Maya: Classic (Other Keyword)
101-125 (857 Records)
This is an abstract from the "The Subterranean in Mesoamerican Cultural Landscapes" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the 25 years since the publication of “Settlement Configuration and Cosmology: The Role of Caves at Dos Pilas,” a number of significant discoveries of architecture constructed in relation to caves have been made. The discovery of the man-made cave constructed beneath the Pyramid of the Plumed Serpent at Teotihuacan is perhaps the...
Caves, Copper, and Pilgrimage: Reinterpretation of Quimistan Bell Cave in Northwestern Honduras (2018)
In 1910, A. Hooton Blackiston discovered a cave 25 miles from Naco containing a cache of 800 copper bells, a possible mosaic mask of turquoise, and other materials. Blackiston interpreted the cave as a place of worship dedicated to the bat god. Copper, however, has very rarely been reported from caves in Honduras. Metals enter Mesoamerican late in its history but quickly assume an importance equal to jade in the native value system. The only other cave known to have held copper bells is...
Cavetuns: Unexplored Theoretical Implications of a Discovery at Mul Ch’en Witz, La Milpa, Belize (2018)
In June of 2017, the Contested Caves Archaeological Project (CCAP), explored what was thought to be a partially capped chultun at the site of La Milpa, Belize. On entering, however, it became clear that the feature was actually a small, natural cave with a classic chultun-style entrance carved into it. Two of the cave’s three chambers contained small pools of water, which receded into the porous limestone, within days of their discovery. The pools make any possibility of storage infeasible...
Celebrity Chefs and the Long View of Sustainable Agriculture in Yaxunah, Yucatán (2019)
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. The ejido (collective agricultural landholding) of Yaxunah, Yucatán, Mexico is known among archaeologists for its pre-Hispanic archaeological sites. But among a growing contingent of food aficionados, Yaxunah is known for its cooking. Having attracted the interest of celebrity chefs like René Redzepi (Noma, Copenhagen),...
Cenote Xtoloc: Paying Attention to the Ignored Cenote (2018)
A truism was established very early in Maya studies that the Cenote of Sacrifice at Chichen Itza had a religious function while the nearby Cenote Xtoloc was the source for domestic drinking water. Part of the attraction of this idea was no doubt its close paralleling of the popular Western dichotomy, sacred vs. profane. The problem with truisms, statements so obviously true that they say nothing new or interesting, is that they direct attention elsewhere. This is probably why the Temple of...
The Ceramic Chronology of Vista Alegre: An Updated Typological Assessment (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The ceramic sequence developed for Vista Alegre, a Maya port site on the northern coast of Quintana Roo, Mexico, demonstrates both the site’s persistence through time and its extensive trade relationships across the Maya world. The Proyecto Costa Escondida (PCE) team has synthesized an official site chronology from an ongoing analysis of the ceramic...
Ceramic Production during the Terminal Classic at Holtun, Guatemala (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The use of provenance studies to answer anthropological questions related to the production and access of ceramics is well documented for the Maya region. Mineralogical and chemical compositional analyses are often used to identify the material origins, or provenance, of ceramics. In this paper, the authors report on Neutron Activation Analysis (INAA) and...
Ceramic Technological Trends in the Three Rivers Region: A Late Classic Maya Overview (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. It is now well recognized that Late Classic Maya communities were highly variable politically, economically, and environmentally. Researchers often assume that community and household variation are corollary with the broader political climate— and this remains under problematized. Thus, research that explores differences in...
Challenges in the Identification of Fresh Volcanic Glass Shards in Ancient Maya Pottery Sherds (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Ceramics and Archaeological Sciences" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The major components of ceramics consist of clay and temper. It is assumed that these components are local. The Maya lowlands are dominated by limestone, and its use as temper is ubiquitous. Therefore, the distinct presence of fresh volcanic ash in the Late Classic period pottery is noteworthy. Efforts to identify a local volcanic source closer than...
Chamá Vessels Revisited: Advances and Questions on a Northern Maya Highland Painting Style (2023)
This is an abstract from the "A Celebration and Critical Assessment of "The Maya Scribe and His World" on its Fiftieth Anniversary" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. During the Late Classic period, a distinct painting style in ceramics emerged in the northern Maya highlands of Guatemala, revealing both the mastery of artisans and the worldview of the Maya. The Chamá style, whose vessels were manufactured on the banks of the Chixoy River, shows clear...
Changing Patterns of Production and Exchange in "Borderland" Economies: The Case of the Classic Maya Civilization (2018)
Following the trajectory of the work of Rita Wright, recent research has focused on production, producers, and exchange in a "borderland" zone, the "frontier" between Classic Maya lowland city-states and less complex, but more diverse, polities of the resource-rich highlands to the south. These "borderland" studies led to insights concerning exchange, production, and the roles of elite managers and non-elite "labor". Archaeologists and economists examined the material culture of dozens of sites...
Changing Plant Economies and Diverse Plant Practices at Piedras Negras (2018)
Botanical residues recovered from the Piedras Negras kingdom have yielded rich information about activities and economies of ancient inhabitants. Data for this paper were derived from large-scale excavations targeting Classic Period craft production areas, defensive features, and dwellings. Evidence of agricultural practices as well as the collection of wild and fallow-dwelling plants has been revealed through charred seeds and other botanical residues. The recovered archaeobotanical remains...
