Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-dnltx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-19T04:14:59.544Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

OPINIONS ON THE LOWLAND MAYA LATE ARCHAIC PERIOD WITH SOME EVIDENCE FROM NORTHERN BELIZE

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 December 2021

Robert M. Rosenswig Open the ORCID record for Robert M. Rosenswig [Opens in a new window]
Robert M. Rosenswig*
Affiliation:
University at Albany—SUNY, Department of Anthropology, AS 237, 1400 Washington Ave., Albany, New York 12222, United States
*
E-mail correspondence to: rrosenswig@albany.edu
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The fourth millennium b.p. in the Maya lowlands provides an interesting case, with mobile, aceramic peoples documented, while ceramic-using villagers lived in other parts of Mesoamerica. Rather than ask why ceramic containers and village life took so long to reach the Maya lowlands, the question can be inverted to posit that a mixed horticultural-foraging adaptation was so effective that it persisted longer than elsewhere. I propose that the so-called 4.2 ka b.p. event was the ultimate cause of increased sedentism and the first adoption of ceramic containers in a limited number of regions of Mesoamerica. My musings are grounded in the comparisons of data from the Soconusco region of southern Mexico and evidence from northern Belize at Colha and Pulltrouser Swamp, as well as the Freshwater Creek drainage. I assume that proximate behavior must account for local adaptations and different rates of change in each region of Mesoamerica. Therefore, regional adaptation in northern Belize during the Late Archaic period provides the evidence with which to reconstruct local adaptation. Excavations and regional reconnaissance document a distinctive orange soil horizon at Progresso Lagoon associated with patinated chert tools and an absence of ceramics. Stone tool assemblages from the preceramic components of three sites in the region indicate a spatial separation of tool use and resharpening at island versus shore. Starch grains recovered from these stone tools indicate that preceramic peoples in northern Belize harvested maize and several other domesticated plant species. These data are consistent with local paleoenvironmental studies that document an extended period of horticultural activity during the fifth and fourth millennia b.p. prior to the adoption of ceramics. Lithic assemblages and associated dietary information from multiple sites provide glimpses of the data necessary to reconstruct Late Archaic period adaptation from a single locale. Such data will be required to understand the proximate causes for the transition to a more settled, village life.

Type
Special Section: The Preceramic and Early Ceramic Periods in Belize and the Central Maya Lowlands
Information
Ancient Mesoamerica , Volume 32 , Issue 3 , Fall 2021 , pp. 461 - 474
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

An, Cheng-Bang, Tang, Lingyu, Barton, Loukas, and Chen, Fa-Hu 2005 Climate Change and Cultural Response Around 4000 cal Yr BP in the Western Part of Chinese Loess Plateau. Quaternary Research 63:347–352.Google Scholar
Arnold, Philip J. III 2009 Settlement and Subsistence among the Early Formative Gulf Olmec. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 28:397–411.Google Scholar
Arnold, Philip J. III 1999 Tecomates, Residential Mobility, and Early Formative Occupation in Coastal Lowland Mesoamerica. In Pottery and People: A Dynamic Interaction, edited by Skibo, James M. and Feinman, Gary M., pp. 157–170. University of Utah Press, Salt Lake City.Google Scholar
