Acanmul is a medium-size center located at the north end of the Bay of Campeche about 25 km north... more Acanmul is a medium-size center located at the north end of the Bay of Campeche about 25 km northeast of the city of Campeche. Between 1999 and 2005, three independent sets of investigations and major architectural consolidation were carried out at the center by archaeologists from the Universidad Autónoma de Campeche (UAC), the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH), Centro Regional de Campeche, and UAC in collaboration with San Diego State University. These efforts produced a wealth of new information on the archaeology of the central Campeche coast, including new insights into the emergence and evolution of the northern slateware tradition and the architectural history of the central coast from Preclassic through Postclassic times. New data concerning changing relationships through time of the central coast Maya to both the interior central and southern lowlands and to the northern plains also were documented, as was the mid ninth century sacking of the center. This...
Nonmetric (morphological) and metric analyses of dental traits and dentition are an established a... more Nonmetric (morphological) and metric analyses of dental traits and dentition are an established and effective, but still much underutilized, means of determining biological relationships among the individuals comprising a population over several generations. Combining such dental analyses, a social organizational typology adapted from social psychology, and small sample statistics, this study hazards a trial examination of the evidence for biological affinity within and between three archaeologically perceived social groups represented in the Classic-period Belize Valley community of Buenavista del Cayo. The groups comprise traditional high elite and commoner categories, and a putative middle level of intermediate elites. Findings suggest a dichotomous kinship structure of elites and non-elites, but one within which there had emerged an emically and archaeologically distinct “middle” status group of intermediate elites or subelites that remained affined by blood to the subordinate n...
Until recently, an extensive area in the central lowlands of the Yucatán peninsula was completely... more Until recently, an extensive area in the central lowlands of the Yucatán peninsula was completely unexplored archaeologically. In 2013 and 2014, during initial surveys in the northern part of the uninhabited Calakmul Biosphere Reserve in eastern Campeche, Mexico, we located Chactún, Tamchén and Lagunita, three major Maya centers with some unexpected characteristics. Lidar data, acquired in 2016 for a larger area of 240 km2, revealed a thoroughly modified and undisturbed archaeological landscape with a remarkably large number of residential clusters and widespread modifications related to water management and agriculture. Substantial additional information was obtained through field surveys and test excavations in 2017 and 2018. While hydraulic and agricultural features and their potential for solving various archaeologically relevant questions were discussed in a previous publication, here we examine the characteristics of settlement patterns, architectural remains, sculpted monumen...
These three reports, prepared for the Delaware Department of Transportation to provide planning i... more These three reports, prepared for the Delaware Department of Transportation to provide planning information on the location of cultural resources within the Route 13 Corridor in Delaware, are based on an initial study (Custer et al., A Cultural Resource Reconnaissance of the Proposed Route 13 Highway Corridor, New Castle and Kent Counties, Delaware, 1984) in which known and predicted locations of prehistoric and historical-period archaeological sites in the corridor were plotted and a predictive model was developed utilizing LANDSAT imagery and logistical-regression statistical techniques. The two 1986 reports more closely examine sensitive areas in two parts of the Route 13 Corridor, using field surveys and several kinds of interpretive analyses to refine assessments of sites in these areas; goals were to test the predictive model and to instruct planning and management considerations for determination of final highway alignment. The 1987 document outlines research methods and questions that will guide Phase I/II archaeological investigations of the final alignment selected. The reports are written clearly, adequately illustrated, and profusely documented with tables, graphs, and appendices, enabling the reader to assess the authors' conclusions independently. Ground verification of the predictive model generally confirms its accuracy, although some refining is in order. For example, as the authors point out, finer resolution of the remote-sensing scanner is needed for bay/basin features, which are shown here to have been used extensively prehistorically, especially in the Woodland I period (3000 B.C.-A.D. 1000). Recorded site-location variables were utilized in several kinds of analyses, including factor analysis, discriminant analysis, and nearest-neighbor analysis. Based on these analyses, a number of topics for research questions were formulated that can be addressed specifically using data from these surveys and future investigations in the research area. Among these topics are the following: prehistoric use of bay/basin features; study of processes by which Woodland I societies were transformed from egalitarian to more complex ranked ones, including Adena; better understanding of the mid-postglacial xerothermic; factors governing historical-period site-location patterning, frontier dynamics and farmstead design; shift from subsistence to market-oriented agriculture; and role of transportation in settlementpattern shifts and market economy. The authors are to be commended for the way they have structured cultural-resource-management-planning tools within the settlement pattern and ecological research frameworks they have chosen for these studies.
