Meaghan Peuramaki-Brown

Key to archaeological research is our ability to recognize and define material-culture patterns and organize such patterns in time and space. Since 2014, the Stann Creek Regional Archaeology Project (SCRAP) has focused on understanding processes of settlement development and growth at the Ancestral Maya town of Alabama in East-Central Belize, constructed and occupied primarily during the transition period between the late facet of the Late Classic to Terminal Classic periods. While we may never know precisely who settled Alabama and why, we aim to answer questions about the where, when, and how of its development in our ongoing research. In following these lines of inquiry, we have had to grapple with several obstacles that have frustrated standard practices of building archaeological chronologies at the site. Such barriers include earthen-core architecture with minimal artifact refuse within platform cores. Additionally, local and regional soil conditions that result in a poorly preserved and highly fragmentary ceramic assemblage and no preservation of human or faunal remains to date. Finally, we face the difficulties of constraining the radiocarbon calibration curve during the primary period of Alabama's settlement and growth. This paper details these problems and outlines our various approaches in their confrontation.

While ubiquitous among ancient Maya sites in Mesoamerica, archaeological analysts frequently overlook the interpretive potential of ground stone tools. The ancient Maya often made these heavy, bulky tools of coarse-grained, heterogeneous materials that are difficult to chemically source, unlike obsidian. This paper describes an application of handheld, energy-dispersive X-ray fluorescence (XRF) to provenance ground stone artifacts (tools and architectural blocks) composed of granite: a nonhomogenous, phaneritic stone. We present a multicomponent methodology that independently tested whole-rock, thin-sectioned, and powdered samples by petrographic microscope, conventional, lab-based XRF, and portable XRF units,

The ceramic assemblage at the Classic Period Maya site of Alabama, Belize is poorly preserved and fragmentary. Most of the pottery cannot be classified using standard type-variety approaches, which privilege decoration and surface treatment. The nature of the Alabama ceramic assemblage requires a classification system organized by paste wares, as opposed to incorporating paste composition as a modal or analytical unit that crosscuts types and wares, as this is the only attribute that can be reliably evaluated across all contexts. We identified and systematically described paste groups as a first step toward a typology organized by ceramic paste wares. We analysed 100% of ceramics from settlement surface collection at the site, including non-diagnostic samples, using a scaffolded approach that integrates macroscopic observations, Dino-Lite USB microscopy, and thin section petrography. This approach facilitates the analysis of pottery from all contexts, regardless of the degree of preservation. Incorporating paste composition into classification schemes provides important data on pottery production traditions and the people responsible for their production, which cannot be determined from stylistic analyses alone. We established five new paste groups indicative of local and non-local pottery production. Our approach to ceramic classification provides a method that can be applied to any archaeological site, regardless of the prevailing classification system in place, and is especially relevant to sites with poorly preserved ceramic assemblages dominated by non-diagnostic sherds.

Since the late 1800s, significant archaeological exploration and investigation has been undertaken in what is now the Stann Creek District of Belize. While typically grouped with sites of the Toledo District under the label of "Southern Belize," as will be discussed, there is much that serves to differentiate the inland Maya sites of Stann Creek District from their neighbours to the south. Following Graham (2001) and Peuramaki-Brown (2017), in this paper we find it useful to differentiate the Stann Creek District as a separate material culture sub-region of the eastern Maya Lowlands. This sub-region has become an important focus for the study of resource acquisition and the movement of goods between identified highland and lowland zones along coastal and inland trade routes and communication corridors, but also in the revisiting of topics such as population movements and displacements, particularly during the Late to Terminal Classic periods. In the spirit of the theme of this RRBA volume-focused on the northern and southern reaches of Belize-this paper, essentially a literature review, briefly summarizes the 100+ years of exploration and archaeology of the ancient Maya that has taken place in the Stann Creek District.