Arz, Helge W., Lamy, Frank, and Patzold, J 2006 A Pronounced Dry Event Recorded Around 4.2 ka in Brine Sediments from the Northern Red Sea. Quaternary Research 66:432–441.Google Scholar
Awe, Jaime J., Ebert, Claire E., Stemp, W. James, Brown, M. Katherine, and Garber, James F. 2021 Lowland Maya Genesis: The Late Archaic to Late Early Formative Transition in the Upper Belize River Valley. Ancient Mesoamerica 32:519–544.Google Scholar
Bar-Matthews, Miryam, and Ayalon, A 2011 Mid-Holocene Climate Variations Revealed by High-Resolution Speleothem Records from Soreq Cave, Israel and their Correlation with Cultural Changes. Holocene 21:163–171.Google Scholar
Bar-Yosef, O. 2011 Climatic Fluctuations and Early Farming in West and East Asia. Current Anthropology 52S:175–193.Google Scholar
Bellwood, Peter 2005 First Farmers: The Origins of Agricultural Societies. Blackwell, Oxford.Google Scholar
Binford, Lewis 1968 Post-Pleistocene Adaptations. In New Perspectives in Archaeology, edited by Binford, Sally R. and Binford, Lewis R., pp. 313–341. Aldine, Chicago.Google Scholar
Blake, Michael. 2015 Maize for the Gods: Unearthing the 9,000-Year History of Corn. University of California Press, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Booth, Robert K., Jackson, Stephen T., Forman, Stephen L., Kutzbach, John E., Bettis, E. A. III, Kreig, Josheph, and Wright, David K. 2005 A Severe Centennial-Scale Drought in Mid-Continental North America 4200 Years Ago and Apparent Global Linkages. Holocene 15:321–328.Google Scholar
Borstein, Joshua A. 2001 Tripping Over Colossal Heads: Settlement Patterns and Population Development in the Upland Olmec Heartland. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park.Google Scholar
Boserup, Ester 1965 The Conditions of Agricultural Growth: The Economics of Agrarian Change under Population Pressure. Aldine, Chicago.Google Scholar
Brooke, John L. 2014 Climate Change and the Course of Global History: A Rough Journey, Cambridge University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Bustamante, Maria G., Cruz, Fransisco William, Vuille, Mathias, Apaestegui, James, Strikis, Nicholas, Panizo, Gonzalo, Novello, V. F., Deininger, M., Sifeddine, A., Cheng, H., Moquet, J. S., Guyot, J. L., Santos, R. V., Segura, H., and Edwards, R. L. 2016 Holocene Changes in Monsoon Precipitation in the Andes of NE Peru Based on δ18O Speleothem Records. Quaternary Science Reviews 146:274–287.Google Scholar
Carolin, Stacey A., Walker, Richard T., Day, Christopher C., Ersek, Vasile, Sloan, R. Alastair, Dee, Michael W., Talebian, Morteza, and Henderson, Gideon M. 2019 Precise Timing of Abrupt Increase in Dust Activity in the Middle East Coincident with 4.2 ka Social Change. Proceedings of the Nation Academy of Science, USA 116:67–72.Google Scholar
Clark, John E., and Blake, Michael 1994 The Power of Prestige: Competitive Generosity and the Emergence of Rank Societies in Lowland Mesoamerica. In Factional Competition and Political Development in the New World, edited by Brumfiel, Elizabeth M. and Fox, John W., pp. 17–30. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Clark, John E., and Cheetham, David 2002 Mesoamerica's Tribal Foundations. In The Archaeology of Tribal Societies, edited by Parkinson, William A., pp. 278–339. International Monographs in Prehistory, Ann Arbor.Google Scholar
Clark, John E., Pye, Mary E., and Gosser, Dennis C. 2007 Thermolithics and Corn Dependency in Mesoamerica. In Archaeology, Art, and Ethnogenesis in Mesoamerican Prehistory: Papers in Honor of Gareth W. Lowe, edited by Lowe, Lynneth S. and Pye, Mary E., pp. 23–42. Papers of the New World Archaeological Foundation 68. Brigham Young University, Provo.Google Scholar
