From Calakmul to the Sea: The Historical Ecology of a Classic Maya City That Controlled the Candelaria/Champoton Watersheds

Abstract

The Candelaria River watershed of Campeche, Mexico, and Peten, Guatemala, has shaped millennia of Maya, perhaps from their beginnings and generations of archaeologists. This chapter reviews efforts to understand Candelaria historical ecology over the past four decades, mostly in the northern branch, the Candelaria-El Caribe-Tomatillal system, as it relates to the cities of Calakmul and Uxul. Additional investigations stem from the river system farther north, the Champoton-Desempeño watershed, which also approaches Calakmul at its headwaters. Four other projects (Oxpemul, Yaxnohcah, Naachtun, Uxul) have emerged in the southern branches of the Candelaria and Desempeño in recent years, in addition to a long-standing project at El Mirador. Methods utilized range over global-local climate teleconnections, geology, ethnoecology, soil formation and transformation, geochemistry, pollen, and phytolith sampling. Brief but key statements of results for each method are reported as they contribute to a holistic perspective on the evolution and the death of Calakmul. Key interests that guided the research are the commercial location of the city and watershed in the Maya urban system, the way the watershed shaped the human settlement pattern in the west central Maya Lowlands, the socioecological adaptations over time, and its utility as a middle-level unit of study in links between human and Earth system changes. Finally, a nutrient flow model unifies the results into a concept that may yield deeper insights into the narrative and simulation modelling of Maya social evolution.

Geomorphology of the Mirador-Calakmul Karst Basin: A GIS-based approach to hydrogeologic mapping

“…Because of rapid drainage into the cockpits, bajos are scarce in the polygonal karst creating a terrain with a low percentage of wetlands ( Table 6 ). It is this 10–15 km wide polygonal karst, a rough landscape that would have hindered trade and communications, that is referred to as a buffer zone between the Calakmul and Tikal polities during the Classic period [ 21 , 77 ].…”

“… Shown are the Calakmul Geographical Region [ 77 ], the upper Candelaria River Watershed referred to as the Calakmul Basin [ 21 ], and the Mirador-Calakmul Basin [ 85 ]. These compare closely to the boundary of the MCKB defined below.…”

“…These compare closely to the boundary of the MCKB defined below. Also noted is a natural buffer zone, the polygonal karst landscape, a region which Gunn and others defined as a military buffer between the Tikal and Calakmul regions during the Classic period [ 21 ]. AW3D30 elevation data have been provided by JAXA ( https://www.eorc.jaxa.jp/ALOS/en/aw3d30/ ) and printed under a CC BY 4.0 license.…”

“…During the Late Preclassic period (350 BCE– 150 CE), El Mirador appears to have become the main center of the region. Subsequently, in the Classic period, Calakmul became one of the powerful capitals of the Maya lowlands [ 18 – 21 ]. Consideration of cultural continuity and internal trade suggests the use of a single polity when describing Calakmul, El Mirador and their surrounding settlements [ 22 , 23 ].…”

“…350 BCE) and later during the Late Classic (ca. 600 CE) under Calakmul [ 21 , 27 ]. Given the importance of the region as a contiguous cultural area, the karst landscape of the Petén Plateau merits classification and the hydrogeologic framework of the Mirador-Calakmul Karst Basin warrants definition.…”