Rani T. Alexander Digital Archive

DOCUMENT Full-Text Brandon McIntosh.

Through evolutionary ecology and niche construction theory, animal exploitation among the inhabitants of Postclassic Isla Cilvituk (A.D. 900-1520) is explored in light of both subsistence and market strategy. An ecological approach is taken to understand how local ecosystems influenced animal exploitation in relation to hunting strategies and market trade at Isla Cilvituk and other sites across the Maya Lowlands. An ecological approach also contributes relevant data to aid in modern conservation...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Sandra Andrade.

To better understand the role of globalization in culture change, this thesis investigates how the growing global economy of the twentieth century has affected the Maya community of Silvituc, Campeche, Mexico, and how those influences are reflected in the archaeological record. By applying both a macro-scale and microscale approach this study demonstrates how wage labor and surrounding land developments, such as the introduction of a highway, have been incorporated into a subsistence-based...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Erin R. Schmidt.

This paper presents archaeological and historical evidence of the changing roles of haciendas in the Mexican economy during the nineteenth century in Yucatán. Specifically, this paper looks at how haciendas changed before and just after the Caste War of Yucatán through the examination of hacienda site structures, population data, and material culture comparisons. Haciendas are agricultural estates that are maintained by a wealthy land-owner and a lower-class labor force to supply...

DOCUMENT [not managed] Full-Text Rani T Alexander.

The social transformations produced by rapid industrialization and expansion of henequen production in the late nineteenth century in western Yucatan were not what happened in Maya-speaking communities further to the east. The Gilded Age in eastern Yucatan was attenuated because communities suffered the protracted aftershocks of the Caste War of Yucatan (1847-1901), which may have repressed wealth disparities instead of heightening them. In this paper, I examine the archaeology of haciendas and...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Briana Bianco.

According to historic documents and scarce archaeological data, apiculture with the stingless bee, Melipona beecheii, was significant in the diet, economy, tribute, medicine, and ritual practices of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica. Current practices with stingless bees give us a frame of reference for interpreting archaeological data. This paper focuses on the ethnoarchaeological studies carried out in Yucatán, Mexico. Soil samples collected from underneath and near modern beehives, as well as samples...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Rani Alexander. Héctor Hernández Álvarez.

In this paper, we examine the changes in household ecology that resulted from the introduction of European domesticates to Yucatán after the Spanish invasion. New animals and plants were not adopted wholesale as a Euroagrarian suite in the sixteenth century. Instead, heterogeneous practices took root in highly altered demographic and environmental settings. Ecosystems were re-engineered as animals moved into new anthropogenic niches. We compare archaeological and ethnoarchaeological evidence of...

PROJECT Rani T Alexander.

With the permission of the Consejo de Arqueología, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, intensive archaeological survey, instrument mapping, and test excavations were carried out at Isla Cilvituk from 1994 to 1996. Isla Cilvituk is a large aggregated site, 50 hectares in size, located on an island in Laguna Silvituc and situated in a lacustrine zone that runs to the south from Lake Mocu, Campeche, to the Peten Lakes, Guatemala. We completed a 100 percent full-coverage survey of the...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Rani T Alexander. Elena Canché Manzanero. Richard Burleson. Hea Joo Chung. Juan Carlos Cruz. Michael Glascock. Sergio Hererra. Alejandra Gudino. John A. Hunter. Brian Fortunato. David Lentz. Amanda L. Martinez.

Con la autorización del Consejo de Arqueología, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, se llevó al cabo el trabajo de campo entre junio hasta agosto de los años 1994, 1995, y 1996. Los análisis del gabinete y del laboratorio se condujeron durante los meses en medio y los años subsecuentes. La primera fase del proyecto involucró el reconocimiento intensivo, el levantamiento y mapeo del sitio, y excavaciones de sondeo para determinar si era probable que las investigaciones de la...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Kristen L. Scudder.

