.The known parts of Kaminaljuyu lie on a broad plain beneath roughly the western third of modern
Guatemala City. Soils are rich because of frequent volcanic eruptions; volcanic ash in the form of hardened tuff reaches depths of several hundred meters in and around Kaminaljuyu, and deep clefts or
barrancos mark the landscape. There are many mysteries, in addition to size and scale, that likely will remain unanswered about Kaminaljuyu. These questions are mainly about the role of the city as the greatest of the
Southern Maya area (SMA) in Preclassic times, particularly during the Miraflores period, c. 400–100 BC. The SMA is long believed to have been seminal in the development of Maya civilization.
Arévalo and Las Charcas cultures Kidder, Jennings, and Shook referred to Kaminaljuyu's artifacts as representative of what they called a "Middle Culture" which they believed represented the earliest phase of complex social and cultural development in Mesoamerica. This reflected their conclusion about the great antiquity of developments at Kaminaljuyu and their belief that Kaminaljuyu was primordial for its cultural and social innovations. Since their work, investigations chiefly undertaken by scholars from the New World Archaeological Foundation on the southern Pacific coast of Mexico have greatly altered this view, deepening in time the incipience of complex social and cultural events in Mesoamerica. Cultures of this phase had a stable agricultural community organized probably as a simple chiefdom. Over many years Shook and Kidder developed the Kaminaljuyu ceramic sequence, and it remains, with refinements by Shook and Marion Popenoe de Hatch, one of the most secure and reliable ceramic chronologies in Mesoamerica, although some doubts remain about the absolute dates due to a paucity of radiocarbon anchors (a revision by Inomata, et al. to the following chronology, based on Bayesian analysis, would push forward the ceramic phases by as much as 300 years, setting the Miraflores apogee to a 100 BC – AD 100 time frame). With Inomata, et al's revision in mind, the first significant settlement dates to the Arévalo phase, c. 900–800 BC, with indications of dense populations no later than c. 400 BC. By the end of the
Las Charcas culture (800–350 BC), Kaminaljuyu was developing "religious and civic institutions." Scattered Las Charcas remains throughout the Valley of Guatemala mark a major occupation of the area at sites such as El Naranjo; at this latter site, as well as at
El Portón some 50 kilometers to the north and
Takalik Abaj, about 130 kilometers to the west in the lower piedmont, plain uncarved upright shaft stones called
stelae, mark the first appearance of a cult of time-reckoning and which became one of the bases for the institution of
Maya kingship. The architecture of Middle Preclassic structures consisted of hardened adobe bricks that served, later, as foundations for raised platforms and pyramidal temples. Excavations indicate that from early in the Middle Preclassic the community was large enough to produce heavy refuse deposits. Cotton was grown as well as maize; palaeobotanical research also has identified
annonas,
avocados,
cacao,
black beans, palm nuts, plums, and sapodilla (
zapote blanco). Arboriculture developed – with groves of crop trees grown in terraces down to the edges of great ravines. Specialists practiced loom-weaving and were expert potters. Large-scale workshops for
obsidian tool-making were spread around the ancient city. Religious practices that would later be further developed throughout Mesoamerica were elaborating during the early Middle Preclassic at Kaminaljuyu, including the erection of mounds to serve as substructures for small shrines or funerary/administrative temples, the development of a complex pantheon of deities – probably based on some primordial mythology and cosmology of which the
Popol Vuh represents a fragment – and euhemerism, an
incensario and stela cult, and warfare to procure captives for royal sacrifice. Many of the artifacts from Las Charcas not associated with burials were found in pits. There were principally two types of pits: shallow bowl-like pits and bottle-shaped pits. The shallow pits were possibly used for digging clay to be used in building and later to hold refuse. Carbonized avocado seeds, maize cobs and remnants of textiles, basketry, mats and rope fragments have been found in those that are bottle-shaped. It is thought these pits were used for cooking, storage and refuse containers. Hand-modeled clay female figurines are also highly characteristic of Las Charcas culture. Those found at Kaminaljuyu are generally of reddish-brown clay and some have a white slip. The female figurines often depict pregnancy and are thought to have been offerings to promote fertility in the fields. Usually, the arms and legs of the figures are mere stumps but some attempt at a realistic body shape has been made. The head has received the most attention to detail. The nose was pinched into the relief and nostrils were made by punctuating the clay. The eyes and the mouth were formed by strategically applied lumps. The figurines often have earplug flares.