Ancient Maya material culture can be investigated from the perspective of ritual economy as a means to interpret the dynamic interrelationships between economic processes and the use of objects in ritual activities. Such interrelationships include access to raw materials, control of production and consumption, and the legitimate use of objects in various activities, including rites and performances, as constituted through a culture’s worldview. This paper presents an exploration of the relationship between obsidian blades and bloodletting in Maya ritual contexts from the perspective of ritual economy, highlighting the use of blades in Actun Uayazba Kab (Handprint Cave) in Western Belize. The roles of producers, consumers, practitioners, and observers are examined in terms of gender, status, and power by tracing the functional and ideological characteristics of obsidian blades, as both objects used to let blood and as symbols of bloodletting, based on evidence derived from microscopic use-wear analysis and iconography. Ethnographic and ethnohistoric information is employed to assist in contextualizing ancient Maya ritual activity in caves and to provide a cultural lens to reconstruct how bloodletting was connected to resource production and consumption, the creation and maintenance of identity, and the allocation of power among Maya participants through ritual.

Stone tool producers in the Maya Lowlands had several types of raw materials from which to choose. Limestone, chert, and obsidian are the most naturally abundant, whereas chert and obsidian outnumber limestone in archaeological contexts. The presence of flaked-stone tools made of limestone is typically attributed to the scarcity of more suitable raw materials. Nevertheless, in chert-rich areas, such as the upper Belize River valley, limestone bifaces and production debitage are present. To understand their presence, we examine limestone biface production and use at Buenavista del Cayo.

High-resolution airborne lidar has been employed in the Maya lowlands to examine landscape modifications, detect architectural features, and expedite and expand upon traditional settlement surveys. Another potentially beneficial—and to-date underutilized—application of lidar is in the analysis of water management features such as small reservoirs and household storage tanks. The urban center of Yaxnohcah, located within the Central Karstic Uplands of the Yucatan Peninsula, provides an ideal test case for studying how the residents of this important Maya community managed their seasonally scarce water resources at the household scale. We employ an integrative approach combining lidar-based GIS analysis of 24 km 2 of the site area, ground verification, and excavation data from five small depressions to determine their function and the role they may have played in water management activities. Our research shows that some, but not all, small depressions proximate to residential structures functioned as either natural or human-made storage tanks and were likely an adaptive component of expanding Middle Preclassic to Classic period urbanization at the site. Thus, while lidar has revolutionized the identification of topographical features and hydrologic patterns in the landscape, a combination of ground verification and archaeological testing remains necessary to confirm and evaluate these features as potential water reservoirs.

This study proposes a sampling method for ground-truthing LiDAR-derived data that will allow researchers to verify or predict the accuracy of results over a large area. Our case study is focused on a 24 km 2 area centered on the site of Yaxnohcah in the Yucatan Peninsula. This area is characterized by a variety of dense tropical rainforest and wetland vegetation zones with limited road and trail access. Twenty-one 100 x 100 m blocks were selected for study, which included examples of several different vegetation zones. A pedestrian survey of transects through the blocks was conducted, recording two types of errors. Type 1 errors consist of cultural features that are identified in the field, but are not seen in the digital elevation model (DEM) or digital surface model (DSM). Type 2 errors consist of features that appear to be cultural when viewed on the DEM or DSM, but are caused by different vegetative features. Concurrently, we conducted an extensive vegetation survey of each block, identifying major species present and heights of stories. The results demonstrate that the lidar survey data are extremely reliable and a sample can be used to assess data accuracy, fidelity, and confidence over a larger area. Este trabajo propone un método de muestreo a fin de contrastar en el terreno los datos obtenidos a partir de imágenes LiDAR, que permitan al investigador verificar y/o predecir la precisión de los resultados sobre un área mayor. El estudio de caso aquí presentado se centra en el sitio de Yaxnohcah, ubicado en la Meseta Cárstica Central de la península de Yucatán. Está área se caracteriza por presentar una variedad de densos bosques tropicales húmedos y zonas de vegetación de humedal con pocos accesos de caminos y brechas. Para este estudio se seleccionaron veintiún bloques de 100 por 100 metros del área, que comprendió una muestra estratificada del 10 por ciento, e incluyeron ejemplos de varias zonas de vegetación distinta. Se realizó un recorrido de superficie por transectos a lo largo de los bloques, registrándose dos tipos de errores. Los Errores del Tipo 1 consisten de rasgos culturales identificados en campo, pero que no aparecen en el los Modelos Digital de Elevación (MDE) o en el Modelo de Superficie Digital (MSE). Los Errores de Tipo 2 consisten en rasgos que parecen culturales en el MDE o MSE, pero que en realidad son causadas por diferentes tipos de vegetación. De manera concurrente, realizamos un extenso reconocimiento de la vegetación en cada bloque, identificando las principales especies presentes, las diferentes alturas de dosel, así como las características generales de la topografía y los suelos. Los resultados del método de contrastación en el terreno demuestran que los datos lidar son sumamente confiables y es posible utilizar una muestra a fin de evaluar la precisión, la veracidad y la certidumbre de los datos sobre un área mayor.

