Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico

Part of: Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The Mexican state of Chiapas contains a diversity of cultural regions and ecological zones—Maya and Mixe-Zoque; highland, lowland, and coastal. In spite of the presence of several large projects, such as those focused on Palenque and the Grijalva Valley, there are large swaths of Chiapas that have been almost totally overlooked, and any understanding of Chiapan archaeology is fragmented and focused on the better-known sites. In this session, scholars will discuss the results of their recent investigations in diverse parts of the state. Papers can be in English or Spanish.

Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-15 of 15)

  • Documents (15)

Documents
  • The Archaeoacoustics of Tenam Puente, Chiapas, Mexico: Auditory Monitoring of an Ancient Monumental Zone (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Elizabeth Paris. Gabriel Laló Jacinto. Roberto López Bravo.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Current research on ancient Maya cities is radically revising our knowledge of their economies. Scholars are beginning to identify the archaeological remains of marketplaces, currencies, and other elements of extensive commercial exchange. However, the surveillance of ancient economic spaces and institutions is rarely investigated...

  • El Jovero: Investigating Political Frontiers on the Usumacinta River (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only G. Van Kollias.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The borders and frontiers of ancient communities provide a rich opportunity to examine the effects of social and political change. These interstitial spaces are often conceptualized as part of a polity body but may be better understood as spaces of continual change and reorganization, positioning these communities as active rather...

  • Espacios subterráneos en Yaxchilán: Las cuevas como elementos modeladores del paisaje constructivo (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Ileana Echauri. Christophe Helmke.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. A lo largo de tres temporadas de campo el “Proyecto Investigación Arqueológica en Yaxchilán y su entorno. Área del Meandro en el Usumacinta”, se ha centrado en realizar el reconocimiento de superficie de toda el meandro sobre la que se asienta Yaxchilán. Como parte de este proyecto, se detectaron alrededor de 20 pequeñas cuevas con...

  • Evidence of Maya Metalworking from Mensabak, Chiapas, Mexico (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Christopher Hernandez. Josue de Jesús Gómez Vázquez.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Evidence of precolumbian Maya metallurgy is increasingly coming to light with numerous finds occurring in the Guatemalan highlands and the northern part of the Yucatan peninsula. In this paper, we present new evidence of Maya metallurgy from the Mensabak region of Chiapas, Mexico, that dates to the Late Postclassic / early Spanish...

  • Locating Sak B’alam: Preliminary Research on the Last City of the Lakandon Ch’ol (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Yuko Shiratori. Brent Woodfill. Josuhé Lozada Toledo. Rubén Núñez Ocampo. Socorro Jiménez Alvarez.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. According to the ethnohistorical sources, the Lakandon Ch’ol managed to maintain their independence from Spanish colonialism for over a century somewhere in the forest, after the Spanish seizure of their capital in 1586. They founded a new center called Sak B’alam, which was finally conquered by the Spaniards in 1695. Sak B’alam...

  • Maya Funerary Diversity: A Nonlinear Perspective from Palenque, Chiapas (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Alizé Lacoste Jeanson.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ancient Maya land is characterized by a great diversity of funerary practices. The settlement of Lakamha’ (Palenque) sharply evidences such heterogeneity: pluralism is found in terms of places of inhumation, types of containers, number of people per grave, grave goods, postmortem treatments, positions, and orientations of the body....

  • Maya Pilgrimage to Interactive Places: Human Bones in Caves at Mensabak, Chiapas (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Josuhé Lozada. Joel Palka. Alizé Lacoste Jeanson.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This presentation focuses on the anthropology of pilgrimage as a journey to places outside of everyday realms. For Maya societies, pilgrimages are important for maintaining the relationships between people and nonhuman persons linked to the ritual landscape. In this context, the presence of human bones in caves around the lakes at...

  • Perplexing Landscapes: The Role of Natural Landscape Features in Late Preclassic Site-Design of Noh K’uh in Chiapas, Mexico (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Santiago Juarez.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Late Preclassic (400 BC–AD 250) ceremonial center of Noh K’uh was designed in a quincunx pattern to commemorate the importance of cardinality and cosmological symbols. This kind of architectural design was commonplace in Preclassic Mesoamerica, as the earliest populations shaped their ceremonial spaces in reverence to natural...

  • Political Dynamics through the Discourse of the Baah Sajal of Yaxchilan (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Pilar Regueiro Suarez.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. During the eighth century, the stone monuments of Yaxchilán and its area of influence recurrently recorded individuals with the title sajal, a position associated with leaders of corporate groups with functions related to the government of peripheral sites, administration, war, and circulation of goods. Among all the sajals of...

  • Settlement and Political Ecology in the Lower Lacantun River Landscape (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Whittaker Schroder.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Over three field seasons, the Lower Lacantun Archaeological Project has examined the political organization and settlement of the region surrounding the confluence of the Lacantun and Usumacinta Rivers in Chiapas, Mexico. This riverine landscape is unique in the Western Lowlands, presenting risks and opportunities related to...

  • Sugar, Alcohol, and Toys: Uses and Changes in Pottery Following the Spanish Conquest of Comitán, Chiapas, Mexico (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Ramon Folch.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Following the work presented in SAA 2023 about identifying specialized potters in the Comitán Valley of Chiapas, a study of change brought by the Spanish conquerors is presented. The local potters had to innovate as their work was integrated into sugar cane processing via the molds or “pilónes” used to crystalize sugar as well as...

  • Turtles, Faces, and Hieroglyphs: 3D Recording of Monuments from La Tortuga and San Isidro (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Mary Kate Kelly. Caitlin Earley. Brent Woodfill.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The adoption of 3D digital recording strategies at archaeological sites yields numerous benefits: detailed preservation of data while the original may be at risk of damage or erosion, increased visibility of small details, and precise tracking of change over time, to name a few. Additionally, there are nearly limitless...

  • Visualizing Salt Production below, above, and on the Ground in Ixtapa, Chiapas, Mexico: Insights from Ethnography, Aerial Photogrammetry, and Geochemistry (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Brent Woodfill. Lauren Norton. Abigail Rowell. Scott Werts. Socorro Jiménez Álvarez.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Ixtapa saltworks in highland Chiapas have the distinction of being one of the last Precolumbian saltworks in the interior Maya world that is still in use, and members of Proyecto Arqueológico Sak B’alam y Salinas del Interior de Chiapas and Winthrop University’s Environmental Studies Program have been conducting investigations...

  • Water Mountain, Ritual, and Maya Community Cohesion at Mensabak, Chiapas, Mexico (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Adriana Sanchez Balderas. Joel Palka.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Maya established communities at Mensabak, Chiapas, instead of other adjacent lakes because of its impressive water mountain on an island where a major river is born. People traveled and pilgrimaged up the Tulijá River to live near Mirador Mountain (Chakaktun “red-hollow stone / cave-of water” in Lacandon Mayan) where they...

  • Women Elites in the Royal Court of Tonina, Chiapas (2024)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Ángel Sánchez Gamboa. Esther Parpal Cabanes.

    This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. New hieroglyphic and iconographic evidence allows us to preliminary reconstruct women’s political hierarchy inside Tonina’s royal court during the Late Classic period. As it is well known, parentage statements are very scarce in the inscriptions of Tonina and limited to maternal ancestry. Aside from the importance of local female...