Maya Funerary Diversity: A Nonlinear Perspective from Palenque, Chiapas

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Ancient Maya land is characterized by a great diversity of funerary practices. The settlement of Lakamha’ (Palenque) sharply evidences such heterogeneity: pluralism is found in terms of places of inhumation, types of containers, number of people per grave, grave goods, postmortem treatments, positions, and orientations of the body. Nonetheless, a little more than half of the burials share a basic pattern: primary inhumation in a container (monumental to very simple) of one person extended on the back, arms alongside the body, head to the north, with clay pots. The vast majority of the burials present non-taphonomical movements that demonstrate human activity taking place inside the graves after the first burying event. Funerary treatment does not seem to depend on sex, but age categories do demonstrate distinct practices and subadults are scarce. In archaeo-thanatology, such funerary diversity is usually interpreted as the presence of distinct populations in the same geographical area. The absence of various identifiable models suggests that Lakamha’ could have been a sacred city where communities, family nuclei or corporative groups of similar cultural forms but different geographical origins congregated periodically. Other elements such as the type of agriculture practiced and Lakamha’s topographic situation support such a perspective.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Recent Archaeological Investigations in Chiapas, Mexico   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 39049.0