Belize (Country) (Geographic Keyword)
2,751-2,775 (4,066 Records)
The Cosma Complex is located in the Cordillera Negra at the headwaters of the upper Nepeña River Valley, Ancash Peru. Fieldwork conducted between 2014-2016 documented repeated reconstruction episodes associated with the reuse of monumental ritual architecture originally dated to the Late Preceramic (3000-1800 BCE). By the Early Horizon infant remains and other offerings were placed into earlier architectural contexts as a final capping episode on at least one mound. As settlement patterns...
Persistence of the Anthropocene in the Maya Lowlands (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Maya Lowlands have been a focus of human development across millennia, and the impact of Maya civilization on this tropical environment has been a focus of sustained research and intense debate. It has become common to discuss environmental crises and societal collapse in the region as analogous to contemporary socio-environmental problems. However, the...
The Personification of Sacrificial Fire: An Undescribed Deity in Imperial Mexica Sculpture (2017)
A recurring theme in H.B. Nicholson’s groundbreaking analysis of Central Mexican deities is the application of a holistic approach to the analysis of Mexica stone sculpture, which includes visual and iconographic analysis, and comparison to early colonial texts. This paper will analyze a poorly understood deity that appears in late Mexica stone sculpture based on Nicholson’s innovative methodology. This fanged being appears only in stone sculpture from the imperial capital, and has previously...
Pervasive Landscapes of Inequality: Want and Abundance within a Hyperobject (2018)
As globalization matures, environmental, social, and economic factors continue to create ever-expanding landscapes of inequality. Among these drivers, human-driven environmental degradation has, for centuries, operated as a significant producer of inequality. Anthropogenic climate change today perpetuates and strengthens these multi-generational, regional-scale phenomena of landscape change. These processes, such as sediment erosion in Iceland during the past millennium, create a ‘second nature’...
Petroglyph panel in Tlaltetela, Veracruz, México (2017)
The Rio de los Pescados runs in a mountanous zone of the state of Veracruz, Mexico. The river passes through various ecological zones of varying terrain before emptying into the Gulf of Mexico. Tlaltetetla is a small town located on a plateau approximately 60 meters above the basin of the Rio de los Pescados in central Veracruz. Approximately one kilometer from Tlaltetetla, there is a large petroglyph panel on a 7.6 meter high by 24.6 meter long rock wall in the river basin. There are over 100...
Petroglyphs in the Lower Pecos Canyonlands: Preliminary Analysis of Context, Style, and Chronology (2019)
This is an abstract from the "The Art of Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Petroglyphs have been an understudied form of rock art in the Lower Pecos canyonlands of Texas, in large part due to the small number of sites known to include carved, incised, or pecked designs. The most famous petroglyph site in the region is Lewis Canyon, where over 1,000 figurative petroglyphs were pecked into the limestone bedrock. Aside from Lewis Canyon...
A Petrographic Analysis of Ceramics from the Prehistoric Maya Site of Hun Tun in Northwestern Belize (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. A petrographic analysis was conducted on sherd samples from the small prehistoric Maya site of Hun Tun, located in the hinterlands of the larger elite polity, La Milpa, in Northwestern Belize. Hun Tun contains a chultun, an archaeological feature in the ground which was filled with a clay which was lacking in inclusions. Dr. Robyn Dodge, the archaeologist who...
Petrographic Analysis of Pre-Columbian Pottery From Nevis, Eastern Caribbean (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Cross-Cultural Petrographic Studies of Ceramic Traditions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Prehistoric Amerindians in the Eastern Caribbean often used local materials in the manufacturing of ceramics, and in some cases, transported these as they migrated. Given the ubiquity of ceramics in the Caribbean, they are useful in discerning past movements, and spheres of interaction. However, studies of this nature are scarce...
