This is a study of agricultural intensification on the household scale in a Mixtec cacicazgo of Oaxaca, Mexico, during the Postclassic period (A.D. 800–1521). Through archaeological, ethnohistorical, and ethnographic methods this study investigates the roles of the state and the independent farming household in the emergence and operation of intensive agricultural systems, and agricultural terracing. I present data on two Postclassic houses and residential and agricultural terraces excavated at the site of Nicayuju in the municipality of San Juan Teposcolula, Oaxaca. Artifact and architectural data are reported. Ethnographic information is presented and used to create a model for terrace construction that is tested against the terrace excavation data presented in this article. It is argued that Robert Netting’s agrarian smallholder model may characterize the social organization of intensive agricultural production in prehispanic Mixtec society and that intensification may have functioned without direct state direction. The application of the agrarian smallholder model in Prehispanic Mesoamerica is significant in that it suggests that long-lasting and environmentally viable methods of agricultural production may originate and operate at the household and community levels.

Teotihuacan, located in the northeastern Basin of Mexico, is best known for its Preclassic and Classic period occupations (ca. 150 B.C.–A.D. 700) but was also an important city-state during the Aztec and Early Colonial periods, circa A.D. 1200–1650. Much has been written about political relations among Aztec city-states in the basin. However, the internal political structures of most city-states remain largely unknown because colonial chroniclers focused mostly on Tenochtitlan-Mexico City and collected little information on the 40 to 50 smaller city-states in the basin. This article addresses the internal political organization of Aztec Teotihuacan and how it changed over time based on analyses of pottery data from the surface collections of the Teotihuacan Mapping Project. A seriation of sherd assemblages using correspondence analysis provides a chronological framework for diachronic analyses. Changes through time pertaining to interresidential status differences and the spatial distributions of elite residences suggest a gradual process of political decentralization. Additionally, pottery and obsidian data, in conjunction with settlement pattern changes, reveal a relocation of the city-state center in the late 1300s or early 1400s, possibly indicating an episode of political upheaval or reorganization.

Large-scale irrigation agriculture formed the economic backbone of civilizations on the north coast of Peru. Contrary to the notion that large systems required the guiding hand of the state, historical sources suggest that management was largely local and segmentary. At the same time, water and land are a potential source of economic and political power for state administrators who may intervene in the supervision and management of farming. The Pampa de Chaparrí, in the Lambayeque region, is an unusually well-preserved system of canals, fields, and settlements where the dynamics of water, land and politics can be observed. Systematic survey documented a Middle Sicán (A.D. 900-1100), Late Sicán (A.D. 1100-1375), Chimú (A.D. 1375-1460) and Inka (A.D. 1460-1532) occupation. During Middle and Late Sicán, settlement patterns reflect the segmentary organization described in historical accounts. With conquest by the Chimú and Inka Empires, state administrative centers were constructed, existing social groups were reorganized and communities and households were transformed. Thus, though local management is an effective and stable strategy for managing large irrigation systems, the wealth and power that these systems represent make them potential targets for more direct state control, with significant consequences for local inhabitants.

The Puuc region of northern Yucatan was one of the most important areas of Maya civilization during the Terminal Classic florescent period. Despite its importance to Maya prehistory, there is little understanding of the times prior to the great cultural florescence. Eight seasons of research at Chac II provide new information regarding an important Maya center between the Classic and Terminal Classic periods (A.D. 300–800), including the changing nature of influence and contacts with foreign groups reaching central Mexico. The great antiquity of Chac, the presence of numerous substructures, and the variety of architectural styles in the Great Pyramid Plaza suggest that the site was an originator of the Early Puuc architectural style. It is argued that the major ritual offering below the central monument at the Gran Plaza re-creates the “turquoise” hearth reenacting the birth of the Fifth Sun at Teotihuacan. These new data are transforming understanding of the Puuc Maya and their relations with greater Mesoamerica.

In prehispanic Mesoamerica, basic utilitarian artifacts, such as non-obsidian chipped stone tools, have rarely been considered outside the realms of technology or the economics of manufacture and circulation. Yet in recent excavations of residential terraces at the Classic period hilltop settlement of El Palmillo, Oaxaca, we have noted spatial patterning in the distribution of chipped stone tools that parallels variation previously observed in a range of nonlocal goods including obsidian, marine shell, and greenstone. Compared to the inhabitants of terraces situated near the base of the site, the apparently higher-status residents of households residing closer to the hill’s apex not only were associated with a somewhat different assemblage of stone tools and debris, but their chipped stone implements tended to be made on better-quality raw materials. As a consequence, chipped stone assemblages can serve as an additional axis of variation for examining status distinctions in the Classic period Valley of Oaxaca, and potentially elsewhere in Mesoamerica.

