaching art at the University of South Alabama, a position that she held until 1980, all the while continuing to paint. The year 1970 marked a crucial point in Linda's life trajectory, for she and David had decided to spend Christmas vacation travelling through Mexico. Their journey, accompanied by five Alabama students, took them to the ruins of Palenque, about which they knew next to nothing. hit me in the gut, she once said, and she returned the next summer to study and draw the architecture. Another milestone year for Linda was 1973. That summer she worked as Merle Greene Robertson's assistant in photographing the stucco reliefs of Palenque and the great burial chamber of its ruler K'inich Hanab Pakal. Then, in December 1973, during the epoch-making First Palenque Mesa Redonda, she not only gave her first professional paper, but also collaborated with the young Australian scholar Peter Mathews to present to the conference members, for the very first time, the virtually complete dynastic history of a great city. This meeting established the previously unknown Linda as a major figure in studies, with an impressive command not only of art and art history, but also of dirt archaeology and epigraphy. This was also a turning point for epigraphy, for it brought together the twin threads of the decipherment: the historical approach of Heinrich Berlin and Tatiana Proskouriakoff, and the phonetic (logosyllabic) approach of Yuri Knorosov. Linda was always a great believer in collaborative scholarship, and soon after participated in a series of miniconferences at Dumbarton Oaks with Floyd Lounsbury (who was a mentor throughout her scholarly career), Peter Mathews, and David Kelley, further refining the Palenque sequence and opening new epigraphic frontiers. By this time, Linda had become so committed to her life as a Mayanist that she burned her bridges, resigning her post at South Alabama and enrolling as a graduate student in Latin American Studies at the University of Texas (Austin). Her 1980 doctoral thesis, Maya Glyphs: The Verbs (published by Texas in 1982), was the first major work on the grammar of hieroglyphic writing and cleared the way for further structural studies of the script by such figures as Victoria Bricker, Katherine Josserand, and Nicholas Hopkins, among others. The very next year she was appointed as Associate Professor of Art by the University of Texas, where she began to attract a host of students who have since become leaders in the field. Linda, in fact, was a truly great teacher and a mesmerizing speaker. In 1977, while technically still on the staff of South Alabama, she initiated the first of 21 consecutive workshops on M ya hieroglyphic writing at the University of Texas. These were a resounding success and probably introduced more interested persons to the field than ma y a popul r book on the subject. She was unforgettable when she strode onto the stage, Coke bottle in hand and wearing t e most informal of clothes; Linda's humor, salty sp ech, a d infectious enthusiasm brought the ancient