Cahal Pech

Cahal Pech
Location
Country	Belize
Region	Cayo District
Nearest town	San Ignacio
History
Culture	Maya
First occupied	1200 BCE
Period	Classic
Abandoned	900 CE
Excavation and maintenance
Responsible body	Belize Department of Archaeology
Dates excavated	1988 - 2000
Notable archaeologists	Jaime Awe
Architecture
Architectural styles	Classic

Cahal Pech is a Maya site located near the town of San Ignacio in the Cayo District of Belize. The site was a palatial, hilltop home for an elite Maya family, and though most major construction dates to the Classic period, evidence of continuous habitation has been dated to as far back as 1200 BCE during the Early Middle Formative period (Early Middle Preclassic), making Cahal Pech one of the oldest recognizably Maya sites in Western Belize.

Location

The site rests high above the banks of the Macal River and is strategically located to overlook the confluence of the Macal River and the Mopan River. The site is a collection of 34 structures, with the tallest temple being about 25 meters in height, situated around a central acropolis. The site was abandoned in the 9th century CE for unknown reasons.

Archaeology

The earliest pottery in western Belize is found here.

"Emerging information from western Belize suggests that ceramic-using populations may have been in place as early as ca. 1200 B.C. at Cahal Pech and perhaps elsewhere (Awe 1992; Clark and Cheetham 2002; Garber et al. 2004; Healy and Awe 1995). While these complexes, termed "Cunil" at Cahal Pech and "Kanocha" at Blackman Eddy, remain to be broadly documented across the Belize River Valley, they are the earliest established ceramic technologies recorded in western Belize."

The name Cahal Pech, meaning "Place of the Ticks" in the Yucatec Maya language, was given when the area was used as pasture during the first archaeological studies in the 1950s, led by Linton Satterthwaite from the University of Pennsylvania Museum. It is now an archaeological reserve, and houses a small museum with artifacts from various ongoing excavations.

The primary excavation of the site began in 1988. Restoration was completed in 2000 under the leadership of Dr. Jaime Awe, Director of the National Institute of Archaeology (NICH), Belize.

Other nearby Mayan sites include Chaa Creek, Xunantunich, Baking Pot, and Lower Dover.

See also

• Cuello
• Colha, Belize

Gallery

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  Aerial of Cahal Pech

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  Main courtyard

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  Main courtyard

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  Main courtyard

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  Remains of a ball court

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  Another building