Social and Political Organization: States and Empires (Other Keyword)

DOCUMENT Citation Only Susan Kus. Victor Raharijaona.

Many societies archaeologists seek to understand are societies of primary orality. They are "lifeworlds" of primary subsistence. Their study demands a multiplicity of approaches. Certainly one needs a sensitive yet hardy material gaze (and touch). Further, one should seek sensuous engagement in subsistence and celebration. Additionally, one should cultivate an incitement to imagine how the poetic and philosophical, of both reflective thought and of speech, are anchored in the material...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Stefanie Bautista. Justin Jennings. Willy Yépez.

In the ninth century AD, Wari settlers founded the site of Quilcapampa in the Sihuas Valley of southern Peru. The first definitive Wari settlement in Arequipa, the site was founded astride an inter-valley trade route that had been used for at least a millennium. This paper will discuss both the site's clear link to Wari, as evidenced by its architecture, ceramics, and foodways, as well as the possible links to the Nazca region where Wari control was likely fractured due to conflict and possible...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Andrés Mejía Ramón. Nadia Johnson. Christian John.

This is an abstract from the "Teotihuacan: Multidisciplinary Research on Mesoamerica's Classic Metropolis" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Proponents of collective and autocratic models of Teotihuacan’s sociopolitical organization relate the control and ritual of water to the development of complex society, but how such institutions materialize on the landscape remains poorly understood. We present evidence from six years of archaeological survey,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Wei Huo.

In the past, the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau region has been vacant in Silk Road route studies. The northern part of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau can be directly connected to the western region, with the Tarim Basin, Hexi Corridor, and the Loess Plateau together forming a very smooth ring. There are a number of oases connecting the desert and the Gobi, which has been considered by some as a direct connection of a Silk Road branch to the northern region of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. The southern part of the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Tamara Bray. Leah Minc. Sergio Chavez.

Copacabana has been a pilgrimage destination and a site of extraordinary reverence from Formative times to the present. Together with the Islands of the Sun and Moon, it formerly comprised one the most sacred ceremonial complexes in the Inca Empire. Recent archaeological research in Copacabana has focused on the Intinkala sector located just east of the modern basilica. The principal aim of the first season was to ascertain the nature of Inca engagement with this powerful locale as evidenced...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Francisco Garrido.

This is an abstract from the "Alfareros deste Inga: Pottery Production, Distribution and Exchange in the Tawantinsuyu" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. As in other parts of the empire, Inca pottery in the southern provinces portrays a mix of Cuzco and local designs. Inca aryballos, plates, and jars incorporated local styles, just as local pots incorporated Inca styles. However, does the presence of Inca style always indicate imperial control? How...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Ann Rowe.

Comparatively little excavation information is available from the Chancay valley, particularly pertaining to textiles, which are abundantly preserved there. Yet, it turned out to be possible to identify in museum collections, including that of the NMAI, two distinct styles of highland tunics found at sites in the mid and lower Chillon valley and vicinity that in turn influenced mid-valley and coastal tunics, particularly Chancay-style examples. Moreover, textile designs made it possible to date...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Rodrigo Areche.

This is an abstract from the "Developments through Time on the South Coast of Peru: In Memory of Patrick Carmichael" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the Cañete Valley, one of the most important valleys in the south coast of Peru, the Inca presence was strong according to ethnohistoric documents and archaeological evidence. Most archaeological evidence for this strong presence comes from sites such as Incahuasi of Lunahuana and Cerro Azul....

DOCUMENT Citation Only Kathryn Grossman. Tate Paulette.

This is an abstract from the "Ancient Pastoralism in a Global Perspective" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In ancient Mesopotamia, animal husbandry was intimately bound up with the process of state making. The twin institutional powers of palace and temple managed enormous herds of sheep and goats. But were these animals mere wealth-on-the-hoof, staple goods supporting a classic system of staple finance? Or were they something else, operating...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Erik Jurado. Carolina Meza Rodriguez. Mario Cordova Tello. Gerardo Gutierrez.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. San Ignacio is located in the Amatzinac Valley of Morelos, approximately 10 kilometers south of the Formative site of Chalcatzingo, where it was the regional center and largest site in Eastern Morelos during the Classic period (300 - 600 CE). Previous studies argued based on regional settlement data that San Ignacio was a possible Teotihuacan...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Alexander Safronov. Dmitri Beliaev. Milan Kovác.

This is an abstract from the "At the Interface the Use of Archaeology and Texts in Research" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The dynastic history of Uaxactun is one of the most ancient among the political centers of the Maya Lowlands in the Preclassic and Classic periods. The beginning of history of a dynasty concerns to the III cent. BC, and its end to the final years of the IX cent. AD. On an extent more than a thousand-year history the dynasty...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Francesca Fulminante. Luce Prignano. Sergi Lozano. Emanuele Cozzo.

This is an abstract from the "Regional Settlement Networks Analysis: A Global Comparison" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Ancient regional routes were vital for interactions between settlements and deeply influenced the development of past societies and their “complexification” (e.g., urbanization). For example, terrestrial routes required resources and inter-settlement cooperation to be established and maintained, and can be regarded as an...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Patrick Ryan Williams.

This is an abstract from the "From Households to Empires: Papers Presented in Honor of Bradley J. Parker" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Bradley Parker was first and foremost a student of empire. As an Assyriologist and a budding Andeanist, he was enthralled with understanding the rise and persistence of empire from a comparative approach, and at the time of his death was building an inspirational model to understand imperial expansion from the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Krzysztof Makowski.

