Mesoamerica: Gulf Coast (Geographic Keyword)
51-75 (125 Records)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Despite over a century of intense research, little has been published on the non-durable technology of the Olmecs. This is due to the "tyranny" of preservation, which strongly biases the archaeological record in most areas toward durable artifacts. Recent analysis of a probably accidentally impressed potsherd from San Andrés, within the urban polity of La...
The Female Terracotta Sculpture at the North Carolina Museum of Art: Pastiche or Fake? (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. Large-scale female terracotta sculptures were extensively produced in the Mixtequilla region of Veracruz during the Late Classic period. It is likely that numbers of these sculptures were looted and smuggled into the United States prior to the 1970 UNESCO Convention on Cultural Property. This paper focuses the female terracotta...
A Fettered Serpent? Quetzalcoatl and Classic Veracruz (2018)
Great is the conflation of Ehecatl Quetzalcoatl and Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl: a mythical player in the world creation of Mesoamerican groups vs. a semi-historical personage who presaged the arrival of Hernán Cortés. Veracruz, a region implicated via the activities of both avatars, is particularly enmeshed in this duality. The Postclassic narrative whereby Quetzalcoatl journeyed to the Gulf lowlands appears to be foreshadowed in the desacralization of Teotihuacan’s Feathered Serpent Pyramid at the...
Flayer and Flayed Figures in Central Veracruz, Mexico: Is It Xipe? (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. The god Xipe Totec has been mostly analyzed from Postclassic evidence (Toltec and Aztec). He is recognized by the representations of a person wearing the skin of a flayed victim or the victim himself. While both types of figures appear in several regions of Mesoamerica, their contexts vary. In this paper I will review Classic and...
Flowers in the Religious Ideology of Contemporary Nahua of the Southern Huasteca (2019)
This is an abstract from the "The Flower World: Religion, Aesthetics, and Ideology in Mesoamerica and the American Southwest" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Flowers are a central feature of religious rituals among today's Nahua of the southern Huasteca. They are associated with the sun, growing corn, life-giving water, the bounty of the living cosmos, and ancestors who visit their relatives during Day of the Dead. For the Nahua, flowers are far...
Formative Communities of Practice and Disjunctures in Southern Gulf Lowland Interaction with Central Mexico (2018)
Recently Stoner and Pool called for an "Archaeology of Disjuncture" to refocus attention on variation in intra- and interregional interaction, illustrating the approach with the case of the Classic period of the Tuxtla Mountains in southern Veracruz. In this paper I extend application of the disjunctive approach into the Formative Period of the southern Gulf lowlands, focusing primarily on interactions with Central Mexico, and incorporating a Communities of Practice perspective on the formation...
Framing Unequal Boundaries: Women, Queens, and Gender (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Gender in Archaeology over the Last 30+ Years" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Since the landmark 1986 “Blood of Kings,” kingship has been a central theme in the archaeology, iconography, and epigraphy of the ancient Americas. Despite recent discoveries, the topic of women rulers remains ancillary to the larger view of male-dominated social and political power. During the past 30 years, roles of women have been...
Function Follows Form, Part II: Experimental Archaeology with Formative Period Mesoamerican Greenstone Tagelus Shell Facsimiles as Textile Tools (2023)
This is an abstract from the "Cordage, Yarn, and Associated Paraphernalia" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Many Formative period Mesoamerican greenstone artifacts are readily identifiable as ornaments, as they have clear counterparts in both form and function in later cultures. Other such artifacts, however, have proven puzzling to scholars, who initially categorized them as “miscellaneous objects,” “objects of unknown use,” or “implements for...
The Grid Patterns in the Vestments and Headdresses of Female Statuary from the Classic Period Cultures of Central Veracruz (2021)
This is an abstract from the "The Precolumbian Dotted-Diamond-Grid Pattern: References and Techniques" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Various researches report that the diamond, rhomboid, and square-gridded patterns and their stepped variants designate the surface of the earth as the fecund female progenitor, manifested in flowers, corn cobs, and sweet, nurturing waters. These patterns also designate the zoomorphic aspects of the shell or skin of...
