Working Papers
Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12588/1718
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Browsing Working Papers by Author "Hester, Thomas R."
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Item An Ancient Maya Hafted Stone Tool from Northern Belize(Center for Archaeological Research, The University of Texas at San Antonio, 1986) Shafer, Harry J.; Hester, Thomas R.In 1974, the late Dennis Puleston excavated a hafted stone artifact from the mucky fill of an ancient canal near San Antonio, Orange Walk District, in northern Belize. This specimen has never been published, although it was illustrated by Palacio (1976). The artifact consists of several pieces of a wooden handle and a large chipped stone biface originally set in a mortise haft through the handle. In 1982, Mary Pohl of Florida State University, in her capacity as the director of the Rio Hondo Project, invited us to conduct a detailed study of the axe. The purpose of this paper is to provide a description of the specimen, assess its antiquity, and comment on its probable function.* It is, as best as we can tell, a unique specimen and is thus of particular significance in the study of the stone tool technology of the Lowland Maya.Item A Fluted Paleo-Indian Projectile Point from Belize, Central America(Center for Archaeological Research, The University of Texas at San Antonio, 1981-03) Hester, Thomas R.; Kelly, Thomas C.; Ligabue, GiancarloWhile much archaeological research has focussed on ancient Maya cultures in the lowland jungles and coastal region of Belize (Palacio 1976; Graham 1980), it has been only recently that the remains of very early Maya settlements, and indeed of pre-Maya occupations, have been found. Hammond et al. (1979) have defined the Early Preclassic Swasey manifestation at the site of Cuello, dating to ca. 1900 B.C., and representing a sedentary agricultural society. Most notable of the pre-Maya (preceramic) investigations is the Belize Archaic Archaeological Reconnaissance (BAAR) directed by Richard S. MacNeish (MacNeish, Wilkerson and Nelken-Terner 1980). They have proposed a very tenative Archaic sequence consisting of five major time periods (and artifact assemblages) spanning the period from ca. 9,000-2,500 B.C. Dating is tenuous for each period, and thus far, no radiocarbon dates are available. Two major sites, Lowe Ranch and Sand Hill, originally recorded by the Colha Project (Hester, Eaton and Shafer 1980) have been further studied by MacNeish and his colleagues. [...]