Davis, Mary E., and Thompson, Lonnie G. 2006 An Andean Ice-Core Record of a Middle Holocene Mega-Drought in North Africa and Asia. Annals of Glaciology 43:34–41.Google Scholar
Diamond, Jared. 1997 Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fate of Human Societies. Norton, New York.Google Scholar
Dixit, Yama, Hodell, David A., and Petrie, Cameron A. 2014 Abrupt Weakening of the Summer Monsoon in Northwest India ~4100 Yr Ago. Geology 42:339–342.Google Scholar
Drennan, Robert D. 1976 Fábrica San José and Middle Formative Society in the Valley of Oaxaca. Memoirs of the Museum of Anthropology 8, Prehistory and Human Ecology of the Valley of Oaxaca 4. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.Google Scholar
Ebert, Claire E., May, N. P., Culleton, Brendan J., Awe, Jaime J., and Kennett, Douglas J. 2017 Regional Response to Drought During the Formation and Decline of Preclassic Maya Societies. Quaternary Science Reviews 173:211–235.Google Scholar
Estrada-Belli, Fransisco 2011 The First Maya Civilization: Ritual and Power before the Classic Period. Routledge, New York.Google Scholar
Fitzpatrick, Scott M. 2011 Verification of an Archaic Age Occupation on Barbados, Southern Lesser Antilles. Radiocarbon 53:595–604.Google Scholar
Flannery, Kent V. 1986 Guila Naquitz: Archaic Foraging and Early Agriculture in Oaxaca, Mexico. Academic Press, Orlando.Google Scholar
Garber, James F., and Awe, Jaime J. 2008 Middle Formative Architecture and Ritual at Cahal Pech. Research Reports in Belizean Archaeology 5:185–190.Google Scholar
Hammond, Norman 2005 The Dawn and the Dusk: Beginning and Ending a Long-Term Research Program at the Preclassic Maya Site of Cuello, Belize. Anthropological Notebooks 11:45–60.Google Scholar
Hayden, Brian 1990 Nimrods, Piscators, Pluckers, and Planters: The Emergence of Food Production. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 9:31–69.Google Scholar
Hester, Thomas R. 1994 The Archaeological Investigations of the Colha Project, 1983 and 1984. In Continuing Archaeology at Colha, Belize, edited by Hester, Thomas R., Shafer, Harry J., and Eaton, Jack D., pp. 1–9. Texas Archaeological Research Laboratory, University of Texas, Austin.Google Scholar
Hester, Thomas R., Iceland, Harry B., Hudler, D. B., and Shafer, Harry J. 1996 The Colha Preceramic Project: Preliminary Results from the 1993–1995 Field Seasons. Mexicon 18:45–50.Google Scholar
Hodell, David A., Anselmetti, Flavio S., Ariztegui, D, Brenner, Mark, Curtis, Jason H., Gilli, A, Grzesik, Dustin A., Guilderson, T. J., Muller, A. D., Bush, M. B., Correa-Metrio, A., Escobar, J., and Kutterolf, S. 2008 An 85 ka Record of Climate Change in Lowland Central America. Quaternary Science Reviews 27:1152–1165.Google Scholar
Iceland, Harry B. 1997 The Preceramic Origins of the Maya: Results of the Colha Preceramic Project in Northern Belize. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of Texas, Austin.Google Scholar
Iceland, Harry B., and Hester, Thomas R. 1996 The Earliest Maya? Origins of Sedentism and Agriculture in the Maya Lowlands. In The Prehistory of the Americas: XIII International Congress of Prehistoric and Protohistoric Sciences, edited by Hester, Thomas R., Minelli, Laura Laurencich, and Salvatori, Sandro, pp. 11–17. Series Colloquia 17. A.B.A.C.O., Forlì.Google Scholar
Inomata, Takeshi, MacLellan, Jessica, Triadan, Daniela, Munson, Jessica, Burham, Melissa, Aoyama, K, and Yonenobu, Hiroo 2015 Development of Sedentary Communities in the Maya Lowlands: Coexisting Mobile Groups and Public Ceremonies at Ceibal, Guatemala. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, USA 112:4268–4273.Google Scholar
