Mary Pohl

Early Agriculture In The Maya Lowlands

Wetland research in northern Belize provides the earliest evidence for development of agriculture in the Maya Lowlands. Pollen data confirm the introduction of maize and manioc before 3000 B.C. Dramatic deforestation, beginning ca. 2500 B.C. and intensifying in wetland environments ca. 1500-1300 B.C., marks an expansion of agriculture, which occurred in the context of a mixed foraging economy. By 1000 B.C. a rise in groundwater levels led farmers to construct drainage ditches coeval with the emergence of Maya complex society ca. 1000-400 B.C. Field manipulations often involved minor modifications of natural hummocks. Canal systems are not as extensive in northern Belize as previously reported, nor is there evidence of artificially raised planting platforms. By the Classic period, wetland fields were flooded and mostly abandoned.

Microfossil evidence for pre-Columbian maize dispersals in the neotropics from San Andrés, Tabasco, Mexico

The history of maize (Zea mays L.) is one of the most debated topics in New World archaeology. Molecular and genetic studies indicate that maize domestication took place in tropical southwest Mexico. Although archaeological evidence for the evolution of maize from its wild ancestor teosinte has yet to be found in that poorly studied region, other research combining paleoecology and archaeology is documenting the nature and timing of maize domestication and dispersals. Here we report a phytolith analysis of sediments from San Andrés, Tabasco, that confirms the spread of maize cultivation to the tropical Mexican Gulf Coast >7,000 years ago (≈7,300 calendar years before present). We review the different methods used in sampling, identifying, and dating fossil maize remains and compare their strengths and weaknesses. Finally, we examine how San Andrés amplifies the present evidence for widespread maize dispersals into Central and South America. Multiple data sets from many sites indicate that maize was brought under cultivation and domesticated and had spread rapidly out of its domestication cradle in tropical southwest Mexico by the eighth millennium before the present.

Prehistoric sunflower (Helianthus Annuus L.) domestication in Mexico

Early remains of Helianthus annuus L. unearthed at the San Andrés site in the Gulf Coast region of Tabasco, Mexico, constitute the earliest record of domesticated sunflower. Accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) age determinations of a large domesticated seed and achene produced dates of 4130 ± 40 years before the present (B.P.) and 4085 ± 50 B.P., respectively. These discoveries challenge the longstanding hypothesis that sunflower was domesticated in eastern North America. Moreover, when considered with other recent discoveries on plant domestication, these data suggest a reconsideration of the idea that the eastern United States was an independent hearth for domestication.ResumenLos registros más antiguos del girasol lo constituyen los primeror restos deHelianthus annuus L. desenter-rados en el sitio de San Andrés, Tabasco, en la costa del Golfo de México. Mediante el acelerador de espectrometría de masas se determinó la edad de una semilla grande domesticada y un aquenio se obtuvieron dos fechas de 4130 ± 40 años antes del presente (A.P.) y 4085 ± 50 A.P., respectivamente. Estos descubrimientos ponen en duda la hipótesis de hace tiempo que dice que el girasol fue domesticado en el este de None América. También, cuando se tomaron en cuenta otros descubrimientos sobre domesticatión de plantas, estos datos suguieren una reconsideratión de la idea que el este de los Estados Unidos fue un centro independiente de domesticatión.

Sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.) as a pre-Columbian domesticate in Mexico.

Mexico has long been recognized as one of the worlds cradles of domestication with evidence for squash (Cucurbita pepo) cultivation appearing as early as 8,000 cal B.C. followed by many other plants, such as maize (Zea mays), peppers (Capsicum annuum), common beans (Phaseolus vulgaris), and cotton (Gossypium hirsutum). We present archaeological, linguistic, ethnographic, and ethnohistoric data demonstrating that sunflower (Helianthus annuus) had entered the repertoire of Mexican domesticates by ca. 2600 cal B.C., that its cultivation was widespread in Mexico and extended as far south as El Salvador by the first millennium B.C., that it was well known to the Aztecs, and that it is still in use by traditional Mesoamerican cultures today. The sunflowers association with indigenous solar religion and warfare in Mexico may have led to its suppression after the Spanish Conquest. The discovery of ancient sunflower in Mexico refines our knowledge of domesticated Mesoamerican plants and adds complexity to our understanding of cultural evolution.

