Cayo (State / Territory) (Geographic Keyword)
701-725 (892 Records)
This is an abstract from the "The Preclassic Landscape in the Mopan Valley, Belize" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Evidence from the Mopan River valley continues to clarify the nature and extent of Preclassic occupation of the region. The hinterland community of San Lorenzo sits directly across the river from both Xunantunich and Actuncan, sites with substantial Preclassic construction and ritual use. Using data gathered from this ancient...
Ritual and Political Landscapes of the Preclassic Maya: A View from the Cival Region (2018)
The link between Lowland Maya ritual and power relations during the Preclassic period has been so far approached primarily through iconographic, burial and artifact data at the local scale. Very little evidence exists linking notions of political authority, ritual practices and landscapes at the regional level. Recent survey and excavation data from the Cival region of Northeastern Peten, reveals a vast and complex settlement pattern. The Preclassic Maya city of Cival was surrounded by a network...
Ritual Cave Utilization Near Tenosique in Tabasco, Mexico (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Preclassic Maya Social Transformations along the Usumacinta: Views from Ceibal and Aguada Fénix" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. As part of the Middle Usumacinta Archaeological Project, I conducted reconnaissance in three caves with archaeological remains, named Santo Tomás, San Marcos, and Corregidora. The three caves are located in the Tenosique municipality in Tabasco, Mexico near the border with Guatemala. A...
Ritual Deposits within the Eastern Pyramidal Structure at Group D, Xunantuntich – Belize (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Between the 2012-2016 field seasons, the Mopan Valley Preclassic Project conducted investigations of an eastern pyramidal structure (Str D-6) at Group D, Xunantunich. Group D is a sacbe terminus architectural group which is connected to Xunantunich’s main plaza. The location of the sacbe suggests that Group D was part of an important ritual circuit. Over 5...
The Ritual Requirements for Opening a Maya Cave (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Studies in Mesoamerican Subterranean Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In 1966 a cave near Chichen Itza was reported to the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH) by Maya living in the area. The cave was investigated by Victor Segovia Pinto, after which the sinkhole entrance was filled with rocks. When archaeologists from the Gran Acuífero Maya opened the cave 52 years later, workers on the...
Ritual Use of the Rejolladas of Tahcabo, Yucatán (2018)
In Tahcabo, Yucatán, 5% of the town’s municipal land is contained within rejolladas. Rejolladas, like cenotes, are sinkholes formed in the karstic bedrock of Yucatán, although they do not reach to the level of the water table. They make for ideal gardens when located within settlements, as their low elevation allows for the collection of deep and moisture-rich soil that provides an advantage for the cultivation of almost any plant. At the nearby site of Kulubá it has also been shown that...
Rituals of Maya Royal Women in Classic Period Inscriptions (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. Classic Maya period inscriptions provide us with extensive documentation of the rituals and ceremonies that Maya elites performed as part of their royal duties. Throughout this paper we will discuss those that were overseen by women belonging to the royal houses of the polities of the Maya lowlands, which have been recorded through the images and...
The Role of Burials in Place Making at Chan Chich, a Royal Court in Northwestern Belize (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Ancient Maya Landscapes in Northwestern Belize, Part II" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Research on ancient Maya cities is generally focused on large paramount sites that had written records of the rulers’ activities. However, these large cities are the exception, rather than the norm, since the majority of the urban sites consist of smaller settlements. Research at the archaeological site of Chan Chich recovered...
The Role of Diet Diversity and Breadth in the Maya “Collapse” (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Stability and Resilience in Zooarchaeology" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Debate has surrounded the Terminal Classic (AD 750–900/1000) Maya “collapse,” a period when the Classic period political structure deteriorated and parts of the southern lowlands were depopulated. While these changes were the result of various developments including warfare, social unrest, environmental degradation, and climate change, one...
The Role of Rockshelters among the Lowland Maya (2018)
Because of Maya religion’s heavy focus on the sacred Earth, subterranean spaces tend to be seen as sacred landmarks. Caves in particular have been shown to be the most promising context for the archaeological study of Maya religion (Brady and Prufer 2005). Rockshelters, however, have received less attention and appear to have identities and meanings that are negotiable across the lowlands. Recent rockshelter excavations have uncovered skeletal remains (Bonor 1995; Glassman et al. 2005; Saul et...
A Royal Portrait at Chichen Itza? Central Mexican Emblems of Authority in the Northern Maya Region (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The city of Chichen Itza has defied attempts to identify individuals who ruled the city and its basic political organization. Scholars once argued for a shared governance system called multepal, basing this assertion on glyphic references to a series of people who apparently jointly held power. Subsequent scholarship challenged this assertion, as revised...
A Rural Travel Stopover at the Late Postclassic Maya Site of Mensabak, Chiapas, Mexico: Overland Trade, Cross-Cultural Interaction, and Social Cohesion in the Chiapas Frontier (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Dynamic Frontiers in the Archaeology of Chiapas" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. A small rural stopover site in the frontier along overland Late Postclassic (ca. 1300–1500 CE) Maya and Aztec trade and travel routes was identified at Mensabak, Chiapas, Mexico. This site is similar in function to rural Old World and Andean caravan stop overs, such as caravanserai and way stations, where travelers and traders obtained...
Sabanas and the Sea: The Yalahau’s Ecological Niches and Preclassic Populations (2018)
The Yalahau region of northern Quintana Roo, Mexico is one of the few regions in the Maya Lowlands where a robust Preclassic population was not followed by the emergence of Classic period polities. For that reason it is an important area when trying to understand the unique characteristics of the Preclassic period in the Northern Lowlands. The Yalahau region is defined physiographically by freshwater wetlands (sabanas), which stand in stark contrast the rest of the Northern Lowlands. These...
