The Classic-period pictographs at Juliq’ Cave,Alta Verapaz,Guatemala: an interdisciplinary approach to cave art as organizing principle

The Cave of Juliq’ in Alta Verapaz, Guatemala contains an impressive corpus of ancient Maya rock art. Unlike other examples of rock art in this area, the Juliq’ pictographs are simply rendered, generally consisting of lines, handprints, and other basic shapes. We thus focus on context rather than on iconographic content in order to access the meaning of these ancient pictographs. We argue that they were used to record human presence in and movement through the alien cave environment in specific ways, demarcating procession routes, points of transition, moments of physical prowess, and places charged with sacred power. These circuits within Juliq’ reflect attempts to order the Underworld landscape and link it to the surface world through ritual movement akin to aboveground ritual processions.     

Pottery politics: Late Classic Maya palace production at Motul de San José, Petén,Guatemala

Archeologists often rely heavily on stone monuments, architecture, settlement patterns, and written texts to reconstruct ancient political systems. In this paper we focus on the role of polychrome pottery as both a reflection of and critical component in the production of power relations. We present rare direct evidence of polychrome pottery production recovered from the Maya site of Motul de San José, the presumed Late Classic (ca. 600–900 AD) capital of the epigraphically-recognized Ik’ polity. Our contextual analysis of production debris and tools complement on-going polychrome vessel style and chemical analyses of Ik’ Style polychrome vessels to suggest that Motul de San José’s royal court was an important center in the manufacture of Ik’ Style polychrome pottery. These elaborate vessels indexed the political history, power, and networks of the Ik’ polity. By combining archeological, iconographic, and epigraphic data of polychrome pottery, we shed light on Motul de San José’s internal political-economic dynamics as well as its macro-political alliances and tensions with other polities.     

Point/counter point: the accuracy and feasibility of digital image techniques in the analysis of ceramic thin sections

Digital Imaging Analysis has been proposed as an efficient alternative to traditional petrography for some applications. This paper tests that proposition in the measurement of temper size and abundance in four pottery thin sections from the Pevey Site, Mississippi. The findings of both studies are presented here and the relative merits of the two techniques are evaluated in terms of accuracy, precision, cost, and time.     

Recent Research in the Southern Highlands and Pacific Coast of Mesoamerica

Recent research on the southern highlands and Pacific Coast of Mesoamerica has investigated topics of interest to all archaeologists. Although best known for studies on the development of early social complexity, research in the region also has addressed hunter/gatherer subsistence patterns, early sedentism, the origins of food production, the development of the state, migration, the construction of social identity, political economy, and the collapse of complex societies. Research has accelerated in the past ten years, fueled by efforts of scholars from a number of disciplines. Recent paleo-ecological studies have provided much needed data for understanding human social action against the backdrop of the natural environment, while the region also has been the scene for testing numerous innovative theories of social change. Studies of identity and its manifestation in material culture have been especially productive.     

Artifacts that speak for themselves: Sounds underfoot in Mesoamerica

Previously overlooked in archaeological research, natural sounds emitted from the underground affect humans and culture. In this paper, it is suggested that noises generated by subterranean ground movement, water, wind, and wildlife are a reason why residents in Mesoamerica perceive caves, waterholes, limestone sinks, and mountains as sacred. Too, a mental grasp of the sounds, conceptualized as anthropomorphized voices and music, may have been employed as an ideological basis for authority in Maya society. Support is shown using examples of ethnohistory, ethnography, and archaeology. Called for is the systematic collection and study of underground sounds, as artifacts, to define the noises as possible use determinants in ritual venues and settlement sites. Their potential importance as early warning devices for destructive agents in the natural environment suggests that an understanding of the noises and their regard by residents in the region could contribute to theory-building in anthropology, particularly in issues of human-environment relations, and sociocultural development.     

How the Olmec used bitumen in ancient Mesoamerica

Bitumen, found in abundance in Mesoamerica’s southern Gulf Coast region in natural seeps and in many archeological contexts, is an important economic resource and exchange item that has received little consideration in Mesoamerica. Analyses of archeological, ethnoarcheological, and experimental data provide insights on the organization of bitumen processing activities, and the end product (archeological bitumen), which the Olmec (1200–400 BC) used in the production of many items. Archeological data are derived from investigations at El Remolino and Paso los Ortices— two Early Formative period levee sites in the San Lorenzo Olmec region. Our findings suggest that among the Olmec, bitumen processing was organized as a specialized activity, involving multiple production stages, but not necessarily elite involvement or control.     

Re-examining the Egyptian colonial encounter in Nubia through a compositional,mineralogical, and textural comparison of ceramics

Textural, mineralogical, and X-Ray fluorescence (XRF) analyses are used as a cost effective method to distinguish for the first time ancient Egyptian and Nubian-style ceramics found in Nubia. Textural and mineralogical data suggest that Nubian-style sherds are mixtures of sand, silt, and clay sediment that is generally finer grained and poorer in quartz than is the sediment mixture used to produce Egyptian-style pottery. Chemical data also establish a significant difference in the amount of chemical variation found within each style population, but nonetheless supports a considerable overlap in the possible provenance of both styles. Observations and data obtained during this study indicate that standardized, Egyptian-style manufacturing was introduced into Nubia under colonialism, without substantially altering the diversity of native methods of production.     

