Alberto Ruz Lhuillier

Lhuillier's grave in Palenque

Alberto Ruz Lhuillier (born January 27, 1906 in Paris , † August 25, 1979 in Montreal ) was a Mexican archaeologist. He became internationally known around 1950 through the discovery of the previously untouched burial chamber of the Mayan ruler K'inich Janaab Pakal I in the ruined city of Palenque .

Life

Born the son of a Cuban émigré and a French woman, he first studied at the École Commerciale in Paris and later agricultural sciences at the University of Havana . Arrested several times for political reasons and in the meantime deported to France, he emigrated to Mexico in 1935. In 1949 he was appointed director of the archaeological sites in the south-east of the country by the national monument protection authority Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH). In 1958 he resigned - again for political reasons - from this post. Later in his career, he taught archeology at the UNAM National University in Mexico City . There he founded u. a. the Seminario de Culturas Mayas (from 1970 Centro de Cultura Maya ). As the editor of a major journal, he had a lasting influence on Mexican archeology. In 1977 he became director of the Mexican National Museum of Anthropology .

literature

• Elaine Day Schele: Profile of Alberto Ruz Lhuillier as a young Man . Bulletin of the History of Archeology Vol. 22, No. 2, 2012, 4-11. doi : 10.5334 / bha.22202
• Elaine Day Schele: The Untold Story of Alberto Ruz and his Archaeological Excavations at Palenque, México: A Micro- and Macrohistorical Approach. Dissertation, The University of Texas, Austin 2012 ( PDF; 21.4 MB ).