Interview with Dr. Andrew Kinkella
The editorial team of Culture and Religion had the opportunity to speak with archaeologist Dr. Andrew Kinkella, professor and director of the Moorpark College Archaeological Program (MCAP).
Since 1993, Professor Kinkella has completed seventeen field seasons in the jungles of west-central Belize, studying Classic Maya culture (AD 250–900). His research focuses on a chain of twenty-five cenotes—natural bodies of water formed in limestone—located in the Cara Blanca region of Belize. His work examines how the ancient Maya used these sacred water sources in water-related rituals.
A particularly important part of his project involves underwater archaeology: researchers use scuba equipment to map and document the interior spaces of cenotes, revealing new aspects of the religious and cultural practices of the ancient Maya civilization.
— We are very pleased to meet you and grateful for the opportunity to share your scholarly reflections with our readers. It is a great honor to speak with a researcher whose work sheds such profound light on the legacy of ancient cultures.
Let us begin with our first question:
What drew you to archaeology, and why did the ancient Maya become the main focus of your research?
Andrew J. Kinkella:
— That’s a great question. You know, the Maya civilization itself is incredibly fascinating. When I was a kid, I grew up watching Indiana Jones movies, and of course it all seemed exciting, almost magical. But when I went to college, I had no intention of becoming an archaeologist. I was pretty open to different possibilities and thought I might become an actor.
Then, at university, I had a professor who was incredibly charismatic and inspiring. Even after taking his class, I couldn’t say that I had definitely decided to become an archaeologist, but I knew one thing for sure: I wanted to be like him. That was how it started. I began taking more courses and getting deeper and deeper into the subject.
The turning point was the opportunity to go to Belize. At the University of California, Santa Barbara, where I was studying, one of my professors organized a summer expedition: three months working at a Maya archaeological site, in the jungle, on ancient pyramids. I was amazed. You mean ordinary people can actually do this? It seemed like something superheroes did!
So I went, and that trip truly changed everything. Imagine being a young guy in Central America for the first time, spending three months in the jungle, eating rice, beans, and tortillas every day, while discovering an entirely new world. It gave me an enormous sense of accomplishment. After that, I couldn’t stop. Nothing else seemed nearly as exciting. From then on, I went back every summer, gradually building my career in archaeology.
I’ve been extremely fortunate. I often think about how lucky I’ve been in life.
— That’s wonderful! Maybe you should write a book about how you became an archaeologist.
Andrew J. Kinkella: I think so. Maybe someday I will. It’s already on my list—just a story about what I’ve experienced and the things that shaped me. I’d also like to do for my students what my professors once did for me: inspire them. I want them to see that this is real, that they can try it for themselves. Over the years, dozens of my students have gone to Belize as well, and that brings me real joy. I’m very happy that I can give them that kind of experience.
— What are you working on now?
Andrew J. Kinkella: I have several projects going on right now. As far as the Maya are concerned, I’ve returned to the very first project I worked on when I was still a very young researcher. It was a major archaeological site in Belize. I worked there for several years, then moved on to other things—my master’s degree, my PhD, new expeditions.
My next major research project involved diving in cenotes—natural bodies of water in the middle of the jungle, almost like deep underground lakes. I was doing underwater archaeology—scuba gear, diving, the whole thing—and I did that for quite a long time.
More recently, I reconnected with my former supervisor. She still teaches at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and as it turns out, I now live nearby. So I go there every week, and we work together on the old project, going through artifacts that we excavated back in the 1990s. It’s genuinely enjoyable to do the laboratory side of archaeology: organizing finds and preparing materials for publication.
And the most remarkable thing is that every once in a while I come across my own old notes, reports, and tables that my friends and I produced when we were students. You look at a piece of paper that’s twenty-five years old, and you recognize your own handwriting immediately. It gives you this sense of coming full circle—what I started with has come back into my life again. It’s a very warm feeling.
