Revisiting the Archaeology of Palenque: 25 Years after "The Children of the First Mother"

Summary

As the site of many of the epigraphic breakthroughs that fully brought the Classic Maya into realm of history, Palenque, Chiapas, Mexico holds an important place in Maya studies. In the Forest of Kings, Linda Schele and David Freidel brought together one of the first truly comprehensive descriptions of the history of a Classic period royal family. Perhaps more significantly, they put forth a narrative of dynastic legitimization through writing and monumental construction that has endured and been applied across the Maya lowlands. This paper will briefly review the impact of subsequent investigations and discoveries at the site on how archaeologists today interpret this narrative. While little was known about the archaeology of Palenque beyond the monumental core in 1990, research by several Mexican and foreign projects over the past 20 years has greatly expanded the scope of our understanding of the ancient city’s development and organization.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Contextualizing Maya History and Archaeology Part II: Reflections on the 25th Anniversary of Forest of Kings   •
• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage