%0 Journal Article
%T Laguna de T¨¦rminos/R¨ªo Candelaria Core: Conditions of Sustainable Urban Occupation in the Interior of the Yucat¨¢n Peninsula
%A Joel D. Gunn
%A William J. Folan
%A John W. Day
%A Betty B. Faust
%J Estudios de cultura maya
%D 2012
%I UNAM, Instituto de Investigaciones Filol¨®gicas
%X Pursuit of a link between the collapse of Maya civilization and climate is a subject that has been revisited periodically for nearly a century. In the 1980s, we began to develop a climatic, paleoclimatic, and ethnographic model of horticultural production that would sustain urban life in an environment fundamentally hostile to large population aggregates. Our focus is on the appropriate conditions for the success of civilization, measured by architectural fluorishing, in the interior upland basins of the Yucat¨¢n Peninsula. To this we have added new research linking the now-collapsed interior cities and their bajo environments to near-shore deposits at the mouths of rivers. This study is based on the Candelaria River watershed of the southwestern Maya Lowlands in the modern Mexican state of Campeche. Campeche is separated from other regions of the Yucat¨¢n Peninsula by hills up to 400 m elevation. These elevated interior lands create important rain shadow effects, limitations on land use, and divide the landscape into valleys and basins. Past climates, local geography, and horticultural customs appear to be important to the success of civilizations in the interior. Results of the recent coring efforts suggest that the Maya of the Candelaria watershed controlled erosion during the period of greatest population, but lost control of it due to the ninth century drought and population dislocations. La b¨²squeda de un eslab¨®n que sirva de enlace entre el colapso de la civilizaci¨®n maya y el clima ha sido retomada peri¨®dicamente durante casi un siglo de estudios. Durante la d¨¦cada de los ochenta, comenzamos a desarrollar un modelo clim¨¢tico, paleoclim¨¢tico y etnogr¨¢fico de producci¨®n hort¨ªcola que ayudar¨ªa a sustentar un n¨²cleo de vida urbana en un ambiente fundamentalmente hostil a grandes conjuntos de poblaciones. El objetivo de este estudio consiste en tratar de encontrar las condiciones apropiadas para el ¨¦xito de un n¨²cleo de civilizaci¨®n basado en el florecimiento arquitect¨®nico urbano en las cuencas interiores de las Tierras Altas con ambientes adversos. Hemos a adido a esas investigaciones unos conceptos nuevos, combinando lo que sabemos de las ciudades del interior (ya abandonadas) y su medio ambiente, incluyendo en este estudio las zonas bajas de la regi¨®n con dep¨®sitos aluviales cerca de las orillas de los esteros de los r¨ªos. El estudio est¨¢ basado en la cuenca del r¨ªo Candelaria que fluye por las Tierras Bajas de la zona maya en el actual estado mexicano de Campeche. Campeche est¨¢ separado de otras regiones de la pen¨ªnsula de Yucat¨¢n por cerros de ha
%K r¨ªo Candelaria
%K Campeche
%K colapso maya
%K modelo clim¨¢tico
%K Candelaria River
%K Campeche
%K collapse of Maya
%K modeling climate
%U http://www.scielo.org.mx/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0185-25742012000100003