Maya (Other Keyword)
126-150 (495 Records)
It has long been known in the Andean region that the communal projects of temple constructions and public rituals played an important role in social formation during the pre-ceramic period. Recent archaeological investigations in Mesoamerica are revealing comparable processes. Various ceremonial centers in Mesoamerica appear to have developed before the establishment of maize agriculture and fully sedentary communities. At the lowland Maya center of Ceibal, Guatemala, a formal ceremonial complex...
Did restructuring at the end of the Maya Classic period include the beginnings of private land tenure? (2016)
The archaeological study of land tenure in non-literate societies is methodologically complex. However, by examining situations before, during and after transitions, insight can be gained. The end of the Maya Classic period, complexes of field walls were built, especially in coastal locations. These appear to not have water control or land management functions but instead delineate space similarly to house lots in contemporary, but traditional, Maya villages. Land tenure at the center of Blue...
Discerning Patterns of Intentional and Unintentional Movement of Human Bones in Maya Caves (2016)
The caves of Central Belize were used extensively by the Maya, primarily during the Late Preclassic and Classic periods (approx. 300 BC to AD 900). Archaeological investigations of human bone deposits in these caves typically seek to identify specific mortuary rituals, often based on analogy with ethnohistoric, epigraphic, and artistic sources, and to interpret these behaviors within broader sociopolitical and environmental contexts. However, because of the long history of cave use in the area...
Dissecting the Heart of a Puuc Royal Court: A Diachronic Analysis of Structure N1065E1025 and Associated Deposits at Kiuic, Yucatán. (2015)
Research on the site of Kiuic, in the Puuc region of the Yucatán Peninsula, has recovered evidence of a long and continuous period of building activity that dates from approximately 700 B.C. to A.D. 900. The construction sequence of Structure N1065E1025, a nine meter temple-pyramid located at the center of the site, evidences episodic changes that transformed the building from a raised platform in the Middle Preclassic to the center of a royal court in the Late Classic and finally a ceremonial...
Dissertation - Community Identity and Social Practice during the Terminal Classic Period at Actuncan, Belize (2015)
This research examines the relationship between the ways in which urban families engaged local landscapes and the development of shared identities at the prehispanic Maya city of Actuncan, Belize. Such shared identities would have created deep historical ties to specific urbanized spaces, which enabled and constrained political expansion during the Terminal Classic period (ca. A.D. 800–900), a time when the city experienced rapid population growth as surrounding centers declined. This research...
Distribution of Organic Residues in a Pottery Vessel from Cerro Maya, Belize (2016)
A reconstructed pottery cooking vessel dating to the Late Preclassic period from the ancient Maya site of Cerro Maya, Belize was sampled for absorbed organic residues. Samples were taken from multiple locations to look for differences in their distribution. Three interior regions –rim, mid-body and base—were sampled along with one from an exterior basal location as a control to evaluate for possible contaminants. Samples were processed using a high pressure liquid extraction technique for...
Diversity of Wetland Form, Historical Ecology, and Human Use in the Maya Lowlands: The View from the Yalahau Wetlands (2015)
Two major freshwater wetland systems of the eastern Maya Lowlands are the riverine-associated wetlands around the New and Hondo Rivers of northern Belize, and the wetlands of the Yalahau region of northern Quintana Roo, Mexico, which are found in karstic depressions associated with the Holbox fracture zone. Both of these wetland systems are linked directly to the freshwater aquifers of the respective regions. In northern Belize the nature and timing of ancient Maya manipulation of the wetlands...
Don Pablo, Cha Chaak Ceremonies, and Archaeological Interpretation (2015)
Don Pablo Canul, a Yucatec Maya h’men living in the village of Yaxunah, appears in vignettes throughout A Forest of Kings. Participation in ceremonies led by Don Pablo was a regular component of the Yaxuna Archaeological Research Project under the direction of David Freidel, and these experiences provided a strong and vibrant example of 20th century Maya culture in Forest of Kings. Many archaeological projects in Yucatan have collaborated with or employed the services of Maya h’men since the...
