Archaeologist Heather McKillop shares the experiences she had off the coast of Belize while searching for clues about the little known ancient Maya sea trade. This recollection of her work there includes the adventure of discovery, as the story of the traders emerges from the excavations. She describes the trading port of Wild Cane Cay, where exotic goods were traded from distant lands, and also discusses the more coastal-inland trade there. Through the story of her work, McKillop models the research design and field work required to interpret civilizations of the past.

Focuses on the maritime trade network sites on Ambergris Caye, Belize, where excavations have revealed remnants of very small villages, or camps, along the Caribbean coastline

"This concise and information-rich study focuses on the importance of salt and its associated trade networks in the Maya area. . . . This work will surely be a useful one for Mexoamerican area specialists interested in trade and its role in the development of complex societies."--Latin America in Books

"McKillop has completed a remarkable task in bringing out significant new data concerning ancient Maya salt making. The implications of environmental exploitation, technological development, and economic possibilities provide the opportunity to revisit these issues on more solid ground."--Fred Valdez Jr., University of Texas, Austin "Long-accepted ideas about Late Classic activities and the role of coastal communities in supporting Late Classic society--even the society of Tikal and the Peten--will now have to change as the result of McKillop's findings."--Elizabeth Graham, University College London In Salt: White Gold of the Ancient Maya, Heather McKillop reports the discovery, excavation, and interpretation of Late Classic Maya salt works on the coast of Belize, transforming our knowledge of the Maya salt trade and craft specialization while providing new insights on sea-level rise in the Late Holocene as well. Salt, basic to human existence, was scarce in the tropical rainforests of Belize and Guatemala, where the Classic Maya civilization thrived between A.D. 300 and 900. The prevailing interpretation has been that salt was imported from the north coast of the Yucatan. However, the underwater discovery and excavation of salt works in Punta Ycacos Lagoon demonstrate that the Maya produced salt by boiling brine in pots over fires at specialized workshops on the Belizean coast. The Punta Ycacos salt works are clear evidence that craft specialization took place in a nondomestic setting and that production occurred away from the economic and political power of the urban Maya rulers, thus providing new clues to the Maya economy and sea trade. McKillop also presents new data on sea-level rise in the Late Holocene that extend geologists' and geographers' sea-level curves from earlier eras. Likewise, she enters the environmental-versus-cultural debate over the Classic Maya collapse by evaluating the factors that led to the abandonment of the Punta Ycacos salt works at the end of the Classic Period, synonymous with the abandonment of inland Maya cities. Heather McKillop is associate professor of anthropology at Louisiana State University.