Gulf Ballgame Viewership: The Ballgame and Center Functions (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Los Rituales del Juego de Pelota en la Costa del Golfo / Ballgame Rituals in the Gulf Lowlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In south-central Veracruz, higher-level centers during the Classic period had ballcourts. The prevailing “low-density urbanism” and a distributed urban network pose challenges for sociopolitical integration. How well did the ballgame accommodate at least nearby populations and contribute to...
Habitar en los bordes, ocupación Clásica en lomeríos y crestas montañosas al oriente de los volcanes de Los Tuxtlas (2018)
Los sitios localizados sobre la planicie costera y en el pie de monte de los volcanes de Santa Marta y San Martín Pajapan, en el sur de Veracruz, se caracterizan por la presencia de arquitectura monumental, grandes áreas domésticas, sitios acondicionados como estaciones portuarias, talleres de artefactos de basalto en formato pequeño y posiblemente áreas de cultivo. En el periodo de mayor ocupación (650-1000 dC.) los terrenos bajos estaban totalmente ocupados, por lo que el asentamiento comenzó...
Identifying the Archaeological Signatures of Inequality: An Analysis of Inequality at Late Formative La Joya and Bezuapan (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This poster presents an analysis of artifact assemblage data from La Joya and Bezuapan, two late Formative Period (ca. 400 BC-AD 100) sites in southern Veracruz, Mexico. The study focuses on the ways in which wealth inequality is manifested in the archaeological record; wealth is defined here as the total of desirable factors consisting of two main categories...
Is That Awl? Olmec Jade Artifacts as Elite Tools, Ornaments, and Inalienable Goods (2018)
Recent research has re-identified certain enigmatic Gulf Coast Olmec greenstone artifacts as elite versions of textile-making tools. These artifacts, which include Middle Formative picks, figural celts, clamshell and plaque pendants, and objects designated as "spoons," were likely used by elites as both functional objects and high-status adornment, as illustrated in the contemporary sculpture. Most examples of these artifacts are found in caches and graves of distant and/or later civilizations,...
Jaguar Serpents, Smoke, and Ropes: Iconographic Analysis of Olmec Thrones incl. La Venta Altar IV and Oxtotitlan Mural I (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Formerly identified cosmograms for the Olmec culture include the Dallas Plaque and the Las Limas figure. Politically, this vision is centered by Olmec rulers which is visible through the iconographic interpretations of works including La Venta Altar 4, Oxtotlitlan Mural 1, among others. These interpretations build on the work of previous scholars and are...
Juego y muerte: Imágenes de un ritual / Game and Death: Images of a Ritual (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Los Rituales del Juego de Pelota en la Costa del Golfo / Ballgame Rituals in the Gulf Lowlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Images from Las Higueras mural paintings as well as from El Tajín bas reliefs depicting ball players and sacrifice related to the ritual will be presented and discussed. Musicians, ballplayers, and divinities seem to have specific roles. Were the losers or the winners sacrificed? Chroniquers...
La lítica tallada de Estero Rabón. Un estudio durante la Fase Villa Alta en la Costa del Golfo (2018)
El empleo de la lítica fue una constante desde los primeros grupos humanos, solucionando sus problemas cotidianos. Por ello, estos artefactos nos aportan información importante para la comprensión de actividades domésticas, sociales, rituales y económicas de una sociedad. El sitio arqueológico Estero Rabón está ubicado en el Sur de Veracruz. A través de las excavaciones en dicho sitio se recuperaron materiales arqueológicos de la fase Villa Alta correspondiente al Clásico Tardío/Terminal. En...
