ABSTRACT
By combining two frameworks (the Dynamic Model and that of political cycling), I use both textual and archaeological evidence to document the origins of the Maya state. The geographic focus is the base of the Yucatan Peninsula, focusing special attention on sites in Quintana Roo, Campeche, and the Mirador Basin. I examine several eras that witnessed a series of major oscillations, with huge centers taking their turn at the top of the administrative hierarchy. I document the shift from amboyant rank society to initial state, a shift back to amboyant rank society, and then the rise of a much larger expansionist Maya state. In this paper I seek both to honor the career of E. Wyllys Andrews and to address a long-standing archaeological question. The question is one that I began asking myself before the ink was dry on my doctoral dissertation: “If the Snake Head refers to Calakmul, why does that emblem glyph appear so late in the archaeological sequence, especially since Calakmul was an important place even during the Middle and Late Preclassic?” Only after I began utilizing a framework that combined both the Dynamic Model (Marcus 1992, 1993) and the notion of political cycling (Anderson 1990; Wright 1984) did I see some of the ways that one might explain the distribution of the Kaan, or Snake Head, emblem glyph (Figure 4.1). Addressing a question of Preclassic political organization seems particularly appropriate as a way to honor Andrews, because so much of his research has been focused on that period (Andrews 1981, 1990; Ringle and Andrews 1988, 1990). “Digging a Preclassic site like Komchen,” he once said at the Atlanta SAA meetings, “has been truly rewarding” but “understanding the Preclassic will be possible only after long-term excavation is conducted at many sites.” Using Andrews’ statements as a point of departure, I will examine political cycling during the Middle and Late Preclassic (800 B.C.–A.D. 250) in the Mirador Basin (Figure 4.2), an area that extends from the base of the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico south into Guatemala (Benavides 2005; Carrasco 2000; Carrasco and Colón 2005; Dahlin 1984; Folan, Šprajc, et al. 2005; Forsyth 1989, 1993; García Cruz 1993; Grube 2005; Hansen 1990, 1994, 1998, 2002; Marcus 2004b; Matheny 1980; Robichaux and Pruett 2005; Ruppert and Denison 1943; Šprajc 2004, 2008; Šprajc, Folan, and González H. 2005; Šprajc, Morales A., and Hansen 2009).
