essay
Climatic settings and prehistoric social complexity: the Central American isthmus
formation of complex society in southeastern mesoamerica • Boca Raton • Published In 1991 • Pages: 237-275
By: Messenger, Lewis C..
AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
In this paper, Messenger takes a general systems approach to culture change in the Mayan region and attempts to map climatic data onto cultural sequences to determine if there is a possible relationship between the two. He examines the data for different areas, including the northeast and central (El Cajón) areas of Honduras, the Chalchuappa and Quelepa regions in El Salvador, and the Greater Nicoya archeological subarea of Costa Rica and Nicaragua He covers the time span from 1400 B.C. up to Spanish contact. He does find in some instances a correlation between warm and cool temperature oscillations and cultural transformation. He speculates that the onset of a global cooling period with decreased precipitation may have prompted a changeover from manioc to maize cultivation. He also surmises that complex societies may have been less able to adapt to climatic changes, contributing to a crisis of confidence, and their ultimate collapse.
- SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
- Climate
- Historical reconstruction
- Chronologies and culture sequences
- traditionCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
- Preclassic Maya
- HRAF PubDateThe date HRAF published the document
- 2001
- RegionThe area the document pertains to
- Middle America and the Caribbean
- Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
- Maya Area
- Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
- essay
- Evaluation
- Creator TypeThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
- Archaeologist
- Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
- 4: Excellent Secondary Data
- 5: Excellent Primary Data
- AnalystThe HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection
- Ian Skoggard ; 2000
- Field DateThe date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
- 1980-1987
- Coverage DateThe date or dates that the information in the document pertains to
- 3500-400 BP
- Coverage PlaceLocation of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
- Central America
- NotesAdditional notes
- Lewis C. Messenger, Jr.
- Revised papers from the 86th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, Chicago, Nov. 1987, and additional material
- Includes bibliographical references (p. 272-275)
- LCCNLibrary of Congress Control Number
- 91010478
- LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
- Mayas--Antiquities