HUMAN SKELETAL REMAINS OF THE ANCIENT MAYA IN THE ...

84Three hundred and fifty meters of the cave were mapped and surveyed during thePetexbatun Regional Cave Survey, whereby the material from eight operations wassurface collected. Every operation produced some artifactual material, however, onlyfour operations produced human skeletal material. Seven lots within Operation CKP2contained human skeletal material. Lot CKP2-03-01 contained the largest amount ofskeletal material. Femora, humeri, tibiae, pelvis portions, and vertebral material areamong the most common skeletal elements in this lot. A right ilium with a wide sciaticnotch was identified as an adult female (Steele and Bramblett 1988). Deciduous teethand relatively smaller-sized skeletal elements with unfused epiphyses indicate thepresence of subadults. The other six lots did not produce nearly the amount of materialcollected from Lot CKP2-03-01. Operation CKP6 has a single lot that produced tworight femoral shafts and three unidentified long bone shaft fragments. Operation CKP7has two lots with skeletal material: Lot CKP7-06-1 contained a single maxillary secondmolar and Lot CKP7-07-1 had two left femoral shafts and several well-preserved cranialelements. An adult male was identified based on the dimensions and general robusticityof a complete left femoral shaft from this lot. The final operation (CKP9) has five lotswith minimal skeletal material. Teeth and long bone material are the most commonelements in this particular operation.I estimated the minimum and probable number of individuals for Cueva deKaxon Pec at four levels. The lot and suboperation produced identical MNI estimates,thus both will be treated as a single level. Skeletal material was broadly categorized asadult or subadult, however, precise age estimates were assessed when possible. These