Lisa J. Lucero (PhD, UCLA, 1994) is an archaeologist who studies the ancient Maya. Her interests focus on the emergence and demise of political power, ritual, water management, the impact of climate change on society, sustainability tropical regions, and the Classic Maya.

Lisa J. Lucero has been conducting archaeology projects in Belize for 30 years, 20 years as director of the Valley of Peace Archaeology (VOPA) project. Publications and reports are available on the VOPA project website VOPA research projects:

Yalbac (2001-present) The medium-sized center of Yalbac is located under jungle canopy near pockets of good agricultural land along Yalbac Creek on the eastern periphery of the southern Maya lowlands. It sits on private property consisting of over 300,000 acres owned and protected by full-time guards of Yalbac Ranch, a sustainable logging company. Permission is required to enter the property through gated entrances. J. Eric Thompson made a brief mention of an eastern group of Yalbac in the 1930's, but missed the site core, which we began mapping in 2001. Test pits excavated in Plazas 2 and 3 exposed several plaza floors and yielded ceramics dating from c. 300 B.C. through c. A.D. 900. All six temples are pyramid buildings with a flat surface at their summit and range from 8 to 16 m in height. There are a total of nine looters trenches (LT) spread out over five temples, eight of which are profiled.

Cara Blanca (1997-present) Cara Blanca ('white face') consists of 25 pools along the base of a limestone escarpment (up to c. 80-100 m high). The far western and eastern pools are lakes, while the central water bodies are cenotes, or steep-sided karstic sinkholes fed by groundwater, up to 60+ m. We have explored eight of the pools, some of which have yielded megafauna fossils. Five of the pools have associated settlement or settlement nearby: Pools 1, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 20. With the abundant year-round water and good agricultural land just beyond the pools, one would expect to find dense settlement, especially given the annual dry season when water became critical. The sparse settlement near cenotes indicates that Cara Blanca cenotes served as a pilgrimage destination for the ancient Maya because of its concentration of sacred features in the form of mountains and portals to the underworld--especially during droughts.

Salvage program (2014-present)”” In the recently cleared lands between Yalbac and Cara Blanca, we have recently began a salvage program to collect as much information from the exposed, plowed mounds before they are completely erased from the landscape. The mounds or collapsed structures ranges from solitary houses to large compounds.

Saturday Creek (1998-2001)”” Saturday Creek consists of dense settlement along the Belize River with numerous architectural types from temples (c. 10 m high), range structures, and large plazuela groups (4-5 structures facing a plaza) to small solitary mounds. We began mapping it in 1998, tested structures in 1999, and excavated several structures in 2001. Most of the site is located in a plowed field, although a large portion of it (c. 350 x 300 m) has not been plowed. Ceramics demonstrate at least Middle Preclassic through Postclassic occupation (c. 900 B.C. – A.D. 1450). Saturday Creek, with its long occupation history and architectural diversity, allows us to explore farming life and the emergence of political hierarchy over the long-term.

Books

• Fiske, Shirley, Susan Crate, Carole Crumley, Kathleen Galvin, Heather Lazarus, George Luber, Lisa J. Lucero, Anthony Oliver-Smith, Ben Orlove, Sarah Strauss, and Richard Wilk (2015) Changing the Atmosphere: Anthropology and Climate Change. American Anthropological Association Climate Change Task Force Report, Arlington, VA.
• Lucero, Lisa J. (2006) Water and Ritual: The Rise and Fall of Classic Maya Rulers. University of Texas Press, Austin.
• Lucero, Lisa J. (2001) Social Integration in the Ancient Maya Hinterlands: Ceramic Variability in the Belize River Area. Anthropological Research Paper No. 53. Arizona State University, Tempe.
• Lucero, Lisa J., and Barbara W. Fash, editors (2006) Precolumbian Water Management: Ideology, Ritual, and Politics. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.
• Bacus, Elisabeth A., and Lisa J. Lucero, editors (1999) Complex Polities in the Ancient Tropical World. Archeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association Number 9. American Anthropological Association, Arlington, VA.

