• DOI:10.7183/1045-6635.23.4.355
• Corpus ID: 164102473

Regroup On “E-Groups”: Monumentality and Early Centers in the Middle Preclassic Maya Lowlands

@article{Doyle2012RegroupO,
  title={Regroup On “E-Groups”: Monumentality and Early Centers in the Middle Preclassic Maya Lowlands},
  author={James A. Doyle},
  journal={Latin American Antiquity},
  year={2012},
  volume={23},
  pages={355 - 379}
}

• J. Doyle
• Published 1 December 2012
• Sociology
• Latin American Antiquity

Abstract For nearly a century, scholars have used astronomical evidence to explain the Lowland Maya architectural type known as “E-Groups” as solar observatories and, by extension, as locations for rituals related to solar and agricultural cycles. This article departs from the usual focus on the observational properties of E-Groups and places them in the context of early Maya monumentality during the Middle Preclassic period. Specifically, E-Groups are seen as the earliest monumental social spaces in the Maya Lowlands, with multifaceted functions and placements that indicate a shared social map of the landscape. Geographic information systems viewshed analysis of Middle Preclassic E-Group sites demonstrates that populations constructed E-Groups in places that maximized visibility of the nearby landscape. Viewsheds conducted at sites with Middle Preclassic E-Groups in the central Maya Lowlands suggest that the large plazas and similar monumental architecture represent the centers of comparable, mutually visible communities. Settlers founding these communities consciously created distance from neighboring monumental centers, perhaps as means of defining and buttressing group identity and undergirding spatial claims to political authority. Recent archaeological evidence affords clues that such spaces were civic, allowing architectural settings for social gatherings and access to resources.