Includes bibliographical references and index.

Introduction : a history of Mesoamerican cave interpretation / James E. Brady and Keith M. Prufer -- Rites of passage and other ceremonies in caves / Doris Heyden -- The cave-pyramid complex among the contemporary Nahua of northern Veracruz / Alan R. Sandstrom -- Constructing mythic space : the significance of a chicomoztoc complex at Acatzingo Viejo / Manuel Aguilar ... [et al.] -- Pre-Hispanic rain ceremonies in Blade Cave, Sierra Mazateca, Oaxaca, Mexico / Janet Fitzsimmons -- Sacred caves and rituals from the northern Mixteca of Oaxaca, Mexico : new revelations / Carlos Rincón Mautner -- Some notes on ritual caves among the ancient and modern Maya / Evon Z. Vogt and David Stuart -- Shamans, caves, and the roles of ritual specialists in Maya society / Keith M. Prufer -- Cave stelae and megalithic monuments in western Belize / Jaime J. Awe, Cameron Griffith, and Sherry Gibbs -- A cognitive approach to artifact distribution in caves of the Maya area / Andrea Stone -- Cluster concentrations, boundary markers, and ritual pathways : a GIS analysis of artifact cluster patterns at Actun Tunichil, Muknal, Belize / Holley Moyes -- Ethnographic notes on Maya Q'eqchi' cave rites : implications for archaeological interpretation / Abigail E. Adams and James E. Brady -- A Lacandon religious ritual in the cave of the god Tsibaná at the holy lake of Mensabok in the rainforest of Chiapas / Jaroslaw Theodore Petryshyn -- Beneath the Yalahau : emerging patterns of ancient Maya ritual cave use from northern Quintana Roo, Mexico / Dominique Rissolo -- Caves, karst, and settlement at Mayapán, Yucatán / Clifford T. Brown -- Concluding comments / Keith M. Prufer and James E. Brady.

Electronic reproduction. Palo Alto, Calif. : ebrary, 2009. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ebrary affiliated libraries.