Verenice Heredia

During the central Mexican late Postclassic period, the Aztec Triple Alliance became the largest and most powerful empire in Mesoamerica. Yet ancient Tlaxcallan (now Tlaxcala, Mexico) resisted incorporation into the empire despite being entirely surrounded by it and despite numerous Aztec military campaigns aimed at the defeat of the Tlaxcaltecas. How did it happen that a relatively small (1,400 km²) polity was able to resist a more powerful foe while its neighbors succumbed? We propose a resolution to this historical enigma that, we suggest, has implications for the broader study of social and cultural change, particularly in relation to theories of state formation and collective action. We find it particularly interesting that the Tlaxcaltecas abandoned a key tenet of traditional Nahua political structure in which kingship was vested in members of the nobility, substituting for it government by a council whose members could be recruited from the ranks of commoners. To achieve such...

Cross-cultural research on ancient societies demonstrates that collective social formations tend to experience a more sudden collapse with relatively catastrophic effects compared to formations low in collectivity. The demise of collective formations often involves more pronounced social unrest and a more complete disintegration of the agrarian and sociopolitical systems. This article further probes this general finding using the case of Teuchitlán, in the Tequila region of Jalisco, Mexico, which lasted for ~700 years, from 350 B.C.E. to about 450/500 C.E., when it suddenly disappeared. It was characterized by power-sharing among multiple groups whose leaders employed varied political strategies. Structurally, Teuchitlán aligns with some of the precepts of collective action and good government, as it was inwardly focused and placed great emphasis on the joint production of the polity's resources, especially agriculture, as well as the equitable distribution of benefits, such as ...

For nearly 200 years, Western social science has argued that good government, embodied in democracy, originated exclusively in Western Europe and was introduced to the rest of the world. This Eurocentric vision has profoundly shaped social science's approach to the non-Western World (and pre-modern Europe). Importantly, distinct theories (e.g., Oriental Despotism, Substantivism, etc.) were developed to address premodern state-building in Asia, the Near East, Africa, and the Americas because “normal approaches” could not be applied in these areas. Regardless of the approach and the geographical area, Europe inevitably appears at the pinnacle of social evolutionary change. However, recently, Eurocentric theories have been subject to reevaluation. In this paper, we pursue that critical agenda through a comparative study of demokratia's original formulation and ask: would a 5th century B.C.E. Athenian recognize democratic attributes in 15th century C.E. Tlaxcallan, Mexico? We an...

Archaeological and ethnohistoric research has demonstrated that political-economic strategies in Late Postclassic (AD 1250 – 1521) Tlaxcallan were highly collective. At the same time, recent cross-cultural research indicates that collective political structures are strongly correlated with internal revenue sources, or taxes and corvée paid by free citizens. Thus, we hypothesize that Tlaxcaltecan political architects established internal revenue strategies to fund state activities. If this were the case, we would expect that goods were distributed through either large-scale redistribution or through open and competitive markets (as commodities). In this paper, we test this hypothesis by drawing on a dataset of roughly 11,000 lithic artifacts yielded by excavations in two Late Postclassic residential terraces located within the city of Tlaxcallan. These data demonstrate that imported obsidian was widely used as a bulk economic resource. Thus, although obsidian was difficult to acquire due to Tlaxcallan's antagonistic relationship with the Aztec, the distribution of obsidian was not controlled for political gain (e.g., distributed as gifts through embedded exchange systems). Thus, this paper contributes to broader studies of economy in Central Mexico by illustrating alternative paths to production and exchange available to consumers.

Intermediate socio-spatial units (ISUs), materialized as neighborhoods and districts, were important elements in the ordering of the built environment in large ancient settlements. They are indicative of an increasing vertical and horizontal complexity because they lie between households and the governing authority. Collective action theory holds that ISUs can take many forms and can be created through bottom-up, top-down, or top-down/bottom-up processes. The distribution of ISUs in the context of other architectural elements illuminates the degree to which collective policies shaped urban landscapes. This article identifies districts and neighborhoods, two types of ISUs, at the site of Los Guachimontones (Jalisco, Mexico) through a study of its internal spatial organization. Intensive survey and mapping have identified thousands of architectural elements, including the circular complexes known as guachimontones. Thiessen polygon analysis reveals that guachimontones are an important...

