Yucatan (State / Territory) (Geographic Keyword)

DOCUMENT Citation Only Victoria Ingalls.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Francisco Estrada-Belli.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Laura Angelica Romero Padilla.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In this paper, I will examine the significance of ritual cave use in the emergence and development of Classic Maya polities. Caves are critical settings to understand the diversity of ritual practices and the involvement of such contexts within socio-political systems. My work in caves in the Middle Usumacinta Valley will further our understanding of...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Laura Angelica Romero Padilla.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Whitney Lytle. Rachel Horowitz. Carolyn Freiwald. Kathryn Brown.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Neil Kohanski. Jeffery Rosa Figueroa.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Maia Dedrick. Carly Pope. Morgan Russell.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Gibránn Becerra.

This is an abstract from the "Los Rituales del Juego de Pelota en la Costa del Golfo / Ballgame Rituals in the Gulf Lowlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Trabajos de investigación sobre arquitectura dañada del Juego de Pelota realizados en el Complejo Monumental de Tlalixcoyan, Centro de Veracruz, permitieron documentar ofrendas de dedicación y múltiples etapas constructivas durante el Clásico. En una de las etapas iniciales, los constructores...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Jessica Munson. Matthew Looper. Jonathan Scholnick.

This is an abstract from the "Archaeological Applications of Network Analysis" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ritual and performance play important integrative functions in the creation, maintenance, and negotiation of social ties that bind communities together. The shared experience of these public displays establishes strong bonds between individuals, defining their membership in certain social groups while reinforcing cultural norms and values....

DOCUMENT Citation Only Alejandro Garay Herrera.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Tomás Gallareta Cervera. Anna Novotny. Brett A. Houk.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Brett Meyer. Claire Ebert. Julie Hoggarth. John Walden. Jaime Awe.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Marilyn Bueno.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only James Doyle.

This is an abstract from the "The Rollout Keepers: Papers on Maya Ceramic Texts, Scenes, and Styles in Honor of Justin and Barbara Kerr" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. While Justin Kerr might be best known for pioneering the rollout photographic technique specific to three-dimensional drinking cups and serving vessels, some of his still photographs of painted plates also proved pivotal to the understanding of Classic Maya religion and history....

DOCUMENT Citation Only Annabeth Headrick.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Benoît Baconnet.

This is an abstract from the "New and Emerging Perspectives on the Bajo el Laberinto Region of the Maya Lowlands, Part 2" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Located on the border between the central and northern lowlands, the Río Bec region developed a singular architecture and iconography from the sixth century. In the eighth century, the Central Lowlands underwent major sociopolitical transformations, such as the gradual fall of the Kaan dynasty and...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Jeffrey B. Glover. Dominique Rissolo. Daniel Leonard.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Justine Shaw.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only M. Kathryn Brown. Jason Yaeger.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Brent Woodfill.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Mallory Matsumoto.

This is an abstract from the "Beyond Maize and Cacao: Reflections on Visual and Textual Representation and Archaeological Evidence of Other Plants in Precolumbian Mesoamerica" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Archaeological, ethnohistorical, art historical, and ethnographic evidence attests to extensive use of reed mats over millennia across the Maya region. In addition to being used for sleeping or sitting atop benches or floors, mats partitioned...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Nathan Parrott. Armando Anaya Hernández. Kathryn Reese-Taylor.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Nicholas Dunning. Christopher Carr. Timothy Beach.

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...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Victoria Ingalls. Mara De Gregori. Brett Houk.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In 2023, the Belize Estates Archaeological Survey Team (BEAST) field assessed recently acquired LiDAR data. This effort included documenting a previously unknown large ceremonial center, Ayiin Winik, located between the La Lucha Escarpment and the Rio Bravo in northwestern Belize. Exploration of the site identified a rare double ball court, a parapet-lined...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Brett A. Houk. Brooke Bonorden.

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...