Dueñas de la memoria, guardianas de la historia: Mujeres Mayas, ritualidad y arqueología en el altiplano del territorio guatemalteco (2023)
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. En el contexto de pueblos invadidos y luego brutalmente colonizados en los territorios que conforman la actual República de Guatemala, las mujeres mayas juegan un papel fundamental en la preservación, transmisión y radicalismo de la cultura. Las mujeres mayas son las constructoras y guardianas del pensamiento, idiomas, valores, filosofías y...
The Dynamics of an Ancient Hegemony: How the Classic Snake Kingdom Rewrites the Story of lowland Maya Political Organization (2016)
The political organization of the Classic Maya has been a hotly contested topic for many years. Since the 1930s, interpretations have fluctuated between visions of large-scale centralized states and small-scale decentralized polities. However, the recognition of a particular body of data in the inscriptions - statements of royal subordination and allegiance - is giving rise to a new consensus that obviates this this well-worn dichotomy. This introductory paper will set the scene for this...
E-Groups and the Origins of Ancient Maya Exchange (2016)
Many communities in the Maya Lowlands began when residents banded together to create E-Groups by leveling bedrock, paving over large plazas, and building modest pyramidal architecture. This presentation traces the spread of E-Groups after 700 BC as a product of two trends: the replication of a primordial place characterized by solar movement and a central living mountain, and the social and commercial gathering of peoples to exchange goods and ideas on a regular basis. The people producing and...
The Early Ceramic History of Cahal Pech: Implications for Local Identity and for the Rise of Regionalism in the Maya Lowlands (2016)
Ongoing ceramic analysis at Cahal Pech have allowed for a more complete understanding of the Cunil Ceramic Complex that was originally defined by Awe in 1992. These data provide important information on the early inhabitants of the site and reflect the formation of new political strategies and identities. The innovation of ceramic manufacture and the display of specific symbols suggest that a rising elite was firmly in place by around 1000 B.C. in the Belize Valley. Recent finds suggest that...
Early Maya Script and Visual Culture: A Chronological and Geographical Reassessment (2015)
This paper presents evidence for a lowland origin of Maya hieroglyphic writing and iconography during the Late Pre-Classic period. It calls into question long-standing models of highland-lowland interaction that have assigned temporal priority of Maya monumental art and visual culture to the southern highlands and Piedmont region. In addition to the several known sculpted and inscribed monuments from the Peten region, archaeological evidence from the site of San Bartolo has revealed integrated...
Ecological and Paleoethnobotanical Research at the Programme for Belize Archaeological Project (2017)
Archaeological research requires interdisciplinary scholarship to answer broad questions relating to resilience, social complexity, climate, and environmental impacts in Mesoamerica throughout ancient Maya times and into the present. RBCMA, PfBAP, plant ecology, and paleoethnobotany have provided a platform to reconstruct ancient Maya landscapes, which delves into the nuances of human-environmental relationships in northwestern Belize. Ecological studies of the impacts of ancient Maya on soils,...
The Economic Landscape of Caracol, Belize (2016)
The economies of the ancient Maya did not exist in vacuums; rather, they were interconnected to each other. This paper details the way in which one of these economies functioned during the Late Classic Period (A.D. 550-900). Archaeological research at Caracol, Belize has been able to reconstruct how ancient Maya production and exchange systems were functioning within a large metropolitan area that serviced over 100,000 people. The population of Caracol maintained agricultural self-sufficiency on...
The Effect of Missionization on the Itza Maya from Isotopic and Biodistance Evidence (2015)
The Spanish victory over Itza factions in 1697 initiated a period of significant change in the Petén Lakes region, where the construction of Spanish missions and resettlement of indigenous populations likely altered patterns of population movement. We present trace element and isotopic values for eleven individuals buried in Structure T-31 at San Bernabé, a newly discovered mission near the modern town of San Miguel. Markedly different burial patterns, combined with new material culture, suggest...
The effects in a Maya community of school enrollment on young adult time allocation to activities dependent on traditional ecological knowledge (2017)
School enrollment in traditional communities potentially compromises young peoples’ participation in agro-ecological subsistence activities that encourage the development and practice of traditional ecological knowledge (TEK). Drawing on data from a Maya community located in Toledo District, Belize, we compared the time allocated to agro-ecological activities for school going (SG) or non-school going (NSG) male and female youth between the ages of 13 and 18 years. We find that SG males spend...
