And here’s the NEWS from Xnoha! Understanding Maya settlement and Early Anthropocene Landscape Modifications at a small Maya center.

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Ancient Maya Landscapes in Northwestern Belize, Part I" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Xnoha is a small Maya center in northwestern Belize that has seen two phases of investigation since it was recorded in 1990. While current research is largely focused on the Central Precinct or kawik, we have also invested much energy in the outlying groups of monumental architecture and settlement.

Xnoha is located in a heavily dissected zone east of the Alacranes Bajo and north of the Dumbbell Bajo. The Central Precinct and associated Elite Residential Groups are located on a broad hilltop with four other such areas surrounding it in each of the cardinal directions. Each of these, NEWS groups, are residential groups with approximately 100 residences in each. Each residence is bounded by low albarradas, which may have formed bases for larger "living walls". These functioned to define residential space and possibly land ownership. Each bounded area was also large enough to support household level agricultural production tying each household into larger market systems.

At the bases of these hilltop residential groups are ditched intensive agricultural systems that likely were controlled by the ruling elites of Xnoha and would have employed labor from the surrounding settlement zone.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Ancient Maya Landscapes in Northwestern Belize, Part I   •
• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 23955