Resources, Power, and Interregional Interaction

Resources, Power, and Interregional

Interaction

INTERDISCIPLINARY CONTRIBUTIONS TO ARCHAEOLOGY

Series Editor: Michael Jochim, University of California, Santa Barbara

Founding Editor: Roy S. Dickens, Jr., Late of University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

Editorial Board: Lewis R. Binford, Southern Methodist University Jane E. Buikstra, University of Chicago Charles M. Hudson, University of Georgia Stephen A. Kowalewski, University of Georgia William L. Rathje, University of Arizona Stanley South, University of South Carolina Bruce Winterhalder, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill Richard A. Yarnell, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

THE AMERICAN SOUTHWEST AND MESOAMERICA Systems of Prehistoric Exchange Edited by Jonathon E. Ericson and Timothy G. Baugh

APPROACHES TO CULTURE CONTACT Ethnohistorical and Archaeological Perspectives on Change Edited by J. Daniel Rogers and Samuel M. Wilson

ECOLOGY AND HUMAN ORGANIZATION ON THE GREAT PLAINS Douglas B. Bamforth

FROM KOSTENKI TO CLOVIS Upper Paleolithic-Paleoindian Adaptations Edited by Olga Soffer and N. D. Praslov

HOLOCENE HUMAN ECOLOGY IN NORTHEASTERN NORTH AMERICA Edited by George P. Nicholas

HUNTER-GATHERERS Archaeological and Evolutionary Theory Robert L. Bettinger

THE INTERPRETATION OF ARCHAEOLOGICAL SPATIAL PATTERNING Edited by Ellen M. Kroll and T. Douglas Price

THE PLEISTOCENE OLD WORLD: Regional Perspectives Edited by Olga Soffer

POTTERY FUNCTION A Use-Alteration Perspective James M. Skibo

RESOURCES, POWER, AND INTERREGIONAL INTERACTION Edited by Edward M. Schortman and Patricia A. Urban

SPACE, TIME, AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL LANDSCAPES Edited by Jacqueline Rossignol and LuAnn Wand snider

Resources, Power, and Interregional

Interaction

Edited by

EDWARD M. SCHORTMAN and PATRICIA A. URBAN

Kenyon College Gambier, Ohio

Springer Science+Business Media, LLC

ISBN 978-1-4419-3220-4 ISBN 978-1-4757-6416-1 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-4757-6416-1

© 1992 Springer Science+Business Media New York Originally published by Plenum Press, New York in 1992

Ali rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming,

recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher

Contributors

Rani T. Alexander • Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131

J. Stephen Athens • International Archaeological Research Institute, Inc., 949 McCully Street, Suite 5, Honolulu, Hawaii 96826

Gary M. Feinman • Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin 53706

Mary W. Helms • Department of Anthropology, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, North Carolina 27412

Philip L. Kohl· Department of Anthropology, Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts 02181

Linda M. Nicholas • Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin 53706

Robert S. Santley • Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131

Edward M. Schortman • Department of Anthropology and Sociology, Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio 43022

Steadman Upham • The Graduate School, University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon 97403-1219

Patricia A. Urban • Department of Anthropology and Sociology, Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio 43022

Phil C. Weigand' Department of Anthropology, Museum of Northern Arizona, Route 4, Box 720, Flagstaff, Arizona 86001

Peter S. Wells • Center for Ancient Studies, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455

Joseph W. Whitecotton • Department of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma 73019

v

Preface

Archaeological research on interregional interaction processes has recently reasserted itself after a long hiatus following the eclipse of diffusion studies. This "rebirth" was marked not only by a sudden increase in publications that were focused on interaction questions, but also by a diversity of perspectives on past contacts. To perdurable interests in warfare were added trade studies by the late 196Os. These viewpoints, in turn, were rapidly joined in the late 1970s by a wide range of intellectual schemes stimulated by developments in French Marxism (referred to in various ways; termed political ideology here) and sociology (Immanuel Wallerstein's world-systems model). Researchers ascribing to the aforementioned intellectual frameworks were united in their dissatisfaction with attempts to explain sociopolitical change that treated individual cultures or societies as isolated entities. Only by reconstructing the complex intersocietal networks in which polities were integrated-the natures of these ties, who mediated the connections, and the political, economic, and ideological significance of the goods and ideas that moved along them-could adequate explanations of sociopolitical shifts be formulated. Archaeologists seemed to be rediscovering in the late twentieth century the importance of interregional contacts in processes of sociopolitical change. The diversity of perspectives that resulted seemed to be symptomatic of both an uncertainty of how best to approach this topic and the importance archaeologists attributed to it.

It was within this context that we decided that archaeologists and others interested in interaction processes might be well served by an attempt to sort through the different major viewpoints on ancient intersocietal interaction. This led us to organize, in 1987, a symposium at the Society for American Archaeology meeting in Toronto, where active researchers, who were representing the world systems, political ideology, and warfare perspectives, kindly agreed to present their views. We were so encouraged by the results of this session that we decided to bring these papers to the printed page so that they could be made available to as wide an audience as possible. The result is the present volume. Built on revised and updated versions of most of the papers of the Toronto meeting, the current collection also includes contributions of scholars who were unable to attend the 1987 meeting. Our

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viii PREFACE

goal has not been to achieve some sort of consensus among the authors concerning the best way to approach the study of ancient contacts among polities. Rather, we want the reader to appreciate how researchers operating from world systems, political ideology, and warfare perspectives investigate and explain the significance of intersocietal interaction in processes of sociopolitical change. We will, to be sure, draw some conclusions of our own on the ways in which interregional interactions are systemically and predictably related to shifts in sociopolitical organization. The goal of the book is not to advance our perspective, however. Instead, we will be satisfied if the reader draws some inspiration of his or her own from the collected papers and comes to a better understanding of the dynamic and exciting quality of current interaction research.

The choice of world systems, political ideology, and warfare as the interaction perspectives represented here is determined by our impression that these viewpoints currently dominate archaeological discussions of intersocietal contact processes. The book is organized into parts containing the chapters that are devoted to each of these viewpoints, introduced in all three cases by brief overviews that set the intellectual context for the chapters to follow. An introductory chapter investigates historical patterns in archaeological considerations of interaction processes. The concluding chapter draws together themes from the preceding chapters and offers some suggestions for the construction of a coherent paradigm through which ancient interaction patterns and their relations to sociopolitical change might be investigated.

More so than most publications, edited volumes are truly cooperative efforts. Such books rise or fall on the quality and cooperation of their contributors. We therefore extend our heartfelt gratitude to the authors represented here, not only for the work they invested in their excellent contributions, but also for their patience and understanding throughout the lengthy publication process. We also wish to thank David Webster, one of the original Toronto participants, for his stimulating paper and commentary on the original session back in 1987. Our thanks are also extended to Eliot Werner of Plenum Press and Michael Jochim for seeing the value of the manuscript, and to Eliot Werner in particular for his considerable help in all stages of editing and publication. The collection, especially our own chapters, was greatly improved thanks to the comments of Mr. Werner and an anonymous reviewer. The editors also wish to extend their thanks to Sharon Duchesne, the secretary of the Anthropology-Sociology Department at Kenyon, for her untiring efforts in deciphering the editors' cryptic remarks, combining all the papers-many on differently formatted disks with different versions of Word Perfect-into a single coherent form, and for cheerfully putting up with the whole typing process.

Contents

PART I. INTRODUCTION

Chapter 1 • The Place of Interaction Studies in Archaeological Thought. . 3

Edward M. Schortman and Patricia A. Urban

PART II. THE ANCIENT WORLD SYSTEM

Chapter 2 • The Political Economy of Core-Periphery Systems. . . . . . . . . . 23

Robert S. Santley and Rani T. Alexander

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23 Variation in the Structure of Core-Periphery Systems. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

The Dendritic Political Economy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 The Hegemonic Empire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 The Territorial Empire. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 Summary......................................................... 31

The Growth of Core-Periphery Systems................................ 32 Disenfranchisement and the Creation of Work. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 Disenfranchisement and Population Redistribution. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 Resource Control, the Organization of Labor, and Power. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37 Summary......................................................... 40

Sequences of Development. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41 Transport Mode and System Scale .................. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43 Summary and Concluding Remarks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

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Chapter 3 • Culture and Exchange in Postc1assic Oaxaca: A World-System Perspective. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Joseph W. Whitecotton

Postclassic Oaxaca. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54 Discussion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Chapter 4 • Pre-Hispanic Interregional Interaction in Southern Mexico: The Valley of Oaxaca and the Ejutla Valley................ 75

Gary M. Feinman and Linda M. Nicholas

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75 Project Methodology. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 The Ejutla Valley and the Valley of Oaxaca .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79

Environment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79 Settlement Patterns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80 Economic Activities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Phase-by-Phase Discussion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 Pre-Monte Alban Phases ........................................... 91 Monte Alban Early I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 Monte Alban Late I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94 Monte Alban II. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97 Monte Alban IlIA. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101 Monte Alban I1IB/IV. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . 106 Monte Alban V. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

Summary and Conclusions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

Chapter 5 • The Transcaucasian "Periphery" in the Bronze Age: A Preliminary Formulation............................... 117

Philip L. Kohl

Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 Ecological Setting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 The Transcaucasian Archaeological Sequence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123 Comparison with Central Asia (Western Turkestan). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

Chapter 6 • Interaction and Isolation: The Empty Spaces in Panregional Political and Economic Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

Steadman Upham

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139 Considering the Regional and Panregional System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140

CONTENTS ri

A Panregional Meaning of Empty..................................... 141 Empty Spaces in Panregional Analyses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142 Population and Labor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143 Travel and Trade................................................. 144 Economic Layering............................................... 145

The Jornada in Panregional Perspective. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 Settlement Patterns. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . 146 Subsistence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146 Material Culture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . 147 Rethinking Jornada Developments.................................. 147

Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150

PART III. THE POLITICAL VALUE OF IMPORTS

Chapter 7 • Long-Distance Contacts, Elite Aspirations, and the Age of Discovery in Cosmological Context. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157

Mary W. Helms

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 Traditional Concepts of Geographical Distance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158 Men of Influence and Geographical Distance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160 Native Views of Europeans. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163 European Views of Distance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172

Chapter 8 • Tradition, Identity, and Change beyond the Roman Frontier......................................... 175

Peter S. Wells

Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175 The Roman Frontier in Europe. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176 Sources of Information. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177 Roman Goods in Native Contexts: Four Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180

Near the Frontier: Westick. . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . 180 On the North Sea Coast: Feddersen Wierde. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181 In the Unconquered Heartland: Liibsow Graves. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182 A New Commercial Center to the North: Gudme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184

Discussion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186

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PART IV. WARFARE

Chapter 9 • Ethnicity and Adaptation: The Late Period-Cara Occupation in Northern Highland Ecuador........................... 193

J. Stephen Athens

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193 Environment........................................................ 195 Historical Documentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196 Archaeological Research-The Late Period. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 202 Regional Trade and Exchange . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208 The Adaptive Significance of Ethnicity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 215

Chapter 10 • Central Mexico's Influences in Jalisco and Nayarit during the Classic Period. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221

Phil C. Weigand

PART V. CONCLUSION

Chapter 11 • Current Trends in Interaction Research .................. 235

Edward M. Schortman and Patricia A. Urban

Units of Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235 Conditions of Interaction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239 Questions for Future Research. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 246 Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248 References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 249

Index.............................................................. 257

Part I

Introduction

Chapter 1

The Place of Interaction Studies in

Archaeological Thought

EDWARD M. SCHORTMAN AND PATRICIA A. URBAN

The last several decades have witnessed a renaissance of archaeological concern with the effects of intersocietal interaction on processes of sociopolitical change. This interest is so pervasive that we see within it the development of a distinct interaction "paradigm" that is focused on the domain of sociopolitical change processes (d. Schortman and Urban 1987). By paradigm we mean a coherent system of interrelated assumptions, unresolved questions, analytical units, and criteria for evaluating research results which focus and guide study (d. Kaplan and Manners 1972; Kuhn 1970; Trigger 1989:22). Interaction studies, in tum, refers to research founded on the notion that individual societies, or "cultures," are not viable but depend on inputs from other societies for survival and reproduction from generation to generation (e.g., Kohl 1987, 1989). The form, structure, and changes observed within any society cannot be understood without recourse to these extraregional inputs. Finally, the" domain of sociopolitical change" is concerned with shifts in power relations usually characterized by centralization, hierarchy building, and the incorporation of diverse ethnic and occupational units within a polity or, of course, the reverse (e.g., Tainter 1988:23-24).

To be sure, efforts devoted to establishing a link between sociopolitical change and interregional interaction are not new in archaeology. Interests in interareal diffusion as well as, more recently, trade are symptoms of this durable concern (see below,

EDWARD M. SCHORTMAN and PATRICIA A. URBAN. Department of Anthropology and Sociology, Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio 43022.

Resources, Power, and Interregional Interaction, edited by Edward M. Schortman and Patricia A. Urban. Plenum Press, New York, 1992.

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4 EDWARD M. SCHORTMAN AND PATRICIA A. URBAN

and Schortman and Urban 1987 for a review). Following the eclipse of diffusion studies, however, most interaction work has proceeded without benefit of an overarching paradigm. The importance of such general intellectual frameworks to the coherent understanding of any phenomenon means that the future success of interaction research is predicated on the development of a consistent paradigm.

It would be reasonable to ask why we need a distinct theoretical system to guide interaction studies. Certainly, there will be some sympathy for capping the proliferation of "new approaches" to the past and incorporating interaction research within existing conceptual schemes. The most likely candidate for such an overarching model would be cultural ecology which presently dominates contemporary archaeology, especially in the United States (e.g., Hodder 1982a, 1982b, 1984; Trigger 1984). Although attractive and parsimonious, such a solution is impossible. There is no extant archaeological paradigm developed to address interaction questions. Cultural ecology, in particular, is defined by a set of assumptions which are not only insufficient for modeling interaction processes but are antithetical to their very consideration. The roots of this exclusion predate the appearance of cultural ecology as a distinct paradigm in the mid-1950s. Rather, they are firmly set in persistent arguments and perceptions which have characterized archaeology and anthropology from their very genesis. A principal goal of this volume is to clarify the developing tenets of the interaction paradigm, to indicate the assumptions researchers in this area share and the questions guiding current study. Before turning to this exposition, however, we must uncover those durable perceptions of intersocietal contacts and briefly examine how they came to be enshrined as axiomatic in modern anthropological archaeology. Theoretical frameworks, such as cultural ecology, make research possible by focusing attention on specific variables and their interrelations (e.g., Kuhn 1970:15-16). As important as such focusing is, it always remains, to a certain extent, arbitrary. Variables of potential significance in understanding the phenomenon under investigation are ignored less because of their established triviality than for their assumed insignificance (Kuhn 1970). When guiding assumptions change, previously devalued processes suddenly leap to prominence (Kuhn 1970). This, we will argue, has characterized the history of interregional interaction concepts throughout the tenure of anthropology. Establishing the legitimacy of an interaction paradigm requires that we first understand this history. We must particularly grasp the basis for cultural ecology's banishment of interregional contacts from its explanatory repertoire.

Such a study could be conducted from a purely synchronic standpoint. A historical analysis of ideas, however, affords the same advantages that archaeology provides in the examination of culture change. Through the study of processes over the long term, we can discern patterns not obvious in the investigation of contemporary phenomena alone. Furthermore, explanations for these processes, which are elusive when viewed synchronically, are often more apparent in diachronic analyses (d. Trigger 1989:3-4).

A long-standing argument in anthropology has been over the validity of trying to identify cross-cultural regularities in human behavior. Closely related to this debate is the question of what constitutes a valid explanation of human actions. Those researchers espousing a "scientific" search for cross-cultural patterning have tended to the notion of inherent causality. Although there have been diverse frameworks which employ this view of causation they concur that phenomena are to be explained

PLACE OF INTERACTION STUDIES 5

by their predictable, functional linkages with other phenomena. Opposed to this view is historical causality in which observations are accounted for as the result of a unique sequence of antecedent events. Proponents of historical causality generally think of cultures as incomparable entities, produced by their distinct histories, and so denigrate the search for significant cross-cultural patterning. Intellectual exchanges on these important issues have played significant roles in forming anthropology over the past 140 years. It is within the context of these arguments that perceptions of the significance of intersocietal contacts in sociopolitical change were formed and eventually became fixed. Specifically, we would argue that from the very beginning of the field, processes of intersocietal interaction have been linked to two phenomena: (1) the unique historical sequences of individual cultures, as the process which created that uniqueness; and (2) the unpredictable aspects of culture change. Intersocietal contacts, in fact, became the principal process underlying arguments of historical causality. As a result, interregional interaction came to be seen as antithetical to a generalizing science of human behavior.

How did these linkages develop? The answers lie at the very beginning of anthropology itself with the development of the evolutionary paradigm in the midnineteenth century. The nature of this conceptual system has been admirably outlined elsewhere (e.g., Harris 1968; Service 1985; Stocking 1968a) as has its relation to archaeology (Trigger 1989:110-147). We will concentrate here on those aspects of evolutionary thought which directly relate to the role of intersocietal contacts in cultural change. Essentially, these early anthropologists argued that shifts within such universal human institutions as the family, government, religion, and technology followed a uniform course wherever they were found (e.g., Morgan 1967 [1877]; Tylor 1958 [1871]). Progress toward ideals of rationality, complexity, and morality characterized this inexorable process with western Europe currently in the vanguard. Though often left implicit, these progressive shifts were driven by growth of the human brain, the structure of which was everywhere the same, its size and complexity varying among different populations (e.g., Tylor, 1878:5, 380-382). Each human brain contained the same primitive II germs of thought" which gave rise to specific, universal institutions (Morgan 1967 [1877]:59-60, 123, 252, 262, 330-331). Natural brain growth, therefore, spontaneously and independently gave rise to new forms of these institutions as certain threshold points were passed. The invariable order of such changes was determined by the nature of these omnipresent II ideas. II Evolutionary stages were, therefore, characterized by specific manifestations of the universal institutions appropriate to the size of the brain which invented and maintained them (e.g., Morgan 1967 [1877]). Given that all humans belonged to the same species, equipped with the same brain, observed cultural differences could be equated with variations in the evolutionary stages individual societies had attained. Living societies became the primary guides to understanding the development of human culture (e.g., Morgan, 1870, 1967 [1877]; Tylor 1958 [1871], 1878). Within this avowedly generalizing framework, there was little room for intersocietal contact.

Diffusion, the spread of ideas and behavior patterns with or without the movement of people, could affect the speed with which individual societies climbed the ladder of culture change. Societies which were mentally ready to adopt new forms of the universal institutions could be spurred to these changes through borrowing from neighboring groups (e.g., Morgan 1870:484, 504; 1967 [1877]:40-41; Tylor 1958 [1871]:1,8-9; 1878:5, 371, 376-377). Nevertheless, the focus of evolutionary studies


was on broad-scale cultural regularities and not individual societies (e.g., Morgan 1967 [1877]:58). The value of the latter lay primarily in the information they could provide on the forms taken by pan-human institutions at different evolutionary levels. They were not of interest in their own right (Morgan 1967 [1877]; Tylor 1878:372). The path of human culture history was unalterable, based on presumed functional links between brain size and institutional forms. Intersocietal contact was powerless to modify this process.

From the very beginning of the discipline, therefore, intersocietal interaction was identified as a process which did affect the histories of individual societies. It played no role in creating, or even obscuring, broader scale cultural regularities. This important point was never empirically established. It followed in large part from the structure of evolutionary assumptions which stressed independent invention and universal causes of cultural change (mental growth).

Nineteenth century evolutionism did not long go unchallenged. The stately, predictable progression of human culture came under persistent attack within anthropology in the early decades of the twentieth century. Leading these assaults were the practitioners of the newly developed "Diffusion School" which would soon dominate anthropology. Once again, the details of these important developments are covered by others (e.g., Harris 1968; Service 1985; Stocking 1968b; Trigger 1989:148-206). What is important from our perspective is that both the champions and vilifiers of evolution accepted the idea that intersocietal contacts were of most significance in accounting for the histories of individual societies. What had changed was the importance attributed to this level of study.

"Diffusionism" encompassed a wide array of perspectives ranging from the universal schemes of the Kulturkreis school to the regionally limited formulations associated with moderate diffusionists in the United States and in Europe (e.g., Daniels, 1964:88-107; Harris 1968:382-387; Trigger 1980:26-27; 1989:148-206). Our focus here is on the latter and their effects on archaeological interpretations of past interaction processes.

Diffusionists rejected the position that broad-scale patterns of culture form and change existed or, at least, were identifiable. Rather, they insisted on the uniqueness of each culture and the historical sequence which formed it. The naive link between biology and culture which underlay the inherent causality of earlier evolutionary schemes was seen to be fallacious. At the very least, it failed to account for the diversity of cultural patterns as these were becoming better known (e.g., Stocking 1986b). Each culture consisted of its own configuration of traits and trait complexes, isolable behavior patterns, and their material associations. Cultures were systems of traits, the latter appearing in any locale as the result of unpredictable historical accidents (e.g., Dixon 1928:66-75, 156-157). The principal historical process which produced these observed configurations was intersocietal borrowing. Diffusion, therefore, remained firmly linked to the histories of individual societies, becoming the paramount means by which traits spread and similarities and differences among cultures were explained (e.g., W. Bennett 1948:1-2; Boas 1940a:291, 294; Boas 1940b:251; Dixon 1928:223-224; Lowie 1966 [1917]:95; Rouse 1957). A significant shift in the perception of intersocietal contacts had taken place, however. To evolutionists diffusion may have been powerless to modify the course of change but it also did not obscure the universal operation of this process. Diffusionists, however, postulated that intersocietal interaction was capricious in its effects (e.g., Boas 1940b:256-257;


Lowie 1925:441) and effectively hid the existence of any cross-cultural regularities (e.g., Dixon 1928:229-283; Lowie 1966 [1917]:86-90, 95).

Diffusion, therefore, was the very antithesis of evolution. Where the latter was founded on presumed regularities in independent invention, diffusion took as its premise the unpredictability of cultural borrowing. Evolution ignored the histories of individual cultures and all processes thought to operate primarily on this level. Diffusion, to the contrary, claimed that cross-cultural regularities either did not exist or were so thoroughly buried by historical accretions that they were virtually unrecognizable. In this process, intersocietal contacts were ever more closely tied to the histories of individual societies and came to be seen as unpredictable, unsystematic, and actively hostile to the recognition of broad-scale cultural patterning.

The reasons behind this linkage are varied. Undoubtedly, some were tied to the need of anthropologists to make some sense of the bewildering varieties of cultural forms they confronted in their increasingly prolonged and detailed field investigations (e.g., Stocking 1986b). An important component in these developments, however, was the nature of the debate between evolutionists and diffusionists. An established, if previously devalued, concept of diffusion was used in this context to question the validity of unilinear schemes which presumed that cultural similarities were the result of independent invention. One way to counter the unilineal view without questioning the unity of the human species was by establishing that cultural similarities were more likely the result of intergroup borrowing. Furthermore, cultural diversity rather than similarity was now the focus of anthropological inquiry. Diffusion, previously used to account for differential speeds of cultural change, became the cause of that diversity. Intersocietal contacts were the very foundation of historical causality in diffusion arguments. Interregional interaction was now opposed to inherent causality and the search for cross-cultural regularities. Once these aspects of diffusion were assumed, they took on a life of their own which gained in acceptability the more they were asserted.

To be sure, the diffusion framework was a dynamic intellectual system. Throughout its existence, efforts were made to replace its naive assumptions which postulated the spread of traits, "like infection with a disease," (Childe 1951:168, quoted in Wright 1989:278) with more realistic appraisals of this process. Archaeologists in particular voiced increasing dissatisfaction with classificatory systems based on diffusion in which artifacts and artifact styles were treated as traits devoid of broader behavioral significance (e.g., Caldwell 1959:303-304; Collins 1940:576-577; McKern 1939; Rouse 1953:61-62, 64-65; Setzler 1940:261; Steward and Setzler 1938; Taylor 1964 [1948]; Wedel 1940:308-317; Willey and Sabloff 1974:106-116). Throughout the 1930s to the 1950s anthropologists and archaeologists attempted to (1) rigorously identify different types and mechanisms of intersocietal contacts (e.g., Barnett 1940; J. Bennett 1944; Hawkes 1954; Jennings 1956:119-120; Kroeber 1940; MacWhite 1956; Meggers 1971 [1955]:117; Rands and Riley 1958; Rouse 1953:71; Thompson 1958); (2) understand processes of trait adoption, including environmental influences on diffusion patterns (e.g., J. Bennett 1943:214; 1953:216,224; J. Bennett 1944; Jennings 1956:116, 120; Krieger 1953:262; Taylor 1064 [1948]:88-89, 164; Willey 1953b:379; Willey and Phillips 1958:19-20,37,57); and (3) evaluate the systemic effects of different types of contact situations on local sequences of culture change (e.g., Krieger 1953:262; Linton 1940; Redfield et al. 1936; Taylor 1964 [1948]:63-64, 164; Thompson 1956:53). Diffusion was increasingly seen as not just an automatic process (Wright 1989:278) spreading his-


torical chaos. It operated, instead, within a complex cultural and environmental field which controlled both how innovations spread and effected the cultures which accepted them.

Several developments in the 1950s and early 1960s illustrate this questioning of the unpredictable and parochial implications of prehistoric intersocietal interactions. The 1955 Carnegie-sponsored seminar on Cultural Contacts brought together archaeologists from diverse areas of the world to construct a taxonomy of intersocietal contact situations and their effects (Willey and Lathrap 1956; see Willey 1953a for an earlier effort along these lines). The typology they advanced was to serve as a basis for further work on cross-cultural regularities in diffusion processes. The Interaction Sphere concept of Caldwell (1964), developed to account for similarities in the treatment of honored dead among northeast North American Middle Woodland societies, also contributed to this theme. Most important from our perspective was the author's argument that the creation of close interelite ties played crucial roles in the development of sociopolitical complexity in histOrically unrelated cases. Such linkages stimulated the development of innovations and facilitated their spread. These efforts advanced the idea that interregional interaction can have predictable, systemic sociopolitical consequences and marked the beginning of potentially productive research in this direction. Diffusion might yet have a role in explanations founded on principles of inherent causality.

These investigations were cut short, however. No further work built on the results of the 1955 Carnegie seminar, and Caldwell's Interaction Sphere was primarily applied to the Adena/Hopewell cases for which it was developed (d. Binford 1965; Rowe 1966). Not enough research had been carried out to test the fruitfulness of these new directions. They were not rejected on empirical grounds. A large part of this disinterest, in fact, was due to a resurgence of a scientific, generalizing approach to culture in which diffusion played little if any role. This scientific renaissance took two distinct forms. One was represented by the work of Leslie White (especially 1945, 1971 [1949), 1957} and Betty Meggers (especially 1954, 1971 [1955), 1956}, the other by Julian Steward (e.g., 1940, 1949, 1972a [1955), 1972b}.

White, and to a large extent Meggers, saw survival as the basic goal of any culture. Since capturing energy from the environment is essential to that aim, cultures would structure themselves to effectively exploit their physical surroundings through their technology (White 1971 [1949]:365-368,376-377, 39O-391). Technology, therefore, determines cultural form. Shifts toward increasing levels of sociopolitical complexity were motivated and directed by technological changes resulting in increasing amounts of harnessed energy and/ or the efficiency with which existing energy sources were used (White 1971 [1949]:367-369, 374-375). White especially thought in terms of unilinear cultural schemes through which all societies could pass, marked by different degrees of sociopolitical complexity based on changes in technology (White 1971 [1949]:368, 374). This scheme retained the universal scope and interest in developmental regularities which had characterized nineteenth century evolutionism (White 1971 [1949]:364). Outmoded notions of mental growth were now replaced with processes of technological change as the principal causal mechanism.

Meggers tended to focus more on the study of individual societies than White but continued to emphasize the causative role of energy capture and use in sociopolitical change sequences (e.g., Meggers 1954; 1956:134). She placed particular emphasis on the efficiency and productivity of the subsistence regime. The more energy this aspect


of technology could extract from the environment, the more people it could support and the more complex the sociopolitical system that could be sustained (e.g., Meggers 1954:802,812,820,822; 1956:150, 152-153).

Diffusion played much the same role in the White-Meggers framework that it had in the nineteenth-century evolution paradigm. Contact among societies could affect the speed with which they moved up the evolutionary ladder of complexity. This is especially true where elements of technology capable of increasing energy capture passed among groups occupying environments where such increases were possible (e.g., Meggers 1954:809, 820; 1956:134, 150, 153-155; White 1945; 1971 [1949]:390). Nevertheless, intersocietal contacts were powerless to alter the course of overall cultural development which was ultimately rooted in technological change (e.g., Meggers 1954:822). White and Meggers, therefore, saw no necessary conflict between evolution and diffusion (White 1945, 1957), and Meggers retained a healthy interest in the latter process throughout her career (e.g., Meggers et al. 1965).

As influential as was the White-Meggers paradigm, the cultural ecology of Julian Steward assumed even greater importance in archaeology where it now dominates the field (e.g., Hodder 1982a; 196; 1982b:1-3, 6; 1984; Trigger 1984). Steward divided the elements of each spatially delimited culture into core and secondary features (see Steward 1940 and Steward and Setzler 1938:8-9 for early statements of this position). The culture core was composed of those behavior patterns which were empirically established as adapting a people to their physical environment (Steward 1940:482-484,486,494,497-498; 1949:674; 1972b [1955]:89). Core elements included technology as well as any other institutions, political, religious, or social, which promoted successful adaptations. The form, structure, and interrelations of core elements were determined by the functional linkages among themselves and with those aspects of their physical surroundings most crucial to a culture's survival (Steward 1940:449-450, 482-484, 486, 494, 497-498; 1972b [1955]:89). Similarities among the cores of historically unrelated cultures were to be expected as the result of adapting to similar environments through similar technologies (Steward 1940:498; 1972a [1955]:184, 208-209; 1972b [1955]:89). Anthropologists and archaeologists were to focus on the study of these cross-cultural regularities and define the laws which governed them. Principles of inherent causality founded on predictable, functional linkages among cultural and ecological elements underlay explanations of core configurations.

Secondary features were those aspects of behavior unrelated to facilitating a culture's physical survival. Their appearance in any locale was determined by the random actions of history, primarily diffusion. Secondary features contributed to cultural diversity and served to obscure developmental regularities among societies sharing similar cores. Whereas inherent causality was used to explain regularities in core features, historical causality-especially diffusion-held sway in accounting for secondary traits (e.g., Steward 1940:482-484; 1949:745-746; 1953:320; Steward and Setzler 1938:8-9). It was precisely these latter behaviors that were the least important aspects of any culture, and that were, in fact, obstacles to the scientific, generalizing study of human behavior (Steward 1972a [1955]:182-185,209). Diffusion, linked by virtue of its past associations with the incomparable aspects of history and cultural forms, continued to play that role in cultural ecology. Steward, in fact, was quite explicit in his denigration of the significance of diffusion in processes of culture change (e.g., Steward 1972a [1955]:182). Intersocietal contacts were not even granted


the diminished role accorded them in the White-Meggers scheme. The significance of diffused technological innovations was questioned by Steward. Whether a trait originated within or outside a culture was of no matter in understanding cause and effect sequences in culture cores (Steward 1972a [1955]:182). Little double was left, therefore, concerning the causal preeminence of adaptive process and the fall from grace of diffusionist ones.

