The Economic Base of an Ancient Maya City

Intensive agriculture supported large ancient Maya populations. However, there have been few attempts to understand how agriculture was integrated with the political economy of a Maya city and that city’s interaction with other polities. The site of Blue Creek in northern Belize offers the opportunity to begin to assess these relationships. Blue Creek had access to enormous agricultural resources and direct access to the riverine coastal trade system. The combination of these factors enabled Blue Creek to become a small, but wealthy Early Classic Maya city.