Article About Mayan Weapons

[David Kush]

http://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/traumatic-skull-injuries-reveal-mayans-used-spiked-clubs-001477left]

[Patrick Waterson]

I am getting a 'page does not exist anymore' entry when trying to access this one.  (Hate it when websites do this to you.)

[Duncan Head]

There's a spurious "left" at the end of the link - try http://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/traumatic-skull-injuries-reveal-mayans-used-spiked-clubs-001477

[Patrick Waterson]

Perfect - thanks, Duncan.

[Patrick Waterson]

The following extract does indicate something, but probably not what the quoted person believes:

Wars were important to the Mayans for a variety of reasons, including subjugation of neighbouring city-states, acquisition of territory, prestige, control of resources, and capture of prisoners for slaves and sacrifices. Very little is known about what caused the sudden decline of the Mayan civilization in the late Classic period between 700 and 900 AD, in which towns and cities became depopulated and abandoned, but many have attributed it to the relentless warfare taking place.

However, in contrast to this theory, Serafin reported that the frequency of the skull trauma decreased during the late Classic period, which suggests that warfare "did not contribute to the Classic period collapse in this area." The researchers did find violence increased in the Post-Classic period, which Serafin says is to be expected since hard times tend to breed violence.

The diminution in skull injuries may be the result of the spreading adoption of the bow, which would inflict more non-skull-trauma casualties and perhaps place more emphasis on distance fighting.  In other words, it suggests a change in the style of warfare rather than the substance.

Anyway, thanks, David, for posting the link.

[Andreas Johansson]

Or maybe just that people clubbed to death became relatively less likely to be buried where archaeologists find them. Maybe attitudes to taking care of the slain changed while rates and styles of killing remained the same.

Also: 116 skills across a period of ~2100 years - just how statistically significant is the Late Classic decrease likely to be? If the skulls were evenly distributed in time just 12 would be from the Late Classic.

[Patrick Waterson]

If we knew more about the sites excavated and how representative these were we could see whether there was in fact a meaningful decrease in blunt-with-spikes-trauma cranial abuse or too much of a dearth of data for the conclusions to be meaningful.

116 skulls suggests the conclusions are based on partial excavation of a few sites populated during the time period given, in other words specific vertical sections through the historical record.  If this is indeed the case, the excavators would base analysis on frequency within stratigraphy and have the confidence to make such pronouncements.  Andreas' caveats nevertheless remain valid, along with the possibility that the spiked club was simply declining in popularity.

It does seem a bit much to conclude on the basis of the spiked skull injury count that war was on the decrease.