Peten (State / Territory) (Geographic Keyword)
701-725 (1,039 Records)
This is an abstract from the "New Light on Dzibanché and on the Rise of the Snake Kingdom’s Hegemony in the Maya Lowlands" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper presents some preliminary results of the first field season of 3D documentation of buildings, monuments, and portable artifacts from the archaeological site of Dzibanché in Quintana Roo, Mexico. Four building facades, 20 stairway blocks, nine miscellaneous sculpture fragments, and six...
O'na Tok: A Preclassic Zoque Center in Western Chiapas, Mexico (2021)
This is an abstract from the "The Archaeology of Trade and Exchange" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Preliminary explorations at the previously unknown Zoque site of O’na Tök reveals within a mid-montane wet forest, a multifaceted archaeological landscape containing an early ceremonial center, an expansive area of long architectural platforms, and nearby caves used for ritual purposes. Artifacts recovered on the surface suggest occupation during...
O'na Tök: A Zoque Center in Western Chiapas, México (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In June of 2016, the archaeological site designated O'na Tök was recorded as a primary center in the western portion of the Central Depression of Chiapas, Mexico. Preliminary studies of cultural material recovered on the surface and test pits suggest the Zoque of O'na Tök participated in an exchange network with contemporary centers during the Early...
Obsidian Blade Caches from the 8N-11 Group of Las Sepulturas, Copan, Honduras (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Ceremonial Lithics of Mesoamerica: New Understandings of Technology, Distribution, and Symbolism of Eccentrics and Ritual Caches in the Maya World and Beyond" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ongoing excavations in Structures 69C and 70W in the 8N-11 group of Las Sepulturas have uncovered pressure blade caches of great complexity and size. While blade caches are relatively common at Copan, these caches were excavated...
Obsidian Blade Production, Social Inequality, and Agency at the Classic Maya Capital of Tamarandito (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Archaeologists studying the Maya have traditionally considered obsidian to be a luxury good that was often tightly controlled by the elite during the Classic period. Archaeological evidence from the Classic Maya capital of Tamarindito in Guatemala challenges these long-held assumptions, however. At Tamarindito, multiple lines of evidence support the...
Obsidian Geochemical Sourcing at Huntichmul, Kiuic and Escalera Al Cielo in the Puuc Region, Mexico (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In recent years, the use of portable X-Ray Fluorescence (p-XRF) spectrometers has become increasingly common to determine the geological sources of obsidian artifacts. This study used p-XRF to obtain trace elemental data for 354 obsidian artifacts from the sites of Huntichmul, Kiuic and Escalera Al Cielo in the Puuc region of the northern Maya lowlands. These...
Obsidian Trade at the Edge of the Maya World (2018)
The position of Vista Alegre at the Northeastern edge of the Yucatan Peninsula, a gateway between the Caribbean and the Gulf of Mexico, made it a strategic location for circumpeninsular maritime trade in Pre-Colombian times. A robust sample of obsidian artifacts from the Terminal-Postclassic transition increases our understanding of trade relations between the eastern and western sides of the Maya world. Technological and source analyses of obsidian artifacts from the site are presented to fill...
An Obsidian Workshop at Budsilhá Chiapas, Mexico (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. One of the persistent difficulties in understanding Classic Maya (AD 250–900) economies has been the challenge of identifying the loci of production (e.g., workshops) and exchange (e.g., marketplaces), and thus interpreting how the two figured into local and regional economies. During the 2013 fieldwork at the site of Budislha, Chiapas, Mexico–a subsidiary...
Of Eye Rings and Torches: The Fire Priests of Chichen Itza and Their Legacy in Aztec Tenochtitlan (2018)
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...
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 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...
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...
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...
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...
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...
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...
Papa Was a Rolling Stone: Migration Stories from the Three Rivers Region, NW 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. A robust body of literature on ancient Maya migration exists, showcasing their intrinsically mobile nature. Interestingly, while migration inquiries have been conducted in urban centers throughout the ancient Maya world, it is less well understood how people moved around more rural landscapes. For the ancient Maya inhabiting...
Partialities of Power at Uci, Yucatan, Mexico (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Beginning in 2008, the Uci/Cansahcab Regional Integration Project has investigated the causes and consequences of the construction of an 18km long causeway that connected four ancient Maya sites with monumental architecture in the Late Preclassic period. This paper presents the results of recent excavations at Ucí, the largest site along the causeway and the...