ABSTRACT
This chapter distinguishes differences in storage strategies, how and where goods were stored, and how stored goods were administered, as a way to reconstruct political structure among the lowland Maya. It explores three major topics concerning Maya storage and the economy: subsistence and surplus, specialization and trade, and the degree of political centralization. This chapter focuses on the Maya city of Tikal, but it is assumed that there was considerable variability across the lowland Maya world. Market capitalism and the commoditization of labor, hallmarks of market-based economies, were an unlikely part of the ancient Maya economy at Tikal. At Tikal, how and where utilitarian goods were produced, distributed, and exchanged to tens of thousands of consumers are not known. Classic Maya palace structures were foci of political and economic activities concerning the ruling elite class. Storerooms in Maya palaces would have been used to house tribute collection and the products of exchange activity.
