[Aztlan] Pre-Columbian Society of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology June Lecture

[michael ruggeri]

Saturday, June 13, 1:30 PM
Pre-Columbian Society of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of  
Archaeology and Anthropology Lecture
"Architectural Narratives at Quirigua: 400 to 800 AD"
Christopher Jones, PhD. Consulting Scholar, University of Pennsylvania  
Museum, and Federico Paredes, Doctoral Candidate, University of  
Pennsylvania:
History is derived from discovered and/or invented narratives, or  
chronologically ordered events. When architecture and historical texts  
both survive, these two mutually independent narrative sources can  
often enhance, verify or even contradict each other. Archaeological  
excavations from 1975 through 1979 at Quirigua reveal a sequence of  
six main stages of growth in the probable royal palace. Decipherments  
from monumental texts found in and near the palace also reveal  
sequences of important events in the lives of the rulers who perhaps  
lived in those buildings. Together, these two narratives enrich each  
other in interesting ways.    Newly drafted 3D computer-assisted, or  
AUTOCAD,  images of six principle stages of palace growth make an  
easier visualization of the changing architecture of the complex. The  
developing fortunes and daily lives of the rulers can sometimes be  
inferred from a combination of building form and historical event. The  
images are presented through direct manipulation by the authors, with  
simulated fly-overs and entry into reconstructed rooms.              
Dr. Christopher Jones is presently a Consulting Scholar and a former  
Senior Research Associate at the University of Pennsylvania Museum. He  
studied Maya archaeology and epigraphy under Linton Satterthwaite and  
William Coe at the University of Pennsylvania, where he received his  
PhD. He excavated for four years at Tikal and was director of the Site- 
Core excavations at Quirigua in 1976 and 1977. His work focuses on the  
connections between the historical statements of the inscriptions and  
the processes of change that can be observed in archaeological  
investigation.  Dr. Jones is the author of Inauguration Dates of Three  
Late Classic Rulers of Tikal Guatemala, in American Antiquity 42,  
1977, The Monuments and Inscriptions of Tikal, with Linton  
Satterthwaite, 1982, Deciphering Maya Hieroglyphs, 1984, and  
Excavations in the East Plaza of Tikal, Guatemala, 1996.  Federico  
Paredes, received his licenciatura in archaeology from the Universidad  
de San Carlos, Guatemala, and was the assistant Director of the  
Chocola Archaeological Project in 2005. He received a Fulbright  
Scholarship to attend a university in the United States in 2005, and  
is now a Doctoral Candidate in the Anthropology Department of the  
University of Pennsylvania. He has been assisting Dr. Jones with the  
computer graphics of the Quirigua project.  A joint paper on the  
Quirigua sequence was presented at the Mesa Redonda at Palenque,  
Mexico in November, 2008
Room 345
University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
http://www.precolumbian.org/nextmeeting.HTM