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Abstract Late Postclassic lowland Maya civic-ceremonial masonry architecture appears in two main configurations—temple assemblages and basic ceremonial groups—first identified at Mayapan. Around the Peten lakes, these two architectural complexes have been tied to northern immigrant Kowojs and Itzas, respectively, and their distributions map the varying control over the lakes by these two ethnopolities. Temple assemblages exhibit considerable variation in their structural components and arrangements throughout the lowlands, but they have not been studied comparatively. Here, we examine 14 temple assemblages at 12 lowland sites. We consider one of the two assemblages at Zacpeten (Sak Peten), Group A, to have been built by Kowojs, who asserted their identity and earlier (Late/Terminal Classic) ties to the site by reusing carved monuments. “Blended” assemblage Group C is more difficult to parse, but reflects cosmo-calendrical principles of statecraft and the builders’ and users’ broader ties to Mayapan and Topoxte.
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Early Monumental Constructions in the Maya Lowlands and their Implications for the Theory of the State
Their discovery of a preceramic temple at the Peruvian site of Kotosh in 1960 led Japanese Andeanists to suggest that repeated temple constructions played a driving role in the development of Andean civilization. More recent finds of ceremonial constructions dating to the preceramic and early ceramic periods in other parts of the world allow us to re-evaluate their proposal from a cross-cultural perspective and to re-examine the concept of the state critically. Whereas early ceremonial constructions in some areas do not appear to have led directly to state formation, monumental constructions built between 1100 and 750 BC in the Maya lowlands triggered a social trajectory toward the emergence of dynasties. Early organizers of ceremonies may have provided a prototype of later Maya rulership, which was closely tied to public performance. Early buildings probably facilitated collaboration among many people without pronounced inequality, but this process likely produced a basis for later hierarchical organization by creating political subjects who willingly accept communal obligations. Those observations encourage us to move beyond the restrictive approach to the state and to examine different dimensions of broad social processes.
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- Award ID(s):
- 1950988
- PAR ID:
- 10553415
- Publisher / Repository:
- Japanese Archaeological Association
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Japanese journal of archaeology
- ISSN:
- 2187-9524
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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