A Crisis of Identity: Late Classic Competition and Interaction on the Southeast Maya Periphery

Abstract

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.Archaeologistsfrequently assume that when cultures interact with each other the most complex partner dominates the transactions. We propose that this is a misleadingly simple view of a complex process. A framework for modeling intersocietal interaction and understanding its sociopolitical consequences is outlined here. This theoretical structure calls attention to who is actually involved in the interaction process, how these transactions are carried out, and what the goals of the contact partners are. The complex material patterns from two neighboring areas of Late Classic (A.D. 600-950) southeast Mesoamerica are then examined using the proposed model to see what insights into ancient interaction processes it can provide.Los arqueologos frecuentemente asumen que las culturas son entidades homogeneas que interactuan mutuamente, y cuando esto sucede, la parte mas compleja domina. En este trabajo se propone que este es un punto de vista erroneo y demasiado simplista, ya que el proceso es co mplejo. Las in teraccio nes entre sociedades se lleva a cabo no por culturas, sino por facciones dentro de las sociedades en cuestion. Estas facciones interactuan bajo la perspectiva de la identidad social, en tanto que categoria aceptada por todas las partes. El marco de referencia del modelo de interaccion de sociedades y de sus consecuencias sociopoliticas esta disenado utilizando este concepto. Esta estructura teorica pone enfasis sobre el agente involucrado en el proceso de interaccion, en la forma en que estas relaciones se llevan a cabo y en las metas que tienen las partes en contacto.En dos regiones adyacentes del sureste de Mesoamerica (el valle del Bajo Motagua, Guatemala, y la region de La Entrada, Honduras) durante el Clasico Tardfo (60s900 D.C.), se observaron tres patrones complejos con base en datos arqueologicos. Estos son: el patron de las tierras bajas mayas, el patron del Bajo Motagua y el patron de transformacion cultural intermedia. En este artfeulo, se examinan estos tres patrones utilizando el modelo prop uesto para ver que perspectivas emergen respecto del proceso de in teraccion en la a n tiguedad. En consecuencia, se propone una hipotesis que considera que la formacion de estos tres patrones de interaccion entre las elites se origina por competencia sobre recursos y por el deseo de las elites de facilitar, controlar y monopolizar los flujos interregionales. Asimismo, en el transfondo de la formacion de estos ambientes se supone que se encuentra el conflicto entre Copan y Quirigua, durante el siglo VIII. This article addresses general questions of interregional interaction within the context of a specificportion of the southeast Maya periphery (eastern Guatemala, western H...

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