Pottery and Ceramics in the Lamanai Museum
The cluttered shelves of the Lamanai museum display pottery and ceramics of various styles and periods informally arranged by theme and size.
Some of the ceramics found in Postclassic burials are affiliated with northern wares, while other pottery is similar to that produced in the Petén.
Later, Mayapan-style censers appeared, and Tulum-style pottery marked the final prehistoric periods at Lamanai.
Source: Adams, Richard, EW Prehistoric Mesoamaerica. p311
The original Mayan name for the site, Lama'anayin, means submerged crocodile, and numerous representations of crocodiles have been found at the site.
Photo courtesy of Marion Canavan
Photo courtesy of Jeff Purcell
Photo courtesy of Jeff Purcell
This is one of a pair of dissimilar stuccoed censers which probably date from about A.D. 1450. It may depict a deity, and was found in Burial N10-7/1.
Photo courtesy of Marion Canavan
Mayapan-style figurine censer from the massive offering scattered over N9-56; probably 14th-15th centuries A.C.
Perdergast, Journal of Field Archaeology, 8:1 51.
Figure 26. Vessels from various contexts, illustrating Post-Classic decorative techniques. Vessels f, k, n, and o are from the crushed lot at the base of Burial N10-1/2; g, j, and m are from Burial N10-2/20, contemporaneous with the structure in Fig. 17, and vessels e and h are from other burials in the same context.
Pendergast, Journal of Field Archaeology, 8:1 (1981) 50.
"The ceramics assoicated with the [Post-Classic] burials share certain traits with those of Mayapan, principally the use of carved decoration, often incorporating serpent motifs, and the presence of segmented basal flanges, usually with border lines and center notches or vertical-line embellishment [see diagram on previous page]. Based on these shared features, it initially appeared that the Lamanai ceramics might be approximately contemporaneous with those from far northern Yucatan, and therefore likely to date from 1250 A.C. or later.
Radiocarbon dates, however, from the structure in N10-2, which contained the largest number of burials, indicate that the Lamanai Post-Classic ceramic complex was fully developed by about 1140 A.C., and presumably had its origins in the 11th century if not earlier.
Judging by the apparent date of the ceramic features of Mayapan, the argument is strong for Lamanai as the source from which the concepts were transmitted northward. This reconstruction of events reinforces the picture of Lamanai as an important Post-Classic center based on the wealth and variety of artifacts alone."
Pendergast, Journal of Field Archaeology 8:1 (1981) 48-49