The position of diffusion within cultural ecology derives in part from the broadranging debates we have discussed so far. There are also very specific reasons behind the correlation of diffusion and secondary features here. Steward's core/secondary distinction can be seen as developing out of a pervasive, albeit often implicit, set of mid-century assumptions in anthropology and archaeology. Kroeber had divided culture into basic and value realms (1952, 1963). The former included those behaviors through which a culture adapted to its environment and had to be explained in terms of this extracultural context (Kroeber 1939:205; 1963:85). Features pertaining to value culture were not related to adaptation and were determined by purely cultural processes including diffusion (Kroeber 1952:217-218; 1963:66-72, 85-86, 209). Archaeologists had also made a similar distinction. Certain traits, especially technology, settlement size and stability, and population density, were recognized as functionally interrelated in a predictable fashion with each other and environmental features (e.g., W. Bennett 1953:220-221; Ford and Willey 1941:326, 335, 343-344; Jennings 1956:69-88,118-119; Linton 1977 [1940]:32, 35-40; Martin and Rinaldo 1951:218-227; Thompson 1956:49-51; Willey and Phillips 1958:127-128). Other behaviors, especially such stylistic elements as pottery decorations and architectural forms, had no such functional interrelations and were freer of environmental restraints on processes of change (e.g., J. Bennett 1943:216; 1953:220-221; Jennings 1956:69-88, 118-119; Kidder 1927:488-489; Martin and Rinaldo 1951:218-227; Thompson 1956:49-51; Willey and Phillips 1958:72, 146-148). Although Steward introduced the concept of determinism into the study of basic cultural features, he carried over the notion that diffusion operated primarily in the value realm and continued to associate it with the capricious action of history. In this way, traditional views concerning intersocietal contacts became embedded in the cultural ecological paradigm.

No attention was paid to contemporary developments in diffusion research which pointed in the direction of a "science" of intersocietal contacts. Rather, the "dead hand" of old debates continued to dominate cultural ecology even as it began. Diffusion was traditionally tied to individual culture histories, a process which created uniqueness and obscured regularities. Steward's call for a study of these regularities almost required, by the logic of earlier arguments, the dismissal of intersocietal contacts from consideration. Cultural ecology, therefore, did not allow for the serious consideration of interregional interaction in processes of culture change and was, if anything, actively hostile to their study. As archaeologists, under the banner of the "New Archaeology," came to adopt this interpretive scheme, they also subscribed to its anti-interaction tenets. A casual examination of the literature since 1960 reveals that the number of concepts developed to model human/environment relations, such as niche, ecosystem, and symbiosis, far outnumber those formulated to advance interaction research (e.g., Binford 1971:34-36; Sanders 1956; Sanders and Price 1968:70-97, 188-191; d. Binford 1965). Named concepts are essential tools which help researchers discuss variables and their relations that are important in understanding phenomena under study (e.g., Kuhn 1970). The relative lack of inter-


action concepts and the plethora of adaptive ones attest eloquently to the recent direction of archaeological theory and research.

Certainly, the naive diffusion of the early twentieth century had run its course by the late 1940s and held little appeal for scholars. Erroneous and racist notions of mental growth had been disproven as causes of culture change. The simplistic assumptions of culture contact which successfully replaced them initially spurred much productive research (e.g., Stocking 1968b). Ironically this work led to questioning the diffusion paradigm itself and to the corrective measures of the 1940s and 1950s briefly reviewed here. There was, therefore, ample cause to react against naive diffusion as a "nonprinciple" (Harris 1968:377) which in causing everything explained nothing. This was the diffusion framework which Steward and his colleagues argued against as they developed cultural ecology. It was not, however, an accurate picture of the state of contemporary research on intersocietal contacts. Diffusion had been reified into an unchanging concept linked with notions of historical causality and cultural chaos. As a result, the hopeful developments of late diffusion research were not incorporated into new theoretical schemes. Intersocietal interaction, instead, was doomed to rejection as the intellectual climate shifted toward a scientific study of developmental regularities.

The picture we have painted here simplistically renders a complex reality. Anthropologists and archaeologists did not reject diffusion and embrace evolution en masse in the 1950s (e.g., Ford 1%9). Nevertheless, we can still perceive a pattern in the treatment of intersocietal contacts within anthropology and archaeology. During periods when generalizing studies of cross-cultural patterning were emphasized, concern with intersocietal interaction waned. The ascendancy of particularistic investigations of individual culture histories generally includes a rise to prominence of diffusion as an important causal process. This pattern continues even now when at least some postprocessual archaeologists call for a return to the study of individual cultures and the reinstatement of diffusion as a valid explanation of culture change (e.g., Hodder 1986:89). This is not meant to imply that the history of archaeology is characterized by oscillations in conceptual schemes with no progress being made from one period to the next. The cultural ecological emphasis on functional relations among observable, quantifiable elements, for example, marks a great advance over the pseudobiology of the nineteenth-century evolutionary framework. In any case, the essential point remains that as much as our paradigms improve, their assumptions concerning intersocietal contacts are generally naive and resistant to change. We are still working with views of interregional interaction that were found wanting and in need of serious revision within the diffusion paradigm itself 50 or more years ago.

If interaction research is to provide insights into cross-cultural regularities in human behavior, then a break must be made with these outmoded views. We have to recognize that, whatever its virtues, a theoretical framework dominated by cultural ecology has no room for interregional interaction. Interaction studies must pick up the threads of late diffusion research, as represented by the 1955 Carnegie symposium and Caldwell's Interaction Sphere concept, and proceed to the development of a paradigm appropriate to the study of interaction questions. Dissatisfaction with the anti-interaction stance of cultural ecology has been evident for the last several decades. The initiation of "trade" studies in the late 1960s was one symptom of this dissatisfaction and interaction research increases in intensity with each passing year


(see Schortman and Urban 1987 for a review). Still, as important as the individual contributions of interaction researchers have been, they do not as yet add up to a coherent view of intersocietal contacts and their significance to general processes of sociopolitical change. This dispersal of insights follows from the absence of an interaction paradigm comparable to that developed in cultural ecology. The development of such a framework has been hampered in archaeology by the pervasive, outmoded assumptions outlined earlier.

The present volume is, in large part, an attempt to gauge where we stand in the development of such an overarching scheme to guide interaction studies. It draws together prominent researchers who have adopted different perspectives on interregional interaction and who apply these views to diverse portions of the ancient world. Their contributions provide the reader with, first of all, an appreciation for the state of the art in interaction archaeology. They give an idea of what we know about complex processes of intersocietal interaction, their relation to sociopolitical change sequences, and indicate what questions are guiding current investigations in this area. More importantly, the collection affords the opportunity to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of different interaction perspectives on sociopolitical change. This important point will be the focus of the concluding chapter. At that time, we will evaluate how far we have come in achieving our goal of creating an interaction paradigm. What assumptions do interaction researchers share, where do we differ, what units appropriate to the study of interaction processes have been identified, and what are the open-ended queries which are demanding attention within interaction studies? As should be obvious from the research included here, much progress has been made in addressing basic issues of interaction research and an overarching framework, while not yet in place, is well on its way to being formed. These are encouraging signs that the study of intersocietal contacts is entering a productive period founded on sophisticated conceptual underpinnings.

In concluding this brief review, we would emphasize that cultural ecological and interaction viewpoints need not be mutually hostile. Anthropology and archaeology have been plagued with too many debates of the "either evolution or diffusion" variety in the past. Arguments of this sort resolve very little. In large part this is because human behavior is very complex, determined by a variety of factors including society / environment as well as society / society interactions. Cultural ecology and interaction perspectives should, therefore, be seen as complementary views of the past. Each is suited to the examination of particular research topics and will yield distinct, equally valid insights into processes of sociopolitical change and stability. Neither view comprehends the totality of its subject matter; no paradigm ever does. Rather than being a cause for alarm or recrimination, it would be best to simply recognize that both frameworks have important roles to play in modeling processes within the domain of sociopolitical change.

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Steward, J., 1940, Native Cultures of the Intermontane (Great Basin) Area. In Essays in Historical Anthropology of North America. Smithsonian Institution Miscellaneous Collections, VoL 100, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., pp. 445-502.

Steward, J., 1949, South American Cultures: An Interpretive Summary. In Handbook of South American Indians (ed. J. Steward). United States Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., pp. 669-672.

PUCEOFllnERACTIONS1UVns 15

Steward, J., 1953, Evolution and Process. In Anthropology Today (ed. A. I<roeber). University of Chicago Press, Chicago, pp. 313-326.

Steward, J., 1972a, Development of Complex Societies: Cultural Causality and Law: A Trial Formulation of the Development of Early Civilizations. In Theory of Culture Change (ed. J. Steward). University of illinois Press, Urbana, pp. 178-209. (Original work published in 1955.)

Steward, J., 1972b, Culture Area and Culture Type in Aboriginal America: Methodological Considerations. In Theory of Culture Change (ed. J. Steward). University of Illinois Press, Urbana, pp. 78-97. (Original work published in 1955.)

Steward, J., and F. Setzler, 1938, Function and Configuration in Archaeology. American Antiquity 4:4-10.

Stocking, G., Jr., 1968a, Mathew Arnold, E. B. Taylor, and the Uses of Invention. In Race, Culture, and Evolution (ed. G. Stocking, Jr.). Free Press, New York, pp. 69-90.

Stocking, G., Jr., 1968b, Franz Boas and the Culture Concept in Historical Perspective. In Race, Culture, and Evolution (ed. G. Stocking, Jr.). Free Press, New York. pp. 195-233.

Tainter, J., 1988, The Collapse of Complex Societies. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Taylor, W., 1964, A Study of Archaeology. Southern lllinois University Press, Carbondale. (Original

work published in 1948.) Thompson, R. (ed.), 1956, An Archaeological Approach to the Study of Cultural Stability. In

Seminar in Archaeology: 1955 (ed. R. Wauchope). Society for American Archaeology, Salt Lake City, pp. 31-57.

Thompson, R. (ed.), 1958, Migrations in New World Culture History. University of Arizona Press/University of Arizona Bulletin 29, Tucson.

Trigger, B., 1980, Gordon Childe: Revolutions in Archaeology. Columbia University Press, New York.

Trigger, B., 1984, Archaeology at the Crossroads: What's New? Annual Reviews of Anthropology13:275-300.

Trigger, B., 1989, A History of Archaeological Thought. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Tylor, E., 1958, Primitive Culture (Vols. 1 & 2). Harper & Row, New York. (Original work

published in 1871.) Tylor, E., 1878, Researchers into the Early History of Mankind and the Development of Civilization.

Henry Holt, New York. Wedel, W., 1940, Culture Sequence in the Central Great Plains. In Essays in Historical Anthropology

of North America. Smithsonian Institution Miscellaneous Collections, Vol. 100. Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., pp. 291-352.

White, L., 1945, "Diffusion vs. Evolution": An Anti-Evolution Fallacy. American Anthropologist 47:339-356.

White, L., 1957, Evolution and Diffusion. Antiquity 31:214-218. White, L., 1971, The Science of Culture. Farrar, Straus, & Giroux, New York. (Original work

published in 1949.) Willey, G., 1953a, A Pattern of Diffusion-Acculturation. Southwestern Journal of Anthropol-

0gy9:369-384. Willey, G., 1953b, Archaeological Theories and Interpretation: New World. In Anthropology Today

(ed. A. Kroeber). University of Chicago Press, Chicago, pp. 361-385. Willey, G., and D. Lathrap (eds.), 1956, An Archaeological Oassification of Culture Contact

Situations. In Seminars in Archaeology: 1955 (ed. R. Wauchope). Society for American Archaeology, Salt Lake City, pp. 3-30.

Willey, G., and P. Phillips, 1958, Method and Theory in American Archaeology. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

Willey, G., and J. Sabloff, 1974, A History of American Archaeology. W. H. Freeman, San Francisco. Wright, R., 1989, New Tracks on Ancient Frontiers: Ceramic Technology on the Indo-Iranian

Borderlands. In Archaeological Thought in America (ed. C. Lamberg-Karlovsky). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 268-279.

Part II

The Ancient World System

Introducing world-systems theory may be a vain attempt to elucidate the obvious, for in the years since Immanuel Wallerstein set out his world-systems concepts (the first volume of his magnum opus, The Modern World-System, was published in 1974 but was preceded by a number of essays largely collected in The Capitalist World Economy [1979a,b,cD, his ideas have become common parlance in social science discourse. Nevertheless, we will proceed, since the chapters in the first part presume familiarity with world-systems theory as originally formulated.

Wallerstein originally developed his theory to account for the appearance and spread of capitalism in the early modern era. In grappling with this question, he defined or redefined several concepts which are crucial to his theoretical framework. For Wallerstein, the proper unit of analysis in social science is not a culture, tribe, nation, state, class, or ethnic group, but rather a "social system."

What characterizes a social system is ... that life within it is largely self-contained, and that the dynamiCS of its development are largely internal. . . . If the system, for any reason, were to be cut off from all external forces (which virtually never happens), the definition implies that the system would continue to function substantially in the same manner. (Wallerstein 1974:347)

Two classes of social systems exist or, in the case of the former, existed: minisystems and world systems (Wallerstein 1974:348; 1979c:155-156). Minisystems are territorially small and their political, cultural, and economic boundaries are the same. These short-lived systems have human labor as their principal resource and have a "limited and elementary specialization of tasks in which the products are reciprocally exchanged among producers" (Wallerstein 1979c:155).

The qualifier world in the world-systems term was chosen to indicate a longer time of duration and greater spatial extent than the minisystems, but does not necessarily mean" global." In addition, when operationalized, world means" an arena, or division of labor, within which more than one 'cultural' grouping exists, but which mayor may not be politically unified" (Wallerstein 1979c: 156 and passim, emphasis in the original; see also Wallerstein 1974:347-348). The presence or absence of political units serves to further distinguish two types of world systems: world empires, which are politically unified, even if in an attenuated fashion, and world economies, in which there exists more than one political system (Wallerstein 1974:348; 1979c:156).

World systems of either sort are made up of three parts-core, semiperiphery, and periphery-and prior to modern times were surrounded by external arenas, that

17

18 PART II

is, areas which were not integrated into the system and which interacted with it seldom if ever. Core regions in the modem world economy are "zones in which are concentrated high profit, high technology, high wage diversified production" (Wallerstein 1979b:97), whereas peripheries have, "low profit, low technology, low wage, less diversified production" (1979:97). Moreover, in a peripheral area, "the indigenous state is weak" (Wallerstein 1974:349), but not all core states are equally strong.

In between cores and peripheries lie, usually both literally and figuratively, semiperipheries, where "productive activities ... are more evenly divided. In part they act as a peripheral zone for core countries and in part they act as a core country for some peripheral areas" (Wallerstein 1979b:97). Semiperiphery states may once have been core states, and they may look forward to promotion to that estate in the future (Wallerstein 1974:349). The semiperipheries are essential to the functioning of the entire system, if only as a buffer zone in between cores and peripheries (Wallerstein 1974). The dynamic which underlies the structure and development of world systems is interregional exploitation with powerful, rich cores taking advantage of weaker, less well-organized peripheries and semiperipheries. Core polities benefit from these unequal exchange relations while peripheries suffer from economic, social, and political underdevelopment. The result is the creation of political and economic hierarchies on an international scale.

Wallerstein's work has by no means been accepted uncritically. Stinchcombe (1982), for example, considers the work bad historical sociology and worse history, whereas Nash (1981) is more accepting of it. More recently, Washbrook (1990; we are indebted to Rita Kipp for pointing out this article) has responded from the perspective of South Asia, criticizing Wallerstein's concepts of semiperiphery, modernity, the growth and use of capital, the effects of colonialism, and Wallerstein's dismissal of the importance of cultural and historical particularity. He concludes that Wallerstein produces a version of history "marked by tradition, Eurocentricity, teleology, and functionalism" (Washbrook 1990:504), which needs substantial improvement.

Archaeologists have not been absent from the fray. Jane Schneider (1977) appears to have been the first to apply world-systems theory to prehistory (applications to historical archaeology exist but are beyond our purview; however, see Lewis 1985; McGovern 1985; and Paynter 1985), but soon after we find treatments of the theory by Kohl (1978, 1979, 1987), Ekholm and Friedman (1979), Pailes and Whitecotton (1979), Upham (1982, 1986), and Blanton and Feinman (1984). These studies and others have recently been discussed by Kohl (1987) in his work on early West Asian states, and by ourselves (Schortman and Urban 1987) in a review of approaches to interregional interaction in prehistory. Some of the major archaeological criticisms revolve around Wallerstein's assertions about the stability and/or instability of ancient world systems, or even the existence of such systems; his dismissal of preciosities (luxury goods) as economically and politically Significant; his denial of the importance of differences in language, religion, ethnicity, and culture in structuring relations within world systems (Kohl 1987; Schortman and Urban 1987).

As Ragin and Chirot (1984:305-306) point out that

lilt is possible to ... take advantage of the ideas and concepts that Wallerstein has introduced and resist the lure of his grand theory. The key is to use these concepts in the same manner as other social science concepts and models ... , Concepts are recognized as tentative from the outset, and there is no expectation that there will be a simple or straightforward correspondence between the conceptual model and

THE ANCIENT WORLD SYSTEM

the historical record. . .. Rather than ignoring or obscuring unsupportive evidence, social scientists ... should see this lack of fit as a basis for interpreting significant unique features.

19

Archaeologists seem to have taken this advice to heart, for in the following contributions, while world-systems concepts do come into play, the theory is never accepted without reworking, redefinition, or other adjustments. Some of our authors were among the first to try to apply world-systems concepts to archaeology, and here we see the mature products of almost two decades of research and reflection. In all cases, world-systems theory is not accepted blindly. In Chapter 2, Santley and Alexander, for example, concur with Wallerstein that control over capital resources is central to social and economic stratification but allow for at least a limited role for preciosities in this process, countering Wallerstein's outright dismissal of luxury items and emphasis on bulk goods (Wallerstein 1979a). Santleyand Alexander conclude that world-systems models are a subset of more general core-periphery models, and they choose to locate their work in this more general context. They also stress cross-cultural similarities through their use of examples drawn from around the globe and different time periods.

In contrast, although Whitecotton (Chapter 3) has a preference for Braudel's world-systems approach over Wallerstein's, he finds little validity in critiques of world-systems theory as applied to prehistory. This stance is consonant with his earlier work (e.g., Pailes and Whitecotton 1979; Whitecotton and Pailes 1986). Here Whitecotton delineates the transition of central Oaxaca from a world system with its own center, Monte Alban in the Classic period, to its position as a semiperiphery or even, perhaps a periphery, in the Postclassic. Of interest is Whitecotton's implicit idea of "nesting": a system may be largely a "world" unto itself, but it may also be a subsystem of an even larger world system.

Feinman and Nicholas turn their attention in Chapter 4 to changing relations between cores and their peripheries, focusing on the Ejutla valley's relationship(s) to the valley of Oaxaca, which they treat as a core of a coherent system. They show that Ejutla changed from an external arena to a periphery, maintaining the latter position for most of Prehispanic time. The kinds of interactions documented by ethnohistory within this region seem to have their roots in these much earlier ties.

In the only chapter in this section exclusively highlighting the Old World (Chapter 5), Kohl draws our attention to the question of underdevelopment. In classic world-systems theory, the peripheries, and usually the semiperipheries, are economically and politically underdeveloped compared to the core state(s) (Wallerstein 1974:349; 1979b:97). The Transcaucasus, however, often was more technologically advanced than was the putative core area of Mesopotamia. Concepts such as underdevelopment do not seem to apply in this case, suggesting that ancient and modern world systems were not structured in the same fashion. Kohl also notes that in antiquity various world systems could coexist, interacting it is true, but nonetheless autonomous.

The final chapter in this section returns us to the New World, this time to the southwestern portion of North America. In Chapter 6, Upham has previously examined this zone from a world-systems perspective (1982, 1986). The current work., however, focuses not on the nodes of the system, but on its interstices. In part because of gaps in our data, and in part because of a tendency to focus on large, permanent settlements (points or nodes in a network), space between settlements or relatively

20 PART II

unpopulated areas, such as Upham emphasizes (the Jornada region), are generally treated as empty space, at best areas through which people, information, and "influences" flow. Upham demonstrates the poverty of this approach in his consideration of the apparently empty-from a permanent settlement perspectiveJornada. He reminds us that for a system to be grasped in its entirety, nodes, paths between them, and the spaces paths traverse must be understood in all their mutual interdependency.

Diverse as these contributions are, common themes are discernable: a critical approach to all world-systems concepts especially "underdevelopment"; an emphasis on the importance of preciosities rather than bulk goods, particularly in New World situations; the coexistence, even possibly the "nesting," of ancient world systems; and the recognition that despite similarities or regularities each system is unique. Archaeologists have indeed heeded Ragin and Chirot's call.

REFERENCES

Blanton, R., and G. Feinman, 1984, The Mesoamerican World System. American Anthropologist 86:673-682.

Ekholm, K, and J. Friedman, 1979, "Capital" Imperialism and Exploitation in Ancient World Systems. In Power and Propaganda: A Symposium on Ancient Empires (ed. M. Larsen). Akademisk Forlag, Copenhagen, pp. 41-58.

Kohl, P., 1978, The Balance of Trade in Southwestern Asia in the Mid-Third Millenium B.C. Current Anthropology 19:463-492.

Kohl, P., 1979, The "World Economy" in West Asia in the Third Millenium B.C. In South Asian Archaeology 1977 (ed. M. Taddei). Instituto Universitario Orientale, Naples, pp. 55-85.

Kohl, P., 1987, The Use and Abuse of World Systems Theory: The Case of the "Pristine" West Asian State. In Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory, Vol. 11 (ed. M. Schiffer). Academic Press, New York, pp. 1-35.

Lewis, K, 1985, Functional Variation among Settlements on the South Carolina Frontier: An Archaeological Perspective. In The Archaeology of Frontiers and Boundaries (ed. S. Green and S. Perlman). Academic Press, New York, pp. 251-274.

McGovern, T., 1985, The Arctic Frontier of Norse Greenland. In The Archaeology of Frontiers and Boundaries (ed. S. Green and S. Perlman). Academic Press, New York, pp. 275-323.

Nash, J., 1981, Ethnographic Aspects of the World Capitalist System. Annual Review of Anthropology 10:393-423.

Pailes, R., and J. Whitecotton, 1979, The Greater Southwest and the Mesoamerican "World System": An Exploratory Model of Frontier Relationships. In The Frontier, Vol. 2 (ed. W. Savage, Jr., and S. Thompson). University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, pp. 105-121.

Paynter, R., 1985, Surplus Flow between Frontiers and Homelands, In The Archaeology of Frontiers and Boundaries (ed. S. Green and S. Perlman). Academic Press, Orlando, pp. 163-211.

Ragin, c., and D. Chirot, 1984, The World System of Immanuel Wallerstein: Sociology and Politics as History. In Vision and Method in Historical Sociology (ed. T. Skocpol). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 276-312.

Schneider, J., 1977, Was There a Pre-capitalist World System? Peasant Studies 6:20-29. Schortman, E., and P. Urban, 1987, Modeling Interregional Interaction in Prehistory. In Advances

in Archaeological Method and Theory, Vol. 11 (ed. M. Schiffer). Academic Press, New York, pp. 37-95.

Stinchcombe, A., 1982, The Growth of the World System. American Journal of Sociology 87:1389-1395.

Upham, S., 1982, Polities and Power. Academic Press, New York.

THE ANCIENT WORLD SYSTEM 21

Upham,S., 1986, Imperialists, Isolationists, World Systems and Political Realities: Perspectives on Mesoamerican-Southwestern Interaction. In Ripples on the Chichimec Sea (ed. F. Mathien and R. McGuire). Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, pp. 205-220.

Wallerstein, I., 1974, The Modern World-System, Vol. 1. Academic Press, New York. Wallerstein, I., 1979a, The Rise and Future Demise of the World Capitalist System: Concepts for

Comparative Analysis. In The Capitalist World Economy (ed. I. Wallerstein). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 1-36. (Original work published in 1974.)

Wallerstein, I., 1979b, Semiperipheral Countries and the Current World Crisis. In The Capitalist World Economy (ed. I. Wallerstein). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 95-118. (Original work published in 1976.)

Wallerstein, I., 1979c, A World System Perspective on the Social Sciences. In The Capitalist World Economy (ed. I. Wallerstein). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 152-164.

(Original work published in 1976.) Washbrook, D., 1990, South Asia, the World System, and World Capitalism. Journal of Asian

Studies 49:479-508. Whitecotton, J., and R. Pailes, 1986, New World Precolumbian World Systems. In Ripples in the

Chichimec Sea (ed. F. Mathien and R. McGuire). Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, pp. 183-204.

Chapter 2

The Political Economy of Core-Periphery Systems

ROBERT S. SANTLEY AND RANI T. ALEXANDER

INTRODUCTION

In a recent article, Richard Blanton and Gary Feinman (1984) argue that pre-Columbian Mesoamerica was a kind of world system. Following the lead of Immanuel Wallerstein (1974), they suggest that the relative wealth and power of different parts of Mesoamerica were due principally to the ability to manipulate flows of material, energy, and people at the macroregional scale through the establishment of ties of superordinance and dependency. In their view, positions of power and authority at the time of the Spanish conquest were based on the ruling elite "maintaining control of the flow of 'luxury' goods, which were ... important in attracting and materially rewarding the cadre of soldiers and officials that were the lifeblood of the state" (Blanton and Feinman 1984:676). Although nearby areas often paid tribute in foodstuffs, fuel, and other bulk items, "controlling the flow of [preciosities] was so important that it provided the major motivation for external conquest" (Blanton and Feinman 1984:677).

The world-system model that Blanton and Feinman apply to Mesoamerica was originally designed to explain the emergence of Western capitalist society. According to Wallerstein (1974), the development of the world system produced a basic dichotomy between a densely populated metropolitan core and an underdeveloped and more sparsely inhabited periphery linked together by unequal exchange. High-cap-

ROBERT S. SANTLEY and RANI T. ALEXANDER • Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico 8713l.


23

24 ROBERT S. SANTLEY AND RANI T. ALEXANDER

ital, intensive high-profit goods were produced in the core area under conditions of "free" wage labor and little supervision, whereas low-profit, low-capital intensive goods and resources were extracted from the periphery usually involving some form of coerced labor and a greater amount of supervision. The result was a unification of overseas trade in the Baltic, Atlantic, and Mediterranean and the creation of an independent market system which increasingly dealt with bulky subsistence items in addition to more valuable luxury goods.

Wallerstein (1974:41) doubts that the circulation of elite goods could have stimulated the development of a precapitalist world system, because the incidence of such exchange was generally quite low. He suggests that in the long run staples account for more of men's economic thrusts than luxuries (1974:41). Presumably, this was the case because preindustrial transport systems were underdeveloped or inefficient. We agree with Wallerstein that most systems of social and economic stratification are based on control of capital resources, especially in preindustrial settings where the capacity of the core to distribute goods over long distances was quite limited; however, we point out that preciosities should not be ignored completely if one is to understand elements of the political economies of early states.

We submit that the world system is really a subtype of a more general coreperiphery model in which articulations between components in the system are dendritic in structure. In such systems, the direction of many raw material and commodity flows is up the settlement hierarchy within the core and then from the core to the periphery. However, the degree to which the core has political and economic control over articulations in the periphery varies. This control may involve direct political dominion, but it need not. The core may be a constellation of autonomous states all competing with one another for control of periphery markets, as in the modem world system, or a single state, which appears to have often been the case in the preindustrial world. The periphery, in contrast, is an area of variable size situated around the core, which functions as an outlet for goods produced in the core as well as populations migrating from it.

This chapter addresses the question of variability in the structure of core-periphery systems and the factors responsible for their genesis. Our consideration of this subject necessarily involves several steps. First, following Hassig (1985), c. Smith (1976), and Luttwak (1976), we define three types of interregional systems in which the core differentially impacts its periphery: (1) the dendritic political economy; (2) the hegemonic empire; and (3) the territorial empire. Although the direction of many commodity, labor, and energy flows in all three systems is from the core to the periphery, each possesses a unique structure defined by different sets of core-periphery interactions. All these interregional systems are examples of what Eisenstadt (1963) calls "historical bureaucratic societies." We will attempt to differentiate several basic sets of economic interactions within this classification.

Second, we look at the growth of core-periphery systems. Our basic thesis is that their growth trajectories are from the center outward (Eisenstadt 1963; Finley 1973; Paynter 1981; Wolf 1966,1982). Such systems generally arise in situations where there are economic problems at home that are due to inequities in access to basic resources of one form or another. The core state's ability to solve these problems leads to the establishment of a core-periphery system. It also concentrates wealth in the center of the system, thereby stimulating additional economic opportunities. As we will argue, this concentration of resources in the core creates substantial amounts of work in the

POLITICAL ECONOMY OF CORE-PERIPHERY SYSTEMS 25

center of the system as well as diversifies its local economic base, thereby enhancing the core's ability to deal with stress. Population redistribution from the core to the periphery is another strategy to relieve local pressures that is often adopted.

The absolute amount of work generated is dependent on the scale of the system, the diversity of the local economic base, as well as the prevailing mode of transport between the core and the periphery. More work creates more economic opportunities, which, in tum, stimulate immigration and indigenous population increase and cause centers in the core to grow in size. Luxury goods are important in such systems only if production and distribution are controlled by the core and the transportation system is efficient enough to make them available over a broad area. In most cases, the political economy of core states, however, still rests on differential access to local capital resources, but dominating alternative resources, commodities made from them, or their distribution networks typically provide a stronger basis for core economic growth than control over anyone (Eisenstadt 1963).

Third, we examine the relationship between source control, the organization of labor, and power. Case examples from Spain and England suggest that the disenfranchisement of core primary producers typically occurs in systems organized under the tributary mode of production (Hindess and Hirst 1975; Wolf 1982). This problem affects elites and commoners alike and is solved by core investment in secondary product manufacture and territorial expansion. The degree to which more work is created diversifies the economic base of the core and ultimately the periphery, enhances the scale and amount of elite political control and economic power, and sets the stage for the development of capitalist economies. The latter are often found in territorial empires. The shift to the capitalist mode of production results in periphery economic development, the integration of the periphery with the core, and finally the fragmentation of the system into its constituent parts.

We close with a discussion of sequences of development and the effects of transport mode on system scale. The history of preindustrial England indicates that the British Empire evolved from a prior system organized as a dendritic political economy. Other cases, however, suggest that there is considerable variation and that there is no unilineal sequence of development. Transport mode, on the other hand, has pronounced effects on the size of the core-periphery system. When the transport mode is inefficient and is based on human power only, as among the Aztecs, the core-periphery system is relatively small in size, and most exchanges involve readily transportable, high-value preciosities, although some basic goods consumed in only nominal amounts per capita may also be distributed from the core to the periphery. In contrast, when transport involves the increasing use of animals, canoes, ships, and other alternative technologies, conditions favor the development of progressively larger systems.

