Maya Archaeology and Ethnohistory

Published by University of Texas Press 1979

Maya Archaeology and Ethnohistory

Edited by: Norman Hammond and Gordon R. Willey

In the series Texas Pan American Series

https://doi.org/10.7560/750401

Overview
Contents

About this book

Embracing a wide range of research, this book offers various views on the intellectual history of Maya archaeology and ethnohistory and the processes operating in the rise and fall of Maya civilization.

The fourteen studies were selected from those presented at the Second Cambridge Symposium on Recent Research in Mesoamerican Archaeology and are presented in three major sections.

The first of these deals with the application of theory, both anthropological and historical, to the great civilization of the Classic Maya, which flourished in the Yucatan, Guatemala, and Belize during the first millennium A.D. The structural remains of the Classic Period have impressed travelers and archaeologists for over a century, and aspects of the development and decline of this strange and brilliant tropical forest culture are examined here in the light of archaeological research.

The second section presents the results of field research ranging from the Highlands of Mexico east to Honduras and north into the Lowland heart of Maya civilization, and iconographic study of excavated material.

The third section covers the ethnohistoric approach to archaeology, the conjunction of material and documentary evidence. Early European documents are used to illuminate historic Maya culture. This section includes transcriptions of previously unpublished archival material.

Although not formally linked beyond their common field of inquiry, the essays here offer a conspectus of late-twentieth century Maya research and a series of case histories of the work of some of the leading scholars in the field.

Author / Editor information

Norman Hammond is Professor Emeritus of Archaeology at Boston University. Gordon R. Willey (1913–2002) was Professor of Archaeology at Harvard University.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contributors Publicly Available Download PDF	v
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Preface Norman Hammond and Gordon R. Will Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
Introduction Gordon R. Willey and Norman Hammond Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
Theoretical Interpretations
1 Priests, Peasants, and Ceremonial Centers: The Intellectual History of a Model Marshall Joseph Becker Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	3
2 Cropping Cash in the Protoclassic: A Cultural Impact Statement Bruce H. Dahlin Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	21
3 A New Order and the Role of the Calendar: Some Characteristics of the Middle Classic Period at Tikal by Clemency Coggins Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	38
4 Teotihuacan, Internal Militaristic Competition, and the Fall of the Classic Maya George L. Cowgill Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	51
5 An Epistemological Pathology and the Collapse, or Why the Maya Kept the Short Count Dennis E. Puleston Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	63
Data Presentations
6 Prehistoric Settlement at Copan by Gordon R. Willey Richard M. Leventhal Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	75
7 Prehispanic Terracing in the Central Maya Lowlands: Problems of Agricultural Intensification B. L. Turner Ii Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	103
8 The Representation of Underworld Processions in Maya Vase Painting: An Iconographic Study Jacinto Quirarte Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	116
9 A Sequence for Palenque Painting Techniques Merle Greene Robertson Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	149
10 The Lagartero Figurines Susanna M. Ekholm Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	172
Ethnohistoric Approaches
11 The Lobil Postclassic Phase in the Southern Interior of the Yucatan Peninsula Peter D. Harrison Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	189
12 Coapa, Chiapas: A Sixteenth-Century Coxoh Maya Village on the Camino Real Thomas A. Lee Jr Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	208
13 Religious Syncretism in Colonial Yucatan: The Archaeological and Ethnohistorical Evidence from Tancah, Quintana Roo Arthur G. Miller and Nancy M. Farriss Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	223
14 Continuity in Maya Writing: New Readings of Two Passages in the Book of Chilam Balam of Chumayel Gordon Brotherston Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	241
Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	259
General Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	285
Author Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	289

Language: English
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Copyright year: 1979
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 310

eBook

Published: April 21, 2014
ISBN: 9780292762565