Abstract
Salt works along the Yucatan coasts of Mexico and Belize provide a record of salt production for inland trade during the height of Late Classic Maya civilisation (AD 550–800). At the Paynes Creek Salt Works in Belize, production focused on the creation of salt cakes by boiling brine in pots supported over fires in dedicated salt kitchens. Underwater excavations at the Early Classic (AD 250–550) site of Jay-yi Nah now indicate there was a longer and evolving tradition of salt making in the area, one that initially employed large, incurved bowls to meet local or down-the-line trade needs before inland demand for salt soared.
Description
© The Author(s), 2024. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Antiquity Publications Ltd. This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Date of publication
2024
Language
english
Persistent identifier
http://hdl.handle.net/10950/4820
Document Type
Article
Recommended Citation
McKillop, Heather and Sills, Cory, "Earliest Ancient Maya salt production in southern Belize: excavations at Jay-yi Nah" (2024). Geography Faculty Publications and Presentations. Paper 3.
http://hdl.handle.net/10950/4820