Over the course of the Postclassic Period (A.D. 950 – 1521), commercialization was on the rise in ancient Mesoamerica, reaching its apex at the time of contact with Europeans. Extant information indicates that both interregional trade and regional market integration increased during this time, especially during the Late Postclassic (A.D. 1250/1300 – 1521). Yet, researchers have little comparative published information on household consumption from well-excavated residential contexts for this period. In this paper we compare access to formal lithic tools (projectile points) at two Late Postclassic sites with differing governing structures: Tlaxcallan (located in Central Mexico), and Santa Rita Corozal (located in coastal Belize). Specifically, we investigate the degree to which political-economic factors affected production and access to projectile points, including the accessibility of non-local raw materials used in their production, and their distribution among various households. We test whether households with differing social statuses monopolized or controlled finished points, and if the raw materials used to produce them varied among households on the basis of status. Finally, we consider the degree to which these patterns correlate with differing political-economic strategies employed by governing officials at the study sites.

La cultura Teuchitlan construyo una sociedad compleja que se establecio en los valles de Tequila, en el centro de Jalisco, y tuvo su centro principal en Los Guachimontones. Los centros ceremoniales en toda esa region incluyen juegos de pelota y templos circulares distintivos, los cuales aparecen frecuentemente despues de 100 a.C.

Abstract Beginning in the last century, archaeologists became interested in the development of social complexity. Since that time, the basic concept of states and complex societies has been defined by rigid social stratification, extreme wealth inequality, and political centralization. However, recently, landscape approaches, household archaeology, city-states, and “alternative pathways to complexity” have begun to make inroads in developing a more robust approach to premodern states. Specifically, anthropological theory has advanced significantly with the incorporation of Collective Action, yet theoretical and empirically based studies of wealth inequality, social stratification, and the built environment in the archaeological literature are still limited. Therefore, in this paper, we seek to test the traditional definition of the state and complex societies using cases from Middle-Late Postclassic Highland Mexico (Central Mexico and Oaxaca), especially the case of Tlaxcallan. Using a comparative approach, we find that a stark division between public and private architecture and a compression of wealth inequality and social stratification, especially the absence of palaces, and a comparatively high degree of political centralization, marked the Tlaxcaltecan state. Accordingly, we conclude that theoretical approaches in archaeology must incorporate Collective Action Theory or other comparable approaches to effectively deal with real empirical variation in the past.

Se presenta la investigación de la cerámica de la tradición Teuchitlán del occidente de México por medio del estudio iconográfico y la presencia de símbolos panmesoamericanos, con una visión alterna hacia los procesos de contacto intercultural, proponiendo que la interacción interregional del occidente fue más compleja y sucedió más prematuramente de lo que se considera. Motivos compartidos fueron incorporados a cánones representacionales locales con un simbolismo regional único indicando que los artesanos continuaron una tradición cultural e implementaron agencia artística. La evidencia indica simultáneamente una cosmovisión compartida a través de la incorporación a complejos simbólicos panmesoamericanos y una afirmación material de configuraciones regionales culturales específicas.

ABSTRACT The geopolitical relations of ancient states were often materialized through the flows of highly valued objects, but such relations also involved territorial strategies to secure access to natural resources and ensure the supply of bulk goods. Portable X-ray fluorescence (pXRF) of obsidian provides an excellent tool for investigating how the territoriality of ancient states shaped the circulation of such bulk commodities at a macro-regional scale. Here, we present the results of a pXRF study of obsidian artifacts from the Late Postclassic (AD 1350–1520) urban center of Tlaxcallan, Mexico. A recent survey and mapping project of Tlaxcallan provides the data to examine its obsidian supply. To assign sources to artifacts we applied pXRF to a sample of 45 artifacts from Tlaxcallan and 35 geological samples from sources of obsidian that we considered likely to have supplied Tlaxcallan. Contrary to expected patterns, our findings challenge the view that the Tlaxcalteca were embedded in economic networks centered in the Basin of Mexico and the Aztec Empire. Our results suggest that the population of Tlaxcallan procured obsidian from sources that fell outside of the major obsidian supply networks already documented in Mesoamerica. Thus, our findings support the idea that the territories of Mesoamerican polities influenced the supply of obsidian and that further studies of the geopolitics of bulk goods supply in ancient states are warranted.

ABSTRACTThe Tequila Valleys, in Jalisco, Mexico, are well-known in archaeology for an early complex society known as the Teuchitlan tradition (350 b.c.–a.d. 450/500), but later developments have received little attention. Here I report on the first systematic, full-coverage survey of the Tequila region north of the Tequila volcano. I explore the ways in which the societies that occupied this territory experienced sociopolitical change diachronically by investigating settlement scale, integration, complexity, and boundedness. Through the use of these core features, I analyze how each changed in varying ways, resulting in patterns that do not conform to static societal categories. Interestingly, there is no evidence that a large polity controlled the entire region at any point in the sequence. Results indicate a dynamic sociopolitical landscape that did not develop along any predetermined pathway.

