Ancient Maya Entrepreneurs Made Salt, Study Finds

[Mark Reiff <markreiff@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

FYI,

A lesson from the past.

"Ancient Maya Entrepreneurs Made Salt, Study Finds"
Reuters
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=585&e=2&u=/nm/20050404/sc_nm/science_maya_dc

: Ancient Mayan entrepreneurs working along the coast of what is now
: Belize distilled salt from seawater and paddled it to inland cities
: in canoes, all without government control, researchers reported on
: Monday.

: They found evidence of 41 saltworks on a single coastal lagoon and
: the remains of a 1,300-year-old wooden canoe paddle.

: Their study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy
: of Sciences, shows the extent of trade just before the Mayan
: civilization in that region mysteriously fell apart.

: "The discovery of the saltworks indicates that there was extensive
: production and distribution of goods and resources outside the
: cities in the interior of the Yucatan," they wrote.

: "To me the exciting thing is that, in addition to the paddle ...
: these saltworks that we have found in the lagoon indicate the
: importance of non-state-controlled production in pre-industrial
: societies," said Heather McKillop of the Department of Geography
: and Anthropology at Louisiana State University, who led the study.

: "I think at some point there was a complex system of production and
: trade that is only beginning to be figured out, including, probably,
: overland transport using human porters and also travel up and down
: river and lagoon systems using canoes," she added in a telephone
: interview.

--
Mark Reiff <markreiff@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>

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