Charismatic and Religious Aspects of Maya Rulership: An Interpretation of the Coronitas Temple Complex of La Corona (2018)
The Coronitas Group at La Corona presents a unique architectural setting, consisting of five pyramidal temples aligned in a north-south row and several attached structures. Excavations in this group have been carried out since the beginning of the project, providing important data concerning the function of these temples throughout the site’s occupation. A detailed chronological analysis has shown that this architectural complex was one of the main ceremonial areas of the site, evinced by not...
Chemical Analyses of Obsidian from Classic Maya Paynes Creek Salt Works, Belize (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Paynes Creek Salt Works were an ancient Maya Classic Period (A.D. 300-900) salt industry located in a shallow salt water lagoon in southern Belize. The rise of the Paynes Creek Salt Works mirrored the growth in population at inland communities during the Late Classic Period (A. D. 600-900) where salt—a basic biological necessity—was scarce. The demand for...
Chert Extraction and Production in Resource-Rich Regions: Chert Economies among the Late Classic Maya of Western Belize (2018)
Global studies of raw material extraction permit us to examine the methods and involvement of different individuals in the extraction and production of lithic materials. One variable which can influence the organization of extraction and production is the abundance or scarcity of raw materials in a region. This paper addresses the extraction and production of chert materials among the Late Classic Maya (A.D. 600-900) in the lowland Maya region, specifically western Belize, a chert-rich area,...
Chert Tools from the Ta’ab Nuk Na Salt Works (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Underwater Maya: Analytical Approaches for Interpreting Ancient Maya Activities at the Paynes Creek Salt Works, Belize" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Assessment of a lithic assemblage excavated from the coastal Maya site of Ta’ab Nuk Na in southern Belize provides insight on economic and domestic activities. A reliance on imported chert tools from the north helps visualize links in the extensive coastal trade system...
Chichen Itza 3D Atlas (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Chichen Itza is an extensive site containing a vast and distinctive corpus of monumental architecture, carved stone iconography, and painted murals. Since its initial excavation in 1913, artifacts have been collected and distributed widely between collections. In 2014, 2017, and 2022 the National Center for Airborne Laser Mapping (NCALM) conducted aerial...
Childness, Humanness, and Violence among the Precolonial Maya (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. Over the past decade or so, bioarchaeologists working in the Maya area have called attention to how permanent alterations of the body transformed immature bodies into fully realized humans. Among these alterations were cranial and dental modification, painful practices...
Chochkitam: A Classic Maya Kingdom on the Kaanu’l Path to Tikal—An Update (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Chochkitam is a major ceremonial center in northeastern Petén, situated among sites with inscribed monuments such as Xultun, La Honradez, Río Azul in Guatemala, and La Milpa in Belize, giving us a few data points on the shifting political history of the Early and Late Classic periods. Since the discovery in 2021 of a carved frieze with a dedicatory...
The Chocholá Style: Expanding the Corpus, Part 2 (2023)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Chocholá style ceramics were part of a Late Classic northern Maya complex of luxury goods that identified the social status and political affiliation of their owners. Vessels in the style are distinguished by their deeply carved iconographic panels, distinctive formatting, and unique dedicatory formulae. Their recognizability—a necessary component of the...
Chocolate, Manioc, and Maize: Kante’t’u’ul and Chachaklu’um in Motul de San José’s Realm (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Ancient Maya Embedded Economies" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Between 2013 and 2015, the Periphery of Motul de San José Archaeological Project conducted fieldwork at two subsidiary sites, Kante’t’u’ul and Chachaklu’um, located within 5 km of Motul de San José, the primary Late Classic center in this zone along the northern shore of Lake Peten Itza. Paleoethnobotanical and chemical residue analyses have highlighted...
Circum-Atlantic Responses to the Late Antique Little Ice Age (536-660 CE) (2024)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Studies of North Atlantic cultures around the margins of the Bermuda Azores Subtropical High offer opportunities to observe parallel impacts on cultures on both sides of an ocean on four continents (Americas, Eurasia, Africa) as changes in global average temperatures influence the size and position of the High. Of special interest is the influence of the...
Cities on the Cutting Edge: Urban Research in Belizean Archaeology (2024)
This is an abstract from the "“The Center and the Edge”: How the Archaeology of Belize Is Foundational for Understanding the Ancient Maya" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Archaeologists’ views of the breadth and depth of precolumbian Maya urbanism, and Mesoamerican urbanism more broadly, have been repeatedly revolutionized by archaeological researchers in Belize. The first National Science Foundation funding for Maya archaeology centered on...
City of the Centipede, Part 1: Context, Boundaries, Community Organization, and Land-Use at El Peru-Waka', Peten, Guatemala (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Part I of II. The Waka’ Archaeological Project (PAW) has conducted over a decade of archaeological investigations documenting the modification, layout, use, and chronology of monumental and residential landscapes of the Classic lowland city of El Perú-Waka’. These papers will evaluate current theoretical and methodological perspectives of ancient Classic Maya...
City of the Centipede, Part 2: Urban Development and Construction Chronologies at El Perú-Waka’, Petén Guatemala (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Part II of II. The Waka’ Archaeological Project (PAW) has conducted over a decade of archaeological investigations documenting the modification, layout, use, and chronology of monumental and residential landscapes of the Classic lowland city of El Perú-Waka’. These papers will evaluate current theoretical and methodological perspectives of ancient Classic Maya...