Petrographic and Geochemical Analysis of Pottery from the White Marl Archaeological Site, St. Catherine Parish, Jamaica, West Indies (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Ceramic Petrographers in the Americas: Recent Research and Methodological Advances" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. White Marl is the largest, most intensively inhabited late-precolonial site documented for Jamaica, with an artifact assemblage dominated by massive quantities of ceramics. Its size and structural organization suggest that it functioned as a major sociopolitical/economic hub among the increasingly complex...
Petrography, Production, and Provenance of Ceramics from La Blanca, Guatemala (2018)
The Middle Preclassic (900-600 BCE) was a critical time of political and social centralization in the Guatemalan lowlands. Of particular interest is La Blanca, one of the first polities to rise and show signs of regional influence and potential urbanization. To reconstruct everyday life I am using excavated ceramic refuse to observe dynamics surrounding three households. This, in turn, elucidates elements of La Blanca’s political economy associated with the manufacturing and production of...
Photogrammetric Documentation of Burials at the Archaeological Site of El Palmar, Mexico (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The application of photogrammetry has been a growing interest in archaeological research. Among different archaeological contexts, burials highlight the effectiveness of photogrammetric for fieldwork. This poster aims to represent how the combination of photogrammetry, total station, and GIS document mortuary contexts in the most efficient manner, not only...
Photogrammetric Registration of Excavation and Sacbe Segments at Yaxuna (2018)
Using aerial imagery in archaeological sites has been viewed as a powerful tool for site recordation. At the Maya site of Yaxuna, located 20km south of the ancient ruins of Chichen Itza and on the longest recorded Maya sacbe, we provide a case study of aerial survey work, combining altitude varying imagery from fixed wing and multirotor aircrafts. Combining such multi-scale imagery allows us to relate excavation scale to landscape wide architecture and layout. Features such as terrain,...
Photogrammetric Techniques for Digital Documentation of Subterranean Maya Architecture (2018)
Photogrammetric techniques are increasingly being used for documenting cultural heritage sites for digital preservation and analysis, but the challenges of working in constrained spaces with difficult lighting conditions have encumbered widespread adoption in subterranean environments. The Proyecto Arquitectura Subterranea de Quintana Roo, coordinated by the Cultural Heritage Engineering Initiative (CHEI), at the University of California San Diego, in collaboration with the Instituto Nacional...
Photogrammetry All the Way Down: Multiscalar and Multiplatform Photogrammetry as Primary Spatial Registry in a Large Excavation Project (2017)
In 2016, a large excavation project was carried out at the site of Mawchu Llacta in the Colca Valley of southern Peru. A colonial reduccíon (planned town), Mawchu Llacta is a large site with plazas, chapels, a parish, and domestic compounds. These spaces all consist of complex standing architecture in varying degrees of preservation. Eleven excavation blocks were opened to better understand ritual and everyday life in the town. The extent and distribution of the excavations, however, presented...
Photogrammetry Reconstructions of the Excavation Process: An Animated Georeferenced Approach (2018)
Photogrammetry can be used to reconstruct the excavation process in a way that aids in both interpretation and education. By peeling back the layers of each excavation level, three-dimensional documentation of the excavation process reveals both the archaeological materials and their context at various stages of excavation. This interdisciplinary tool can also be georeferenced with GIS and used within 3D modeling programs to extend its visualization applications into virtual or augmented reality...
Photographing the Ancient Maya (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Photography is a ubiquitous part of our daily lives and a pervasive feature of archaeological practice. For over a century, photographs have fostered interest in archaeology and offered a means to document artifacts, sites, and excavations. Perhaps because of its prevalence, archaeological photography is often taken for granted and only occasionally examined...
A PHYTOLITH AND STARCH RECORD OF FOOD AND GRIT IN MAYAN HUMAN TOOTH TARTAR (1997)
Diet often is reconstructed based on indirect evidence. Tooth tartar traps food particles, preserving a record of food consumed. Dental calculus removed from primary and secondary burials at Kichpanha was examined to identify imbedded phytoliths, starch granules, and debris as indicators of diet. The purpose of this study is to determine whether phytoliths and starch granules are preserved and recoverable from human dental calculus, to establish appropriate methods for this recovery and to...
