The Aztatlán-Huasteca Network: A Model for the Acquisition and Dissemination of Scarlet Macaws from Mesoamerica to the US Southwest/Mexican Northwest

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Bringing the Past to Life, Part 1: Papers in Honor of John M. D. Pohl" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

In the long-running debate on the nature of interaction between societies in prehispanic Mesoamerica and the US Southwest/Northwest Mexico, the acquisition of scarlet macaws and their dissemination to the SW/NW has been perplexing. Questions abound as to how and why long-distance social networks were established and sustained to facilitate the northward movement of these tropical birds over thousands of kilometers between AD 900 and 1450. Who acquired scarlet macaws? How were they transported? What routes did these birds and their carriers traverse? Two decades ago, John Pohl proposed that an ideology of Seven Flower-Xochipilli—a solar deity linked to scarlet macaws, flowers, and maize-agricultural fertility—may have appealed to SW/NW people and spurred their interest in acquiring scarlet macaws, a hypothesis that has been substantiated by the author in recent years. Mimbres (late AD 1100s) and Casas Grandes (AD 1200–1450) people bred scarlet macaws, and genetic studies indicate that these birds derived from wild populations around the broader Guatemala, Campeche, Chiapas, and Veracruz border region. I propose the existence of a ritually scheduled cross-continental route traversed by Aztatlán core-zone cargo holders that intersected with Huastecan networks, a corridor by which macaws and associated ideas were then transmitted northward via west Mexico.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Bringing the Past to Life, Part 1: Papers in Honor of John M. D. Pohl   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37971.0