Page 1. 772 A ME RICA N AN THR OPOL OGIS T [74, 1972 Embers start from the opposite tack of accou... more Page 1. 772 A ME RICA N AN THR OPOL OGIS T [74, 1972 Embers start from the opposite tack of accounting for the role of men in the productive process and conclude that since war (in the broad sense of institutionalized lethal ...
An interdisciplinary approach to Late Classic Maya polychrome-painted ceramics from Buenavista de... more An interdisciplinary approach to Late Classic Maya polychrome-painted ceramics from Buenavista del Cayo and Cahal Pech, Belize allows for preliminary observations relevant to a better understanding of elite pottery production and use in the western Belize Valley. The combination of typological and contextual data from archaeological investigations of ceramics along with art-historical stylistic analyses and ceramic-paste chemical-composition data identifies ordinary and special-purpose vessels excavated from palace-midden contexts as having been created in the same elite-oriented or “palace” workshop(s) at Buenavista del Cayo. The method allows for the identification of unslipped, monochrome, and polychrome pottery excavated from “palace” contexts at nearby Cahal Pech as products of the “palace” school workshop(s) at Buenavista del Cayo, which implies movement of the ruling elite of the site between the two locales. The method also allows for the identification of a group of multiph...
Acanmul is a medium-size center located at the north end of the Bay of Campeche about 25 km north... more Acanmul is a medium-size center located at the north end of the Bay of Campeche about 25 km northeast of the city of Campeche. Between 1999 and 2005, three independent sets of investigations and major architectural consolidation were carried out at the center by archaeologists from the Universidad Autónoma de Campeche (UAC), the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH), Centro Regional de Campeche, and UAC in collaboration with San Diego State University. These efforts produced a wealth of new information on the archaeology of the central Campeche coast, including new insights into the emergence and evolution of the northern slateware tradition and the architectural history of the central coast from Preclassic through Postclassic times. New data concerning changing relationships through time of the central coast Maya to both the interior central and southern lowlands and to the northern plains also were documented, as was the mid ninth century sacking of the center. This...
Nonmetric (morphological) and metric analyses of dental traits and dentition are an established a... more Nonmetric (morphological) and metric analyses of dental traits and dentition are an established and effective, but still much underutilized, means of determining biological relationships among the individuals comprising a population over several generations. Combining such dental analyses, a social organizational typology adapted from social psychology, and small sample statistics, this study hazards a trial examination of the evidence for biological affinity within and between three archaeologically perceived social groups represented in the Classic-period Belize Valley community of Buenavista del Cayo. The groups comprise traditional high elite and commoner categories, and a putative middle level of intermediate elites. Findings suggest a dichotomous kinship structure of elites and non-elites, but one within which there had emerged an emically and archaeologically distinct “middle” status group of intermediate elites or subelites that remained affined by blood to the subordinate n...
