Maya archaeology and the political and cultural identity of contemporary Maya in Guatemala

La colonización dejó en una posición desigual a las personas de ascendencia Maya comparada con las personas ladinas en los aspectos sociales, políticos, y culturales en Guatemala. Esta experiencia no es diferente de la de otras naciones indígenas en América Latina. Los personas Maya, así como otras naciones indígenas, tienen una historia de resistencia que ha continuado desarrollándose a medida que cada generación crea nuevas estrategias para superar su posición de desventaja. La arqueología puede ser usada para escribir una historia que provee beneficios esenciales o atribuye estereotipos perjudiciales a las comunidades Maya. Los/as arqueólogos/as que trabajan en Guatemala tienen el compromiso de ser más éticos/as con las comunidades en las que trabajan, particularmente en el campo de la interpretación y creación de teorías sobre la historia maya. Los Maya han sido afectados por los estudios realizados en arqueología y tienen und derecho inherente de forjar su propia identidad a través de la historia.

---

Résumé Comparée aux hispanophones, la colonisation a laissé les Mayas dans une position inégale dans les domaines économiques, sociaux, politiques et culturels au Guatemala. Cette expérience n'est pas différente de celle des autres autochtones en Amérique latine. Comme ces autres groupes, les Mayas ont une histoire de résistance qui a poursuivi son développement alors que chaque génération a créé de nouvelles stratégies pour surpasser sa position désavantageuse. L'archéologie peut être utilisée pour écrire l'histoire procurant des bénéfices essentiels ou des stéréotypes négatifs des communautés mayas. Les archéologues qui pratiquent au Guatemala sont appelés à être plus éthiques à l'égard des descendants des communautés avec qui ils travaillent, en particulier dans le domaine de l'interprétation et de la création de théories au sujet de l'histoire maya. Les Mayas sont affectés par les connaissances produites en archéologie et ont le droit inhérent de forger leur propre identité à travers leur histoire.

     

Seafaring Capabilities in the Pre-Columbian Caribbean

At historic contact Europeans remarked on the skill and proficiency of native Caribbean Amerindians to build and travel in dugout canoes. While archaeological examples of these have been recorded throughout the circum-Caribbean, very few exist in the Antillean chain of islands. Despite this deficiency, indirect evidence of seafaring along with archaeological data has suggested to many that the sea was an artery that linked prehistoric communities together between islands and continents through exchange networks and settlement ‘lifelines’. It is clear that frequent interaction was taking place prehistorically in the region, but examination of seafaring capabilities and the general lack of hard archaeological evidence for contacts in many places suggest this was largely restricted to interaction between the islands and with South America. The fact remains that seafaring in the Caribbean, as one of the smaller aquatic realms inhabited by humans in the past, was highly influenced and largely structured by oceanographic and anemological effects that limited the development of various watercraft designs and navigational techniques which are seen in many of the other world’s seas and oceans. In this paper I: (1) synthesize what is currently known about the antiquity and development of early seafaring in the Caribbean; (2) highlight debates about the level of technologies found in the region; (3) discuss how environmental conditions likely influenced seafaring capabilities and settlement patterns; (4) outline the possible evidence for connections between the different surrounding mainland areas; and (5) provide a comparison with seafaring technologies found in the Pacific to help contextualize the Caribbean into the broader context of global seafaring.     

Frontiers of Contact: Bioarchaeology of Spanish Florida

The arrival of Europeans in the New World had profound and long-lasting results for the native peoples. The record for the impact of this fundamental change in culture, society, and biology of Native Americans is well documented historically. This paper reviews the biological impact of the arrival of Europeans on native populations via the study of pre- and postcontact skeletal remains in Spanish Florida, the region today represented by coastal Georgia and northern Florida. The postcontact skeletal series, mostly drawn from Roman Catholic mission sites, are among the most comprehensive in the Americas, providing a compelling picture of adaptation and stress in this setting. Study of paleopathology, dental and skeletal indicators of physiological stress, stable isotope (carbon and nitrogen) analysis, tooth microwear, and skeletal morphology (cross-sectional geometry) reveals major alterations in quality of life and lifestyle. The bioarchaeological record indicates a general deterioration in health, declining dietary diversity and nutritional quality, and increasing workload in the contact period. The impact of contact in Spanish Florida appears to have been more dramatic in comparison with other regions, which likely reflects the different nature of contact relations in this setting versus other areas (e.g., New England, New France). The bioarchaeological record represents an important information source for understanding the dynamics of biocultural change resulting from colonization and conquest.     

Recent Progress in Bioarchaeology: Approaches to the Osteological Paradox

The publication of The Osteological Paradox (Wood et al., 1992, Current Anthropology, 33:343–370) a decade ago sparked debate about the methods and conclusions drawn from bioarchaeological research. Wood et al. (1992, Current Anthropology, 33:343–370) highlighted the problematic issues of selective mortality and hidden heterogeneity in frailty (susceptibility to illness), and argued that the interpretation of population health status from skeletal remains is not straightforward. Progress in bioarchaeology over the last few years has led to the development of tools that will help us grapple with the issues of this osteological paradox. This paper provides a review of recent literature on age and sex estimation, paleodemography, biodistance, growth disruption, paleopathology, and paleodiet. We consider how these advances may help us address the implications of hidden heterogeneity in frailty and selective mortality for studies of health and adaptation in past societies.     