This is an abstract from the "A Decade of Multidisciplinary Research at Castillo de Huarmey, Peru" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Excavations since 2005 at Pachacamac (Lurin Valley) near Lima and since 2010 at Castillo de Huarmey (Huarmey Valley) have provided important new evidence about the character and chronology of these two sites, considered by Menzel to be religious and political centers of the Wari Empire. Both sites were contemporaneous,...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Brandon Lewis. Rui Mataloto. Samantha Lorenz. Hugo Miranda de Morais.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Excavations at Freixo, Portugal, continue to provide substantive data regarding the nature of Roman Imperial organization and decline in the southern Iberian Peninsula. Of specific interest is the role of hinterland communities within the overarching sociopolitical and ideological landscape. Recent discoveries at the Freixo Basilica suggest material...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Bethany Turner.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. During the 14th-16th centuries, the Inka Empire transformed Peru’s Urubamba Valley, located in the piedmont foothills of the eastern Andes, into an integrated landscape that was both economically productive and spiritually sacred. Extensive surveys have identified a shift whereby the Inka appear to have relocated settlements at higher elevations to the...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Sarah Richardson. Timothy Matney. Britt Hartenberger. Mary Shepperson. Tina Greenfield.

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The preliminary season of the Sebittu Project on the Erbil Plain of Iraqi Kurdistan was conducted over four weeks this summer. The project includes seven Neo-Assyrian sites on the plain with the goal of documenting the agrarian economy during the Neo-Assyrian period (c. 900-600 BC) in northern Iraq, the heartland of the Assyrian empire. The initial...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Dmitri Beliaev. Simon Martin. Sergei Vepretskii.

This is an abstract from the "The Rise and Apogee of the Classic Maya Kaanu’l Hegemonic State at Dzibanche" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In 2017 previously unknown mid-sixth-century Kanul king K’ahk’ Ti’ Ch’ich’ Aj Saakil was identified in Classic Maya hieroglyphic inscriptions. He acceded as “high king” (kalomte) in AD 550 and was responsible for the defeat of Tikal in AD 562 and the expansion of Dzibanche hegemony through the Southern...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Dmitri Beliaev. Simon Martin.

This is an abstract from the "New Light on Dzibanché and on the Rise of the Snake Kingdom’s Hegemony in the Maya Lowlands" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Recent studies of the inscriptions related to the Kaanul dynasty has revealed a new ruler named K’ahk’ Ti’ Ch’ich’. He is mentioned in various Maya sites (El Peru, Uaxactun, Naranjo) as a high king and overlord with a wide dominion. His accession in 550 CE is recorded on the wooden Lintel 3 from...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Diane Chase. Elizabeth Graham. Melissa Badillo.

This is an abstract from the "“The Center and the Edge”: How the Archaeology of Belize Is Foundational for Understanding the Ancient Maya" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Without Belizean archaeological data, we would know very little about the Maya Postclassic period (CE 950–1530). While viewed as a period of lesser cultural development by earlier researchers, Postclassic archaeological research in Belize was published as early as 1898 but...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Tomas Barrientos. Marcello Canuto.

This is an abstract from the "Regimes of the Ancient Maya" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Data from investigations at the archaeological site of La Corona reflect the role that secondary sites had for political integration in the Maya lowlands. Comparing what the hieroglyphic texts suggest with what the material culture of the secondary sites indicates, it is possibly to assess the nature of La Corona political regime before, during, and after its...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Krzysztof Makowski. Roberto Pimentel.

The comparison of new evidence obtained from Pachacamac and Castillo de Huarmey sites sheds new light on the character of Wari presence on the Peruvian Coast. Both sites are contemporary (Late Middle Horizon, ca. 800 - 1100 AD) and most new information comes from funerary contexts. In both cases, imitations of foreign styles, originated in the south coast and highlands, as well as the local ones are present in the iconography found in the offerings. Recent analyzes lead us to the conclusion that...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Barbara Stark.

This is an abstract from the "Textile Tools and Technologies as Evidence for the Fiber Arts in Precolumbian Societies" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The western lower Papaloapan basin in south-central Veracruz was subject to systematic survey and surface collection in several blocks of terrain. An initial analysis of spindle whorls from one survey block showed cotton-sized whorls were relatively abundant during the Classic and Postclassic...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Damien Marken. Olivia Navarro-Farr. David Freidel.

This is an abstract from the "Regimes of the Ancient Maya" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Classic period (250–900 CE) politics of the Lowland Maya have been the subject of intense debate among scholars for decades. Having long ago moved beyond unsupported models of peaceful theocracies and vacant ceremonial centers, investigators nevertheless continue to wrestle with characterizing the nature of Classic political structure. This paper will...

DOCUMENT Citation Only Christina Carolus. Asa Cameron. Amartuvshin Chunag. Joshua Wright. William Honeychurch.

This is an abstract from the "Advances in Macrobotanical and Microbotanical Archaeobotany Part 1" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The end of the first millennium BC (ca. 250 BC–AD 150) marks the genesis of Xiongnu, eastern Eurasia’s first nomadic state, which emerged from central Mongolia to successfully integrate one of the largest-scale political configurations in prehistory. This transformative period also marks the appearance of Mongolia’s...