Valuing the ubiquitous: Resource availability and landscape value among the Classic period Maya of western Belize

Abstract

Studies of materials' value in past societies have examined a wide variety of causes for value including, but not limited to, labor, skill, access, cultural associations, and scarcity and abundance. This article examines how scholars can determine which of these causes of value relate to values of landscapes and the materials extracted from those locations, particularly for abundant materials. It draws on an archaeological case study of the availability of chert raw materials for making lithic, or stone, tools for the Late Classic period Maya of western Belize (600–900 CE). In western Belize, chert resources are common but distributed unevenly across the landscape. Despite the ease of access, chert was a valued raw material, and households relied on its extraction as a key economic activity. The economic logic behind resource value can be examined based on a lithic extraction and production area, Callar Creek Quarry. This article, based on excavations of quarry and household contexts and analysis of the resultant materials, finds that the widespread availability of chert resources in the Maya lowlands did not result in these resources being less valuable but that the skill added to the materials through extraction and production increased their value.

Lithics in the Maya Region: Exploring Gendered Trends in Research in the Last Decade

“…In northern Belize, Barrett (2011) identified elite management of chert resources. In western Belize, studies find decentralized access, with local producers managing chert extraction (Horowitz 2018(Horowitz , 2021(Horowitz , 2022; in the Peten, the presence of chert in pockets within the limestone bedrock makes it unlikely that resource extraction was managed (Hansen 2016:355;Kwoka 2014). Similar patterns are visible in obsidian extraction as the geographic extent of sources makes them difficult to manage (e.g., Alvarado Hernandez 2016).…”

The Cultural Landscapes of Maya Roads: The Material Evidence and a GIS Study from the Maya Lowlands of Chiapas and Tabasco, Mexico

“…The study of roads in archaeology examines the social organization and spatial configuration of past societies, including the indices of integration, scale, and complexity of a polity (Dalakoglou and Harvey 2012; Earle 1991; Gorenflo and Bell 1991; Horowitz 2022; Schroder et al 2021; Snead et al 2009; Trombold 1991). Road networks are studied to understand how they relate to the ceremonial and political nodes of chiefdoms and smaller statelets (Earle 1991:13).…”

Landscapes of value

“…But economic anthropology's long project of identifying, contextualizing, and questioning the apparent truisms governing neoclassical economics applies even here. Horowitz (2022) looks to the Late Classic period Maya of western Belize (600–900 CE) to analyze the valuation of chert resources in Callar Creek Quarry, arguing that ubiquitous resources were more valued than scarce ones. Finding no evidence of ritual use or symbolic value, Horowitz argues that knowledgeable extractors infused commonplace lithic materials with greater value through the application of skilled labor—specifically, the knowledge to select higher‐ over lower‐quality specimens for craft production.…”

“…Finding no evidence of ritual use or symbolic value, Horowitz argues that knowledgeable extractors infused commonplace lithic materials with greater value through the application of skilled labor—specifically, the knowledge to select higher‐ over lower‐quality specimens for craft production. Contra the expectations of supply and demand, Horowitz (2022, 322) argues that “abundant resources can hold tremendous value” when infused with people's skilled labor. In a context where the abundance of a landscape resource made irrelevant any attempts at hoarding or exclusion, the kinds of value that can be created and attributed to those resources also shift.…”