Under the direction of Dr. David Freidel, Damien Marken will undertake an extensive and intensive regional study of the settlement surrounding the ruined royal city of El Perú-Waka', northwestern Petén, Guatemala. He will do this by means of the analysis of satellite imagery, full-scale ground survey, and test excavations in residential compounds. The main site and its ambient settlement present an excellent opportunity to investigate the long-term changing relationships between the rulers of a large, regionally strategic, Maya polity and their local sustaining population.
Settlement pattern studies play an integral role advancing archaeological conceptions of Classic period (200-900 AD) Maya sociopolitical organization. Processes of polity growth/contraction and settlement distribution are quite variable between sites and sub-regions in the Maya lowlands of southeastern Mexico and Central America. This research will document the range of settlement groups within the El Perú-Waka' polity to identify how families of farmers, tradesmen, craftspeople, the social building blocks of Maya kingdoms, articulate.
El Perú-Waka' is located in the southern portion of the Laguna del Tigre Nation Park (PNLDT) in northwestern Guatemala. The PNLDT is the largest national park in the country and contains the largest protected wetlands of Central America. The difficult terrain, dense vegetation, and seasonal climate have left large sections of this area unexplored or lightly surveyed. At present, El Perú-Waka' has received the greatest archaeological attention in the PNLDT. Initial survey and reconnaissance of outlying areas indicate that a wide range of settlement types existed in the vicinity of El Perú-Waka', from isolated mounds to smaller monumental centers, some with architecture suggesting that they, at times, functioned as "outposts" of the El Perú-Waka' polity (Marken 2007b).
Data from coeval hieroglyphic texts suggest El Perú-Waka' played an important role in Classic period inter-polity political, military and commercial alliances. Inscriptions indicate that the royal dynasty provided key vassals to ambitious military overlords in the antagonistic relationship between the major regional capitals of Tikal and Calakmul from 500-800 C.E., repeatedly shifting allegiance throughout its history. Furthermore, geographic, ceramic, and epigraphic evidence suggest that El Perú-Waka' was situated along two important overland trade routes, one running north-south, between the site of Calakmul and the Petexbatun region, and one east-west, between Tikal and the Usumacinta River. The research will study the interplay between several processes within the polity. These include the relation between settlement and environment, relations between central and peripheral settlement, and how these combined to affect and alter the natural and social landscape.
This archaeological field work provides local people with jobs and the larger El Perú-Waka' project has functioned as an important collaborator in ecological and cultural conservation efforts within the PNLDT. Maintaining a scientific presence within the park facilitates infrastructural and informational support of conservation and government personnel stationed in the region. From a cultural heritage conservation perspective, the proposed research will document the archaeological resources and evidence of their destruction within an important national park and natural reserve in Guatemala. By mapping looters' trenches encountered in survey the extent and intensity of illegal excavation in the PNLDT can be assessed. This information is highly useful to conservation and security personnel within the park. Results will be disseminated locally in the form of improved guidebooks supplied to aspiring tour guides in the community of Paso Caballos, nationally through formal reports and presentations at the annual symposium in Guatemala City, and internationally through articles in peer reviewed journals.