VARIATION IN THE STRUCTURE OF CORE-PERIPHERY SYSTEMS

We have identified three types of political economy that involve control over a nonlocal periphery. These we term (1) the dendritic political economy, (2) the hegemonic empire, and (3) the territorial empire (see also C. Smith 1976; Hassig 1985; Jacobs 1969;


Kelley 1976). Although in all three subtypes the direction of many economic linkages is up the settlement hierarchy and extralocal inputs are important components to the core economy, the impact of the core on the periphery is variable, which affects not only the scale but also the internal organization of the core system. Moreover, all elements of these three types of political economy are not mutually exclusive, and hegemonic and territorial empires often incorporate local dendritic systems. As systems, however, they possess organizational integrity. In terms of basic structure, the world-system model discussed above appears to be an example of a territorial empire. In this instance, multinational companies centered in the core are integrated with periphery economies, but political compliance is always backed by the threat of core economic sanctions or direct military reprisal, even though different polities in the world system maintain autonomous jurisdictions over discrete territories. The recent Persian Gulf crisis is a case in point.

The Dendritic Political Economy

A dendritic political economy develops in states when peasant-produced goods flow directly from rural areas to the top-ranking center and when there are few exchanges between centers of equivalent rank (E. Johnson 1970; Kelley 1976; Mintz 1960; C. Smith 1976; Vance 1970). Production for export to a periphery beyond the boundaries of the local state appears to be the primary variable determining economic structure. Political control of this periphery, however, is not in evidence. In all dendritic systems studied thus far, the largest community in the core polity is a primate center which contains an export industry (c. Smith 1976). Lower-order centers exist, but they function mainly as bulking places for raw materials shipped from the hinterland up the settlement hierarchy and as break-of-bulk places for the downward flow of specialized goods from the primate center (Kelley 1976). The commodities bulked in the primate center or produced by industries in it may be basic goods, preciosities, or both.

In dendritic political economies rural sellers receive a low price for goods produced in the countryside, owing to the peasant's lack of capital and underdeveloped transportation nets which constrain the rural producer's marketing radius (c. Smith 1976). Traders, on the other hand, have the capital to move goods in bulk. They also exchange goods produced in the primate center, but because firms in the primate center totally dominate the marketing hinterland, city-produced goods are more costly, which drains capital from rural areas and concentrates wealth in the hands of the urban elite. Dendritic mercantile systems are consequently monopolistic systems controlled by city-based elites who stipulate the terms of trade. Dendritic political economies are also administered in the sense that regional economic elites frequently monopolize administrative offices directly or staff key positions with their clients. This leads to the incomplete development of second-order centers and to a greaterthan-expected number of lowest-order centers whose primary function is resource bulking (c. Smith 1976).

Dendritic central place systems occur in situations where there are great variations in resource distribution and access to wealth derived from them (E. Johnson 1970; Santley 1984a). They also occur in contexts where there are major differences in transport efficiency or access to transport nets (Burghardt 1971; Mintz 1960; Vance 1970). Primate centers in dendritic central place systems are thus often located near


deposits of some critical resource that is shipped beyond local system boundaries and/ or at the terminus of a major trade route where goods are transported in bulk (Santley 1984a; C. Smith 1976). Although production and bulking for export may not have been the original reason behind the founding of the local center, it becomes the overriding concern with respect to the establishment of dependent communities or the types of activities conducted in them once extralocal markets are tapped. Growth of the system is therefore from the top down rather than from the bottom up.

The Kirman Basin of Iran is an example of this type of political economy (English 1966). Before the 1970s, the local economy was dominated by Kirman City, a primate center situated on a major trade route to the West. Since the nineteenth century, Kirman City was a center of, first, shawl manufacture and, more recently, carpet weaving. European looms were eventually introduced to Kirman and to other cities, and the scale of the industry increased dramatically, reaching a peak in the 1920s when more than five thousand looms were in operation. Kirman City was the financial and administrative center for every major activity in the region. The local elite dominated all key institutions and basic resources in the province. For example, they owned much of the cultivated land and the water which irrigated it; they built new qanats and repaired old ones; and they controlled weaving and herding under the contract system. Although the Kirman Basin is part of a modem state, until recently the same types of economic linkages were present in neighboring regions, with a dendritic structure characterizing elements of the national economy as well.

The emergence of a large-scale industry in Kirman City had great impact on rural settlement patterns, demographic growth profiles, and articulations between the city and the countryside. The weaving industry required support in the form of subsistence production as well as more herding, which stimulated indigenous population growth and immigration from neighboring areas. Much of this growth occurred in rural areas, with each major secondary center controlling a fan-shaped hinterland from which wool was obtained for shipment in bulk to industries based in the city. Kirman City also grew dramatically in size as more looms were set up and other specializations established to support the burgeoning carpet-making industry. Although ownership of land was the traditional basis for elite power, the economic interests of the upper class became more diversified, with wealth derived from both land and textile production.

The Hegemonic Empire

In a hegemonic empire, a core state politically dominates a large periphery which provides tribute for the support of the core (Hassig 1985; Luttwak 1976). Political dominance is achieved by direct conquest, and subordinate states are kept in line through the threat of military force. A large standing army is thus not needed in the provinces, though one might be mobilized if tribute levies are not met (Hassig 1985). Many of the key local systems that the hegemony controls are themselves the centers of dendritic political economies, but the empire siphons off resources and processed commodities from them. In such systems, the core political economy is also dendritic in structure; many local raw material and commodity flows feed into the imperial capital where exchanges occur for exotics and basic consumables not available locally. Basic subsistence goods flow both through the local system and from the core to the periphery. The imperial capital is also the center of an empire-wide system


extracting luxury goods, and it may also be a major production node for preciosities distributed from the core to the periphery. Members of the top-ranking elite may also be entrepreneurs, converting tribute into other goods to acquire more wealth. Hegemonic empires do not have large bureaucracies since tribute acquisition is primarily the responsibility of local rulers (Hassig 1985). Wealth in hegemonic empires therefore derives from the control of a dendritic political economy organized on multiple levels, some emphasizing local exchanges and others devoted mainly to the longdistance distribution of critical resources and luxury goods. The tribute system and long-distance exchange network intersect at a number of junctures in the system to ensure both dominance of the local political economy and control of the empire at large.

The Aztec Empire is a case in point. From their capital, Tenochtitlan, the Aztecs controlled an empire which stretched from Veracruz to the Pacific Coast and from Central Mexico to Guatemala (Berdan 1982). Conquered provinces, however, were only loosely integrated into the empire. The principal aim of conquest was tribute acquisition, with the local nobility left in place so long as the annual levy was met (Carrasco 1978; Davies 1973). According to Ross Hassig (1985:101-102).:

By adopting an imperial system based on low-extraction hegemony, the Aztecs achieved a moderate gain in tribute from all areas [and] by exercising a controlling influence over the main cities of provinces rather than over their territorial expanse, the Aztecs tapped into the local commodity flow at the highest level, exercising very little administrative control.

Although the tribute levy for the average peasant was not great, the total sent to Tenochtitlan involved literally tens of thousands of tons of material annually. In general, basic foodstuffs were collected from provinces within a lS0-km radius of Tenochtitlan, whereas more distant parts of the empire paid their tribute primarily in luxury, sumptuary, and other exotic goods (Bedoian 1973). This tribute was used by the Aztecs in a number of ways, including support of the monarch's palace, gifts and commissions to distinguished warriors, the ruler's political clients, and royal artisans, subsidy of state administrative and military activities, elite foreign trade, emergency storage, and redistribution to urban populations in times of need (Berdan 1982). The bureaucracy required to extract this tribute was minimal, amounting to only a few tax collectors in each province.

Trade was carried out on a number of levels in the Aztec world (Berdan 1986). First, there were peasants and other part-time small-scale producers who sold their wares in local markets. Most vendors of this type dealt in subsistence goods, though ceramics, ground stone tools, charcoal, and other basic technology were probably also marketed on this level. Second, there were regional merchants who serviced major markets in the provinces. Although they also dealt in subsistence goods, these middlemen concentrated on buying and selling high-bulk, medium-value products, such as salt, cotton, and cacao, which they transported from market to market, often across political borders. At the top of the trader hierarchy were the pochteca. These professional merchants were organized into hereditary guilds which limited membership, and they lived in specific neighborhoods of the city and had their own religious cult. Most long-distance trade outside of the empire was managed by the guild merchants, although they traded heavily within the empire as well. Caravans, sometimes involving thousands of burden bearers, were equipped at Tenochtitlan and other Cen-


tral Mexican cities, and often trading expeditions were in the field for months, if not years on end. The pochteca trafficked mainly in preciosities, but they also moved such necessities as salt and obsidian (Bittman and Sullivan 1978). The total amount of goods exchanged from Tenochtitlan was therefore enormous.

Aztec control over the movement of goods long distances also had major impact on craft specialization at Tenochtitlan (Berdan 1982; Hassig 1985). Goods imported by the guild merchants consisted largely of raw materials: hides, feathers, metals, precious stone, and so forth. In consequence, as long-distance exchange was dominated more and more by the pochteca, specialization in the production of certain luxury goods became increasingly centralized at Tenochtitlan (Hassig 1985). Like the pochteca, featherworkers, lapidaries, and metalworkers were organized into guilds, held special rank in Aztec society, and resided in separate wards of the city. Since control over long-distance exchange gave the Aztecs better access to imported raw materials, skilled artisans moved to Tenochtitlan in increasing numbers where they received raw materials and produced luxury goods, both for local consumption and for export as well. Salt making and obsidian working were also conducted on a large scale near deposits of raw material in the countryside (Sanders et al. 1979).

The exchange and tribute systems converged at a number of points to assure Aztec dominance. First, by requiring that distant provinces pay tribute in exotics, goods unavailable throughout much of the empire were concentrated at the Aztec capital, making it the major source of foreign goods sold in smaller markets and giving the Aztec nobility a definite H gift-giving" advantage. Second, by redirecting the flows of exotic raw materials through pochteca long-distance exchange, TenochtitIan became a major production center, providing luxury goods for local clienteles as well as the empire as a whole. Finally, the Aztecs often required that peasants pay tribute in goods that they could not produce themselves or for which they lacked the essential raw materials. These they purchased in regional marketplaces supplied by the pochteca or directly from the pochteca caravans. The exchange process had thus come full circle, with the balance inevitably tipped in Tenochtitlan's favor.

The political economy of the Aztec Empire consequently had a marked vertical orientation. Since there was little economic interaction between centers of equivalent rank, the Aztec economy was not fully commercialized, as some scholars have argued (M. Smith 1979). Rather, economic articulations in the core were politically administered, with Tenochtitlan heading a dendritic central-place system which emphasized the flow of goods up and down the hierarchy. Tenochtitlan was also the center of a hegemonic empire which extracted large quantities of subsistence goods and preciosities from the periphery for the support of local populations or for conversion into luxury goods that were exchanged back to the empire at large. The economy was dominated by a set of urban monopolies with close ties to the ruling elite which controlled the flow of exotic raw materials as well as the production and distribution of luxury goods and certain basic necessities.

The Territorial Empire

The territorial empire is a logical outgrowth of a hegemony. Territorial empires are characterized by expansion based on conquest and the maintenance of a coercive military force at distant loci (Eisenstadt 1963; Hassig 1985; Wolf 1982). In such systems, peripheries are incorporated into a single, unified political system under the


direct dominion of the core, and a large provincial bureaucracy, backed by a core military presence, is set up in the periphery to monitor the collection of tribute, which is channeled up the hierarchy to a paramount ruler resident in the imperial capital. According to Carol Smith's (1976) classification, territorial empires have a partially commercialized, dendritic central place hierarchy which allows the integration of large areas. The economy of the core is often more commercialized than the periphery, but relations between them are still vertical in orientation, with the core dominating the balance of trade. The central portions of territorial empires have large populations, and expansion allows nonproductive surplus population to migrate to the peripheries. The military is often composed of such marginal or disenfranchised individuals, and military service or the colonial bureaucracy may furnish opportunities for social mobility. The additional produce acquired through exploitation of the periphery may also offset stress generated by the unequal domestic redistribution of wealth in the core (Barroll1980).

The core of the territorial empire, however, tends to be organized differently from the periphery. Exotic raw materials and products are extracted from the periphery via some form of coercive labor organization and are channeled up the hierarchy through a dendritic network (Paynter 1981; Wolf 1966). Military force as well as bureaucratic supervision ensures compliance. Local exchange of foodstuffs and subsistence items in the periphery is often by means of direct or indirect polyadic exchange networks and relatively uncommercialized. In contrast, production in the imperial core tends to be more diversified and based on remunerative compliance. Basic subsistence items as well as manufactures and secondary products are exchanged through a competitive market system. Monopolies also occur in the core, frequently under the direct control of the central authority. Variability among territorial empires exists in the degree to which the central government administers and controls the market system in the core (Schneider 1977; Schneider and Hansen 1972). The degree of political control over the market system possesses implications for social mobility and the development of industry and specialization. Two contrasting examples of this variability are the Spanish colonial empire and preindustrial England.

Spanish economic structure in the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries was characterized by a dualism between the central provinces engaged in sheep raising and agricultural production, dominated by Madrid, and the more diversified productive regions around the coastal cities which were oriented toward overseas commerce (Ringrose 1983). Madrid developed primarily as a political center and functioned as the node between the central and coastal economies. Spain had developed an unfavorable balance of trade with the rest of Europe by the sixteenth century, and the government became increasingly dependent on wealth flowing from the colonies. Agricultural production on the Iberian peninsula was frequently insufficient to meet the needs of the population, and Spain exported bulk commodities and raw materials, especially raw wool and exotics from the colonies, in exchange for necessary subsistence items (Lynch 1981). Attempts by the Crown to restrict and monopolize competition in the colonial maritime trade became increasingly ineffectual in the seventeenth century with the rise of contraband enterprises and the increasing autonomy of colonial centers.

Madrid's urban economy was dependent on government administration and poorly developed overland transport (Ringrose 1983). Extraction of wealth and resources from the core as well as from the periphery was accomplished by subsidizing

POLIDCAL ECONOMY OF CORE-PERIPHERY SYSTEMS 31

the urban market and administratively redirecting commodity flows. This undermined the economies of the older commercial and industrial towns on the coast and minimized the incentive for rural specialization. Furthermore, the trade imbalance retarded the development of rural production and industry, because cheap imported luxuries and exotics could not be reexported to the hinterland but instead were channeled out of the system. The result for the Spanish state was a series of economic depressions and episodes of population loss. Critical resources had to be imported from farther and farther distances, often at great cost, and Spain's political and economic position relative to the rest of Europe declined, culminating in the loss of her overseas empire in the nineteenth century. England, on the other hand, experienced prolonged and sustained growth throughout the preindustrial period (Clarkson 1971; Clay 1984; Wolf 1982). Agricultural production was intensified and diversified to supply the needs of the rapidly growing population. Intensification was accomplished by means of the enclosure of farm land which resulted in the disenfranchisement of a significant proportion of the population who migrated to the cities and towns. Diversification added a stimulus to craft production and secondary product manufacture, the labor for which was provided by increasing numbers of migrants from the countryside. Much of this production was shipped to the colonies and other parts of the empire. In contrast to Spain, England also had many more subsidiary urban centers scattered throughout the core as well as larger numbers of people to work as "free" wage laborers.

Industry developed in the English countrySide as well as in the principal urban centers. Exotic raw materials imported from the periphery were channeled through London to stimulate industrial production of secondary products via the "puttingout" system in which specific operations in the production process of a commodity were parceled out to individuals and then reassembled into the final product. Depending on the type of commodity produced, the putting-out system frequently obviated the need for large-scale production facilities, such as factories or warehouses. Much of this industrial production was oriented toward overseas export, and England's economy thus developed a favorable balance of trade with the rest of Europe. Competition between organizations specializing in long-distance maritime trade was encouraged rather than inhibited, and a plethora of "companies" were established during the early colonial period, often with the government as a major partner. Competitive maritime trading with the colonies supplied the core with relatively cheap imported luxuries which could then be redistributed throughout the core to stimulate production. The growing population also increased demand within the market, and England's economic growth was limited only by the lack of specie and credit institutions rather than by inefficient transport or insufficient production.

Summary

Our review of the literature indicates that there is significant variation in the structure of core-periphery systems. Although all core-periphery systems contain a primate center located in the core which provides the periphery with resources and manufactures, the degree to which the core has control over the periphery as well as the degree to which the two are economically integrated vary considerably.

In a dendritic political economy, the core lacks political control over the periphery, although it may dominate the periphery economically if production involves


necessities and there are few alternative sources of supply. In the hegemonic empire, in contrast, the core politically incorporates the periphery, from which it extracts raw materials and tribute and to which it distributes secondary product manufactures. However, because the core provides provincials with few services and the periphery is not defended by garrisons of troops stationed near its frontiers, hegemonies do not maintain large bureaucracies or standing armies. In the territorial empire, the core and the periphery are more politically and economically integrated. Although many wealth and raw material flows are still dendritic in structure, the core provides the periphery with important services and there are improvements in periphery infrastructures, which require the presence of a bureaucracy and military forces. The English and Spanish cases suggest that the degree of core development is linked to the extent to which periphery resources are reinvested in core infrastructures or are used to stimulate local economic growth.

THE GROWTH OF CORE-PERIPHERY SYSTEMS

Variability in the structure of political economies holds significant implications for patterns of resource extraction, labor organization, commodity flows, the power of elites and bureaucracies, and ultimately urban and imperial growth, stagnation, and decline. Dendritic political economies, hegemOnic empires, and territorial empires, however, have several features in common. For one, the top-ranking community in the system is a primate center, a settlement that is very much larger than any other core settlement, often by several orders of magnitude (Berry 1961; Blanton 1976; G. Johnson 1981; C. Smith 1976). Second, the economy of the primate center is generally more diversified than that of any other center in the system. Finally, the economy of the core rests on the extraction of goods, raw materials, or other revenue from the periphery (Eisenstadt 1963; Finley 1973; Paynter 1981). To a variable degree, these resources are reinvested in system structure, which leads to variations in the organization of both the local political economy and that of the system as a whole.

Mose core-periphery systems grow from the center outward (Finley 1973; Paynter 1981; Price 1978; Wolf 1966, 1982). Problems plaguing the economy of the core region require the absorption of peripheries to extract wealth, raw materials, and other goods. This solution is often more efficient, or provides more goods on a short-term basis, than the intensification or commercialization of the core. The latter are also often distinguishing characteristics of core economies, particularly in hegemonies or territorial empires, as we will argue below. In contrast, dendritic political economies are dependent on demand from a periphery that is not under their political control. Local patterns of growth, however, are much the same as in other types of core-periphery systems. This commonality, along with the parallels indicated above, suggests that growth was in response to a similar set of problems, all dealing with disenfranchisement of segments of the population from the means of production. These responses include the creation of work and population redistribution.

Disenfranchisement and the Creation of Work

In a recent study, Martin Barroll (1980) noted that there appears to be a strong relationship between the domestic tensions associated with class stratification and

POUTICAL ECONOMY OF CORE-PERIPHERY SYSTEMS 33

empire formation. In the six cases he discusses, there is clear evidence of an economic crisis at home at the time of expansion, the outcome of inequities in the distribution of land or the means of production. Disenfranchisement, the term we call this process, occurs when peasants and other members of society have access to inadequate amounts of resources necessary to sustain life or a standard of living. The process of disenfranchisement frequently takes place under conditions of population pressure, but it may also be due to modes of land tenure and inheritance, excessive taxation and tribute demands, differential redistribution, warfare, military conquest and forced displacement, and environmental stress. This disenfranchisement process is intimately related to the emergence of primate centers and, later, the development of empires. Moreover, success in providing solutions to such inequities is a function of resolving problems derived from not only the lower class but also other elites in the core system as well.

Archaeological and historical evidence indicates that most preindustrial civilizations were agrarian states (Claessen and Skalnik 1978). In Mesoamerica, for example, food producers comprised the bulk of society, and many early cities were regal-ritual or administrative centers, occupied by the nobility, a few craft specialists who produced goods for local elites and their political arm, the state, and large numbers of farmers (Sanders and Webster 1988). In contrast, the centers of dendritic and imperial systems differ from the capitals of early agrarian states in that specialists comprised a much larger proportion of their populations. As indicated above, many of these cities were also primate centers that had a broad-spectrum economic base where large numbers of resource and commodity flows converged and where substantial amounts of wealth were concentrated. The primate center, we suggest, represented a long-term solution to disenfranchisement from the agrarian base. Because the emergent center acquired central place functions, more work was created, which stimulated rural-to-urban migration. This work involved new positions in the administrative hierarchy, resource extraction, craft production, and especially transport.

Following Jacobs (1969), Donald Kurtz (1987:331) has recently pointed out that

urbanization is not the mere consequence of nucleation and population growth in response to irrigation agriculture; rather, it represents the differentiation and specialization of the social roles and institutions that comprise a city, and these changes occur as new work is created. The process is likely to be slow initially, speeding up and perhaps resulting in a period of explosive urban growth when exponential and cybernetic processes converge. It has two steps, the first of which is an export multiplier effect as work is added to the export economy. Additional exports permit the import of a greater variety and volume of products. Some imports feed into the export work, but others increasingly are consumed locally and stimulate new work in processing, manufacturing, and distribution. This initiates the second step, the import-replacing multiplier effect. Some finished goods that were once imported are replaced with goods made locally. This creates new jobs and gradually alters the composition of imports and permits them to be shifted within the local economy, stimulating additional work and increasing the size of the economy. (emphasis added)

Historic data on the development of core-periphery systems essentially support Jacobs's hypothesis. In the case of the Kinnan Basin, large-scale weaving industries emerged at a time when population growth put pressures on the local agrarian base (English 1966). Simultaneously, Europe's increased demand for Middle Eastern


shawls and rugs meant that textile production was a viable solution to problems of agrarian disenfranchisement on the local level. As weaving increased in scale in Kirman City and the larger towns, more support industries were required (e.g., dyers, potters, bakers, policemen, etc.), which initiated a positive feedback process involving both the export multiplier effect and the export-replacement multiplier effect that led to both dramatic urban growth as well as changes in articulations of the regional system as a whole. The entire core-periphery system, however, dealt in preciosities, not in basic goods or necessities. Hence, as demand for Persian carpets began to wane in the last few decades, the local economy collapsed.

The Kirman case suggests that dendritic political economies work well on a long-term basis only if they control demand in the periphery. Many archaeologists have argued that preciosities are generally used by local elites as symbols of power and authority, but because the type of luxury good utilized is dependent on the momentary whims of periphery elites, the core often has very little genuine control over demand in the long run. A completely different situation occurs with basic goods, particularly necessities which are found or made out of materials that occur in circumscribed geographic areas. These goods and resources are required for the maintenance of periphery economies; consequently, the core is able to obtain large amounts of wealth from the periphery over the long term. Iran's recent behavior relative to her oil reserves is a case in point. The same may be said for Teotihuacan's domination of obsidian deposits in Mesoamerica (Santley 1984b).

The history of Aztec urban development in the Basin of Mexico shows similar patterning. The Aztec period was one of marked and sustained demographic growth, with population levels rising from 250,000 to more than 1,250,000 at the time of the Spanish conquest (Sanders et al. 1979). The Aztec period was also a time when the state constructed major hydraulic works to feed urban populations, bringing substantial portions of the southern lakes under cultivation, and when salt making became a large-scale specialization north of the capital. The incidence of salt production increased with the establishment of the Aztec Empire, suggesting that some imports were fed back into salt making to expand the industry. Given the fact that no other salt-making industry remotely comparable in size is known for the Central Plateau, it would appear that the Aztecs totally dominated production and distribution by the end of the fifteenth century. Major industries producing luxury goods also appeared at Tenochtitlan at this time. This development was a function of Aztec redirection of many flows of exotic raw materials to Tenochtitlan via the tribute system: the import-replacing multiplier effect in other words (Hassig 1985).

Aztec domination of the distribution system also created substantial amounts of work. Large numbers of porters were needed to cart basic goods from production areas to consumers, as well as to bring tribute to the capital. Provisioning all of Central Mexico with salt and obsidian alone would have required between 17,100 and 34,200 bearers working full-time. The tribute system demanded an even larger labor force. Altogether, between 929,000 and 1,236,000 loads of goods entered Tenochtitlan each year, 68% of which were basic foodstuffs (Bedoian 1973). The manpower needed to move this quantity of material was huge: between 44,900 and 56,800 persons we estimate. Although tributary states were often charged with defraying this transport cost, most goods came from provinces near the capital, indicating much of the work created was local. To these totals should be added the guild and regional merchants, who probably required a labor force at least as large. Therefore, at least 10% to 15%


of the population of Central Mexico was apparently directly involved in moving goods, and much of this labor force was probably concentrated in the Basin of Mexico: the ultimate starting point and destination of most commodity flows.

Disenfranchisement and Population Redistribution

Decision-making by top-ranking imperial elites is a two-edged sword. On the one hand, the ruler must placate lesser-ranking nobles, including his kinsmen. Because elites frequently maintain polygynous households, they produce large numbers of offspring who survive to reach adulthood. More descendants means more claims to the throne or family inheritance, the ultimate result being disenfranchisement of part of the landed aristocracy. Placation here often involves status goods which are given as gifts to dissident nobles. James Boone (1986), in an independent study, essentially comes to the same conclusion. In Late Medieval and Early Modem Portuguese society, high-ranking nobles produced more offspring than lower-ranking elites, and because low-status females often married upward, there was a shortage of females toward the bottom of the hierarchy. Moreover,

Demographic data derived from genealogies show that among the high nobility, males out-reproduce females, whereas among the lower nobility females outproduce males, and that the tendency to concentrate investment in male offspring correspondingly increases with status. This family structural arrangement has a societal effect of generating intense competition among males for available titles, which results in increased warfare mortality among men and indirectly in the increased claustration of women. (Boone 1986:859)

On the other hand, the creation of more work at the imperial capital sustains the rural-to-urban migration process. Ultimately, the primate center becomes much larger than would be expected given the amount of work created, which exacerbates local land pressures and unemployment at home.

Territorial empires solve these problems through the redistribution of population from the core to peripheries. Provincial bureaucracies are often staffed with lower-ranking core elites to ensure efficient tribute extraction, and higher-level administrators are supported by estates assigned to the office by the imperial power. In addition, provincial leaders may be removed from positions of power and authority or held hostage in the core where they are indoctrinated in imperial ideology, thereby subverting traditional loyalties and enhancing their bonds with the core state.

The periphery also requires a military presence to prevent external incursions, quell local rebellions, and enforce the bureaucracy's decisions. The officer corps provides employment and wealth-building opportunities for disenfranchised core elites, while enlisted personnel are often drawn from the landless peasantry. Although booty is frequently cited as the reason for enlistment, veterans are also awarded plots of land in the provinces after retirement. This is a point frequently missed in core-periphery models which stipulate that rewards in luxury goods were primary goals of conquest. Among the Aztecs, for example, distinguished warriors were certainly given preciosities after battle, but they were also allotted land (Bedoian 1973). These gifts were symbols of achieved status in a system where the ultimate reward was land. Such redistribution therefore provided a very compelling reason for the Aztecs to go to war in the name of the empire.


The empire may also physically relocate entire populations from the core to the periphery. Colonies are founded in the provinces and the indigenous populations moved elsewhere, massacred, or sold into slavery. New colonies need their own administrative apparatus as well as support industries, which adds more work to the economy as a whole. These settlements are frequently situated near the frontier which solidifies the boundaries of the system and provides a buffer between the periphery and adjacent political units. This frontier may be used later as a base of operations for further expansion and political incorporation.

By redistributing populations and creating work in the periphery, the territorial empire releases pressures in the core and thus provides important system-serving functions. This process also serves to integrate the periphery with the core to a much greater degree than in hegemonic empires. Indeed, we would argue that hegemonies are fundamentally unstable. The institutional framework holding territorial empires together is lacking in hegemonies, and cohesion is achieved only through exercising military force or the threat of reprisal. Consequently, either they must evolve into territorial empires or break up into their constituent parts.

The political history of the Roman Empire illustrates the interplay between these processes. Rome's early history involved repeated wars with her Latin neighbors. The city owed its early success in part to control of the salt trade up the Tiber, but later on tribute became a major source of wealth. Peasant conscripts drafted into the army were frequently killed in combat or moved to the city which allowed Roman elites to buy up land and build great estates. With the rise in population during the Republican period, increased pressure was put on the local agrarian base, which stimulated a further round of conquest and tribute extraction, first against Carthage and then against Spain, Gaul, and Greece. By the end of the Republic, Rome was the center of a large hegemony, but the provincial bureaucracy was only weakly developed and the military was largely in the hands of the aristocracy. Success in politics depended on

the nobleman winning and keeping the goodwill and loyalty of the troops under his command and arranging for their welfare when they were discharged. [In addition], Italians who did not enjoy the privileges of Roman citizenship ... were increasingly evicted from their own lands either to make way for ex-soldiers or for the big estates of the nobles. (Ogilvie 1980:250-251)

With the rise of Augustus, however, power was ultimately consolidated in the hands of one individual, the army stationed in frontier provinces, and the administration of the empire was reorganized. The provincial bureaucracy was staffed with members of the equestrian class, and numerous colonies were founded for the settlement of army veterans, especially in southern France, in Spain, and in North Africa.

Rome was supported by grain from the provinces which was issued to her citizens free of charge. With the establishment of colonies came the spr~ad of Roman language, science, and political and social institutions which bound the empire into a cohesive unit. As time went on, rights to citizenship were extended to provincials as well, which increased the pool from which officials were drawn and decreased Roman participation in the military. Ultimately,

The extension of Roman citizenship, the gradual withdrawal of senators from military commands, the increasing proportion of posts filled from the equestrian

POLITICAL ECONOMY OF CORE-PERIPHERY SYSTEMS

order, often by men risen from the ranks, upset the balance and made control more difficult, particularly at a time when there was no dynasty that claimed empirewide loyalty, and when the soldiers' concern for their home province, threatened by invasion, was stronger than patriotism for the empire as a whole. (Liebeschuetz 1980:259)

37

The result was fragmentation first into the Eastern and Western empires followed by the rise of feudal Europe.

Resource Control, the Organization of Labor, and Power

Variability in the organization of labor and the strategies used for gaining wealth holds implications for the power relations among elites within a political economy. Control of exotics and preciosities under some structural conditions may be critical to the maintenance of authority in the face of competition from other elites and may provide the means of exercising hegemony over large geographic areas. Early territorial states have usually been based on what Eric Wolf (1982) has called the tributary mode of production (see also Hindess and Hirst 1975). Under this form of organization, surplus production or tribute is extracted from primary producers by political or military means. The deployment of labor to produce tribute is largely a function of the locus of political power. If control over strategic elements of production and coercive force is concentrated in the hands of a ruling elite at the apex of the system, rulers are able to gather tribute with relatively little assistance from periphery power holders, thus undermining the authority of peripheral elites.

