Mesoamerica: Maya lowlands (Geographic Keyword)

DOCUMENT Citation Only Nathan Parrott. Carlos Peraza Lope.

This project examines an assemblage of 37 bark beaters from Northwest Yucatán, principally from the Postclassic Maya site of Mayapán. Bark beaters are stone tools used in the production of bark paper. In Mesoamerica, these tools were important in several specialized craft industries, including the manufacture of codices and clothing for religious and political ceremonies. There is still much that is unknown about pre-Columbian bark paper production, as bark paper rarely survives in the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Humberto Nation. Leah Minc. Holley Moyes. Polly Peterson. James E. Brady.

Recent investigations in various surface and underground cave sites indicate the existence of extensive political, economic, religious and military exchanges between polities in the Maya lowlands of Belize. The occurrence of "foreign" materials at surface and cave sites have become an increasingly well-documented phenomenon (Brady et al. 1997) and are indicative of transport of speleothems during ancient Maya cave visitations. This phenomenon has raise several questions such as the spatial...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kaitlin Ahern.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. During the summers of 2018 and 2019, the author collected 19 lime plaster floor samples from the ancient Maya sites of Cival, Holmul, and Witzna. These three sites are located in the Holmul region, which is situated in the Petén along the border with Guatemala and Belize. The majority of the plaster samples were collected during the Holmul Archaeological...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Cynthia Hannold. Francisco Estrada-Belli.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Geometric, anthropomorphic, zoomorphic, and abstract forms comprise the variety of lithic silhouettes of Central America. Commonly called eccentrics, these elaborate, technically remarkable forms are often recovered from ritual offerings and elite burials. This paper addresses more than sixty eccentrics recovered in the Holmul region, primarily from the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Gabriela Saldaña. Tia Watkins. Rosamund Fitzmaurice. Adam Jurský. Julie Hoggarth.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The ceremonial center of Baking Pot, Belize is one of the longest occupied sites in the Belize River Valley, starting in the Late Middle Preclassic (600–300 BC) and spanning through the Terminal Classic (AD 750–900/1000) period, with some evidence of reoccupation during the Late Postclassic (AD 1200–1521) period. Considerable research efforts over the past...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Katelyn Bishop.

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. The site of Holtun is a civic-ceremonial center located in the Petén region of Guatemala, occupied from the Late Middle Preclassic to the Terminal Classic period (600 BCE–900 CE). Excavations conducted between 2010 and 2017 have resulted in a mid-size vertebrate faunal assemblage and a large archaeomalacological assemblage, including...

DOCUMENT Citation Only George J. Micheletti.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ritual and its practice were essential mechanisms for negotiating social identity, status, and political involvement for all members of ancient Maya society. Yet, changes to ritual practices through time are often framed around the legitimization of royal elite, reifying traditional models of dominant ideology. Identifying how ritual of periphery...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Aimee Alvarado.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Peri-abandonment deposits in the Maya region have been a source of contention in recent years given the varied artifact assemblages and the lack of clear understanding for their purpose. This research describes peri-abandonment deposits at Xunantunich, Group B, an elite residential plazuela group located approximately 150 meters from the site core. Excavations...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Lisa DeLance. Jaime Awe.

Archaeologists working in Mesoamerica frequently encounter construction fill within architecture. Construction fill has been variously used as a tool for determining architectural construction sequences, as a resource for seriation dating, and occasionally as a context for radiocarbon deposits. Although much information can be gleaned from examining construction fill, material culture found within such fill is frequently mentioned in passing as little more than refuse, if it is mentioned at...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Whitney Lytle.

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. Ancestor veneration was a cornerstone for Maya social organization and vital to the maintenance of hierarchy. As the Maya became more politically and socially complex, ritual practices involving ancestors also rose in complexity. Critical to the concept of ancestors is the recognition of the bond between ancestors and spaces. This...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Christina Halperin.

This is an abstract from the "The Vibrancy of Ruins: Ruination Studies in Ancient Mesoamerica" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ruination studies allow one to see the past not as a fixed “thing” but as living landscapes that emerge from, enliven, and incorporate temporal dimensions, ancestors, and animating forces young and old, near and far. Furthermore, over the past two decades Mesoamerican scholars have increasingly recognized that ruins were an...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Scott Hutson.

This is an abstract from the "Ancient Mesoamerican Population History: Demography, Social Complexity, and Change" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Research in northwest Yucatán, Mexico, has played a large role in the development of demographic archaeology in the Maya area, beginning with Edward Thompson’s nineteenth-century investigations of housemounds at Labna and reaching a mid-twentieth-century pinnacle with maps of Mayapan and Dzibilchaltun. In...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Molly Corr.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Environmental DNA (eDNA), or the genetic material obtained from sediments, ice, or water, is a relatively new and untapped methodology in archaeology. This technique provides important insight into the biodiversity of different plant, animal, and microbial communities, positioning archaeologists to understand human-landscape interactions of the past...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Scott Fedick. Anabel Ford. Jorge Mendoza-Vega. Víctor Ku Quej. Narciso Torres.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. One enduring mystery of the ancient Maya is how they managed to feed large populations in a tropical environment and land resources that have long been characterized as hostile and challenging for agriculture. The traditional academic and popular perception of Maya agriculture, both ancient and modern, was based on the cultivation of maize, beans, and...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Joshua Schnell.

