Tlaxcala (State / Territory) (Geographic Keyword)
51-75 (497 Records)
This is an abstract from the "Plant Exudates and Other Binders, Adhesives, and Coatings in the Americas" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Investigations on monumental earthen architecture in the Classic period La Joya site in Central Veracruz led to the hypothesis that a bitumen additive was used as a stabilizer in construction. The use of bitumen resulted in increased resistance to weathering in a humid tropical environment, as well as control of...
Blood on the Stones: Heart Sacrifice and Sacrificial Altars in the Northern Maya Lowlands and Mexico-Tenochtitlan (2021)
This is an abstract from the "New Perspectives on Ritual Violence and Related Human Body Treatments in Ancient Mesoamerica" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Heart sacrifice constituted one of the most basic yet fundamental tenets of Mesoamerican ritual practice. At Early Postclassic Chichen Itza, as with the later Aztec of Tenochtitlan, hearts and blood were offered to the bellicose solar deity whose daily journey through the sky not only depended...
Bright Light in the Big City: The Aztec New Fire Ceremony and the Drama of Darkness (2019)
This is an abstract from the "After Dark: The Nocturnal Urban Landscape & Lightscape of Ancient Cities" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Populated by as many as 200,000 people, the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan—like most cities—was buzzing with activity through the night. Given the dynamism of the city, and especially weighed against our modern understanding of the sounds and lights that keep cities alive during the night, it is significant that one...
Building Community Ties Using Archaeology in Tlajinga, Teotihuacan (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Teotihuacan is an ancient city located in Mexico that was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987. It was the largest city in the Americas during its peak between 100-550 CE and its significance as an early, cosmopolitan center has been demonstrated over decades of continuous study. The Proyecto Arqueológico Tlajinga Teotihuacan (PATT) began in 2012...
The Burial Artifacts of Epiclassic Los Mogotes, Basin of Mexico (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The hilltop, Epiclassic period (ca. 600-900 CE) site of Los Mogotes (ZU-ET-12) sits on the boundary between the northern Basin of Mexico and the southern Mezquital valley. Hence, it is well-placed to understand local and regional transformations between the fall of Teotihuacan (ca. 650 CE) and the rise of Tula (ca. 900 CE). In this paper, we examine burial...
Burials and Society at Teotihuacan: Examining Inequality Through Burial Offerings in Residential Contexts (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Many archaeologists think that Teotihuacan was a relatively equalitarian society. Prior research on economic inequity has focused on factors such as the size of houses and the remains of murals in residential complexes. The Burials and Society project approaches the question of inequality at Teotihuacan from a new angle, that of burial data. The project has...
By the Sea Shore: Examining the Prehistoric Shell Industry of the Rio Grande Delta (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In North America the archaeologically defined prehistoric culture of the Rio Grande Delta is essentially unknown outside of the state of Texas. Even within Texas the culture of the Rio Grande Delta is poorly understood. Adding to this obscurity is the lack of cross-border communication or collaboration between researchers regarding the material culture of the...
Caminos a Los Horcones, Chiapas: An Least Cost Path Analysis of Early Classic Trade Routes (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. During the Early Classic Period (250-600 CE), the site of Los Horcones rose to become and important gateway community sitting strategically on the flanks of Cerro Bernal where it controlled the terrestrial trade route along Pacific Coast into the Soconusco region. Archaeological research of this important regional center has revealed a complex history of...
Canaries in the Coal Mine: How Children Reveal the Embodied Realities of Colonialism (2024)
This is an abstract from the "The Marking and Making of Social Persons: Embodied Understandings in the Archaeologies of Childhood and Adolescence" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Childhood is paradoxically the most precarious yet vital period of a person’s life. It is when children form their biological and social self, embodying everything around them. However, what surrounds them may not be safe, stable, or congruent with a healthy, long life....
Captive Birds and Pet Keeping in Ancient Mesoamerica: The Case of Scarlet Macaws from Vista Hermosa (Tamaulipas, Mexico, 1300–1500 AD) (2018)
In Mesoamerica, the tropical colourful birds were highly valued for their feathers. Among them, the scarlet macaw (Ara macao) provided bright red, blue and yellow feathers that were traded to the Central Mexican Highlands and, beyond Mesoamerica, until the American Southwest. As suggested by ethnohistoric records, some birds may have been maintained in captivity and harvested to supply the demand in feathers. In spite of examples of large-scale macaw management in the American Southwest, there...
Captive management and sacrificial power: Using ancient genomics to study animal sacrifice in Teotihuacán (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Excavations of the Moon and Sun Pyramids (1998-2004) at Teotihuacan have yielded both human and animal sacrifices, interred as part of state rituals. These rituals demonstrated the power of the state, and the species chosen reflected that power. Isotopic and zooarchaeological analyses of the sacrificed animals show that some of them were held for extended...
Carbonized Wood Remains from the Matacanela Site, Veracruz, Mexico (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Olmec Manifestations and Ongoing Societal Transformations in the Tuxtlas Uplands: A View from Matacanela" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper describes the carbonized wood remains recovered from fifty-five heavy fractions of flotation from seven units and fifty light fractions of flotation from six units collected during the excavations of the Matacanela Site in Veracruz, Mexico. Environmental comparisons are...
Casta, Class, or Race? Social Transformations at the Colonial Port of Veracruz (2018)
The social structure of colonial New Spain underwent large-scale transformations following the Spanish conquest. Changes in social categories of identification evolved through an interplay between religious and civil administrators -- who attempted to control colonial populations -- and local social relationships of interpersonal interaction. I examine social relations and changing categories of identification at the colonial Port of Veracruz. Throughout the colonial period, Veracruz served as a...
