The role of climate change in the development and demise of Classic Maya civilization (300 to 1000 C.E.) remains controversial because of the absence of well-dated climate and archaeological sequences. We present a precisely dated subannual climate record for the past 2000 years from Yok Balum Cave, Belize. From comparison of this record with historical events compiled from well-dated stone monuments, we propose that anomalously high rainfall favored unprecedented population expansion and the proliferation of political centers between 440 and 660 C.E. This was followed by a drying trend between 660 and 1000 C.E. that triggered the balkanization of polities, increased warfare, and the asynchronous disintegration of polities, followed by population collapse in the context of an extended drought between 1020 and 1100 C.E.

We employed paleolimnological methods to investigate tropical forest recovery and soil stabilization that followed abandonment of agricultural systems associated with disintegration of Classic Maya polities ca. A.D. 800–1000. We used lithological, geochemical, magnetic, and palynological data from sediment cores of Lake Petén Itzá in the Maya Lowlands of northern Guatemala. Sediment core chronology was developed using radiocarbon dates on terrestrial wood and charcoal fragments. Our results indicate that in the absence of large human populations and extensive farming activities, Petén forests recovered under humid climate conditions within a span of 80–260 yr. Soil stabilization postdates pollen evidence of forest regrowth stratigraphically, and required between 120 and 280 yr. We conclude that the tropical forest ecosystem in the watershed of Lake Petén Itzá had been reestablished by the early Postclassic Period (A.D. 1000–1200).

Colonized as early as 13,500 years ago, the Northern Channel Islands of California offer some of the earliest evidence of human habitation along the west coast of North America. The Chumash people who lived on these islands are considered to be among the most socially and politically complex hunter-gatherers in the world. This book provides a powerful and innovative synthesis of the cultural and environmental history of the chain of islands. Douglas J. Kennett shows that the trends in cultural elaboration were, in part, set into motion by a series of dramatic environmental events that were the catalyst for the unprecedented social and political complexity observed historically.