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Mexico’s southern state of Quintana Roo is often perceived by archaeologists as a blank spot on the map of the Maya world, a region generally assumed to hold little of interest thanks to its relative isolation from the rest of Mexico. But salvage archaeology required by recent development along the “Maya Riviera,” along with a suite of other ongoing and recent research projects, have shown that the region was critical in connecting coastal and inland zones, and it is now viewed as an important area in its own right from Preclassic through post-contact times. The first volume devoted to the archaeology of Quintana Roo, this book reveals a long tradition of exploration and discovery in t...
L'éditeur indique : "This book explores how the Mayans gave value to commodities through the lens of anthropology and archaeology."
Hidden Dimensions is a collection of essays drawn from papers presented at an international conference in Vancouver, British Columbia in April 1995. Scholars from around the globe examine several aspects of wetland archaeology in North America, Mexico, Europe, eastern Siberia, and New Zealand. Some of the essays in this volume explore environmental and historical contexts of wet-sites as well as past human adaptation to wetland environments. Others concentrate on the contributions of wetland archaeology to reconstructions of cultural history and the interpretation of unique perishable materials. In addition to discussions on the dynamic nature of wetlands and concern about the future of the cultural resources they contain, the authors look at practical issues of land management and object conservation. In Hidden Dimensions the authors seek to raise awareness of the significance of wetland archaeology issues at a time when wetlands around the globe are rapidly shrinking and their cultural contents are at risk of disappearing.
The flat, dry reaches of the northern Yucat‡n Peninsula have been largely ignored by archaeologists drawn to the more illustrious sites of the south. This book is the first volume to focus entirely on the northern Maya lowlands, presenting a broad cross-section of current research projects in the region by both established and up-and-coming scholars. To address the heretofore unrecognized importance of the northern lowlands in Maya prehistory, the contributors cover key topics relevant to Maya studies: the environmental and historical significance of the region, the archaeology of both large and small sites, the development of agriculture, resource management, ancient politics, and long-di...
"In recent years the Three Rivers region of Belize and Guatemala has been the site of some of the most intensive archaeological research in the Maya Lowlands, providing a wealth of regional data. This volume brings together articles reporting on findings and interpretations of the Programme for Belize Archaeological Project that range over a 10- to 12-year period and that shed new light on how ecology, economy, and political order developed in the ancient past.".
In recent years the Cochuah region, the ancient breadbasket of the north-central Yucatecan lowlands, has been documented and analyzed by a number of archaeologists and cultural anthropologists. This book, the first major collection of data from those investigations, presents and analyzes findings on more than eighty sites and puts them in the context of the findings of other investigations from outside the area. It begins with archaeological investigations and continues with research on living peoples. Within the archaeological sections, historic and colonial chapters build upon those concerned with the Classic Maya, revealing the ebb and flow of settlement through time in the region as peoples entered, left, and modified their ways of life based upon external and internal events and forces. In addition to discussing the history of anthropological research in the area, the contributors address such issues as modern women’s reproductive choices, site boundary definition, caves as holy places, settlement shifts, and the reuse of spaces through time.
The essays collected here offer important new reflections on the multiple images of and rhetoric surrounding the rain forest. The slogan “Save the Rain Forest!”—emblazoned on glossy posters of tall trees wreathed in vines and studded with monkeys and parrots—promotes the popular image of a marvelously wild and vulnerable rain forest. Although representations like these have fueled laudable rescue efforts, in many ways they have done more harm than good, as these essays show. Such icons tend to conceal both the biological variety of rain forests and the diversity of their human inhabitants. They also frequently obscure the specific local and global interactions that are as much a part...
The Oxford Handbook of Mesoamerican Archaeology provides a current and comprehensive guide to the recent and on-going archaeology of Mesoamerica. Though the emphasis is on prehispanic societies, this Handbook also includes coverage of important new work by archaeologists on the Colonial and Republican periods. Unique among recent works, the text brings together in a single volume article-length regional syntheses and topical overviews written by active scholars in the field of Mesoamerican archaeology. The first section of the Handbook provides an overview of recent history and trends of Mesoamerica and articles on national archaeology programs and practice in Central America and Mexico writ...
The ancient Maya shaped their world with stone tools. Lithic artifacts helped create the cityscape and were central to warfare and hunting, craft activities, cooking, and ritual performance. 'The Technology of Maya Civilization' examines Maya lithic artefacts made of chert, obsidian, silicified limestone, and jade to explore the relationship between ancient civilizations and natural resources. The volume presents case studies of archaeological sites in Guatemala, Mexico, Belize, and Honduras. The analysis draws on innovative anthropological theory to argue that stone artefacts were not merely cultural products but tools that reproduced, modified, and created the fabric of society.
Human activity during centuries of occupation significantly altered the landscape inhabited by the ancient Maya of northwestern Belize. In response, the Maya developed new techniques to harvest the natural resources of their surroundings, investing increased labor and raw materials into maintaining and even improving their ways of life. In this lively story of life in the wetlands on the outskirts of the major site of La Milpa, Julie Kunen documents a hitherto unrecognized form of intensive agriculture in the Maya lowlandsÑone that relied on the construction of terraces and berms to trap soil and moisture around the margins of low-lying depressions called bajos. She traces the intertwined h...