Radiocarbon (14C) dating is one of the most important tools for archaeologists. Although radiocarbon dates provide a temporal foundation for analyzing the remains of past cultures, it is critical that these dates be periodically reviewed for consistency and accuracy to ensure chronological control. A review of publications pertaining to Caribbean archaeology since the 1960s demonstrates that researchers there have often failed to adequately report and critique radiocarbon dates, making it difficult to fully assess their value in chronology building. A chronometric hygiene analysis of over 600 dates reveals that when isolated, culturally ambiguous, poorly provenienced, and contaminated dates are rejected, only about 80 percent remain useful. In addition, the paucity of early Saladoid (ca. 500 B.C.–A.D. 1) and Archaic age (ca. 2500–500 B.C.) dates in the southern Lesser Antilles suggests that there was not a “stepping-stone” migration of prehistoric peoples northward from South America into the Lesser Antilles.

Specialized production forms an important component of the socioeconomic organization of ancient complex societies. Excavation provides critical information on the internal organization of production within a particular workshop and permits the recovery of features not preserved on the surface. In large settlements like Teotihuacan where modern occupation covers much of the ancient city, it is not feasible to fully excavate every suspected craft production locale. At Teotihuacan and in other complex societies, the use of surface indications to generate thematic maps permits discussion of the spatial relationships between economic and social units within the settlement. I use the surface collections made by the Teotihuacan Mapping Project and the partial excavation of one apartment compound and ceramic workshop in the Tlajinga district to consider the organization of specialized production in this neighborhood. I rely on the co-occurrence of ceramic production indicators to define likely workshops, using the surface collections from the excavated workshop as a reasonable indicator of production. Considering the evidence for vessel form specialization and dimensional standardization and previous ethnoarchaeological analyses of the excavated materials, Tlajinga district pottery production appears to have been maximally organized at the community level, with individual apartment compounds forming the basic production units.

During the Middle Horizon (A.D. 600-1000), the Wari state extended its influence over much of Peru. One popular view of the Wari expansion is that the state constructed a system of administrative centers that ruled through an idiom of generalized reciprocity and extracted, stored, and redistributed goods from local groups. This paper considers how this model of the Wari periphery was constructed over the last 100 years, and argues that interpretations that fit within this model have been given added weight in academic literature because they fit our expectations of what the past should be like. I suggest that there are significant problems in this understanding of the Wari periphery that need to be addressed, and offer an alternative model that better fits the available evidence.

It has long been recognized that the Nasca culture (ca. A.D. 1–750) of the Peruvian south coast finds its roots in the Paracas society (ca. 800 B.C.–A.D. 1). Yet the social mechanisms responsible for the innovations that characterize the transition are poorly known. The southern Nasca region, which became the most dynamic region in terms of ceremonial life and intervalley integration, however, was never an important area of Paracas occupation. In this article I use literature on migration and frontier development to explain the genesis of Nasca society. Four phenomena that are common on historical frontiers seem to have been at play in the southern Nasca region: initial simplification of hierarchy, pioneer effect, “wealth-in-people,” and factionalism. Based on data from excavations at La Puntilla, a settlement that spanned the Late Paracas—Initial Nasca transition, I argue that the needs of interregional integration and cooperation following initial settlement of the frontier by Paracas populations and subsequent demographic growth prompted the genesis of Nasca society. The proposed long-term scenario also provides a context for later innovations in water management and agricultural intensification.

We summarize what is known about Archaic period occupation of southeastern Mesoamerica and Central America as background for presenting new paleoenvironmental evidence of pre-Early Formative human impacts on the landscape of Pacific coastal Guatemala. Our evidence comes from sediment cores in three locations, all of which are in the mangrove-estuary zone of the lower coast. Pollen and phytoliths from the cores document increased burning, decreased forest cover, the appearance of domesticates, and increased disturbance indicators at various times during the Archaic period, the earliest being around 3500 cal B.C. The available evidence demonstrates that shifting horticulture was an early and widespread adaptation to the southeastern Mesoamerican deciduous tropical forest and constituted the base from which later adaptations, including that of early Maya farmers, differentiated. Early Formative adaptive innovations may have been favored by shifts in return rates from various estuarine and terrestrial resources during a dry and variable interval 2000 and 1500 cal B.C.

