Arthur A. Joyce

Commoner Power: A Case Study from the Classic Period Collapse on the Oaxaca Coast

This article argues that the agency of commoners has not been adequately theorized in archaeological studies of the political dynamics of complex societies. Recent developments in social theory emphasize that political relations are produced through social negotiations involving commoners as well as elites. This paper considers the role of commoners in the Classic period collapse in the lower Río Verde Valley, Oaxaca, Mexico. Regional survey and excavation data demonstrate that the Classic-to-Postclassic transition was marked by dramatic changes in settlement patterns and sociopolitical organization, including the decline of the Late Classic regional center of Río Viejo. The research indicates that rather than passively reacting to the sociopolitical developments of the Classic-to-Postclassic transition, commoners actively rejected many of the ruling institutions and symbols that were central to the dominant ideology of the Late Classic state. Early Postclassic people reused and reinterpreted the sacred spaces and objects of the Río Viejo state such as carved stone monuments and public buildings. The evidence from the lower Verde is examined in the context of an emerging theoretical perspective in archaeology that considers commoner power. We argue that commoners contribute to the social negotiation of dominant discourses through three overlapping forms of social interaction: engagement, avoidance, and resistance.

Smokescreens in the Provenance Investigation of Early Formative Mesoamerican Ceramics

We are glad that Sharer et al. (this issue) have dropped their original claim that the INAA data demonstrate multidirec tional movement of Early Formative pottery. Beyond this, however, they offer nothing that might enhance understanding of Early Formative ceramic circulation or inspire new insights into Early Formative cultural evolution in Mesoamerica. Instead, their response contains fresh distortions, replications of mistakes made in their PNAS articles, and lengthy pas sages that are irrelevant to the issues raised by Neff et al. (this issue). We correct and recorrect their latest distortions and misunderstandings here. Besides showing why their discussion of ceramic sourcing repeatedly misses the mark, we also correct a number of erroneous assertions about the archaeology of Olmec San Lorenzo. New evidence deepens understanding of Early Formative Mesoamerica but requires that some researchers discard cherished beliefs.

Formative Period Social Change in the Lower Rio Verde Valley, Oaxaca, Mexico

This article reports on archaeological and geomorphological research carried out by the 1988 Rlo Verde Formative Project in the lower Rlo Verde Valley, Oaxaca, Mexico. The research suggests that the region was only sparsely inhabited prior to 500 B.C. During the Late/Terminal Formative (400 B.C.-A.D. 250), however, survey data suggest that the lower Rlo Verde Valley experienced considerable population growth. Excavations at the sites of Cerro de la Cruz and Rlo Viejo yielded evidence for emerging status inequalities during the Late Formative leading eventually to the rise of complex social organization by the Classic period (A.D. 250-900). Two preliminary explanations are offiered for the seemingly late occurrence of large populations with complex social organization in the region. The explanations focus on environmental change and interregional social interaction, respectively. Evidence for the exploitation of coastal habitats is also discussed, since the use of marine and estuarine resources could alter the implications of both explanations of societal change.

Exchange Implications of Obsidian Source Analysis from the Lower Rio Verde Valley, Oaxaca, Mexico

excavations at four archaeological sites in the lower Rio Verde valley on the Pacifc coast of Oaxaca, Mexico. Determinations of source locations of these artifacts permit the examination of changes in obsidian exchange patterns spanning the late Middle Formative to the Classic period. The results show that through most of this period the importation of obsidian into the lower Verde region was dominated by sources in the Basin of Mexico and Michoacan. The data allow us to evaluate previous models of interregional relations during the Formative and Classic periods, including interaction with the highland centers of Monte Alban and TeotEhuacan.

Prehispanic human ecology of the Río Verde drainage basin, Mexico

Abstract This article discusses the results of ten years of interdisciplinary archaeological research along the Rio Verde drainage basin, Oaxaca, Mexico. In the highland valleys of the upper drainage basin we have documented six periods of significant geomorphic change. The first two were probably the result of climatic change during the mid‐Holocene. The four subsequent periods of landscape change are correlated with major shifts in demographics and human land use; we argue that these factors may be causally related. Erosion in the highland valleys led to modification of stream channel dynamics, alluviation and expansion of the agriculturally rich floodplain in the lower Rio Verde Valley. Increasing agricultural productivity in the lowlands may explain in part the rapid increase in population and social complexity beginning in the Late Formative. However, increased flooding also created risks for people living on the floodplain. The research demonstrates the dynamic nature of prehispanic ecology in the R...

