All of a Piece: The Politics of Growth and Collapse in Classic Period Maya Kingdoms (original) (raw)
Related papers
All of a Piece The Politics of Growth and Collapse in Classic Maya Kingdoms
Contributions in New World Archaeology, 2012
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. Resumen Los procesos políticos que producen el crecimiento de las sociedades complejas, organizadas como estados, han sido percibidos como procesos distintos de los que contribuyen al colapso de esos sistemas. Los períodos de crecimiento se interpretan como el producto del saludable y pleno funcionamiento de los regímenes políticos y las sociedades, mientras que los períodos de colapso político y la disolución demográfica se interpretan como el resultado de una u otra patología sistémica. Así, el "Colapso Maya" de las tierras bajas del sur en el siglo noveno dC se ha interpretado como el resultado de la guerra fuera de control, el cambio climático, las revueltas campesinas, las invasiones de los pueblos extranjeros, o alguna combinación de estos. Al reunir los datos epigráficos y los resultados de nuestra investigación arqueológica en los reinos de Piedras Negras y Yaxchilán, se argumentará, en cambio, que se formó el crecimiento y el colapso de los reinos del período Clásico de la Cuenca del Usumacinta de una sola pieza. Es nuestro argumento que los mismos procesos que permitieron a las dinastías de Piedras Negras y Yaxchilán a establecerse en pequeñas capitales nucleadas y poco a poco extender su control sobre un territorio cada vez mayor resultó de una forma lógica-aunque de ninguna manera inevitable-a su eventual colapso.
Golden and Scherer - All of a Piece: The Politics of Growth and Collapse in Classic 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.
Evolution of Maya polities in the ancient Mesoamerican system
International Studies Quarterly, 1999
The analysis of politics in antiquity presents new opportunities for political science and international relations, particularly the ancient New World (c. 2000 B.C. to A.D. 1521). Governance through leadership and institutions, collective action, war and peace, alliance dynamics, regional hegemonies, interstate rivalries, and other universal patterns of world politics existed in Mesoamerica, antedating the modern state system. We report findings from a study to record systematically the rise and fall of Maya polities in the Mesoamerican political system, using sources from archaeology and epigraphy. Based on tests of competing hypotheses and new distribution statistics and hazard rates (survival analysis) for 72 Maya polities, our findings support a model of Maya political dynamics based on Preclassic origins, punctuated phases of development, multiple cycles of system expansion and collapse, and weaker political stability for increasingly complex polities. We draw two main implications: (a) a new theory of the Maya political collapse(s), based on their failure to politically integrate; and (b) confirmation for a new periodization of Maya political evolution, different from the traditional cultural periodization, based on several cycles of rise-and-fall, not just one. Our findings may also make possible future investigations in areas such as the war-polarity and war-alliances hypotheses.
2013
A long-standing problem in the study of Maya civilization is the eighth to tenth century end of the Classic Lowland Maya Civilization. The so-called “collapse” of Maya civilization has been the subject of popular speculation, as well as serious study and debate throughout the twentieth century. What must be made clear at the outset is that — in keeping with the theme of this volume — this crisis in the Maya tradition was the end of only one manifestation of that tradition: it was specifically the end of the city-states in the Maya lowlands, especially the southern lowlands. The Maya tradition continued elsewhere with vigor and recovered significantly in the northern lowlands. It was one specific episode in the vast spectrum of Maya civilization discussed in this volume. Nonetheless, the late eighth to tenth century crisis in the Maya tradition in the lowlands is of tremendous interest for comparative studies of civilizations. The end of the city-states of the lowlands can be compare...
Chronology and the Evidence for War in the Ancient Maya Kingdom of Piedras Negras
Journal of Anthropological Archaeology, 2022
Through a case study of the Classic period (A.D. 350–900) kingdom of Piedras Negras, this paper addresses a number of debates in the archaeology of war among the ancient Maya. These findings have broader comparative use in ongoing attempts to understand war in the precolonial Americas, including the frequency of war, its role in processes of polity formation and collapse, the involvement of non-elites in combat, and the cause and effect of captive-taking. This paper provides the first synthesis of a number of datasets pertaining to war and violence in the region of Piedras Negras while presenting new settlement data gleaned from recent lidar survey of the area. Focus is especially on tracing the material, iconographic, and epigraphic evidence for war in diachronic perspective. Material evidence includes the spatial distribution of settlement, presence of fortifications, weaponry, and human skeletal remains demonstrating evidence of traumatic injury. Additional data are drawn from epigraphy and iconography. As with all archaeological contexts, there are crucial gaps in the record. Nevertheless, by combining these datasets it is possible to reconstruct a history of warfare within this precolonial indigenous polity of the first millennium.
Middle Preclassic Maya Society: Tilting at Windmills or Giants of Civilization?
The Origins of Maya States, 2016
For the Maya lowlands, the study of the rise of ancient complexity must explain the alchemy that transmutated a particular blend of social practices, developed in sedentary subsistence farming communities, into ideologies of hereditary inequality and divine rulership. Specifically, this chapter addresses the potential drivers of social complexity in the lowland Maya area of the Preclassic period by focusing on the social relations that shaped the everyday lives of this area's inhabitants. In other words, how did social forms of identity, interaction, and organization of the Preclassic Maya condition the development of socio-political complexity?
Drawing on theoretical understandings of the relationship between civil society and the state, the authors argue that the collapse of the kingdoms of Piedras Negras and Yaxchilan in the ninth century AD resulted from the same political processes that permitted the expansion of dynastic power in preceding centuries. Populations initially clustered around the dynastic capitals of these kingdoms, where daily spheres of interaction facilitated trust building among its residents. The image and performance of the polity was focused on the monarch, and participation in communal efforts, such as construction, warfare, and feasting, nurtured generalized trust within society as a whole, strengthening the polity. As populations expanded over the course of the Classic period and polities grew in territorial extent, spheres of interaction were more diffuse and trust-building efforts were increasingly focused on activities and individuals outside of the king and his court. The result was a breakdown of uniform trust across the kingdom and the failure of dynastic polities. Beyond a study of historical particularities in two kingdoms, this article is intended to suggest ways to more broadly frame interpretations of political processes in Maya polities within the broader context of ancient and modern complex societies worldwide. The model may also be applicable in other cultural contexts where emergent states contended with the challenges of maintaining coherency across an expanding territory.