Materialist Factors

Abstract

This chapter details the two principal materialist research foci of the project, water and cacao. Water control systems in Mesoamerica and at ancient Maya cities are reviewed in order to set the discoveries at Chocolá in context in an attempt to understand both functional and ideological meanings of water control at the ancient city. Chocolá’s hydraulic engineering, including stone conduits and canals, closely resembles the systems at Takalik Abaj and Kaminaljuyu, suggesting a deliberate sharing of technology and underscoring the likelihood of links between these three ancient cities and polities. Similarly, the context of cacao in ancient Mesoamerica and specifically in the ancient Maya world is explained, leading to the hypothesis of intensive surplus arboriculture—large cacao groves—that, it is proposed, underlay Chocolá’s rise to wealth and power as a complex society. In addition, a “mystery tale” is recounted, in which one of the most stunning carved monuments of the Southern Maya Region, the so-called Shook Altar, plays a central role in the authors’ theory of surplus cacao production at Chocolá and long-distance trade of the commodity.