Ka’Kabish, an ancient Maya city in north-central Belize, was first identified by Dr. David Pendergast, in the late 1980s while working at Lamanai as part of a ROM research project. Although Ka’kabish is only 10 km inland from Lamanai, accessing the site originally involved a tortuous overland drive of almost three hours along a logging trail. Today, travel between the two sites takes less than 30 minutes courtesy of a graded dirt road created in the early 1990s. The new road, which connects the town of San Filipe in the west to the village of Indian Church and Lamanai ruin in the east bisected Ka’kabish into the north (Group F) and south halves (Groups B, C, D, E, and the Fenton Group), it caused the complete destruction of at least two buildings and damaged the plaza and several other cultural features adjacent to the road. It also opened the site up to extensive looting, a challenge we face every year as the site is currently on private land and therefore not subject to patrol by Tourist Police or the Belize Defense Force.
In the mid-1990s, a team of archaeologists from the Maya Research Program (MRP), based in the Blue Creek Mennonite community, visited the site and, despite being hampered by dense bush and heavy rains produced, produced a rudimentary map of the main area of the sites (Guderjan 1996). This first map documented 27 structures arranged in two loose clusters – on to the north and the other to the south of the road. Based on this map, the Ka'kabish was presumed to be a small, likely a secondary political center, that served as an administrative outpost of the larger site of Lamanai a scant 10 km to the east.
The Ka'kabish Archaeological Research Project was founded in 2007, with an initial focus on remapping the site center. Aided by a small team of local men from Indian Church Village, and supported by equipment from MRP, we were able to clear and map the south half of the site. Over the next few years it quickly became evident that the site exceeded the initial structure count and to date the project has mapped over 100 structures in twelve groups. Excavation work at the site started in 2010 and has continued every year since. This work has revealed that that Ka'Kabish enjoyed a long history of occupation. As part of our on-going study of the ancient Maya city of Ka’kabish we have been engaged in documenting settlement clusters outside of the site-core. Documenting these settlements is not only important for understanding the type of urban design employed at Ka’kabish, but also for understanding how the city functioned and thrived for 2,300 years.
Ka’kabish was founded in the Middle Formative period the city flourished into the Early Classic period. From its founding, Ka’kabish was an active participant in inter-regional and regional trade networks, and caches of jade and marine shell beads associated with a burial dating to the Middle Formative period were discovered deep beneath the main plaza .
Ka’kabish continued to flourish throughout the Early Classic, with many of our structures being built or refurbished during this period. Excavations have revealed that large quantities of obsidian (and important long-distance trade good) were used in the construction of tombs around the center. We also have recovered ceramic tomb vessels showing strong stylistic ties to the Central Petén.
At the end of the Early Classic period monumental construction at Ka'kabish appears to have ceased completely, only to resume during the Terminal Classic period. The hiatus coincides with the erection of Stela 9 at Lamanai, on which the ruler declares himself Kaloomte’ (Overlord) of the region , while the resumption of activity at Ka'kabish correlates to the destruction of this monument . That the individual depicted wears a headdress associated with military success suggests that the hiatus at Ka’kabish may have been the result of a military conquest and its revitalisation also may have been the result of violent action. Competition and warfare, likely fueled by rising populations, environmental degradation, droughts, or combinations thereof, is known to have intensified in the Terminal Classic period (ca. AD 830-950), leading to the cessation of many of the features that characterised the Classic Period (e.g., writing and divine kingship). Long-distance trade networks were also disrupted and reoriented as a result of the decline of the Central Petén centres.
The transition from the Classic to the Post-Classic period (ca. AD 900-1500) has often been mis-identified as the ‘collapse of classic Maya civilisation’. More recently, researchers have recognised that the different regions varied in their response to the changes existing at the end of the Late Classic. La Milpa to the west of Ka’kabish and Altun Ha to the east both failed quite suddenly, if quietly with no clear reason for their failure, while other centres, such as Dos Hombres, have signs of purposeful abandonment as evidenced by termination rituals, while Colha apparently suffered a violent and grisly end. A scant handful of other centres in the region also lingered into the early part, or were reoccupied in, the Post-Classic (Blue Creek, Chau Hiix, Nohmul, and Santa Rita Corazol), however, none were on the size or scale of Lamanai or Ka’kabish.
Up until our work at Ka'kabish, Lamanai was see as the only polity to survive the transition between the Terminal Classic and Post-Classic periods unscathed by an abandonment phase. Ka’kabish, while suffering a hiatus in the early Late Classic period, is not only revived in the Terminal Classic but continued to flourish into the Post-Classic. We see evidence of Ka'kabish's success and prosperity in the presence of copper artefacts. Ka’kabish is one of the few Maya sites in Belize to have acquired copper objects (Lamanai and Tipu being the other two). Copper is not local to the Maya world, but originates in West Mexico and in Costa Rica. Other evidence of the continued prosperity is noted in the large quantities of obsidian still being imported into the site and ceramics with ties to Lamanai and Santa Rita.
