Three Maya women served as documented rulers during
the Classic period. The expressions of their names and
titles, unlike those of all of their contemporaries, share
a unique syntactic variation throughout Mayan hieroglyphic
inscriptions: their systematic lack of feminine prefixes.
In addition to this variation, the bestowing of the na
bate warrior title upon other exceptionally prominent
Maya women suggests that women of extraordinary status
in Classic-period Maya society were “masculinized,”
or granted male attributes, in order to accommodate their
sharing of status or occupancy of roles that were traditionally
masculine. Since some male rulers were similarly portrayed
with certain feminine traits, it is suggested that the
Classic Maya concept of gender was based on a complementary,
or balanced, relationship of masculine and feminine. The
projection of one gender's traits onto individuals
of another sex indicates that gender was not polar but
rather inclusive and reciprocal, such that characteristics
could be adopted and utilized by members of both sexes
in order to make them suitable for specific roles.