Maya gastronomy and archeology of the senses
Maya gastronomy and archeology of the senses
Was there gastronomy in ancient civilizations? Is it possible for science to approach this? These are some questions that have arisen in the last decades in the field of archeology, within the framework of a theoretical and methodological proposal known as the archeology of the senses.
Cooking does not just involve flavor. Since prehispanic times, references have been found of chocolate foam, highlighting the importance of the combination between texture and flavor. Annatto, a condiment commonly used in Yucatan, not only gives a particular flavor to food, but also a reddish color that is characteristic of many traditional dishes, such as mucbipollos and cochinita pibil.
Yanis Hamilakis, recognized professor of archeology at the University of Southampton, proposed to recover and reconstruct the past from the experiential and multisensory forms of relating to the world, highlighting qualitative elements such as memory, affections, materials and their textures, flow of substances, sensory stimuli and emotional-affective interactions, among various aspects.
"The archeology of the senses seeks to approximate a little to those elements that could surround the sensitivity of people, which somehow enveloped their daily life and that, without a doubt, is part of who we are. It is not so much about reaching what they felt as such, because that is impossible, but what could have generated the sensations through the material vestiges, the evidence, "said Lilia Fernández Souza, research professor at the Autonomous University of Yucatán (Uady) (Mexico).
The appearance, texture, color and smell are important elements when thinking about the gastronomy of the past, and its approach is still a challenge for archeology. In particular, the researcher is dedicated to the study of taste, which highlights the synesthetic aspect, that interactive relationship between all the senses.
"To generate the sensations synaesthesia is required, then I study the taste but combined with the touch, the aroma, the visual touch (...) The archeology of the senses, among many other things, seeks to approach synesthesia".
Dr. Lilia Fernández de Souza. The Dictionary of the Spanish language defines gastronomy as the art of preparing a good meal; the love of good food; and the set of dishes and culinary uses of a specific place. On this definition, Fernandez Souza emphasizes the words "art" and "good food", since it is not a meal only, but it is a food qualified by its own culture as good or "high".
Justin Kerr, The maya vase catalog. (Photo: DICYT)
Alfredo López Austin, a renowned Mexican historian, proposed the concept of the hard core of the Mesoamerican worldview as a system of mental acts that is shared throughout the history of Mesoamerica. In that sense, if we consider that human beings have not only thoughts but also feelings and sensations, the possible scope of archeology of the senses for the Mesoamerican area can be understood, said the researcher.
"Of course, for archeology is very difficult to think about feelings, but regardless of what our methods are to reach these forms in which the human being develops, it is true that we can not conceive the human being without feelings and without sensations, It depends mainly on cultural perspectives, "said the researcher.
Under the supervision of Fernández Souza, María Jesús Novelo Pérez studied as part of her master's thesis the role of fire within the different activities in the Mayan domestic space, from the perspective of agency and performance in archeology. "From the perspective of agency and performance, fire is seen as a social actor, that is, it is capable not only of having presence but its presence generates other actors to develop in a certain way, in a specific context".
The thesis aimed to address the way in which fire, as a common element of everyday life, affects the actions of other actors, be they human or non-human. From the material evidence was analyzed the action of fire in the activities of food production, economic production (coal and clay objects), cleaning activities and use of fire as light.
"In the particular case of the Mayan cuisine, the use of two particular elements was mainly analyzed: k'oben (three stones firebox) and pib (underground oven) within the contexts of daily and ritual use," said Novelo. Pérez, who was a fellow of the National Council of Science and Technology (Conacyt).
The k'oben is an artifact of three stones that the Mayan communities have used for cooking and that surrounds all a deep knowledge. There are various ways of cooking food in K'oben according to the use of fire, whether it is fire itself, like flames, or its derivatives, such as ash, or through other elements such as hot stones.
There are specific words in maya for each form of cooking food in the k'oben, for example: top'ta'antah is roasting corn in the ash or roasting or roasting grains, chiles or seeds in the embers; k'a'abil is roasting; chel chuk is roasting over embers; muk ta'an tah is sub-cooking or cooking under the ash (according to the Maya Cordemex Dictionary). "Therefore, cooking in k'oben is not a simple action of cooking food, it is an art of knowing how to use fire since each way of cooking is unique in execution, smells and flavors for food," commented Novelo Pérez.
For the case of the pib (underground oven), knowledge about the use of fire is accompanied by taboos or superstitions at the time of its use for cooking. One is in relation to gender, in the sense that mainly men are destined to use it, since there is a kind of restriction towards women, because of the intensity or amount of fire to be handled, an attribution of "danger" to women . "That's where schemes are broken, like the fact that the kitchen is cataloged for women, this in the daily context, since in the ritual it is very different."
There are also actions that people do to "control" the fire, for example, cutting and throwing to the hut of hair pib (nine hairs specifically) of guests when cooking in gin or throwing nine bacales (central part of the ears of corn). corn) or cross-shaped salt. This has the purpose of cooking the food or not burning and the main reason is because in the Maya perspective there are people with unfavorable energies, mainly those called siska (cold hands), known, in the everyday environment, such as those They do not have the gift of cooking certain foods.
