Bioarchaeology of Space and Place

Gabriel Wrobel is an Associate Professor of Anthropology at Michigan State University and the director of the Central Belize Archaeology Survey (CBAS) project. The primary focus of his research is mortuary contexts in caves and rockshelters in the Caves Branch River and Roaring Creek valleys, in which he seeks to reconstruct funerary pathways and explore aspects of social identity among those placed there. These data inform broader archaeological questions about the sudden and dramatic appearance of sociopolitical complexity in the area during the Middle Classic period, as well as its depopulation in the Terminal Classic period. While most of his research has concentrated on ancient Maya contexts in Belize, he has also worked in the American Southeast, in Kyrgyzstan and in Egypt at the site of Hierakonpolis.

• Chapter 1: Introduction.- Chapter 2: Sedimenting Social Identity: The Practice of Pre-Columbian Maya Body Partibility.- Chapter 3: Cueva del Lazo: Child Sacrifice or Special Funerary Treatment? Discussion of a Late Classic Context from the Zoque region of Western Chiapas (Mexico).- Chapter 4: A Case Study of Reverential Cave Use from Je’reftheel, Central Belize.- Chapter 5: Isotopic Insights into Mortuary Treatment and Origin at Xunantunich, Belize.- Chapter 6: Odontometric Investigation of the Origin of Freestanding Shrine Ossuaries at Mayapan.- Chapter 7: Human Dedicatory Burials from Altun Ha, Belize: Exploring Residential History Through Enamel Microwear and Tissue Isotopic Compositions.- Chapter 8: Danse Macabre: Death, Community and Kingdom at El Kinel, Guatemala.- Chapter 9: Mortuary Pathways and Ritual Meanings Related to Maya Human Bone Deposits in Subterranean Contexts.- Chapter 10: Mortuary Sealing Among the Maya.

“Primarily a study of context and scale, The Bioarchaeology of Space and Place offers scholars of Mesoamerica, bioarchaeology, and mortuary archaeology a suite of illustrative case studies and caveats regarding the analysis of small, biased burial samples. … Wrobel's volume provides a timely reminder regarding the importance of context and multiple lines of evidence to inform on the principles that structure the interment and reveal the identities of the inhumed decedents.” (Danielle S. Kurin, Journal of Anthropological Research, Vol. 71, 2015)