I also run projects with my students here in Southern California. We work with local archaeological firms and help investigate local sites. So right now I’m working in two directions at once: continuing my research on the ancient Maya and participating in archaeology closer to home.
— So in a sense, you are giving new life to your earlier research.
Andrew J. Kinkella: Yes, I suppose that’s exactly right.
— Could you tell us more about these sacred bodies of water? What role did they play in Maya culture?
Andrew J. Kinkella: Of course. I’m talking about cenotes, the natural bodies of water I mentioned earlier. I worked on them for quite a long time, and I’m sure I’ll return to them sooner or later. We’ve taken a short break from the project, but I think it will resume.
Cenotes are deep limestone sinkholes and caves filled with fresh water, hidden in the heart of the jungle. For the ancient Maya, they had not only practical importance but also sacred significance. In Maya mythology, cenotes were believed to be entrances to the underworld—Xibalba, the realm of darkness and spirits. In this sense, they were understood as gateways between our earthly existence and the world beyond.
That is why the Maya brought offerings there—ritual objects, artifacts, and, on some occasions, human sacrifices. I want to emphasize that human sacrifice among the Maya was not an everyday occurrence. It was rare and regarded as an extremely serious and sacred act associated with major rituals.
Cenotes therefore had a dual significance. They were both religious centers, symbolic bridges between worlds, and vital sources of fresh water. During the dry season, some areas of the tropical forest can become surprisingly dry, and underground water sources like these could literally keep people alive. So for the Maya, cenotes were not only gateways to Xibalba but also quite literally sources of life.
— Could you describe Maya water rituals?
Andrew J. Kinkella: It’s a very interesting subject, but also one of the most difficult things to reconstruct. It is relatively easy for archaeologists to determine when rituals took place—through artifacts, sediment layers, and dating. But understanding exactly how those rituals were performed is much more difficult.
We know that water rituals existed for many centuries. The strongest evidence comes from the Classic period, roughly AD 600 to 900, particularly the Late Classic. Similar rituals continued into the Postclassic period, all the way up to the fifteenth century, when the Spanish arrived.
To get at least some idea of what these rituals looked like, we turn to Spanish chronicles. They are not always reliable—they represent an outside perspective and are often biased—but they still provide certain kinds of information. For example, they describe groups of people gathering around cenotes to perform communal ceremonies.
According to some accounts, human sacrifices occasionally took place. The chronicles mention one case involving an illegitimate child, and in fact cases involving children of particular social origins appear alongside captives taken during warfare between Maya city-states.
The popular image of a “young maiden thrown into a cenote” is more likely a myth produced by the European imagination. The reality appears to have been different: victims were generally prisoners of war or children of particular backgrounds, and the ritual itself was treated as an exceptionally solemn and sacred act.
Still, reconstructing the process step by step—who participated, what prayers were spoken, exactly how the ceremony unfolded—is almost impossible. This is one of those areas of archaeology where many mysteries remain.
— What philosophical or worldview ideas do you think shaped the Maya understanding of the world?
Andrew J. Kinkella: I’ll answer in one word: maize.
I always tell my students: if you don’t know what to write on an exam, just write “maize,” and you’ll probably be right. That’s because the entire Maya worldview, their whole philosophy, revolves around this plant.
The growth, death, and rebirth of maize form a central symbol in their religious and mythological system. In Maya myths, rituals, and cosmology, maize is life itself. In order to sustain the people and preserve political authority, a ruler had to ensure a successful maize harvest. Everything revolved around this cycle—planting, growth, and harvest.
One of the major deities in the Maya pantheon was the Maize God, a symbol of fertility, abundance, and renewal. Alongside him was the Rain God, because rain made the growth of maize possible. In the end, the entire religious structure—sacrifices, prayers, festivals—was directed toward one fundamental goal: bringing rain so the land would produce a harvest.
So if you try to reduce Maya philosophy to its essence, everything—literally everything—can be explained through maize. Its seed germinated not only in the earth but also in their worldview, mythology, art, and ideas about life and death.