This is an abstract from the "Approaches to the Archaeology of Health: Sewers, Snakebites, and Skeletons" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The ancient Maya are often highly regarded for their skill in dentistry—evidenced by longstanding traditions of filing and inlaying teeth. These procedures had a considerable success rate suggesting a pervasive knowledge of dental anatomy among practitioners. However, this study of aesthetic practices has...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Erin Thornton. Richard Hansen. Edgar Suyuc-Ley.

The site of El Mirador (Petén, Guatemala) is among the largest Preclassic settlements in the Maya lowlands. The site has attracted attention due to its size and antiquity, but also for its location within a region containing few permanent or perennial water sources. This study summarizes current zooarchaeological evidence from the site to assess past diet, habitat use, environment, and exchange. Comparative analysis demonstrates that the inhabitants of El Mirador conformed to certain widespread...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Horvey Palacios. Tanvi P. Honap. Douglas J. Kennett. Keith M. Prufer. Cecil M. Lewis, Jr..

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Oral microbial ecologies are shaped by an interaction among environmental and cultural factors, including wealth and status inequalities, which were pervasive throughout ancient Maya society. Few studies have directly integrated the oral microbiome of ancient individuals with a detailed analysis of their status from archaeological contexts. To interrogate...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Theresa Heindel.

Research conducted during the 2015-2017 Actuncan Archaeological Project field seasons revealed several land use strategies utilized during the Late and Terminal Classic periods, including terracing, agricultural plots, and cobble mounds. Excavations conducted in the Northern Neighborhood of Actuncan exposed two terracing methods: 1) terraforming, in which earthen berms created to facilitate water drainage and 2) two small agricultural plot systems filled with a large amount of redeposited...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Robyn Dodge.

This is an abstract from the "Prehispanic Maya Marketplace Investigations in the Three Rivers Region of Belize: First Results" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper discusses preliminary data related to a potential ancient Maya marketplace at the Late Classic site Hun Tun. The Hun Tun Archaeology Project operates under the larger Programme for Belize Archaeological Project and within the modern geographic boundaries of the Rio Bravo...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Marisol Cortes-Rincon. Jeremy McFarland. Jonathan Roldan. Cady Rutherford. Spencer Mitchell.

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 will discuss investigations of two sacbeob in the hinterlands in northwestern Belize. These features connect ancient Maya household groups, aguadas, quarries, terraces and ritual features. The study of ancient causeway systems is crucial to the understanding of mobility, sociopolitical, and economic networks in the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Angelina Locker.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Migrations are a key feature of human populations past and present, and people moved across landscapes regardless of cultural affiliation, hierarchical structures, or place of birth. But, what does it mean when individuals and/or pieces of their remains are moved elsewhere posthumously? This paper builds upon discourse centered around social memory and...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Christopher Carr. Jeffrey Brewer. Nicholas Dunning. Kathryn Reese-Taylor. Armando Anaya Hernández.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Lidar has dramatically expanded our view of the ancient Maya landscape. We have used lidar to study the key natural resources of limestone and chert- their location, extent, and relationship to other ancient Maya features. Limestone was a key building material and chert was the source for most chipped stone tools. Lidar-derived imagery and hydrological...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Arlen Chase. Diane Chase. Adrian Chase.

This is an abstract from the "Advancing Public Perceptions of Sustainability through Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Long-term archaeological research at Caracol, Belize has revealed a sizeable city with over 100,000 inhabitants at A.D. 650 that practiced intensive agriculture within its urban boundaries. Over 160 square kilometers of the landscape within Caracol was anthropogenic, having been rebuilt to both provide agricultural...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Lori Phillips. Erin Thornton. Eleanor Harrison-Buck.

This is an abstract from the "Archaeology and the History of Human-Environment Interaction in the Lower Belize River Watershed" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Understanding how the ancient Maya interacted with wetland environments has been a topic of research for roughly 50 years. Previous studies suggest these resource-rich environments provided a diverse assortment of flora and fauna for the ancient Maya to utilize. Wetlands provide an ideal...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Timothy Beach. Sheryl Luzzadder-Beach. Nicholas Dunning.

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. One of Steve Houston’s sublime volumes is The Fiery Pool, which was also a groundbreaking exhibit. These explored the themes of the Maya and their relationships with water. Here we consider the themes from The Fiery Pool from the perspectives of ancient Maya Wetland fields, "creatures", and...