In this paper I investigate the community-level articulation of imperial and local political structures during the Inka occupation of the Collagua Province, located in the Colca Valley of highland southern Peru. Combined ethnohistorical and archaeological analysis document the emergence of a hybrid imperial/local political formation in the shift from autonomous rule during the Late Intermediate period (A.D. 1000–1450) to the Inka occupation during the Late horizon (A.D. 1450–1532). Documentary evidence reveals considerable but uneven penetration of Inka imperial institutions across the two ranked moieties that structure local community organization, with remarkably close conformity between Inkaic ideals of rank and hierarchy among the communities (ayllus) of the lower moiety, but greater autonomy among the higher-ranking ayllus of the upper moiety. New data from a systematic survey around the provincial capital documents a decentralized Late Intermediate period settlement pattern associated with fortifications, suggesting segmentary autonomous political organization. The subsequent Late horizon settlement pattern signals overall occupational continuity, but with the establishment of an Inka administrative center and the installation of central plazas and Inka structures at large settlements with local elite domestic architecture. The two data sets combined provide a integrated view of centralized, but locally mediated, Inka administration.

A recent study of Early Formative Mesoamerican pottery by instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) yielded surprising results that prompted two critiques in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The INAA study indicated that the Olmec center of San Lorenzo was a major exporter of carved-incised and white pottery and that little if any pottery made elsewhere was consumed at San Lorenzo. The critiques purport to "overturn" the INAA study and demonstrate a more balanced exchange of pottery among Early Formative centers. However, the critiques rely on a series of mistaken claims and misunderstandings that are addressed here. New petrographic data on a small sample of Early Formative pottery (Stoltman et al. 2005) are potentially useful, but they do not overturn INAA of nearly 1000 pottery samples and hundreds of raw material samples.

We compare the bone assemblages of Milford 1 (TOB-3) and Golden Grove (TOB-13) in Tobago, West Indies. Milford 1 is a small preceramic occupation (ca. 3000-2800 cal B.P.), whereas Golden Grove is a large ceramic-period village (ca. 1700-900 cal B.P.). Species richness at TOB-13 is greater than at TOB-3, both in marine (67 vs. 39 fishes) and terrestrial (32 vs. 9) taxa. Major shifts in marine exploitation from the preceramic to ceramic periods can be seen in relative abundance of tuna, toadfishes, and in fishes inhabiting mangrove and brackish water environments, and decreases in relative abundance of parrotfish, carnivorous reef fishes, and sea turtles. The abundance of tuna bones at TOB-13 is uniquely high among West Indian archaeological sites. For terrestrial taxa, the difference in species richness exceeds the expected, including decreased specialization on big game (peccaries) at TOB-13, with a greater tendency to hunt reptiles, birds, and mammals of all sizes at TOB-3. Factors underlying the shifts in fishing and hunting may include different collection methods and food preferences of non-Arawakan (preceramic) vs. Arawakan (ceramic) peoples, as well as human-induced declines in populations of peccaries, sea turtles, and selected fish species. Another possible factor is site setting, with the inhabitants of TOB-13 having enhanced access to mangrove habitats.

Evidence from preceramic Paleoindian and Archaic time periods in Belize has been recorded over the past quarter of a century by a number of projects. This paper summarizes previously published information and presents new archaeological data in bringing the hunting-and-gathering and itinerant horticultural millennia of this region into a more accurate and comprehensive perspective than has been presented to date. The Paleoindian period includes influences from North as well as South America, with settlement preferences shown for river valleys and near-coastal margins. Cave sites hold particular promise for yielding new and well-preserved remains from this early period. The Archaic, beginning as early as 8000 B.C., is poorly dated until 3400 B.C. and was probably characterized by mobile hunter-foragers. The Late Archaic includes two facets, the Early (3400–1900 B.C.) and the Late (1500–900 B.C.) Preceramic, and represents the first appearance and gradual spread of cultivation together with habitat modification. The period beginning around 1500 B.C. shows intensifying maize cultivation, apparently mobile populations, and also the emergence of well-defined stone tool traditions that trend into the early Middle Preclassic. Ceramics seem to appear unevenly from ca. 1200 to 900 B.C., when the Cunil and Kanocha complexes in western Belize and Swasey sphere in northern Belize are reported.