However, in situations where the strategic elements of production are in the hands of local power holders, the central power has less control over primary producers, and local officials can interrupt the flow of tribute with relative impunity. Following extraction, tributary surpluses are generally placed into circulation and exchanged, thus generating mercantile wealth. If one is not a tribute-taker, strategies for gaining wealth are somewhat limited. Merchants can maximize surplus in three ways: (1) by buying and stockpiling tribute from the tribute collectors in exchange for other goods; (2) by opening exchange relationships with primary producers, encouraging specialization, and creating a situation of dependency upon exchange with the merchant; or (3) by expanding slavery or providing extra labor needed to intensify production in specific areas (Wolf 1982:83-87; see also Paynter 1981).

In contrast, under a capitalist mode of production producers are denied access to the means of production and are forced to bargain with those who control the means of production for permission to operate them in return for wages (Wolf 1982:77-78). Wealth is extracted from wage laborers under this type of labor organizations in the form of surplus value. A worker's production is worth more than the amount for which he is remunerated. Unvalued labor, such as that of family members, might also enter the production process of petty commodities if the locus of manufacture is in the home or in a relatively unsupervised environment. Unlike the strategies by which merchants obtain surplus under a tributary mode of production, the controllers of the means of production in the capitalist mode maximize wealth by changing the methods of manufacture, usually through improved technology, or by keeping wages low. A precondition of this production mode is a large disenfranchised population that can supply the necessary labor force.


The tributary and capitalist modes of production are not mutually exclusive within the same economic system. In fact, one may find a local capitalist organization of labor embedded within a larger tributary network, or one may encounter tributary patterns of extraction within a capitalist system, examples of which occur in peripheral areas of some territorial empires, such as North America and the fur trade (Rich 1959), Asia and the Dutch spice trade (Parry 1966), or the retention features characteristic of a tributary economy in England following the industrial revolution (Hill 1949, 1967). The juxtaposition of these two modes of production within the same economic system may reflect power conflicts among elites of the society that occur as part of the process of transformation of a political economy from a narrow-spectrum to a broad-spectrum economic base.

Narrow-spectrum political economies have a relatively undiversified economy in which the bases for economic stratification are limited, providing fewer opportunities for gaining elite status. Early territorial states based principally on a tributary mode of production in which economic stratification is related to the control of primary agricultural producers provide an example of a narrow-spectrum political economy. In broad-spectrum systems, on the other hand, the bases for economic stratification are more varied and provide greater opportunities for achieving elite status. The introduction of a capitalist mode of production into a system may provide the basis for broadening the political economy even further, as elites would be able to exploit an alternative source of wealth and surplus value extracted from disenfranchised laborers, instead of having to rely on extracting or gaining access to greater amounts of tribute from a shrinking pool of primary producers.

Systems undergoing a transformation from a narrow-spectrum base to a broadspectrum base at whatever level of the political economic hierarchy, local or regional, are likely to experience increased elite competition and power conflicts over the realignment of the bases of economic stratification. In such situations, control over preciosities that mark elite status, exotic raw materials needed to produce secondary products, and transport become important means by which different groups of elites possessing access to different sources of wealth (primary production vs. surplus value) may attempt to dominate one another. Control over preciosities, however, will contribute to long-term diversification only if access to alternative commodity flows is retarded and the core system dominates access to precious raw materials or production technology. The success of one group over another has implications for the continued growth and development or the ultimate collapse of the system.

In preindustrial England, for example, the transition to a form of labor organization based on the extraction of surplus value depended on the inability of the peasant population to resist the changes in heritable land tenure to a system in which rents could be renegotiated at intervals and on the primary cultivator's inability to alter cultivation methods and land management in opposition to the landlord. The relative weakness of the English peasantry resulted in disenfranchisement of a considerable portion of the population from the agrarian base (Clarkson 1971; Clay 1984). Rural labor was increasingly absorbed by the wool and cloth industry, and large numbers of state-chartered sailing companies were created to circulate crafts and manufactures.

Conflict between the landlords collecting profits from rents and intensive agriculture, manufacturers, and commercial traders versus the court, high nobility, and merchant monopolists manifested itself in the political unrest during the civil wars

POUTICAL ECONOMY OF CORE-PERIPHERY SYSTEMS 39

and the Restoration. According to Wolf (1982), the outcome destroyed absolute royal power and changed the tax base, eliminating royal tributary dues and levies on manufacturing monopolies in favor of the excise tax on commodities and the assessment tax on landed estates. It also increased the growth of agricultural commodity production by stimulating land enclosure, and it encouraged domestic industry which employed the labor of landless households. Power shifted from the courtbased power holders dependent for their wealth on a tributary labor organization to coalitions of provincial entrepreneurs who extracted wealth via a capitalist mode, paving the way for continued economic development and expansion.

The situation in Spain was very different from that of England in that the Spanish Crown was able to maintain its power within the core by engaging in a variety of hegemonic and territorial strategies. The resource base of the monarchy was organized within a tributary mode of production, and royal revenues were derived from the extraction and taxation of raw materials, especially wool. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, population growth and disenfranchisement of cultivators created a possible challenge to this resource base. In response, the Crown expelled the Jews, the principal source of competitive mercantile capital, and the Moors, cultivators who specialized in intensive irrigation agriculture, and issued edicts restricting the enclosure of land for agricultural purposes, thus ensuring the growth of wool production (Lynch 1981). The nascent textile industry's access to raw wool and dyestuffs was restricted, and most of these products continued to be exported in bulk to the Low Countries. The distribution of other raw materials necessary for secondary product manufacture, such as hides for the leather industry, was also monopolized by the central authority. Since most of these crucial raw materials were imported from the periphery, and since the monarchy possessed the monopoly on transportation both overseas and within the core, industrial development was severely inhibited (Ringrose 1970).

Excess population and potentially competitive elites were encouraged to emigrate from Spain to the colonies. Positions in the military and the colonial bureaucracy as well as the granting of encomiendas provided employment and a source of wealth for these people, and the proportion of disenfranchised laborers remaining in the core was kept to a minimum. Spanish colonists, however, begat generations of Spaniards who were native to the New World, the criollos, who presented a challenge to the power of both the Church and the Crown. Sixteenth-century colonial history was largely an account of competition among the Church, the Crown, and the criollos over the control of the indigenous population, the primary producers and suppliers of tributary wealth (McAlister 1984).

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, disenfranchisement of the native population began to occur as the result of land policies and population growth (Gibson 1964). The availability of wage laborers and debt peons allowed the criollos to reorganize and expand their resource base by establishing commercial agricultural and manufacturing enterprises, the haciendas. By the end of the seventeenth century, most goods could be produced in the colonies, and New Spain was no longer dependent on the mother country. Only the highest quality luxury goods were imported from overseas, and an increasing number of these were supplied by contraband trade rather than by Spain (McAlister 1984). Although the Crown attempted to regulate production and trade, its ability to do so became weaker and more ineffectual through time. Competition between the monarchy and the colonists culminated in the Latin


American Wars for Independence in the early nineteenth century which resulted in the fissioning of the periphery from the core.

These examples of core-periphery systems suggest that disenfranchisement of a proportion of the population creates problems for an established central authority whose resource base is derived from primary producers organized under a tributary mode of production. Would-be elites may attempt to gain wealth through the exploitation of wage labor and the extraction of surplus value, thus providing themselves with an alternate, more diversified, and probably more profitable resource base which may allow them to compete successfully with the established order. Central authorities may deal with this threat in several ways. Imperial expansion provides increased resources with which to pacify competing elites, and the disenfranchised may be persuaded to move to the peripheries where more economic opportunities are located. The core may also attempt to control the distribution of materials needed for secondary product manufacture under the new capitalist organization of labor, and it may also monopolize transport, influencing not only the flow of raw materials necessary for production but also the distribution of the final products.

Summary

Historical evidence suggests that the economic basis of power and authority in early states rested on control of the agrarian base. In general, their economies were narrow spectrum, with a major proportion of all goods Circulating in the system derived from primary production on lands in the immediate vicinity of the urban centers. Also, many of these systems were relatively small in size, each maintaining jurisdiction over discrete territories in which farming was the principal means of livelihood.

Increases in system scale result in the development of core-periphery systems of variable size and complexity. As we have seen, core-periphery systems typically grow from the center outward. This is because population densities in the core are generally higher than in the periphery, or the core experiences more growth at faster rates, which initiates the disenfranchisement process. When this process occurs on a landscape with a punctuated resource distribution, a dendritic political economy will develop, with the core of the system located in the special resource zone. The creation of new work generated as a function of the core's locational advantage reduces disenfranchisement and stimulates a rural-to-urban migration process, producing the primate central place pattern so typical of early core-periphery systems. In many situations, the new work created is only a short-term solution to the problem of disenfranchisement if core population densities continue to rise. If the core maintains an organizational or technological advantage over its neighbors, it may establish a hegemony over the periphery to extract tribute to support the burgeoning urban population, elite and commoner alike. Because they do not support large bureaucracies or standing armies, hegemonies represent a least effort strategy, maximizing the amounts of incoming resources and commodities which can be used to subsidize local core populations or which can be reinvested in core infrastructures. Such systems generate even more work than dendritic political economies; larger numbers of transport specialists are required to move tribute to the core, which may also increasingly monopolize the production and distribution of other secondary product manufactures, including preciosities. Hegemonies, however, are fundamentally


unstable entities, since few mechanisms exist to ensure tributary compliance other than the threat of military reprisal. Although the political economies of dendritic and hegemonic systems are more broad-spectrum than those in early agrarian states, wealth and power are still based primarily on the control of land. Moreover, rebellion is a common occurrence because provincials generally receive little in return for their dependence on core manufactures or their compliance with its tributary demands.

Territorial empires solve these problems through emigration. Populations in the core polity are redistributed to the periphery where they are granted land or new sources of income. This process accelerates the diffusion of core institutions, lifestyles, and language, which may require greater investments in periphery infrastructures. Since the provincial landscape is now improved and contains a larger population than before, the periphery must be defended and bureaucracies must be set up to monitor resource collection, resource distribution, and infrastructure maintenance.

A shift to a capitalist mode of production is also likely in territorial empires, especially in their cores, as would-be elites and entrepreneurs begin to exploit wage labor to a greater extent than before, both in the urban centers and in the countryside. The economy of the core may thus become increasingly commercialized, but relations with the periphery will still be mainly dendritic in structure, since the core remains the principal source of many manufactures. A more commercialized core often requires progressively greater investments in infrastructure, particularly in the transport system, to facilitate the movement of goods, raw materials, and people between centers. If, however, such investments are lacking, commercialization will be retarded, and the core may not be able to maintain dominance over the periphery. Under such conditions, political fragmentation should occur. A similar outcome is expected when the economy of the periphery becomes a structural duplicate of the core.

SEQUENCES OF DEVELOPMENT

The preceding discussion raises the question of sequences of development. In other words, is there a universal unilineal sequence beginning with dendritic political economies, which then evolve into hegemonies and ultimately territorial empires, or is development a much more variable phenomenon? As we have pointed out, dendritic political economies generally evolve on landscapes having a punctuated distribution of resources. On such a landscape, control of local resources which are in demand in a nascent periphery is often a major factor behind system development. However, because the core economy is dependent on external demand, commodity type has great impact on system longevity. When the economy of the core is focused on preciosities, shifts in periphery reliance (e.g., from one type of good to another produced elsewhere) can have dramatic repercussions on the core economy, frequently causing its collapse. In contrast, periphery demand for necessities produced in the core solidifies dependency linkages between the core and the periphery, contributing to system persistence. Kirman City's domination of carpet manufacture illustrates the first type of situation, whereas OPEC's virtual monopolization of petroleum prices is an example of the latter.


Several case examples suggest that dendritic political economies sometimes did provide the structural basis for hegemony formation which preceded the rise of territorial empires in the same regions. England's control of wool production and trade gave it an advantage over neighboring states, which was used to expand the spatial extent of its tributary domain (Clarkson 1971; Clay 1984). Later, the core came to include most of the British Isles, and a territorial empire was established following the defeat of the Spanish armada.

Rome's hegemony developed under somewhat similar circumstances. Rome had an advantage over adjacent states, because it controlled the salt trade up the Tiber, which gave it the means to extract grain from other Latin states in central Italy (Bourne 1966). During the Second Punic War, however, Hannibal so devastated the Italian countryside that Rome had to find grain supplies farther afield. Carthage was then conquered and her territories absorbed, which created a hegemonic system of enormous size. Extreme pressures were consequently placed on Rome to effectively manage this new domain. These developments occurred at the same time as Roman elites were buying up small land holdings, which disenfranchised a very large segment of the local population (Ogilvie 1980). This problem, along with the consolidation of political authority, finally resulted in the establishment of the territorial empire, with its huge army and civil service.

The Aztec and Spanish Empires, in contrast, suggest that dendritic political economies do not always provide the structural basis for empire formation. In both cases, the region was politically balkanized prior to empire formation, with neighboring states competing with one another for tributary domains (Davies 1973; Lynch 1981; Sanders et al. 1979). However, in neither instance during preimperial times did control of local resources in demand elsewhere play much of a role in structuring core economic organization, and expectably there is little evidence that core systems were organized as dendritic political economies. Rather, the states that succeeded in carving out imperial domains were the ones that maintained a demographic advantage over their neighbors. The Aztec salt-making industry also developed at the time of empire formation or immediately after it, indicating that the hegemony also contained elements of a dendritic political economy (Sanders et al. 1979). The same may be said for the industries in Tenochtitlan manufacturing preciosities (Hassig 1985).

The Aztec case also suggests that there is more than one solution to the problem of core disenfranchisement. Here, industries extracting necessities available locally expanded in scale coeval with political expansion, but substantial revenues were also invested in intensifying the local agrarian base through the construction of chinampas (Parsons 1976). Although the Spanish invested in wool production to support the growing population, little energy was routed into secondary product manufacture and agricultural intensification (Lynch 1981; Ringrose 1983). Consequently, Spain's colonies were not as economically dependent on the core as Tenochtitlan's provinces were, although Madrid did control the distribution of iron to the empire for some time. This lack of dependence on goods from Spain, we feel, was a principal reason behind the breakup of her empire a few centuries after its founding (McAlister 1984).

Territorial empires likewise need not evolve from hegemonies. In Southern Mesopotamia, for example, political balkanization was the norm before the Third Dynasty of Ur, although earlier city-states occasionally established short-lived hegemonies to extract tribute (Redman 1978). However, by the reign of Shulgi, the great Sumerian monarch,

POLITICAL ECONOMY OF CORE-PERIPHERY SYSTEMS

city-states were now just administrative districts .... Appointed by the sovereign, transferable from one city to another, [and] revocable at will, the ensis were no more than high officials with judicial, fiscal, and administrative responsibilities on a regional scale. Military affairs were no longer in their hands, being entrusted to a district general (shagin), also appointed by the king .... The royal government possessed all the estates previously owned by local rulers and those acquired by conquests. It had big factories and workshops, numerous trading centres in Mesopotamia and abroad, thousands of labourers for agricultural, industrial, and public works, and an army of civil servants and policeman to ensure production and enforce the law. (Roux 1980:162-163)

43

These developments occurred in direct response to the need to provision the core state with grain. By the end of the third millennium B.C., the buildup of sodium salts in the soil had greatly reduced agricultural production, but large urban populations were still primarily confined to the southeastern alluvium (Adams 1981). Foodstuffs from cities upstream were thus required to feed the burgeoning urban populations, and a territorial empire was established to provide those goods. The Old Babylonian Empire apparently tried to repeat this pattern, but the system was doomed to failure as the landscape became increasingly degraded (Yoffee 1979). Later Mesopotamian empires, though much larger in size, were expectably mainly hegemonic in structure (Contenau 1966; Olmstead 1948).

Curiously, the empires of Ur and successor states in Mesopotamia were not very long-lived, despite the fact that each invested heavily in secondary product manufacture, particularly weaving (Adams and Nissen 1972). No one city, however, had a monopoly on the industry, so all were in competition with one another for periphery clienteles. The expected result of such a situation should be cycles of short-lived dominance, with one center replacing another: a pattern to which the history of Mesopotamia well attests.

It therefore appears that there is no unilineal sequence of development in coreperiphery system structure. Although dendritic political economies sometimes evolve into hegemonies and later territorial empires, the latter do not require the presence of dendritic political economies as a precondition for their emergence. Hegemonic and territorial empires whose core centers are greatly involved in secondary product manufacture for distribution to peripheries, however, tend to persist for longer periods of time than those that do not. This investment, in turn, requires a core monopoly on production and distribution; otherwise, no one center will be dominant over the long term.

TRANSPORT MODE AND SYSTEM SCALE

Thus far we have discussed several major processes influencing the development of core-periphery systems as well as several factors which produce variability in structure. The historic systems we have canvassed, however, varied greatly in scale as did the size of their principal central places. The cases included in our study were also integrated by transport systems involving different power sources: human power (the Aztecs); draft animals (Mesopotamia); moderate-sized boats and draft animals (Rome); and large sailing ships (Spain and England). These shifts in power source and transport technology associate with increases in the size of the periphery that the core


dominates, which suggests that system scale, at least in part, is a function of the volumetric capacity, speed, and efficiency of the prevailing mode of transportation.

Core-periphery systems integrated by foot power are generally small in their geographic extent and have comparatively small capitals (Sanders and Santley 1983). This scalar constraint occurs because human burden bearers must carry their own provisions as well as goods to be exchanged. Therefore, the farther goods are transported, the less tonnage carried. Most trafficking in bulky basic goods in the Aztec Empire took place within a 150-km radius of Tenochtitlan (Bedoian 1973), and Berdan's (1986) recent study suggests that the balance of all exchanges occurred within regions of considerably smaller size.

One way around this limitation is trade in lighter-weight basic goods or preciosities, which have a high value-to-weight ratio and which are not consumed in great amounts per capita (Brumfiel and Earle 1987). Goods that meet these criteriasalt, obsidian, jade and metal ornaments, feathers, and cotton-were traded all over the empire, though the volume exchanged from Tenochtitlan probably decreased at some distance from the capital (Bittman and Sullivan 1978). Another accommodation is to sacrifice mass for speed: in other words, to increase the rate of transport. Loads carried long distances by Aztec porters were about half the size of those hauled short distances, but the distance traveled was twice as far (Hassig 1985; Sanders and Santley 1983). Faster transport rates also increase the final delivery price because of the higher levels of energy expenditure, which should restrict demand to increasingly smaller clienteles or decrease the rate at which goods are used by periphery consumers.

The use of pack animals, carts, and animals greatly expands the range over which goods can be distributed. For example, the standard load hauled by mules in colonial New Spain was 113 kg, a 450% gain over that carried by human burden bearers, and an individual driver could handle several animals (Hassig 1985). This increase is due to two factors. First, draft animals subsist primarily on grass and other low vegetation which are generally not consumed by humans (Raish 1988; Reed 1969). Consequently, there is less a need to carry provisions, although some goods or currency might be required to pay for pasture rights. Also, because mules and donkeys are much larger than humans, animals can haul goods in larger lots. Thus, the cost for each unit of distance traveled is much less in comparison to human-powered systems (Sherratt 1981). The larger geographical extent of the Mesopotamian Empires is a case in point. Babylon, at the time of the Nebuchadnezzars, had a population of nearly 400,000 and claimed hegemony over an empire much larger than the Aztecs, stretching from Palestine to Iran (Oates 1986). The core-periphery system was integrated by significant amounts of animal transport as well as boats transporting goods up and down the Euphrates as well as between Mesopotamia and East Africa and India (Casson 1974; Oppenheim 1954). The use of carts and wagons may require a major effort in road building, which increases costs but also enhances the speed and efficiency of transport (Casson 1974; Ringrose 1970).

Exchange by sea provides a more efficient means of moving commodities between cores and peripheries than either foot power or animal-based transport. Not only can goods be carried in even larger quantities but also the major source of power, the sail, involved the use of an unearned resource, the prevailing winds (Greene 1986; Parker 1990). Early Mesopotamian boats were comparatively small in size, the largest class capable of hauling no more than 11 tons of cargo (Casson 1971). Mycenaean,


Phoenician, Greek, and Roman galleys typically carried cargoes in the 70 to 500-ton range (Casson 1971; Parker 1990), while merchantman of 1,200 tons or more did not appear in any considerable numbers until the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (pomey and Tchernia 1978). Admittedly, this reliance on a naturally occurring but seasonally variable resource restricted travel to certain times of the year. Use of oarsmen solved this problem partially, but it also reduced transport system efficiency, because of its reliance on human power (Casson 1971). The great size attained by core-periphery systems based on this mode of transportation is exemplified by early imperial Rome, which managed to integrate all of the Mediterranean basin as well as regions beyond. Those provinces that were a part of the empire for only short periods of time were situated either near the boundary of the system (e.g., Britannia) or connected to the main body of the empire by ground (e.g., Mesopotamia; Bourne 1966). The Romans recognized the fact that ship-based systems could not service land-locked regions. Thus, there also was a major emphasis on the construction of roads that could be used year-round. Even though many Roman roads were originally constructed for the military, they also served as major routes of communication and commerce (Casson 1974; Greene 1986). However, as Duncan-Jones (1974) has pointed out, travel by wagon was 28 times more costly than transport by sea. Therefore, although Roman roads were often congested with traffic, low-value bulky goods were generally carried comparatively short distances (Greene (1986).

Technological advances in ship-building resulted in increased speed, the capacity to haul even larger cargoes, and eventually reliance on new power sources, coal and oil, which permitted travel throughout the year, even in areas where the winds were seasonal or intermittent (Greene 1986; Pomey and Tchernia 1978). The ultimate developments were core-periphery systems of global scale. The Spanish and English Empires illustrate this process, with their emphasis on galleons, schooners, and other ships of immense size that could transport goods in enormous quantities (Curtin 1984). In fact, local sea-borne systems were often left in place, with the imperial "companies" preferring to haul goods like mechanized equipment which could not be shipped in smaller craft.

Transport mode also plays a major role in affecting the size of the principal central places in the core as well as the degree to which there will be an emphasis on secondary product manufacture in them. The Aztec capital, Tenochtitlan, had a population of around 225,000, and it was much larger and contained more specialists than all other centers in the core, presumably because canoe transport expanded its support radius and immediate marketing hinterland (Hassig 1985). Except for the lapidaries, metal-workers, and feather-workers, however, most specialists produced basic goods for use by core clienteles and not for exchange to the periphery (Berdan 1986), for reasons indicated above.

Madrid had a population that was about the same size as Tenochtitlan's, but its empire was global in scale (Ringrose 1970). Madrid, however, was a landlocked center, and the Spanish Empire formed at a time when neighboring states emerged as rivals heading similar core-periphery systems (Ringrose 1983). Tribute from her empire was consequently channeled primarily into naval building and into imports in foodstuffs and other necessities to feed the growing population. This greatly retarded investments in core infrastructures, such as an efficient land transportation network that would have allowed Madrid to grow to larger size (Ringrose 1970). Spain therefore was well connected to her empire, but the core was not well in-


tegrated, and there was little secondary product manufacture, because ground transport was poor.

In contrast, in the case of preindustrial England, the presence of numerous navigable rivers into the interior facilitated the development of a regionally integrated core once overseas colonies were established (Clarkson 1971). London's location on the Thames provided a further stimulus to core integration. The fact that the different parts of the core were well connected meant that secondary manufactures could be readily transported to the capital and then overseas. Likewise, resources extracted from the periphery could be easily distributed to all parts of the core. Consequently, it should come as no surprise that London was very much larger than Madrid, even though both territorial empires were about the same size. Because the Tiber provided direct access to the sea, the same may be said for Rome.

The mode of transport, as well as the transportation infrastructure, affects the scale of the core-periphery system, the degree to which the core is economically integrated, and the size of its major centers. By itself a change in transport mode will have little direct impact on system size. As a contextual variable, however, it will permit expansion in the scale of periphery hinterlands, increases in the volume and variety of goods and information flowing to and from cores, and enlargements in the range over which populations may be redistributed. The present analysis suggests that large systems typically occur in situations where the prevailing mode of transport is reasonably efficient. This allows for a high volume of exchange and provides a setting conducive to secondary product manufacture. On the other hand, small systems occur when these conditions are not met.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUDING REMARKS

In this chapter, we have examined the political economy of three types of coreperiphery systems. In dendritic political economies, a core provides a periphery with goods but often exercises little or no political or economic control, unless the goods supplied are necessities. In hegemonies, on the other hand, control is based on the tributary mode of production, with a large periphery supplying both basic and luxury goods for use in the core. Territorial empires also incorporate peripheries to extract tribute, but large bureaucracies, backed up by a military presence, are set up to ensure efficient tribute extraction. The political economy of the core is based in part on the capitalist mode of production, which further diversifies the core economy, provides more work for landless peasants, and generates alternative bases for elite power.

All three types of systems are supported by broad-spectrum economies, in comparison with simple agrarian states, but the political economies of territorial empires are the most diversified because of the core's greater investment in the capitalist mode of production. Disenfranchisement is a process common to the growth of all three types of systems, and by creating more work and redistributing population, pressures affecting the political economy of the core are relieved. The creation of a landless peasantry often occurs under conditions of population growth, but disenfranchisement is a problem which plagues the elite stratum as well.

Although the relationships between the variables discussed above are a simplified description of a complex set of articulations, our examination of historically known core-periphery systems suggests that they are the basic determinants of


system structure. The preceding discussion also suggests that Wallerstein's model is a specific example of a particular type of core-periphery system. Imposing the worldsystem model on archaeological cases may, therefore, obscure important structural variation. In this chapter, we have also not discussed prehistoric cases. This omission is intentional, because we believe that most reconstructions of prehistoric systems by archaeologists still rest on methods that either are inadequate or produce very ambiguous results. The analysis of the structure of historic systems, however, can provide a sound basis for dealing with prehistoric ones as well. How such methods should be built is a problem we plan to address in the near future.

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Sanders, W., 1. Parsons, and R. Santley, 1979, The Basin of Mexico: Ecological Processes in the Evolution of a Civilization. Academic Press, New York.

Santley, R., 1984a, Chalcatzingo, the Olmec Heartland, and the Gateway Community Hypothesis. Journal of Anthropological Research 40:603-607.

Santley, R., 1984b, Obsidian Exchange, Economic Stratification, and the Evolution of Complex Society in the Basin of Mexico. In Trade and Exchange in Early Mesoamerica (ed. K. Hirth). University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, pp. 43-86.

Schneider, J., 1977, Was There a Pre-capitalist World System? Peasant Studies 6:20-29. Schneider, J., and E. Hansen, 1972, Modernization and Development: The Role of Regional Elites

and Noncorporate Groups in the European Mediterranean. Comparative Studies in Society and History 14:328-350.

Sherratt, A., 1981, Plough and Pastoralism: Aspects of the Secondary Products Revolution. In Pattern of the Past: Studies in Honour of David Clarke (ed. I. Hodder, G. Isaac, and N. Hammond). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 261-305.

Smith, c., 1976, Exchange Systems and the Spatial Distribution of Elites: The Organization of Stratification in Agrarian Societies. In Regional Analysis: Vol. 2. Social Systems. (ed. C. Smith). Academic Press, New York, pp. 390-474.

Smith, M., 1979, The Aztec Marketing System and Settlement Pattern in the Valley of Mexico: A Central Place Analysis. American Antiquity 44:110-125.

Vance, 1., 1970, The Merchant's World. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs. Wallerstein, I., 1974, The Modern World-System: Vol. 1. Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the

European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century. Academic Press, New York. Wolf, E., 1966, Peasants. Prentice-Hall, New York. Wolf, E., 1982, Europe and the People without History. University of California Press, Berkeley. Yoffee, N., 1979, The Decline and Rise of Mesopotamian Civilization: An Ethnoarchaeological

Perspective on the Evolution of Social Complexity. American Antiquity 44:5-35.

Chapter 3

Culture and Exchange in Postclassic Oaxaca A World-System Perspective

JOSEPH W. WHITECOTTON

Since the publication of Immanuel Wallerstein's world-system model in 1974, there has been increasing interest in applying this approach to premodern situations. So far, the perspective has been used to analyze ancient world-systems in Europe and in the Mediterranean (Ekholm 1980, 1981; Ekholm and Friedman 1982; Frankenstein 1979; Frankenstein and Rowlands 1978; Friedman and Rowlands 1977; Kohl 1978, 1979, 1987; Larsen 1987; Rowlands 1980, 1984, 1986, 1987), in Mesoamerica (Blanton and Feinman 1984; Blanton et al. 1981; Price 1986; Weigand 1978, 1979, 1982a, 1982b; Whitecotton and Pailes 1979, 1986), including attempts to better understand the relationship between Mesoamerica and the Southwest in pre-Columbian times (Di Peso 1980; Kelley 1981; Pailes and Whitecotton 1979; Plog et al. 1982; S. Plog 1986; Riley 1987; Upham 1986; Weigand 1982a, 1982b; Weigand et a1.1977; Whitecotton and Pailes 1986; Wilcox 1986). It has also been used to characterize exchange relationships among hunter-gatherers and agriculturists (Bender 1981; Friedman 1982) and in other situations involving nonstate societies (Baugh 1984; Gledhill and Rowlands 1982; Kristiansen 1982, 1987; Rowlands 1987; Upham 1982).

Various criticisms and modifications of the approach have emerged in the literature. Some, for example, who interpret it in a literal and mechanical sense-and erroneously consider it to be a mere extension of cultural evolutionism-dismiss it on the grounds that it is inapplicable to situations in which all the societies or cultures participating have not reached a state level of development. Similar criticisms have

JOSEPH W. WHITECOTTON • Department of Anthropology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma 73019.


51

52 JOSEPH W. WHITECOTTON

been made regarding its application to state-level societies which are precapitalist. Both of these criticisms are inappropriate for they assume that the basic unit of analysis is a bounded society or culture whereas Wallerstein (1974a, 1974b; also see Hall 1983) insists we are studying total social systems-interacting systems with a single division of labor.

Still others treat the approach as if it were merely a reintroduction of "diffusionism" into anthropological studies and, like any "external" approach to culture change, in opposition to cultural evolutionism which uses an endogenic model of culture change (Haas 1984; Renfrew 1984:82). This criticism also views the approach primarily in terms of dichotomies or "schools" in the history of anthropology which are thought to have some "real" efficacy. However, unlike "mainstream" theories in anthropology, most world-system theorists insist that social change stems from a combination or from the interaction of internal and external sources and attempt to analyze this relationship rather than merely assert an a priori dominance of one or the other of these factors (see Chirot and Hall 1982; Hall 1983, 1984).

Others, who seem disposed to the reductionism of a cultural materialist strategy, emphasize Wallerstein's insistence that a world-economy derives its "systemness" from the transport of bulk commodities or necessities over considerable distances rather than long-distance trade in preciosities or luxuries (see particularly Creamer 1987; Mathien 1986; McGuire 1986; Stark 1986). They argue that Wallerstein's approach is not applicable to a situation where the technology will not allow the transportation of bulk goods over long distances, a technology that only seems to be associated with" capitalism." So, particularly in the case of ancient Mesoamerica and its hinterlands, they claim that the world-system perspective is irrelevant primarily because of the nature of the transportation system which was based almost excluSively on human carriers (Drennan 1984; Hassig 1985).

