Research on the Lowland Maya Hiatus that focuses solely on the inscriptions on monuments is too limited to provide information about its causes, nature, and consequences. I consider the hiatus at Tikal using additional evidence from architecture, settlement patterns, caches and burials, domestic artifacts, and inscriptions on portable objects. A preliminary conclusion is that Tikal's long hiatus can be regarded as part of a sequence of internal political development rather than due to conquest from outside. The displacement and destruction of inscribed and plain stone monuments was an ongoing phenomenon at Tikal. It was present from Terminal Preclassic times and occurred with increasing frequency until the beginning of the late Late Classic period. Monument destruction may have come to a halt then under a series of powerful rulers. The setting of inscribed stone monuments and wooden lintels continued for another two centuries until the disappearance of dynastic rule itself.
Lowland Maya Settlement Patterns
