John E. Clark

Radiocarbon Chronology for the Late Archaic and Formative Periods on the Pacific Coast of Southeastern Mesoamerica

Archaeological excavations carried out during the past five years along the Pacific coast of Mexico, Guatemala, and El Salvador have recovered 79 new 14 C dates for the Late Archaic and Early to Middle Formative periods. We analyze these new dates along with 25 previously published dates to refine a sequence of 10 archaeological phases spanning almost three and a half millennia, from ca. 4000 to 650 B.C. The phases are summarized with a brief description of their most salient characteristics. We include illustrations of the Early Formative period ceramics and figurines from the Mazatan region. The sequence of phases reveals a trajectory of cultural evolution beginning in the Archaic period with the mobile hunting, fishing, and gathering Chantuto people. By 1550 B.C., the first ceramic-using sedentary communities appeared on the coast of Chiapas. They were hunter-fisher-gatherers who supplemented their food supply with cultivated plants, including maize and beans. We suggest that by the Locona phase (1400–1250 B.C.) in Chiapas, they began the transition from egalitarian sociopolitical organization to simple chiefdoms, leaving behind evidence of large-scale architectural constructions, long-distance imports such as obsidian and jade, and elaborately crafted prestige goods. Also in Chiapas, during the Cherla phase (1100–1000 B.C.), ceramic and figurine styles, nearly identical to those found at San Lorenzo Tenochtitlan on the Gulf Coast, made their first appearance. Many of the local artifact styles were gradually replaced by styles that became increasingly widespread in Mesoamerica. The chronology presented here shows that these changes were roughly contemporaneous with similar ones in neighboring regions of Mesoamerica.

A Technological Typology of Prismatic Blades and Debitage From Ojo de Agua, Chiapas, Mexico

A technological typology for the description and analysis of Mesoamerican obsidian industries is proposed, and its relative merits vis-a-vis Sheetss (1975a) “behavioral” typology are briefly explored. The typology is used to classify and describe a pristine deposit of obsidian-blade refuse recovered from the Early Classic Maya site of Ojo de Agua, Chiapas, Mexico. Analysis of this deposit revealed that the obsidian artifacts were manufacturing refuse resulting from the production of fine prismatic blades from polyhedral cores imported from highland Guatemala. The obsidian refuse was recovered from a workshop dump rather than from an actual workshop.

Ball court design dates back 3,400 years

Excavations at the archaeological site of Paso de la Amada, in the Soconusco region of Pacific coastal Chiapas, Mexico, have uncovered an earthen ball court dating to approximately 1400 BC (uncalibrated),which is at least five centuries older than any previously excavated ballcourt in Mesoamerica. Moreover, this discovery reveals that the design of ball courts dates back 3,400 years.

Prismatic Blademaking, Craftsmanship, and Production

Artifacts from an obsidian-blade workshop dump from Ojo de Agua, Chiapas, Mexico, are analyzed to determine levels of craftsmanship and craft specialization. Detailed consideration of knapping errors and rejuvenation flakes reveals that the blademaker at Ojo de Agua was moderately skilled at his craft, which he practiced on a part-time basis. The maximum level of output from his workshop was 26,000, or fewer, fine blades per year, or the equivalent of part-time work during a three-month period. Analysis of knapping strategies evident in the workshop debris suggests that the blademakers overriding strategy was to achieve a balance between effort and knapping risk at the expense of raw material. Access to obsidian cores does not appear to have been a concern, as little effort was made to economize in this respect, and thousands of usable, irregular blades were discarded in the workshop refuse.

Another Look at Small Debitage and Microdebitage

AbstractAfter a brief review of recent studies of small debitage and microdebitage it is suggested that such studies would be most useful in identifying primary knapping areas. In particular, Behms (1983) study of primary and secondary deposits of knapping refuse is evaluated in light of ethnographic evidence, mostly from Mesoamerica. These data indicate that neither o f Behm s criteria hold in all situations. A major factor determining the nature of workshop deposits appears to be the degree of mobility of a given society and, subsequently, the need to re-use work space.

Platforms, Bits, Punches and Vises: A Potpourri of Mesoamerican Blade Technology

Several unresolved issues of Mesoamerican prismatic blade manufacture concern the bit used in the Aztec pressure tool, the importance of indirect percussion in blade production (Clark 1982:373), an...

Counterflaking and the Manufacture of Mesoamerican Prismatic Blades

AbstractExperimental and archaeological examples of counterflaking damage are presented and discussed. It is argued that the non-random occurrence of this type of damage is indicative of different blade-making techniques. The pattern of counterflaking noted for archaeological prismatic blades is convincing evidence that pre-Columbian, Mesoamerican knappers held cores with their feet rather than with vises.

Time Reckoning and Memorials in Mesoamerica

Mesoamerica was the time-place in the New World where the memory arts of writing and calendrical notation achieved their highest forms. Both had long histories going back at least to the first millennium bc and were part of an even longer and wider history of memorials and commemorations dating millennia earlier. In this essay we consider time and memorials as social constructs and forms of practice and provide data for sequential changes in both. As commonly deployed and materialized, history and memorials are about the evolving ‘now’ and future aspirations rather than a fixed past — but they are communicated by re-presenting supposed pasts. In Mesoamerica, the things remembered, the manner of remembering them, and the reasons for doing so evolved with changing social and political institutions and circumstances.

Stoneworkers’ Approaches to Replicating Prismatic Blades

The title of this chapter alludes to articles by Don Crabtree ( 1966, 1968 ) on the replication of Folsom points and Mesoamerican prismatic blades. I evaluate Crabtree’s contributions in light of subsequent experiments in making pressure and percussion blades, with special attention to Mesoamerican blades.

MESOAMERICA'S FORMATIVE SCHOLAR: GARETH W. LOWE, 1922–2004

The challenge in summing up the active life and productive career of any famous person is to put the important facts on record while steering a respectful path between hagiography and recitation of his curriculum vitae. We attempt to do this for our esteemed colleague and mentor, one of Mesoamericas last originals, Gareth W. Lowe (Figure 1). With his death on March 8, 2004, in Tucson, Arizona, at age 82, Gareth left behind a legacy that reaches far beyond his well-deserved international reputation. Gareth spent 50 years of his life working in Mesoamerica, principally on the Formative period in Chiapas, Mexico. He first went to southern Mexico in 1953 as a crew member of the newly organized New World Archaeological Foundation (NWAF). Two years later, the NWAF was rescued by the sponsorship of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and much later (in 1976) it became part of Brigham Young University. Gareth served two stints as NWAF field director (1956–1959, 1961–1975), basically as de facto director, and finally served officially as director from 1975 to 1987. In a real sense, Gareth was the NWAF, and its successes and agenda were largely his. The story of one cannot be understood without the other.