The Bolonchen Regional Archaeological Project: 25 Years of Research in the Puuc

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "The Bolonchen Regional Archaeological Project: 25 Years of Research in the Puuc" at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The Bolonchen Regional Archaeological Project (BRAP) will complete its twenty-fifth year of research in the Puuc Region of the northern Maya lowlands in 2024. Codirected by Tomás Gallareta Negrón, William Ringle, and George J. Bey III, the BRAP has addressed a wide range of issues relating to the development and evolution of social complexity in the Puuc. Project findings have demonstrated that monumentality emerged in the region as early as 800 BC and that the Puuc experienced its own trajectory of demographic ebbs and flows up through a Terminal Classic period population boom. Extensive lidar coverage has ushered in a new phase of research, expanding the territorial and theoretical scopes of the project. Pursuing an integrative and extensive regionwide approach, the BRAP has overseen investigations at the sites of Kiuic, Xocnaceh, Yaxhom, Huntichmul, Muluchtzekel, Kom, and Paso del Macho, among others. Beyond its scholarly contributions, the BRAP has implemented a community engagement and environmental stewardship approach through its management of the Kaxil Kiuic Biocultural Reserve. In this session, BRAP-affiliated archaeologists review research milestones, present syntheses of findings from 25 years of research, and offer a vision for the next quarter-century of archaeological investigations in the Puuc region.