Campeche (State / Territory) (Geographic Keyword)
776-800 (1,201 Records)
A number of enigmatic human figures in the imagery of late 9th-early 10th century A.D. Chichen Itza can be identified as fire priests, men whose task was to drill, tend, and/or oversee ritual fires reenacting the primordial birth of the sun from a flaming hearth at ancient Teotihuacan. Detailed analysis of the costumes, ceremonial responsibilities, and internal rankings of Chichen’s Itza’s fire priests reveals strong similarities to those of later Aztec fire priests as documented in painted...
Of Snakes and Masks: A Contextual and Iconographic Study of Ancient Maya Greenstone Mosaic Masks (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Dancing through Iconographic Corpora: A Symposium in Honor of F. Kent Reilly III" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. We argue that ancient Maya portable mosaic masks, found in high-elite burials across the Maya Lowlands, could have, at some point during the Late Classic period (AD 550–800) and perhaps even earlier, been the ideal insignias of the Kaanul “snake” regime, which in ancient Maya writing is represented by the...
The Olmec "Double-Merlon" Motif and the Origins of Color Directional Symbolism in Formative Mesoamerica (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Decipherment, Digs, and Discourse: Honoring Stephen Houston's Contributions to Maya Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Among the most striking signs of Olmec iconography is the "double-merlon," this being a horizontal form supporting two parallel, upwardly projecting tabs. This presentation examines and discusses where it appears in Olmec imagery during the Middle Formative period (1000-400 b.c.), stressing...
Olmec Asphalt Trade Revealed by Combined Biomarker and Chemometric Analysis (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Within the Olmec region, resources such as basalt, asphalt, cacao, kaolin clay, and hematite pigment are available in discreet areas. This uneven distribution of raw materials has led some scholars to suggest that Olmec leaders controlled the sources of raw materials and regional trade, from which they derived their economic and political power. The...
On the Place of Sa-ja-la Title Holders in the Classic Maya Regime (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Regimes of the Ancient Maya" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Since they began to be discerned in the 1980s, much has been written about the political offices and roles of various secondary members of the Classic Maya court. In particular, the political office of sa-ja-la has come to be seen as that of a “governor” of smaller settlements within and between Classic Maya centers. However, the presumed role of sa-ja-la...
Ongoing Household Research at Hun Tun: An Ancient Maya Hinterland Settlement in Northwestern Belize (2018)
The ancient Maya site, Hun Tun is a Late-Terminal Classic commoner settlement located in northwestern Belize. Research at Hun Tun operates under the Programme for Belize Archaeological Project (PfBAP). Social complexity at the household level serves as a research theme for Hun Tun investigations. This paper addresses the ancient Maya commoners who lived in household contexts at Hun Tun while discussing how their role as a hinterland community contributed to ideas of household identity, social...
Ongoing Research at Hun Tun and Medicinal Trail Community: The Ancient Maya Hinterland of Northwestern Belize (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Ancient Maya Landscapes in Northwestern Belize, Part I" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper discusses features and material culture from two hinterland settlements located in northwestern Belize, Hun Tun and the Medicinal Trail Community, east of the ancient Maya urban center of La Milpa. Residential groups include formal courtyards with "expensive" structures at one end of the continuum to numerous informal...
The Organization of Obsidian Exchange at Postclassic Sauce and its Hinterland in Veracruz, Mexico (2018)
I analyze residential inventories from the center of Sauce and its hinterland in combination with regional settlement data from Barbara Stark’s Proyecto Arqueológico La Mixtequilla (PALM I, II) to describe the structure of exchange, production, and consumption of obsidian chipped stone during the Middle Postclassic period (AD 1200-1350) in south-central Veracruz, Mexico. Previous research on obsidian production found a spatial association with Sauce, which could support political administration...
The Origins of Maya Civilization: New Evidence from Ceibal and Sites in the Middle Usumacinta Basin (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. The analysis of new LiDAR data has revealed many previously unknown early Middle Preclassic sites in the Middle Usumacinta drainage. The sites are monumental in their extensions and consist of a large rectangular feature or platform oriented slightly east of north, delineated by low mounds...
The Origins of Sociopolitical Complexity in Western Belize: Investigating Preclassic Occupation in the Site Core of Xunantunich (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Previous studies in the Maya area indicate many lowland Maya site cores developed gradually with continuous construction and modifications extending back to the Preclassic era (1200 BC–AD 300). In spite of this developmental sequence, few sites exhibiting Preclassic transition phases have been intensively investigated. One example is the Belize Valley site...
An Osteobiography of Skeletal Remains from Holtun, Guatemala (2018)
Excavations at the site of Holtun, Guatemala during the 2014 – 2017 field seasons yielded eighteen human burials from various temporal periods and site locations. Holtun was inhabited by the ancient Maya from the Middle Preclassic (1000 – 300 BCE) to the Terminal Classic Period (600 – 900 CE). Recent archaeological investigations have identified the Preclassic period at Holtun as a time characterized by increasing social inequality, but few burials have been recovered to infer the impact of...
An Osteobiography of Tomb Op. 42, Ent. 5 from Copán, Honduras (2024)
This is an abstract from the "The Marking and Making of Social Persons: Embodied Understandings in the Archaeologies of Childhood and Adolescence" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This research constructs an osteobiological narrative of two females and a male from Copán, Honduras, who were placed together within a Classic period (AD 600–822) tomb in the residential group Salamar (8L-10) Op. 42. Utilizing mortuary and isotopic data, this case study...
Out of Clay and into Stone: The Emergence of Warriors at Chichen Itza (2018)
In the Early Classic period a distinct characteristic of Central Mexican art is the appearance of warriors in public art. To the contrary, these figures generally appear on more private, personal items in the art of the Classic Maya, though their proliferation on these media distinctly rises in the Late Classic. In a remarkable development, the presence of warriors in public art explodes in Early Postclassic Chichen Itza. While central Mexican influence may have sparked this development, this...