Although a literal application of Wallerstein to ancient Mesoamerica would seem to be most problematical, it is clear that we cannot persist in viewing Mesoamericathe area with which this chapter is concerned-as a congeries of ecolOgical regions, each of which followed an independent line of cultural evolution; neither can we conceptualize.it as a single culture area (or area co-tradition) composed of "triballike" cultures which interact with one another like so many billiard balls on a table, to borrow Wolf's (1982:6) metaphor.

Both of these conceptions of Mesoamerica are based on a culture concept which was worked out at a time when nations were thought to be the basic carriers of political economy and in conjunction with an attempt to reconstruct the disappearing "cultures" of North American Indians. Clearly, Mesoamerica was neither a culture area in the sense of the American "Plains" nor did it contain "nations" with clear-cut political boundaries. The concept of Mesoamerica needs to be reexamined in the light of the confrontation of anthropology with far-flung exchange systems and with reference to what anthropologists have learned about complex hierarchical societies.

A first step would be to look afresh at the relationship between world-systems theory and other concepts of complex social fields. Lesser (1961), for example, long ago argued that a theory of cultural evolution could be developed in conjunction with a conception of "weblike, netlike connections" between human cultures and societies. Schneider (1977), Wolf (1982), Blanton and Feinman (1984), and Whitecotton and Pailes (1986) have argued that the concept of a "world" of exchange does not need to be confined to situations involving" capitalism." In fact, Schneider (1977) has argued

A WORLD-SYSTEM PERSPECTIVE 53

that exchange in preciosities or luxuries may, in fact, integrate and give shape to expansive social systems and stimulate exchanges of other kinds.! This argument parallels others, such as that of Braudel (1984) and Sombart (1967) who have argued that the exchange of preciosities was and is, in fact, a key ingredient of "capitalism."

It would take us too far afield to discuss the many arguments over the nature of capitalism here. Suffice it to say that there is lack of unanimity not only over its definition but over when it began and where and whether or not it constitutes a modE' of production, a particular kind of exchange "grafted on" to other aspects of the economy (such as reciprocity, redistribution, and market exchange), and the relationship between capitalism, mercantilism, and the state.

Most authors agree, however, that world economies-or trade ecumenes (Curtin 1984)-existed either prior to, or outside of the context of, modem agricultural or industrial capitalism. Braudel (1984:25), for example, talks about Phoenician and Hellenic world economies, and Wallerstein (1974a:348) says that there were shortlived world-economies before the capitalistic one which were quickly absorbed by world empires-Wallerstein' s other type of world system.

Wolf (1982:82) describes large hierarchical societies "predicated upon the tributary mode ... which oscillate between centralization and fragmentation" much as did Wallerstein's early world-economies and world-empires. He points out that while surpluses may be exacted through tribute in societies based on this mode, some surplus is exchanged and placed into more general distribution. "Only in the rarest cases," Wolf writes "is there no role for processes whereby surpluses are circulated either socially or geographically ... without the participation of commercial intermediaries or merchants" (1982:82). Characteristically, merchants from competing polities are engaged in long-distance trade in elite goods or luxuries (Wolf 1982: 83-84).

Thus, the basic Wallersteinian dichotomy between world-empire and worldeconomy might be used also to analyze societies based on a tributary mode of production. Doing so would still allow us to contrast different political-economic orientations-as centralized versus fragmented political systems-while evading the thorny problem of capitalism. It must be kept in mind, however, that like all oppositions, the distinction between a world-empire (where a single political system corresponds to a single economic system) and a world-economy (where the economy transcends any single political entity) must constitute a continuum and that the two types are "ideal" and do not perfectly fit any "real" case.

A reconsideration of a world-system perspective within the context of a tributary mode of production also invites a reconsideration of the way we look at the concept of "culture." Both Wallerstein and Wolf view cultures as dynamic entities reshaped and reconstructed in response to larger social fields. Wolf (1982:387), for example, argues persuasively that we must replace the concept of culture as "fixed, unitary, and bounded" with a concept of "cultural sets" which are characterized by "fluidity and permeability." Furthermore, hegemony in tributary societies, especially among

! Actually there are two issues here which are related but not always distinguished by some authors. One involves the role of luxury trade within or between areas within a world-economy or a world system. The other concerns the relationship of luxury trade between areas in a world-economy and those which Wallerstein (1974a) calls the" external arena." Luxury trade can contribute to system integration in both of these cases, although it need not necessarily do so.


those whose cultures have been called "civilizations," "usually involves the development of an ideological model by a successful centralizing elite of surplus takers, which is replicated by other elites within the political-economic orbit of interaction" (Wolf 1982:82-83). There is, therefore, a "centering of" such social systems based on a larger social field of commercial and political interaction.

Thus, a reconsideration of world-system theory or social field theory within the context of ancient Mesoamerica invites us to examine whether or not and the extent to which the interactions and exchanges of competing tributary societies within a larger social system-whether we call it a world-economy, world-empire, civilization, trade ecumene, or interaction sphere-involves political, economic, and cultural "hierarchicalization": that is, hegemonic situations in which some social orders become subordinated to others in core/periphery (or intermediate semiperipheral) like situations.

Rather than attempt to examine Mesoamerica as a whole-for why should we expect that an area which has been defined on the basis of a culture area procedure should conform to a political economy?-this chapter will attempt to show how Oaxaca in the late Postclassic can be understood in the context of the "hierarchicalization" of tributary societies in a larger social field. Specifically, I will examine two issues: (1) the relationship between elite status emulation and the construction of cultures, and (2) the relationship between political fragmentation (or decentralization) and commercialism or mercantile exchange.

I also consider how this examination will contribute to a broader understanding of archaic or "antique" world-systems, a topic that is briefly addressed in the final section of the chapter.

POSTCLASSIC OAXACA

Marcus and Flannery (1983:217-218) have made the important point that in Postclassic Oaxaca some Mixtec elites had become "internationalized" as title, lineage, and status became more important than regional or local affiliation. This phenomenon was apparently not new in Mesoamerica; other periods in earlier history had resulted in widespread horizon or "international" styles, with the Olmec and Teotihuacan horizons being the most conspicuous.

Following a suggestion by Bernal (1966:365) that the fall of Toltec Tula (ca. AD. 1160) may have allowed a build-up of Mixtec power and expansion,2 Marcus and Flannery (1983:218) further argue that the Mixtecs may have become, in their attempt to emulate-or perhaps replace?-the Toltecs, one of the most prestigious-pretentious?-elites in central Mesoamerica. Therefore, other elites, such as status-seeking Zapotecs from the Valley of Oaxaca, who had lost prestige with the fall of their classic metropolis of Monte Alban (for locations in Oaxaca and Mesoamerica~ see figs. 1 and 2) between AD. 800 and 900, sought to intermarry with or emulate them.

It has been known for some time that Mixtec nobles did migrate to the Valley of Oaxaca in the Postclassic even though there are some differences of opinion concern-

2Paddock (personal communication, 1987) views the build-up of Mixtec power as earlier than the rise of Toltec Tula and would argue, following Davies (1977), that the Toltec "empire" was a small affair and not nearly as significant as it is depicted in most of the Mesoamerican literature.

A WORLD-SYSTEM PERSPECTIVE

100" 96· 88"

22·

GULF OF MEXICO Chich"n lIz ..

Tajin e

2ft Tula. ·Pachuca Tzintz~ntzan Tlateldco •• Teotihu8Can

18"

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Tenochtitlan- .Tlaxeala Cholula·· Puebla

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YOPE

kilometers 300

• Uxmal

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CHIAPANEC PRINCIPALITIES

.Soconusco

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• Copan

Figure 1. Archaeological sites and towns of Mesoamerica.

PACIFIC OCEAN Huatulco

100

kllomet.r.

Figure 2. Archaeological sites and towns of Oaxaca.

55

18·

88·


ing the mechanism, effect, and extent of the Mixtec impact on this previously Zapotec region. Most investigators accept that the movement involved marriage alliances between Zapotec and Mixtec elites, ultimately eventuating in a migration of some Zapotec nobles to the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, and that Mixtec nobles actually brought peasant retinues (the tay situndayu-see Flannery and Marcus 1983d) with them to the valley. Documentary sources, such as the Relaciones Geogrtificas of Cuilapan (Barlow 1945) and Teozapotlan (Zaachila) (Paso y Troncoso 1905-1906, Vol. 4:190-191, hereafter cited as PNE) and the chronicles of the Dominican Fray Francisco Burgoa (1934, Vol. 1:348, 387, 394-396, Vol. 11:59-60), tell of Mixtec movement into the western arm of the valley. Excavations of tombs at Monte Alban-such as the famous Tomb 7 (Caso 1969)-and at Zaachila (Gallegos 1978) revealed contents of MixtecaPuebla style. The settlement patterns of the western and northern arms of the Valley of Oaxaca as compared to the eastern arm also reflect a difference: the former areas consist of highly dispersed settlements while the eastern arm shows nucleated towns or cities (Blanton et ai. 1982; Kowalewski 1983). Some have interpreted this difference in settlement pattern, coupled with documentary data and additional archaeological evidence, to reflect an ethnic one arguing that Zapotec elites remained in control of the eastern arm-even though they may have borrowed Mixtec elite characteristics or shared common cultural symbols with them-while Mixtec elites dominates the more dispersed western and northern arms (Blanton et ai. 1982:134-137; Flannery and Marcus 1983a, 1983b, 1983c; Kowalewski 1983:287-288; Spores 1984:62-63, 75-77; Whitecotton 1977:89-121).

Other researchers, such as Paddock (1982a, 1982b, 1983a, 1983b) and Bernal (1966), as did Caso (1941) before them, see the Mixtec impact as penetrating throughout the Valley of Oaxaca and having been brought about by military conquest or invasion. They also argue that certain traits, ceramics, and architecture, for instance, reflect a definite Mixtec presence even in the eastern arm of the valley.

Regarding the role of conquest versus marriage alliance, the two positions would seem not to be necessarily mutually exclusive. For, after a careful study of the Mixtec codices, Caso (1977:76) wrote:

Era costumbre de los reyes mixtecos, cuando conquistaban un lugar, casarse con la viuda del senor que habia muerto en la guerra, 0 con alguna de sus hijas. El objeto era obtener para sus hijos un derecho que ya no derivaba puramente de la conquista, sino de la herencia legal del sefiorio, seg6.n las leyes de sucesi6n.

It was the custom of the Mixtec kings when they conquered a place to marry the widow of the lord who had been killed in the war or to marry one of his daughters. The object was to acquire for his sons a right that was not derived solely from conquest but also an hereditary right to the kingdom according to the laws of succession.

Furthermore, as indicated below, there is new documentary evidence that a Mixtec nobleman did conquer one principality in the eastern arm of the Valley of Oaxaca and that certain towns in the western arm of the valley were also taken in "war." However, it must be pointed out that the wars were between lords associated with the dynasties of particular towns and not between" empires," "ethnic groups," or "nations." Such terms as Mixtec and Zapotec-which are primarily linguisticshould not mislead us. The predominant Postclassic political form in Oaxaca was antagonistic city-states or principalities (Whitecotton 1977:83-84, 126-128, 139-142).

A WORLD-SYSTEM PERSPECTWE 57

Mixtec principalities warred against other Mixtec principalities as Zapotec city-states warred against one another; there were also wars between Zapotec and Mixtec principalities. Lord warred against lord, and although fairly stable alliances seem to have formed, ethnicity was apparently a minor factor in determining them. In numerous instances, Zapotec and Mixtec lords also allied with one another against the Aztecs.

Similarly, we must not be misled into believing that there were clearly bounded "Mixtec" and "Zapotec" cultures. It was once thought, for example, that the Monte Alban IV phase in the Valley of Oaxaca represented Postclassic Zapotec culture there while Monte Alban V was Mixtec. It is now known that Monte Alban V is only a period that replaced IV throughout the valley. And many traits-such as certain ceramics and architectural traits-that were formerly thought to be exclusively the feature of one culture or the other are now known not to correspond with linguistic distributions. Even though this would appear to be obvious, the notion that Mesoamerican cultures were clearly demarcated bounded units has often misled some investigators.

Thus, it would seem that, once relatively minor differences are carefully examined and once the stratified and dynamic natures of Mesoamerican cultures are recognized, the so-called Mixtec-Zapotec problem in the Valley of Oaxaca would seem to fade into insignificance. Most investigators now accept the fact that the Late Postclassic Valley of Oaxaca was a biethnic area and one in which the culture of the elites there was produced by complex interactions (Blanton et al. 1982:134-137; Flannery and Marcus 1983c; Marcus and Flannery 1983; Paddock 1982b, 1983a, 1983b; Spores 1984:62-63,65-67; Whitecotton 1977:119-121). In fact, Paddock (1983b:89-91) sees Monte Alban V culture as a syncretism produced by the interaction of Mixtec and Zapotec elites.

My recent work on previously unknown or underutilized sixteenth century pictorial-genealogical documents from the Valley of Oaxaca has provided even greater historical specificity to these processes (Whitecotton 1982, 1983a, 1983b, 1984, 1990). These sources, of colonial origin, were probably presented to validate cacique status in Spanish courts. They depict as many as fifteen generations of native nobles that extend well into the prehispanic past. With glosses written in Zapotec, they give evidence of naming patterns, social status, the place of origin for in-marrying females-providing place names-and contain expository passages that describe crucial events in local history. Interestingly enough, in each of the three major genealogical histories, from Macuilx6chitl in the eastern arm of the Valley, Santa Cruz IxtepecCuilapan in the western arm, and Etla in the northern arm, noble Zapotec lineages claim descent from prehispanic Mixtec (bene yohui) lords and ladies, individuals who are found also in the Mixtec codices. From one point of view, it is irrelevant whether or not these sources represent actual history; that is, whether or not such nobles as 5-Reed Ocoi'lai'la from Teozacoa1co actually conquered and occupied valley towns as the Mapa (Paddock 1982a) and Genealogy of Macuilx6chitl claim (in addition to Whitecotton 1982 and 1983a, see also Rabin 1982 and Paddock et al. 1982); elites characteristically manipulated genealogies to desired ends. What is important, however, is that Zapotec nobles attempted to validate cacique (coque) claims by citing crucial links to prominent Mixtecs-which, I suppose, would make them ZapoMixtecs. In fact, there are no known late prehispanic Zapotecs worthy of a claim to prominence. Even the famous Cociyo Hueza may be a late invention of Zapotecs who


were attempting to revive their history (Paddock 1983b:6, 28-30,91-92), or, alternatively, he probably was of "mixed" origin.

Furthermore, as mentioned above, the Valley of Oaxaca as a region is not uniform nor were the processes that operated there, a fact that is reflected in the genealogical histories. The most extensive of these comes from the Etla arm of the valley (the northern arm) where native caciques persisted the longest in colonial times and where, as mentioned above, a "serfdom" or "feudal" settlement pattern was the most highly developed.

The Etla pictorial genealogy represents a number of intermarrying families who come to form a single large interrelated lineage. Although the source is clearly of colonial origin, it is more like a Mixtec codex than are the other pictorial histories from the valley in that it shows all the male and female marriages and offspring thereof regardless of their importance as political figures. One of the ramages or lines of this large lineage also claims to be of Mixtec origin.

The second pictorial history, from Cuilapan-Ixtepec, is different from the first in that power and conquest are stressed and less emphasis is given to individual genealogical relationships than in the case of the Etla document. In this document, females, except for two crucial ones-6-Monkey and 4-, 8-, or ll-Movement-are not shown. This document, now housed in the Map Collection of the Yale University Library, seems to represent a compilation of a number of oral traditions but strongly favors a lineage associated with the place of Xipe or Red-and-White Bundle in the Mixtec codices. This source also has a kind of "map" showing the conquest of "hills" in the western arm of the valley near Monte Alban by descendants of 6-Monkey and ll-Wind "Bloody Tiger," places also mentioned on the Mapa de Xoxocotlan (Smith 1973:158-161,202-210).

Of a different character yet is the Genealogy of Macuilx6chitl that depicts a single line of nobles and shows its ultimate demise. After a long expository passage describing 5- Reed Ocofiafia and his conquest of the area, the line ends with the death of the first postconquest cacique. The Tlacolula arm of the Valley of Oaxaca where Macuilx6chitl is located, unlike Cuilapan and Etla, had strong nucleated prehispanic communities but weak colonial caciques factors that are reflected in other documents that chronicle Macuilxochitl's trajectory from a regional center to a relatively unimportant peasant community (Whitecotton 1983a; 1990).

These documents reveal that, unlike the late pre hispanic more urban and populous Valley of Mexico, the Valley of Oaxaca was more "rural" and dominated by small states, principalities, and fiefdoms. To understand the reasons for this pattern, one must adopt a larger Mesoamerican historical perspective.

In the Classic, Mesoamerica, at least as far as central Mexico and Oaxaca were concerned, was dominated by two metropolises: Teotihuacan and Monte Alban. These were not replicas of one another, however, but showed distinctively regional "cultures." Politically and economically there were also differences between them. Teotihuacan was a primate center in central Mexico that controlled a commercial empire: a key commodity of Teotihuacan manufacture and control was green obsidian of Pachuca, the distribution of which ranged from the Gulf Coast to the Maya area.

Teotihuacan did not control Oaxaca, however, which seems to have been under the domination of a competing, if differently organized, core state centered at Monte Alban. Although these two cities may have engaged in some trade and diplomacy, the


elites of the two places did not share a common or even similar culture. In this period, culture seems to have been spatially distributed.

Teotihuacan fell; Monte Alban waned or rather petered out. The fall of each created a power vacuum and a struggle between various city-states each of which hoped to achieve political if not economic dominance. In central Mexico, after a Late Classic in which none among a number of competing states emerged as dominant, Tula seems to have prevailed for a short time in the early Postclassic, even though Tula's empire was never as large as that of Teotihuacan (Davies 1977).

In Oaxaca, the valley became balkanized after the fall of Monte Alban, although Zaachila may have become a new political, not economic, center in period IV. At the same time, the Mixteca-now, of course, no longer under Monte Alban hegemony as it had been during the Classic-spawned powerful, predatory, expansive elites whose origin, according to local legends, was outside the Mixteca. Spores (1983a:231) has written:

In time, such high-status individuals must have coalesced into a significant stratum of society, a self-conscious, identifiable social class. This coalescence can be viewed as an adaptive strategy aimed at expanding and consolidating control over a large ecologically diverse and productive geopolitical sphere to satisfy the needs of an increasingly demanding aristocracy. Conquest and marital alliance, then were ... aimed at ... the maintenance of a social system based on social stratification.

Because the Mixteca lacked the rich agricultural land of other Oaxacan areas, these conquests frequently involved a search for basic resources. For example, AImoloyas, a principality allied with Yanhuitlan, conquered the Cuicatlan region to gain access to their rich irrigated agricultural lands (Hopkins 1983:268; Spores 1984:78-79). Mixtecs from Almoloyas, according to the Relaci6n de Cuilapan (Barlow 1945:23), also migrated to the Valley of Oaxaca as a result of marriage between Zapotec and Mixtec nobles (PNE, Vol. 4:190-191; Barlow 1945:23-25). Blanton (cited by Marcus and Flannery 1983:221) speculates that low population densities in the western Valley of Oaxaca may have meant a shortage of agricultural labor. As a result, Zapotec elites married Mixtecs in order to bring Mixtec terrasquero laborers into the Valley of Oaxaca. Blanton also thinks such alliances may have been advantageous to Mixtecs as well, because Spores' data indicate there was probably a surplus population in the Mixteca Alta during the Postclassic.

It would seem, however, that this process might as well work the other way. Mixtecs seeing labor shortage, weak states (brought on by balkanization following the fall of Monte Alban), and great agricultural potential, could have sought alliances with the Zapotecs, or sought to conquer some towns in the Valley of Oaxaca as they had done in Cuicatlan.

Some of the build-up of elite power in the Mixteca was accompanied by imperial aspirations. Lord 8-Deer "Tiger Claw" of Tilantongo (for 8-Deer's history, see Caso 1979:169-184, and Smith 1973:36-37, 67-78) attempted to consolidate a large area under his tutelage and through a combination of conquest and marriage brought together a number of formerly independent Mixtec kingdoms. This area included not only principalities in the Mixteca Alta but also the Costa region of Tututepec where he apparently replaced Zapotec elites. This consolidation had a tremendous effect on the Valley of Oaxaca as well and is mentioned in a number of valley sources including


the Yale Genealogy. The Relaciones Geogrrificas of Mitla (PNE, Vol. 4:149) and Teozapotlan-Zaachila (PNE, Vol. 4:193-194) mentioned having wars against Tututepec.

The imperial design of 8-Deer was not without its commercial dimensions. He attempted to control the major markets in the area-which in the Mixteca Alta were Coixtlahuaca, Teposcolula, Tlaxiaco, Tamazulapan, and Tejupan (Spores 1984:82-83)-linking them to the system of the tropical coast economic system. Towns conquered by 8-Deer apparently brought their resources to central markets where they were distributed. Burgoa (1934 1:352-353), for example, describes Achiutla's (a Mixteca Alta town probably allied with Tlaxiaco, a major market town) obligation to Tututepec:

The obligation [of Achiutla] was to bring the produce of their town to a great fair which was held by order of the king on the plains of Putla ... where he would acquire whatever was necessary for his subjects. (translated by Smith 1973:85)

Since Putla "was more than 20 leagues of hilly and steep mountains and dense vegetation" (Smith 1973:85) from Achiutla, the king of Tututepec was stimulating exchange over considerable distances and between diverse ecological regions of the Mixteca. This was apparently not atypical. Mixtec commercialism included exchange among producers, traders, and consumers, and tribute exacted from local populations which was in part redistributed. It also included

monopolistic entrepreneurial enterprises controlled by high-status caciques and nobles, involving such goods as salt, probably obsidian, fine clothing, jewelry and ornamentation, precious stones, fine feathers, possibly fine decorated ceramics and other exotic goods. (Spores 1984:83)

According to Ball and Brockington (1978), the Mixteca and the Valley of Oaxaca were involved in two exchange networks, which had far-flung commercial dimensions. The first of these, called the "Oaxacan Inland Highland-Lowland Symbiosis" (Ball and Brockington 1978:113), probably dates from the late Preclassic, continued into the Classic, perhaps with Monte Alban as a crucial center, and collapsed in the Late Classic, possibly after the fall of Monte Alban, to be revived again in the Late Postclassic. It joined the states of Tututepec, Miahuatlan, and Coixtlahuaca-found, respectively, in the Mixteca Costa, the southern Zapotec region, and the Mixteca Alta-with the Zapotec state of Tehuantepec.

Cotton, quetzal feathers, and slaves were the major commodities traded in this system. Raw cotton apparently came from Tututepec and Tehuantepec and was manufactured into textiles in the highland towns of Tlaxiaco, Coixtlahuaca, and Nochistlan (Spores 1984:83) in the Mixteca Alta, perhaps in the Valley of Oaxaca town of Cuilapan, and in the highland town of Teotitlan del Camino.

Quetzal feathers, which came from Chiapas and Guatemala, tied this economic network to another economic interaction sphere which Ball and Brockington (1978:112) call the "West Mexican-South Coast Combine." This network included the so-called Tarascan empire, the Yope state, Tututepec (important in the HighlandLowland system), Tehuantepec (part of each of the two systems), and the Chiapanec principalities which had important trading relations with Soconusco. Miahuatlan in the southern Zapoteca-which acted as a kind of "free" port-was apparently an important participant in this complex as well as in the Oaxaca Highland-Lowland system.


The West Mexican-South Coast Combine specialized in the production and trade of polychrome pottery of the Mixteca-Puebla variety-which is found in abundance in the Mixteca Alta and "from the Gulf to the Pacific and from Puebla to Chiapas" (Spores 1984:83)-utilitarian bronze and copper bells, copper money axes, macaws and feathers, quetzal birds and feathers, hallucinogenic drugs, and textiles. It was clearly linked to regions further up the coast in Guerrero, Colima, and Nayarit, extending as far north as Guasave in northern Sinaloa where it has been identified as the Mixteca-Puebla route associated with the Aztatlan complex in pre-Aztec times (Ekholm 1942; Kelley 1980). Still further north, it probably linked with Casas Grandes (Di Peso 1974; Kelley 1980). The West Mexican-South Coast Combine also was linked to the Zoque-Acalan region-thus, to Xicalango on the Gulf Coast-through the Chiapanec principalities and to the south at least as far away as Costa Rica (Smith and Heath-Smith 1980; Stone 1977).

This vast area, of course, was never united under a single polity; 8-Deer's imperial visions were short lived, and he was apparently sacrificed at Yanhuitlan in the Mixteca Alta or at Cuilapan in the Valley of Oaxaca (Caso 1979:177; 1966:329; however, see Smith 1973:78, 64).

Instead, commercial growth and fragmented political structure went hand in hand in southern Mexico after the fall of Monte Alban's empire. In fact, in the Postclassic, the most important political centers are not only different from, but are smaller in scale than, the commercially oriented sites. Tututepec and Tilantongo, two of the most important centers of political power, are relatively unimpressive archaeologically in comparison to places like Yanhuitlan in the Nochistlan valley, the pueblo viejo de Tamazulapan, and Coixtlahuaca-all of which were commercial centers (Spores 1983b:258-260). Appel (1982:147) has also noted a distinction between commercial and administrative centers in Oaxaca. And Zaachila, which may have had considerable political power in period IV in the Valley of Oaxaca, is quite small in comparison to the much more commercially oriented Jalieza (Blanton et al. 1982:115-130).

This lack of congruence between administrative center and trade center coupled with a stratified or hierarchical system of elite competition spawned increasing commercialism, as access to wealth in luxury goods (a kind of conspicuous consumption) became a political statement in its own right. Although some of these luxury goods were acquired through tribute, market centers became the main locales for their manufacture and distribution.

This pattern-in which a market center expands concomitantly with political decentralization-has been studied most intensively in the Valley of Oaxaca where Blanton and his colleagues (Blanton et al. 1982:130) observe

that the basis for regional integration during the Late Postclassic was a system of markets. The hierarchy of central places in [Monte Alban] V ... was more a hierarchy of commercial places than a hierarchy of administrative ones.

They argue essentially that the valley had been integrated with a combined administrative and commercial center under Monte Alban in periods I-IIIB. This was of the type resembling an "empire" even though Monte Alban's empire differed organizationally from that of Teotihuacan.

In period IV, there was no integration-no regional system or site hierarchy-in the Valley of Oaxaca but total balkanization. In period V, Monte Alban again rose to


prominence; however, now its major settlement was not atop a number of prominent ridges that overlook the valley floor but below the hill and II consisted of a number of spatially distinct but closely packed settlement loci" (Blanton et al. 1982:121). Since this site extended from Monte Alban to the Mixtec settlement of Cuilapan, Blanton and his colleagues refer to it as "Cuiban." This was undoubtedly the place named Xaaquietoo in Zapotec (Torralba 1800; Judith Whitecotton 1982:275-276); in Mixtec it was called Saayucu (Barlow 1945:23; Burgoa 1934, Vol. 1:395-396). Paddock (1983a:93-94) believes that by this time Zaachila-which had some political prominence in period IV -became merely a place of residence for Mixtec elites and that Zapotec elites had either been reduced in status or had fled to Tehuantepec.

In short, the political system had become totally decentralized (although this does not imply an absence of political power). As Kowalewski (1983:288) has pointed out, rather than being controlled by a system of central state tribute, commoner households were manipulated through the commercial networks of the regional market, and by patron-client relationships with particular nobles. These elites constituted the ruling families and classes of small kingdoms rather than those of large unitary bureaucratic states.

Thus, a system had evolved-a world-economy-which involved at least the three regions of the Mixteca, parts of the Valley of Oaxaca, and the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. There were apparently tensions in this system; perhaps the eastern part of the valley, Tehuantepec, and Miahuatlan also faced in other directions. On the whole, however, here was a stable system which combined commercial exchange, political decentralization, and aristocratic stratification in an effective way. Following Spores's (1974) lead, Appel (1982:145) has aptly concluded that

the complex interactions of Late Postc1assic kingdoms formed a regional system which was very unstable when viewed from the perspective of any individual kingdom, but very stable at a macroscopic level. To permanently transform such a system, by developing more strongly centralized control, would have been extremely costly.

In order to understand its workings, the system must be viewed as a whole. Concentration on the political dealings of individual kingdoms, or on the relationships between "billiard-ball-like" ethnic groups, presents a picture of an instability and conflict that is as deceptive as a concentration on the wars between European kingdoms and nations in the sixteenth century distorts the unity of the European world economy.

It may have been the strength of this system that attracted the Aztecs; much of Oaxaca became subjected to Aztec hegemony and mercantilism a few years before the Spanish conquest. While Coixtlahuaca may have been conquered by the Aztecs under Moteuczoma I or llhuicamina-and, as archaeology attests, had extensive contact with the Mexica (Bernal 1949)-other Oaxacan towns were apparently not "conquered" until the time of Ahuitzotl (1486-1502) and Moteuczoma II or Xocoyotzin (1502-1520), at most 30 years before the Spanish conquest.3

3There is some discrepancy in the sources regarding the dates of Mexica "conquest" of Oaxacan towns and areas. For sources and discussions, see Appel (1982), Marcus (1983b), and Whitecotton (1977:121-126).

A WORLD-SYSTE'M PERSPECTIVE 63

It should be noted here that Aztec hegemony must be as carefully defined as was Mixtec hegemony in relationship to the Valley of Oaxaca. The Aztec "empire," was also hegemonic and not a territorial" empire" in any real sense. As Hassig (1985:93-94) has observed, this "hegemonic empire" was characterized by

(1) expansion of political dominance without direct territorial control, (2) a focus on the internal security of the empire by exercising influence on a limited range of activities within the client states, and (3) the achievement of such influence by generally retaining rather than replacing local officials.

As a result, the Culhua-Mexica relied on threats, fear of reprisals, and local resources to maintain their empire. An Aztec army was used only for major conquests or rebellions. Institutions, such as standing armies, military forts, and garrisons, were much less extensive than would be found in a territorial empire.

And, as Davies (1978) has pointed out, being subject to the Mexica was frequently an on-again, off-again proposition. Teotitlan del Camino may have been one of the on-again, off-again cases. Tututepec was apparently never conquered by the Mexica.

That the Aztecs were primarily interested in commercialism is clear from the pattern of conquest and the way in which the area was administered: "Another consequence (if not purpose) of Aztec conquest was the reorganization of the relatively autonomous market centers into a more systematic and integrated marketing system" (Hassig 1985:110). In fact, the Aztecs interfered in the systems only to the extent that they attempted to reorient and control the flow of certain elite goods in and out of certain market centers. Otherwise, goods were supplied to consumers in a situation resembling a "free market" which "left unhindered, and perhaps even encouraged, professional trade" (Hassig 1985:113).

