Maya Archaeology

Plants and Caves in Ancient Maya Society

by Christopher Morehart

Situating Power and Locating Knowledge: A Paleoethnobotanical Perspective on Late Classic Maya Gender and Social Relations

by Christopher Morehart

Ritual exchange and the fourth obligation: ancient Maya food offering and the flexible materiality of ritual

by Christopher Morehart

Complexities of Collapse: Maya Obsidian as Revealed by Social Network Graphical Analysis (Mark Golitko, James Meierhoff, Gary M. Feinman, and Ryan Williams, 2012)

by Gary Feinman

Antiquity 86:507-523

The Fourth Obligation: Food Offerings in Caves and the Materiality of Sacred Relationships

by Christopher Morehart

Ancient Textile Remains from Barton Creek Cave, Cayo District, Belize

by Christopher Morehart

Wood of the Gods: The Ritual Use of Pine (Pinus sp.) by the Ancient Lowland Maya

by Christopher Morehart

Complexities of Collapse: the evidence of Maya obsidian as revealed by social network graphical analysis

by Mark Golitko

Antiquity, June 2012, with James Meierhoff, Gary M. Feinman, and Patrick Ryan Williams

The First Direct Evidence of Pre-Columbian Sources of Palygorskite for Maya Blue

by Gary Feinman

A Compare and Contrast between Temple I of Tikal and the Temple of Inscriptions of Palenque

by Andreas Michaelas

The Context of Ancient American Violence

by Stanley Serafin

in press in Journal of Iberian and Latin American Research

Book review of:

El Sacrificio Humano en la Tradición Religiosa Mesoamericana, edited by Leonardo López... more Book review of:

El Sacrificio Humano en la Tradición Religiosa Mesoamericana, edited by Leonardo López Luján and Guilhem Olivier, Mexico City, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia / Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas, 2010.

Latin American Indigenous Warfare and Ritual Violence, edited by Richard J. Chacon and Rubén G. Mendoza, Tucson, University of Arizona Press, 2007.

Warfare in Cultural Context: Practice, Agency, and the Archaeology of Violence, edited by Axel E. Nielsen and William H. Walker, Tucson, University of Arizona Press, 2009.

Blood and Beauty: Organized Violence in the Art and Archaeology of Mesoamerica and Central America, edited by Heather Orr and Rex Koontz, Los Angeles, Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press, 2009.

The Need For Others: Why The West Wants the Maya

by Richard Wilk

This paper was prepared for the XV ICAES 2K3
Humankind/Nature Interaction: Past, Present and Future
Florence (ITALY) July 5th – 12th, 2003
It was never delivered - my mother was dying and I stayed in the USA.
But given the furor over 2012 - how timely the paper appears now!

This paper is about the role of global power relationships in the writing of the past. In the name of science,... more
This paper is about the role of global power relationships in the writing of the past. In the name of science, European culture has long aspired to write 'world history' from a particular viewpoint. Mayan peoples were caught up in this system as representatives of a particular romantic project that criticizes the inauthentic nature of modernity. The writings of Mahler, Thompson, and Gann about modern and ancient Maya people are full of morally-laden arguments about the virtues and pitfalls of civilization. Over time, this romantic project has been transformed and transmuted in fascinating ways. All of these processes of manipulation and interpretation can be understood within a framework I have called "common difference." This is a process that narrows down the discussion of how 'we' are different from 'them' to a few crucial dimensions of contrast. "Otherness" is thereby perceived only along the scales developed by social scientists. In the case of the Maya these scales pertain exclusively to religion, technology, and the arts. In the process, all the other degrees of difference (including things like quality of life and poverty) fall into the background or disappear. In consequence, even when modern Mayan peoples argue for the equality or superiority of their culture, they must do so along avenues already mapped and paved by social science. 

Maya Hunting Sustainability: Perspectives from Past and Present

by Linda A. Brown

(2012) Kitty F. Emery and Linda A. Brown. In, The Ethics of Anthropology and Amerindian Research: Reporting on Environmental Degradation and Warfare. R.J. Chacon and R.G. Mendoza (eds). Springer Press, pp. 79-116

Journey from the Ancient Maya Tomb: Ropes, Roads, and the Point of Departure

by Kerry Hull

The cosmogonic symbolism of the corbeled vault in maya architecture

by Kerry Hull

Proyecto Arqueológico Cotzumalguapa: Informe de la Temporada 2002

by Oswaldo Chinchilla

Report of archaeological research at Cotzumalguapa, Escuintla, Guatemala (El Baúl, Bilbao, El Castillo). Submitted to... more Report of archaeological research at Cotzumalguapa, Escuintla, Guatemala (El Baúl, Bilbao, El Castillo). Submitted to the Instituto de Antropología e Historia de Guatemala.

Proyecto Arqueológico Cotzumalguapa: Informe de la Temporada 1999-2000

by Oswaldo Chinchilla

Report of archaeological research at Cotzumalguapa, Escuintla, Guatemala (El Baúl, Bilbao, El Castillo). Submitted to... more Report of archaeological research at Cotzumalguapa, Escuintla, Guatemala (El Baúl, Bilbao, El Castillo). Submitted to the Instituto de Antropología e Historia de Guatemala.

Proyecto Arqueológico Cotzumalguapa: Informe de la Temporada 1996-1997

by Oswaldo Chinchilla

By Oswaldo Chinchilla Mazariegos and Sonia Medrano

Report of archaeological research at Cotzumalhuapa, including rescue excavations at El Baúl in 1996-1997. Report of archaeological research at Cotzumalhuapa, including rescue excavations at El Baúl in 1996-1997.

The Quest For Life Consciousness, Immortality, and Death in The Maya Creation Myth, The Popol Vuh

by Louise Simone

A Jungian analysis of the Quiche Maya creation myth the Popol Vuh A Jungian analysis of the Quiche Maya creation myth the Popol Vuh

The Context and Significance of Copper Artifacts in Postclassic and Early Historic Lamanai, Belize

by Scott Simmons

co-authored with David M. Pendergast and Elizabeth Graham. Journal of Field Archaeology 2009

We consider the archaeological contexts in which copper objects have been recovered at the ancient Maya site of... more We consider the archaeological contexts in which copper objects have been recovered at the ancient Maya site of Lamanai in northern Belize and the significance these objects had for the residents of the community during Postclassic (ca. AD 950-1544) and Spanish Colonial (post 1544) times. More copper objects have been recovered from controlled archaeological contexts at Lamanai than any other site in the southern Maya lowlands Area. Bells make up the majority of the assemblage during the centuries just prior to and during historical times, but high status objects such as rings and clothing ornaments found in elite burials dominate in the Early Postclassic Period. All of these objects were imported from outside the Maya area. Utilitarian objects, including needles, axes, and fish hooks are found in a variety of contexts during Late Postclassic and Spanish Colonial times, as are bells and rings. Production materials, including prills, axe blanks, and pigs/ingots, in addition to mis-cast objects that are production failures, also appear during this time. Nearly all of the copper objects found at Lamanai are distinctly Mesoamerican in form and design, and based on metallurgical analyses it appears that manufacturing technologies were distinctly Mesoamerican as well. The presence of production materials and mis-cast pieces, along with the results of chemical compositional and microstructural analyses, support the idea that the Maya at Lamanai were engaged in the on-site production of copper objects by late precolumbian times.