Ceramic Chronology in the Absence of a Horizon (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Central Mexico after Teotihuacan: Everyday Life and the (Re)Making of Epiclassic Communities" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In this paper, I present an initial ceramic seriation for the Epiclassic site of Chicoloapan Viejo, in the southern Basin of Mexico, with a discussion of issues particular to periods of political fragmentation. I demonstrate that two phases can be distinguished at Chicoloapan Viejo, based on...
Ceramic Evidence for Immigration among Households at Calixtlahuaca in the Toluca Valley (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Calixtlahuaca is a Middle-to-Late Postclassic (A.D. 1130-1530) Mesoamerican site located in the Toluca Valley of Central Mexico. While originally a Matlazinca settlement, the site was conquered by the Aztec Empire, and documentary evidence suggests subsequent Mexica immigration to the region. I use the site to examine immigration patterns based on the...
Ceramic Evidence of Normal and Anomalous Diffusion from Mesoamerica into Northwest Nicaragua (2018)
The ceramic record of Pacific Nicaragua can be interpreted as showing evidence of migration in the form of both normal and anomalous diffusion. Normal diffusion is seen in the Department of Chinandega through the ceramics of the early facet of the Late Preclassic Cosigüina complex, which derive from the Providencia Sphere. This ceramic sphere originates from the southern highlands of Guatemala and western El Salvador and now extends at least to northwest Nicaragua. The evidence of superdiffusion...
Ceramic Pastes: Refining Epiclassic and Early Postclassic Basin of Mexico Typologies and Interactions Close to Home (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Interactions during the Epiclassic and Early Postclassic (AD 650–1100) in the Central Highlands: New Insights from Material and Visual Culture" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The interplay of compositional, stylistic, and technological variation of pottery from the Basin provides the framework to assess shifting patterns of regional interaction. The Epiclassic is characterized by Coyotlatelco pottery, although this...
Ceramic Production in Epiclassic Central Mexico: Strategies for Assessing Regional Variation with INAA, Paste Recipes, and Stylistic Choices (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Ceramics and Archaeological Sciences" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Epiclassic Central Mexico (ca. AD 550–850) is characterized by competing city-states in which ceramic distribution aligns with a series of neighboring solar market economies. INAA compositional study provides key evidence for assessing multiscalar patterns of production of diagnostic and decorated ceramic wares in the Basin of Mexico and Tula...
Ceramics, Ground Stone and Miscellanea at the Zaragoza-Oyameles Obsidian Quarry in Puebla, Mexico (2018)
One result of the intensive, 5-m interval surface survey of the Zaragoza-Oyameles obsidian source area in Puebla, Mexico was the recovery of several artifact classes suggestive of prolonged habitation. Ceramic and ground stone artifacts recovered indicate that domestic activities were an important component of the obsidian procurement and production economy. Ceramics tended to concentrate in areas that also contained higher quantities of ground stone, but did not correlate with any one stage of...
Cerro de las Mesas Monument 2 (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Sculpture of the Ancient Mexican Gulf Coast, Part 2" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Cerro de las Mesas Monument 2 is a colossal portrait head. Its flattened rear surface contains a relief-carved scene with a ruler in a broad-brimmed hat, vanquished captive with a calendric sign above his or her head, and a worn hieroglyphic text placed between them. In its entirety Monument 2 bridges the site’s Olmec heritage with...
The Chalcatzingo Reliefs Seen from a Critical Perspective (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper is dedicated to carrying out a detailed study of some of the reliefs that were carved on the slopes of Cerro Chalcatzingo, during the Middle Formative period, as well as to present some critical reflections about the interpretations that have been made by other authors. All descriptions imply interpretation, in consequence, every process of...
Changes in Settlement, Resource Extraction, and Trade in the Lower Río Verde Valley, Oaxaca, Mexico, between the Late Classic and Late Postclassic Periods (CE 500–1522) (2021)
This is an abstract from the "Cholula to Chachoapan: Celebrating the Career of Michael Lind" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Michael Lind investigated major sociopolitical changes between the Late Classic and Postclassic periods in Oaxaca, particularly involving Mixtec and Zapotec peoples. His interpretations integrated both ethnohistorical and archaeological evidence. In the lower Río Verde Valley, an ethnohistoric record provides insight into the...
Changing Patterns of Plant Use at Formative and Classic Period Matacanela (2019)
This is an abstract from the "Olmec Manifestations and Ongoing Societal Transformations in the Tuxtlas Uplands: A View from Matacanela" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Although there has been much speculation about the nature of agriculture along the Formative and Classic period Gulf Coast of Mexico, the local and regional subsistence economies of these periods remain poorly understood, particularly for Classic-period sites. In this paper, we...
Changing Representations of Gender in Ceramic Figurines During the Emergence of the Teotihuacan State (2018)
This paper investigates transformations in the construction and expression of gender in the Basin of Mexico from the late Middle Formative through Classic periods (approx. 600 BC- AD 600). Ceramic figurines from the sites of Teotihuacan, Axotlan, Cerro Portezuelo, and Huixtoco are used to explore how elements of gender were constructed and communicated in the region over the course of a millennium, and how these practices underwent a radical transformation during the emergence and expansion of...
Changing Urban Networks in Formative Central Mexico: A View from Tlalancaleca, Puebla (2018)
It is likely that Formative urban centers and their interactions with one another provided cultural and historical settings for the creation of Central Mexican urban traditions during later periods. Yet their urbanization process remains poorly understood. Our research over the last six field seasons indicates that some residential groups were settled at Tlalancaleca towards 800 BC and the settlement was urbanized with a significant population growth during the later Middle Formative period (ca....