The Emergence of Ecological Knowledge in the Ancient Maya Yalahau (2016)
This paper explores how the ancient Maya of the Yalahau region generated and used ecological knowledge of their unique wetland environment in the Preclassic period. We approach ecological knowledge generation as a process that arises within the context of observable seasonal environmental events and changing and evolving pragmatic goals. Using paleoenvironmental reconstructions, we isolate the key seasonal events that would parametrically structure how environmental capacities could be...
The Emic, the Etic, and the Electronic: Digital Documentation in Northwestern Belize (2017)
Twenty-five years of archaeological research in northwestern Belize have yielded a robust regional database, allowing a rich and diverse picture of ancient Maya life to emerge. As part of this research, multiple projects have recently adopted innovative digital technologies using new methods to record and envision ancient sites in novel ways. This paper presents some of the ways in which researchers have engaged with digital technologies that allow for the collection of new types of data, as...
Entangled Ideologies on the Pacific Coast: the Teotihuacan-style Maya censers from the Department of Escuintla, Guatemala (2017)
Teotihuacan-style censers from the Pacific Coast of Guatemala are seminal markers of "international" interaction and ideology during the Early Classic Period (250-550 CE). But the paucity of archaeological data for this artifact class and the lack of recent in-depth analysis of their iconographic narratives leave unexplored a potential body of material concerning interaction, identity, and ideological shifts in this gateway region of southern Mesoamerica. Data from archaeological investigations,...
Entorno a la sal y el agua: Los conjuntos residenciales en el sitio Salinas de los Nueve Cerros, Guatemala (2015)
Salinas de los Nueve Cerros was a large Prehispanic center located at the edge of the Maya lowlands. It was founded atop the only non-coastal salt source in the lowlands and because of this was one of the most important cities during the Classic period. The site covered an area of over 30 km2 with an occupation that spanned the Middle Preclassic (ca. 800 BC) through the Postclassic (ca. AD 1200). Previous archaeological projects focused on salt production in the site core, while the present...
Entre genes y memes: estudios de paleogenética de poblaciones en el México antiguo (2017)
El centro de México ha sido una región de convergencia y tránsito de ideas y mercancías desde la época prehispánica. Los grandes centros urbanos del Clásico y del Posclásico se caracterizaron por un constante trasiego que alcanzó desde el actual centro de México hasta Centroamérica. La intensidad de este intercambio desde épocas muy tempranas consolidó el complejo cultural mesoamericano principalmente identificado por la iconografía. Sin embargo no sólo las ideas y las mercaderías viajan,...
Environmental and Socio-Environmental Dynamics in the Subtropical Maya Lowlands: Hydrosystems and Agrosystems of the Wetlands (bajos) around Naachtun (2016)
The eco-socio-system of the wetlands (bajos) situated around the city of Naachtun is studied in relation with the water and soil resources (availability, use, management), between environment, climate and societies. The objectives are to characterize the evolution of the hydrosystems and agrosystems during the last 3 millennia and particularly during the Classic Period. The approach is systemic and multi-scalar, based on interdisciplinary works with geoarchaeological, geomorphological,...
Environmental Legacy of Precolumbian Maya Mercury: Using the Present to Understand the Past (2023)
This is an abstract from the "2023 Fryxell Award Symposium: Papers in Honor of Timothy Beach Part I" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Mexico and Central American region has a history of mercury use that began at least two millennia before European colonization in the sixteenth century. Archaeologists have reported deposits of cinnabar (HgS) and other mercury materials at Classic period (ca. 250–900 CE) Maya settlements across the region;...
Establishing the Acropolis: Two Seasons of Excavation at Chan Chich (2015)
Open plaza spaces are a commonality among Maya sites. Excavating through the sealed contexts of these plaza surfaces can yield reliable data on the construction history of the site and how the space may have changed over time. This paper details the results from two seasons of excavations, which took place in May-June of 2012 and 2013 at the Maya site of Chan Chich in Northwestern Belize. Our investigations focused on the Upper Plaza, located at the acropolis of the site. Our investigations...