Obsidian Tool Function and Maya Lithic Economy at Terminal Classic Pook's Hill, Belize: Subsistence, Domestic Activities, and Craft Production

Abstract

The typological, technological, and use-wear analyses of obsidian artifacts from Terminal Classic Pook's Hill (AD 830–950+) provide opportunities to better reconstruct socioeconomic activities in this plazuela group, including long-distance trade, tool production, subsistence practices, domestic tasks, and the organization of craft production. Based on visual sourcing, most of the obsidian originated from highland Guatemala, specifically El Chayal. The majority of obsidian artifacts were prismatic blades, although both casual and bipolar reduction of blade cores and the recycling of blades from earlier occupations occurred at the site. Use-wear analysis reveals that obsidian tools were mainly used for subsistence and domestic household activities; however, the concentrations of tools with specific wear patterns (bone, ceramic, plants, and shell) at some locations in the plazuela provide evidence for local craft production among the population. Further support for craft production is provided by comparable use-wear on chert/chalcedony tools from these same locations. The products of low-level craft production were used within Pook's Hill itself and may have been distributed to neighboring communities within the Roaring Creek and Upper Belize River Valleys. Despite the sociopolitical and socioeconomic disruptions to lifeways that accompanied the Terminal Classic period, the Pook's Hill Maya seem to have experienced minimal upheaval in their daily lives and continued local low-level craft production. However, one important change in the Terminal Classic appears to be the increased difficulty in obtaining obsidian at Pook's Hill and the growing need for tool recycling and raw material conservation.