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The Maya World brings together over 60 authors, representing the
fields of archaeology, art history, epigraphy, geography, and
ethnography, who explore cutting-edge research on every major facet
of the ancient Maya and all sub-regions within the Maya world. The
Maya world, which covers Guatemala, Belize, and parts of Mexico,
Honduras, and El Salvador, contains over a hundred ancient sites
that are open to tourism, eight of which are UNESCO World Heritage
Sites, and many thousands more that have been dug or await
investigation. In addition to captivating the lay public, the
ancient Maya have attracted scores of major interdisciplinary
research expeditions and hundreds of smaller projects going back to
the 19th century, making them one of the best-known ancient
cultures. The Maya World explores their renowned writing system,
towering stone pyramids, exquisitely painted murals, and elaborate
funerary tombs as well as their creative agricultural strategies,
complex social, economic, and political relationships, widespread
interactions with other societies, and remarkable cultural
resilience in the face of historical ruptures. This is an
invaluable reference volume for scholars of the ancient Maya,
including archaeologists, historians, and anthropologists.
The Maya World brings together over 60 authors, representing the
fields of archaeology, art history, epigraphy, geography, and
ethnography, who explore cutting-edge research on every major facet
of the ancient Maya and all sub-regions within the Maya world. The
Maya world, which covers Guatemala, Belize, and parts of Mexico,
Honduras, and El Salvador, contains over a hundred ancient sites
that are open to tourism, eight of which are UNESCO World Heritage
Sites, and many thousands more that have been dug or await
investigation. In addition to captivating the lay public, the
ancient Maya have attracted scores of major interdisciplinary
research expeditions and hundreds of smaller projects going back to
the 19th century, making them one of the best-known ancient
cultures. The Maya World explores their renowned writing system,
towering stone pyramids, exquisitely painted murals, and elaborate
funerary tombs as well as their creative agricultural strategies,
complex social, economic, and political relationships, widespread
interactions with other societies, and remarkable cultural
resilience in the face of historical ruptures. This is an
invaluable reference volume for scholars of the ancient Maya,
including archaeologists, historians, and anthropologists.
The flood of archaeological work in Maya lands has revolutionized
our understanding of gender in ancient Maya society. The dozen
contributors to this volume use a wide range of methodological
strategies archaeology, bioarchaeology, iconography, ethnohistory,
epigraphy, ethnography to tease out the details of the lives,
actions, and identities of women of Mesoamerica. The chapters, most
based upon recent fieldwork in Central America, examine the role of
women in Maya society, their place in the political hierarchy and
lineage structures, the gendered division of labor, and the
discrepancy between idealized Mayan womanhood and the daily
reality, among other topics. In each case, the complexities and
nuances of gender relations is highlighted and the limitations of
our knowledge acknowledged. These pieces represent an important
advance in the understanding of Maya socioeconomic, political, and
cultural life and the archaeology of gender and will be of great
interest to scholars and students.
For the ancient Maya, food was both sustenance and a tool for
building a complex society. This collection, the first to focus
exclusively on the social uses of food in Classic Maya culture,
deploys a variety of theoretical approaches to examine the meaning
of food beyond diet-ritual offerings and restrictions, medicinal
preparations, and the role of nostalgia around food, among other
topics. For instance, how did Maya feasts build community while
also reinforcing social hierarchy? What psychoactive substances
were the elite Maya drinking in their caves, and why? Which dogs
were good for eating, and which breeds became companions? Why did
even some non-elite Maya enjoy cacao, but rarely meat? Why was meat
more available for urban Maya than for those closer to hunting
grounds on the fringes of cities? How did the molcajete become a
vital tool and symbol in Maya gastronomy? These chapters, written
by some of the leading scholars in the field, showcase a variety of
approaches and present new evidence from faunal remains,
hieroglyphic texts, chemical analyses, and art. Thoughtful and
revealing, Her Cup for Sweet Cacao unlocks a more comprehensive
understanding of how food was instrumental to the development of
ancient Maya culture.
Everyday Life in the Classic Maya World introduces readers to a
range of people who lived during the Classic period (200–800 CE)
of Maya civilization. Traci Ardren here reconstructs the individual
experiences of Maya people across all social arenas and
experiences, including less-studied populations, such as elders,
children, and non-gender binary people. Putting people, rather than
objects, at the heart of her narrative, she examines the daily
activities of a small rural household of farmers and artists,
hunting and bee-keeping rituals, and the bustling activities of the
urban marketplace. Ardren bases her study on up-to-date and diverse
sources and approaches, including archaeology, art history,
epigraphy, and ethnography. Her volume reveals the stories of
ancient Maya people and also shows the relevance of those stories
today. Written in an engaging style, Everyday Life in the
Classic Maya World offers readers at all levels a view into the
amazing accomplishments of a culture that continues to fascinate.
This volume represents the final report of the Selz Foundation
Yaxuna Archaeological Project at the Precolumbian Maya center of
Yaxuna, Yucatan, Mexico from 1986 to 1996. This volume contains
summaries of all survey data, excavations, artifact analyses, and
current interpretations. Contents: 1) Introduction; 2) Background
to the investigations; 3) The natural setting; 4) Chronology
(Yaxuna Ia (750/500 B.C.-250 B.C.), Yaxuna Ib (250 B.C.-A.D. 250),
Yaxuna IIa (A.D. 250-A.D. 400), Yaxuna IIb (A.D. 400-A.D. 550),
Yaxuna IIc (A.D. 550-A.D. 600), Yaxuna III (A.D. 600-700/730),
Yaxuna IVa (A.D. 700/730-A.D. 900/950), Yaxuna IVb (A.D. 900/950-
A.D. 1100/1200), Yaxuna V (1100/1200-1400?), Yaxuna VI (?)), 5)
Excavations; 6) Conclusions; Appendices.
This volume illuminates human lifeways in the northern Maya
lowlands prior to the rise of Chichen Itza. This period and area
have been poorly understood on their own terms, obscured by
scholarly focus on the central lowland Maya kingdoms. Before
Kukulkan is anchored in three decades of interdisciplinary research
at the Classic Maya capital of Yaxuna, located at a contentious
crossroads of the northern Maya lowlands. Using bioarchaeology,
mortuary archaeology, and culturally sensitive mainstream
archaeology, the authors create an in-depth regional understanding
while also laying out broader ways of learning about the Maya past.
Part one examines ancient lifeways among the Maya at Yaxuna, while
part two explores different meanings of dying and cycling at the
settlement and beyond-ancestral practices, royal entombment and
desecration, and human sacrifice. The authors close with a
discussion of the last years of occupation at Yaxuna and the role
of Chichen Itza in the abandonment of this urban center. Before
Kukulkan provides a cohesive synthesis of the evolving roles and
collective identities of locals and foreigners at the settlement
and their involvement in the region's trajectory. Theoretically
informed and contextualized discussions offer unique glimpses of
everyday life and death in the socially fluid Maya city. These
findings, in conjunction with other documented series of skeletal
remains from this region, provide a nuanced picture of the social
and biocultural dynamics that operated successfully for centuries
before the arrival of the Itza.
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