— What do we know about Maya warrior traditions and martial culture?
Andrew J. Kinkella: This is another one of those subjects where much remains mysterious. As with rituals at the cenotes, we can date events fairly accurately, but reconstructing the actual process—how warriors fought, what their rituals were, what tactics they used—is extremely difficult. I have my own ideas based on observations and experience, but a great deal is still unknown.
In general, warfare among the Maya was not uncommon. Their city-states often fought one another, though not constantly. There were periods of intense conflict and periods of relative calm. In that respect, the ancient world was not so different from the modern one.
As for the warriors themselves, they used different kinds of weapons. My favorite is an object called a manopla. It looks like a stone ring—or, if you like, a stone doughnut—with a large opening in the middle. The inner diameter is large enough to put your hand through it and grip it somewhat like brass knuckles. Essentially, it was a stone equivalent of modern knuckle weapons.
We found one of these manoplas during an expedition. It even had a face carved into it—perhaps the image of a spirit or deity. I joked at the time: I wonder whether that “knuckle weapon” left the face imprinted on the person it hit? It sounds pretty brutal, but archaeologically it is fascinating. There is evidence that objects like these may have been used not only in warfare but also in ritual combat—something like boxing contests. Imagine two fighters using stone “knuckles.” That would have been a pretty rough spectacle.
Warriors also had a rich symbolic tradition. In Teotihuacan—which is in Central Mexico rather than the Maya region, though it was culturally connected to the broader Mesoamerican world—warriors were associated with butterflies. In our culture, butterflies are often seen as delicate or feminine, but among ancient Mesoamerican peoples they could symbolize the highest form of valor. Why? Because a butterfly flies directly into the flame—without fear, giving itself completely. It became an image of absolute courage and willingness to sacrifice oneself.
So the martial cultures of the Maya and their neighbors contain many remarkable and sometimes paradoxical symbols, where strength exists alongside poetry and violence alongside profound philosophy.
— Were there any discoveries that completely changed the way you understood Maya history?
Andrew J. Kinkella: I can’t say there was one single discovery that turned everything upside down, where I could say, “I used to think this, and now I think something completely different.” But overall, advances in technology have had an enormous impact—especially the development of LiDAR.
LiDAR is an airborne laser-scanning system. An aircraft flies over the jungle and sends millions of laser pulses toward the ground, producing a detailed three-dimensional map of the terrain. It essentially allows us to “see through” the vegetation and detect what is hidden beneath the tropical forest canopy.
The results are extraordinary. At the same ancient settlement in Belize where I began my career and where I am now working again, we obtained a LiDAR map, and it is simply astonishing. It confirmed a great deal of what we already knew, but it also revealed completely new structures—pyramids, plazas, entire residential complexes that had previously gone unnoticed. The jungle is so dense that you can literally walk within a few yards of ruins and never realize they are there.
These maps have radically expanded our knowledge in just the past few years. LiDAR is not merely a useful tool—it is almost miraculous for archaeologists. We now have LiDAR maps of our main ancient city, but we do not yet have them for the cenote region where I also conduct research. I’m really looking forward to getting those data. I’m sure they will lead to many new discoveries.
— What do you think twenty-first-century society could learn from ancient civilizations?
Andrew J. Kinkella: The short answer is: just about everything. The slightly longer answer is that old historical cliché: we study the past so we do not repeat its mistakes.
The ancient Maya experienced a major collapse around AD 900—the famous “Maya collapse,” when many large cities were abandoned. People left, and society went through a profound crisis and major transformation. The causes were complex: environmental degradation from intensive agriculture, particularly maize cultivation, which can be very demanding on the soil; a succession of ineffective rulers; and, finally, severe droughts.
If you think about it, what does that sound like? The world today. The same things: environmental destruction, ineffective governance, climate change. It is almost as though the Maya are shouting to us across a thousand years, “Don’t repeat our mistakes!” And yet we keep repeating them. It is both funny and sad to watch humanity go down the same road.
