The Resilience and Vulnerability of Ancient Landscapes

This volume represents the concerted efforts of a group of Maya archaeologists to employ a different approach to their archaeological data that is consistent with an effort called IHOPE: Integrated History and Future of People on Earth. IHOPE is a global network of scientists and researchers that seeks to use a wide range of data to examine how changes in the Earth's systems of the past have been correlated with changes in the coupled human-biophysical environment (Costanza et al. 2007). “The specific objectives for IHOPE are to identify slow and rapidly moving features of complex social-ecological systems, on local to continental spatial scales, which induce resilience, stress, or collapse in linked systems of humans and nature. These objectives will be reached by exploring innovative ways of conducting inter and trans-disciplinary science, including theory, case studies, and integrated modeling” (Costanza et al. 2012:1). The integration of these data, a large portion of which are derived from archaeology, is seen as an important contribution to the accurate and applicable information base for addressing both short- and long-term planning issues facing modern populations.

Table of Contents iii

Foreward v

INTRODUCTION

Chapter 1. Diversity, Resiliency, and IHOPE-Maya: Using the Past to Inform the Present
Arlen F. Chase and Vernon Scarborough 1

Chapter 2. Tropical Landscapes and the Ancient Maya: Diversity in Time and Space
Arlen F. Chase, Lisa J. Lucero, Vernon L. Scarborough, Diane Z. Chase, Rafael Cobos, Nicholas P. Dunning, Scott L. Fedick, Vilma Fialko, Joel D. Gunn, Michelle Hegmon, Gyles Iannone, David L. Lentz, Rodrigo Liendo, Keith Prufer, Jeremy A. Sabloff, Joseph A. Tainter, Fred Valdez Jr, and Sander E. van der Leeuw 11

Chapter 3. Water and Landscape: Ancient Maya Settlement Decisions
Lisa J. Lucero, Scott L. Fedick, Nicholas P. Dunning, David L. Lentz, and Vernon L. Scarborough 30

CASE STUDIES

Chapter 4. Growth and Decline in Classic Maya Puuc Political Economies
Christian Isendahl, Nicholas P. Dunning, and Jeremy A. Sabloff 43

Chapter 5. Ancient Climate and Archaeology: Uxmal, Chichen Itza, and Their Collapse at the End
of the Terminal Classic Period
Rafael Cobos, Guillermo de Anda Alanýs, and Roberto Garcýa Moll 56

Chapter 6. A Reassessment of Water and Soil Resources in the Flatlands of the Northern Maya Lowlands
Scott L. Fedick 72

Chapter 7. Population Dynamics and Its Relation to Ancient Landscapes in the Northwestern
Maya Lowlands: Evaluating Resilience and Vulnerability
Rodrigo Liendo, Elizabeth Solleiro-Rebolledo, Berenice Solis-Castillo, Sergei Sedov, and Arturo Ortiz-Perez 84

Chapter 8. Calakmul: Agent Risk and Sustainability in theWestern Maya Lowlands
Joel D. Gunn, William J. Folan, Christian Isendahl, Mar´ýa del Rosario Dom´ýnguez Carrasco, Betty B. Faust, and Beniamino Volta 101

Chapter 9. The Alternative Economy: Resilience in the Face of Complexity from the Eastern Lowlands
Vernon L. Scarborough and Fred Valdez 124

Chapter 10. Path Dependency in the Rise and Denouement of a Classic Maya City: The Case
of Caracol, Belize
Diane Z. Chase and Arlen F. Chase 142

Chapter 11. Resilience and Vulnerability in the Maya Hinterlands
Gyles Iannone, Keith Prufer, and Diane Z. Chase 155

COMPARATIVE STUDIES

Chapter 12. Transformative Relocation in the U.S. Southwest and Mesoamerica
Ben A. Nelson, Adrian S. Z. Chase, and Michelle Hegmon 171

Chapter 13. Comparative Landscape Analysis: Contrasting the Middle East and Maya Regions
T. J. Wilkinson 183

Chapter 14. Collapse and Sustainability: Rome, the Maya, and the Modern World
Joseph A. Tainter 201

CONCLUSION

Chapter 15. Transforming Lessons from the Past into Lessons for the Future
Sander E. van der Leeuw 215

List of Contributors 232

Arlen F. Chase is a Mesoamerican archaeologist and is faculty member in the anthropology department at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Previously, he served as the Departmental Chair at the University of Central Florida, noted for his work on exploring traces of Mayan civilization using lidar. Vernon L. Scarborough is the author of The Resilience and Vulnerability of Ancient Landscapes: Transforming Maya Archaeology through IHOPE, published by Wiley.