JULY/AUGUST 2020 * VOLUME 73, NUMBER 4 CONTENTS 42 An illustration of a mural at the site of Bonampak in Chiapas, Mexico, depicts a full range of Maya clothing FEATURES 24 HAGIA SOPHIA'S HIDDEN HISTORY Unprecedented fieldwork in Istanbul has revealed new evidence of the cathedral at the heart of the Byzantine Empire BY BENJAMIN LEONARD 32 IDOL OF THE PAINTED TEMPLE On Peru's central coast, an ornately carved totem was venerated across centuries of upheaval and conquest 42 FROM HEAD TO TOE IN THE ANCIENT MAYA WORLD Clothing, jewelry, and body modification spoke volumes about people's social status and the varied roles they played BY LYDIA PYNE 50 THE POWER OF SECRET SOCIETIES Clandestine groups throughout history have used shadowy rituals to control the world around them BY JULIAN SMITH BY MARLEY BROWN 36 A SILK ROAD RENAISSANCE Excavations in Tajikistan have unveiled a city of merchant princes that flourished from the fifth to the eighth century a.d. Cover: Hagia Sophia, or the Church of "Holy Wisdom" in Byzantine Constantinople (modern Istanbul) was first built by the emperor Justinian I in a.d. 537. It has also been a mosque and a museum. PHOTO: Jesse durOcHer/GeTTy ImaGes BY ERIC A. POWELL archaeology.org 1http://www.archaeology.org