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Belize

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ArmadilloHuechero

Huechero

A huechero is a person who clandestinely excavates at archaeological sites for the purpose of obtaining marketable antiquities; a looter.

Photo of Machaquilá Stela 2, provided by and used with the permission of MUNAE; the cuts made by looters to render the sculpture into transportable blocks are visible.

Machaquilá Stela 2

Maya sculpture looted from Guatemala and smuggled into the U.S. resulting in a ground-breaking court decision.

Related Publications

Tremain, C.G. and D. Yates, eds. (2019), The Market for Mesoamerica: Reflections on the Sale of Pre-Columbian Antiquities. Gainsville: University Press of Florida

Yates, D. (2015), ‘Reality and Practicality: Challenges to Effective Cultural Property Policy on the Ground in Latin America’, International Journal of Cultural Property 22 (2–3): 337–356.

Yates, D. (2014), ‘Displacement, deforestation, and drugs: antiquities trafficking and the narcotics support economies of Guatemala’. In J. Kila and M. Balcells (eds) Cultural Property Crimes: an overview and analysis on contemporary perspectives and trends (Brill: Leiden) 23–36.