Assessing Defensibility: Geospatial Analyses of Preclassic to Colonial Highland Maya Settlement Patterns

Summary

Postclassic Maya settlement patterns have long been explained in terms of the increasing defensibility in the transition from Classic period settlement patterns. Drawing on arguments for the increased militancy and conflict that characterized the Maya region in the wake of the Classic "collapse", this narrative has endured despite minimal cross-context, large scale assessment. This paper presents the results of a large-scale, in-progress diachronic geospatial analysis of Maya settlement patterns, defensibility and agrosuitability from Preclassic to Colonial periods. Working from Edwin Shook’s site survey data, we employ geospatial and statistical approaches to determine defensibility and its intersection with historic land use practices in order to provide cross-comparable and quantifiable data on changing site defensibility across multiple time periods and in different regions. While our results address and nuance defensibility and violence narratives, we also provide insight into the variable historical trajectories, experiences and motivations of diverse Maya communities reflected in heterogeneous settlement patterns.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)   •
• Maya Highland and Pacific Coast Archaeology: New Data, Debates, and Directions, Part 2

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 17345