PHYTOLITH PROCESSING FOR SEDIMENT SAMPLES FROM COLHA, BELIZE (2017)
Processing only.
Pib Naah y la Partería: Birth Rituals and Midwifery at Río Amarillo, Copan, Honduras (2023)
This is an abstract from the "The Role of Women in Mesoamerican Ritual" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper explores evidence of women’s ritual practice at Río Amarillo, a site located 20 km from the Classic period center of Copan. While the ritual activities of royal women are largely hidden from view in Copan’s Acropolis, excavations at the site of Río Amarillo and in the groups surrounding it uncovered two contexts that were particularly...
Pictographs on Artery Lake, Bloodvein River System, Extreme Northwest Ontario, Canada: (2018)
The pictographs of the Bloodvein River, Artery Lake, Ontario offer an important view of rock art design and purpose during the late prehistoric period and perhaps continuing well into the nineteenth century. All images are finger applied and utilize iron oxide based pigment. The sites appear to be of varying function. The largest and most complex consists of seven or eight panels and may reveal a narrative of healing associated with the Fourth Degree of the Midewiwin or Ojibwe Grand Medicine...
Piecing Together the Life History of K’ahk’ Uti’ Witz’ K’awiil (2017)
Copan's longest-lived ruler dramatically expanded his realm, reach, and resources. The valley population nearly doubled, and the historical record indicates he was active in the ritual and political lives of other centers both near to home and farther afield. Ruler 12 contextualized his defensive perimeter within the sacred geography of the valley by erecting six stelae in 652 C.E. His successor enshrined that achievement and his memory in the most elaborately decorated temple outside the royal...
The Piedras Rayadas of El Tigre, Honduras: Brokering Place and Cultural Memory (2024)
This is an abstract from the "The Problem of the Monument: Widening Perspectives on Monumentality in the Archaeology of the Isthmo-Colombian Area" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Grooved boulders seem to be an archaeological feature unique to El Tigre island in Honduras. Distributed around the small island, they are known locally as piedras rayadas, and feature in local oral histories. As durable traces, their meaning is everchanging, yet...
Pigment Composition and Color Structure and Usage in the Lienzos De Chiepetlan, Guerrero, Mexico: A Non-destructive Analysis (2019)
This is an abstract from the "From Materials to Materiality: Analysis and Interpretation of Archaeological and Historical Artifacts Using Non-destructive and Micro/Nano-sampling Scientific Methods" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The community of Chiepetlan, Guerrero possesses six colonial lienzos. One manufactured during the 16th century, and four manufactured during the 18th century and used as legal documents in colonial land disputes. The...
Pigment Mining for Color Meanings: El Condor Mine from Atacama Desert (A.D. 300-1.500) (2017)
The mineralogical richness of the Atacama Desert allowed for the development of an important set of mining-extracting and metallurgic, lapidaric and pigmental productive activities, which became significant activities in the sociocultural dynamics of desert dwellers. El Cóndor mine, an important hematite source located in the middle section of the Loa River, was exploited from the Formative Period (~A.D. 300) until Inka times (~A.D. 1500). In contrast to other mining sites in Atacama, El Cóndor...
PIN7, a diachronic study of a specialized production in Eastern Soconusco (2017)
Soconusco, a rich ecological environment in far-southern Chiapas, Mexico, has been occupied throughout Mesoamerican history. The Proyecto Arqueológico Costa del Soconusco (PACS) focused on settlements in the mangrove zone of Eastern Soconusco. A LiDAR survey identified a total of 203 features thought to be associated with human activities. This paper focuses on site Pin7, which is located in the mangrove zone about 1.5 km west of the Rio Cahuacan. Magnetometer and ground-penetrating radar...