Despite the wealth of knowledge about Post-Classic sites in this area, the bulk of our knowledge about Classic period political dynamics, however, centres around sites in the Central Petèn and the Belize River Valley , with very little known about the politic landscape of northcentral Belize. Our research attempts to redress this gap by providing information not only from one of the largest known sites in the area, but from one of the longest surviving cities in the region as well.
In the mid-1990s, a team of archaeologists from the Maya Research Program (MRP), based in the Blue Creek Mennonite community, visited the site and, despite being hampered by dense bush and heavy rains produced, produced a rudimentary map of the main area of the sites (Guderjan 1996). This first map documented 27 structures arranged in two loose clusters – on to the north and the other to the south of the road. Based on this map, the Ka'kabish was presumed to be a small, likely a secondary political center, that served as an administrative outpost of the larger site of Lamanai a scant 10 km to the east.
The Ka'kabish Archaeological Research Project was founded in 2007, with an initial focus on remapping the site center. Aided by a small team of local men from Indian Church Village, and supported by equipment from MRP, we were able to clear and map the south half of the site. Over the next few years it quickly became evident that the site exceeded the initial structure count and to date the project has mapped over 100 structures in twelve groups. Excavation work at the site started in 2010 and has continued every year since. This work has revealed that that Ka'Kabish enjoyed a long history of occupation. As part of our on-going study of the ancient Maya city of Ka’kabish we have been engaged in documenting settlement clusters outside of the site-core. Documenting these settlements is not only important for understanding the type of urban design employed at Ka’kabish, but also for understanding how the city functioned and thrived for 2,300 years.
Ka’kabish was founded in the Middle Formative period the city flourished into the Early Classic period. From its founding, Ka’kabish was an active participant in inter-regional and regional trade networks, and caches of jade and marine shell beads associated with a burial dating to the Middle Formative period were discovered deep beneath the main plaza .
Ka’kabish continued to flourish throughout the Early Classic, with many of our structures being built or refurbished during this period. Excavations have revealed that large quantities of obsidian (and important long-distance trade good) were used in the construction of tombs around the center. We also have recovered ceramic tomb vessels showing strong stylistic ties to the Central Petén.
At the end of the Early Classic period monumental construction at Ka'kabish appears to have ceased completely, only to resume during the Terminal Classic period. The hiatus coincides with the erection of Stela 9 at Lamanai, on which the ruler declares himself Kaloomte’ (Overlord) of the region , while the resumption of activity at Ka'kabish correlates to the destruction of this monument . That the individual depicted wears a headdress associated with military success suggests that the hiatus at Ka’kabish may have been the result of a military conquest and its revitalisation also may have been the result of violent action. Competition and warfare, likely fueled by rising populations, environmental degradation, droughts, or combinations thereof, is known to have intensified in the Terminal Classic period (ca. AD 830-950), leading to the cessation of many of the features that characterised the Classic Period (e.g., writing and divine kingship). Long-distance trade networks were also disrupted and reoriented as a result of the decline of the Central Petén centres.
The transition from the Classic to the Post-Classic period (ca. AD 900-1500) has often been mis-identified as the ‘collapse of classic Maya civilisation’. More recently, researchers have recognised that the different regions varied in their response to the changes existing at the end of the Late Classic. La Milpa to the west of Ka’kabish and Altun Ha to the east both failed quite suddenly, if quietly with no clear reason for their failure, while other centres, such as Dos Hombres, have signs of purposeful abandonment as evidenced by termination rituals, while Colha apparently suffered a violent and grisly end. A scant handful of other centres in the region also lingered into the early part, or were reoccupied in, the Post-Classic (Blue Creek, Chau Hiix, Nohmul, and Santa Rita Corazol), however, none were on the size or scale of Lamanai or Ka’kabish.
Up until our work at Ka'kabish, Lamanai was see as the only polity to survive the transition between the Terminal Classic and Post-Classic periods unscathed by an abandonment phase. Ka’kabish, while suffering a hiatus in the early Late Classic period, is not only revived in the Terminal Classic but continued to flourish into the Post-Classic. We see evidence of Ka'kabish's success and prosperity in the presence of copper artefacts. Ka’kabish is one of the few Maya sites in Belize to have acquired copper objects (Lamanai and Tipu being the other two). Copper is not local to the Maya world, but originates in West Mexico and in Costa Rica. Other evidence of the continued prosperity is noted in the large quantities of obsidian still being imported into the site and ceramics with ties to Lamanai and Santa Rita.
Despite the wealth of knowledge about Post-Classic sites in this area, the bulk of our knowledge about Classic period political dynamics, however, centres around sites in the Central Petèn and the Belize River Valley , with very little known about the politic landscape of northcentral Belize. Our research attempts to redress this gap by providing information not only from one of the largest known sites in the area, but from one of the longest surviving cities in the region as well.