Mesoamerica: Maya lowlands (Geographic Keyword)
651-675 (1,004 Records)
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...
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...
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...
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...
Pasado, presente y futuro de la conservación del patrimonio edificado de la región serrana de Yucatán: Kabah, Sayil, Xlapak y Labná (2019)
This is an abstract from the "La Restauración de Monumentos Prehispánicos en México: Principios, Práctica, y Visión al Futuro" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. El sureste mexicano tiene una larga tradición en intervenciones de restauración de edificios monumentales. Estos trabajos se iniciaron desde principios del siglo pasado, con la intención de conservar los majestuosos edificios que se encontraban en pie y que fueron dados a conocer al mundo...
Pathways and the Power of Organizational Process: Defining Polity at Wari Camp, Belize (2018)
The ancient Maya community of Wari Camp was organized into a quincunx pattern of four quarters delineated by the intersection of two inter-cardinal alignments. One was formed by a series of "temple-on-the-east" groups running northwest to southeast. The other consisted of a massive, northeast-to-southwest trending drainage modified for foot traffic. At their intersection stood an uncarved stela. Other stelae marked crossroads, while pairs of temple groups stood at entrances into the drainage...
Pathways to Power for Classic Maya Sub-royal Elites (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Bringing the Past to Life, Part 1: Papers in Honor of John M. D. Pohl" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. John Pohl’s research is groundbreaking in its analysis of the supporting characters in Mesoamerican royal courts. Secondary elites (including the nobles, priests, merchants, and artisans of the court) vied for power using innovative tactics that worked outside the traditional systems of inherited authority. Pohl’s...
Paul Gendrop’s Río Bec, Chenes, and Puuc Architecture: New Insights after 40 Years (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. While certain Northern Maya Lowland architectural characteristics remain constant for these three peninsular stylistic “entities” defined by Paul Gendrop, such as few dynastic hieroglyphic monuments, ballcourts or E-Group complexes, the past forty years have revealed many new, insular features: zoomorphic mask elements adorning massive monumental...
The Peal of Domination at San Bernabé, Petén, Guatemala (2019)
This is an abstract from the "After Cortés: Archaeological Legacies of the European Invasion in Mesoamerica" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In 1718, Bishop Juan Gómez de Pareda, the 20th bishop of Yucatan, consecrated a number of bells destined for churches in what is now Petén, Guatemala. At least two of these bells swung in the San Bernabé mission church. The mission was established on the western end of the Tayasal peninsula in Petén, Guatemala...
People-Plant Negotiations in Two Rejolladas at Yaxuna and Joya, Yucatán (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Advances in Macrobotanical and Microbotanical Archaeobotany Part 1" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Rejolladas have long been identified as sites of specialized agricultural and ritual practice across the northern Maya lowlands. However, archaeological investigations of these cavernous, soil-rich features have been sporadic until relatively recently, and there is still much to be understood about the way people engaged...
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...
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...
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...