Deep in the Olmec heartland of central Mexico reside 17 stones that seem a bit out of place. These stones – boulders rather – are portraits from a bygone era, moved hundreds of miles from their place of origin in the Tuxtla Mountains. Their ‘new’ home is that of the Central American jungle, a land of marshy terrain and exotic wildlife. It is here in this tropical rainforest that they were sculpted some two thousand years ago into the faces of kings. Kings whose names have long been lost to history.
What are the Olmec Colossal Heads?
The Olmec Colossal Heads. Has kind of a weird ring to it right? You would think they’d be called something cool like ‘The Olmec Headstones’ or maybe even ‘The Olmec Gigaheads’. But I guess whoever was in charge of naming things that day was feeling pretty bland, so they went with ‘The Olmec Colossal Heads.’ Kind of lame if you ask me. Regardless of what you choose to call them, it’s pretty easy to initially understand what they are… giant stone sculptures… shaped like human heads.
The way the Olmec created these beautiful works of art is really a mystery that archeologists have slowly been able to piece together over the years. Each stone head weighs no less than six tons and was carved from a large piece of basalt mined roughly one hundred miles away. Using log rollers and some large canoes, the Olmec were able to transport these stones to their cities. Here they were sculpted using primitive hand tools into portraits of their kings. Let me say that again. The Olmec, without knowledge of the wheel, hauled stones weighing AT LEAST EIGHT THOUSAND POUNDS, ONE HUNDRED MILES, ALL TO MAKE SCULPTURES FOR PEOPLE WHOSE NAMES WE DON’T EVEN KNOW. These must’ve been some damn good leaders.
Now why just the heads? Why didn’t they make full-body sculptures? The answer to this actually resides in the Olmec religious belief system. As was common with many pre-Columbian Mesoamerican civilizations, the Olmec believed a person’s soul resided in the head. This may have been their reasoning for only sculpting heads, so their souls could be guided in the afterlife. Each head also features a unique headdress carved into the forehead. At the time, this was likely made from animal hide and worn during battle or the Mesoamerican ballgame.
Where are they located?
In total, there are seventeen Olmec Colossal Heads that have been located throughout Mesoamerica to date:
- Ten at San Lorenzo: These are believed to be the oldest as San Lorenzo is the oldest Olmec city-state (1200 BCE – 900 BCE). They are also of the highest quality and possibly represent an ancient Olmec dynasty.
- Four at La Venta: These heads were located in close proximity to the Great Pyramid of La Venta.
- Two at Tres Zapotes: These stone heads were believed to have been carved during a later period as they seem to show a later form of Olmec sculpting.
- One at La Cobata: This stone was discovered in the Tuxtla Mountains and is believed to be an unfinished Colossal Head.
- One at Takalik Abaj: This Colossal Head is the only one to be discovered outside of the Olmec heartland in modern-day Guatemala. It is believed this head was carved into a throne later in its life.
The Olmec Heads Today
Several of the Olmec Colossal Heads endured vandalism throughout the course of their lives. In San Lorenzo, many of them were buried, perhaps to legitimize the rule of a new dynasty in the city-state. More recently, there was an incident in 2009 involving grape juice, but I won’t get into that as I would never speak against ‘Big Juice’.
Anyway, after doing all this research on the Olmecs, it really got me thinking about how many other wondrous civilizations we have lost to the jungle. Just to be clear, I am not supporting deforestation here, but wouldn’t it be cool to peel back the rainforests to see what kind of people thrived there? I mean we didn’t really know about the Olmecs until the 1860s. If the Olmec were able to build giant stone heads in the middle of the jungle and stay hidden for that long, can you imagine what we might find in the Amazon?
To wrap things up, here are some better names than Olmec Colossal Heads:
- The Olmec Gigaheads
- The Stoneheads
- The Olmec Headstones
- The Big-Brained Basalt Boys
- The Obscenely Large Olmec Heads
- The Heads of Humanity
- The San Lorenzo Skulls
- The Basalt Beans
- The Six-Ton Olmec Coconuts
- The Compensating Coconuts
- The Colossal Coconuts (you can really make a lot of these using coconuts)
- The Colossal Cabesas
- The Next Level Noggins
- The Big Ass Olmec Heads