In this contribution, we report on the 2007 season of the Mopan Valley Archaeological Project. The 2007 season had two goals. First, it sought to better understand Buenavista del Cayo’s East Plaza, including its layout, use, and history. To accomplish that, we employed shovel testing, remote sensing, extensive excavations, microartifact analysis, and soil chemistry analysis. The results show the plaza was significantly remodeled during the Late Classic period to create zones of low cobble platforms, some organized around walkways, that were demarcated by large linear stone features. Macroartifact patterning reveals that the highest densities of ceramic and lithic materials were found in different areas, suggesting distinct activity zones within the plaza. The season’s second goal was to understand the history and socioeconomic composition of the settlement zone immediately south of Buenavista’s site core. Mapping and testing revealed 19 mapped sites, including housemounds, terraces, and possible check-dams. The artifacts and architecture revealed through testing suggest a range of socio-economic status. Occupation of this zone begins in the Preclassic; peaks in the Late Classic, reaching a maximum in the early part of that period; declines slightly into the later Late Classic; and drops precipitously in the Terminal Classic.

The Mopan Valley Archaeological Project seeks to understand the social, political, and economic dynamics of the Mopan valley of western Belize in light of the competition between the valley’s major political centers and the valley’s changing natural environment. Since 2007, the project has investigated the Buenavista del Cayo East Plaza to evaluate the hypothesis that it served as the site’s marketplace. The results of shovel testing, remote sensing, extensive excavations, microartifact analysis, and soil chemistry analysis are all consistent with the marketplace hypothesis during the Late Classic period. It has also surveyed and tested the settlement zone immediately south of the site’s monumental core. The sites discovered include housemounds, terraces, check-dams, and a possible administrative group. The materials recovered show a range of socio-economic positions, from quite poor to quite wealthy. Testing suggests that the population reaches its maximum in the early part of the Late Classic period, declines slightly later in that period, and then drops. In this paper, we integrate data recovered from these two lines of inquiry in 2008 within a larger synthetic discussion of the site’s changing social and economic organization in the Late and Terminal Classic periods.

Classic Maya civilization was characterized by a complex economy in which exchanges at centralized marketplaces were one way that people obtained the goods they needed and wanted, both for daily activities and less frequent events and practices.  Archaeologists often infer marketplace exchange indirectly using a distributional approach that examines the degree of homogeneity in the consumption of utilitarian goods among households of differing statuses.  Less frequently, scholars have studied marketplace venues themselves.  In this paper, we present data from both a marketplace and consuming households to reconstruct the economies centered at the site of Buenavista del Cayo.  We present evidence that indicates marketplace exchange, including household consumption and production practices, and identification of a marketplace venue.  Based on these analyses, we propose that Buenavista householders obtained local and non-local domestic goods such as chert and limestone bifaces, obsidian blades, and organic goods through marketplace exchange, while other goods, in particular polychrome painted pottery, circulated through vertical exchange systems such as gifting.  These findings demonstrate a complex economic network of a Classic Maya polity.