Previous research in Mesoamerican fauna analysis has contributed insights into resource use, but Maya turtle use remains unexamined. Faunal analysis, zooarchaeology, vertebrate taphonomy, and behavioral archaeology provide a guideline into the past taphonomic and life histories of the turtle bones recovered from Isla Cilvituk (A.D. 900-1525). The primary objective of my research is to establish an archaeology model of exploitation of the small and large turtles recovered from Isla...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Sean T. Arata.

My main goal with this thesis was to create a sampling design, using Geographic Information Systems (GIS), which would allow me to determine the best datable contexts at Isla Cilvituk. Once this sampling design was created, I analyzed the spatial distribution of these datable contexts using the frequency of specimens divided by the total volume of each archaeological layer as a measurement of density (m3). This analysis was divided into two parts. The first analysis looked at the distribution...

PROJECT Rani T Alexander.

With the authorization of the Consejo de Arqueología, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH), we conducated investigations in historical archaeology of the towns of Ebtun, Kaua, Cuncunul, Tekom, and Tixcacalcupul and their related settlements situated in north-central Yucatan, Mexico. The purpose of the investigation is to document and explain changes in cultural practices and agrarian ecology in Maya-speaking communities from AD 1545 to 2000, comparing archaeological settlement...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Rani T Alexander. José Díaz Cruz. Adam Kaeding. Ruth Martínez Cervantes. Matthew Punke. Susan Kepecs.

Por medio de la autorización del Consejo de Arqueología, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH), se llevó a cabo el proyecto de investigación en la arqueología histórica del pueblo de Ebtún y los pueblos circundantes de Kaua, Cuncunul, Tekom, y Tixcacalcupul, localizados en la región norte-central de Yucatán, México (Figura 1). El propósito de la investigación fue desarrollar y profundizar el conocimiento de los cambios en las prácticas culturales y la ecología agraria en las...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Nina E. Williams.

This paper addresses the changes to the noria platform and to noria technology of north-central Yucatán. I question whether personal preference influenced differentiation of the technology or if specific utilitarian activities dictated more standardization through time. I use statistical analysis to determine if there is equal variance among the noria openings and platforms. By comparing three different property types (haciendas, ranchos, and conventos) the data indicates the noria...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Ruth Maria Martínez Cervantes.

This thesis analyzes the social and subsistence value of the freshwater gasptropod Pomacea spp. in Isla Cilvituk. This is a Postclassic (900 -1525 A.D.) archaeological site on the Maya lowlands. The site is located in Lake Silvituc, Campeche, Mexico. Freshwater resources, such as Pomacea sp., have been neglected from archaeological studies. Scholars have argued that these types of resources are of little importance to the diet, stating that these contain low nutritional value, and even excluding...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Richard L. Burleson.

The goal of any microwear analysis is to reconstruct as completely as possible the site economy. Once accomplished, such lithic data can then be incorporated into more complex interpretations concerning economic, social, and political organization. This research focuses on the obsidian and chert assemblage from the Postclassic Maya site Isla Cilvituk (AD 900-1545). A replica set of obsidian prismatic blades have been subjected to a full range of activities associated with prehispanic Maya...

DOCUMENT Full-Text Paisley C. Palmer.

The purpose of my thesis is to analyze the deer from the zooarchaeological assemblage recovered from the archaeological site of Isla Cilvituk, Campeche, Mexico, to determine if environmental depression affected Isla Cilvituk. Isla Cilvituk is a Maya archaeological site located in a lacustrine region on the Yucatán peninsula. Environmental depression is defined as the destruction of ecosystems by the mismanagement of resources and/or climate shifts. I focus on deforestation and animal...

DOCUMENT Full-Text John A. Hunter.

Zooarchaeological, taphonomic, and behavioral analyses offered insight into human-animal relationships at the Maya archaeological site, Isla Cilvituk (AD 900-1525), located in southwestern Campeche, Mexico. Taxonomic abundance, spatial analyses, and reconstruction of animal life histories provided evidence of taxonomic abundance; species are not statistically associated with elite and non-elite structure types, butchering and cut marks are evidence, differential disposal is not evident in...