Book Description
The central goal of this book is to contribute to the timely discussion and understanding of Maya sacrifice and related posthumous body manipulation. Most school children in the US learn about the Maya and their practices based on their cultural and religious beliefs in their Social Studies classes. But a number of new sites have been discovered, giving an interdisciplinary group of researchers a channel to discuss these acts and their meaning.
The editors bring together not only archaeologists but anthropologists, forensic anthropologists, art historians and bioarchaeologists, giving the volume a more complete perspective on these sites and the material culture and biological evidence found there. The field of archaeology is growing to include the physical remains of ritual practice along with the material remains and this book can be seen as an example of who the study of ancient civilizations can be more comprehensive. Additionally, this is an international volume with scholars from the area studied which is becoming more and more important in archaeological research.
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- An excellent overview of Mayan Archaeology
- Archaeology and T The New he Ancient Maya
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The New Archaeology and the Ancient Maya (Scientific American Library)
Jeremy A. Sabloff
Manufacturer: Scientific American Library
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0716750546 |
Customer Reviews:
An excellent overview of Mayan Archaeology.......2000-10-10
I found this book very informative. It demonstrates how much archaeology and our knowledge of the Maya has changed since the Mayan ruins were first 'discovered' in the 19th century.
The cultural biases of the early archaeoligts now explain many of the 'facts' put forward in early books on this subject. Acutally many of these 'facts' were just guesses, but because they were put forward by prominent people they were taken on face value. Much of the work, especially since the 1960's has disproved or changed out of recognition these early 'facts'.
The last overview book on the Maya I read had them as peace loving people in lovely cities in the jungle, who just "gave it all up for no decent reason". This book completly changed my view on that. It made me realise on how slim a foundation many of the earlier works lay.
I'd reccomend this book to anybody who wants to know how much archaeology has changed - and why what these people have discovered is not only in the past, but also has a bearing on us today..
Archaeology and T The New he Ancient Maya.......2000-02-29
There are many books written on the subject of the Maya civilization. What sets
Jeremy Sabloff's book apart from the rest is how he approaches the subject. He refers
to his book as a story, and provides his reader with a very concise overview of the Maya
civilization. The clarity of his text enhances the usefulness of the book, which in turn
broadens the audience from anthropology students to anyone interested in learning
about the Maya. Sabloff sets out his `story' to combine history, theory, methods and
fieldwork and best describes the text in his own preface, an "attempt to explain how
early archaeologists arrived at the `traditional model' of ancient Maya civilization that
was popular in the first half of the century and how fieldwork has given birth to new
discoveries of the Maya." (Sabloff, preface). The text is broken down into six chapters
and in each chapter he uses subheadings to organize his interpretation of the
information and to reveal an accurate knowledge of Maya studies.
Using Maya archaeology as an extended study, Sabloff uses relevant sites
during specific time periods as case studies to examine the area he wishes to describe
to his reader.
The first chapter is entitled `Growth of Modern Scientific Archaeology',almost
beginning were the preface left on in terms of what Sabloff views as the `traditional
model' of early Maya archaeology. This begins with the idea of what stream of
questions the archaeologist should ask. In the `traditional model', Sabloff shows that
the `what' and `where' questions of the past are no longer as relevant as the newly
replaced `why' and `how' shift. It is in this chapter that Sabloff introduces the first of
many different scholars to emphasize each section. Schiffer and Binford are discussed
as well as one of their more popular methodological issues of the past, linked cultural
activities.
The next two chapters give the reader a contrast with the `traditional model' of
ancient civilization and new views of the classic period. With these topics, Sabloff
refers to the findings of Morley and Thompson in chapter two and Willey and
Proskouriakoff in the following section. The way he introduces these scholars is one of
respect. Sabloff does not bash the early ideas of archaeologists (knowing now that the
information is not thorough), he describes their work prior to the archaeological
revolution as successful and that many of their ideas were not wrong, just not
developed enough. With regards to the later of the four scholars, Sabloff explains
Proskouriakoff's remarkable findings from the Usumacinta River sites of Piedras and
Yaxchilan and the breakthrough idea that Maya texts record history. What Sabloff
seems to stress is that with each decade, the scholars and the information they have
gathered help the next generation of archaeologists in their quest to better understand
Maya civilization.
Chapter four evaluates new views of the Pre-classic and Post-classic period.
Sabloff introduces specific case studies such as the areas of Chichen Itza and
Cozumel. By focusing in on these areas, Sabloff is able to convey to his reader an
understanding of what archaeology can accomplish.
The remaining two chapters analyze the emergence of a new model and takes a
look at archaeology under this new modern world. Sabloff highlights the scholars
Webster and Gonlin and their research on the emergence of more distant rural
areas among the Maya subareas.