The relationship between Andean coca use and dental deposits is explored through the use of scanning electron microscopy/energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (SEM/EDS). Elemental analyses of samples of large dental deposits from archeologically recovered skeletons from Ecuador dating between 500 B.C. and A.D. 1532 are compared with those of normal calculus deposits of individuals from North America (modern and precontact), of normal tooth structure and of samples of alkali recovered from Ecuadorian artifacts thought to have been employed in coca use. Spectral analysis revealed homogeneity among all dental samples (deposits and structure) and that they are distinct from the elemental pattern revealed in the analysis of the artifact alkalis.

Excavaciones en las tierras altas del occidente de la Puna de Atacama han identificado una estructura templaria datada entre los 2630 ± 60 a 2490 ± 80 a.P. (no calibradas) en el centro de un montículo ocupacional estratificado, inserta en un asentamiento aldeano pastoralista. La arquitectura monumental registrada en el sitio Tulán-54, perteneciente a la fase Tilocalar (3030 ± 70 a 2380 ± 70 a.P.) es contemporánea con el período Formativo Temprano del altiplano central y meridional. Sin embargo, de acuerdo a su patrón arquitectónico e indicadores culturales no presenta analogía con el área centro sur andina. Un análisis cronoestratigráfico, contextual y tecnológico, permitió establecer una secuencia Arcaico-Formativa, incluyendo una fase transicional entre ambos períodos y caracterizar a la vez el desarrollo ocupacional del montículo. Estas evidencias permiten proponer que el proceso circumpuneño de emergencia de complejidad sociocultural tendría un carácter autónomo e independiente de las relaciones pan-andinas en términos de núcleo-periferia.

We investigate ground stone tools, specifically manos and metates, throughout the Bladen region of the Maya Mountains of Belize and adjacent areas during the Late and Terminal Classic periods. Because of the distinctiveness and relative heterogeneity of rock types in the Bladen region, we can pinpoint the Bladen communities that exploited the raw materials used in manufacturing manos and metates utilized in other communities. Based on mano and metate fragments that were recovered from the Bladen communities, as well as from communities outside the Bladen region, we reconstruct an intercommunity network within the Bladen region and investigate communities outside of the Bladen to which the Bladen communities were directly or indirectly linked. This investigation shows that if enough geo-specific information is available, it is possible to reconstruct a relatively accurate picture of inter-community relations. Moreover, it is shown that the Bladen region was a valuable source of ground stone for the Maya Lowlands and the Bladen communities were integral players in its exploitation.

The 2005 articles by Stoltman et al. and Flannery et al. to which Neff et al. (this issue) have responded are not an indictment of instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA) but, rather, of the way Blomster et al. (2005) misuse it and of the hyperbolic culture-historical claims they have made from their INAA results. It has long been acknowledged that INAA leads not to sources but to chemical composition groups. Based on composition groups derived from an extremely unsystematic collection of sherds from only seven localities, Blomster et al. claim that the Olmec received no carved gray or kaolin white pottery from other regions; they also claim that neighboring valleys in the Mexican highlands did not exchange such pottery with each other. Not only can one not leap directly from the elements in potsherds to such sweeping culture-historical conclusions, it is also the case that other lines of evidence (including petrographic analysis) have for 40+ years produced empirical evidence to the contrary. In the end, it was their commitment to an unfalsifiable model of Olmec superiority that led Blomster et al. to bypass the logic of archaeological inference.

We propose that pottery-using villages did not appear in the upland Apizaco region of central Tlaxcala, Mexico, until after 1000 B.C., centuries after such developments in choice locations for maize agriculture. We excavated at two of the earliest known Formative sites in the region. That work revealed abundant intact refuse deposits, allowing us to evaluate an existing ceramic chronology with new radiocarbon dates as well as characterize Formative subsistence. Our results support a more general model of emerging sedentism in central Mexico involving population dispersions from prime agricultural areas to zones of higher elevation. The earliest pottery-using agriculturalists in Apizaco were probably migrants from adjacent regions.

A precolumbian Maya dock and dam complex was located on the Río Hondo in northwestern Belize near the site of Blue Creek. Survey and excavation showed a range of activities to be associated with the complex, including lithic raw material procurement and manufacture. The discovery also underscores Blue Creek’s role in long-distance commercial exchange involving lowland riverine systems. Large quantities of exotic commodities, including jadeite from the Motagua River valley in Guatemala and stone tools from the industrial manufacturing site of Colhá, Belize, have been recovered from Preclassic and Classic period deposits at Blue Creek, and the site is posited as a vital point of transshipment responsible for the filtering of peripheral resources into the central lowlands. The Blue Creek dock and dam provides a rare glimpse of Maya riverine architecture and offers tangible evidence of infrastructural supports associated with maritime commerce.