The "Miraflores" The apogee of Preclassic developments at Kaminaljuyu occurred during what scholars refer to as the "Miraflores" period – once a name for a Late Preclassic ceramic phase, now split into two, the Verbena and Arenal. Preclassic remains, particularly from this epoch, are extremely abundant at Kaminaljuyu; Shook and Kidder noted that in Mound E-III-3 "...an average of...200 sherds per cubic meter [were found...the mound] in its final stage [having] a volume of some 75,000 cu. m [yielding] the astounding total of approximately 15,000,000 fragments...[A]llowing 30 sherds to represent one vessel – a high average considering the abundance of small pre-Classic bowls...at least 500,000 complete vessels had been used, broken, and their fragments incidentally incorporated in the fill of this one mound." What Kidder, Jennings, and Shook referred to as the Middle Cultures are now understood as the Middle Preclassic period, which lasted from 1000 to 400 BC, and the Late Preclassic period, dating from 400 BC to 250 AD. In its "Miraflores" heyday, enormously eclectic sculptures were placed around the city, in plazas, and in front of platforms and temples. Brightly colored murals and giant masks adorned the sides of edifices. Monuments included effigies of toads, bats, owls, jaguars, and serpents; particularly important was the
Principal Bird Deity, a symbol of celestial power often invoked in the iconography of kingship. Early versions of other Classic Maya deities were depicted, including the maize god, the
Hero Twins, and a merchant god. The sculptural eclecticism is another indication of the Preclassic cosmopolitan and "international" character of Kaminaljuyu, the role of "port-of-trade" or "gateway" capital continuing through Classic times despite a major change of cultural traditions and, possibly, ethnic affiliation at the end of the Preclassic.
Sacred Kingship Enormous thrones and stelae attest to the might and splendor of "Miraflores" Kaminaljuyu. Stela 10, a fragment of a gigantic throne, is carved with a decapitation narrative scene showing a ruler masked and attired to impersonate an underworld jaguar deity wielding a flint axe over what likely was a kneeling captive; the head of a jaguar deity floats to the right of the ruler/protagonist, invoked by the burning of blood in a sacrificial plate. The similarly gigantic Monument 65 is carved, on the front, with three seated, throned rulers, each one framed by two bound, kneeling, nude captives, each ruler and his paired victims vertically positioned within a lower, a central, and an upper register. Almost annually, fragments of once very large sculptural monuments are found in Guatemala City often during unregulated municipal demolition and construction. Many monuments were carved with Preclassic hieroglyphic texts (Kaplan 2011), underscoring the fact that, as Coe observes, "the elite of [Kaminaljuyu] were fully literate at a time when other Maya were perhaps just learning that writing existed."
Hydraulics In the last twenty years, archaeologists have studied sophisticated water control systems in the southern precincts of "Miraflores" Kaminaljuyu, indicating an extensive bureaucracy and concomitant social hierarchy must have been in place to supervise and maintain the hydraulics. These systems date to the "Miraflores" and endured through to the end of the Preclassic.
Esperanza cultures and a Teotihuacán Intrusion? Two major mounds excavated by Kidder, Jennings, and Shook contained tombs probably representing rulers from the Esperanza period. In Mound A the tomb is associated with a pit burial. All that remains in the pit burial of its original fill are worn igneous rocks, quantities of coarse sherds and human skull parts that had been cut through by the digging of the tomb. The tomb contains the remains of eight people. One corpse received special treatment, as evinced by the considerable amount of jewelry and the offerings left with it. The bodies were borne into the tomb on fabric mats or animal hides of which only traces remain. Among the objects found as offerings in the tomb were
jade beads around the necks of two of the corpses, wafer-like disc shells forming a choker on one skeleton, jade earplug flares, an unusually large number of shells, a fine
obsidian blade, a
tortoise shell,
metates, and various fine pottery pieces including a whistling jar and a carved tripod vessel. Several coarse brown ware vessels heaped against the wall of the tomb probably originally contained food prepared for the after-life journey of the dead. The Esperanza tombs of Mounds A and B are notable because of the interment within them of elite-use ceramic vessels in unmistakable
Teotihuacán style. Teotihuacán was the greatest ancient city in Mesoamerica, with far-flung hegemonic reach from its location in Central Mexico. During the Early Classic period in the Maya world, art and artifacts, as well as hieroglyphics, attest to specific intrusions by and influences from Teotihuacán at great Lowland cities such as
Tikal,
Piedras Negras, and
Copán, although the exact nature of this presence remains controversial. Teotihuacán, like the later Aztec empire, was drawn to the Southern area undoubtedly because of its rich resources of obsidian and cacao. Dating to Esperanza times and later in the Classic period, twelve ballcourts have been found, possibly indicating an emphasis on the resolution of conflicts through ritual game-playing rather than war, which would underscore Kaminaljuyu's role as a nexus and intermediary between powerful foreign entities and as a religious "pilgrimage" site. ==Economics==