<html>Human Bones in the Maya Tool Box at Ucanal, Petén, Guatemala: Isotope Analyses and <i>Chaîne Opératoire</i></html>
Author(s): Camille Dubois-Francoeur
Year: 2025
Summary
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2025: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.
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The excavations carried out in 2018 and 2019 at Ucanal, a site located in the Maya Lowlands of Guatemala, unearthed the remains of a bone tool workshop dating to the Late Classic period (AD 600-900). It was primarily composed of production waste in which a large proportion of the worked bones were human (up to 40 %). Human bones, along with the white-tailed deer and other animals, appear to have been preferentially selected by Ucanal’s crafters to make a variety of tools. Although instances of human bone use is documented across Mesoamerica, fewer examples were found in the Maya region. Our understanding of such a practice is often limited to ornamental objects and ritual contexts. Therefore, the making of utilitarian objects using human bones as raw material is poorly documented. A comparative analysis between the chaîne opératoire of the animal and human bones shows no significant differences between treatment of both type of raw materials. In addition, strontium (<sup>87</sup>Sr/<sup>86</sup>Sr) and oxygen (δ<sup>18</sup>O) isotopic data, collected from isolated human teeth in the deposit, point to a mostly local origin of the human remains. ***This presentation will include images of human remains.
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Cite this Record
Human Bones in the Maya Tool Box at Ucanal, Petén, Guatemala: Isotope Analyses and Chaîne Opératoire. Camille Dubois-Francoeur. Presented at The 90th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. 2025 ( tDAR id: 511076)
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Abstract Id(s): 53450