Oldest Writing in the New World

Martínez, Ma. del Carmen Rodríguez; Ceballos, Ponciano Ortíz; Coe, Michael D.; Diehl, Richard A.; Houston, Stephen D.; Taube, Karl; Calderón, Alfredo

doi:10.1126/science.1131492

Cited by 50 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…Soon thereafter was the apogee from 3400 to 3150 BP of the Olmec’s large ceremonial and political center of San Lorenzo (Inomata et al, 2021) on elevated (up to 50 m) terrain above the floodplain of the Coatzacoalcos River. By this time, the Olmec started to develop expertise in ceramics, possibly developed early writing (Rodríguez Martínez et al, 2006), and stone carving such as the giant stone head sculptures that epitomize Olmec culture (Coe and Diehl, 1980). By c. 3700 BCE (5650 BP), humans were occupying floodplain levees of the Bari River (a tributary of the Tonalá River) further north, around 12 km from the Gulf Coast, and La Venta became a powerful center with a large population around 2800 BP, situated on elevated terrain on the Tonalá River delta (Rust and Sharer, 1988; Inomata et al, 2013).…”

Section: Study Areamentioning

confidence: 99%

Four millennia of geomorphic change and human settlement in the lower Usumacinta–Grijalva River Basin, Mexico

Muñoz‐Salinas

Cook

Castillo

et al. 2023

Progress in Physical Geography: Earth and Environment

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The lower Usumacinta–Grijalva River Basin contains one of the richest biodiversity landscapes of the Maya region. Our research is based on (1) an integrative literature review of the geomorphological and archaeological papers published about the lower Usumacinta–Grijalva River Basin and (2) topographic analysis of digital elevation models using a geographical information system to explore the relationship between past human settlement and landscape accessibility along the coastal plain of Tabasco. This work provides a new synthesis of previous research and proposes new models for the geomorphic evolution of the lower Usumacinta–Grijalva River Basin in the context of four millennia of human land use and settlement. For the evolution of the strand-plain of the Usumacinta and Grijalva rivers, there are two published geochronological models that provide different chronologies. We discuss here how both geochronological models encompass Pre-Columbian human settlement in the delta. Interestingly, we notice that one of them overlaps a possible high-magnitude flood event (or events) that drove large geomorphic change around 750 CE (1200 BP), with implications for settlement patterns and chronology. Based on topographical analysis of the eastern-distal sector of the Usumacinta–Grijalva delta, we propose a new model for the evolution of this area with implications for the human occupation during the Mesoamerican Terminal Classic and Early Postclassic on the delta. As one of the main conclusions, we propose that the Pom–Atasta water bodies predate much of the Usumacinta–Grijalva delta and the most recent phase of delta building overlays the original lagoon barriers, resulting in a geomorphic setting more attractive to local human occupation after the Terminal Classic period. According to one of the geochronological models of the delta, this dates to ca. 900 CE, preceding the establishment of nearby settlements such as Atasta.

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Section: Study Areamentioning

confidence: 99%

Four millennia of geomorphic change and human settlement in the lower Usumacinta–Grijalva River Basin, Mexico

Muñoz‐Salinas

Cook

Castillo

et al. 2023

Progress in Physical Geography: Earth and Environment

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“…There is still on-going research into the origins and development of Maya Preclassic writing (Saturno, Stuart, & Beltran, 2006;Chase et al, 2009;Houston & Garrison, 2015). Scholars are converging on the Olmec heartland site of La Venta, an area 80 kilometers south of the Gulf of Mexico, and western-adjacent to the Yucatan Peninsula, as the place where the earliest writing emerged (Martinez et al, 2006;Law, 2015, p. 170). Maya writing had its origins in the 1000 years before the Classic period in an era of warring chiefdoms who depicted their conquests (Postgate, Wang, & Wilkinson, 1995, p. 471) At the time of the Classic period, urban centers used a fully-developed and complex system "that combines logographic and phonetic signs" (Law, 2015, p. 158), which could represent the spoken word.…”

Section: Ancient Mayamentioning

confidence: 99%

How and Why Formal Education Originated in the Emergence of Civilization

Eskelson¹

2020

JEL

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The purpose of this study is to argue that formal education had multiple, independent origins in the emergence of ancient civilizations, for universally the same reasons. It uses socio-biological literature to outline the nature of human societies; ethnographic literature to show that no systems of formal education existed in small-scale hunter-gatherer communities; and evolutionary psychological literature, specifically the cognitive niche theory of human evolution, and domain-specific brain module theories, to show how children learn. The second section details the organizational changes that occurred in the emergence of civilization and why this required the development of formal institutions of education. The study uses four ancient civilizations—Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, and Mesoamerica—to provide evidence for the paper’s argument. The study offers a theory for the relationship between the structural organization of human societies and the implications this has for social learning. Overall, it provides a working theory for how and why formal education first emerged in human societies, due to the administrative tools needed to keep a state-level society functioning.

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“…In this way, anything that is 'hieroglyphic' assumes the quality of being 'pictographic'. That the quintessential 'hieroglyphic' system will thus be reminiscent in form of the Egyptian hieroglyphic prototype is immaterial to the definition itself, so that a historically distant system such as the controversial Cascajal Block is often defined as, basically, 'hieroglyphic' (del Carmen Rodríguez Martínez et al 2006).…”

Section: "Hieroglyphick! What Meanest Thou By That?"mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ferrara¹

2014

Athyrmata: Critical Essays on the Archaeology of the Eastern Mediterranean in Honour of E. Susan Sherratt

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Oldest Writing in the New World

Cited by 50 publications

References 3 publications

Four millennia of geomorphic change and human settlement in the lower Usumacinta–Grijalva River Basin, Mexico

Four millennia of geomorphic change and human settlement in the lower Usumacinta–Grijalva River Basin, Mexico

How and Why Formal Education Originated in the Emergence of Civilization

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