It has been estimated that the 36 workshops at Colha produced nearly 4 million chert and obsidian tools and eccentrics that were dispersed throughout Mesoamerica during the Maya era.
Adams, Dana Anthony, Jaime Awe, Palma Buttles, Meredith Dreiss, Jack D. Eaton, James T. Escobedo Jr., Lawrence H. Feldman, Eric C. Gibson, Thomas R. Hester, Harry B. Iceland, John S. Jacob, John G. Jones, Thomas C. Kelly, Eleanor M. King, Jon C. Lohse, Virginia K. Massey, Marilyn A. Masson, Roberta McGregor, Richard Meadows, Frances Meskill, George H. Michaels, Shirley B. Mock, Daniel R. Potter, Ketherine V. Reese, Erwin Roemer, Robert F. Scott IV, Harry J. Shafer, Leslie C. Shaw, Janet Stock, Lauren A. Sullivan, A.J.
The project began in 1979 with an extensive investigation of the lithic production sites noted by Hammond and his associates, under the direction of Thomas Hester, Harry Shafer, and Robert Heizer.
[9] Highlights from this season included the development of quadrants and numbering schemes, the beginning of a regional survey program, and the outlining of a preliminary ceramic chronology by Adams and Valdez.
The CRS program was important in the locating of several preceramic sites in Northern Belize including; Ladyville, Lowe Ranch, and Sand Hill.
1985 saw no work of the Colha Project, but 1986 saw a return to this transition with a greater influence on expanding the knowledge on the Late Classic, especially as it pertained to Lithic production.
The research centered around preclassic deposits at Operation 2031,[15] while John Jacob's important soil coring project started in the adjacent Cobweb Swamp.
[16] Jacobs work was the main focus in 1990, but in 1991 attention turned back to the preceramic and operation 4046 through Valdez's second Colha field school.
[18] This period seems to have been a time of temporary settlement and selective adaptation through agriculture, with most sites located near easily attained natural recourses and adjacent to "swamp and lagoon margins, river valleys, near-coastal areas, upland settings along ecotonal boundaries, rockshelters, and caves".
[19] Despite the understanding of where to look for these evidences, concrete habitation sites for this period have been illusive to archaeologists, who must rely heavily on lithics and pollen studies to reconstruct the settlement patterns for the Late Archaic in Belize.
Jones documented evidence that "early human forest modification, disturbance and domesticated plant cultivation was established for the period prior to 2,500 B.C.
Macroblades, microblades, pointed unifaces, and other specific lithic types have been noted for Colha and used to extrapolate dating for the region.
[18] The most diagnostic tool in the Late Preceramic assemblage is a distinctive type of uniface that appears to have been used for extensive clearing of land for farming.
[23] The early portion of the Middle Preclassic, as the inception of permanent settlement in Colha, was characterized by small households that are dispersed throughout the site[1] and the Bolay Complex of ceramics (found primarily in caches),[24] with evidence of wetland agriculture and "garden hunting" in nearby Cobweb Swamp as a subsistence strategy[25][26] The community of Colha quickly progressed from there.
), Chiwa complex (or Mamom phase) settlement patterns suggest that the series of interactive households became unified and probably represented a low-level chiefdom society".
[30] The site grew to an estimated population of 600 during this period and began to construct its first monumental architecture, in the form of formal plazas, temples, and a ballcourt.
[34] This ritual evidence may coincide with the first observations of mathematics and writing at Colha, which includes glyphs incised into one of these cache vessels.
[1][24] According to Buttles, "During the Early Classic Cobweb complex are apparent decreases in population, lithic production, settlement patterns, mortuary practices, and in general, material culture".
According to Jack Eaton, Late Classic Colha may have grown to a population of nearly 1,000 people in its epicenter and 4,000 within a six square kilometer area.
[31] Consequently, a majority of architectural remains, both public and domestic are erected in the late Classic[1] and there is a large increase in the number of raised fields found at Cobweb Swamp during this period.
According to Buttles, "following the apparent violent end of Colha during the Terminal Classic the site remained unoccupied for a period of 50-100 years until around A.D.950".
[47] Colha's Hiatus allowed a regeneration of the environment, something that has been suggested as a causal factor in the sites reoccupation in the Early Postclassic period.
[46] The impetus for the re-occupation has also been inferred to be the site's location in the vicinity of the chert bearing lands, as evidenced by the 12 lithics workshops attributed to the Postclassic.
[48] However, Colha of the Postclassic was likely a small society of agrarian farmers who used lithic production to either supplement their subsistence or to serve a greater polity in the Yucatan.
Consider the following excerpt from Buttles (2002): This re-occupation has been suggested to be by a group with strong ties to the Yucatan and significantly different material culture than those who occupied Colha before the hiatus[30] and no monumental architecture.