Let no space go to waste: comparing the uses of space between two Late Classic centers in the El Paraíso valley,Copan, Honduras

Phosphorus analysis of earthen and plaster floors has been used in Mesoamerica to locate and identify activities at ancient sites. This study uses phosphorus analysis to discern if the inhabitants of two Late Classic coeval and proximal sites located in the El Paraíso Valley of Honduras were different culturally from each other. The buried earthen and plaster surfaces of both sites were systematically sampled and analyzed for phosphorus remains. The patterns of elevated phosphorus from these open spaces were subsequently compared to determine if differences in the habitual use and treatment of open spaces could be discerned. These differences are evaluated as a function of behavioral norms, functional responses, and cultural dispositions in order to evaluate the extent to which these two populations were indeed different from each other.     

Kings and commoners at Copan: Isotopic evidence for origins and movement in the Classic Maya period

Eight human interments were excavated in the 1990s beneath the Acropolis at the Classic Maya site of Copan in Honduras, which was the capital of a Maya kingdom from ca. AD 400 to 800. These human remains come from both royal tombs and less elaborate burials dating to the early part of this period and lie deep in the accumulated architectural layers of the Acropolis. We present a brief summary of the context, contents, and external links represented by these interments. Several lines of evidence point to connections between early Copan and Teotihuacan in the Central Highlands of Mexico, and Tikal in the central Maya lowlands of the Petén in Guatemala.     

Selected with care? – the technology of crucibles in late prehistoric Scotland. A petrographic and chemical assessment

Prehistoric crucibles and other metalworking ceramics are often described as highly specialised tools made from refractory materials, but little is known about regional trajectories and individual material developments. Hence, further analyses of materials from less studied regions are needed. The current study investigates the technological development of crucibles from late prehistoric Scotland and its relation to technological choices and specialisation. The examination, using ceramic petrography and Energy Dispersive X-Ray Spectroscopy, focuses on the selection of clays and additives for the manufacture of crucibles in contrast to moulds and pottery. It is demonstrated that the production of crucibles in the late prehistoric period predominantly used local resources. Late Bronze Age crucibles have a close relationship with other types of technical and domestic ceramics, while materials in the Iron Age indicate an increased material specialisation for the preparation of particular fabrics. This development is seen across Scotland and echoes trends seen in other areas of Europe, emphasising the role and importance of metallurgical and technological networks.     

Using hearths for temper: petrographic analysis of Middle Woodland charcoal-tempered pottery in Northeast Florida

Charcoal-tempered pottery is uncommon in North America, but was produced with notable frequency in Northeast Florida from ca. AD 300–600. Thirty-six thin sections of pottery were analyzed by petrographic analysis and compared to 10 clay samples in order to characterize the paste of charcoal-tempered wares in terms of charcoal and mineralogical composition and abundance, assess the number of clay sources used to make the pottery, identify the species of wood represented in charcoal inclusions, and infer techniques of ceramic production. This analysis identified four temper categories, three texture groups, and three distinct clay resources used to make charcoal-tempered pottery, all of which were likely local to Northeast Florida. Identified wood taxa include pine (Pinus sp.), cedar (cf. Juniperus sp.), cypress (cf. Taxodium sp.), and sassafras (Sassafras albidum), with pine suspected to be the most common. These genera of charred wood, which exhibit minimal shrinkage in the samples, along with the prevalence of bone and grog inclusions, indicate that hearth contents were processed as temper, sometimes in combination with quartz sand. Potential reasons for the use of hearth contents as temper are considered.     

Craft Production, Exchange, and Political Power in the Pre-Incaic Andes

This article explores the relationship between craft production, exchange, and power in the pre-Incaic Andes, with a focus on recent archaeological evidence from Chavín, Nasca, Tiwanaku, Wari, and Moche. I argue that craft production and exchange in concert with materialized ideologies played vital roles in the development of political power in the Andes. In later state societies, craft production, exchange, and materialization were critical in maintaining and legitimizing established political power.     

Architectural Aesthetics,Orientations, and Reuse at the Terminal Classic Maya Site of Ucanal,Petén,Guatemala

ABSTRACT

The Terminal Classic period (ca. a.d. 830–950/1000) in the Southern Maya Lowlands is known as a time in which investments in public architecture and vaulted masonry buildings began to wane. Masonry constructions have often been noted to be of poorer quality in comparison with previous phases. Moving beyond models of scarcity, this paper examines the aesthetics, meanings, and reorientations of architectural projects at the site of Ucanal, Petén, Guatemala during the Terminal Classic period. We highlight three processes that were central to the new architectural programs at the site: an emphasis on the aesthetics of wood, the reorientation of sacred space in residential contexts, and the fragmentation and reuse of buildings and monuments. Although these materials and processes are often associated with a loss of splendor, we suggest that they were part of an active architectural revisionism, one that remade history by reworking the old and reorienting the new.     

Long-term clay raw material selection and use in the region of Classical/Hellenistic to Early Byzantine Sagalassos (SW Turkey)

A provenance study was carried out on coarse ceramics from the Classical/Hellenistic to Mid-Byzantine city of Sagalassos, SW Turkey. The ceramics were sampled from the excavations of the city, and clay raw materials were sampled throughout its ancient territory. Used techniques were optical microscopy and electron microprobe analysis on thin sections, geochemical analysis (fusion ICP/MS and mineralogical analysis (X-ray diffraction). The geochemical/mineralogical diversity in the ceramics is not as wide as for the clay raw materials. It seems that even at the restricted scale of this study, the resources were limited to the area around the ancient site. The differences between the ceramics are likely due to the use of different ophiolitic clay bodies being exploited for their production.