For nearly 200 years, Western social science has argued that good government, embodied in democracy, originated exclusively in Western Europe and was introduced to the rest of the world. This Eurocentric vision has profoundly shaped social science's approach to the non-Western World (and pre-modern Europe). Importantly, distinct theories (e.g., Oriental Despotism, Substantivism, etc.) were developed to address premodern state-building in Asia, the Near East, Africa, and the Americas because “normal approaches” could not be applied in these areas. Regardless of the approach and the geographical area, Europe inevitably appears at the pinnacle of social evolutionary change. However, recently, Eurocentric theories have been subject to reevaluation. In this paper, we pursue that critical agenda through a comparative study of demokratia's original formulation and ask: would a 5th century B.C.E. Athenian recognize democratic attributes in 15th century C.E. Tlaxcallan, Mexico? We answer this question by first summarizing literature on Classical Athens, which concludes that among the key values of demokratia were isonomia and isegoria and then explore the evidence for similar values in Tlaxcallan. Our response is that an Athenian would see strong parallels between his government and that of Tlaxcallan.

Cross-cultural research on ancient societies demonstrates that collective social formations tend to experience a more sudden collapse with relatively catastrophic effects compared to formations low in collectivity. The demise of collective formations often involves more pronounced social unrest and a more complete disintegration of the agrarian and sociopolitical systems. This article further probes this general finding using the case of Teuchitlán, in the Tequila region of Jalisco, Mexico, which lasted for ~700 years, from 350 B.C.E. to about 450/500C.E., when it suddenly disappeared. It was characterized by power-sharing among multiple groups whose leaders employed varied political strategies. Structurally, Teuchitlán aligns with some of the precepts of collective action and good government, as it was inwardly focused and placed great emphasis on the joint production of the polity's resources, especially agriculture, as well as the equitable distribution of benefits, such as community feasting and ritual, and some form of political participation or voice (e.g., power-sharing). Scholars working in the area have invoked various environmental factors, demographic movements, natural disasters, the collapse of central places, and a breakdown in trade connections, among others, as causes of Teuchitlán's disintegration—and the answer may indeed lie in a combination of these phenomena. This article explores the major shifts in the institutions that comprised Teuchitlán, thereby presenting an alternative view of its nature and disappearance. Settlement patterns, architectural differences, ceramic decoration and vessel forms, and lithic technology from the period following Teuchitlán's collapse suggest major changes in ideology, economy, and politics. The placement of large centers along trade routes, coupled with increased control of interregional exchange, indicates a shift toward direct, discretionary control of polity revenues by political leaders with little benefit for the populace. As part of these changes, the human landscape became more ruralized. Teuchitlán is comparable to other well-known cases in the world where more collective forms of political organization met a similar fate, such as Chaco Canyon (Southwest USA), Jenne-jeno (Mali), and the Indus Civilization.

Page 1. 365 Archaeological Survey in the Mixteca Alta of Oaxaca, Mexico Andrew IZ.Balkansky George Washington University, Washington, DC Stephen A. IZowalewski University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia Veronica Perez Rodriguez Thomas J. Pluckhahn Charlotte A. Smith ...

Beginning in the last century, archaeologists became interested in the development of social complexity. Since that time, the basic concept of states and complex societies has been defined by rigid social stratification, extreme wealth inequality, and political centralization. However, recently, landscape approaches, household archaeology, city-states, and “alternative pathways to complexity” have begun to make inroads in developing a more robust approach to premodern states. Specifically, anthropological theory has advanced significantly with the incorporation of Collective Action, yet theoretical and empirically based studies of wealth inequality, social stratification, and the built environment in the archaeological literature are still limited. Therefore, in this paper, we seek to test the traditional definition of the state and complex societies using cases from Middle-Late Postclassic Highland Mexico (Central Mexico and Oaxaca), especially the case of Tlaxcallan. Using a compa...

Intermediate socio-spatial units (ISUs), materialized as neighborhoods and districts, were important elements in the ordering of the built environment in large ancient settlements. They are indicative of an increasing vertical and horizontal complexity because they lie between households and the governing authority. Collective action theory holds that ISUs can take many forms and can be created through bottom-up, top-down, or top-down/bottom-up processes. The distribution of ISUs in the context of other architectural elements illuminates the degree to which collective policies shaped urban landscapes. This article identifies districts and neighborhoods, two types of ISUs, at the site of Los Guachimontones (Jalisco, Mexico) through a study of its internal spatial organization. Intensive survey and mapping have identified thousands of architectural elements, including the circular complexes known as guachimontones. Thiessen polygon analysis reveals that guachimontones are an important feature of the site's spatial organization, as well as to the materialization of ISUs and other socio-spatial units. Broadly speaking, the organization of these built spaces reveals that their growth can be attributed to collectively oriented political strategies.