Sacbeob in the Cochuah Region: Barriers or Links? (2018)
During the Terminal Classic, sacbeob were built at three Maya sites in the Cochuah region of west-central Quintana Roo, Mexico. The roads provided a physical connection between portions of Ichmul, San Felipe, and Yo’okop, running between important structures, out to outlying groups, and even to what had likely been separate settlements. Although they would have been used for processions between termini and may have had numerous symbolic meanings, the impact of some the roadways on the lives of...
The Sacred Landscape of Xunantunich, Belize (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Manifesting Movement Materially: Broadening the Mesoamerican View" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Early Maya communities centered themselves within a broader sacred landscape imbued with meaning through ritual practices. Centuries of movement through the landscape converted spaces into places that were deeply rooted in cosmology and social memory. Ritual practices at the center of the community and important places in...
Sacred Places as Battlefields: The Role of the Ritual Landscape in Struggles for Conquest and Resistance in the Northern Transversal (2018)
The Northern Transversal Region in central Guatemala is one of the most fertile regions of the Maya world in addition to being a key strategic point in the past and present. The rivers flowing out of the highlands provide fertile, volcanic soil in addition to natural communication routes. As a result, it has been subject to multiple waves of colonization over the past two millennia, from Classic period Tikal and Calakmul to contemporary narcotraffickers and transnational corporations. In this...
The Sakjol Marketplace of Yaxnohcah, Campeche, Mexico (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ancient marketplaces serve as invaluable sources of information regarding the political-economic organization of archaeological sites. Marketplaces were important locations within ancient cities serving as nexuses of social, economic, and political interaction. There is a rich collection of ethnohistoric, linguistic, and pictorial evidence indicating the...
Sakwitz’ob: There’s Gypsum in Them Thar Hills (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This poster documents the discovery in 2018 of a large ancient Maya gypsum quarry in southern Campeche, Mexico. The quarry extensively mined a regionally prominent hill (witz), likely making it a white beacon within the ancient landscape. Nearby sites appear to include gypsum workshops. Gypsum mines have also been recently discovered near El Zotz, Peten. We...
The San Pedro Maya and the Western Frontier of British Honduras (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Making and Breaking Boundaries in the Maya Lowlands: Alliance and Conflict across the Guatemala–Belize Border" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Having fled the violence of the Caste War in Mexico, the San Pedro Maya occupied nearly two dozen small villages in the forests of western British Honduras and northeastern Petén from the 1850s to the 1930s. Archaeological and archival information attest to the fact that the...
Scale and Political Integration of Ancient Maya Polities: Ideology, Frame Analysis, and Caracol, Belize (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Regimes of the Ancient Maya" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Interpretations of ancient Maya society may be cast in different ways based on the bodies of data that are used and on the frame of analysis considered. New data and syntheses are changing what sometimes have been polarized perspectives. Excavation, survey, and particularly lidar data show both scalar relationships and regional variability on all levels,...
Scrutinizing Theories of Maya Collapse with the CHAAHK Spatial Simulation Model (2018)
The Classic Maya collapse remains as both relevant and controversial a topic as ever. For over a century, dozens of researchers have proposed different causes that may have driven this complex process. The last few decades have witnessed the academic community’s opinion converge on the notion that many different social and environmental factors, operating at likewise diverse scales, somehow contributed to a temporally gradual and spatially heterogeneous disruption of the demographic, political,...
A Season after Covid: Investigating Las Monjas Sascabera 2 (2023)
This is an abstract from the "The Subterranean in Mesoamerican Cultural Landscapes" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In June 2022, the Gran Acuífero Maya resumed investigations initiated in 2018 of Las Monjas Sascabera 2 (LMS2), one of 11 sascaberas located south and west of the Las Monjas complex at Chichén Itzá. In the intervening years, rain washed out accumulated soil that had blocked access to the circular, constructed entrance and exposed...
The Second Chapter: Further Analysis of Granite Ground Stone Tools from the Belize River East Archaeology Project, 2015–2022 (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Recent Advances in Ground Stone Studies in the Eastern Maya Lowlands" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Granite was a preferred raw material for ground stone tool production in many parts of the Maya Lowlands. However, granite outcrops are spatially restricted within the Maya Mountains of Belize, and access to this material was limited. The movement of raw and/or finished tools would have required various mechanisms of...
Seeds that Germinate: Models, Paleobotanical, and Archaeological Evidence for Colha’s Early Inhabitants (2018)
The archaeological site of Colha, located within the northern Belize chert-bearing zone, is well-known for being one of the largest Maya lithic production sites in Mesoamerica. The site has occupation dating to the Archaic Period as well as the Middle Preclassic through the Early Postclassic. Pollen and geomorphologic evidence suggest intensive forest clearance, wetland soil manipulation, swamp margin, and upland manipulation dating as early as the Archaic Period. Evidence for intensive blade...
Selective Surplus: Material Networks in Formation at Yaxuná, Yucatan, Mexico (900 to 350 BCE) (2018)
Recent investigations of Yaxuná, Yucatan, Mexico have provided evidence to suggest that the earliest permanent spaces, by way of the site’s E-group complex, in the Northern Lowlands were roughly contemporaneous with the early developments observed at Central Lowland sites. On the one hand, this data provides an outlet to better explore the large scale social processes impacting the early macro-region of the Maya area. However, material analysis of recovered shell, lithic, and ceramic artifacts...