Until recently, an extensive area in the central lowlands of the Yucatán peninsula was completely... more Until recently, an extensive area in the central lowlands of the Yucatán peninsula was completely unexplored archaeologically. In 2013 and 2014, during initial surveys in the northern part of the uninhabited Calakmul Biosphere Reserve in eastern Campeche, Mexico, we located Chactún, Tamchén and Lagunita, three major Maya centers with some unexpected characteristics. Lidar data, acquired in 2016 for a larger area of 240 km2, revealed a thoroughly modified and undisturbed archaeological landscape with a remarkably large number of residential clusters and widespread modifications related to water management and agriculture. Substantial additional information was obtained through field surveys and test excavations in 2017 and 2018. While hydraulic and agricultural features and their potential for solving various archaeologically relevant questions were discussed in a previous publication, here we examine the characteristics of settlement patterns, architectural remains, sculpted monumen...
These three reports, prepared for the Delaware Department of Transportation to provide planning i... more These three reports, prepared for the Delaware Department of Transportation to provide planning information on the location of cultural resources within the Route 13 Corridor in Delaware, are based on an initial study (Custer et al., A Cultural Resource Reconnaissance of the Proposed Route 13 Highway Corridor, New Castle and Kent Counties, Delaware, 1984) in which known and predicted locations of prehistoric and historical-period archaeological sites in the corridor were plotted and a predictive model was developed utilizing LANDSAT imagery and logistical-regression statistical techniques. The two 1986 reports more closely examine sensitive areas in two parts of the Route 13 Corridor, using field surveys and several kinds of interpretive analyses to refine assessments of sites in these areas; goals were to test the predictive model and to instruct planning and management considerations for determination of final highway alignment. The 1987 document outlines research methods and questions that will guide Phase I/II archaeological investigations of the final alignment selected. The reports are written clearly, adequately illustrated, and profusely documented with tables, graphs, and appendices, enabling the reader to assess the authors' conclusions independently. Ground verification of the predictive model generally confirms its accuracy, although some refining is in order. For example, as the authors point out, finer resolution of the remote-sensing scanner is needed for bay/basin features, which are shown here to have been used extensively prehistorically, especially in the Woodland I period (3000 B.C.-A.D. 1000). Recorded site-location variables were utilized in several kinds of analyses, including factor analysis, discriminant analysis, and nearest-neighbor analysis. Based on these analyses, a number of topics for research questions were formulated that can be addressed specifically using data from these surveys and future investigations in the research area. Among these topics are the following: prehistoric use of bay/basin features; study of processes by which Woodland I societies were transformed from egalitarian to more complex ranked ones, including Adena; better understanding of the mid-postglacial xerothermic; factors governing historical-period site-location patterning, frontier dynamics and farmstead design; shift from subsistence to market-oriented agriculture; and role of transportation in settlementpattern shifts and market economy. The authors are to be commended for the way they have structured cultural-resource-management-planning tools within the settlement pattern and ecological research frameworks they have chosen for these studies.
Page 1. 772 A ME RICA N AN THR OPOL OGIS T [74, 1972 Embers start from the opposite tack of accou... more Page 1. 772 A ME RICA N AN THR OPOL OGIS T [74, 1972 Embers start from the opposite tack of accounting for the role of men in the productive process and conclude that since war (in the broad sense of institutionalized lethal ...
An interdisciplinary approach to Late Classic Maya polychrome-painted ceramics from Buenavista de... more An interdisciplinary approach to Late Classic Maya polychrome-painted ceramics from Buenavista del Cayo and Cahal Pech, Belize allows for preliminary observations relevant to a better understanding of elite pottery production and use in the western Belize Valley. The combination of typological and contextual data from archaeological investigations of ceramics along with art-historical stylistic analyses and ceramic-paste chemical-composition data identifies ordinary and special-purpose vessels excavated from palace-midden contexts as having been created in the same elite-oriented or “palace” workshop(s) at Buenavista del Cayo. The method allows for the identification of unslipped, monochrome, and polychrome pottery excavated from “palace” contexts at nearby Cahal Pech as products of the “palace” school workshop(s) at Buenavista del Cayo, which implies movement of the ruling elite of the site between the two locales. The method also allows for the identification of a group of multiph...
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