Tatsuya Murakami

Polanyi's categorical models of exchange systems (reciprocity, redistribution, and market exchange) have provided a powerful tool for characterizing ancient (and modern) economies. While such models are useful in some respects, they obscure variations within each economic system and similarities between different systems. This chapter explores different dimensions of exchange, including market exchange, as a methodological framework for assessing the nature of exchange systems. Then, it examines the nexus of economy and social relations and provides a more nuanced understanding of the variations and commonalities of economic systems using a case study from Teotihuacan, the capital of a regional state in pre-Contact Mesoamerica (150-600 CE). [exchange, market economy, Polanyi, consumption approach]

Teotihuacan underwent an urban renewal during the Tlamimilolpa phase (AD 250-350) in which more than 2,000 apartment compounds were constructed to accommodate its estimated 100,000 residents. Although the orderly layout and canonical orientation of the city imply top-down planning, growing evidence suggests a bottom-up process of urban transformation. This study combines architectural energetics with archaeometric analysis of nonlocal construction materials (lime plaster and andesitic cut stone blocks) to examine the labor organization behind the construction of the apartment compounds. The results of the energetic analysis suggest that residents relied on labor forces external to their compounds, whereas materials analysis indicates that the procurement, transportation, and production of building material were centrally organized and thus indicative of a state labor tax. Based on these results, I argue that compounds were assembled through corporate group labor exchange or communal (neighborhood-level) labor cooperation/obligation, with differing degrees of support from the state labor tax. Apartment compound construction was not uniform but rather a diverse process in which state labor mobilization , communal labor obligations, and corporate labor exchange were articulated in various ways. Durante la fase Tlamimilolpa (250-350 dC), Teotihuacan experimentó una renovación urbana en la cual se construyeron alre-dedor de 2.000 conjuntos departamentales, con la finalidad de albergar a un número aproximado de 100.000 residentes. Aun-que la traza original y la orientación canónica de la ciudad suponen un diseño coordinado por las elites gubernamentales (top-down), la creciente evidencia sugiere un proceso de transformación de abajo hacia arriba (bottom-up). El presente estu-dio combina el análisis de inversión energética en arquitectura con análisis arqueométricos de materiales constructivos fo-ráneos (estuco y bloques de andesita) para examinar la organización del trabajo en la construcción de los conjuntos departamentales. El resultado del estudio energético sugiere que los residentes dependían de fuerzas de trabajo externas a sus conjuntos; mientras que el análisis de los materiales revela que la adquisición, transporte y producción de materiales cons-tructivos estaba centralizada. Esto indica, por lo tanto, la existencia de un impuesto estatal de trabajo. Sobre la base de estos resultados, se propone que dichos conjuntos fueron construidos a través del intercambio de trabajo entre grupos corporativos y/o la cooperación u obligación comunal (a nivel del barrio), con diferentes grados de apoyo por parte del impuesto estatal de trabajo. La construcción de los conjuntos departamentales no fue uniforme, sino un proceso en el cual la movilización del trabajo por parte del Estado, las obligaciones laborales comunales y el intercambio de trabajo colectivo estaban articulados de diversas maneras. Palabras Clave: urbanismo, arquitectura, materiales constructivos, organización de trabajo, Altiplano central de México

While surface collection constitutes an important component of field research at the site and regional levels, the association between surface and sub-surface materials needs to be examined through independent lines of evidence. This study employed manual bucket auger probing and soil geochemistry at the Formative site of Tlalancaleca, Central Mexico (800 B.C.–A.D. 250), to evaluate the results of surface collection and to understand the formation process of the anthropogenic landscape. The combined results at one of the largest architectural complexes at Tlalancaleca indicate that it was built during the Late Formative period (500–100 B.C.) and rebuilt during the subsequent Terminal Formative period (100 B.C.–A.D. 250), which is corroborated by radiocarbondates. Moreover, the results suggest segregated uses of space such as cooking/storage, waste disposal, and craft production areas within the complex. Overall results demonstrate the effectiveness of this multi-method approach for reconstructing occupational history and activity areas.

This study presents preliminary results of petrographic and X-ray fluorescence analyses of cut stone blocks used for urban construction at Teotihuacan, the capital of a regional state in Central Mexico (ca. AD 150–650). Cut stone blocks were concentrated in the civic-ceremonial core of the city and were probably prestigious architectural elements due to their higher costs of procurement and transportation compared to alternative materials (boulders and clay amalgam). This suggests that the organization of stone block procurement and distribution was likely embedded in power relations between commissioners and mining groups. By combining multiple analytical methods that complement one another, this study was able to discriminate local (within 10–15 km radius) from non-local materials. The results suggest that the majority (> 80%) of andesitic cut stone blocks were brought from non-local sources. This paper discusses procurement organization and suggests that most rocks were quarried by specialized groups and brought to the city through a tribute system and/or patron-client relations. This has implications for understanding the nature of the urban-hinterland relationship and expansion of the Teotihuacan state.

Political economy has provided a broad framework for the study of power relations in early complex societies , but its top-down approaches have limitations for understanding the simultaneous formation of unequal and equal social relations. Through the conception of power as heterogeneous, contradictory, and multidimensional, this study addresses how inequality and equality are constituted through production, exchange, and consumption of material objects. Recent material culture studies grounded in practice theories highlight material objects as both medium and consequence of social practice and negotiation. Such a conception of material culture leads us to explore consumption as a key theoretical and methodological concept to understand the relationship between material culture patterns and social reproduction and transformation. This study explores how consumer demand is created by examining the process of the creation and transformation of the regimes of value, which allows to address the entan-glement of material properties, multiple agencies, and the acts of production, exchange, and consumption. A case study from Teotihuacan documents archaeological evidence of changing distribution, direct evidence of production, and material characterization of lime plaster and demonstrates how changing social relations were embodied by production, exchange, and consumption of lime plaster.

Architectural conspicuous consumption provides an important basis for elucidating changing power relations, and architectural energetics or labor analysis has been widely employed in the study of early complex societies. However, neither the duration of construction nor the number of laborers is specified in standard labor-time measurements and this needs to be addressed in order to providemeaningful and comparablemeasurements. This paper presents energetic data for construction derived from replicative experiments and discusses the duration and timing of monumental construction at Teotihuacan. The results suggest that the duration of construction computed using the estimated population in the Teotihuacan Valley is consistent with archaeological evidence. Based on the estimated duration, the phase assignment of monumental structures is revised, and changes in state power are discussed in light of two alternative models of the trajectory of labor expenditure: one based on published chronology and the other based on the revised chronology.