Deborah L. Nichols

Aztec craft production and specialization: Archaeological evidence from the city‐state of Otumba, Mexico

Abstract Recent (1987–9) archaeological research within the Aztec city‐state of Otumba located in the northeastern Basin of Mexico has provided data relevant to a consideration of the role of craft specialization in the evolution of city‐states between the fall of Tula (c. AD 1150) and the arrival of the Spaniards (AD 1519). Designed to evaluate alternative models of such evolution the investigations have confirmed the presence of extensive archaeological evidence for craft specialization in the city‐state centre of Otumba. Items manufactured at the site include obsidian cores, prismatic blades, and bifaces, ornaments of obsidian and rare stones, figurines, ceramic censers, spindle whorls (and their moulds), fibres, and groundstone implements. Craft specialization at rural dependencies was more restricted. The results of the project shed important light on the intricacies of the Aztec economic system.

PRODUCTION INTENSIFICATION AND REGIONAL SPECIALIZATION

Although textiles were important commodities in the Aztec political economy, it is widely held that textile production did not involve organized workshops. In the late 1960s, Charlton (1971, 1981) found a concentration of large spindle whorls at the Aztec city-state capital of Otumba that he interpreted as remains of a maguey-fiber workshop. A subsequent survey and surface collections made by the Otumba Project discovered additional concentrations of spindle whorls associated with fiber-processing tools and manufacturing debris that provide substantial evidence for organized maguey-fiber workshops at Otumba. An unusually large sample of more than 1,600 spindle whorls was recovered in surface collections from sites in the Aztec city-state of Otumba where both small cotton whorls and large maguey whorls occurred in low densities associated with concentrations of domestic pottery (and in some cases house-mound remnants). In the Aztec capital town of Otumba, maguey spindle whorls were also present in localized dense concentrations within a restricted area of the site. These concentrations also included molds for making spindle whorls, “wasters,” a high density of heavily worn obsidian blades and basalt scrapers used in fiber production, and obsidian scrapers. Based on the quantities and types of associated artifacts we argue that these concentrations represent remains of Late Aztec maguey-fiber workshops that were household based. The workshops processed maguey fibers and made maguey spindle whorls in a range of sizes for spinning thin and thick threads and cordage. Secondary craft activities in one workshop included making cotton spindle whorls and some lapidary and figurine manufacturing. Maguey-fiber processing, spinning, and, presumably, weaving also took place in rural villages, but evidence of organized workshops has only been found at the urban center. The growth of the maguey-fiber industry at Otumba during the Late Postclassic period was part of a broader economic trend of production intensification in the northeastern Basin of Mexico that included xerophytic plant cultivation and craft specialization.

PROVENIENCE INVESTIGATION OF CERAMICS AND OBSIDIAN FROM OTUMBA

Obsidian and ceramic artifacts from the Otumba project were analyzed by instrumental neutron-activation analysis. Sources for the obsidian were determined by comparison to a databank of Central Mexican source analyses. Ceramic sources were determined by comparison to a series of reference groups from the Basin of Mexico and by comparison with raw material samples. Obsidian from the lapidary workshop (Operation 11) comes predominantly from the Otumba and Pachuca sources. There is also an unknown compositional profile present among the artifacts. This profile may derive from a not-yet-sampled flow within one of several nearby obsidian-source areas, such as Otumba or Paredon. The majority of Otumba ceramics fall into a large group derived from clays of the Teotihuacan-valley alluvium. Aztec II Black-on-Orange and red-ware samples come from other sources in the eastern basin. Ceramics from sites along the trade route leading northeast toward Tulancingo include figurines derived from Otumba, figurines probably made locally near Tepeapulco and Tulancingo, and long-handle censers probably made in the latter two locations.

Ecological Theory and Cultural Evolution in the Valley of Oaxaca [and Comments and Reply]

A number of researchers have recently challenged the usefulness of cultural ecology for explaining pre-Hispanic ultural evolution in the Valley of Oaxaca. We address those criticisms and attempt to show how a rather traditional ecological model is at least consonant with the data. Our aim is not so much to demonstrate the greater explanatory power of our model in comparison with the arguments of the researchers of the Valley of Oaxaca projects as to show that the published data do not permit he rejection of either.

