Kulubá Archaeological Project 2001 Field Season

Domestic Architecture

The domestic architecture we mapped ranged from frame brace houses built directly on bedrock to vaulted houses built on substantial basal platforms. As is the case with the rest of the peninsula, platforms were often built on altillos, natural rises in the limestone bedrock. Like the civic architecture we examined, the domestic architecture at our sites was not well preserved. Most residential platforms featured unrecognizable rubble alignments on their surface; in situ foundation walls were relatively rare. The ones we did see were usually single-roomed houses. Houses with more than one room were attached laterally in what has been called the "row house" plan. No front-back house plans (or "file houses"), which are common at Chichén Itzá, were found during our residential mapping. Likewise, gallery-patio structures were not found at any of the sites we mapped. We also did not note any tandem plan houses, common at Postclassic Mayapán.

There was a curious lack of metates associated with residential platforms. Not one was found at either San Pedro or Santa Monica. It could be that the ancient residents of the Kulubá hinterlands processed their corn with something other than a metate. Another explanation which we feel is more plausible is that ranchers have systematically picked over the ruins on their property and removed metates in order to use them as ready-made water troughs. We spotted several metates at the numerous ranches we visited being used in this manner.

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