Selected Journal Articles

• Larmon, Jean T., H. Gregory McDonald, Stanley Ambrose, Larisa R. G. DeSantis, and Lisa J. Lucero (2019) A Year in the Life of a Giant Ground Sloth During the Last Glacial Maximum in Belize. Science Advances 5:eaau1200.
• (2018) A Cosmology of Conservation Journal of Anthropological Research 74:327-359.
• Lucero, Lisa J, Jessica Harrison, Jean Larmon, Zachary Nissen, and Erin Benson (2016) Prolonged Droughts, Short-Term Responses and Diaspora: The Power of Water and Pilgrimage at the Sacred Cenotes of Cara Blanca, Belize. WIREs Water. doi: 10.1002/wat2.1148.
• Lucero, Lisa J., Roland Fletcher, and Robin Coningham (2015) From “Collapse” to Urban Diaspora: The Transformation of Low-Density, Dispersed Agrarian Urbanism Antiquity 89:1139-1154.
• Lucero, Lisa J., and Andrew Kinkella (2015) Pilgrimage to the Edge of the Watery Underworld: An Ancient Maya Water Temple at Cara Blanca, Belize. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 25:163-185.
• Lucero, Lisa J., Joel D. Gunn, and Vernon Scarborough (2011) Climate Change and Classic Maya Water Management Water Water 3:479-494.
• (2010) Materialized Cosmology among Ancient Maya Commoners. Journal of Social Archaeology 10:138-167.
• Scarborough, Vernon L, and Lisa J. Lucero (2010) The Non-Hierarchical Development of Complexity in the Semitropics: Water and Cooperation. Water History 2:185-205.
• (2007) Classic Maya Temples, Politics, and the Voice of the People. Latin American Antiquity 18:407-427
• (2003) The Politics of Ritual: The Emergence of Classic Maya Rulers. Current Anthropology 44:523-558.
• (2002) The Collapse of the Classic Maya: A Case for the Role of Water Control. American Anthropologist 104:814-826.

Selected Book chapters

• Lucero, Lisa J., and Jean T. Larmon (2018) Climate Change, Mesoamerica and the Classic Maya Collapse. In Climate Changes in the Holocene: Impacts and Human Adaptation, edited by E. Chiotis, pp. 165-181. CRC Press, London.
• Isendahl, Christian, Lisa J. Lucero, and Scott Heckbert (2018) Sustaining Freshwater Security and Community Wealth: Diversity and Change in the Pre-Columbian Maya Lowlands. In Water and Society: Resilience, Decline, and Revival from Ancient Times to the Present, edited by F. Sulas and I. Pikiray, pp. 17-39. Routledge, London.
• (2017) Climate Change and Water Management in Tropical Societies: The Classic Maya. In Exploring Frameworks for Tropical Forest Conservation: Integrating Natural and Cultural Diversity for Sustainability, A Global Perspective, pp. 204-213. UNESCO Mexico, Mexico City
• Lucero, Lisa J., Scott L. Fedick, Nicholas Dunning, David Lentz, and Vernon L. Scarborough (2014) Water and Landscape: Ancient Maya Settlement Decisions. In The Resilience and Vulnerability of Ancient Landscapes: Transforming Maya Archaeology through IHOPE, edited by Arlen Chase and Vernon Scarborough, pp. 30-42. Archeological Papers of the American Anthropological Association No. 24. Wiley-Blackwell, Hoboken, NJ.
• Lucero, Lisa J., and Andrew Kinkella (2014) A Place for Pilgrimage: The Ancient Maya Sacred Landscape of Cara Blanca, Belize. In Of Rocks and Water: Towards an Archaeology of Place, edited by Omür Harmanşah. Joukowsky Institute Publication 5, pp. 13-39. Oxbow Books, Oxford.
• Water Control and the Emergence of Polities in the Southern Maya Lowlands: Evolutionary, Economic, and Ecological Models (2013). In Cooperation and Collective Action: Archaeological Perspectives, edited by D. M. Carballo, pp. 223-242. Fundamental Issues in Archaeology. Springer Press, New York.
• (2008) Memorializing Place among Classic Maya Commoners. In Memory Work: Archaeologies of Material Practices, edited by B.J. Mills, edited by W.H. Walker, pp. 187-205 School for Advanced Research Press, Santa Fe ^[1]
• Lucero, Lisa J, and Sherry A. Gibbs (2007) The Creation and Sacrifice of Witches in Classic Maya Society. In New Perspectives on Human Sacrifice and Ritual Body Treatments in Ancient Maya Society, edited by V. Tiesler and A. Cucina, pp. 45-73. Springer Press, New York.
• (2006) The Political and Sacred Power of Water in Ancient Maya Society. In Precolumbian Water Management: Ideology, Ritual, and Politics, edited by L. J. Lucero and B. Fash, pp. 116-128. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.
• Lucero, Lisa J, Scott L. Fedick, Andrew Kinkella, and Sean M. Graebner (2004) Ancient Maya Settlement in the Valley of Peace Area. In Belize Archaeology of the Upper Belize River Valley: Half a Century of Maya Research edited by J.F. Garber. Gainesville University of Florida Press 2004, p. 86-102.
• Walker, William H, and Lisa J. Lucero (2000) The Depositional History of Ritual and Power. In Agency in Archaeology, edited by M. Dobres and J. Robb, pp. 130-147. Routledge Press, London.