Showing items related by title, author, creator and subject.

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  Shifting Allegiances at La Milpa, Belize: A Typological, Chronological, and Formal Analysis of the Ceramics

  Inomata, Takeshi; Culbert, T. Patrick; Sagebiel, Kerry Lynn; Inomata, Takeshi; Reid, J. Jefferson; Hammond, Norman (The University of Arizona., 2005)

  The primary goal of this dissertation is to present an outline of the culture history of the site of La Milpa and its immediate sustaining area through the elaboration and elucidation of a ceramic chronology and typology. However, an equally important aspect of this dissertation is a thorough critique of the type-variety/mode (T-V) system of classification upon which Maya ceramic analysis has been based over the last forty years. The analysis presented here was completed using a relational database (Microsoft Access). By using this database program, it became clear that it is necessary to rethink the basis and use of the type-variety system and how (or whether) it can be adapted as a tool for use in database driven analysis.
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  The settlement of Nohmul: Development of a prehispanic Maya community in northern Belize.

  Culbert, Patrick; Pyburn, Karen Anne.; Kramer, Carol; Yoffee, Norman; Hammond, Norman (The University of Arizona., 1988)

  The study of prehistoric Maya settlements has been hampered by simplistic views of cultural ecology, over generalized ethnographic analogy, and a lack of attention to both natural and cultural site formation processes. As a result, Mayanists have tended to expect very little variety in archaeological features and have assumed cultural uniformity over wide ranges of time and space. Traditional research designs support these assumptions. Current knowledge of Maya social organization suggests that more structural variety may occur in Maya archaeological sites than is ordinarily discovered. Some of this variation is evidenced by features not currently visible on the ground-surface. The Nohmul Settlement pattern project employed a "purposive" sampling design to search for settlement variation over time and space. Several assumptions about surface-subsurface relationships were tested. Surface indications were not found to outline subsurface variety. Excavating at intervals from site center in both visible and "invisible" features, showed that the Nohmul community was affected by both centralizing and decentralizing influences and grouped into residential clusters resembling neighborhoods. The degree of centralization and the location of the clusters, as well as some of their characteristics, changed notably over Nohmul's 2500 year occupation.
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  Residential architecture on Albion Island, Belize

  Culbert, T. Patrick; Cook, Patricia Maria, 1965- (The University of Arizona., 1991)

  The discovery of small, residential-sized mounds in the northern Yucatan composed of solid or nearly solid rubble limestone triggered a vigorous debate within Maya archaeology over the actual function of these mounds. Many Mayanists found it difficult to accept that these were indeed housemounds based on their size and composition. A review of recent excavations of similar mounds from various regions within the Maya area is combined with new evidence from Albion Island, Belize, to posit that rubble construction is merely an alternate form of construction dictated by geologic and geographical constraints. Group 200 on Albion Island is a group of five mounds which in size, shape, and cultural artifacts fall within the designation 'housemound,' but which are composed mainly of limestone cobbles and boulders.