The perfect storm: climate change and ancient Maya response in the Puuc Hills region of Yucatán

Smyth, Michael P.; Dunning, Nicholas P.; Weaver, Eric; Beynen, Kaya Van; Zapata, David Ortegón

doi:10.15184/aqy.2016.266

Cited by 20 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…Altogether, these data indicate ceremonial activity spanning the entire indigenous occupation sequence suggesting native religious rituals performed here until the founding of Villa de Leyva. This water temple and alleged association with portrait statues [3] appears to be similar to a site documented by Silva [2,47] at the Salina de Mongua, a highland setting some 80 km to the east. Mountain stream channels (quebradas) empty into the Rio Leyva but must first pass through the Colonial heart of Villa de Leyva (Figure 2a).…”

Section: Terrace Platform and Stream Channelssupporting

confidence: 69%

“…Recent climate change and human ecodynamic research in the Leiva Valley identified an engineered hydraulic landscape consisting of irrigation canals, check dams, drainage conduits, as well as potential raised-fields (artificially elevated planting surfaces) along river alluviums near the archaeological site of El Infiernito (Figure 1; see below) [2]. Prehispanic canals and raised-fields in the valley were reported to be still in use in the 16th century [3].…”

Section: A Hydraulic Landscape and Cosmologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Reconnaissance surveying along mountain arroyos revealed water pools and megalithic terrace tiers for a hilltop platform with shaped monolithic stones adjacent to the confluence of streams aligned with the helio-elliptical rising of the Winter Solstice. Importantly, in association are eight Muisca-style stone portrait statues of mythical figures emphasizing themes of fertility recalling the Legend of Iguaque, a myth of cosmic ontogeny and ancestral origin ( Figure 3, [2]). These mountain stream channels, canalized in Colonial and possibly Prehispanic times, travel across Villa de Leyva before emptying into the Rio Leyva.…”

Section: A Hydraulic Landscape and Cosmologymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Hydraulic Chiefdoms in the Eastern Andean Highlands of Colombia

Smyth¹

2018

Heritage

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The natural and cultural heritage of the Valley of Leiva in the Eastern Colombian Andes is closely tied to the Colonial town of Villa de Leyva. The popular tourist destination with rapid economic development and agricultural expansion contrasts sharply with an environment of limited water resources and landscape erosion. The recent discovery of Prehispanic hydraulic systems underscore ancient responses to water shortages conditioned by climate change. In an environment where effective rainfall and erosion are problematic, irrigation was vital to human settlement in this semi-arid highland valley. A chiefly elite responded to unpredictable precipitation by engineering a hydraulic landscape sanctioned by religious cosmology and the monolithic observatory at El Infiernito, the Stonehenge of Colombia. Early Colonial water works, however, transformed Villa de Leyva into a wheat breadbasket, though climatic downturns and poor management strategies contributed to an early 17th century crash in wheat production. Today, housing construction, intensive agriculture, and environmental instability combine to recreate conditions for acute water shortages. The heritage of a relatively dry valley with a long history of hydraulic chiefdoms, of which modern planners seem unaware, raises concerns for conservation and vulnerability to climate extremes and the need for understanding the prehistoric context and the magnitude of water availability today. This paper examines human ecodynamic factors related to the legacy of Muisca chiefdoms in the Leiva Valley and relevant issues of heritage in an Andean region undergoing rapid socio-economic change.

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Section: Terrace Platform and Stream Channelssupporting

confidence: 69%

Section: A Hydraulic Landscape and Cosmologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: A Hydraulic Landscape and Cosmologymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Hydraulic Chiefdoms in the Eastern Andean Highlands of Colombia

Smyth¹

2018

Heritage

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“…These formations are primarily distributed according to climate (temperature and precipitation), soil type (e.g., volcanic, alluvial), and elevation (highlands and lowlands). Past [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20] and the transition between the two [21]. These changes in hydroclimate are reported to be primarily driven by the interactions of three climatic forces: (i) the position of the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ); (ii) the North Atlantic Oscillation; and (iii) the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) [22].…”