With each chapter, Sabloff gives the reader a new finding in terms of Maya
civilization. He frequently looks for parallels between ourselves and the Maya which
make this civilization even more real and exciting to the reader. The `story' concludes
with Sabloff asking questions to the reader, and having read the book, the questions
encompass so much information in only a few lines. Sabloff leaves the reader thinking
as well as feeling confident enough to ponder the questions himself.
After the final word has been read, there are ten pages of further readings listed
by chapter, which include everyone mentioned in the book and then some.
`The New Archaeology and the Ancient Maya' is lavishly illustrated with
photographs, site plans and maps all of which are in colour. All of these visual aids in
conjunction with the accurate read, help to summerize this complicated subject with
success. Sabloff hits his target perfectly with how he feels this story should be told,
his story is "to understand the development of a past culture, not find lost arks".
Book Description
In the suburbs of Washington a secret is lurking. Everyone notices that Sam Johanek, a weapons analyst with a top-secret clearance, is changing. He exhibits peculiar mood swings, weird food preferences and a bizarre case of amnesia. No one suspects that Sam is battling a recurring nightmare and a scary obsession with his Basenji dog. In fear for his well being, Sam's wife contacts an inexperienced psychologist. Series of events follow, that take the readers on a trip, from Egypt's Valley of the Kings to the jungles of Gabon, where hides the oldest secret of the ancient Egyptians. As time runs out for Sam, his fate rests in the hands of three people destined to uncover the 'The Basenji Revelation.' Find out why the Midwest Book Review calls this book "...an action packed thriller that will have readers white knuckled and holding their breath...try not to read it with the lights off," and why The Gothic Revue says "...it gave me the shivers."
Customer Reviews:
Compelling, Intriguing, and Well Worth the Time!.......2007-04-10
The Basenji Revelation is an exceptional book. The horror portion of the book is genuinely scary. The author uses a combination of heart-pumping
action scenes, mythological references, and rich vocabulary to make the reader feel each action of the protagonist. An example is the nightmare Maggie has right before her husband lapses into his first public display of madness. For me, this episode remains one of the rare, truly frightening pieces of literature I've personally read. However, horror was not the only thing that attracted me to this book. I've been toying with the idea of getting a basenji breed for about a year. I
wanted to learn more of this particular breed, especially about its origin. When I searched online, I found good information on Wikipedia and there I read about Simon Cleveland's book. The book is rich with historical and mythological details about the breed and its link to the Egyptian culture and religion. What's really fascinating is how the author links modern society with the ancient people. In the character of Sam he reveals more than just a burnt out workaholic with mental issues. Sam is a product of the impacts of modern technology and cultural values. The wife's character, Maggie, symbolizes the natural human response to mental illness, mainly the desire to help and the confusion or lack of knowledge on how to achieve that. The book never failed to entertain me. The end is probably what I found the most compelling. It suggests much greater symbolic meaning to the book than the dramatic conclusion and I think that any reader would be impressed with it.
I thought it was amazing.......2006-06-16
I can still hear the call of the Basenji. I have a basenji in fact. No wonder it's called the barkless dog, it sounds like a female crying. This book gives a new meaning to mythological horror. It's both a contemporary mystery and psychological thriller, except it has a fully developed historical research to tie it nicely to the overall story. Before I bought it I read one of the reviews below that said something like: Try not to read it with the lights off and something about giving you the shivers. Both are very true. In one of the scenes where the psychologist is alone with the Basenji in the middle of the night, boy it freaked me out. Does anyone know anything about the Rosetta stone? Are the creature's phrases really based on the Demotic and Coptic languages from the ancient Egypt? Wow, what a book.
Hungry for horror in the style of 'The Mummy'? Look out King.......2006-06-03
This is one of the best books I've read in a while. The story seizes you immediately from the start and before you know it, you're turning the last page. This author has a wild imagination, that's for sure. There's a fully developed horror story around a 6,000 year-old Egyptian deity and the final revelation made the heirs on the back of my neck stand.
The way he explains some of the scenes, I felt as if I was part of the action. Definitely gets a high score in my book.
reader from pa.......2006-04-14
I found this book an intruiging read. I disagree with another reader about giving the breed a bad name. I own a basenji myself, and anyone that owns or has been around them knows they're sweet, clever, silly little dogs. I don't think any less of St. Bernards because of "Cujo".
