The Nature of Residential Tikal: a Spatial Analysis

Resumen

This study reports the results of the application of some methods of spatial analysis to the map of Tikal produced by the Tikal Project and published in 1961 (Carr and Hazard, 1961), in an attempt to gain a better understanding of the nature of residential Tikal in Classic times.

As in Puleston (1973: 22-24), the following terms will be used in this paper. Epicentral Tikal will refer to the ceremonial core of the site and its assumed elite residences. North-south and east-west axes were drawn from the center of the Great Plaza; the limits of epi· central Tikal would extend 0.40 km on the south axis, 0.75 km on the west axis, 0.50 km on the cast axis, and 1 km on the north axis. The axes correspond to the sun·ey strips which Puleston mapped and studied. Residential Tikal extends from epicentral Tikal to the site boundaries, defined by Puleston as the line outside of which there are more than 2 has of cultivated land per residential structure coupled with the line of the defensive earthworks to the north and south of the center of Tikal (Puleston, 1973: 19; Puleston and Callender, 1967). The unmodified name Tikal will refer to a combination of residential and epicentral Tikal. Intersite areas are areas not continuously covered by remains of structures as between the boundaries of residential Tikal and Uaxactun, regardless of whether it may be demonstrated that these areas fall within the political jurisdiction of a particular site.