Section: Vegetationmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Apparent Resilience of the Dry Tropical Forests of the Nicaraguan Region of the Central American Dry Corridor to Variations in Climate Over the Last C. 1200 Years

et al. 2019

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The Central American Dry Corridor (CADC) is the most densely populated area of the Central American Isthmus and is subject to the greatest variability in precipitation between seasons. The vegetation of this region is composed of Dry Tropical Forests (DTF), which are suggested to be highly susceptible to variations in climate and anthropogenic development. This study examines the vulnerability of past DTF surrounding the Asese peninsula, Nicaragua to climatic and anthropogenic disturbances over the past c. 1200 years. Past vegetation, climate, burning, and animal abundance were reconstructed using proxy analysis of fossil pollen, diatoms, macroscopic charcoal, and Sporormiella. Results from this research suggest that DTF have been highly resilient to past climatic and anthropogenic perturbations. Changes in DTF structure and composition appear to be linked to the abundance and intensity of fire. Pre-Columbian anthropogenic impacts on DTF are not detected in the record; however, DTF taxa decline slightly after European contact (1522 C.E.). Overall the DTF for the Nicaraguan region of the CADC were found to be highly resilient to both climatic and anthropogenic disturbances, suggesting that this region will continue to be resilient in the face of future population expansion and climatic variation.

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“…), climate and drought (Smyth et al. ), and the struggles and strategies of enslaved colonial peoples (Hauser ).…”

Section: Addressing Current Issuesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Finding Archaeology in 2017: What Is Archaeology and Why Are We Doing It? Why Should We Be Doing It?

Lewis

2018

American Anthropologist

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These annual review essays focus on what we as archaeologists are doing year by year. Many themes continue on from review to review, waxing and waning, not unlike the bell curves of a traditional pottery seriation.Each year, themes are highlighted and presented in varied ways according to the orientation and aims of the reviewer. All do a masterful job of curating the vast range of what archaeologists were, in each annual period, currently producing. My review follows in the footsteps of its predecessors, summarizing an array of new and exciting research, and describing how agendas presented in 2017 cluster around sets of related questions and aims. It will also look at the growing literature that asks, in one way or another, fundamental questions about what archaeology really is and why we pursue it. In this time when the value of academic pursuits and scientific perspectives are being highly scrutinized in politics and popular culture, archaeologists are faced with the uncomfortable question of "What is it, really, that we should be doing?" [archaeology, current issues, public archaeology, digital archaeology] RESUMEN Estos ensayos de revisión anual se enfocan en lo que como arqueólogos estamos haciendo año tras año. Muchos temas continúan de revisión en revisión, creciendo o menguando, no muy diferente de las curvas en forma de campana de la seriación de la cerámica tradicional. Cada año, temas son enfatizados y presentados de varias maneras de acuerdo a la orientación y metas del crítico. Todos hacen un trabajo magistral de organizar un rango vasto de lo que los arqueólogos estaban, en cada período anual, realmente produciendo. Mi revisión sigue los pasos de sus predecesores, resumiendo una colección de nueva y emocionante investigación, y describiendo cómo las agendas presentadas en el 2017 se agrupan alrededor de juegos de cuestiones y metas relacionadas.También examina la creciente literatura que pregunta, de una manera u otra, cuestiones fundamentales acerca de lo que la arqueología realmente es y por qué nos dedicamos a ella. En este tiempo cuando el valor de los empeños académicos y las perspectivas científicas están siendo altamente escrutados en política y cultura popular, los arqueólogos se enfrentan a la pregunta incomoda de "¿Qué es lo que realmente deberíamos estar haciendo?"[arqueología, cuestiones actuales, arqueología pública, arqueología digital] ARCHAEOLOGICAL FRAGMENTATION?While the theme of what such a diverse discipline should be subtly undergirds much of the literature, a number of 2017 articles, each in a very different way, directly address the very nature of what archaeology is and why we practice it. In the Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, Assaf Nativ (2017, 55) asks us to reconsider our notions of the

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The perfect storm: climate change and ancient Maya response in the Puuc Hills region of Yucatán

Abstract: Abstract

Cited by 20 publications

References 26 publications

Hydraulic Chiefdoms in the Eastern Andean Highlands of Colombia

Hydraulic Chiefdoms in the Eastern Andean Highlands of Colombia

The Apparent Resilience of the Dry Tropical Forests of the Nicaraguan Region of the Central American Dry Corridor to Variations in Climate Over the Last C. 1200 Years

Finding Archaeology in 2017: What Is Archaeology and Why Are We Doing It? Why Should We Be Doing It?

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