"This is how the high value and prestige of food cooked in pib entails a series of relationships and mysticism between men and women," explained Novelo Pérez.
According to the researcher, the perspective of agency and performance allowed analyzing how fire as an actor affects decision-making, in the transformation of elements, creates taboos, generates feelings, thoughts, language and particular forms of action.
"Talking about Mayan gastronomy is talking about a complex cuisine, since it contains a lot of knowledge that involves taboos, language, forms of interaction and, I can say, a high development of the senses, of who makes the food and who enjoys it".
For Fernández Souza, the only way to approach the horizons of the archeology of the senses and, in particular, the Mayan gastronomy, is through a multidisciplinary approach. From this perspective, the researcher highlights the use of "traditional" archaeological evidences through artifacts and traits; the archaeometric evidences; the epigraphic evidence; the iconography; the historical evidences; and the ethnographic and ethnoarchaeological evidences.
The ingredients of the food constitute the first level of approximation to the study of the gastronomy of antiquity for the archeology for being, generally, those of greater access, while a second level of approximation is in the process that could have suffered said ingredients.
In the north of the peninsula, zooarchaeologists work, among many other activities, in identifying the type of cooking a piece of meat may have had, for example, if it was baked or roasted. In the case of plants, paleobotanists have analyzed starch granules in which they have found damage that can be the result of processing, such as cooking in water, cooking in dry or fermentation.
"We can not go back to what we felt in the past, but we can try to see the scenario and think about some elements that we sometimes associate with flavor, but that may have other connotations," the researcher said.
In the search for evidence of preparation and consumption of food, the materials that are commonly used are the large metates. "Here in the north of the peninsula what we find, especially before the Postclassic, are large apodal metates, later the tripod metates arrive, even basalt metates arrive, but the great majority of milling pieces that we have here in the north These are pieces of limestone, in this case these metates, "said Fernández Souza.
As part of the daily life project in San Antonio Sihó, supported by the Basic Scientific Research Fund of Conacyt with the objective of studying the daily life of non-elite groups in the region, Fernández Souza's research group found metates placed on stones as supports, as has been found in other settlements and as seen in the image recorded in the catalog of Justin Kerr (K1272) that shows a woman grinding in an apodal metate placed on supporting stones.
At the site of Kabáh, where they have collaborated with the archaeologist Lourdes Toscano, differences have been identified in the chemical residues found around the grinding stones found in situ.
1-Justin-Kerr, -The-maya-vase-catalog.jpg Justin Kerr, The maya vase catalog. "We have found that, for example, some have more protein residues than others, or a greater relative amount of carbonates, than they could be the result of nixtamalization. It is likely that they were women working with these metates, maybe meat on the one hand, beans or some highly protein food, and on others corn, "said Fernández Souza.
In addition to grinding stones, which constitute the first great element as evidence of food preparation, ceramics is the artifact that is found in the greatest number of sites.
"Ceramics goes a long way, the first thing is chronology, but there are other things that have to do with technology, production, exchange and there is a very interesting relationship between the forms of ceramics, the discovery and other types of archaeological evidence. The colleagues María Jesús Novelo Pérez, Moisés Herrera Parra and I recently presented a work that crosses chemical and paleobotanical information, according to the different forms of ceramics, and really interesting things are coming out. "
The results obtained from the combination of macroscopic archeological evidences with archaeometric evidences allow to know mainly indicators of levels of phosphates, carbonates, fatty acids, protein residues, carbohydrates and pH, which shed information on the tendencies of what could constitute the gastronomy of the past. "They do not specifically tell us what substance is found, but it does give us many trends about what might be found," said the researcher.
Currently, Dr. Lilia Fernández Souza conducts her research in the Laboratory of Chemical and Microscopic Analysis of the Faculty of Anthropological Sciences of Uady, promoted by the mentoring of the work team of Dr. Luis Barba Pingarrón, attached to the Institute of Anthropological Research of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), as well as Dr. Guillermo Acosta, also from UNAM.
In addition, it is part of the Conacyt Thematic Network of Applied Sciences in the Research and Conservation of Cultural Heritage, "which allows us to interact with many of the scientific approaches that are being made in Mexico and that give rise to much multidisciplinary work in the future" , the researcher pointed out.
The archeology of the senses intersects with the discipline of anthropology in its broadest sense and with the anthropology of the senses in a particular way. One of the references for Lilia Fernández Souza in this field is the anthropologist Steffan Igor Ayora, who is dedicated to the study of gastronomy and taste as part of the Laboratory of the Senses of the Autonomous University of Yucatan.
Currently, he also collaborates with chefs professors of the culinary career of the Technological University of Poniente de Maxcanú, who have dedicated themselves to recovering and putting into practice traditional culinary techniques. (Source: CONACYT / DICYT)
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