Sculpting the Landscape: Analyzing the Formative-Classic Period Built Environment at Los Guachimontones, Jalisco

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Regional and Intensive Site Survey: Case Studies from Mesoamerica" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Los Guachimontones is the quintessential and largest archaeological site of the Teuchitlán tradition or culture. Despite this, until recently our understanding of the site has been hampered in part by an overemphasis on excavations in the largest, most monumental guachimontón (or circular architectural groups). However, recent intensive survey and mapping of the site is now providing a more nuanced understanding of this large and complex settlement. In this paper, I report on the results of multiple spatial analyses at the scale of the entire site during the Formative to Classic periods. The results suggest a highly accessible built environment. Specifically, the inhabitants of Los Guachimontones created discrete and socially meaningful spaces (e.g., neighborhoods), where a variety of economic and ritual activities took place. The centers of these neighborhoods were focused on a guachimontón, which served to organize social use of space and their limits were expressed in the form of empty or sparsely occupied zones. The highly repetitive and planned character of the urban landscape sheds light on the internal organization of the site, which provides important insights into its political and economic organization.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Regional and Intensive Site Survey: Case Studies from Mesoamerica   •
• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 24433