Beginning in the last century, archaeologists became interested in the development of social complexity. Since
that time, the basic concept of states and complex societies has been defined by rigid social stratification, extreme
wealth inequality, and political centralization. However, recently, landscape approaches, household archaeology,
city-states, and “alternative pathways to complexity” have begun to make inroads in developing a
more robust approach to premodern states. Specifically, anthropological theory has advanced significantly with
the incorporation of Collective Action, yet theoretical and empirically based studies of wealth inequality, social
stratification, and the built environment in the archaeological literature are still limited. Therefore, in this paper,
we seek to test the traditional definition of the state and complex societies using cases from Middle-Late
Postclassic Highland Mexico (Central Mexico and Oaxaca), especially the case of Tlaxcallan. Using a comparative
approach, we find that a stark division between public and private architecture and a compression of wealth
inequality and social stratification, especially the absence of palaces, and a comparatively high degree of political
centralization, marked the Tlaxcaltecan state. Accordingly, we conclude that theoretical approaches in
archaeology must incorporate Collective Action Theory or other comparable approaches to effectively deal with
real empirical variation in the past.

The Tequila Valleys, in Jalisco, Mexico, are well-known in archaeology for an early complex society known as the Teuchitlán tradition (350 B.C.-A.D. 450/500), but later developments have received little attention. Here I report on the first systematic, full-coverage survey of the Tequila region north of the Tequila volcano. I explore the ways in which the societies that occupied this territory experienced sociopolitical change diachronically by investigating settlement scale, integration, complexity, and boundedness. Through the use of these core features, I analyze how each changed in varying ways, resulting in patterns that do not conform to static societal categories. Interestingly, there is no evidence that a large polity controlled the entire region at any point in the sequence. Results indicate a dynamic sociopolitical landscape that did not develop along any predetermined pathway.

This investigation presents ceramics of the Teuchitlán tradition in western Mexico through an iconographic study. The presence of pan-Mesoamerican symbols in many examples yields insight into the processes of intercultural contact, suggesting that interregional interaction involving western Meso-america was more complex and occurred earlier than was considered. Shared motifs were incorporated
in representational canons with regionally unique symbolism, suggesting that Teuchitlán artisans were both continuing a cultural tradition and exercising artistic agency. The evidence simultaneously indicates a cultural world view shared through the incorporation of broader pan-Mesoamerican symbolic complexes and a material affirmation of regionally specific cultural configurations.

In recent years, scholars have become dissatisfied with neoevolutionists’ view of social evolution as a series of step-like transformations leading to political centralization and have refocused attention away from traditional theory and toward issues of agency, power sharing, and alternative pathways to complexity. To build on this emerging theoretical orientation, we propose that collective action theory provides a useful path to explaining social change. To evaluate this idea, we make use of ethnohistoric and archaeological sources on the Postclassic (AD 1250–1521) of Highland Mesoamerica (Central Highlands of Mexico and the Mixteca Alta region of Oaxaca), to investigate the causes and consequences of key aspects of sociopolitical change. Of the study states, Tlaxcallan, Cholula, Texcoco, and other central Highlands polities relied extensively on internal revenues and, accordingly, implemented power sharing, control of political officials, and infrastructural power. Conversely, states in eastern Puebla and the Mixteca Alta focused on external revenues and, thus, exhibited greater degrees of despotic governance. These results suggest that collective action provides a useful starting point for understanding state-building in Highland Mesoamerica and merits further testing with other Mesoamerican cases as well as societies in other world areas.

The Tequila Valleys, in Jalisco, Mexico, are well-known in archaeology for an early complex society known as the Teuchitlán tradition (350 b.c.–a.d. 450/500), but later developments have received little attention. Here I report on the first systematic, full-coverage survey of the Tequila region north of the Tequila volcano. I explore the ways in which the societies that occupied this territory experienced sociopolitical change diachronically by investigating settlement scale, integration, complexity, and boundedness. Through the use of these core features, I analyze how each changed in varying ways, resulting in patterns that do not conform to static societal categories. Interestingly, there is no evidence that a large polity controlled the entire region at any point in the sequence. Results indicate a dynamic sociopolitical landscape that did not develop along any predetermined pathway.