Bones and Ritual among the Ancient Maya of Calakmul and Champotón, Campeche: Celebrating the Legacy of Dr. William Folan (1931–2022)

Summary

This is an abstract from the "A Session in Memory of William J. Folan: Cities, Settlement, and Climate" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The Mayanist community recalls a close colleague and tireless promoter of Maya archaeology, Dr. Folan. The Bioarchaeology Laboratory of the Autonomous University of Yucatan remembers him with great affection and a deep appreciation of a remarkable person, scholar, and student mentor. He ably led the archaeological explorations at the Maya sites of Calakmul and Champotón, Campeche, where a string of extraordinary findings and persistent interdisciplinary inquiries have enabled new interpretations of dynasties, climatic impact, and also ritualized treatments of the human body. These discussions and many more began in the nineties, at the legendary Maya Culture Meetings, an annual conference that Dr. Folan turned into a must-attend academic venue. In this contribution we present the most recent interpretation on physically embodied ritualized violence and public display at Champotón and Calakmul. Put into regional context, their joint reconstruction warrants novel insights on the underlying ritual sequences and their potential religious advocations.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• A Session in Memory of William J. Folan: Cities, Settlement, and Climate   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37262.0