“In the days of my life.” Elite activity and interactions in the Maya lowlands from Classic to Early Postclassic times (the long ninth century, AD 760-920) (original) (raw)

Late Postclassic Lowland Maya Archaeology

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org. The archaeology of the Late Postclassic lowland Maya (ca. A.D. 1200-1517) is summarized and reviewed. The history of past research is outlined, and investigations on topics of major scholarly concern are discussed. The current data allow us to present an approximate reconstruction of the events and pro cesses that characterize the period, although the information on many areas and topics is still fragmentary. Research in Maya archaeology has focused heavily on the more spectacular developments of earlier periods, creating the impression that the last few centuries of the prehispanic era were a time of disorganization and decline. New data and interpretations indicate that the Late Postclassic was a dynamic period in which the lowland Maya were moving in new directions, restructuring their society and worldview.

Changes in Maya Rulership at the End of the Classic Period: An Introduction

HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), 2021

From 760 to 810 CE, one-fourth of the Classic Maya cities (among those that have been investigated) suddenly lost their royal dynasties. Palaces were abandoned; no more stone monuments were erected; no more inscriptions were carved using a calendric date in the Classic Long Count notational system. Even though most of these cities were not immediately depopulated, their inhabitants ceased to build large masonry temples and residences; and, within one hundred years, the residents of these sites gradually emigrated to other settlements as the cities themselves were returned to the forest. While this was happening, even more cities saw the abrupt demise of their own dynasties and their own eventual abandonment. A few cities survived, but generally, by 950 CE, the entire system of capitals, towns, and villages throughout much of the Maya area had been displaced. Some populations resettled around lakes, on the shores of rivers, and on seacoasts and their proximate hinterlands in the Yucatan Peninsula. Thus, during those disastrous times (750-950 CE) between the Classic (250-950 CE) and Postclassic (950-1540 CE) periods, a widespread political collapse occurred (Culbert 1973;

The Timeline(s) of Classic Maya Mythology: Revisting the Dates 3114 BC, AD 2012, and AD 4772 (2014)

[in "Axis Mundi. Journal of the Slovak Association for the Study of Religions," 7(1): 22-35] Now that the date 13.0.0.0.0, 4 Ajaw 3 K'ank'in (December 21, 2012; [...]) has passed, in this essay I will discuss mythological dates in the deep past past and the remote future as recorded at various sites in the Maya area. Instead of considering these mythological dates ( and associated events) as part of one Classic Maya "collective memory" or one Classic Maya timeline, I will describe these events per site (more or less per dynasty) and, as such, will introduce various individual timeslines of Classic Maya mythology. While there are clear and common connections between these timelines, the differences are of far greater importance to ultimately understand local and regional Classic Maya royal legitimization.

The Classic Maya Western Region: A History (BAR Int. Series 2308, Oxford, 2011).

Over the past decade there has been substantial progress in understanding Maya hieroglyphic writing. This development led to the reconstruction of Classic Maya (AD 300-900) political history. Epigraphers suggested a major influence of Teotihuacan during the Early Classic Period (AD 300-600), and some even argued for a direct Teotihuacan conquest of the Maya lowlands. The Late Classic Period (AD 600-900) was interpreted as a constant hegemonic struggle between Tikal and Calakmul, which in different ways influenced Classic Maya political relations. These reconstructions of political history were directly tied to the interpretations of political organisation, ranging from peer polity interaction models (segmentary states, galactic states) to more bureaucratic polities (unitary states, archaic states, hegemonic states). In this book I examine and analyse inscriptions from the Western Maya Region, which are especially rich in information concerning interaction of polities and interpolity organisation. I reconstruct the historical development of the region, examining the influence of Teotihuacan and that of the hegemonic states Tikal and Calakmul. I conclude that at present Teotihuacan’s involvement in Classic Maya politics at best is indirect in the region. In turn, the role of the hegemonic powers is difficult to assess, but it is likely that Tikal did not play a major part in the wider political interactions of the Western Maya Region. Analysing various words in Classic Ch’olan (the language of the hieroglyphs) that are connected to politics, I conclude that the Western Maya Region polities were territorially small and were rarely able to control each other for more than one or two decades, although hegemonic tendencies certainly existed.

All of a Piece: The Politics of Growth and Collapse in Classic Period Maya Kingdoms

The political processes that lead to the growth of complex, state organized, societies are often taken to be dramatically different from the processes that lead to the collapse of such systems. Periods of growth are interpreted as the product of fully functioning and healthy political regimes and societies, while periods of political collapse and demographic dissolution are interpreted as the result of one or another systemic pathology. Thus the "Maya Collapse" of the Southern Lowlands in the 9th century AD has been interpreted as the result of warfare raging out of control, climatic change, peasant revolts, invasions of peoples from outside the Southern Lowlands, or some nuanced combination of these prime movers. Bringing together epigraphic data and the results of our archaeological research in the Piedras Negras and Yaxchilan kingdoms, we will argue, instead, that the growth and collapse of the Classic period kingdoms of the Usumacinta Basin was all of a piece. It is our argument that the very political processes that allowed the dynasties of Piedras Negras and Yaxchilan to establish themselves in small nucleated capitals and slowly extend their control over an ever growing territory lead in a logical -though by no means inevitable -way to their eventual collapse.