Early Maya Monumentalism

The time period ∼1200–1000 BCE was pivotal in the Maya area, which witnessed the adoption of ceramics, changes in subsistence practices, a decrease in mobility, and the first monumental constructions. These first monumental building efforts were on a landscape scale and emphasized horizonal monumentality through the construction of massive artificial plateaus and platforms and standardized architectural complexes. Complex and multifaceted interregional interactions over a large area of southern Mesoamerica seemed to have been critical in the creation and adoption of this new monumental public-ritual architecture and indicate that different ethnic and linguistic groups shared fundamental cosmological concepts. In the Maya area, the building projects themselves may have led to more social cohesion and cooperation among social groups that were, at the beginning, probably still mostly mobile. These processes eventually led to increased social differentiation and the development of what we today call the ancient Maya.