  Prompted by the recent MAXIMA-1 and BOOMERANG-98 measurements of the cosmic
microwave background (CMB) anisotropy power spectrum, and motivated by the
results from the observation of high-redshift Type Ia supernovae, we
investigate CMB anisotropies in quintessence models in order to characterize
the nature of the dark energy today. We perform a Bayesian likelihood analysis,
using the MAXIMA-1 and BOOMERANG-98 published bandpowers, in combination with
COBE/DMR, to explore the space of quintessence parameters: the quintessence
energy density \Omega_\phi and equation of state w_\phi. We restrict our
analysis to flat, scale-invariant, inflationary adiabatic models. We find that
this simple class of inflationary models, with a quintessence component
\Omega_\phi < ~0.7, -1 < = w_\phi < ~-0.5, is in good agreement with the data.
Within the assumptions of our analysis, pure quintessence models seem to be
slightly favored, although the simple cosmological constant scenario is
consistent with the data.