Freshwater Wetland Plant Communities of Northern Belize: Implications for Paleoecological Studies of Maya Wetland Agriculture

Plant species composition and standing crop in relation to soil and water characteristics were studied to determine which environmental variables are responsible for structure and distribution of marshes in northern Belize. Sampling sites were located in the floodplains of the Rio Hondo and New River and within karstic depressions in the interfluves of the two rivers. Relationships among environmental variables and the occurrence of the individual marsh types, in particular those dominated by Cladium jamaicense, Eleocharis cellulosa, and Typha domingensis were investigated using canonical correspondence analysis. Discriminant analysis was used to select a reduced set of variables for predicting the distribution of dominant species. Eleocharis cellulosa marshes dominated areas with soil and water of high conductivity due to high content of gypsum and calcium carbonate. Nutrient concentrations, namely nitrogen and phosphorus, were very low. Conditions were rather similar in sawgrass marshes (Cladium jamaicense), except for higher water depth and lower conductivity. Marshes dominated by Typha domingensis occupied areas with higher content of nitrogen and phosphorus. Discriminant functions developed for these three marsh communities can be used to help interpret paleoecological data and infer ancient Maya impacts upon marsh development.

Strategies for 14 C Dating the Oxtotitlán Cave Paintings, Guerrero, Mexico

ABSTRACT Oxtotitlán Cave paintings have been considered among the earliest in Mesoamerica on stylistic grounds, but confirmation of this hypothesis through absolute dating has not been attempted until now. We describe the application of advanced radiocarbon strategies developed for situations such as caves with high carbon backgrounds. Using a low-temperature plasma oxidation system, we dated both the ancient paint and the biogenic rock coatings that cover the paint layers at Oxtotitlán. Our research has significantly expanded the time frame for the production of polychrome rock paintings encompassing the Early Formative and Late Formative/Early Classic periods, statistically spanning a long era from before ca. 1500 cal B.C. to cal A.D. 600. Los murales de la Cueva de Oxtotitlán, de acuerdo con criterios estilísticos, han sido considerados entre los más tempranos de Mesoamérica. Sin embargo, hasta la fecha esta hipótesis no había sido corroborada mediante fechamiento absoluto. En este trabajo se describe la aplicación de técnicas de radiocarbono avanzadas, las cuales han sido desarrolladas para lugares como cuevas con un elevado fondo de carbón. Fechamos tanto la pintura antigua como los recubrimientos biogénicos que cubren las capas de pintura utilizando un sistema de oxidación de plasma a temperatura baja. Nuestras investigaciones han ampliado de manera significativa el intervalo temporal de la pintura mural policroma en Mesoamérica, abarcando los periodos del Formativo Temprano al Formativo Tardío/Clásico Temprano, desde antes de aproximadamente 1500 cal a.C. hasta 600 cal d.C.

AMERICAS, CENTRAL | The Olmec and Their Contemporaries

The Olmec and their contemporaries were the first to crystallize the Mesoamerican cultural framework of rulership, gift economics, trade, gaming, religiosity, and literacy. Urban centers, multi-tiered settlement systems, monumental constructions, craft production, and elaborate exchange systems mark significant social changes that occurred during the period 1500–400 BC. Olmec ritual focused on a sacred landscape of mountains, water sources, and the sun, all believed to be essential to human life. Caves, mountains, and springs were ceremonial pilgrimage destinations. At the same time a huge output of labor brought substantial stone resources such as obsidian, greenstone, and volcanic rock from distant regions to Olmec ceremonial centers of Gulf Coast Mexico to be shaped into monuments, offerings, and gifts that underwrote the power of rulership. Olmec elites participated in the development of writing in connection with their elaboration of kingly power. Writing included recording the Mesoamerican calendar, which centered on divination and prophecy. Olmec settlement concentrated around the enormously productive river systems of the Gulf Coast. Olmec subsistence focused increasingly on maize with the addition of beans, manioc, corozo palm nuts, chile, and sunflower. Domesticated dog and later white-tailed deer, as well as aquatic resources such as fish and turtles, were the primary sources of meat. The Olmec social developments of the Mesoamerican Formative period paralleled those of contemporaneous cultures in central Mexico, across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, and down the Pacific watershed as far south as El Salvador. Scholars have debated the extent to which the Olmec were the prime movers in Formative period developments or were equal participants in a larger pattern of social change. The widespread distribution of artifacts in Olmec style attests to shared belief and value systems throughout Mesoamerica in the Formative period. Later Mesoamerican rulers, from the Maya to the Aztec, modeled themselves after Olmec elites, copying their architectural plans and adopting their writing systems.