Jeremy A. Sabloff

This book is a series of essays that offers a framework for the study of lowland Maya settlement patterns, surveying the range of interpretive ideas about ancient Maya remains. Suggesting hypotheses to guide future research, the articles discuss historical, geographical, chronological, and theoretical matters.

Cities are so common today that we cannot imagine a world without them. More than half of the world's population lives in cities, and that proportion is growing. Yet for most of our history, there were no cities. Why, how, and when did urban life begin?

New insights from the Tikal excavations and epigraphic breakthroughs suggest that a thriving marketplace existed in the center of the city, that foreigners comprised a significant element of its populace, and that differences in tomb form and contents signal the changing fortunes of Tikal's rulers.