La Piedra del Gigante de Orizaba y el Monolito de Maltrata: Estudios iconográficos y su protección como patrimonio arqueológico (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. La Piedra del Gigante y el Monolito de Maltrata, pertenecen a lo que se llama escultura monumental en piedra, y se encuentran ubicadas en la región de los valles intermontanos de las Grandes Montañas, al centro y oeste de estado de Veracruz. Son importantes representaciones en bloque amorfo de piedra que relatan un evento...
La sociedad prehispánica del valle intermontano de Maltrata, Veracruz: Desarrollo poblacional, aprovechamiento y cosmovisión (2018)
El valle de Maltrata, al oeste del estado de Veracruz, presenta un desarrollo poblacional que inicia desde el periodo Preclásico, continúa en el Clásico, Posclásico y Colonia, durante esos periodos de tiempo la población se fue asentando en distintas partes del valle, aprovechando los espacios naturales que se disponían. Desde el inicio de la ocupación se utilizó la posición estratégica del valle como una ruta de comunicación, comercio e intercambio, que fue usada por diversas culturas para la...
The Late Classic Islas de los Cerros Landscape: A Tapestry of Kinship, Identities, Histories, and Ancestries (2019)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Archaeological studies on cultural landscapes are promising avenues for interpreting the embodiment of meaning to ancient peoples. Within Mesoamerica, most are restricted to elite contexts and centers with monumental architecture. In contrast, this presentation considers residential landscapes across social classes using settlement data and house mound...
Learning the Ropes: Cordage, Knots, and Lashings, Their Purposes and Their Meanings in Olmec Art (2024)
This is an abstract from the "The Ties That Bind: Cordage, Its Sources, and the Artifacts of Its Creation and Use" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. While only small fragments of actual cordage have been recovered in Gulf Coast Olmec excavations, depictions of cordage figure prominently in Olmec and Olmec-related art. Reliefs of string, rope, and knots appear as costume components on Colossal Heads, on figures in the round, and in relief images on...
Los complejos arquitectónicos para el Juego de Pelota en la Costa de Los Tuxtlas (2024)
This is an abstract from the "Los Rituales del Juego de Pelota en la Costa del Golfo / Ballgame Rituals in the Gulf Lowlands" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. En esta presentación se darán a conocer los resultados de las investigaciones realizadas acerca los Complejos Arquitectónicos para el Juego de Pelota que han sido registrados en la Costa de Los Tuxtlas.
Machine Learning Applications with Lidar to Predict Locations of Natural and Cultural Features in the Maya Lowlands (2021)
This is an abstract from the "SAA 2021: General Sessions" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This project entails creating machine learning models to predict the locations of caves and archaeological features using airborne Lidar (laser scanning) data. The goal of this work is to bridge the gap between machine learning pursued by computer scientists and the types of on-the-ground projects of interest to scientists who seek to improve management and...
Making sense of a Holy Trinity: the Dioses Narigudos of Classic period Central Veracruz (2018)
Dioses Narigudos are a series of ceramic figurines that are extremely frequent during the Classic period in a very restricted area of South Central Veracruz. They occur generally in ritual deposits under floors of major and minor buildings, combining female and male representations of different hierarchy. Current interpretations relate them to a solar deity or a water deity, none of which identifications apply to all three main figurine types. Their attributes and the contexts in which they are...
Matacanela in Its Regional and Cultural Context (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. In this presentation I synthesize recent studies that the Matacanela Archaeological Project has produced as a way of situating the presentations in this session within their broader temporal and spatial contexts, both with the Tuxtlas and the broader Gulf lowlands. One notable aspect...
Maíz y olmecas: una truculenta trayectoria. (2018)
Tradicionalmente en la arqueología de la costa del golfo y en específico, dentro de la zona nuclear olmeca se había propuesto que uno de los principales productos que se consumieron durante el preclásico por la sociedad olmeca fue el maíz. Aunado a esto las contantes representaciones de esta planta dentro del sistema de registro olmeca, sugerían una tendencia muy marcada y una preferencia inminente a la producción de este alimento, ya sea con fines ceremoniales o para consumo. Sin embargo,...