Thus, Aztec "expansion" and "dominion" was concentrated on the major distribution or market centers-tributary provinces in the Matricula de los Tributos were the primary market areas for each of the regional systems (for the tributary provinces, see Barlow 1949). For example, the Valley of Oaxaca province was called Coyolapan after Cuilapan (undoubtedly referring to" Cuiban" or Saayucu). According to colonial sources (see Marcus 1983b), the Aztecs conquered this" province" in a battle at Huitzo which pitted them against an alliance of the Mixtecs of Cuilapan, led by a cacique from Achiutla, and the Zapotec king of Zaachila. Even though this account must undoubtedly be distorted-and the chronology unreliable-the Aztecs probably did "conquer" key towns in the valley, presumably to enforce political compliance by local rulers. On the one hand, they wanted to assure clear passage through the valley to the Isthmus market of Tehuantepec and ultimately to Soconusco, the rich cacaoproducing province in Chiapas. On the other hand, as Appel (1982:146) has noted, Coyolapan (Cuilapan) was one of the few tributary provinces outside of the central Mexican area which paid tribute to the Triple Alliance in foodstuffs and not excluSively in luxury items. This led her to conclude that the valley regional system probably specialized in foodstuffs, rather than in long-distance luxury trade items.

According to Duran (1951:229-236), the Aztecs founded a garrison at Acatepec or Huaxacac in the valley, one of the few such military establishments to be founded by the Mexica in Mesoamerica. This garrison was allegedly populated by settlers from a number of central Mexican cities.

Archaeologists have disputed this account since little evidence of Aztec occupation has been found. In fact, ten Aztec sherds at EI Plumaje near Monte Alban


(Blanton 1983:318), one sherd from Yagul (Flannery 1983:294), and a Xipe found while digging the swimming pool for the Hotel Sefiorial in Oaxaca City (Paddock 1985:321-322) constitute the total archaeological record of the Aztec presence in the Valley of Oaxaca.

However, one must remember that Aztec dominion was not that of a conquest state; so an Aztec presence would not necessarily be conspicuous. Furthermore, Aztec culture, as Zantwijk (1985) has shown, was not a preexisting distinct-bounded entity but an amalgamation from various sources, heavily influenced by the Mixteca-Puebla culture, and still absorbing new ideas from foreign provinces including the cult of Xipe Totec from Guerrero and Oaxaca (SahagUn 1970). Paddock, for example, who disputes the Aztec presence, shows that Tezcatlipoca, a central Mexican deity, is absent from Oaxaca except along the Aztec "route through Oaxaca" (Paddock 1985:319) and for "a very short period" (Paddock 1985:322).

Perhaps most importantly one should remember that the sixteenth-century chroniclers thought in terms of nations and ethnic groups in the European and Biblical sense and that Spain was one of the few European nations to have achieved unity in the sixteenth century; the Spanish chroniclers clearly projected this experience onto their conceptions of the native political, linguistic, and economic units of pre-hispanic Mesoamerica.

The tale regarding Cociyo Hueza (also written Cosihuesa, Cociohuezaa, Cocijoeza, Cosijoeza, and so forth), the alleged Zapotec king of Zaachila and Tehuantepec, and his encounter with the Aztec forces of Moteuczoma II (or Ahuitzotl) illustrates the extent to which distortion may occur if one assumes the presence of "nations" or empires struggling for dominion over a territory. Apparently, the Aztecs had considerable difficulty in tapping into the Tehuantepec system. Moteuczoma Xocoyotzin's (or Ahuitzotl's) army was defeated in the Isthmus by a joint Zapotec-Mixtec alliance under Cociyo Hueza. Ultimately, however, the sources tell us that Cociyo Hueza married a daughter of Moetuczoma Xocoyotzin, who was called Pelaxilla in Zapotec.

Cociyo Hueza has been romanticized by generations of Oaxacan historians even though there has been little agreement concerning his actual existence; even his name has been the subject of many contrived and contorted translations (for histories of Cociyo Hueza, see Marcus 1983a; Paddock 1983b, 1983c; and Whitecotton 1977:130-131, 304-305). My current opinion, after an exhaustive study of Zapotec-Mixtec naming patterns (Whitecotton 1982), is that the name may be translated as "RainGod" (Tialoc) or "Lightning" (Cociyo), 4-, 8-, or ll-Water (hueza or gueza), the former being a commonly used male noble personal name, whereas the latter is a typical day name.4 This translation would correlate-contrary to other translations-with his name glyph on the Lienzo de Guevea and support Paddock's (1983a) view that the Tehuantepec dynasty was the same as the Xipe dynasty in the Codex Nuttall that is probably associated with Xaaquietao (Cuilapan or Monte Alban-Cuilapan) in the Valley of Oaxaca. Thus, "Rain God ll-Water" would be either a Mixtec or a ZapotecMixtec (the lines had become so "mixed" by the Late Postclassic as to make ethnic distinctions less than clear in most cases) even though Cociyo Hueza may, in fact, have been able to make claims on Zaachila. Since the nobles of Zaachila, Cuilapan,

4For more discussion of this translation, and a possible association of the name Cociyo with Xipe, as well as with "Lightning" and "Rain God," see Whitecotton (1990).

A WORLD-SYSl£M PERSPECTIVE 65

and Achiutla were undoubtedly linked by marriage, the king of Achiutla-ally of Zaachila and Tehuantepec-would have been Cociyo Hueza's relative. It is also perhaps more than coincidence that the Mixtec name (Dzahuindanda) (Marcus 1983b:315) of the father of the cacique of Achiutla means the same as the Zapotec name Cociyo Hueza.5

Regardless of these details, the legend does indicate that the Zapoteca and Mixteca had become a kind of semiperiphery in relationship to central Mexico. This intermediate status-usually occupied by a former independent state or regional system which becomes incorporated into another political-economic system-also affected the nature of status emulation among elites, for this Mexican background, coupled with early postconquest Nahua migrations to the valley, was used by some nobles to claim cacique status in the colonial period. A genealogy from San Antonino Ocotliin, the so-called Genealogia Oaxaqueiia (Whitecotton 1982), reflects this by showing an obviously forced "tlatoani" title appended to Zapotec names. Along similar lines, a local cacique from Tlacochahuaya claimed to be tlatoani who traced descent from Mexicans who, he claimed, had occupied the area from time immemorial (AGN, Tierras, 1206). Similar documents exist from San Juan Chapultepec and a mapa from Macuilx6chitl (PNE, Vol. 4) contains a Nahuatl text describing the native rulers of the area. In a similar fashion, as if to playa kind of "one upmanship" on Valley caciques who claimed Mixtec ancestors, the cacique of Tehuantepec, Don Juan Cortes, claimed descent from the Mexican tlatoani Moctezuma; in fact, the Zapotec Cociyo Hueza legend6 may have been derived from this claim. Thus, the political economy of Mesoamerica as viewed from the Valley of Oaxaca displays a pattern of elite emulation that reflects hegemonies and commercialism that extended considerably beyond any local region.

DISCUSSION

Numerous investigators have recognized the existence of a Mixteca-Puebla elite culture (see particularly Vaillant 1942; Caso 1941; 1977:11-14; Jimenez Moreno 1966;

5Dzahui is the Mixtec gloss for "TIaloc or Rain God;" the meaning of ndanda is less clear but it might be related to the day name for "water" -see Caso (1977:163) and Smith (1973:24-25). It is not unlikely that the lord of Achiutla could have been related to the lord of Zaachila-Cuilapan. Achiutla seems to have been allied with TIaxiaco which at one time was under the hegemony of Tututepec. However, TIaxiaco was also allegedly conquered by the Culhua-Mexica according to central Mexican sources. Since the Mexica had not conquered Tututepec, however, it follows that an Achiutla lord might seek allies with the valley town of Cuilapan-Zaachila against the Mexica.

6 As Paddock (1983b) has pointed out, Mexican independence brought with it attempts to rewrite local histories and a resurgence of ethnic pride in certain regions. Nowhere was this more important than in the Oaxaca. Some nineteenth-century intellectuals, including Gay (1950[1881]) and Martinez Gracida (1988), took up this theme and wrote at least partially fictionalized histories of Cociyo Hueza and has family-which included his son Cociyo Pij who became Don Juan Cortes after the Spanish conquest. Perhaps because a Zapotec heritage was more consciously promoted there, Isthmus traditions and sources were used to write Zapotec history.


Nicholson 1960; and Stone 1982) that spread throughout Mesoamerica and beyond in the Postclassic. Most have recognized that many of the accoutrements of this culture were adopted, and adapted, by the Culhua-Mexica Aztecs, who contributed to its further dissemination.

The extent of its association with the earlier Toltecs of Tula is less clear, although elements of this culture are certainly found in many regions-but most notably in northern Oaxaca and southern Puebla-ranging from central Mexico to the Yucatan Peninsula in the early Postclassic if not in the Epiclassic period.

This complex culture was not the preserve of a single people and, like elite culture elsewhere, it easily crossed linguistic boundaries. It spread in layers, being added to and reworked by elites in a number of different areas. Its material manifestations and symbols were dispersed by trade (mercantilistic as well as "free"), by status emulation, and by elite marriage exchanges. But most importantly, it became hegemonic, as had at least two of the elite groups with which it was associated: the Mixtecs of Oaxaca and the Aztecs of central Mexico.

In Oaxaca, the shifting hegemonies of Postclassic elites led to an increasing hierarchicalization and peripheralization. As a region that had had its own world system centered on the core state of Monte Alban in the Classic, it became part of a larger world system in the Postclassic. It is not certain where the early Postclassic world system was centered; although clearly the Mixtec regions-in political terms it probably involved the states of Tilantongo and Tututepec-had assumed hegemony with reference to the Valley of Oaxaca by A.D. 1200, if not earlier. Increasingly, however, by the Late Postclassic most of Oaxaca, excluding perhaps Teotitlan del Camino and Tututepec, had become hierarchicalized with reference to a new hegemony centered in the Valley of Mexico.

The Postclassic hegemonies were not those of empires in the strict sense of the word, however, although clearly 8-Deer of Tilantongo-Tututepec and the MexicaAztec tlatoque used imperial style tactics. On the whole, however, increasing commerce and social alignments generated fragmented power fields and small weak states in Oaxaca, a situation which reflects its evolution from a single world economy to its incorporation into another. As Wallerstein (1974a:355) has written: "It follows ... that the world-economy develops a pattern where state structures are relatively strong in the core areas and relatively weak in the periphery." While it is more likely that Oaxaca comprised semiperipheral states in Wallerstein's scheme, it certainly developed a core-periphery hierarchy with reference to central Mexico in at least two ways:

1. It was involved in a dominance/dependence relationship based on either political or economic coercion. Whether this involved actual conquest, or more than likely, only the threat of conquest, the Mexica made a profound political impression on the region.

2. Increasing interdependence led to an unequal exchange relationship so that trade-including tribute-benefitted the core more than it did the "peripheralized" areas (mercantilism). Tenochititlan-Tlatelolco was built on the processing of raw materials brought to it in tribute, which were then forced back on subject peoples as finished products. And the locals in Miahuatlan and Tehuantepec did not consider green or purple lake scum, tortillas of "worms or grubs," and waterbug egg cakes-which they were forced to take


from the Mexica pochteca and rebelled against on one occasion-as an even exchange for textiles, worked gold, precious jewels, and ornate feathers (Duran 1951:368).

Whether or not to call the Mexica-Culhua a world-empire is problematical. On one level, the opposition between a world-empire and a world-economy is undoubtedly not as distinct as Wallerstein makes it seem; certainly this dichotomy must involve a continuum.

fhe Aztec state had not achieved political hegemony over all of its known world: at the least the Tarascans may still have maintained influence over a world-economy which also included Tututepec. Another possible world-economy involved Tlaxcala and the east, although this one was certainly weakened, and largely incorporated, by the Mexica. My present view, however, in refinement of an earlier one in which I held that Wallerstein's position that precapitalist world-economies were unstable would not apply to Mesoamerica (Whitecotton and Pailes 1979), is that most of the worldeconomies in ancient Mesoamerica had a tendency to either become united under a single political structure, to collapse, or to be incorporated into even larger systems. The Aztecs by the time of Spanish conquest had already brought under their hegemony a larger area than had any previous state; probably they would ultimately have achieved political and economic predominance over the whole area ranging from Central America on the south to the American southwest on the northwest. Had this developed, it is probably that ultimately Aztec control over the region would have ranged more toward the world-empire rather than the world-economy pole if these two types are viewed as falling along a continuum.

One might argue that such a view is contradicted by cultural information, however, in that Wallerstein (1974a:349) argues that world-economies are characterized by social systems with spatially distributed cultures and world-empires have occupationally defined ones. Certainly Classic Mesoamerica had cultures that were strongly defined regionally. However, one must not be misled into thinking that Mesoamerica, defined as culture area, was a single world-system. The symbols of Teotihuacan culture were increasingly more widespread among Mesoamerican elites. The fact that Monte Alban did not intensively participate in this Teotihuacan phenomenonalthough it is debated among archaeologists and difficult to ascertain on the basis of archaeolOgical data alone-does not negate the process. It simply puts Monte Alban outside the Teotihuacan orbit; it formed its own world-system. The term world here refers to a zone of regular relations not necessarily a zone of perceptions or contacts.

In the Postclassic, spatially defined cultures also existed; there were differences between regions. Elites still retained local cultural traditions and continued to speak a regional language even though they may have become polyglot and ultimately may have adopted Nahuatl as lingua franca. Increasingly, however, cultural distinctions were becoming distinctions of estates, if not differences of class: merchants of one region were becoming like merchants in another; elite warriors and rulers were more similar wherever they were found and even claimed descent from a common "lineage"; and, if the Relaciones Geograficas may be trusted as sources of information on pre-hispanic conditions, peasants were becoming increasingly aware of the cultural differences, including the linguistic ones, between themselves and the elites who demanded tribute from them.


It must be remembered, however, that the Mesoamerican Postclassic involved an elite culture in the process of formation and that, although there may have been general tendencies, it displayed variable manifestations. Elites in the orbit of a civilization, while they may attempt to replicate the symbols of a single hegemonic tributary society, also may

exploit the ambiguities of inherited forms, ... impart new evaluations or valences to them, ... borrow forms more expressive of their interest or, ... create wholly new forms to answer to changed circumstances. (Wolf 1982:387)

Thus, Zapotecs and Mixtecs may have emphasized different symbols in different contexts. When the Zapotecs were under clear hegemony of the Mixtecs, they became more Mixtec-like. Later, with conflicting or ambiguous hegemonies, they embraced other symbols as well.

The fluidity characteristic of cultural symbols also applies to economic relationships, and one must be careful not to assume a one-to-one fit between the nature of political domination, types of ideology, and types of economic exchanges. Increasingly, evolutionary schemes-such as the reciprocity, redistribution, and market sequence of the unilineal evolutionists-are coming under attack (see particularly Appadurai 1986). Most state-level economies, this must include nonstate societies within their orbit, are layered rather than monolithic; a whole economic system is not characterized by one kind of economic exchange. Exchanges may also be differently perceived depending on the position of a group or society within the larger social field.

For example, while archaic or antique world-economies may not be "capitalistic" in one sense of the term, they may contain "capitalistic-like relationships" within them. As Ekholm and Friedman (1982:88) have stated it:

We do not deny that there are important differences between industrial capitalism and the ancient systems. It is clear that the modem system in which industrial capitals compete for survival by direct investment in the productive forces implies a kind of dynamic unknown in the past. The accumulation of capital as a form of abstract wealth, however, is a truly ancient phenomenon. To say that this ancient "capital" played a fundamental economic role is not to say that it functioned directly in the production process, but that its accumulation and control were dominant features of those economies.

And, for Mesoamerica, Hassig (1985:126) has observed:

The picture presented in many sixteenth-century chronicles of a free economyincluding laissez faire entrepreneurs, supply-and-demand markets, bargaining, and freely hired professional parties-is accurate. All this took place. The control exercised by the state operated on a more subtle level, controlling the nature and locale of exchanges and overseeing the transportation needed to benefit by the transactions.

From the perspective of only one part of it, a system may exhibit apparent contradictions. Oaxaca may seem to resemble a market economy in the Postclassic because of an apparent lack of overarching administration and an emphasis on exchange, commercial and otherwise, in local and regional marketplaces. But from above, from the perspective of the core, one sees a conquest tribute state or empire, forced mercantilism, and controlled merchant wealth. For the political economy of Mexico-Tenochtitlan, like that of Venice, rested

A WORLD-SYSTEM PERSPECTIVE

upon a dialectic between a market economy developing almost unaided and spontaneously, and an over-arching economy which seizes these humble activities from above, redirects them and holds them at "its mercy." (BraudeI1984:38)

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

69

This chapter is adapted from two conference papers. The first, "Native Elites and Regional Inequality in Early Oaxaca," was presented in the symposium Stratification and Regional Inequality from Its Origins: The Case of Oaxaca at the 85th annual meeting of the American Anthropoligical Association in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, during December of 1986. The second, "Culture and Exchange in Mesoamerica and the Southwest" (co-authored with Richard A. Pailes), was read in the symposium Interregional Interaction in Prehistory at the 52nd annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, during May of 1987. I wish to thank. Arthur Murphy and Laura Finsten for inviting me to participate in the first symposium and Edward Schortman and Patricia Urban for my inclusion in the second. I am grateful to Richard Blanton, John Chance, Stephen Kowalewski, and Richard Pailes for helpful comments on one or the other papers.

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Oklahoma Press, Norman.

Chapter 4

Pre-Hispanic Interregional Interaction in

Southern Mexico The Valley of Oaxaca and the Ejutla Valley

GARY M. FEINMAN AND LINDA M. NICHOLAS

INTRODUCTION

Ethnohistoric accounts document Late Postclassic interrelationships between the Pacific coast and highland valleys of Oaxaca. These highland-lowland interactions, which involved both trade and warfare, apparently were mediated by the inhabitants of the southernmost extensions of the Central Valleys of Oaxaca (see Figure I), most notably the pre-Hispanic residents of the Miahuatlan Valley (Ball and Brockington 1978; Paso y Troncoso 1905). Although a peripheral part of the Central Oaxaca Valleys, Miahuatlan was in a strategic position for pre-Hispanic travel (Brockington 1973) and served as a port of trade by the Late Postclassic period (Ball and Brockington 1978). Cotton was a principal element in the highland-lowland network, traded largely from such coastal areas as Tututepec and Tehuantepec to highland towns where the cotton was made into finished textiles (Ball and Brockington 1978). The town of Miahuatlan may have supplied the Valley of Oaxaca with lowland products and goods through Cuilapan, a close trading partner (Ball and Brockington 1978). The exchange of people also is mentioned, both in colonial documents that

GARY M. FEINMAN and LINDA M. NICHOLAS • Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin 53706.


75

76 GARY M. FEINMAN AND LINDA M. NICHOLAS

describe Miahuathin as a pre-Hispanic slave market (Paso y Troncoso 1905), and in records of royal marriages (Caso 1949).

The Late Postclassic landscape in Oaxaca (as in much of the rest of Mesoamerica) was made up of small petty states, which ethnohistoric sources indicate were frequently at war (Whitecotton 1977). Much of the coast at that time was controlled by Tututepec, which made forays into the highlands (Davies 1968). Tututepec may have even conquered Miahuatlan and used it as a base for military operations against places as far away as Mitla in central Oaxaca (Ball and Brockington 1978; Brockington 1973; Davies 1968). This Late Postclassic warfare may have been economically initiated, as Tututepec tried to gain control of highland-lowland trade from Miahuatlan (Ball and Brockington 1978).

Although ethnohistory provides rich documentation of coastal-central valley connections during the immediate pre-conquest period, it tells us little about the antecedents of these relations, when they were initiated, how they may have changed over time, and what role the peripheral valleys, such as Miahuatlan and Ejutla (situated between the Miahuatlan Valley and the Valley of Oaxaca), played in their development (Figure 1). The Ejutla Valley Settlement Pattern Project was designed, in part, to collect and examine the archaeological data that are necessary to address the history of these relationships. Through our study of the Ejutla Valley and the nature of its long-term relationship with the Valley of Oaxaca and the Pacific coast, we endeavor to contribute to the larger anthropological debate about the structural relations between regions in pre-Hispanic Mesoamerica, and to increase our knowledge about how ancient systems in general were interconnected (d. Blanton and Feinman 1984; DeAtley and Findlow 1984; Green and Perlman 1985; Trinkaus 1987; Wilcox 1986).

A more specific goal has been to address a series of questions concerning the relationship between cores and their margins, and how their interconnections may have been related to processes of internal change and development. What are the comparative settlement histories of the Valley of Oaxaca and its near-periphery, the Ejutla Valley? Are peripheries simple microcosms of the core? Are they marginal or diminished in all respects relative to the core? Do they carry out special roles or activities not found, or found less frequently, in the core? In discussing a marginal area such as Ejutla, we follow the sense of the theoretical definitions of Friedman and Alonso (1969) and Strassoldo (1980), who distinguish "frontiers," open, sparselysettled, almost "virgin" areas of growth, from peripheries, which are dependent, more-closed domains distant from the developed cores, and perhaps linked to them through specific channels.

Is there a changing dynamic between cores and their margins? Is the relationship static or does interplay between the areas have a dynamic effect on the relationship as Paynter (1985) has suggested? Paynter (1985) gives a 3eries of sequential relationships that may develop between core areas and their margins depending on the nature of the interconnection. In contrast, Hudson's (1969) model of colonization postulates that all frontier development follows a single trajectory.

How did ancient states expand and what is the effect on their margins? One of the clearest trends in human history has been the formation and integration of political and economic institutions of ever increasing size (Carneiro 1978; Wallerstein 1974). But what is the relationship between scale and internal organization over a long time frame? How are shifts in the boundaries of these polities related to internal

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societal transitions? And how do these internal changes affect the core's relationship with its margins?

One consequence of the growth of powerful core states in Mesoamerica was a widespread stimulation of trade, often reorienting local production and exchange systems (Blanton and Feinman 1984). One hypothesis postulates that labor-intensive activities, such as cloth production, were pushed to the spatial margins so that intensive food production could become the focus of the more densely occupied cores (Blanton 1985; Blanton and Feinman 1984). Are specific economic specializations more evident in peripheral areas, such as the Ejutla Valley, than in core areas, and if so, under what conditions did this pattern develop and which crafts were involved?

PROJECT METHODOLOGY

The Ejutla Valley Settlement Pattern Project was designed to collect regional-scale settlement pattern data for the Ejutla region that were comparable to the information available for the larger, flatter, and agriculturally more productive Valley of Oaxaca to the north (Blantonet al.1982; Feinmanet al.1985; Kowalewskiet al., 1989). Although one goal was to learn more about this little-studied region, an equally important emphasis was placed on obtaining information that would allow comparisons between the two areas.

The regional study of Ejutla, implemented during the summers of 1984 and 1985, used systematic field-by-field foot survey methods similar to those employed in the archaeological surveys of the Valley of Oaxaca (Blanton et al. 1982; Feinman et al. 1985; Kowalewski et al. 1989) and very much like procedures followed in other highland valleys in Mesoamerica (Blanton 1972; J. Parsons 1971; Sanders et al. 1979). Field crews, usually of three to four persons, walked over every field, knoll, ridge, arroyo, and village street to assure thorough coverage. Information on phase-by-phase occupation boundaries, sherd densities, land use, architecture, and other features was regularly recorded directly on the 1:5000 enlargements of 1:20,000 air photograph mosaics of the Ejutla Valley, carried into the field with each crew. Notes were taken on site dimensions, environmental variables, agricultural potentials, pottery, chipped stone, ground and building stone, possible evidence of specialized activities, houses, terraces, walls, as well as any other important features. All mounded architecture was measured, described, drawn, and, when possible, dated and interpreted. The possible effects of postdepositional events, such as later occupation, erosion, and alluviation, were examined at each site.

In the laboratory in Ejutla, all data were organized systematically by site. Each air photograph was carefully traced, and all site boundaries (by phase) and architectural drawings were checked. In Madison, Wisconsin, the topographic base map was prepared, and all recorded sites were placed on this map. Using the base map, phase-by-phase settlement pattern maps were made by tracing all components for each phase onto separate maps. A compensating polar planimeter was used to measure the size of all components. Population estimates were calculated for each component, using the basic procedures developed by Sanders (1965) and J. Parsons (1971) in the settlement pattern survey of the Basin of Mexico and employed in the regional surveys of the Valley of Oaxaca (Blanton 1978; Blanton et al. 1982; Feinman et al. 1985;

PRE-HISPANIC INTERREGIONAL INTERACTION 79

Kowalewski et al. 1989). These procedures are based on the assumption of a general relationship between the areal extent of a site and its population. For the Oaxaca surveys, including Ejutla, the figures of 10 to 25 people per hectare were used to calculate the population of most settlements. In discussing pre-Hispanic populations in Ejutla or Oaxaca, we refer to mean values for ease of presentation. Preliminary analyses of artifact distributions (shell, spindle whorls, obsidian, projectile points, and some ceramic types) also have been completed for the Ejutla region, as well as the total volume of mounded architecture for each site.

THE EJUTLA V ALLEY AND THE V ALLEY OF OAXACA

Because of its pre-Hispanic importance, the Valley of Oaxaca in the southern highlands of Mexico has been the focus for major programs of archaeological, ethnohistoric, and epigraphic research, including the recent completion of the Valley of Oaxaca Settlement Pattern Project (Blanton 1978; Blanton et al. 1982; Feinman et al. 1985; Kowalewski et al. 1989). Much has been learned (see Flannery and Marcus 1983 for a current multidiSCiplinary synthesis) concerning the lifeways of the region's ancient Zapotec and Mixtec inhabitants. We are able to describe a long pre-Hispanic sequence for the valley, beginning with nomadic hunting and gathering peoples through early farming villages, to the rise and fall of a major hilltop urban center (Monte Alban), followed by the complicated landscape of small fractionated petty states.

The systematic coverage of 522 km2 in Ejutla links the southern boundary of the 2,150 km2 Valley of Oaxaca Settlement Pattern Project study region (Kowalewski et al. 1989) with the northern limit of Charles Markman's (1981) survey transect through the Miahuatlan Valley (Figure 1). The comparison of these sets of data allows us to study interregional relationships and their role in shaping the trajectory of long-term change in the Southern Highlands of Mexico.

Environment

Located in the state of Oaxaca, the Ejutla and Oaxaca Valleys lie in Mexico's Southern Highlands (Figure 1), a patchy environment composed of agriculturally forbidding steep slopes interspersed with only a few alluvial basins with flat farmable land. The Valley of Oaxaca (the Upper Basin of the Rio Atoyac) contains the largest expanse of good arable land in the Southern Highlands. The southern boundary of the Rio Atoyac's Upper Basin gently divides the Valley of Oaxaca from the Ejutla Valley (Welte 1973). The Ejutla Valley, which begins approximately 40 km south of Oaxaca City, comprises, along with the Miahuatlan Valley (to the south of Ejutla) and the Sola Valley (to the west of Ejutla), the Middle Basin of the Atoyac. The Ejutla Valley is considerably narrower than the Valley of Oaxaca. Broad stretches of flat alluvial land are rare, and most of the Ejutla Valley is composed of rolling piedmont hills. In addition to less flat alluvial terrain, much of the Ejutla Valley is also somewhat less suitable for agriculture than the Valley of Oaxaca because of the distribution of rainfall (Carta de Climas 1970). Whereas roughly only 35% of the Valley of Oaxaca lies outside the 700-mm isohyet, more than 90% of the Ejutla Valley receives less than this essential annual quantity of average precipitation, an amount necessary for the re-


liable rainfall farming of maize. Yet, while Ejutla was marginal for agriculture relative to the Valley of Oaxaca in general, the Ejutla Valley would not have been an unfamiliar habitat for pre-Hispanic Oaxaquenos. The drier eastern, or Tlacolula, arm of the Valley of Oaxaca proper presented similar environmental constraints for agriculture to those of the Ejutla Valley.

Settlement Patterns

Not surprisingly, the pre-Hispanic occupation of the Ejutla region was generally marginal, both demographically and politically, compared to the broader Valley of Oaxaca. A series of atemporal, analytical comparisons that cut across the now completed 2,672 km2 Oaxaca-Ejutla survey block (Figure 2) illustrates this ancient marginality. The overall density of archaeological localities in the Ejutla Valley is just over 0.8 sites (irrespective of size and phase) per km2 as compared with 1.25 per km2 in the Valley of Oaxaca. The difference in the number of components (phase-specific occupation) is even greater. The 423 sites we recorded in Ejutla include a total of 691 temporally specific archaeological components (Table 1). The 6,000 components that were mapped in the much larger Valley of Oaxaca represent twice as many temporal components per km2 as were found in Ejutla. Another comparative dimension of Ejutla's marginality relative to the Valley of Oaxaca is the diminished occupational continuity of pre-Hispanic sites in the former region. Sites in the Ejutla Valley average roughly less than one and two-thirds components per site (310 of the Ejutla sites were single component), while the comparable mean figure for the Valley of Oaxaca is two and one-third components per archaeological locality. The relative political marginality of pre-Hispanic Ejutla also is suggested by fewer recorded monumental structures per km2 and per site relative to the Valley of Oaxaca (even if the numerous mounded platforms at Monte Alban are excluded from the latter sample).

Ejutla's demographic marginality relative to the Valley of Oaxaca continued throughout the pre-Hispanic era (Figure 3), with sites in Ejutla never equaling the size of the largest Oaxaca settlements (e.g., Monte Alban). For each temporal phase (Table 2), the number of recorded components per km2 was less in Ejutla than in Oaxaca as a whole (Table 3). Estimated population densities also were always lower in Ejutla (Table 4); however, the degree of difference in density between the two regions varied

Table 1. Ejutla Valley Component List

Number of Site area Phase components (in ha) Population

Early Formative 3 .59 24 Rosario 4 1.50 40 Early I 21 12.10 259 Late I 63 211.74 3,455 Monte Alban II 46 114.54 2,184 Monte Alban IlIA 135 1,003.12 14,656 Monte Alban IIIB/IV 52 153.86 3,029 Monte Alban v 362 1,071.10 19,970 Unknown 5

PRE-HISPANIC INTERREGIONAL INTERACTION

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Figure 2. Valley of Oaxaca and Ejutla Valley Settlement Pattern Project survey areas, with places and subregions mentioned in the text.

81


170 VALLEY OF OAXACA

;) 0 z « 100 UJ ~ 0 :I: I-

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Figure 3. Pre-Hispanic population trends in the Valley of Oaxaca and the Ejutla Valley. (TL=Tierras Largas; SJ=San Jose; G=Guadalupe; R= Rosario; EI=Early I; LI=Late I; II=Monte Alban II; IIIA=Monte Alban IlIA; IIm=Monte Alban IIm; IV=Monte Alban IV; V=Monte Alban V.)

greatly through time, ranging from an order of magnitude difference early in the sequence to a factor of two in Monte Alban IlIA and V. Interestingly, at various points in the pre-Hispanic sequence, the Ejutla region was more heavily occupied than specific subregions of the Valley of Oaxaca proper. For example, in Monte Alban IlIA, we estimate that Ejutla was more densely settled than was the better-watered Etla subregion at the north end of the Valley of Oaxaca. Less surprisingly, the observed demographic trends in the Ejutla study area were most consistently similar to the patterns found for the southernmost and contiguous subregion of the Valley of Oaxaca, the southern Valle Grande (Figure 4).