If we could recognize that and actually learn from it—stop destroying the environment and learn how to deal seriously with climate challenges… I live in California, and we recently went through terrible wildfires. I joke with my students that “I’m old,” although I’m really not that old, but even within my own lifetime I can clearly see the climate changing: droughts are getting worse, wildfires are becoming more frequent, and we are not making the decisions we need to make. Things just keep getting worse.
That is what we need to remember. We can learn from the ancient Maya, the Egyptians, the Greeks—anyone. It has all happened before. We simply need to look at how ancient cultures dealt with their challenges and try not to make the same mistakes again.
— In your view, what invention or technology was the most important in the ancient Maya world?
Andrew J. Kinkella: First, it’s worth talking about what they didn’t have. The Maya did not use the wheel for transportation, even though they clearly knew how to make one. We have found wheels on children’s toys, but they were not used in everyday transportation or agriculture. The Maya simply did not have draft animals—no oxen, no horses, no animals capable of pulling a cart or plow. So there was no practical need for wheeled transport.
When it comes to technology, there was no single invention that suddenly “revolutionized” the Maya world. Their technologies developed gradually, through evolution and adaptation. Stone remained their primary material for tools, but the quality of Maya stonework is remarkable. I would even say that Maya stone-tool craftsmanship was among the finest in the world. They were able to produce extraordinarily thin, sharp, and durable tools.
They also reached a very high level of skill in ceramics and pottery. Their vessels were both beautiful and durable, which made them extremely important in everyday life.
If we are talking about technological breakthroughs, perhaps the most significant was not a particular invention but an agricultural innovation: the Maya learned how to cultivate maize in wetland areas, known as bajos. This development emerged around the first century AD and made it possible to significantly increase agricultural yields.
So their “technology” was above all an ability to adapt to their environment—to use the resources of the jungle and develop trade, hunting, and agriculture. Their strength did not lie in dependence on machinery, but in knowledge, persistence, and an ability to live within their environment.
— Why do you think it is important to make research on ancient civilizations more accessible and engaging for the general public?
Andrew J. Kinkella: That’s really what it all comes down to. I talk about this a lot. Sure, archaeologists can get together and talk to each other about ancient cultures, but honestly—who cares? Nobody. And where do archaeologists get funding, grants, and support? From society. From taxpayers. From people who are supposed to find this work meaningful. If the public doesn’t understand what we do, why should they support us?
I emphasize this constantly to my colleagues. Public outreach is a major part of my own work. I have a YouTube channel, a podcast, and I appear on television programs. When someone invites me, I always say yes. I take it very seriously.
Unfortunately, most archaeologists don’t do this. In fact, not many scientists make a serious effort to engage with the public. They stay in their laboratories and write academic papers—dry, boring papers written in language so complicated that sometimes even another archaeologist can’t understand them. I read some of them myself and think, “What are you even trying to say, man?”
But being able to capture the public’s interest and bring people into the research is one of the most important responsibilities an archaeologist has. It should be priority number one. Archaeology is inherently exciting. That’s why you’re interviewing me right now—because archaeology really is amazing.
But if real archaeologists—people like me and my colleagues—don’t talk to the public about our work, that space gets filled by pseudoarchaeologists. They invent sensational stories, myths, and conspiracy theories, and people find them exciting even though they aren’t true. That is a huge problem today. And unfortunately, we archaeologists are partly responsible. We allowed the noise to drown out the science.
So I strongly believe that archaeologists need to engage with the public more often, share their discoveries, and learn how to explain complex ideas in clear language. It isn’t merely important—it is essential.
— Your work is incredibly important, Professor. Thank you very much for such an inspiring and valuable conversation.
From Culture and Religion, Issue No. 9, “The Grandeur of Forgotten Civilizations.” “Archaeology in the Twenty-First Century: How Can Science Find Its Voice Again?” An Interview with Dr. Andrew Kinkella.
Interview by Anna Kaliuzhna