Tikal material culture: Artifacts and social structure at a classic lowland Maya city.

Abstract

During the Classic Period, c. A.D. 250-889, Tikal was the capital of a state in the core area of the Southern Maya Lowlands. Its residents were a socially stratified society composed of a small class of elite and a large class of commoners. From 1956 to 1970 the city was excavated by the Tikal Project of the University Museum, University of Pennsylvania. This dissertation links a sample of material culture recovered by Tikal Project excavations to the social groups that made and used them, and constructs the stages by which durable materials moved through the cultural system. Six categories of material included both artifacts and production debitage: chert and bone, predominantly from local sources, and obsidian, jade, slate, and shell, which had to be imported. Three variables in the distribution of artifacts and debitage were investigated: (1) type of associated structure group, (2) distance from the center of the city, and (3) recovery context. Three material culture complexes were defined: two status complexes consisting of ornaments and ritual objects associated with (1) the highest-ranking elite and (2) lower-ranking elite or high-ranking commoners, and (3) a domestic complex of primarily utilitarian artifacts that could be used by everyone. There was a minor expedient industry of local chert. Otherwise, quality of workmanship and standardization of form indicate specialized artifact production. Most craft specialists lived and worked in small structure groups surrounding the civic-ceremonial heart of the city. Little evidence of production was recorded beyond a radius of about two kilometers from the center of the site. Distributions also indicate that different types of structure groups were economically, as well as socially, diverse. Debitage quantities and recovery contexts suggest that (1) most craft production was on a part-time basis and (2) production for the elite of artifacts of both the domestic and higher status complexes was by attached or patronized specialists, some of whom may have worked on a full-time basis.