Ritual and Symbolism (Other Keyword)

DOCUMENT Citation Only Sarah Newman.

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. The practice of human sacrifice is one of the defining traits of ancient Mesoamerica, at least according to the modern imagination. But painted objects, carvings, and codices reveal that nonhuman animals often served as sacrificial victims as well. Were some classes or species of animals...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Jodi Jacobson. James Ramsey.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Animal bone was utilized for more than subsistence purposes. Most non-subsistence use has been focused on utilitarian tools. Bone-use beyond subsistence and utilitarian tool use is rarely identified or considered for its cultural impact or implications. Often it is difficult to identify in the archaeological record, and is frequently overlooked, with its...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Steve Davis. Knut Rassmann.

This is an abstract from the "On the Periphery or the Leading Edge? Research in Prehistoric Ireland" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Brú na Bóinne World Heritage Site is known globally for its middle Neolithic passage tombs, in particular the 'megatombs' of Knowth, Dowth and Newgrange. However, the area also possesses one of the highest densities of late Neolithic monuments in the henge tradition anywhere in the world. These comprise a variety...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Stephen Yerka. Russell Townsend.

This presentation explores the ways in which 3D reconstruction can succeed as an innovative platform for both archaeological study and public engagement using a case study from the Hiwassee River watershed, North Carolina. The project, initiated by the Tribal Historic Preservation Office (THPO), Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI), involves an effort to repair a vandalized petroglyph panel. The rock art panel is a complex composition of incised, interwoven petroglyphs from which a 1.5 m...

DOCUMENT Citation Only José Luis Punzo Díaz. Miguel Alberto Ibarra López. Jakob Sedig.

This is an abstract from the "Looking to the West: New insights into Postclassic Archaeology in Michoacán" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This poster will present the first results from the bioarchaeological analysis of more than half a ton of human skeletal remains recovered from the ossuary of the ancient city of Tzintzuntzan on the shores of Lake Patzcuaro in the state of Michoacán, Mexico. In addition to conventional morphological analysis,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Katelyn Bishop.

As one of the only classes in the animal kingdom capable of flight, birds are privy to a realm of movement that humans can only partially control. Birds possess specific traits and engage in a variety of behaviors that directly affect the mechanics of capture and use, such as gregariousness and flock size, preferences in nesting and feeding locations, wing strength and readiness to flush, and aggressiveness and territoriality. Human-bird relationships also move beyond the semantics of capture to...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Katelyn Bishop.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Birds have remained one of the most symbolically valued animals in human cultures, from prehistoric past to ethnographic present, and across the globe. Especially in the North American Southwest, whole birds and their parts have been an integral part of Pueblo ceremonial life for centuries. Their ritual and symbolic value has been demonstrated both...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kirby Farah.

This is an abstract from the "After Dark: The Nocturnal Urban Landscape & Lightscape of Ancient Cities" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Populated by as many as 200,000 people, the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan—like most cities—was buzzing with activity through the night. Given the dynamism of the city, and especially weighed against our modern understanding of the sounds and lights that keep cities alive during the night, it is significant that one...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Christine Ward.

This is an abstract from the "Coloring the World: People and Colors in Southwestern Archaeology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. "Color" often evokes thoughts of vibrancy, boldness, and distinctiveness. With no denigration or judgement of the area intended, a casual visitor to the Jornada region may not be left with such impressions. Miles of exposed sands, stark mountains, and sparse vegetation do not immediately bring images of bright and unique...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Myles Miller.

This is an abstract from the "Sacred Southwestern Landscapes: Archaeologies of Religious Ecology" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Among prehispanic and historic societies of the American Southwest and Mesoamerica, mountains and caves had multivalent metaphorical and symbolic meanings relating to underworld, ancestors, water, and emergence. Mountains and caves are featured among origin and emergence myths and many contemporary Pueblo societies...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Danielle Romero.

This is an abstract from the "Local Development and Cross-Cultural Interaction in Pre-Hispanic Southwestern New Mexico and Southeastern Arizona" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Designs on Mimbres pottery have long fascinated archaeologists. These complex geometric and figurative images can shed light on daily activities, household organization, and groups of potters. Excavations at the Elk Ridge Site, a large Classic Mimbres pueblo in the northern...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Michael Adler.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In May 1988, reconstruction activity at the historic mission church at Picuris Pueblo by community members found a small stone box covered with a mano (grinding stone) and containing 27 items, including 18 religious medallions, four metal crucifixes, three crucifixes with inset glass beads, and three thin metal rings. This paper considers the origins and...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kaitlin Ahern.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In 2013 and 2014, a series of excavations were conducted on Structure 9 at the Preclassic period center of Cival. Structure 9 is the western radial pyramid associated with the site’s central E-Group complex. These excavations uncovered a series of caches, termination rituals, and deliberate destruction of architectural features across five major phases of...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Nora Rodríguez Zariñán. Christopher W. Schwartz. Ben Nelson.

