Late Classic Lowland Maya Political Organization and Central-Place Analysis: New insights from the Upper Belize Valley

Abstract

Between 1984 and 1989, the San Diego State University Mopan-Macal Triangle Project carried out six extended seasons of fieldwork oriented toward documenting the internal sociobehavioral structure and organization of a representative Classic period community in the southern Maya Lowlands. The project also undertook to delineate the spatial boundaries of several such contiguous communities and to test a selected set of alternative models for Classic period political organization at the local and regional levels. This article summarizes our approach to understanding political organization and presents our preliminary conclusions: a model of the so-called segmentary state type as recently espoused by several researchers best approximates the reality of internal political organization at the single polity level during the Late Classic period of the southern Maya Lowlands.Since 1984, the San Diego State University Mopan-Macal Triangle Archaeological Project has examined the interrelated issues of Late Classic Lowland Maya community form, structure, and political organization within the upper Belize Valley zone of central western Belize. In pursuing these issues, we have employed a strategy composed of four basic methodological and theoretical elements. Individually, these have been (1) a full-coverage regional research strategy, (2) a focus on a region characterized by comparatively small major centers and lower order sites, (3) an emphasis on the extensive stripping and point-plot recording of numerous complete Late Classic depositional contexts and their contents, and (4) a test model based on the work of urban anthropologist, Richard G. Fox (1977). ' We intended originally to examine the qualities of structure and organization at the community level only. However, our results pointed toward wider implications concerning political organization above the local community as they began to support functional identification of the Late Classic period MopanMacal centers with Fox's regal-ritual urban type and its generally associated form of political integration, the segmentary state (Fox 1977:41-43). Further supporting these findings were a gradually demonstrated functional redundance among the sev-1 Unlike other applications of the Fox and antecedent Southall (1956) models to Mesoamerica (Fox 1987; Marcus 1983b; Sanders and Webster 1988), our approach involved reformulating the models as a series of hypotheses and then designing a program of field investigations to recover data suitable for testing these (Ball and Taschek 1986). Thus, rather than using the Fox models to "explain" our data, we sought to acquire data with which to test the appropriateness of those models.

How to Queer the Past Without Sex: Queer Theory, Feminisms and the Archaeology of Identity

“…Chan was an ancient agrarian village located in the Upper Belize River Valley, approximately 4 km southeast of the minor polity-center of Xunantunich (Robin 1999). The Belize Valley's proximity to the urban center of Naranjo places it within the sphere of Petén politics (Ashmore and Leventhal 1993;Ball and Taschek 1991;Martin and Grube 2000). As the paramount center, Naranjo was the primary economic and political force in the region, impacting the growth and expansion of centers throughout the Belize Valley.…”

New world complex societies: Recent economic, social, and political studies

“…In the parallel case of Classic Maya cities, a number of scholars argue for a low level of urban utilitarian craft production (Ball and Taschek, 1991;Sanders and Webster, 1988), linking this pattern to R. G. Fox's model (1977) of the regal-ritual city. The political function of Maya cities is a topic of research and debate by epigraphers and archaeologists; this issue is discussed below.…”

“…Within Mesoamerican archaeology, the long-standing debate between the demographic and the functional views of urbanism continues (Ball and Taschek, 1991;Chase et aL, 1990;Kowalewski, 1990;Marcus, 1983a;Sanders and Santley, 1983;Sanders and Webster, 1988;Smith, 1989), although none of these scholars have presented a comprehensive comparative analysis of Mesoamerican urban centers [Marcus (1983a) comes closest]. In South America, explicit discussions of urbanism as a process are much rarer (see Kolata, 1990;Silverman, 1988); in fact, the most important recent treatment of Andean cities and towns avoids explicit discussion of urbanism entirely: "The words city and urban are usually avoided in this book because of the diverse meanings that have accrued to them in specialized literature" (Hyslop, 1990, p. xii).…”

Elite Maya Pottery and Artisans as Social Indicators

“…On the other hand, the high status residential compound at Buenavista seems to have been the location of a specialized painted ceramic workshop (Ball 1993, Ball andTaschek 1991;Reents-Budet, Bishop, Taschek and Ball n.d.). This may argue for the presence of at least some Late Classic specialized craft workshops dedicated to the single-medium production of specific high-status crafted items.…”

“…The contemporary hieroglyphic inscriptions and archaeological record document a marked increase in wars between polities at this time (Culbert 1991:128-146;Demarest 1992:135-158;Houston 1993Houston :127-148, 1983Reents and Sosa 1980;Schele and Mathews 1991:226-252;Schele, Stuart and Grube n.d.). Current data suggest that the combatants were sparring, in part, to concentrate sociopolitical power in the hands of the victor, with which he could control other lineages and their land and trade networks which, in turn, provided the victor with tribute in the form of foodstuffs, other raw commodities, human labor, and manufactured items (Ball and Taschek 1991;Demarest 1992:143-145). The Late Classic period, then, may be described as comprising a web-like system of alliances and patronage relationships among the ruling elite.…”