By Belize Live News Staff: Deep in the Maya Mountains of southern Belize, archaeologists have studied the grave of a woman whose burial may have been fit for royalty.
According to a new preprint, the woman was placed in a shallow pit in Bats’ub Cave. Her head had been removed, and in its place was part of a vessel holding a single jade bead. A bowl containing five cacao seeds was set upside down above her pelvis, surrounded by a large cluster of human teeth.
Other grave goods included a bowl painted with a figure whose detached head rests on its abdomen, a vessel decorated with a feathered hummingbird serpent and a small rosewood stool, which researchers say is the first of its kind found in a burial.
The ancient Maya viewed caves as gateways to the underworld and places to connect with ancestors, much like Actun Tunichil Muknal in Cayo.
DNA testing showed the woman was distantly related to several people whose teeth were left in the cave. Researchers believe later generations treated her as an ancestor and returned over centuries to honour her.
The genetic data also suggest elite families traced descent through the male line, with women marrying into the family.
The research was carried out under permits from the Belize Institute of Archaeology and the Belize Forest Department, in partnership with the Ya’axché Conservation Trust in the Bladen Nature Reserve. Nearby communities were consulted several times between 2016 and 2024 and have asked for results to be shared in English, Mopan and Q’eqchi’.
The study has not yet been peer reviewed.