Table 2. Valley of Oaxaca Chronology

Date Oaxaca Ejutla

1500

1300 Monte Alban V Monte Alban V

1100

900 Monte Alban IV

700 Monte Alban 11m/IV Monte Alban IIIB

500 Monte Alban IlIA Monte Alban IlIA

300

AD. 100 Monte Alban II Monte Alban II

100 B.C.

300

500

700

900

1100

1300

Monte Alban Late I Monte Alban Late I

Monte Alban Early I Monte Alban Early I

Rosario Rosario

Guadalupe Early Formative

San Jose

Tierras Largas

Table 3. Component Densities per Km2 in Oaxaca and Ejutla

Phase

Early Formative Rosario Early I Late I Monte Alban II Monte Alban IlIA Monte Alban IV Monte Alban V

Oaxaca

0.019 0.040 0.121 0.347 0.241 0.501 0.207 1.142

Ejutla

0.006 0.008 0.040 0.121 0.088 0.259 0.100 0.693

83

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30

20

10

Table 4. Population Densities per Km2 in Oaxaca and Ejutla

Phase Oaxaca Ejutla

Early Formative 00.90 00.05 Rosario 00.85 00.08 Early I 06.82 00.50 Late I 23.68 06.62 Monte Alban II 19.22 04.18 Monte Alban IIIA 53.59 28.08

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Figure 4. Pre-Hispanic population trends in six Valley of Oaxaca subregions and the Ejutla Valley. (R=Rosario; EI=Early 1: LI=Late I; II=Monte Alban II; IIIA=Monte Alban IlIA; IIIB=Monte Alban IlIB; IV=Monte Alban IV; V=Monte Alban V.)


Economic Activities

Although Ejutla was marginal to the Valley of Oaxaca in many respects, a few economic activities were more prevalent in Ejutla than in Oaxaca. Nonceramic artifactual materials found on the surface can be difficult to date without subsequent excavation. Therefore, we present most of the evidence for economic specialization in an atemporal fashion. Yet the majority of data on craft activities that we recorded during the Ejutla survey were found at sites with either Monte Alban IlIA and/ or V diagnostic pottery, indicating that the respective activities were much more prevalent during the Classic and Postclassic periods than they had been earlier.

Relatively little evidence for the production of utilitarian craft items (ceramics and local chipped stone) was noted during our survey of the Ejutla region. Much greater evidence for such activities exists in the Valley of Oaxaca than in Ejutla (Figure 5). There are almost 50 ceramic production localities in Oaxaca (Kowalewski et al. 1989); in contrast, we found only three tentative loci for pottery making in Ejutla, and the evidence for them was less secure than for many of the Oaxaca sites. If Ejutla's smaller size (about one-quarter that of the Valley of Oaxaca) and its lower site density are taken into account, between four and five times as many ceramic production localities per unit area were present in Oaxaca than in Ejutla.

We did find many good clay deposits in the Ejutla region and suspect that small-scale ceramic manufacture did occur there, but these activities generally were not of the scale nor duration to produce the residue of surface material that was observed more frequently during the Oaxaca surveys. The Ejutla survey project recovered fewer than 10 kilnwasters, some of which appeared to have been usable.

As with ceramics, surface concentrations of local lithic materials also were more prevalent in the Valley of Oaxaca than in Ejutla (Figure 6). Densities of local chipped stone indicative of possible stone tool production or intensive use were observed at only four sites in Ejutla. In contrast, the manufacture of stone tools has been suggested for almost 150 sites in the Valley of Oaxaca (Kowalewski et al. 1989). Standardized by size of area or number of sites, lithic concentrations were six to nine times more prevalent in the Valley of Oaxaca than in the Ejutla region.

These patterns of ceramic and lithic production may be related partially to demographic factors, as with fewer people concentrated in the Ejutla Valley, there would have been a smaller market for the large-scale production of utilitarian goods. Most frequently, utilitarian goods may have been produced by small-scale, less specialized producers for local consumption.

In contrast to utilitarian goods, we did find more surface indications for the use and production of exotic craft items in Ejutla, especially shell and spindle whorls, but also obsidian. Although shell was rarely encountered on the ground surface during the surveys of the Valley of Oaxaca, it was comparatively abundant in the Ejutla region (Figure 7). Shell was recorded at only 20 archaeological localities (out of 2,700) in the Valley of Oaxaca, including Monte Alban (Kowalewski et al. 1989), whereas in Ejutla, shell was recorded at 21 sites. Per capita (Le., relative to the total number of sites in each region), surface shell was between six and seven times more prevalent in Ejutla than in Oaxaca, just the opposite of the pattern seen for ceramics and locally available stone. Three shell workshops have been recorded in the combined survey areas (Figure 7), two in Oaxaca (at Monte Alban [Blanton 1978] and San Jose Mogote [Flannery and Winter 1976]) and one in Ejutla (at the large site in the town of Ejutla itself).


Interestingly, shell also was relatively more abundant in the Miahuatlan Valley (to the south of Ejutla) than in the Valley of Oaxaca, occurring with the same relative frequency as in Ejutla. Both Brockington (1973) and Markman (1981) also recorded a single shell-working area in Miahuatlan, which appears to be similar to the one we recorded in Ejutla. At both the Ejutla and Miahuatlan sites, considerable quantities of obsidian, including blades, spalls, and awls, were recorded with the concentrations of shell on the surface.

Because of the scarcity of shell and shell-working areas in the Central Valleys of Oaxaca, we recently have begun a field program to examine this activity at the multicomponent Ejutla site. During August, 1990, a set of exploratory test pits was placed in the concentration of surface shell. The information from these preliminary excavations indicates that shell ornaments were crafted at the site during Monte

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Figure 5. Distribution of ceramic production locations in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.

PRE·HISPANIC INTERREGIONAL INTERACTION 87

Alban IlIA (and possibly as early as Monte Alban II). Nevertheless, because only a small percentage of the site was tested, we cannot rule out the production of shell artifacts during other phases (see Feinman and Nicholas 1991).

Most of the shell, observed both on the surface and in excavated test pits, was debris. We noted considerably less in the way of finished (or partially finished) items, such as beads, disks, pendants, and bracelets. It is possible that at least some of the finished shell from Ejutla was traded north to the Valley of Oaxaca, particularly to major centers like Monte Alban. The distribution of surface shell from the regional surveys (Figure 7) tentatively supports this interpretation, as shell was recorded mostly in the western part of the combined survey region (between Ejutla and central Oaxaca), as well as between the two workshops at Monte Alban and San Jose Mogote.

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Figure 6. Distribution of lithic production locations in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.


Spindle whorls were rare items in both Ejutla and the Valley of Oaxaca, yet their greater prevalence in Ejutla relative to Oaxaca (Figure 8) was even more marked than the difference in the presence of shell. Twice as many spindle whorls were found on the ground surface in Ejutla as in Oaxaca (11 for Ejutla and 6 for Oaxaca, including Monte Alban), even though Ejutla is only one-fourth the size.

In both areas, spindle whorls were found most abundantly at larger sites. Three of the 11 spindle whorls found in Ejutla were recovered from the plaza of one site. Most of the Ejutla spindle whorls are relatively crude, lack decoration, and their size and shape are varied. Based on the three important dimensions of hole diameter, total diameter, and weight, 9 of the 11 Ejutla spindle whorls would fit neatly into Mary Parsons's (1972) smallest, or Type III, category of Basin of Mexico spindle

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Figure 7. Distribution of shell and shell workshops in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.


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\.. • V I) • • I'\. • 1

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El E2 E3 E4 E5 E6 E7 E8 E9 E10 Ell E12

Figure 8. Distribution of spindle whorls in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.

89

whorls, which she associates with the spinning of cotton. The other two spindle whorls are similar in size to her larger Type I whorls and may have been used for spinning maguey. The Late Postclassic ethnohistoric accounts of cotton entering the valley from lowland areas to the south (Ball and Brockington 1978) support the suggestion that most of the spindle whorls in Ejutla were used to spin cotton. Although we noted no contemporary evidence for it, some cotton also could have been grown using irrigation in the Ejutla Valley, which is at a slightly lower elevation than the Valley of Oaxaca. Spinning, whether of cotton or maguey, definitely was a more prevalent activity among the pre-Hispanic residents of Ejutla than Oaxaca, and as with shell, some of the finished product may have been traded north into the Valley of Oaxaca.

The distribution of obsidian in the Valleys of Oaxaca and Ejutla is intermediate between the distributional patterns observed for utilitarian goods and exotic items.


Although obsidian was an exotic good (there is no known obsidian source in the Central Valleys of Oaxaca), it was generally much more abundant on the surface than either shell or spindle whorls.

A comparison of the number of sites where obsidian was present, 541 sites in the Valley of Oaxaca (Kowalewski et al. 1989) and 103 in Ejutla, indicates comparable densities of obsidian for the two regions when the different areal extent and numbers of sites in each area are considered. However, comparing the number of archaeologicalloci with obsidian per 100 site components (Figure 9), Ejutla had a slightly greater quantity of obsidian than any subregion of the Valley of Oaxaca.

Evidence for obsidian-working (or very heavy obsidian use) was recorded at two sites in Ejutla; these were areas with dense concentrations of obsidian debris (by Oaxaca standards), large proportions of blades, and obsidian projectile points. Although projectile points in general were relatively more abundant in Ejutla than in Oaxaca, the distribution of obsidian points varied from that of projectile points made from other materials. Other points more frequently were found at sites in defendable locations, whereas obsidian points were found most commonly at lower elevations along the valley floor. The greatest number of obsidian points was recovered from the large site at Taniche in the center of the Ejutla region, which we tentatively have proposed as an obsidian-working area.

PHASE-BY-PHASE DISCUSSION

This section focuses diachronically on relevant settlement pattern information from the Ejutla region. Data are related to changes that occurred in the larger Valley of

Figure 9. Obsidian density in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block. (Density figures represent the number of sites where obsidian was present on the surface per 100 components. Components are defined as each phase-specific occupation at a specific archaeological location or site.)


Oaxaca to the north to show the relationship between a core and its margin. In addition, information on interconnections with coastal areas to the south is presented when available.

Pre-Monte Alban Phases

Compared to the more northern reaches of the Valley of Oaxaca, the Ejutla Valley was settled late and rather sparsely (Figure 10). No definitive Tierras Largas phase occupations have been recorded in the Ejutla region. The earliest ceramics there most closely resemble Valley of Oaxaca ceramics of the San Jose phase. We have taken a cautious stance and have dated these occupations more broadly to the Early Formative period. This early pottery was found at three small sites in the study region, although none of these sites is situated specifically in the drainage of the Rio Ejutla, a tributary of the larger Rio Atoyac. In comparison, 26 Tierras Largas phase and 41 San Jose phase occupations were recorded by the Valley of Oaxaca Settlement Pattern Project (Kowalewski et al. 1989).

Two of the three Ejutla settlements are situated close to the Rio Atoyac in the northwestern comer of the Ejutla survey region (Figure 11) and appear to represent a southern frontier extension of a small cluster of settlements around the early village of Santa Ana Tlapacoyan, one of the larger Early Formative settlements in the Valley of Oaxaca (Blanton et al. 1982; Kowalewski et al. 1989). The third Ejutla site, positioned

Figure 10. Early Formative (San Jose phase) population densities per km2 for each of seven subregions in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.

92

o 5 ...... KILOMETERS


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SANTA ANA TLAPACOYAN

Figure 11. Early Formative settlement pattern in the Ejutla Valley survey area.


further south on a piedmont terrace directly overlooking the Atoyac, may represent the southernmost extension of Early Formative settlement in the Central Valleys of Oaxaca, as no sites of this age have yet been recorded in the Miahuatlan Valley to the south (Markman 1981). The sparse, open nature of settlement in the Ejutla Valley fits our definition of a frontier, and we suggest that the earliest sites in the Ejutla survey region were settled by pioneering groups that moved south out of the Valley of Oaxaca along the course of the Rio Atoyac.

The settlement pattern of Ejutla changed little during the subsequent Rosario phase, and the population density of the area remained far below that of the Valley of Oaxaca (Figure 12). Only four small Rosario phase settlements were recorded, all of which are located relatively close to the Rio Atoyac and Santa Ana Tlapacoyan (Figure 13). Although one of the Ejutla sites was associated with mounded construction, this structure most likely pertained to a later, larger occupation. No settlement differentiation is evident. All four sites were positioned in the low piedmont directly above good alluvial land, indicating an agricultural orientation. However, further to the south the rich floodplain near the Rio Ejutla remained uninhabited, as did the southern extensions of the Central Valleys of Oaxaca. The data do not suggest that the relationship between the Valley of Oaxaca and its margins changed significantly during the Rosario phase. The Ejutla Valley remained a sparsely settled frontier.

Figure 12. Rosario phase population densities per km2 for each of seven subregions in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.


Monte Alban Early I

The Rosario-Early I transition in the Valley of Oaxaca was characterized by rapid population growth and the emergence of the hilltop center of Monte Alban, as well as the foundation of a series of smaller centers with mounded structures. Dozens of Early I settlements larger than two hectares in size were located in the valley, with at least several of these situated in each subregion (Kowalewski et al. 1989). The population of the Ejutla Valley also increased at a rapid rate between the Rosario and Early I phases (Figure 3). But by comparison, all Ejutla settlements were smaller than two hectares. Additionally, although ceramics were associated with mounded construction at several sites in Ejutla (Figure 14), each of these structures also was associated with larger quantities of surface pottery that pertained to larger, later occupations. Hence, no mounded architecture could be definitively linked with Ejutla's Early I settlements and, in several cases, collections made from exposed mound fill clearly placed the structures later in time.

Most of the Ejutla settlements still were small farming hamlets located along the Atoyac and its tributaries, including, for the first time, the drainage of the Rio Ejutla (Figure 14). During Monte Alban I, the first occupations were recorded in the Miahuatlan Valley (Markman 1981). Thus, the southern extension of the Central Valleys of Oaxaca remained a sparsely inhabited frontier lacking any archaeological indication of the emergent hierarchical institutions evident in the Valley of Oaxaca at this time. The absence of large or civic-ceremonially important Early I centers in both Ejutla and along the southern edge of the Valley of Oaxaca survey region leads us to suggest preliminarily that most interactions may have been handled reciprocally by individuals at small, relatively autonomous communities along this southern frontier.

In Early I, Ejutla was still more sparsely settled than the Valley of Oaxaca had been hundreds of years earlier during the San Jose through Rosario phases (see Table 4). At this time, the two Valley of Oaxaca subregions farthest from Monte Alban, the southern Valle Grande and eastern Tlacolula, were settled more than twice as densely as the Ejutla region (Figure 15). Since eastern Tlacolula has less fine bottomland and is generally more agriculturally marginal, the demographic sparsity of Ejutla relative to Oaxaca would seem at least partially a consequence of its spatial position.

Monte Alban Late I

The most rapid episode of pre-Hispanic demographic increase in the Ejutla region occurred between Monte Alban Early I and Late I (see Figure 3). This demographic increase could reflect either very rapid local population growth, colonization from the Valley of Oaxaca, or a movement into the less settled fringe of the Central Valleys of Oaxaca from outside the region. The number of Late I components in Ejutla increased threefold (see Table I), and these occupations were increasingly differentiated in size and architectural complexity (Figure 16). Late I settlements covered more than 200 hectares, and we estimate an areal population of at least several thousand people (see Table I). The population density was roughly similar to what it had been earlier in the Valley of Oaxaca during Monte Alban Early I (see Table 4). Yet, based on surface assessments, no Late I settlement in Ejutla was comparable in size or architectural complexity to Late I Monte Alban or, for that matter, to Early I Monte Alban, pre-Monte Alban San Jose Mogote, or even the larger Late I secondary centers in the Valley of Oaxaca.


o 5 MM. _ ..

KILOMETERS

• SETTLEMENT

• SANTA ANA TLAPACOYAN

Figure 13. Rosario phase settlement pattern in the EjutJa Valley survey area.

95

96

o 5 Me Me ..

KILOMETERS


..........

,.,.J'''-' '-----. ,..",,---

POPULATION • ~ 30

MOUND VOLUME .~1000m3 .. <1000

Figure 14. Monte Alban Early I settlement pattern in the Ejutla Valley survey area.


Figure 15. Monte Alban Early I population densities per km2 for each of seven subregions in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.

97

The Ejutla study area was not dominated by one or two centers as was the Valley of Oaxaca. Even though almost 20% of the Late I Ejutla sites had average estimated populations greater than 100, none had more than 350. Mounded construction is associated with 16 Late I components (Figure 16); however, most of these sites had no more than four structures, and most of the mounds were very small. Later, larger occupations also were present at the four sites where Late I ceramics were associated with larger or more numerous structures, yet the larger, more monumental construction almost certainly pertains to these later phases. At four sites where Late I was the sole ceramic phase associated with the structures, the single mounds or small plaza groups were low and very small. Thus, though a larger proportion of the Late I relative to Early I sites had nonresidential architecture, the Late I construction generally was internally similar and simple in plan. As with the distribution of the Ejutla population, these settlements were well dispersed along the region's rivers and tributaries, suggesting the continued absence of a single dominant regional center.

Monte Alban II

As in the Valley of Oaxaca, the transition from Monte Alban Late I to II in the Ejutla Valley was marked by both a slight demographic decline (see Figure 3) and much greater settlement discontinuity than evidenced earlier. Although the population density of Ejutla during Monte Alban II remained an order of magnitude below that of the Valley of Oaxaca (see Table 4), by this time the former region (Ejutla) was more a dependent periphery than a frontier. Although the number of small hamlets

98

o 5 8M 8M ..

KILOMETERS


.... _.-

,.. . .,.-._._., I~~

.J .r

POPULATION • ~ 100

MOUND VOLUME • ~1000 rn 3 .. < 1000

Figure 16. Monte Alban Late I settlement pattern in the Ejutla Valley survey area.


remained roughly constant (see Table 1), most of the small Late I Ejutla centers diminished considerably in size or were abandoned entirely. Three strategically positioned Late I centers increased in extent and most probably in their architectural elaboration. The two smaller and southernmost of these sites (EJ-SAA-SAA-15 and EJ-YO-YO-12, Figure 17) grew to their maximum extents in Monte Alban II; both were associated with 13 comparatively large structures. Although this construction cannot be placed securely in time, these settlements were clearly larger and more important in Monte Alban II than they had been earlier.

The third Monte Alban II center (EJ-EJ-EJ-1) grew to roughly twice the size of any prior Ejutla settlement or other contemporaneous community (Figure 17). Situated underneath the contemporary distrito head town of Ejutla, this dominant site was centrally placed in the middle of the Rio Ejutla drainage. In fact, from the tops of the truly monumental structures that were built, one can view a large segment of the study region. Nine very large structures were recorded and measured (several additional structures were too badly disturbed to measure), and these have a very rough total volume of nearly 80,000 m3, more than four times the estimated volume of the constructions at the other two large sites. Several of these mounds were built up more than 12 m, and mound fill observations, made possible by the poor condition of the structures, indicated a Monte Alban II construction date.

Several other factors point to a significant Monte Alban II transition in the Ejutla region and a change in the region's interconnection with the Valley of Oaxaca. The number of small low-lying hamlets in northern Ejutla and the southern Valle Grande decreased, indicating a drop-off in the kinds of open, horizontal communications that are expected along a frontier. Instead, for the first time, several Ejutla sites were positioned in defendable locations. However, unlike the defendably situated localities in Monte Alban IlIA and V, which tended to face outside the Valley of Oaxaca, the phase II sites were positioned closer to the alluvium overlooking the most direct route between Monte Alban and the Ejutla site.

A shift in the nature of interactions between Oaxaca and Ejutla also is suggested by the changing distribution in Ejutla of Monte Alban I and II cream paste pottery. These distinctive cremas, which are produced and found most abundantly in the central and northern parts of the Valley of Oaxaca, were very rare in Ejutla in phase I contexts. Yet the temporally specific and highly decorated Monte Alban II cremas were found more frequently, and are particularly abundant, at the three aforementioned centers. Hence, interactions between the two regions may have been handled more directly through elite individuals living at the major centers.

Suggestively, prior studies by Spencer (1982) and Redmond (1983) in the Cuicatlan Canada and by Marcus (1980) of the glyphic record on Building T at Monte Alban have proposed that Monte Alban may have exerted force against other external domains in the state of Oaxaca during Monte Alban II. We would include Ejutla, as at least an area of increasing interest to Monte Alban. Markman (1981) reports that there was no "fundamental" change in settlement patterns in the Miahuatlan Valley during Monte Alban II, although he notes some increase in public construction. Perhaps the Miahuatlan Valley remained more of a frontier than a periphery. Interestingly, although Spencer (1982) and Redmond (1983) have suggested that the Cuicatec area had a diminished Valley of Oaxaca presence in subsequent Monte Alban IlIA, the more proximate Ejutla region seems to have continued as at least a partial dependency of Monte Alban.

100

r o 5 Me Me ..

KILOMETERS

i .; , ; i


i i i i,-'"

)~lJ/ ~' / /

/ , /~ ,

;,; J) I " i .I \} \ \

( ,.J , ,. Ji

)r' ,. j i

\

i.

" ..... _._._r·r

POPULATION

.~500

., '.

• 100-499 MOUND VOLUME

• ~ 25,000 m 3

• 1000-24,999 .. < 1000

Figure 17. Monte Alban II settlement pattern in the Ejutla Valley survey area.


Monte Alban IlIA

Beginning with the Classic period, many general patterns observed for the Valley of Oaxaca (Kowalewski et al. 1989) also occurred in the Ejutla Valley. Monte Alban IlIA and V were the two most populous phases in both areas (see Figure 3), while Monte Alban IlIB and IV were phases of demographic decline. Yet population densities in Ejutla continued to remain considerably lower than those found in most Valley of Oaxaca subregions (Figure 18). In IlIA, the population density of the Ejutla region (an estimated 28 people per km2) was closer to that of Oaxaca (53 per km2) than at any other time in the pre-Hispanic sequence (see Table 4). The massive demographic expansion in the southern arm of the Valley of Oaxaca during IlIA apparently also extended into the Ejutla region, where there was a proliferation of many small hamlets, especially in northern Ejutla and in the central part of the study area along the Rio Ejutla drainage. Perhaps the much greater exploitation of the southern reaches of the Central Valleys of Oaxaca was interrelated with Monte Alban's loss, between Monte Alban II and IlIA, of more distant northern peripheries, such as Cuicatlan. The extension of the demographic patterns observed in the southern Valle Grande into Ejutla during Monte Alban IlIA suggests that the two regions remained interconnected, with perhaps a basic continuation in the core-periphery relationship that had developed previously.

In IlIA, much of the Valley of Oaxaca population was concentrated in several large sites, such as Monte Alban and Jalieza in the Valle Grande, and this pattern also

Figure 18. Monte Alban IIIA population densities per krn2 for each of seven subregions in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.


was observed in Ejutla with the establishment of a large center near San Joaquin in central Ejutla (Figure 19). This site had almost four times the population of the next largest contemporary Ejutla settlement, the site under modem Ejutla that had been the preeminent phase II center of the region. Even though the old Monte Alban II center increased in extent, it was completely overshadowed in size by the new center to the north, much closer to the area of expansion in the southern Valle Grande.

Although Ejutla seems to have been thoroughly incorporated into the Valley of Oaxaca system in the Early Classic period, some militaristic tension may have existed between the two areas. Ejutla appears to have been a well-defended extension of the Valley of Oaxaca, yet some of the defendable locations were situated between Oaxaca and Ejutla and not simply along the outer edges of Ejutla. Hilltop terraced sites, which were very common in the Valley of Oaxaca during IlIA, especially along the southern and eastern fringes (Blanton et al. 1982; Kowalewski et al. 1989), also were found along the eastern side of Ejutla, as well as in a line across the southern Valle Grande and northern Ejutla (Figure 20). This inner string of terraced sites could represent an internal line of valley defense or possibly reflect an episode of tension between the occupants of the two valleys. Unlike defendable sites in the Valley of Oaxaca, most of the Ejutla hilltop loci did not have large residential terrace occupations. Only the northernmost such site just to the south of the limit of the Valley of Oaxaca survey region had more than 60 residential terraces. The Ejutla hilltop sites were more clearly garrisons or lookout points; they were small, elevated, and inaccessible, and in three cases perimeter stone walls were still standing. In IlIA, these defendable sites were concentrated along the eastern edge of the survey area (Figure 21), particularly overlooking the pass that leads into the Ejutla Valley from the drainage of the Rio Tehuantepec and its tributaries. Several sites also overlooked the Atoyac above the southernmost expanses of alluvium.

Projectile points were recovered at several of these hilltop sites. Although we cannot securely date these points to individual phase occupations, more than half (32 of 57) of the projectile points recovered during the Ejutla survey were associated with IlIA occupations. Overall, the density of projectile points in Ejutla (11 per 100 km2)

was twice as high as the density in the Valley of Oaxaca (6 per 100 km2). This difference most likely indicates a greater defensive nature to the occupation in Ejutla.

Even though much of the evidence for economic activities (shell, spindle whorls, and obsidian) in the Ejutla region could not be dated securely to a single phase, most of these materials were found at sites with either Monte Alban IlIA and/ or V diagnostics. Very little shell was found at sites in Ejutla that did not have either Monte Alban IlIA or V occupations. The presence of these materials at several single component IlIA sites indicates that such activities were initiated at least by the Early Classic period.

Spindle whorls recorded on the surface also are difficult to date. However, cloth production in Ejutla almost definitely pertains to the Early Classic and the Late Postclassic. All spindle whorls were found at sites with at least one of these two periods present, and several could be dated securely to one or the other since only a single ceramic phase was associated with the whorls on the surface (five to Monte Alban IlIA and two to V).

In addition to the evidence from shell (several species were clearly Pacific) and cloth (at least some of the cotton likely came from the coast), support for highlandcoastal connections during Monte Alban IlIA also comes from the presence of a


o 5 .. 8M ..

KILOMETERS

, \ i I

POPULATION

.~1000


• ~ 25,000 rn3

• 1000-24,999 • <1000

Figure 19. Monte Alban IlIA settlement pattern in the Ejutia Valley survey area.

103

104

•


'),' 6'-i, t3> ' •

o ... []I

• TERRACED SITE

o DEFENSIVE WALL

10 kit!

Figure 20. Monte Alban IlIA hilltop terraced sites in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.


N4

N3

N2

N1

51

52

53

54

55

• DEFENSIVE SITE E5 E6 E7

Figure 21. Monte Alban IlIA sites situated in defendable locations in the Ejutla Valley survey area.

105

carved stela that we recorded in the town of Ejutla during the first field season of survey (Feinman 1985). The most notable feature of the carved stone is the crossedarms motif that is common on monuments in the coastal area of southern Oaxaca. Ten stelae with crossed-arms were recorded during a survey in the coastal Rio Grande and Tututepec area Gorrin 1974). Although these unprovenienced monuments are difficult to date securely, most of the coastal stelae were found on sites with predominantly Classic period ceramic materials Gorrin 1974). The varying amounts of


green and gray obsidian recorded during the surveys of Oaxaca and Ejutla also indicate that sites in the Ejutla Valley may have served as a gateway for goods arriving in the Central Valleys from areas to the south or east. At single component Monte Alban IlIA sites, 73% of the obsidian in the valley of Oaxaca was gray (Finsten 1983), compared to 93% in Ejutla (the remainder was green and probably was imported from Central Mexico to the north of the valley system). The Ejutla distribution was most closely matched by the southern Valle Grande, the valley subregion that it borders. Although the Ejutla obsidian has not been sourced yet, some of this gray obsidian could have entered the Central Valleys of Oaxaca through Ejutla from known obsidian sources in the Guatemala Highlands (see Pires-Ferreira 1975:13). To the southeast of Ejutla, in the southern Isthmus of Tehuantepec on the Oaxacan coast, one of the major sources of obsidian (prior to A.D. 300) was El Chayal in Guatemala (Zeitlin 1978).

Monte Alban IIIB/IV

We discuss periods IlIB and IV jointly because of the difficulty we had in distinguishing these temporal phases on the basis of surface ceramics in the Ejutla region. Very few potsherds clearly diagnostic of Monte Alban IllB were observed during the survey; much of the grayware present at Classic/Early Postclassic sites could have been associated with either IlIB or IV. Monte Alban IlIB also was poorly represented in the southern parts of the Valley of Oaxaca, just north of Ejutla, so it is not surprising that we found so little good evidence of IlIB pottery in Ejutla. Diagnostics of Monte Alban IV were more prevalent, and it is possible that the IlIA ceramics continued in use longer in Ejutla than in the more northerly parts of the Valley of Oaxaca and were followed directly by a ceramic complex similar to phase IV. The observed Ejutla settlement pattern is more similar to that of Monte Alban IV in the Valley of Oaxaca than of IlIB. The comparisons that we draw for the two areas, therefore, are for Monte Alban IlIB/IV in Ejutla and Monte Alban IV in the Valley of Oaxaca.

After Monte Alban IlIA, the population of the Ejutla region declined significantly (see Figure 3), as did the population of the Valley of Oaxaca. This decline was much greater in Ejutla than in Oaxaca; the only valley subregion to have lower population densities in phase IV than Ejutla was Etla. Interestingly, Ejutla and Etla have the same peripheral relationship to eastern Tlacolula, the subregion where the heaviest populations were situated during the Early Postclassic (Figure 22). Substantial unoccupied areas separate Etla, as well as the southernmost part of the Valle Grande and Ejutla, from the more heavily populated central and eastern portions of the Valley of Oaxaca. These outlying areas may have become less integrated with the core valley populations. The relative abundance of imitation fine orange and gray ceramics in Ejutla suggests that the region was developing new kinds of ties with other parts of Mesoamerica.

The political decentralization of the Ejutla area can be seen in the decline of the large IlIA centers; no one settlement was considerably larger than the rest in terms of either population or amount of mounded architecture (Figure 23). In addition, the Ejutla population was concentrated into several roughly equal-sized settlement clusters across the central part of the survey area. Two of these clusters were located along the eastern and western edges of the Ejutla region, respectively, with new large settlements located in defendable locations in high piedmont or mountainous areas


Figure 22. Monte Alban IV population densities per krn2 for each of seven subregions in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.

107

(Figure 23), a pattern also seen in Miahuatlan (Markman 1981). The westernmost cluster appears to be an extension of the Valley of Oaxaca settlements that surrounded the major Early Postclassic site of EI Choco; these Ejutla sites had no imitation fine gray or orange (only one piece of fine orange was found at EI Choco), while sites in the other Ejutla clusters did. Given their spatial segregation, these settlement clusters may have been somewhat autonomous of each other, as has been suggested for the petty states that developed in the Valley of Oaxaca at that time.

