Nakbé

See Nakbé gallery
 

See Dr. Richard Hansen's Lecture in UFM, Preclassic Mirador Basin, Guatemala on Feb 5 2007

Nakbé was first reported in 1930 by an aerial expedition from the University of Pennsylvania but was not visited by any scholars until archeologist Ian Graham located and mapped a portion of the site in 1962. Graham called it Nakbé, which means "by the road", a fitting name since a major ancient causeway can be observed extending across the bajo from El Mirador toward the site. Nakbé has the earliest architecture (Platforms) found to date dating from 1400 BC.

The major architecture at Nakbé is divided into two principal clusters of platforms and mounds, one to the west and one to the east. The western group includes Structure 1, which at 150 feet is Nakbé's tallest pyramid, while the eastern group includes the 100-foot-high Structure 59, a massive platform surmounted by three mounds, the typical triadic complex of the Preclassic. To date, Nakbé has been probed by more than 150 major excavations,

Nakbé, Located in the Mirador Basin, northern Petén, Guatemala is perhaps the oldest large Maya site, the place that started the Maya Civilization as we know it, 1400 year before than earlier thought, there are structures dating from 1000 BC at Nakbé, including a ball court, the oldest in Mesoamerica,  that evolved through the Pre-classic

In the past decade, work at sites such as El Mirador has revealed that the complexities of The Maya Civilization actually extended back into the late Preclassic, the period from 400 BC to 200 AD. Nakbé is now revising our views of the middle Preclassic, from 1,400 BC to 400 BC, which at other lowland sites appears to be represented only by simple village remains.

One of the most unusual discoveries at Nakbé emerged from excavations around a small mound in the site's eastern group of architecture, forty-five fragments of an eleven-foot-high limestone monument, Nakbé Stela 1, which had been smashed in antiquity. When pieced together, the jigsaw puzzle revealed a carved scene, apparently duplicated on both sides of the monument, depicting two individuals who stand face to face and are dressed in regal costumes of a very early style. One of the two is pointing upward with an index finger to a disembodied profile head, which in turn is faintly joined to the headdress of the other, representing  the Hero Twins, Xbalanqué and Hunahpú as the Popol Vuh relates.

The form and style of the Stela found there are definitely Preclassic, but the dating is difficult since the monument was installed on a small late Classic platform about 700 AD (and sometime afterward, it was deliberately smashed). But an altar stone located immediately to the east of Stela 1 was sealed below a floor that dates to the latter part of the middle Preclassic. If  Stela 1 was associated with that altar (in typical Maya fashion), then the sculpture probably dates to about  400 BC . Further excavations around the altar are expected to clarify this issue.

The extreme antiquity of Nakbé and other sites  in the Basin, such as Wakná, El Mirador, and Tintal in northern Guatemala, allows a glimpse of a poorly known period in the early formation of complex Maya society. At El Mirador, San Bartolo  and Wakná, for example, archeologist  have recently discovered some of the earliest hieroglyphic texts in the Maya lowlands. These texts, possibly from 300 BC, have yet to be deciphered. In addition, there is also a pattern in the placement of the Preclassic royal tombs that were looted at Wakná and Tintal. With this knowledge, there is hope to uncover unnoted tombs in Nakbé and El Mirador.

While there is at least some remains from nearly every period of Maya society at Nakbé, the site was never a major center after the beginning of the late Preclassic period. Archeologist Richard Hansen initially hoped to find remains of occupation from about 300 BC to 250 AD, to further understand the nearby late Preclassic center of El Mirador. The last construction phases of the largest pyramids at Nakbé date to the beginning of this period, and the two sites were even joined by a Sacbé, or causeway. But late Preclassic artifacts have proved sparse throughout the site of Nakbé, perhaps because the settlement was rapidly eclipsed by the rise of El Mirador. Nakbé remained virtually abandoned for a thousand

Vase Codex style

 years, until some late Classic Maya reoccupied the site. These people established small communities in and around the ruins and left some fine examples of "Codex Style" Classic ceramics, but they built no monuments of their own. Both sites were abandoned during the first Maya Civilization Collapse

Hansen believes that the spectacular rise of El Mirador over Nakbé, was related to that site's better supply of water and especially to its more defensible position, yes the Maya Warfare is that old. The important public architecture at El Mirador was constructed on the brink of a steep escarpment, which provided protection to the settlement's northern and western flanks, while the east is protected by swamps (bajos).