title: Classic Maya bloodletting and the cultural evolution of religious rituals: quantifying patterns of variation in hieroglyphic texts.
abstract: Religious rituals that are painful or highly stressful are hypothesized to be costly signs of commitment essential for the evolution of complex society. Yet few studies have investigated how such extreme ritual practices were culturally transmitted in past societies. Here, we report the first study to analyze temporal and spatial variation in bloodletting rituals recorded in Classic Maya (ca. 250-900 CE) hieroglyphic texts. We also identify the sociopolitical contexts most closely associated with these ancient recorded rituals. Sampling an extensive record of 2,480 hieroglyphic texts, this study identifies every recorded instance of the logographic sign for the word ch'ahb' that is associated with ritual bloodletting. We show that documented rituals exhibit low frequency whose occurrence cannot be predicted by spatial location. Conversely, network ties better capture the distribution of bloodletting rituals across the southern Maya region. Our results indicate that bloodletting rituals by Maya nobles were not uniformly recorded, but were typically documented in association with antagonistic statements and may have signaled royal commitments among connected polities.
authors.affiliation: Department of Linguistics, University of California Davis, Davis, California, United States of America.
authors.forename: Jessica
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Munson
authors.affiliation: Department of Computer & Information Science, University of Konstanz, Konstanz, Germany.
authors.forename: Viviana
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Amati
authors.affiliation: Human Evolutionary Studies Program and Department of Archaeology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada; Department of Archaeology, University of Aberdeen, St Mary's Building, Aberdeen, Scotland, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Mark
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Collard
authors.affiliation: Department of Linguistics, University of California Davis, Davis, California, United States of America; Department of Native American Studies, University of California Davis, Davis, California, United States of America.
authors.forename: Martha J
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Macri
mesh_terms: D000569:Americas / Q000208:ethnology; D001815:Bloodletting / Q000266:history* / Q000523:psychology; D002562:Ceremonial Behavior; D003196:Computer Graphics; D003468:Cultural Evolution; D004282:Documentation; D005006:Ethnicity / Q000266:history* / Q000523:psychology; D049690:History, Ancient; D006801:Humans; D015233:Models, Statistical; D010363:Pattern Recognition, Automated; D012067:Religion / Q000266:history*; D014956:Writing / Q000266:history*