Ceibal (also spelled Seibal) is an important Maya site in the lowlands of Guatemala. It is located on the west bank of the Pasion River, about 100 kilometers (62 miles) from where that river joins the Rio Salinas to form the Usumacinta, the largest river in Mesoamerica.
History
Ceibal is one of the most ancient of Maya sites, and it was occupied at least as early as the Middle Formative period (900-300 BC) up into the Terminal Classic period (700-930 AD). As with many Maya capitals in the Petén region of Guatemala, Ceibal suffered a period of decline in population and political importance during the Early Classic (AD 250-600), but underwent a revival during the Late Classic (AD 600-900).
The end of the Late Classic and Terminal Classic (AD 700-900) periods were generally characterized by frequent warfare among the Maya capitals, and Ceibal was conquered and its king captured by the neighbour-enemy city of Dos Pilas in AD 735. In the late Terminal Classic, Ceibal reached its apogee, and most of its imposing structures visible today were built during this period. By the second half of the 10th century, Ceibal was mostly abandoned, and apart from a scattered occupation, never regained its power.
Architecture
Ceibal covers an area of approximately 1 sq km (2.5 acres), on the top of a series of high terraces overlooking the river, and in a strategic position for controlling the river traffic. Its monumental core lies at about 110 meters (360 feet) above the river level. The site is divided into three main building groups, called somewhat blandly Group A, Group C and Group D. (Group B exists but it lies outside the site core, about 2 km (1.3 mi) south of the main center, and it consists of a single plaza with a pyramid.) These architectural complexes are located on terraces and escarpments and are connected to each other through a series of causeways, which allowed people to move across gullies and ravines. Residential house platforms are located north, west, and south of the ceremonial core.
Group A is the largest of the building groups, and it constitutes the monumental core of Ceibal. Here, a series of pyramids, elevated platforms, and a ball court are arranged around three main plazas: the South Plaza, the Central Plaza and the North Plaza. Group A is also the area of the site where recent investigations by Takeshi Inomata and his colleagues have concentrated.
Group C is located east of Group A and it has few platforms and pyramids and a ballcourt; and Group D is separated by the others by a deep ravine. It is located east of Group C and it is the closest to the river.
Archaeological Investigations
Ceibal was first officially reported by Federico Artes in 1892, a Guatemalan officer charged by the Guatemala government to recover archaeological pieces (mainly carved stelae) to send to the 1893 World's Columbian Exhibition in Chicago. A few years later, the explorer Teobert Maler, working for the Peabody Museum, recovered more stelae and drew a first map of the site. In 1914, the Carnegie Institution represented by Sylvanus Morley paid a visit to the site. But it was only in the 1960s that Ceibal was systematically investigated. From 1964 to 1968 Harvard University organized a project directed by Gordon Willey, which included a new plan of the site, and extensive excavation of the building groups.
Ceibal-Petexbatun Project
Investigations at Ceibal have been recently resumed by a team of Guatemalan and US archaeologists and the new Ceibal-Petexbatun project is currently under the direction of Takeshi Inomata, from the University of Arizona.
Recent research carried out by the Ceibal-Petexbatun Project supports the idea that toward the end of the Terminal Classic period (AD 800-930), which saw the apogee of Ceibal, the Central Plaza of Group A could have hosted periodic markets. Chemical analysis of soils have identified particularly high levels of phosphate near a series of low stone alignments in the center of the plaza. High levels of phosphate are typically connected with market activities, like preparation of food for sale, and these low alignments certainly could have supported temporary market stalls. Other scholars argue that these walls might have served a defensive purpose.
In 2013, Inomata and colleagues reported the discovery of an E-Group complex of structures, and, dated to the Middle Formative, the complex is the earliest e-Group to date in the Maya lowlands.
- Learn more about Monumental Architecture at Ceibal
Sources
This glossary entry is a part of the About.com guide to the Maya Civilization, and the Dictionary of Archaeology.
Inomata T, Triadan D, Aoyama K, Castillo V, and Yonenobu H. 2013. Early Ceremonial Constructions at Ceibal, Guatemala, and the Origins of Lowland Maya Civilization. Science 340:467-471.
Inomata, Takeshi and Daniela Triadan (eds.), 2008, Informe del Proyecto Arqueologico Ceibal-Petexbatun: Temporada 2008
Inomata, Takeshi, Daniela Triadan, Otto Román, Estela Pinto, Jessica Munson y Kenichiro Tsukamoto, 2009, Cambios sociales durante los periodos Preclásico y Clásico en Ceibal: Los resultados del Proyecto Arqueológico Ceibal-Petexbatun. In XXII Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala, 2008, edited by J.P. Laporte, B. Arroyo y H. Mejía, pp.641-652. Museo Nacional de Arqueología y Etnología, Guatemala.
Román de León, Otto, Jessica Munson, Víctor Castillo, Mónica Cortave y Geraldine Fondebille, 2010 Fundación y desarrollo, ritos y ceremonias: Época Preclásica en el Grupo A de Ceibal y Anonal. In XXIII Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala, 2009 edited by B. Arroyo, A. Linares y L. Paiz, pp.62-74. Museo Nacional de Arqueología y Etnología, Guatemala
Webster, David, 2001, Seibal, in The Archaeology of Ancient Mexico and Central America: An Encyclopedia, edited by Susan Toby Evans and David Webster, Garland Publishing Inc., New York, pp. 659-660
Willey, Gordon R, 2001, Seibal, in The Oxford Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures, edited by David Carrasco, Oxford University Press, pp. 130-132.
Willey, Gordon R., A. Ledyard Smith, Gair Tourtellot, and Ian Graham, 1975, Excavations At Seibal, Department of Peten, Guatemala. Introduction: The Site and Its Setting. Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Memoirs Volume 13 (1). Harvard University, Cambridge.
