The Uncertain Origins of Mesoamerican Turkey Domestication

The turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) is the only domesticated vertebrate to originate from North America. Accurate reconstructions of the timing, location, and process of its domestication are thus critical for understanding the domestication process in the ancient Americas. A substantial amount of recent research has been devoted to understanding turkey domestication in the American Southwest, but comparatively little research has been conducted on the subject in Mesoamerica, despite the fact that all modern domestic turkeys descend from birds originally domesticated in Mexico during pre-colonial times. To address this disparity, we have conducted a review of the available literature on early turkeys in the archaeological record of Mesoamerica. We evaluate the evidence in terms of its accuracy and use this evaluation as a stepping off point for suggesting potential avenues of future research. Although the lack of available data from Mesoamerica currently precludes detailed cross-cultural comparisons, we briefly compare the origins and intensification of turkey rearing in Mesoamerica with the American Southwest to generate more dialogue among researchers independently studying the topic in these two distinct but interconnected cultural regions.     

Recent Trends in Theorizing Prehispanic Mesoamerican Economies

Theoretical frames for modeling prehispanic Mesoamerican economies have been informed mostly by political economy or agency approaches. Political economy models examine the ways in which power is constructed and exercised through the manipulation of material transfers, mainly production and distribution. Research along these lines emphasizes regional redistribution, wealth and staple finance, debt and reciprocity, and regional integration through core/periphery relations. Agency models, on the other hand, explore the social aspects of manufacture, circulation, and consumption to infer the processes by which power is negotiated and contested. Work using this framework focuses on the manner by which meaning and value are assigned to, and become fixed in, social valuables, as well as the moral and emotional dimensions of allocation and consumption. Political economy and agency approaches are converging in Mesoamerican research to forge a new, hybrid theoretical construct, “ritual economy,” which strikes a balance between formalist and substantivist views by considering the ways that belief systems articulate with economic systems in the management of meanings and the shaping of interpretations.     

Mesoamerican Obsidian Blades: an Experimental Approach to Function

Abstract

The experimental replication and utilization of a sample of 165 obsidian blades is discussed in terms of research design. methodology, and results. Use-wear observed on the blades provides the basis for 1) the identification of wear-pattern “signatures” corresponding to particular modes of use and contact materials, 2) the evaluation of general propositions concerning edge damage on utilized tools, and 3) the determination of the probable function of a sample of prismatic obsidian blades recovered from Patarata 52, a Classic Period residential site located in an estuarine zone of coastal Veracruz, Mexico.

Two levels of functional analysis are discussed: the low-intensity or in-the field study, and the high-intensity analysis, which involves tool replication and use. high-power microscopy , and statistical manipulation with computers. Both approaches are advocated: the choice of one method over the other must be made on the basis of availability of time. money, special skills, and equipment.     

Ethnicity,world view,and experience in two Mesoamerican communities

Gregory G. Reck. In the Shadow of Tlaloc: Life in a Mexican Village. New York: Penguin Books, 1978. 224 pp. Photographs. $3.95.

Kay B. Warren. The Symbolism of Subordination: Indian Identity in a Guatemalan Town. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1978. xii + 209 pp. Photographs, references and bibliography. $11.95.     

Revisions of the Vanquished: Some Recent Studies in New Mexican and Mesoamerican Colonial History

Vingt études sur le Mexique et le Guatemala. Réunies à la mémoire de Nicole Percheron. Edited by ALAN BRETON, JEAN‐PIERRE BERTHE and SYLVIE LECOIN. Toulouse: Presses Universitaires du Mirail, 1991. Pp. 381.

Literacy, Education, and Society in New Mexico 1693–1821. By BERNARDO P. GALLEGOS. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1992. Pp. viii, 119.

Nahuas and Spaniards: Postconquest Central Mexican History and Philology. By JAMES LOCKHART. Stanford: Stanford Universty Press, 1991. Pp. xiii, 304.

The Nahuas After the Conquest: A Social and Cultural History of the Indians of Central Mexico, Sixteenth through Eighteenth Centuries. By JAMES LOCKHART. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992. Pp. xv, 650.

Disease and Death in Early Colonial Mexico: Simulating Amerindian Depopulation. By THOMAS M. WHITMORE. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1992. Pp. xvi, 261.     

Museum salvage: A case study of Mesoamerican artifacts in museum collections and on the antiquities market

Abstract

Museum salvage refers to critical studies of museum collections with little or no provenience information that seek to glean useful archaeological information from these artifacts and examine the nature of their origins and possible connections to the illicit antiquities trade and the art market. Our case study focuses on artifacts from Mesoamerica and objects from the ancient capital of Teotihuacan in particular. We take a multi-scalar approach, including a quantitative analysis of Sotheby’s auction records for Mesoamerican items from 1966 to 2010, a survey of Teotihuacan attributed items in U.S. museums, and a more detailed examination of Teotihuacan-style artifacts in the Denver Museum of Nature & Science collections. The study tracks and attempts to explain diachronic patterns in the Mesoamerican antiquities trade, connections to museum collecting practices, and looting behavior. The study illustrates the potential benefits of museum salvage, while also revealing the clear limitations of research on poorly documented archaeological material.     

Aztec period houses and terraces at Calixtlahuaca: The changing morphology of a Mesoamerican hilltop urban center

Abstract

Calixtlahuaca, a Middle–Late Postclassic site in the Toluca Valley of central Mexico, was occupied ca. a.d. 1100–1530. Our excavations reveal some of the processes involved in the creation, functions, and decay of a large hilltop urban center. At its height, the majority of the site’s surface (264 ha) was covered with residential-agricultural terraces supported by a complex water management system. House construction techniques included the use of adobe brick, wattle-and-daub, and stone pavements. Our fieldwork contributes to a growing body of research on hilltop political capitals in Mesoamerica. Using a refined chronology, we illuminate the processes by which people constructed the residential zones of this ancient hilltop city.     

Controlling for Doubt and Uncertainty Through Multiple Lines of Evidence: A New Look at the Mesoamerican Nahua Migrations

Nahuatl represents a relatively recent extension of the Uto-Aztecan language family into Mesoamerica. Ethnohistorians have linked Nahuatl's arrival to the historically attested migrations of nomadic people into central Mexico in the last centuries before the Spanish Conquest. Archaeologists have tended to treat migration as an explanation for a change in material culture rather than a social question to be examined theoretically. We approach this migration through the comparison of multiple data sets and conclude that what has previously been treated as a historical event is instead part of a longer term process tying together Mesoamerica's northern periphery with its highland core. While we find that certain themes from migration theory are reflected in this preindustrial migration as well, other variables are unique and bode well for archaeology's ability to address and contribute to theoretical issues relating to migration.