Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Belize "Rock Piles"

     Over on my blog "Waking Up On Turtle Island," I am slowly writing up my experiences at a Maya site I visited in Belize - not on the mainland but on Ambergris Caye (Key) - not the devolped type of site like the temple you might be envisioning but a place that is more like the sites that appear on this blog (and others like it) than you might think.
     And yes I know and remember well that flurry of activity about "Mayan Pyramids in Georgia" and all that, but just take a look at some random photos I took (forgetting to bring a tripod, so they may be a bit blurry and I apologize for that) barely a week ago...

The above "Rock Piles-like Mounds" are about here on the site map above, the south west slope below the more formal and much larger platform mounds, and below I can't resist adding a few shots of the "Beer Bottle Mounds," where I spotted an Obsidian Flake amongst the melange of artifacts... 
Every footsep I took was on some kind of an artifact, anthrosol or pottery:
Sometimes a projectile point:
Sometimes Human Bones:

4 comments :

pwax said...

Oh my god! Thank you Tim. It is SO weird to see a rock pile with palm trees on it.

pwax said...

Were there also larger pyramids?

Tim MacSweeney said...

The Marco Gonzalez Site is thought to be a Trading Village - no pyramids or temples, just platform mounds. But as well as those familiar looking piles, there were some familiar looking "walls" on a "mysterious structure" that might be a residence (but I don't see how), a "construction stockpile" (but it's all so carefully stacked), or a lighthouse sort of thing...

Tim MacSweeney said...

Jan Brown commented to me that these rock piles may just be tossed aside by looters or hurricanes and tides, no symbolism attached, but I mentioned to her that that is something a New England boy like me hears all the time re: rock piles here. She also loves to remind people who say they are open minded to be open minded...