In 2010, a rich and enigmatic tomb was discovered at the Classic Maya city of El Zotz, Guatemala. Found on a hill high above El Zotz, in a place called El Diablo or "The Devil," the tomb lay within a building covered with remarkable solar and celestial imagery. The tomb and building revealed striking new evidence on local Maya dynasties at their time of origin. The findings at El Zotz also show how royal families acquired the landscape some 1600 years ago. Join Dr. Stephen Houston and discover what the tomb and its sculpted building reveal about El Zotz, Maya royalty, and the Maya culture.
Dr. Houston, a 2008 MacArthur fellow and the Dupee Family Professor of Social Sciences and professor of anthropology at Brown, is concluding his excavations at the Classic Maya city of El Zotz, Guatemala, and has finished five seasons of work at the ruins of Piedras Negras, Guatemala. Born in Chambersburg, PA, Houston was educated at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Edinburgh as an exchange student. At Yale University he earned his Master of Philosophy degree in 1983 and Ph.D. in 1987. Prior to Brown, Dr. Houston served as Jesse Knight University Professor at Brigham Young University.
Sponsored by the Friends of the Office of State Archaeology (FOSA), the Connecticut State Museum of Natural History and Connecticut Archaeology Center at UConn, and the Archaeology Society of Connecticut (ASC). The FOSA membership meeting begins before the lecture at 1 pm and is open to the public. In case of inclement weather, the snow date will be Sunday, January 27, 2013 with the presentation beginning at 1 pm and the annual meeting following.