Inomata, Takeshi, Triadan, Daniela, Vázquez López, Verónica A., Fernandez-Diaz, Juan Carlos, Omori, Takayuki, Méndez Bauer, María Belén, Hernández, Melina García, Beach, Timothy, Cagnato, Clarissa, Aoyama, Kazuo, and Nasu, Hiroo 2020 Monumental Architecture at Aguada Fénix and the Rise of Maya Civilization. Nature 582:530–533.Google Scholar
Jacob, John S. 1995 Ancient Maya Wetland Agricultural Fields in Cobweb Swamp, Belize: Construction, Chronology and Function. Journal of Field Archaeology 22:175–190.Google Scholar
Jones, John G. 1994 Pollen Evidence for Early Settlement and Agriculture in Northern Belize. Palynology 18:205–211.Google Scholar
Joyce, Arthur A., and Goman, Michelle 2012 Bridging the Theoretical Divide in Holocene Landscape Studies: Social and Ecological Approaches to Ancient Oaxacan Landscapes. Quaternary Science Review 55:1–22.Google Scholar
Kelly, Thomas C. 1993 Preceramic Projectile-Point Typology in Belize. Ancient Mesoamerica 4:205–227.Google Scholar
Kennett, Douglas J., Piperno, Dolores R., Jones, John G., Neff, Hector, Voorhies, Barbara, Walsh, Megan K., and Culleton, Brendan J. 2010 Pre-Pottery Farmers on the Pacific Coast of Southern Mexico. Journal of Archaeological Science 37:3401–3411.Google Scholar
Kennett, Douglas J., Thakar, Heather B., VanDerwarker, Amber M., Webster, David L., Culleton, Brendan J., Harper, Thomas K., Kistler, Logan, Scheffler, Timothy E., and Hirth, Kenneth 2017 High-Precision Chronology for Central American Maize Diversification from El Gigante Rockshelter, Honduras. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, USA 114:9026–9031.Google Scholar
Kennett, Douglas J., Prufer, Keith M., Culleton, Brendan J., George, Richard J., Robinson, Mark, Trask, Willa R., Buckley, Gina M., Moes, Emily, Kate, Emily J., Harper, Thomas K., O'Donnell, Lexi, Ray, Erin E., Hill, Ethan C., Alsgaard, Asia, Merriman, Christopher, Merridith, Clayton, Edgar, Heather J. H., Awe, Jaime J., and Gutierrez, Said M. 2020 Early Isotopic Evidence for Maize as a Staple Grain in the Americas. Science Advances 6:eaba3245.Google Scholar
Killion, Thomas W. 2013 Nonagricultural Cultivation and Social Complexity: The Olmec, Their Ancestors, and Mexico's Southern Gulf Coast Lowlands. Current Anthropology 54:569–606.Google Scholar
Killion, Thomas W., and Urcid, J 2001 The Olmec Legacy: Cultural Continuity and Change in Mexico's Southern Gulf Coast Lowlands. Journal of Field Archaeology 28:3–25.Google Scholar
Kruger, Robert P. 1996 An Archaeological Survey in the Region of the Olmec: Veracruz, Mexico. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh.Google Scholar
Laland, Kevin N., Sterelny, Kim, Odling-Smee, John, Hoppitt, William, and Uller, Tobias 2011 Cause and Effect in Biology Revisited: Is Mayr's Proximate-Ultimate Dichotomy Still Useful? Science 334:1512–1516.Google Scholar
Lesure, Richard G., Borejsza, Aleksander, Carballo, Jennifer, Frederick, Charles, Popper, Virginia, and Wake, Thomas A. 2006 Chronology, Subsistence, and the Earliest Formative of Central Tlaxcala, Mexico. Latin American Antiquity 17:474–492.Google Scholar
Lohse, Jon C. 2010 Archaic Origins of the Lowland Maya. Latin American Antiquity 21:312–352.Google Scholar
Lohse, Jon C. 2020 Early Holocene Cultural Diversity in Central America: Comment on Prufer et al. (2019) “Linking Late Paleoindian Stone Tool Technologies and Populations in North, Central and South America.” Lithic Technology 45:59–67.Google Scholar
Lowe, Gareth W. 1998 Los olmecas de San Isidro en Malpaso, Chiapas. Colección Científica 371. UNAM, San Cristóbal de las Casas.Google Scholar
Lowe, Gareth W. 2007 Early Formative Chiapas: The Beginnings of Civilization in the Central Depression of Chiapas. In Archaeology, Art, and Ethnogenesis in Mesoamerican Prehistory: Papers in Honor of Gareth W. Lowe, edited by Lowe, Lynneth S. and Pye, Mary E., pp. 63–108. Papers of the New World Archaeological Foundation 68. Brigham Young University, Provo.Google Scholar
