The Terminal Classic in the Maya Lowlands: Collapse, Transition, and Transformation. Edited by Arthur A. Demarest, Prudence M. Rice, and Don S. Rice. Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2004. Pp. xvii, 676. Maps. Figures. Tables. Notes. Bibliography. Index. $59.95 cloth.

AbstractResearch at the ancient Maya city of Yaxuna, located in the heart of the Yucatan Peninsula, has provided sufficient data to suggest a preliminary chronological framework for the cultural development of this large polity. Primary ceramic and stratigraphie data are presented to support a five-phase scheme of cultural history, encompassing the Middle Formative through Postclassic periods (500 b.c.–a.d. 1250). In addition to chronological significance, the political ramifications of a pan-lowland ceramic trade are addressed. Yaxuna experienced an early florescence in the Late Formative–Early Classic periods, when it was the largest urban center in the central peninsula. A second renaissance in the Terminal Classic period was the result of Yaxuna's role in an alliance between the Puuc and Coba, in opposition to growing Itza militancy. This paper proposes a chronological framework for the cultural development of one northern Maya region in order to facilitate an understanding of this area as part of the overall history of polity interaction and competition in the Maya lowlands.

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Drought, agricultural adaptation, and sociopolitical collapse in the Maya Lowlands

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences ◽

10.1073/pnas.1419133112 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 112 (18) ◽

pp. 5607-5612 ◽

Cited By ~ 72

Author(s):

Peter M. J. Douglas ◽

Mark Pagani ◽

Marcello A. Canuto ◽

Mark Brenner ◽

David A. Hodell ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Carbon Isotope ◽

Sediment Cores ◽

Classic Period ◽

Maya Lowlands ◽

Agricultural Adaptation ◽

Terminal Classic ◽

Paleoclimate Records ◽

Early Classic Period ◽

Plant Wax ◽

Terminal Classic Period

Paleoclimate records indicate a series of severe droughts was associated with societal collapse of the Classic Maya during the Terminal Classic period (∼800–950 C.E.). Evidence for drought largely derives from the drier, less populated northern Maya Lowlands but does not explain more pronounced and earlier societal disruption in the relatively humid southern Maya Lowlands. Here we apply hydrogen and carbon isotope compositions of plant wax lipids in two lake sediment cores to assess changes in water availability and land use in both the northern and southern Maya lowlands. We show that relatively more intense drying occurred in the southern lowlands than in the northern lowlands during the Terminal Classic period, consistent with earlier and more persistent societal decline in the south. Our results also indicate a period of substantial drying in the southern Maya Lowlands from ∼200 C.E. to 500 C.E., during the Terminal Preclassic and Early Classic periods. Plant wax carbon isotope records indicate a decline in C4 plants in both lake catchments during the Early Classic period, interpreted to reflect a shift from extensive agriculture to intensive, water-conservative maize cultivation that was motivated by a drying climate. Our results imply that agricultural adaptations developed in response to earlier droughts were initially successful, but failed under the more severe droughts of the Terminal Classic period.

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Classic-to-Contact-Period Continuities in Maya Governance in Central Petén, Guatemala

Ethnohistory ◽

10.1215/00141801-4260647 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 65 (1) ◽

pp. 25-50 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Prudence M. Rice ◽

Don S. Rice

Keyword(s):

Power Sharing ◽

Classic Period ◽

Contact Period ◽

Maya Lowlands ◽

Archaeological Data ◽

Terminal Classic ◽

Governance Strategies ◽

Per Se

Abstract This article integrates ethnohistorical and archaeological data in examining political continuities or structural equivalencies in the lakes region of central Petén (southern Maya lowlands) between the Late and Terminal Classic periods and the Postclassic and Spanish Contact periods. The equivalencies are of three kinds: “deep structures” (quadripartition), common political expediencies and functions (power-sharing and council houses), and temporal continuities per se (dual rulership). The article concludes that the rupture (“collapse”) between Classic and Postclassic political forms was only partial, and numerous structures and practices of late Petén Itza Maya geopolitical organization can be seen in earlier Classic-period phenomena. These underscore long-term continuities in governance strategies.

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