New Investigations on the Northeast Coast of Honduras

Summary

As part of the Central American Isthmus, Honduras adopted a special role in prehispanic America. Together with Nicaragua, the territory of modern Honduras functioned as a bridge between the culture areas of Mesoamerica and the Intermediate Area. In spite of that unique situation, archaeological investigations in Honduras have been focusing on the western, Mesoamerican part, especially on the Maya city of Copan. In contrast, cultural developments in the east remain largely unknown. With the goal to enlarge the data base about the settlement history and cultural developments of that zone, archaeological excavations were realized for the first time in Guadalupe, near Trujillo, on the northeast coast of Honduras. The first excavation campaign revealed an extended settlement with a central platform, dating in the upper layers to the late Postclassic Period (Cocal). The unexpected abundance of artifacts (ceramics, obsidian, shell, greenstone, etc.) will allow to refine the existing artifact typologies and chronologies. These first results permit preliminary ideas about the characteristics of archaeological sites in that region and about their relations within an interregional exchange network.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Nica News: Recent Archaeological Research in Nicaragua   •
• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)

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Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 16726