MacNeish, Richard 2001 Tehuacán Region. In Archaeology of Ancient Mexico and Central America: An Encyclopedia, edited by Evans, Susan T. and Webster, David L., pp. 705–710. Garland Publishing, New York.Google Scholar
MacNeish, Richard 1967 A Summary of the Subsistence. In The Prehistory of the Tehuacan Valley: Environment and Subsistence, Vol. 1, edited by Byers, Douglas S., pp 290–309. University of Texas Press, Austin.Google Scholar
MacNeish, Richard S., and Nelken-Terner, Antoinette 1983a The Preceramic of Mesoamerica. Journal of Field Archaeology 10:71–84.Google Scholar
MacNeish, Richard S., and Nelken-Terner, Antoinette 1983b Final Annual Report of the Belize Archaic Archaeological Reconnaissance. Center for Archaeological Studies, Boston University, Boston.Google Scholar
Marcus, Joyce 1983 Lowland Maya Archaeology at the Crossroads. American Antiquity 48:454–488.Google Scholar
McAnany, Patricia A., Murata, Satoru, Thomas, Ben S., Lopez Varela, Sandra L., Finamore, Daniel, and Buck, David G. 2004 Deep History of the Sibun River Valley. Research Reports in Belizean Archaeology 1:295–310.Google Scholar
Mueller, A. D., Islebe, G. A., Hillesheim, M. B., Grzesik, D. A., Anselmetti, F. S., Ariztegui, D., Brenner, M., Curtis, J. H., Hodell, D. A., and Venz, K. A. 2009 Climate Drying and Associated Forest Decline in the Lowlands of Northern Guatemala During the Late Holocene. Quaternary Research 71:133–141.Google Scholar
Nakamura, Atsunon, Yokoyama, Yusuke, Maemoku, Hideaki, Yagi, Hiroshi, Okamura, Makoto, Matsuoka, Hiroshi, Miyake, Nao, Osada, Toshiki, Adhikari, Danda P., Dangol, Vishnu, Ikehara, Minoru, Miyairi, Yosuke, and Matsuzaki, Hiroyuki 2016 Weak Monsoon Event at 4.2 ka Recorded in Sediment from Lake Rara, Himalayas. Quaternary International 397:349–359.Google Scholar
Neff, Hector, Pearsall, Deborah M., Jones, John G., de Pieters, Barbara Arroyo, and Freidel, Dorothy E. 2006 Climate Change and Population History in the Pacific Lowlands of Southern Mesoamerica. Quaternary Research 65:390–400.Google Scholar
Piperno, Dolores R., and Flannery, Kent V. 2001 The Earliest Archaeological Maize (Zea mays L.) from Highland Mexico: New Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Dates and their Implications. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, USA 98:2101–2103.Google Scholar
Piperno, Dolores R., and Smith, Bruce D. 2012 The Origins of Food Production in Mesoamerica. In The Oxford Handbook of Mesoamerican Archaeology, edited by Nichols, Deborah L. and Pool, Christopher A., pp. 151–164. Oxford University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Piperno, Dolores R., Ranere, Anthony J., Holst, Irene, Iriarte, Jose, and Dickau, Ruth 2009 Starch Grain and Phytolith Evidence for Early Ninth Millennium B.P. Maize from the Central Balsas River Valley, Mexico. PNAS 106:5019–5024.Google Scholar
Pohl, Mary D., Pope, Kevin O., Jones, John G., Jacob, John S., Piperno, Dolores R., deFrance, Susan D., Lentz, David L., Gifford, John A., Danforth, Marie E., and Josserand, J. Kathryn 1996 Early Agriculture in the Maya Lowlands. Latin American Antiquity 7:355–372.Google Scholar
Pohl, Mary E., Piperno, Dolores R., Pope, Kevin O., and Jones, John G. 2007 Microfossil Evidence for Pre-Columbian Maize Dispersals in the Neotropics from San Andres, Tabasco, Mexico. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, USA 104:6870–6875.Google Scholar
Pope, Kevin O., Pohl, Mary E., Jones, John G., Lentz, David L., Von Nagy, Christopher, Vega, Fransisco J., and Quitmyer, Irvy R. 2001 Origin and Environmental Setting of Ancient Agriculture in the Lowlands of Mesoamerica. Science 292:1370–1373.Google Scholar