Powerful symbolism - frightful yet thought provoking.......2006-02-09
There are few books written in the horror genre that deserve special attention. These are the treasures that possess both the power to frighten and the capacity to compel by responding to the reader's expectations and fears. The Basenji Revelation is one of these rare treasures. Simon Cleveland had fashioned a powerful drama, which although supernatural in its core never escapes actual human reality. The story is quite interesting. It combines elements of both the mythical and the modern as it charms the readers with a rich history. In the end, the author's message goes beyond the unexplained. It leaps forward in search of the symbolic nature of the super human - the one who ultimately becomes aware of all life's mysteries. And it is this leap forward that transitions the Basenji Revelation out of the routine realm of horror and marries it with the one of magical realism. A very, very good read indeed.
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Palaces of the Ancient New World (Dumbarton Oaks Pre-Columbian Conference Proceedings)
Manufacturer: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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Cultural Landscapes In The Ancient Andes: Archaeologies Of Place
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Pikillacta: The Wari Empire in Cuzco
ASIN: 0884023001 |
Book Description
Among the most sumptuous buildings of antiquity were royal palaces. As in the Old World, kings and nobles of ancient Mexico and Peru had luxurious administrative quarters in cities, and exquisite pleasure palaces in the countryside. This volume explores the great houses of the ancient New World, from palaces of the Aztecs and Incas, looted by the Spanish conquistadors, to those lost high in the Andes and deep in the jungle. This volume, the first scholarly compendium of elite residences of the high cultures of the New World, presents definitive descriptions and interpretations by leading scholars in the field. Authoritative yet accessible, this extensively illustrated book will serve as an important resource for anthropologists, archaeologists, and historians of art, architecture, and related disciplines.
Book Description
This volume offers new calendrical models and methodologies for reading, dating, and interpreting the general significance of the Madrid Codex. The longest of the surviving Maya codices, the Madrid Codex includes texts and images painted by scribes conversant in Maya hieroglyphic writing, a written means of communication practiced by Maya elites from the second to the fifteenth centuries A.D. Some scholars have recently argued that the Madrid Codex originated in the Petén region of Guatemala and post-dates European contact. The contributors to this volume challenge that view by demonstrating convincingly that it originated in northern Yucatán and was painted in the Pre-Columbian era. In addition, several contributors reveal provocative connections among the Madrid and Borgia group of codices from Central Mexico.
Customer Reviews:
Scholarly and well-researched comprehensive look at the ancient Maya .......2007-02-26
_The Ancient Maya_ by Heather McKillop is a comprehensive and thoroughly researched overview of this Central American civilization, complete with maps, diagrams, photographs, and many pages of references.
Organized like a textbook (and I understand it is used as such in some college courses), it is divided into eleven chapters. The first chapter is a general introduction, the author noting some of the evolution in scholarly understanding of the Maya, due to a huge growth in the amount of fieldwork and critical breakthroughs in decipherment of Mayan hieroglyphics, particularly thanks to the efforts of such scholars as Yuri Knorozov (who pointed out that the hieroglyphs were phonetic and not logographs or based on picture writing) and Tatiana Proskouriakoff (who discovered that hieroglyphs on carved stone monuments or stelae recorded historical information and the exploits of Classic Maya royalty, not priestly writings on astronomy and mathematics). McKillop introduced three competing theories that attempted to explain the collapse of the classic Maya civilization in the ninth century, something that she would revisit several times (briefly, they were ecological disaster resulting form overpopulation and overuse of the land, escalating endemic warfare between the various Maya city-states, and catastrophic environmental change brought about by climatic shifts).
Chapter two looked at where the ancient Maya civilization existed, dividing the Maya area into three regions; the northern Maya lowlands (the Yucatan peninsula), the southern Maya lowlands (Belize, the Peten area of Guatemala, the Chiapas area of Mexico, and part of Honduras), and the southern Maya highlands (southern Guatemala). She noted the rock types used by the ancient Maya - chert (which she said is erroneously referred to as flint), limestone, obsidian, basalt - and their sources and issues in studying existing plant and animal communities in the region (ramon trees, which produce an edible nut, are prolific around Maya ruin sites but were not a major component of the Classic Maya diet; these trees love the lime-rich soil found around deteriorating limestone buildings).
Chapter three looked at the history of the archaeology of the Maya. She noted how far study has advanced, from destructive digging ("Gann holes" are still found in the center of some stone mounds, the legacy of enthusiastic explorer Thomas Gann) and forgeries (the famous crystal skull found in 1927) to sophisticated modern techniques (including studies of debitage - flakes left over from making stone tools - and obsidian hydration, which can pinpoint the source of obsidian used for tools and help trace Maya trade routes).
Chapter four is on the origins, growth, and decline of Maya civilization. An important chapter, she provided a good definition of the Classic period (approximately A.D. 300 to 900, when Maya kings and queens had stone monuments erected with historical information and dates in the Maya long count and the peak of the civilization in terms of population, architecture, and the arts). She provided an overview of the great importance in studying Maya pottery, an overview of Maya architecture, and a discussion of Postclassic Maya civilization.