Peri-urban zones of settlement are unique localities among the urban-rural continuum that form due to dispersed urban growth, creating hybrid landscapes of fragmented urban and rural characteristics. Within these zones, domestic-scale reservoirs that the ancient Maya modified and maintained to manage their seasonally-scarce water resources are an important component. This study focuses on processes of multiple nuclei urban development and associated peri-urban formation at the site of Yaxnohcah in southern Campeche, Mexico, with particular emphasis on the collaborative research on residential and small water reservoirs situated between the Alba and Fidelia complex groups. Yaxnohcah is located in the middle of the Central Karstic Uplands, a region in the Yucatán Peninsula known for its large, early urban centers. The extended period of occupation at the site (c. 1000 BCE-850 CE) combined with a distinct, dispersed, multiple nuclei settlement pattern provide an excellent opportunity to investigate questions concerning early urban development and its dynamic connections to local environmental and integrative processes. Our research to-date (2011-) adopts both higher and lower scale approaches—using lidar-derived imagery and investigating massive platforms, smaller urban houselots, and household tanks—to advance our awareness of early urban development in this area of the central Maya lowlands.

The Mopan River valley was home to a number of pre-Hispanic Maya polities, including both political centers and rural communities. The forests and plant products grown in the region played crucial roles in the lifeways of these Maya, providing food, fuel, construction materials, and medicine. This paper presents preliminary results from the analysis of macrobotanical remains recovered through flotation by the Mopan Valley Archaeological Project and Mopan Valley Preclassic Project. These plant remains come from the polity and settlements of Buenavista del Cayo.  They derive from a variety of archaeological contexts, including commoner residences, pibs, and middens. Temporally, the samples span various important transformations in the valley’s social history including a political florescence during the Late Classic period, and the collapse of divine kingship associated with a large-scale depopulation of the area in the Terminal Classic period. The results will be discussed in terms of what they reveal about elite and commoner lifeways and broader sociopolitical dynamics.

Archaeology is traditionally a hands-on, in-person discipline when it comes to formal and informal instruction; however, more and more we are seeing the application of blended and online instruction and outreach implemented within our discipline. To this point, much of the movement in this direction has been related to a greater administrative emphasis on filling university classrooms, as well as the increasing importance of public outreach and engagement when it comes to presenting our research. More recently, we have all had to adjust our activities and interactions in reaction to physical distancing requirements during a pandemic. Whether in a physical classroom or online, archaeologists must learn to properly leverage digital technology in order to create enthusiastic, engaging, respectful, and accessible (from-place and in-place) learning environments. This article brings together scholars who are learning to do just that. We apply a usable and easily navigated framework for archaeologists to consider while in either formal or informal educational environments and provide examples of how digital technologies can be applied to satisfy the three “presences”—social/emotional, teaching, and cognitive—required for a successful “community of inquiry” experience in archaeology. Examples are drawn from our personal experiences in North America, Central America, and Europe.

While ubiquitous among ancient Maya sites in Mesoamerica, archaeological analysts frequently overlook the interpretive potential of ground stone tools. The ancient Maya often made these heavy, bulky tools of coarse-grained, heterogeneous materials that are difficult to chemically source, unlike obsidian. This paper describes an application of handheld, energy-dispersive X-ray fluorescence (XRF) to provenance ground stone artifacts (tools and architectural blocks) composed of granite: a nonhomogenous, phaneritic stone. We present a multicomponent methodology that independently tested whole-rock, thin-sectioned, and powdered samples by petrographic microscope, conventional, lab-based XRF, and portable XRF units,