Powis, Terry G., Stanchly, Norbert, White, Christine D., Healy, Paul F., Awe, Jaime J., and Longstaffe, Fred 1999 Maya Subsistence Economy at Cahal Pech, Belize. Antiquity 73:364–376.Google Scholar
Prufer, Keith M., Alsgaard, Asia V., Robinson, Mark, Meredith, Clayton R., Culleton, Brendan J., Dennehy, Timothy, Magee, Shelby, Huckell, Bruce B., Stemp, W. James, Awe, Jaime J., Capriles, Jose M., and Kennett, Douglas J. 2019 Linking Late Paleoindian Stone Tool Technologies and Populations in North, Central and South America. PloS ONE 14:e0219812.Google Scholar
Prufer, Keith M., Robinson, Mark, and Kennett, Douglas J. 2021 Terminal Pleistocene through Middle Holocene Occupations in Southeastern Mesoamerica: Linking Ecology and Culture in the Context of Neotropical Foragers and Early Farmers. Ancient Mesoamerica 32:439–460.Google Scholar
Richerson, Peter J., Boyd, Robert, and Bettinger, Robert L. 2001 Was Agriculture Impossible During the Pleistocene But Mandatory During the Holocene? A Climate Change Hypothesis. American Antiquity 66:387–411.Google Scholar
Rosenmeiner, Michael F., Hodell, David A., Brenner, Mark, and Curtis, Jason H. 2002 A 4000-Year Lacustrine Record of Environmental Change in the Southern Maya Lowlands of Petén, Guatemala. Quaternary Research 57:183–190.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M. 2004 New Archaeological Excavation Data from the Late Archaic Occupation of Northern Belize. Research Reports in Belizean Archaeology 1:267–277.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M. 2006a Northern Belize and the Soconusco: A Comparison of the Late Archaic to Formative Transition. Research Reports in Belizean Archaeology 3:59–71.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M. 2006b Sedentism and Food Production in Early Complex Societies of the Soconusco, Mexico. World Archaeology 38:329–354.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M. 2007 Beyond Identifying Elites: Feasting as a Means to Understand Early Middle Formative Society on the Pacific Coast of Mexico. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 26:1–27.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M. 2010 The Beginnings of Mesoamerican Civilization: Inter-Regional Interaction and the Olmec. Cambridge University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M. 2011 An Early Mesoamerican Archipelago of Complexity: As Seen from Changing Population and Human Depictions at Cuauhtémoc. In Sociopolitical Transformation in Early Mesoamerica: Archaic to Formative in the Soconusco Region, edited by Lesure, Richard, pp. 242–271. University of California Press, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M. 2012 Materialism, Mode of Production and a Millennium of Change in Southern Mexico. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 19:1–48.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M. 2015 A Mosaic of Adaptation: The Archaeological Record for Mesoamerica's Archaic Period. Journal of Archaeological Research 23:115–162.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M. 2022 Who Were the First Ceramic-Using Villagers in the Maya Lowlands? In Origins of the Maya: The Pre-Mamom Unnamed Period, edited by Walker, Debra. University of Colorado Press, Boulder. In press.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M., and Masson, Marilyn A. 2001 Seven New Preceramic Sites Documented in Northern Belize. Mexicon 23:138–140.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M., Pearsall, Deborah M., Masson, Marilyn A., Culleton, Brendan J., and Kennett, Douglas J. 2014 Archaic Period Settlement and Subsistence in the Maya Lowlands: New Starch Grain and Lithic Data from Freshwater Creek, Belize. Journal of Archaeological Science 41:308–321.Google Scholar