Bioarchaeology: The Lives and Lifestyles of Past People

Skeletons represent the most direct evidence of the biology of past populations, and their study provides insight into health and well-being, dietary history, lifestyle (activity), violence and trauma, ancestry, and demography. These areas help inform our understanding of a range of issues, such as the causes and consequences of adaptive shifts in the past (e.g., foraging to farming, sedentarism), the biological impact of invasion and colonization, differential access to food and other resources (e.g., by gender or status), and conflict and warfare. Central to bioarchaeological inquiry are the interaction between biology and behavior and the role of environment on health and lifestyle. Bioarchaeological analysis has traditionally focused on local settings. However, important perspective on general questions of human adaptation is possible both regionally and globally.     

Moving Forward: A Bioarchaeology of Mobility and Migration

Journal of Archaeological Research - Growing interest in bioarchaeology and its ability to address complex questions tied to social and biological identities in the past has led to the development...     

Maya and their animals

Hamblin, Nancy L. Animal Use by the Cozumel Maya. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1984. vii + 206 pp. including references and index. $23.00 cloth.     

The Pre-Columbian Peopling and Population Dispersals of South America

Journal of Archaeological Research - This paper summarizes the current archaeological, physiographic, demographic, molecular, and bioarchaeological understanding of the initial peopling and...     

Pre-Columbian congenital syphilis from the late antiquity in France

Today, exactly 500 years after the discovery of America, there is still a lot of controversy about the history of syphilis in Europe, especially about the Columbian and pre-Columbian hypotheses. This paper presents evidence for the presence of venereal treponematosis in the late Antiquity in France. The case that we examined comes from the necropolis of Costebelle (3rd-5th centuries AD; Hyères, Var, France). Grave no. 1 contained the well-preserved skeleton of a relatively old woman with the skeletal remains of an approximately 7-month-old fetus in her pelvic cavity. The osseous lesions of the fetal remains can be described in four groups: periosteal appositions on the skull vault (frontal and parietal); signs of periostitis on the long bones (bilateral cortical irregularities, predominantly on the left side, which affect first of all tibiae, femora, fibulae, radii and humeri, particularly in the metaphyseal region); some infraperiosteal detachment reminiscent of an infraperiosteal haematoma surrounding the distal extremity of the left forearm and the left hand; and finally, the irregular lesions of the humeral distal and proximal tibial metaphyses reminded us radiologically of Wimberger's signs. The most probable diagnosis of all the lesions mentioned above is that of a precocious congenital syphilis. This case consists of an argument against the epidemiological theories about the migration of Treponema pallidum from the New World back to the Old World starting at the end of the 15th century.     

New Directions in Bioarchaeology: Recent Contributions to the Study of Human Social Identities

As a discipline that bridges the biological and social sciences, bioarchaeology has much to contribute to a contextualized and theoretically sophisticated understanding of social identities. Here, we discuss the growing methodological sophistication of bioarchaeology and highlight new developments in osteological age and sex estimation, paleodemography, biodistance analysis, biogeochemistry, and taphonomy, particularly anthropologie de terrain. We then discuss how these methodological developments, when united with social theory, can elucidate social identities. More specifically, we highlight past and future bioarchaeological work on disability and impairment, gender identity, identities of age and the life course, social identity and body modification, embodiment, and ethnic and community identities.     

Development and Discourse among the Maya of Southern Belize

This article explores the discourse of development in southern Belize, and the appropriateness of post‐development ideas to understand its effects. It investigates a prevailing notion in development texts from the region that population pressure represents an environmental threat, an odd image for a country with so few inhabitants and so many trees. It also examines the consequences of apparent attempts by the government to employ development projects to defuse local contention over plans to privatize Maya land tenure. While post‐developmentalists have opened up fruitful avenues of analysis this study suggests that some of their conclusions are overstated. In particular, it questions the de‐politicizing effect of development discourse, and the notion of grassroots movements searching for alternatives to development, amounting to a ‘rejection of the entire paradigm’.     

Droughts as random events in the Maya lowlands

Because the values of most of the parameters controlling the occurrence and severity of a drought in a given location are unknown, and no periodicity has been observed, droughts can be considered random events. Running a random number generator within the limits of the annual rainfall variability relevant to the Maya lowlands, and defining a “Lean Year”, it is observed that strings of lean years occur quite frequently. Defining “Severe Drought”, “Disaster”, and “Catastrophe” based on the length of these strings, it is observed that a severe drought occurs on average every 32 years, a disaster occurs on average every 130 years, and a catastrophe on average every 500 years. These values fit the measured variability of the Yucatan climate, as observed in lake core sediments and in the post conquest written records. It also fits the average occurrence of “megadroughts” in the US Great Plains.The fit between the random occurrence model and the actual, “measured” occurrence of droughts supports the notion that for all practical purposes, droughts had been random events in the Maya region and could not be predicted. The lack of evident periodicity could be one of the reasons why means for long-term storage of food products were not developed there. It may also have affected the relationship between the priesthood and the general populace in that region.Since the method described here can be applied to any climatic region once the rainfall variability and the sensitivity of the local agriculture are known or can be estimated, if similar results are found they may probably have affected other regions with other ancient cultures in a similar way.     

金坛三星村新石器时代人骨研究

三星村新石器时代墓地男女性个体比例约为1．69：l,男性明显多于女性。