OTUMBA AND ITS NEIGHBORS

Otumba is one of a few Late Aztec-period city-states in the Basin of Mexico whose central city or town is not obscured by post-Conquest occupation. Long-term research there began in the early 1960s, with more recent fieldwork between 1987 and 1989, and has been complemented by intensive laboratory and technical analyses that are still underway. Traditional typological analyses have been aided by neutron activation analyses providing strong evidence of economic linkages between the Otumba city-state and raw material sources, as well as evidence of tribute and market distribution channels for finished products within and outside the Otumba city-state.

Watering the Fields of Teotihuacan: Early Irrigation at the Ancient City

Recent excavations in Tlailotlacan, the “Oaxaca barrio,” near the western periphery of the ancient city of Teotihuacan, revealed remains of irrigation features associated with the early history of the city. Small floodwater irrigation canals were found underneath a residential structure that had been occupied by Zapotec immigrants from Oaxaca. Radiocarbon dating, corroborated by ceramic evidence, places the earliest architecture in the Early Tlamimilolpa phase (ca. a.d. 200–300), thus providing a concrete terminal date for the hydraulic system, an advantage not enjoyed by previous canal explorations in the region. The hydraulic features consist of segments of two superimposed canal networks that, based on associated pottery, date to the Terminal Formative period (Tzacualli and Miccoatli phases), which represents the earliest well-documented date for the use of irrigation at Teotihuacan. Shortly after the canals were abandoned, control over this land passed from the original inhabitants to Zapotec immigrants. We suggest that this change in ownership and land use directly involved the Teotihuacan state and was part of a policy of maintaining control over the location of economically important “resources,” including foreign immigrants like the Zapotec, who had important trade connections.

CERRO PORTEZUELO: STATES AND HINTERLANDS IN THE PRE-HISPANIC BASIN OF MEXICO

Abstract George Brainerd directed excavations at Cerro Portezuelo in the mid-1950s to understand the Classic to Postclassic transition and the questions he asked are still salient. We have undertaken a reanalysis of the artifacts, survey, and excavation data from Brainerds project to better understand the nature of relations between the Early Classic period city of Teotihuacan, its immediate hinterlands, and the change from the Teotihuacan state system to Postclassic period city-state organization. Because of Cerro Portezuelos long occupation that began in the Late/Terminal Formative period and continued beyond the Spanish Conquest, it is a strategic site to investigate the dynamics of state formation and episodes of centralization and fragmentation over this long span. Here we review the history of research concerning Cerro Portezuelo, discuss the current research project reported in the articles that comprise this Special Section, and highlight some of the major findings.

Fifteen Years on the Rock: Archaeological Research, Administration, and Compliance on Black Mesa, Arizona

The Black Mesa Archaeological Project has been conducting field investigations and archaeological research in northeastern Arizona since 1967. The work is contracted for by Peabody Coal Company in order to comply with federal, state, and tribal statutes. The longevity of the project, as well as its size and complexity, affords a unique opportunity to evaluate and refine research, project administration, and legal compliance procedures. In most situations, clear advantages have resulted from the opportunities to learn from the projects history. Unfortunately, changing statutes and changing interpretations of the same statutes have resulted in major problems-both for the archaeologists and for the Peabody Coal Company.

Civilization and urbanism, rise of

When the archaeologist V. Gordon Childe coined the term ‘urban revolution’, he posed a central question for archaeology: what is the relationship between the development of the earliest cities and states? The emergence of the first cities entailed an historical and evolutionary transformation in human social relations and the landscapes where these developments first took place: Mesopotamia, Egypt, the Indus Valley, China, Mesoamerica, and South America.

Demographic Reconstructions in the American Southwest: Alternative Behavioral Means to the Same Archaeological Ends

ABSTRACTPaleodemographic reconstructions are an important component of many evaluations of prehistoric cultural change, and the number of sites in an area, the size of those sites, or both of these variables are frequently used to estimate population size over time. Some of the reconstructions are based on a set of implicit assumptions—that a large number of large sites is the result of a large population. Despite the plausibility of this assumption, factors other than many people may have produced many and/or large sites. Data from the historic Navajo occupation of Black Mesa, Arizona, are used to illustrate our point.