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Distinguished Alumni Award, Trent University

Household salt production by the Late Classic Maya: underwater excavations at Ta'ab Nuk Na

Briquetage and Brine: Living and Working at the Classic Maya Salt Works of Ek Way Nal, Belize

Human–environment interactions at Ta'ab Nuk Na, a submerged Maya salt works site in Belize

Flooded mangrove landscapes hide ancient Maya coastal sites in Belize

Earliest Ancient Maya salt production in southern Belize: excavations at Jay-yi Nah

Maya Salt Works (Maya Studies)

By Heather McKillop - The Ancient Maya: New Perspectives (Reprint) (2006-08-01) [Paperback]

In Search of Maya Sea Traders (Texas A&amp;M University Anthropology Series Book 11)

Salt: White Gold of the Ancient Maya (Maya Studies)

Maya Coastal Trade & Underwater Archaeology

Heather Irene McKillop is a Canadian-American archaeologist, academic, and Maya scholar, noted particularly for her research into ancient Maya coastal trade routes, seafaring, littoral archaeology, and the long-distance exchange of commodities in pre-Columbian Mesoamerica.

Heather McKillop earned a Bachelor of Science and Master of Arts in Anthropology from Trent University, located in Peterborough, Ontario. She received her Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of California in Santa Barbara, California.

Heather McKillop has carried out archaeological fieldwork along the coast, on the cays, and underwater in Belize since 1979.

Since the 2004 discovery of ancient Maya wooden architecture and a wooden canoe paddle preserved in a peat bog below the sea floor, McKillop and her team of Louisiana State University (LSU) students and colleagues have been focused on the discovery, mapping, excavation, sediment coring and analyses of the waterlogged remains. She started the DIVA Lab (Digital Imaging and Visualization in Archaeology) in 2008 to make 3D digital images of the waterlogged wood, pottery, and other artifacts from the underwater Maya sites—Paynes Creek Salt Works. As of 2016 McKillop is Thomas and Lillian Landrum Alumni Professor in the Department of Geography and Anthropology at LSU.

Maya Coatal Trade Routes

Pre-Columbian Civilizations

Maya Civilization

Maya Archaeology

Littoral Archaeology

LSU Faculty Profile

Wikipedia Page

ResearchGate Citations

Academia Citations

An LSU professor's study of waterlogged posts causes worldwide stir in archaeological circles

Who built the LSU campus mounds provides insight into these prehistoric treasures

LSU anthropologist Heather McKillop dives into new Maya discoveries

Thomas & Lillian Landrum Alumni Professor

Using 3D in Archaeology: LSU archaeologist Heather McKillop will talk about the search for ancient Maya underwater sites in Belize. LSU undergraduates and graduate students work as a team in the field and back at LSU in the Digital Imaging and Visualization in Archaeology, or DIVA lab, to use 3D technology to study and preserve ancient cultures.

LSU Science Café: Heather McKillop, September 2017

Webinar Date: May 19, 2022

Waterlogged wooden building posts and artifacts, including the K’ak’ Naab’ canoe paddle, presented a conservation nightmare when removed from the water for study. If allowed to dry, the wood shrunk, cracked, and decayed, not good for study or preserving long-term for exhibit in the case of the canoe paddle. The solution was to create 3D digital replicas of waterlogged wood, with some objects professionally conserved and others curated in deep silt in the lagoon. In this talk McKillop will describe setting up the DIVA Lab (Digital Imaging and Visualization in Archaeology), 3D digital imaging research-quality replicas of the underwater material. She will also discuss 3D printed replicas for exhibits in Belize funded by an AIA Site Preservation Grant.

Archaeology Abridged: Preserving Underwater Maya Finds using 3D Technology with Heather McKillop

"Discovery! Ancient Maya Wooden Buildings Underwater in Belize"

Lecture Date: Thursday, April 7, 2022 at 1:00 pm ET

Classic Maya salt workers constructed salt kitchens and residences along the shores of a coastal lagoon that were subsequently submerged below sea level. In this talk, McKillop will describe the discovery, mapping, and excavation of wooden buildings and artifacts that were spectacularly preserved below the sea floor in red mangrove peat. Wood normally decays in the tropical landscape of Central America where Maya sites are dominated by stone buildings, so the findings of pole and thatch buildings at the Paynes Creek Salt Works are significant to understanding more modest buildings that likely were common. Field techniques were modified to survey and excavation of shallow underwater sites, including floating on Research Flotation Devices (RFDs) and diving using the airline system of hoses from a gas-powered compressor.

Archaeology Abridged: Discover! Ancient Maya Wooden Buildings Underwater with Heather McKillop

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