Criss-Crossing Paths with Fred: Settlement and Subsistence from Colha to Maax Na

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Sessions in Honor of Dr. Fred Valdez Jr. and His Contributions to Archaeology, Part 1" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Despite working in large prehispanic Maya city centers such as Rio Azul, Fred Valdez to this day maintains that his strongest interest lies in small Maya communities and households. He is happiest when exploring how the average Maya lived, away from the pomp and circumstance of the ruling classes. My interests parallel his and our research has often dovetailed and intersected, from Colha, where we first worked together, to the Programme for Belize (PfB), where I now direct a project under his aegis. This paper explores settlement and subsistence practices in both locations, with a special focus in the PfB on Maax Na, a large city, and Bolsa Verde, its much smaller neighbor. It will compare and contrast the different ways people inhabited and used their landscape and their different methods of making a living at those sites. It will revisit past discoveries and present them in the light of current knowledge about the Maya. Both Colha and the sites in the PfB, including the two named, have contributed significantly to our 21st century view of the Maya. The paper will therefore also review past theories and the contributions work in these places, notably Fred’s, made to our current models.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Sessions in Honor of Dr. Fred Valdez Jr. and His Contributions to Archaeology, Part 1   •
• Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 52701