The ceremonial architecture of Late Postclassic Mayapán (A.D. 1268-1441) in Yucatán, Mexico, included repetitive arrangements of buildings known as temple assemblages. Archaeological investigations conducted by the Proyecto Maya Colonial in Petén, Guatemala, revealed a pocket of temple assemblages in a zone occupied by the seventeenth century Kowoj Maya. The Kowoj claimed to have migrated from
... [Show full abstract] Mayapán sometime after the city's collapse in A.D. 1441. Indigenous documents also describe Kowoj in Mayapán and linguistic data indicate migrations between Yucatán and Petén as well. A specific variant of temple assemblage defines the location of the Kowoj in both Mayapân and Petén. I argue that these assemblages were the exemplary centers or microcosms of the Kowoj social and physical universe and they were transplanted as the Kowoj re-centered themselves in new or, perhaps, reclaimed lands. The temple assemblages also communicated a prestigious connection with Mayapán and differentiated the Kowoj from their neighbors in Petén.
