Pilli is a Nahuatl word that means noble, and it perfectly fits the beautiful, rich white surfaces of some of the ceramic wares produced at the Olmec trade outpost of Tlapacoya, located on an island in Lake Chalco in the southeast corner of the Valley of Mexico. For several decades, the small group of locally made vessels that comprise the Pilli White inventory has been known for its high-quality depictions of classic Olmec iconographic themes typically found on hard greenstone sculptures, not on ceramics.

from Snite Museum of Art, Selected Works: Snite Museum of Art (Notre Dame, 2005)