The University of Southern Mississippi The Aquila Digital Community Faculty Publications 12-1996 Early Agriculture in the Maya Lowlands Mary D. Pohl Florida State University Kevin O. Pope Geo Eco Arc Research John G. Jones Texas A&M University John S. Jacob Fugro International Dolores R. Piperno Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute See next page for additional authors Follow this and additional works at: https://aquila.usm.edu/fac_pubs Part of the Anthropology Commons Recommended Citation Pohl, M. D., Pope, K. O., Jones, J. G., Jacob, J. S., Piperno, D. R., deFrance, S. D., Lentz, D. L., Gifford, J. A., Danforth, M., Josserand, J. (1996). Early Agriculture in the Maya Lowlands. Latin American Antiquity, 7(4), 355-372. Available at: https://aquila.usm.edu/fac_pubs/15375 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by The Aquila Digital Community. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of The Aquila Digital Community. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Authors Mary D. Pohl, Kevin O. Pope, John G. Jones, John S. Jacob, Dolores R. Piperno, Susan D. deFrance, David L. Lentz, John A. Gifford, Marie E. Danforth, and J. Kathryn Josserand This article is available at The Aquila Digital Community: https://aquila.usm.edu/fac_pubs/15375 EARLY AGRICULTURE IN THE MAYA LOWLANDS Mary D. Pohl, Kevin O. Pope, John G. Jones, John S. Jacob, Dolores R. Piperno, Susan D. deFrance, David L. Lentz, John A. Gifford, Marie E. Danforth, and J. Kathryn Josserand Wetland research in northern Belize provides the earliest evidence for development of agriculture in the Maya Lowlands. Pollen data confirm the introduction of maize and manioc before 3000 B.C. Dramatic deforestation, beginning ca. 2500 B.C. and intensifying in wetland environments ca. 1500-1300 B.C., marks an expansion of agriculture, which occurred in the con­ text of a mixed foraging economy. By 1000 B.C. a rise in groundwater levels led farmers to construct drainage ditches coeval with the emergence of Maya complex society ca. 1000-400 B.C. Field manipulations often involved minor modifications of natural hummocks. Canal systems are not as extensive in northern Belize as previously reported, nor is there evidence of arti­ ficially raised planting platforms. By the Classic period, wetland fields were flooded and mostly abandoned. Las investigaciones sobre las regiones de suelos hiimedos o pantanosos del norte de Belice ofrecen las primeras evidencias del desarrollo de la agricultura maya. La information paleoecologica que se encontro en los pantanos de Belice confirma el uso de manioca y maiz antes del ano 3000 a.C, mientras que el periodo alrededor de los ahos 2500-1300 a.C. se distingue por una gran expansion agricola que ha quedado marcada por un episodio de dramdtica deforestation que incluyo el cul- tivo de pantanos. Estos cambios ecologicos tuvieron lugar en el contexto de una economia deforrajeo. Aproximadamente en el ano 1000 a.C. el nivel fredtico subio creando la necesidad de la construction de canales de drenaje, contempordnea con la emergencia de la compleja infraestructura en la socieded maya en los ahos 1000-400 a.C. Este desarrollo incluye pequenas modificaciones en la topografia. Nuestra investigation encontro que el sistema de canales no es tan extenso en el norte de Belice como previamente se reporto, e incluso no se encontraron evidencias de plataformas agricolas artificiales. Durante el horizonte Cldsico los campos de suelos hiimedos fueron inundados y en su mayoria abandonados. Well-preserved botanical food remains nally thought (Fritz 1994; Long et al. 1989). from caves in semiarid, highland areas Current interpretations indicate that sedentary of Mexico (Flannery 1986; MacNeish communities existed in the highlands as early as 1964) have shaped much of our view of the agri- the sixth millennium B.C. (Niederberger 1979), cultural basis of early societies in Mesoamerica but cultigens such as maize (Zea mays) appeared (Figure 1). The traditional view was that agricul- no earlier than ca. 3500 B.C. (Fritz 1994; Long et ture emerged in the highlands by 5000 B.C. and al. 1989) and at Patzcuaro perhaps as late as 1500 spread much later to the lowlands. More recently, B.C. (O'Hara et al. 1993). Complex society, a reevaluation of developments in highland including structures suggesting the emergence of regions indicates that the origin and spread of political control, developed mostly after agriculture are not as well understood as origi- 1500-1200 B.C. Mary D. Pohl and J. Kathryn Josserand • Department of Anthropology, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306 Kevin O. Pope • Geo Eco Arc Research, 2222 Foothill Boulevard, Suite E-272, La Canada, CA 91011 John G. Jones • Department of Anthropology, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843 John S. Jacob • Fugro International, P.O. Box 740010, Houston, TX 77274 Dolores R. Piperno • Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, APO 34002-0948 Susan D. deFrance • Corpus Christi Museum, 1900 North Chaparral, Corpus Christi, TX 78401 David L. Lentz • New York Botanical Garden, Bronx, NY 10454 John A. Gifford • Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, Miami, FL 33149 Marie E. Danforth • Department of Anthropology, University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg, MS 39406 Latin American Antiquity, 7(4), 1996, pp. 355-372. Copyright © by the Society for American Archaeology 355 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. USM Libraries, on 07 Aug 2018 at 20:41:58, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.2307/972264 356 LATIN AMERICAN ANTIQUITY [Vol. 7, No. 4, 1996] "^PATZCUARO 1500 BC ^S~^ts^ VENTA j< COB TEHUACAN j "C 3400 BC /i 3500 BC •^ AMK4 #}] v • c LOWLANDS ( \T-PULLTROUSE- R PUERTO —/ ^-v GUILA NAOUITZ MARQUEZ * rv-COLH A (COBWEB) X PETENXIL ) ACAPETAHUA - O MAZATAN YOJOA . 2500 BC ^ TRONADORA- VIEJA \ N °< SANTA MARIA WATERSHED 5000-4000 BC Figure 1. Map of Middle America showing sites discussed in the text and dates for appearance of maize. The date of 3400 B.C. for Cob Swamp represents our best estimate of the appearance of maize in northern Belize. Until recently archaeologists have known little disturbance including charcoal from burning for about the origin and evolution of agriculture in forest clearance and the pollen and phytoliths midlatitude and adjacent lowland humid regions (species-specific silica structures) of domesti­ of Middle America, largely because Archaic cated plants. The view now emerging is that par­ period sites of foragers and early agriculturalists allel developments involving deforestation and are difficult to locate. There may be several rea­ experimentation in the cultivation of a variety of sons for archaeologists' difficulty in finding plants, including maize, occurred in the highlands Archaic sites. Settlement may have been and lowlands prior to 3000 B.C. ephemeral; it may have occurred in areas different There is mounting evidence that the origins of from those of later periods, or it may be buried Mesoamerican plant domestication lie not in the below sediments or water as a result of the post­ dry highlands as previously thought but in the glacial rise in sea level. Another problem is that warmer, wetter, midlatitude habitats of the Pacific macrobotanical remains are rarely preserved in slope of southwestern Mexico (Piperno and humid tropical environments. New evidence has Pearsall 1993). Long ago Carl Sauer (1941) pre­ shown that the key to understanding this early dicted that the origins of Mexican agriculture episode of lowland prehistory lies in combining should be sought in the seasonally wet Pacific paleoecological and archaeological research, slopes of southern Mexico because of the ecolog­ including analyses of sediments in cores from ical requirements of maize, beans, and squash; perennially wet environments where preservation evidence from a variety of sources substantiates is good. Paleoecological investigations can detect his view. Genetic (allozyme) as well as morpho­ human occupation even in the absence of sites. logical (phytolith) studies indicate that domestic Such evidence comes in the form of vegetation maize most closely resembles wild teosinte from Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. USM Libraries, on 07 Aug 2018 at 20:41:58, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.2307/972264 REPORTS 357 the Rio Balsas drainage of Guerrero and that this Chiapas and Tabasco, Mexico, dating to area was the hearthland of maize (Benz 1994; 2500-2000 B.C. (Blake et al. 1992b; Hoopes Doebley 1990; Piperno and Pearsall 1993). The 1991; Rue 1988; Rust and Leyden 1994). An common bean (Phaseolus) (Gepts et al. 1986) excellent archaeological record of Late Archaic may have been domesticated in an area of Jalisco and Early Formative settlement exists in the only about 195 km from populations of teosinte southern region of the Pacific coast of Chiapas thought to be ancestral to maize (Doebley 1990). (Blake et al. 1992a, 1992b; Clark 1994; Voorhies Moreover, the squash Cucurbita sororia, which et al. 1991). Here some groups may have taken up also occurs in the thorn scrub vegetation in this maize cultivation to a greater extent than others. area, may be the wild ancestor of the cultigen For example, although residents of the Mazatan Cucurbita argyrosperma. Although there is less zone of coastal Chiapas intensified settlement and information on root crops, the domestication of adopted paraphernalia used to assert social rank­ tubers such as sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) ing (such as mirror headdresses and finely made and perhaps also manioc (Manihot esculenta) pottery) by 1600 B.C., analysis of human bone may have taken place in southwestern Mexico as chemistry has revealed relatively low maize con­ well (Hawkes 1989; Rogers 1963, 1965). sumption. In contrast, the same bone chemistry Unfortunately, no direct archaeological evi­ study revealed that earlier (ca.