This is an abstract from the "Journeying to the South, from Mimbres (New Mexico) to Malpaso (Zacatecas) and Beyond: Papers in Honor of Ben A. Nelson" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The presence of canids (members of the biological family Canidae, including dogs, wolves, coyotes, and foxes) at the archaeological site of La Quemada in Zacatecas, Mexico has been established through multiple lines of evidence, including broad representation in...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Robin Singleton. Karissa Hughes. Ron Van Den Bussche. Nawa Sugiyama. Courtney Hofman.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Excavations of the Moon and Sun Pyramids (1998-2004) at Teotihuacan have yielded both human and animal sacrifices, interred as part of state rituals. These rituals demonstrated the power of the state, and the species chosen reflected that power. Isotopic and zooarchaeological analyses of the sacrificed animals show that some of them were held for extended...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Cameron L. McNeil.

Pollen analysis of Classic-period temple and tomb spaces in Copan’s Acropolis revealed a range of plants important to ancient Maya ritual practice. Some of these species were not represented in macroremains in ritual or household contexts. Scholars have described temple spaces as thick with the odor of burned offerings and copal, but added to this would also have been the fresh and heady fragrance of blooming buds and greenery, adding a fecund perfume to the areas of ritual supplication. These...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kathy Durand. Jeremy Loven.

This is an abstract from the "25 Years in the Casas Grandes Region: Celebrating Mexico–U.S. Collaboration in the Gran Chichimeca" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The prehistoric inhabitants of the Casas Grandes region of northwest Chihuahua, Mexico, exploited a wide range of local and non-local fauna. This paper explores the value of different animal species throughout the prehistory of this region and how various animals were utilized for daily...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Nancy Peniche May. Lilia Fernandez Souza.

How does a building become architecture of power? How can this power be release or lost? There are many ways in which a building can be imbued with certain attributes that allow expressing and regulating unequal power relations. Along with the form and style of buildings, ritual is perhaps one of the most important means. Through ritual performance, actors imbue the building with the ch'ulel, ensouling and animating it; obliged the ch'ulel to leave the building, killing the animate construction,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kiri Hagerman.

This paper investigates transformations in the construction and expression of gender in the Basin of Mexico from the late Middle Formative through Classic periods (approx. 600 BC- AD 600). Ceramic figurines from the sites of Teotihuacan, Axotlan, Cerro Portezuelo, and Huixtoco are used to explore how elements of gender were constructed and communicated in the region over the course of a millennium, and how these practices underwent a radical transformation during the emergence and expansion of...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kirk French.

Although arriving early to an event and consuming food and beverages outside of an arena arguably has its origins in ancient Rome and Greece, the popular and ritualized tailgating associated with American college football is a behavior that warrants archaeological investigation. The Tailgating Behavior Project is attempting to better understand these communal events through ethnographic interviews and garbological/archaeological surveys at Penn State’s Beaver Stadium at University Park,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Jackeline Quinonez.

This is an abstract from the "Heat, Steam, and Health: The Archaeology of the Mesoamerican Pib Naah (Sweat Baths)" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In recent times, sweat baths are customary within Indigenous communities of the Guatemalan highlands; specifically, in the Ixil population, in places such as la sierra de Los Cuchumatanes, San Gaspar Chajul, San Juan Cotzal, and Santa María Nebaj. This region is known for its cold climate due to its...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Jill Neitzel.

This paper investigates whether hatched designs on Hohokam red-on-buff ceramics symbolized colors other than the red that was used to paint them. This idea is an extension of previous research done on Ancestral Pueblo and Mogollon black-on-white pottery. J.J. Brody initiated these investigations with his suggestion that hachure on Chaco ceramics from northwest New Mexico represented the color blue-green. Stephen Plog subsequently confirmed this hypothesis by comparing the colors and designs on...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Brigitte Faugere.

This is an abstract from the "Polychromy, Multimediality, and Visual Complexity in Mesoamerican Art" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In Northwestern Mesoamerica, polychromy is a characteristic of Chupicuaro pottery during the Late Formative. It is the case for the hollow figures whose decoration is obtained by overlapping geometric motives painted in white and black on a red background. The figurines were also polychrome, even if the paints...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Rebecca Friedel. M. Kathryn Brown.

The importance of fire in Maya rituals is well-known, both archaeologically and ethnographically. Fire, which is symbolic of the life cycle in Maya ideology, has been used as a means of communicating with the supernatural world in order to manage specific aspects of everyday life, such as the success of the agricultural season. In the archaeological record, we find evidence for ancient fires as features consisting mostly of burnt plant remains, some of which resemble modern Maya fire altars both...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Zachary Hruby. Jaime Awe. Christina Halperin. Catharina Santasilia.

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. Two recently discovered ritual deposits from the eastern Maya Lowlands seem to reveal similarities in the kinds of eccentrics used in Late Classic Maya caches from different political centers. Upon closer examination, however, they...