The Nature of an Ancient Maya City
Resources, Interaction, and Power at Blue Creek, Belize

Thomas H. Guderjan (Author), L. Antonio Curet (Series edited by)

9780817354268

Paperback / softback, published 9 December 2007

169 pages, 40 illustrations
23.2 x 15.7 x 1.1 cm, 0.318 kg

Clearly written, substantive, and well-organized, this volume is a summary of the most important aspects of the research and is designed to alert the discipline to the major discoveries and interpretations. - David Freidel, Southern Methodist University

This work is a comprehensive study of a unique Maya site offering the full range of undisturbed architectural features. For two millennia, the site now known as Blue Creek in northwestern Belize was a Maya community that became an economic and political center that included some 15,000-20,000 people at its height. Fairly well protected from human destruction, the site offers the full range of city components including monumental ceremonial structures, elite and non-elite residences, ditched agricultural fields, and residential clusters just outside the core. Since 1992, a multi-disciplinary, multi-national research team has intensively investigated Blue Creek in an integrated study of the dynamic structure and functional inter-relationships among the parts of a single Maya city. Documented in coverage by National Geographic, ""Archaeology"" magazine, and a documentary film aired on the Discovery Channel, Blue Creek is recognized as a unique site offering the full range of undisturbed architectural construction to reveal the mosaic that was the ancient city. Moving beyond the debate of what constitutes a city, Guderjan's long-term research reveals what daily Maya life was like.