Chapter five was devoted to economic matters, which is divided by scholars into the prestige economy (production and distribution of goods for the royal Maya) and the subsistence economy (goods for the daily use of all classes of Maya society). There is still considerable debate over the degree of elite control and centralization of the ancient Maya economy as well as how specialized the means of production was; was there mass production or cottage industries?
Chapter six covered Maya society. It was interesting to learn that there was a Maya middle class and even "garden cities" or suburbs in some of the 80 Maya polities that existed. She covered the evolution in understanding of Maya population (from concepts of Maya cities as largely empty ceremonial centers to instead that of teeming metropolises) and the different social levels of Maya society; there were two classes of elites (ahau and cahal), while the remaining 98 percent of Maya society was made up two classes of commoners and perhaps slaves (it is debated).
Chapter seven looked at Maya politics. There is debate over whether the Maya city-states were fairly autonomous and operated independently (the segmentary model) or whether there was more centralization and various regional superpowers rose and fell. Other debates center over the nature of warfare; was it related to expansionistic empire-building by Maya royalty, or was it to obtain captives for sacrifice? She covered the development of defensive walls in Maya cities, noting that some cities apparently hastily built defensive walls and moats using the stone from buildings, causeways, and paths of their own city.
Chapter eight looked at Maya religion and ideology, with lots of coverage of the ball game and of Maya deities.
Chapter nine looked at the material culture, with much discussion of the types of items found and how they are studied. Interesting facts; chert was sometimes used to make complex renditions of Maya rulers and their method of manufacture "defies modern replication," Maya painters showed frame-by-frame action, something not shown in Western art until the late 19th century, and pumice was used to make fishing floats.
Chapter ten looked at the intellectual accomplishments of the Maya, notably their mathematics, calendars, writing, and astronomy. Though books were apparently once common in the Classic period, only four Postclassic books survive. They were made of fig bark paper whose surface was coated with a white coating of plaster or gesso (a calcium sulphate), written on with either a sharp quill pen or a brush pen, and were fan-folded with text and images on both sides. Maya glyphs were quite variable, reflecting the decentralized nature of the Classic Maya political landscape.
The final chapter summarized future issues for Mayanists, notably discussions of the Classic collapse (an issue complicated by the fact that the collapse took 150 years to happen and some areas in northern Belize, the coast, and the northern Maya lowlands actually climaxed after the collapse), the nature of Mayan politics, food, and issues of illegal trade in Maya antiquities.
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New Theories on the Ancient Maya (University Museum Monograph)
Elin C. Danien
Manufacturer: University of Pennsylvania Museum Publication
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0924171138 |
Book Description
Copán in modern Honduras was one of the great cities of the Classic Maya. Abandoned to the rain forest for nearly a thousand years, it was rediscovered in the early 1800s. Now, two centuries later, an international team of scholars is solving the puzzle of Copán and the ancient Maya. William Fash, himself one of the key contributors to the recent breakthroughs, describes how decipherment of the Maya inscriptions together with tomb finds have unlocked the secrets of Copán's history. For this revised edition, Professor Fash shows how recent discoveries in the Acropolis, urban wards, and rural redoubts of the Copán kingdom reveal fascinating insights into the life and times of royalty, nobles, and commoners in this distinguished Maya city. The uncovering of the extraordinary tomb of the dynasty's founder provides illuminating information on his origins and accomplishments, while archaeological and hieroglyphic studies have demonstrated the importance of Tikal and the great metropolis of Teotihuacan in the founding and long-term legitimization of the Copán royal line. New excavations in the royal residential area give a blueprint for the layout and functioning of Maya palaces, as well as dramatic evidence for the violent and sudden end to dynastic rule. 11 color and 109 b/w illustrations.
Customer Reviews:
Not bad but not fantastic either.......2007-04-28
I will be visiting Copan at the end of the month so i picked up this book to get some information about the place.Overall the book is really good with lots of pictures which deifinetly is a plus with me.The explanations are very good altough i found myself re-reading some of them often because the author uses a lot of technical terms.The book is to big so i will not carry it with me when i visit Copan.It would have been a plus if the book would have been smaller.One thing that i didnt like was the fact that the author spends too many pages explaining Copan's relationship with other cities in the area.I would have loved to read more about the people of Copan, their daily lives and their beliefs.But again, good introduction.
Scribes, Warriors, and Kings.......2001-09-18
An excellent, comprehensive, and very readable text, written by a true expert on the subject. I highly reccomend it.
best book there is about copan.......1999-02-20
nothing to say just read i
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