Rosenswig, Robert M., VanDerwarker, Amber M., Culleton, Brendan J., and Kennett, Douglas J. 2015 Is It Agriculture Yet? Intensified Maize-Use at 1000 cal B.C. in the Soconusco and Mesoamerica. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 40:89–108.Google Scholar
Schittek, Karsten, Forbriger, Markus, Mächtle, Berti, Schäbitz, Frank, Wennrich, Volker, Reindel, Markus, and Eitel, Bernhard 2015 Holocene Environmental Changes in the Highlands of the Southern Peruvian Andes (14° S) and Their Impact on Pre-Columbian Cultures. Climate Past 11:27–44.Google Scholar
Shafer, Harry J., and Hester, Thomas R. 1983 Ancient Maya Chert Workshops in Northern Belize, Central America. American Antiquity 48:519–545.Google Scholar
Sluyter, Andrew, and Dominguez, Gabriela 2006 Early Maize (Zea mays L.) Cultivation in Mexico: Dating Sedimentary Pollen Records and Its Implications. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, USA 103:1147–1151.Google Scholar
Smith, Bruce D. 1997 The Initial Domestication of Cucurbita pepo in the Americas. 10,000 Years Ago. Science 276:932–934.Google Scholar
Smith, Bruce D. 2001 Low-Level Food Production. Journal of Archaeological Research 9:1–43.Google Scholar
Stemp, W. James, and Awe, Jaime J. 2013 Possible Variation in the Late Archaic Period Bifaces in Belize: New Finds from the Cayo District of Western Belize. Lithic Technology 38:17–31.Google Scholar
Symonds, Stacey, Cyphers, Ann, and Lunagómez, Roberto 2002 Asentamiento prehispánico en San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Ciudad de México.Google Scholar
Tykot, Robert H., Van der Merwe, Nikolaas J., and Hammond, Norman 1996 Stable Isotope Analysis of Bone Collagen, Bone Apatite, and Tooth Enamel in the Reconstruction of Human Diet: A Case Study from Cuello, Belize. In Archaeological Chemistry: Organic, Inorganic, and Biochemical Analysis, edited by Orna, Mary Virginia, pp. 355–365. ACS Symposium Series 625. American Chemical Society, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Valdez, Fred Jr., Sullivan, Lauren A., Buttles, Palma J., and Aebersold, L. 2021 The Origins and Identification of the Early Maya from Colha and Northern Belize. Ancient Mesoamerica 32:502–518.Google Scholar
Walker, M. J. C., Berkelhammer, M., Björck, S., Cwynar, L. C., Fisher, D. A., Long, A. J., Lowe, J. J., Newnham, R. M., Rasmussen, S. O., and Weiss, H. 2012 Formal Subdivision of the Holocene Series/Epoch: A Discussion Paper by a Working Group of INTIMATE (Integration of Ice-Core, Marine and Terrestrial Records) and the Subcommission on Quaternary Stratigraphy (International Commission on Stratigraphy). Journal of Quaternary Science 27:649–659.Google Scholar
Weiss, Ehud, Kislev, Mordechai E., and Hartmann, Anat 2006 Autonomous Cultivation Before Domestication. Science 312:1608–1610.Google Scholar
Weiss, Harvey 2016 Global Megadrought, Societal Collapse and Resilience at 4.2–3.9 ka B.P. across the Mediterranean and West Asia. PAGES Magazine 24:62–63.Google Scholar
Welc, Fabian, and Marks, Leszek 2014 Climate Change at the End of the Old Kingdom in Egypt Around 4200 B.P.: New Geoarchaeological Evidence. Quaternary International 324:124–133.Google Scholar
Wilson, Samuel M., Iceland, Harry B., and Hester, Thomas R. 1998 Preceramic Connections Between Yucatan and the Caribbean. Latin American Antiquity 9:342–352.Google Scholar
Zeder, Melinda A. 2009 The Neolithic Macro-(r)evolution: Macroevolutionary Theory and the Study of Culture Change. Journal of Archaeological Research 17:1–63.Google Scholar
Zeitlin, Robert N. 1984 A Summary Report on Three Seasons of Field Investigations into the Archaic Period Prehistory of Lowland Belize. American Anthropologist 86:358–368.Google Scholar