Boundary Dynamics between Chichen Itza and Ek Balam

Summary

Social boundaries of the past and present are usually nebulous, contested, and fluid. In this paper we examine the ancient towns and villages between the two Maya kingdoms of Chichen Itza and Ek Balam in northern Yucatam. We hypothesize that the boundary area between these two cities in the 9th century AD was based on Classic Maya concepts of ruler-centered polities but changed dramatically in the 10th century as Chichen Itza became a fundamentally different kind of Maya city the likes of which had never been seen before. As Ek Balam faded in power, smaller communities in the vicinity became tethered to Chichen Itza in a variety of ways. We focus our discussion on Ichmul de Morley, located halfway between Chichen and Ek Balam but supplement it with information from Santa Cruz, a small outlying site south of Ichmul that was the focus of our 2017 fieldwork.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 20140