Interregional Interaction and Social Development on the Oaxaca Coast

This article provides a synthetic examination of the role of external relations in the social, cultural, and political development of the Oaxaca Coast. The article deals primarily with the lower Rio Verde valley and the southern Isthmus since these two regions have been the focus of archaeological research on the Oaxaca Coast; other areas of the coast are discussed when data permit. The data from the coast indicate that interregional relations were dominated by elites in pursuit of exotic materials and ideas that served to symbolize and legitimize their special status in society. Evidence for contact with some of the most powerful political centers of pre-Hispanic Mexico are documented, including Monte Alban, Teotihuacan, Tenochtitlan, and possibly El Tajin and Tula among others. Despite contact with these powerful centers the Oaxaca Coast appears to have been politically autonomous for most of its pre-Hispanic history.

Late Formative Community Organization and Social Complexity on the Oaxaca Coast

AbstractExcavations at Cerro de la Cruz on the western coast of Oaxaca exposed the remains of two residential terraces from the Late Formative Period (400–100 B.C.). Portions of 11 Late Formative structures were cleared, including probable residences, storehouses, and a public building. Burials yielded the remains of 84 individuals dated to the same period. Intrasite patterning of selected artifacts, architecture, and features as well as comparative data on residential patterning are used to examine social complexity at Cerro de la Cruz. The data suggest that the site was part of a coastal chiefdom, though inequalities in social status appear to have been less pronounced than in other Late Formative chiefdoms from the Oaxacan interior.

Ceramic Production and Exchange in Late/Terminal Formative Period Oaxaca

Patterns of Late/Terminal Formative period (ca. 500 B.C.-A.D. 300) ceramic exchange in Oaxaca are examined through instrumental neutron activation analysis (INAA). Samples of 453 Late/Terminal Formative period sherds were submitted to the Missouri University Research Reactor for INAA to determine elemental composition. The sherds came from 20 exca vated sites and two surveys in the following regions: the Valley of Oaxaca, MixtecaAlta, Mixteca Baja, lower R?o Verde Val ley, and Cuicatl?n Ca?ada. Selected for the study were vessel fragments from three recognized paste categories: grayware (gris), fine brownware (caf? fino), and creamware (crema). We also sampled clays and sherds from known sources in four modern pottery-making towns in the Oaxaca Valley. The research adds to the INAA database for Oaxaca by identifying the chemical signatures of six source groupings that we can link to specific regions and, in two cases, to particular source zones within regions. The evidence from chemical composition and typology indicates continuity in resource use and production practices in bothAtzompa and Coy otepec from pre-Hispanic into modern times. The data show that the exchange of ceram ics in Late/Terminal Formative Oaxaca was multidirectional, with ceramics imported both to and from the Oaxaca Valley.

SHIFTING PATTERNS OF OBSIDIAN EXCHANGE IN POSTCLASSIC OAXACA, MEXICO

Abstract In this paper, we present a diachronic analysis of obsidian procurement patterns during the Postclassic period in the Lower Río Verde region of Oaxaca. The study is based on x-ray fluorescence (XRF) and visual analysis of obsidian artifacts from excavated household contexts at Early Postclassic (a.d. 800–1100) Río Viejo and Late Postclassic (a.d. 1100–1522) Tututepec (Yucu Dzaa). We report the presence of at least six sources of obsidian imported to the lower Río Verde region in the Early Postclassic, whereas during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries of the Late Postclassic, the local assemblage was dominated by obsidian from Pico de Orizaba and Pachuca. Changes in obsidian procurement patterns in the lower Río Verde region through time are interpreted in light of sociopolitical change at the local, regional, and macroregional scales. The study represents the most detailed analysis of Postclassic period obsidian exchange yet reported from Oaxaca.

Multiproxy paleoecological reconstruction of prehistoric land-use history in the western region of the lower Río Verde Valley, Oaxaca, Mexico

Paleoecological archives from three paleomeander sites and one archeological feature located in the lower Río Verde Valley, Oaxaca, Mexico, are used to develop a spatial understanding of the patterns of prehistoric agricultural land use over the last ~3000 years. Multiproxy paleoecological data at each site (i.e. magnetic susceptibility, micro- and macroscopic charcoal, pollen and stable carbon isotopes) provide a history of land use. By examining the spatial differences in agricultural indicators at all the sites through time, augmented with our understanding of changes in demography and settlement patterns determined through the archeological record, we are able to reconstruct the complex human/land interactions in the western portion of the valley.