Out of Olmec: Continuity and Disjunction in Veracruz Stone Sculpture (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Sculpture of the Ancient Mexican Gulf Coast, Part 1" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Gulf Olmec sculpture is renowned for the cultural, political, and aesthetic precedents it helped to establish in preconquest Mesoamerica. Often its legacy is discussed in relation to the artistic traditions of succeeding civilizations that emerged to the south and west of Olman. However, there has been little recognition of the impact...
An Overview and Synthesis of Paleocoastal Research on the Yucatan Peninsula (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Advances in Global Submerged Paleolandscapes Research" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The broad carbonate platform and shallow continental shelf of the Yucatan Peninsula supported the rise of the northern lowland Maya and the dispersal of Paleoamerican peoples thousands of years earlier. Exploration—particularly in the region’s now-submerged cave systems—has revealed the remains of the Yucatan’s earliest human...
Overview of Archaeological Investigations in the Middle Usumacinta Region (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. The Middle Usumacinta Archaeological Project started investigations in the Department of Tabasco, Mexico, in 2017. Its main objectives are to examine the relationship between the residents of the Maya lowlands and those of the Olmec region and to trace social change during the Preclassic...
An Overview of the Dos Hombres to Gran Cacao Archaeology Project Soil Testing and Methodologies (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper aims at emphasizing the importance of soil science practice to archaeology thus adding a scientific analytical nature to the cultural nature of archaeology. This report explores this field application of pH and NPK testing in the Dos Hombres to Gran Cacao Archaeology Project area located in northwestern Belize. These types of testing are of...
Paisajes aprovechados y causes modificados en el sistema portuario de la costa este de Los Tuxtlas, Veracruz (2018)
En la zona este de Los Tuxtlas se ha identificado un complejo sistema de intercomunicación fluvial y marítima, construido a partir del aprovechamiento y acondicionamiento de corrientes acuáticas. Una gran parte de estas vías de comunicación confluyen en el sistema portuario de la costa este de Los Tuxtlas. La región se caracteriza por estar en un abanico aluvial, por lo que presenta un gran dinamismo fluvial, es decir los causes no son estáticos en el tiempo. En los estudios arqueológicos debe...
Paisajes, recursos y su aprovechamiento en Los Tuxtlas, Veracruz, Mexico (2018)
Síntesis de una investigación arqueológica que se enfocó en analizar y comparar la morfología del paisaje cultural de antiguos asentamientos prehispánicos en la sierra de Los Tuxtlas, Veracruz, México. Combinando aspectos de la geografía cultural, procesualismo, y unidades de paisaje geomorfológico se pudieron describir y analizar sitios arqueológicos en Los Tuxtlas, así como discernir las posibles dinámicas de agencia y adaptación del medio ambiente, uso del espacio y aprovechamiento de los...
Paleoecology and Geoarchaeology of the Buenavista Valley, Petén, Guatemala (2023)
This is an abstract from the "La Cuernavilla, Guatemala: A Maya Fortress and Its Environs" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. We have studied the long-term environmental change and geoarchaeology of the Buenavista Valley in the region of El Zotz and La Cuernavilla in Guatemala’s Petén through multiple NSF grants from the 2000s to an NGS Grant for fieldwork in 2022. Past studies focused on the El Zotz reservoir, other regional reservoirs, dam...
Paleoenvironmental Research at Yaxnohcah, Campeche, Mexico (2024)
This is an abstract from the "New and Emerging Perspectives on the Bajo el Laberinto Region of the Maya Lowlands, Part 1" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. When the Proyecto Arqueológico Yaxnohcah began 13 years ago in 2011, some of our driving questions centered on the Bajo el Laberinto and the role that this enormous wetland played in the rise and development of what was to become the great city of Yaxnohcah: Why were the early inhabitants of the...
Paleoenvironmental Studies at the Ancient Maya Center of Yaxnohcah based on Analyses of eDNA, Pollen, and Plant Macroremains (2024)
This is an abstract from the "New and Emerging Perspectives on the Bajo el Laberinto Region of the Maya Lowlands, Part 1" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Yaxnohcah was a major civic-ceremonial center of the ancient Maya world, especially during the Preclassic period (1000 BCE–200 CE). Environmental data from excavations provided important insights into the interaction between the ancient inhabitants of the polity and the surrounding Neotropical...
A Paleoethnobotanical Analysis of Ceramic Residues from Caches and Burials at the Lowland Maya Site of Holtun, Guatemala (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Among the Maya, plant-based foods were not just important for sustenance but also had ritual meaning, especially emphasized when placed in graves and caches. Food offered during ritual performances created a reciprocal relationship between living individuals, their ancestors, and the gods. This poster will present the paleoethnobotanical results from...
A Paleoethnobotanical Analysis of Ceramic Residues from Caches and Burials at the Lowland Maya Site of Holtun, Guatemala (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Holtun: Investigations at a Preclassic Maya Center" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Among the Maya, plant-based foods were not just important for sustenance but also had ritual meaning, especially emphasized when placed in graves and caches. Food offered during ritual performances created a reciprocal relationship between living individuals, their ancestors, and the gods. This paper presents the paleoethnobotanical...
Paleoethnobotanical Remains from an Early Classic Maya Tomb at Buenavista del Cayo, Belize (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the tropics, paleoethnobotanists often face challenging preservation environments, making most of the macrobotanical specimens that we analyze those that are preserved through processes of carbonization. This preservation issue is often framed as limiting the questions we can ask and the interpretations we can make about ancient Maya relationships with the...