Monte Alban V

The rapid population growth observed for the Valley of Oaxaca between the Early and Late Postclassic also occurred in the Ejutla region (see Figure 3) and Miahuatlan (Markman 1981), although the population densities in the Valley of Oaxaca remained much higher. The distribution of the much greater Monte Alban V population throughout the combined survey areas continued the phase IV pattern in that eastern Tlacolula continued to have the largest populations while Etla and Ejutla had the smallest.

In Ejutla, more than a third (38%) of the population was concentrated in the three largest settlements, and the remaining population was dispersed into smaller settlements and isolated residences. Very few Monte Alban V sites had mounded architecture (less than 1 %), and those sites that did were fairly evenly spaced across the region (Figure 24).

During phase V, after the breakup of the Monte Alban polity, the valley's set-

108

o 5

KILOMETERS


" "

, \ \ I

,.. ..... -._.-I _

"

POPULATION • <2:100

MOUND VOLUME

A <2:1000 m3 • < 1000

Figure 23. Monte Alban IlIB / IV settlement pattern in the Ejutla Valley survey area.


o 5 --KILOMETERS

't

POPULATION

• ~ 1000


• ~ 25,000 m 3

• 1000-24,999 • <1000 - BALL COURT

Figure 24. Monte Alban V settlement pattern in the Ejutla Valley survey area.

109


tlement landscape was fragmented into many smaller, at least partially autonomous settlement systems. This pattern, which has been observed in other regions of Mesoamerica during the Postclassic, also was found in the Ejutla region where three or four smaller population clusters can be defined. The western and northern clusters were continuations of settlement along the southern edge of the Valley of Oaxaca survey area. However, the largest concentration focused on the Rio Ejutla drainage, with major centers beneath the contemporary settlements of Ejutla and Taniche and on the piedmont slopes above the municipio of Coatecas Altas. By the Late Postclassic, the occupants of the Ejutla region seem again to have been interlinked more closely with the now politically fragmented, but economically interconnected, Valley of Oaxaca system. Yet, at the same time, the populace in the Ejutla drainage apparently continued also to act as an economic and military interface with Late Postclassic populations that lived outside the Central Valleys of Oaxaca.

During the Late Postclassic, the continued presence of hilltop terraced sites in the Valley of Oaxaca, in addition to many other smaller sites located in defendable positions (Blanton et al. 1982; Kowalewski et al. 1989), illustrates the importance of military activities. The Ejutla region also was ringed by sites in defendable locations (Figure 25). At nine of these hilltop localities, we mapped standing defensive walls. Many of these sites are located near the edges of the three settlement clusters we discussed above. The sites not only overlook the southern entrance to the Atoyac alluvium and the same pass into Tehuantepec that was guarded earlier in IlIA, but they also stood above the natural pass that now is followed by the contemporary highway that links the Ejutla drainage with Miahuatl<in.

The defensive nature of the pre-Hispanic Ejutla settlement pattern is also suggested by the relative abundance of projectile points in Ejutla compared to the Valley of Oaxaca. As in Monte Alban IlIA, over half (39 of 57) of the points we recovered in Ejutla were associated with phase V components (several of these sites were multicomponent with IlIA and V occupations). Many of these points, especially the nonobsidian ones, were recovered at the defensive walled sites.

As in Monte Alban lIlA, the presence of shell and spindle whorls at Monte Alban V sites, including several single component sites, indicates that shell manufacture and cloth production continued to be important activities in Ejutla during the Late Postclassic. However, we are not able to clearly gauge the relative importance of these activities throughout the Classic and Postclassic periods or to describe changes in the practice based on the available survey data. Our exploratory excavations did not find definitive evidence of shell-working in Monte Alban V as it did for Monte Alban lIlA; however, because only a small area was excavated, we cannot yet rule out shellworking in the Late Postclassic.

The changing distribution of green and gray obsidian across the Central Valleys of Oaxaca indicates that Ejutla may have increased the autonomy of its links to other areas, while direct ties to the Valley of Oaxaca may have been weakened relative to Monte Alban lIlA. In single component Monte Alban V sites, green obsidian was more abundant than gray in the Valley of Oaxaca (68% vs. 32%, Finsten 1983), while gray obsidian continued to be more prevalent in Ejutla, although to a slightly lesser degree than at single component lIlA sites (Figure 26). The Ejutla distribution continued to be most closely matched by the southern Valle Grande, and also eastern Tlacolula; however, the difference between Ejutla and Oaxaca was greater than in lIlA since in Monte Alban V all Valley of Oaxaca subregions had at least 50% green while


52

53

54

55

• DEFENSIVE SITE E5 E6 E7

Figure 25. Monte Alban V sites situated in defendable locations in the Ejutla Valley survey area.

Ejutla had considerably less. Much of the obsidian debris, including finished projectile points, found at the large site in Taniche can be dated securely to Monte Alban V. The amount of obsidian recorded at this site greatly surpassed the counts at any other site in Ejutla, and the site appears to have been an obsidian-working area. As with other sites in Ejutla, much of the obsidian was gray. Although some of these points may have been traded north into the Valley of Oaxaca, much may have been distributed locally.


Figure 26. Percentage of green versus percentage of gray obsidian present at single component Monte Alban V sites for each of seven subregions in the Valley of Oaxaca-Ejutla Valley survey block.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

At the outset of this work, we set forth a series of questions concerning the preHispanic settlement histories of the Ejutla and Oaxaca Valleys. Our intent was to compare these regions, to examine the interrelationship between them, and to unravel their interconnections to other parts of ancient Mesoamerica. We discovered that the Ejutla region was settled later and generally less intensively than the Valley of Oaxaca. Through Monte Alban Early I, Ejutla remained a sparsely settled frontier with slow population growth, while major political and demographic developments occurred to the north. It was not until Monte Alban II that major organizational changes took place in the Ejutla area with the construction of an architecturally elaborate center at the region's core. By that time, the Ejutla region was more of a dependent periphery than a sparsely settled frontier.

Ejutla remained a periphery of the Valley of Oaxaca throughout the remainder of the pre-Hispanic sequence. Following this change from frontier to periphery, the Ejutla region took on new roles in the regional system. The first clear evidence of economic specialization in the Ejutla Valley is present by the Early Classic period, and the production of certain exotic goods, such as shell and cloth, was more prevalent in Ejutla than the Valley of Oaxaca core.

By the Late Postclassic, Ejutla may have been a more autonomous periphery. There was no dominant core state in the Valley of Oaxaca during the Postclassic that


controlled as much area as Monte Alban had previously. However, the Ejutla area continued to serve some of the economic and military roles that had developed earlier during the Oassic period. With the fragmentation of earlier settlement systems across Mesoamerica, elites in separate systems formed their own trading networks. In Ejutla, it tentatively appears (based on obsidian color) that a more independent obsidianprocurement network may have developed during the Late Postclassic period. In addition, the buildup of defendable sites, many with standing walls, along Ejutla's southern border during Monte Alban V offers support for the occurrence of military encounters with groups to the south.

The Ejutla Valley was not simply a microcosm of the larger Valley of Oaxaca, nor was it marginal or disadvantaged in all respects. At times, Ejutla was economically integrated into the Valley of Oaxaca system. Even though utilitarian craft items, such as ceramics and chipped stone, appear to have been produced on a relatively smaller scale in Ejutla than in Oaxaca, other economic activities, especially shell-working and cloth production, were more prevalent in Ejutla. During the Oassic and Postclassic periods, Ejutla, along with Miahuatlan, served as economic gateways for goods entering the valley system from areas to the south and east. Some of the goods were raw materials that were made into finished items to be traded further north. In general, the items produced were not low-ranking goods, rather the economic activities in Ejutla mostly pertain to rarer objects, known to have been linked to higher status groups in the pre-HispaniC Mesoamerican world.

We do not expect that all peripheral areas would have the same roles at the macroregional scale; however, the preliminary results of the Ejutla study imply that we should not assume that all peripheral areas are unimportant, unintegrated II cultural" backwaters. Studying marginal regions may be essential for understanding changes at the core and for increasing our knowledge of macroregional processes.

We traced a trajectory of settlement in the Ejutla region from a sparsely settled frontier, through a dependent periphery, to a somewhat more autonomous periphery. We suspect that this trajectory was the result of a complex interplay between a range of local factors and external forces. Hence, we would not expect all marginal regions to follow a single trajectory for use and occupation, as suggested by Hudson (1969). Rather, a perspective similar to Paynter's (1985) approach, which gives consideration to long-distance political and economic relations and stratification, offers a more realistic view of the range of interconnections that may develop between core areas and their margins.

We cannot adequately address the broader issue of early state expansion by examining data from the Ejutla region alone; however, we can assess the effect of the expansion of the Monte Alban-centered state on the marginal Ejutla region. The Ejutla Valley appears not to have been affected greatly by the initial political and demographic developments in the Valley of Oaxaca. Ejutla was still only very sparsely settled prior to Monte Alban's occupation. The major transformation in the relationship between the Ejutla and Oaxaca regions occurred in Monte Alban II several hundred years after the foundation of Monte Alban, when the Monte Alban state expanded its area of apparent tributary control beyond the physiographic boundaries of the Valley of Oaxaca proper. This change promoted clear shifts in the political and settlement organization of the Ejutla Valley and, at least by the Early Classic period, Significant transitions in interregional patterns of exchange and production.

During the Classic period, the Valley of Oaxaca state reached its highest popula-


tion levels and greatest level of hierarchical complexity, coinciding with the first definitive evidence of economic specialization in the Ejutla region. Tentatively, this supports Blanton's hypothesis about the spatial structure of pre-Hispanic states (Blanton 1985; Blanton and Feinman 1984), which postulates that labor-intensive activities, such as shell-working and cloth production, were exported to spatial margins, such as the Ejutla area, in order to free up the rural labor force near larger centers in core areas, such as central Oaxaca, for more intensive food production. Previously, Monte Alban settlement pattern shifts in the central and southern portions of the Valley of Oaxaca were suggested to have resulted from an organized effort to stimulate intensive agricultural production (Blanton et al. 1982).

In sum, through the Ejutla Valley Settlement Pattern Project, we have offered a preliminary picture of the long-standing pre-Hispanic relations that linked various regions within the state of Oaxaca. The interregional linkages discussed in ethnohistoric accounts for the Late Postclassic period have been shown to have had much earlier antecedents. Yet, as implied by the documentary accounts, these long-distance relations from their outset seem to have had a strong basis in military affairs and the exchange and production of sumptuary goods.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The Ejutla Valley Settlement Pattern Project has been supported by a research grant from the National Science Foundation (BNS 84-06229/BNS 85-42668). The Foundation also funded the exploratory study of shell-working at the Ejutla site (BNS 89-19164). The permission and valuable assistance of the Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia de Mexico and the Centro Regional de Oaxaca are recognized with great gratitude. Joaquin Garcia Barcena, Angel Garcia Cook, and Lorena Mirambell have been particularly helpful and supportive throughout these projects. The Department of Anthropology, the Graduate School, and the Latin American and iberian Studies Program of the University of Wisconsin-Madison all have provided vital support to this research program. Richard E. Blanton, Kent V. Flannery, Ernesto Gonzalez Licon, David C. Grove, Stephen A. Kowalewski, Joyce Marcus, Ma. de la Luz Topete Vargas, Cecil Welte, and John E. Yellen all provided very valuable advice and support. We wish to thank all the members of the field and laboratory crews (Scott Fedick, Everardo Olivera, Fausto Olivera, Laura Finsten, Sherman Banker, J. Michael Elam, Beth Misner, Paula Schulze, Kathy Niles, Kelly Hamilton, Karen Benz, and Carol Waggener) who assisted in data collection and analysis. A special debt of gratitude also is owed to the people of the Ejutla distrito who remained helpful, understanding, and interested as we plodded through their villages and fields.

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Ejutla Valley, Oaxaca, Mexico. Mexicon 7:60-68. Feinman, G., S. Kowalewski, L. Finsten, R Blanton, and L. Nicholas, 1985, Long-Term Demo

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Flannery, K., and J. Marcus (eds.), 1983, The Cloud People: Divergent Evolution of the Zapotec and Mixtec Civilizations. Academic Press, New York.

Flannery, K., and M. Winter, 1976, Analyzing Household Activities. In The Early Mesoamerican Village (ed. K. Flannery). Academic Press, New York, pp. 34-45.

Friedmann, J., and W. Alonso (eds.), 1969, Regional Development and Planning. MIT Press, Cambridge.

Green, S., and S. Periman, 1985, The Archaeology of Frontiers and Boundaries. Academic Press, New York.

Hudson, J., 1969, A Locational Theory for Rural Settlement. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 59:365-381.

Jorrin, M., 1974, Stone Monuments. In The Oaxaca Coast Project Reports: Part I (ed. D. Brockington, M. Jorrin, and J. R Long). Vanderbilt University Publications in Anthropology 8. Nashville, pp.23-81.

Kowalewski, S., G. Feinman, L. Finsten, R Blanton, and L. Nicholas, 1989, Monte Alban's Hinterland: Part 2. The Prehispanic Settlement Patterns in Tlacolula, Etla, and Ocotltin, the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico. University of Michigan, Museum of Anthropology, Memoir 23. Ann Arbor.


Marcus, J., 1980, Zapotec Writing. Scientific American 242:50-64. Markman, c., 1981, Prehispanic Settlement Dynamics in Central Oaxaca, Mexico: A View from the

Miahuatldn Valley. Vanderbilt University, Publications in Anthropology 26. Nashville. Parsons, J., 1971, Prehistoric Settlement Patterns of the Texcoco Region, Mexico. University of Mich

igan, Museum of Anthropology, Memoir 3. Ann Arbor. Parsons, M., 1972, Spindle Whorls from the Teotihuacan Valley, Mexico. In Miscellaneous Studies

in Mexican Prehistory (M. Spence, J. Parsons, and M. Parsons). Museum of Anthropology, University of Michigan, Anthropological Papers, Ann Arbor, pp. 45-79.

Paso y Troncoso, F. del, 1905, Relaciones Geograficos de la Diocesis de Oaxaca. Papeles de Nueva Espana, Segunda Serle, Tomo 4. Madrid.

Paynter, R., 1985, Surplus Flow between Frontiers and Homelands. In The Archaeology of Frontiers and Boundaries (ed. S. Green and S. Perlman). Academic Press, New York, pp. 163-211.

Pires-Ferreira, J., 1975, Formative Mesoamerican Exchange Networks with Special Reference to the Valley of Oaxaca. University of Michigan, Museum of Anthropology, Memoir 7. Ann Arbor.

Redmond, E., 1983, A Fuego y Sangre: Early Zapotec Imperialism in the Cuicatian Canada, Oaxaca. Museum of Anthropology, University of Michigan, Memoir 16. Ann Arbor.

Sanders, W., 1965, The Cultural Ecology of the Teotihuacan Valley: A Preliminary Report of the Results of the Teotihuacan Valley Project. Unpublished manuscript. Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park.

Sanders, W., J. Parsons, and R. Santley, 1979, The Basin of Mexico. Academic Press, New York. Spencer, c., 1982, The Cuicatldn Canada and Monte Alban. Academic Press, New York. Strassoldo, R., 1980, Centre-Periphery and System-Boundary: Culturological Perspectives. In

Centre and Periphery: Spatial Variation in Politics (ed. J. Gottmann). Sage Publication, London, pp.27-6l.

Trinkaus, K. (ed.), 1987, Polities and Partitions. Anthropological Research Papers, No. 37. Arizona State University, Tempe.

Wallerstein, 1.,1974, The Modern World-System. Academic Press, New York. Welte, c., 1973, Ready Reference Release NO.2. Oaxaca. Whitecotton, J., 1977, The Zapotecs: Princes, Priests, and Peasants. University of Oklahoma Press,

Norman. Wilcox, D., 1986, A Historical Analysis of the Problem of Southwestern-Mesoamerican Connec

tions. In Ripples in the Chichimec Sea (ed. F. Mathien and R. McGuire). Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, pp. 9-44.

Zeitlin, R., 1978, Long-Distance Exchange and the Growth of a Regional Center: An Example from the Southern Isthmus of Tehuantepec, Mexico. In Prehistoric Coastal Adaptations (ed. B. Stark and B. Voorhies). Academic Press, New York, pp. 183-210.

Chapter 5

The Transcaucasian "Periphery" in the Bronze Age

A Preliminary Formulation

PHILIP L. KOHL

INTRODUCTION

Fashionable interpretative models in late twentieth-century American archaeology often resemble earlier constructions that dominated the literature at the beginning of the century (see Schortman and Urban, Chapter 1, this volume). Neo-evolutionary schema that compare and type societies at similar "levels of development" and view them as universally passing through broadly defined, though essentially identical, "stages" of sociocultural complexity consciously recall nineteenth-century unilinear evolutionary models, despite their more nuanced qualifications and insistence upon multilinear paths of development. Criticisms of such neo-evolutionary models also recall the earlier critiques of evolutionism by the Boasians, as well as by so-called modified diffusionists like Childe. Again, the vocabulary today differs-concepts are more refined and subtly expressed-but the basic criticism of evolutionism remains: cultures do not pass through identical evolutionary stages for they are open-ended systems caught up in historical processes larger than themselves that inevitably interrupt, modify, facilitate, impair, or destroy their internal evolutionary development. Consideration of "interregional interaction" necessarily entails, in terms of the older terminology, the treatment of diffusionary processes in which societies or "archeological cultures" become involved in networks of contact, conflict, or exchange that differentially affect all the participant societies.

PHILIP 1. KOHL • Department of Anthropology, Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts 02181.


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118 PHILIP L. KOHL

One relatively recently formulated macrosociological model-the world-systems approach extensively developed by I. Wallerstein and his followers-has been utilized by archaeologists on the" diffusionist" side of this debate (for a review, see Schortman and Urban 1987). The value of the world-systems model lies not only in its macroscopic perception of reality and insistence upon very broadly defined temporal and spatial units of analysis, but also in its fundamental emphasis upon the development of asymmetrical relations among interacting societies and upon the phenomenon of unequal exchange structurally weighted to the advantage of "core" societies over their "peripheries." Some societies or elites within societies benefit at the expense of others which are exploited or "underdeveloped." To phrase this slightly differently, adaptation is a suspect concept in a world-systems approach, and, in this respect, the contrast with neo-evolutionary models is manifest.

Some modified form of world-systems theory may be profitably utilized by archaeologists to better understand broad patterns of "interregional interaction" stretching back into the prehistOric past. As I (Kohl 1987) have argued elsewhere however, the world-systems model, developed originally to describe interrelations in the modern era (which began, according to Wallerstein, in the sixteenth century AD.), should not be adopted literally for much earlier epochs since certain qualitative changes undoubtedly have occurred that distinguish the modern world system. Specifically, for Bronze Age societies of the Old World at least three features distinguish ancient world systems from that of the modern era: (1) the nature of ancient empires and extent of economic dependency created between imperial powers and their colonies; (2) the multiplicity of noncontiguous, politically and economically independent but contemporaneous and overlapping mini-world systems in antiquity, a feature resulting in relatively loose ties of dependency between cores and peripheries; and (3) the possibility-even probability at certain times and in certain spheres, such as metal-working and horse-breeding-of technological parity and superiority of peripheries over core states. Political control was not necessarily linked to economic control, and the former phenomenon was fragile and unstable in part because less hierarchically differentiated, often resource-rich (relative to the alluvial settings of early Old World states) peripheries had considerable room for maneuver (see also Santley and Alexander, Chapter 2, this volume). One result of these differences with the modern world system was that "the development of underdevelopment" was not typically fostered; areas in the penumbrae of the early riverine states often benefited from the relations that were established-sometimes even to the extent of conquering their civilized neighbors.

This chapter attempts to demonstrate this noncorrespondence between the modern world system and the interacting Bronze Age world system(s) of West Asia through a consideration of the material culture record of an area "peripheral" to Mesopotamian civilization: Transcaucasia or the area south of the Great Caucasus range which today primarily consists of the Soviet republics of Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia. It also explores the question of how best to understand the Transcaucasian "periphery" in terms of its manifest interregional interactions with Anatolia, Iran, the Aegean/Mediterranean world, and, of course, Mesopotamia. That is, since it is impossible to understand the prehistory of Transcaucasia solely as a product of internal evolutionary development and if the area is not a "periphery" in the modern world-system sense of Wallerstein, what is it? Finally, this chapter will compare and contrast the Transcaucasian evidence with that from Soviet Central Asia (or, more

TRANSCAUCASlAN "PERIPHERY" IN THE BRONZE AGE 119

broadly, western Turkestan), a vast area which alternatively may be regarded as either a regional mini-world system in its own right or a peripheral (semiperipheral ?) area most closely linked to the early South Asian complex society centered along the Indus valley (see again Kohl 1987). The comparison will demonstrate broadly shared features of development or patterns documenting the participation of both areas in "world" historical development during the Bronze Age, though not as dependent peripheries of advanced cores.

This chapter presents a partial and somewhat schematic overview of Transcaucasian prehistory that is a product largely of a five month visit to the area in 1986. The history of archaeological research in Transcaucasia extends well back into the nineteenth century, and the record that has been assembled is rich, extremely complex, and growing yearly at a phenomenal rate principally because of state-sponsored cultural resource management or salvage archaeology conducted by local archaeologists in each republic or autonomous region. In addition, Caucasian archaeologists tend to work within their own politically administered regions and frequently publish their results in their own languages (principally Georgian, Azeri Turkish, and Armenian)-facts, needless to say, that further impede synoptic understanding of the entire area. Finally, as in many archaeologically defined culture areas, there is no universally agreed consensus of interpretation among Caucasian specialists, though there is a generally accepted culture sequence (principally defined by Kuftin 1941), and there remain many unresolved chronological problems, some in part today relating to the application of corrected radiocarbon determinations (see Kavtaradze 1983 or, in English, Glumac and Anthony n.d.). For all these reasons, this chapter presents a "preliminary formulation" or presentation of Transcaucasian prehistory. Vast quantities of archaeological materials are presented selectively, if not impressionistically, and recalcitrant interpretative problems, such as unresolved chronological issues, are either ignored or mentioned in passing only as they affect the theoretical issues adumbrated above; they certainly cannot be tackled here.

ECOLOGICAL SETTING

Transcaucasia is the area immediately south of the main Caucasus range or mountain chain that stretches uninterruptedly for ca. 1,200 km northwest to southeast from the Black and Azov Seas in the west to the Caspian Sea in the east (Figure 1). It is a mountainous region marked by considerable environmental diversity, consisting of separate intermontane valleys, high upland plateaus, the lush subtropical Colchidean depression in western Georgia, dry steppes bordering the Kura-Araxes lowlands in eastern Azerbaijan, and a fairly broad coastal Caspian plain. The climate varies according to altitude, and the prevailing wind patterns are shaped by the rugged topography with natural precipitation generally decreasing west to east from an average annual rainfall of ca. 2,500 mm in Batumi on the Black Sea coast of the Adzharian Autonomous Republic in western Georgia to about 300 mm in the KuraAraxes lowlands and approximately 200 mm on the petroleum-rich Apsheron peninsula in eastern Azerbaijan (Plashchev and Chekmarev 1978: 152-153). Besides the small rivers of western Georgia, such as the Rioni (327 km), that flow west into the Black Sea, the major rivers of Transcaucasia consist of the Kura (1,364 km) and Araxes (1,072 km); joined by their tributaries which drain either the Great or Little Caucasus

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PHILIP L. KOHL

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TRANSCAUCASIAN "PERIPHERY" IN THE BRONZE AGE 121

ranges, they flow west to east, ultimately meeting in their lower courses before entering the Caspian.

Transcaucasia is rich in native floral, faunal, and mineral resources which still occur today or were present during the Early Holocene in different regions and in different attitudinal zones. Nearly half of all the wild and cultivated forms of wheat known are found in the Caucasus, a fact that led the great Soviet botanist N. I. Vavilov to conclude that the area contained more variety of wheats than any other and was a primary candidate for early experiments in wheat domestication. Also numerous varieties of wild and cultivated grapes abound, and direct archaeological evidence supports their cultivation as early as the Aeneolithic period. Ancestors to domesticated animals, such as the aurochs, moufflon sheep, bezoar goats, and wild pigs, were found in the Caucasus, and it is likely that local varieties were domesticated, as well as other forms and different species, such as horses, introduced later into the area. Chipped stone sources are common, including important obsidian deposits in southern Georgia and throughout most of Armenia. The Caucasus was one of the most important centers for the early development of metallurgy, and copper-rich ores are found throughout the Great and Little Caucasus ranges. As elsewhere in the greater Near East, arsenic bronzes were produced fir~t, tin-bronzes appearing only at the end of the Early Bronze period (toward the end of the third millennium B.C.). The original use of tin-bronzes probably reflects a southern Anatolian influence, with tin itself most likely introduced into the area as a result of long-distance trade (see below and Gevorkjan 1980:89-91).

Such diverse natural conditions obviously were important determinants of cultural development with different subsistence systems appearing in different environmental zones. Certain highland areas, for example, were most suitable as seasonal pastures, whereas other more low-lying and arid zones, such as the Mugan and Milskii steppes of Azerbaijan, could only have been permanently settled with the development of irrigation agriculture. It was not necessary to irrigate crops in the subtropical conditions of western Georgia where the real difficulty was drainage. Here, some form of slash-and-burn agriculture possibly may have been developed as early as Neolithic times, a conclusion indirectly supported by the discovery of harvesting and agricultural implements on preceramic sites in this region. A different form of dry farming could have been practiced at an early stage along the middle course of the Kura river in Shida Kartli and to the south in Kvemo Kartli, particularly in the area drained by the Khrami river where significant numbers of stratified agricultural Aeneolithic settlements (the Shulaveri-Shomu group) have been excavated. Dry farming in these regions, however, would have produced uncertain yields and relatively small-scale water diversion practices were introduced at an early stage as suggested by the presence of cut channels surrounding settlements like Arukhlo I and Imirisgora (Kushnareva 1986:29) which date back to the sixth-fifth millennia B.C.It is possible, particularly given the floral remains from these Aeneolithic settlements in central Transcaucasia (consisting of eight types of wheat, four types of barley, millet, lentils, oats, peas, and grapes), that the early Aeneolithic agriculturalists of Kvemo Kartli might have sown both winter and spring crops (Kushnareva 1986:28) Later

Figure 1. The Caucasus: physical features, administrative areas, and selected archaeological sites.

122 PHILIP L. KOHL

during the Early Bronze Age (which begins probably in the middle to early fourth millennium B.C.), extensive agricultural terraces were constructed in highland zones or in smaller intermontane valleys lacking extensive agricultural plains. Such terraces, for example, were discovered in association with the settlement of Verkhnii Gunib in mountainous Daghestan (Kushnareva 1986:35). Farther east in Azerbaijan or, particularly, to the south in the fertile Ararat valley (ca. 120 km long and ca. 40 km wide), along the middle course of the Araxes river in southernmost Armenia and Nakhicevan, more intensive irrigation systems were established at least by the Early Bronze period.

Similarly, stockraising practices varied tremendously from region to region within Transcaucasia depending above all on the nature and proximity of suitable pastures. As currently understood, the prevalence of fish and game in western Georgia retarded the development of animal domestication in this region practically until the beginnings of the Bronze Age; elsewhere cattle breeding gradually gave way or was combined with a sheep / goat pastoralism that may have involved migrations to distant pastures (otgonnie pastbishcha); that is, some form of pastoral nomadism, probably taking place again during the Early Bronze period or the time of the Kura-Araxes culture. The spread of Kura-Araxes settlements throughout nearly all regions and altitudinal zones of eastern Transcaucasia, as well as mountainous Daghestan, may have been associated with the development of stockbreeding practices and utilization of seasonally available pastures.

The northern boundary of Transcaucasia is well-defined by the main ridge of the Great Caucasus range; even though the major passes of the Great Caucasus, such as the Krestovi (ca. 2,380 m.a.s.1), are not terribly forbidding (all less than 3,000 m in altitude) and open much of the year, they are and were easily defended through the strategic placement of stone structures at narrow defiles along the routes. The mountains formed not only a physiographic but also a cultural divide, separating ultimately the cultures developing on the South Russian steppes from those evolving farther south in more or less continuous contact with the cultures and high civilizations of the ancient Near East. On the other hand, contact certainly occurred between the northern Caucasus and Transcaucasia during prehistoric times as is evident, particularly, to the northeast in Daghestan and in the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Republic where Kura-Araxes settlements and materials have been unearthed. In fact, it can be argued that attempts to define an earlier relative chronology for the northern Caucasus beginning with the supposedly intrusive Maikop culture on the basis of general economic correspondences far to the south in Syria and northern Mesopotamia (e.g., Andreeva 1977), founder precisely on the lack of expected correspondences with the Transcaucasian sequence. That is, the data principally derived from kurgans (elaborate burial mounds) in the northern Caucasus must have their parallels in Transcaucasia, and these only appear initially during the second half of the third millennium B.C., a fact supporting the traditional mid-third millennium date for materials from the Great Maikop Kurgan.

In contrast to the northern boundary formed by the Great Caucasus, there is no well-defined southern limit to Transcaucasia. The modern political border represents little more than that, particularly as the Armenian highlands stretch imperceptibly across the Ararat Valley into what is today eastern Turkey. It is important to note that both the Kura and Araxes rivers rise in eastern Turkey; the Araxes's headwaters are in the vicinity of Erzerum or immediately east and north of those of the upper


Euphrates (and its Murad tributary). That is, when one considers the cultural, as opposed to just natural, ecology of Transcaucasia, its connection with the greater Mesopotamian world is obvious and direct.

THE TRANSCAUCASIAN ARCHAEOLOGICAL SEQUENCE

The beginnings of food production, dating back to the Early Holocene, are not yet well-established. It is likely, however, for both the botanical reasons mentioned above and the discovery of sites in western Georgia (e.g., the Darkvet rock shelter) and Daghestan (e.g., the Chokh open-air settlement) in which Neolithic remains are found stratified above earlier Mesolithic tool-bearing levels that domestication occurred largely as the process of an internal evolutionary development. Part of the difficulty for reconstructing the actual sequence of this development relates to the fact that most of the earliest aceramic lithic assemblages come from deflated and largely destroyed sites in western Georgia, a subtropical region not conducive to decent archaeological preservation. Trace-wear analysis of obsidian blades from the site of Anaseuli 1 has established that they were used as reaping tools, presumably for the harvesting of wild grasses, a practice that supports an early and probably largely independent focus for early cereal domestication (Korobkova 1987:43 [illus. 5, 2], 123). Subsequently, crude handmade ceramics appear together in western Georgia with typologically more advanced lithics, primarily made of local flint-a fact possibly suggesting the decline of the earlier, presumably pan-Transcaucasian obsidian exchange network.

With the exception of a few recently discovered aceramic sites, such as Dmanisi, with obsidian tools from Kvemo Kartli (southeastern Georgia), the first well-established archaeological horizon, the Shulaveri-Shomu culture of Kvemo Kartli and western Azerbaijan, relates to the Late Neolithic/Early Aneolithic period and is well-dated by a series of consistent corrected radiocarbon determinations from the mid-sixth through the first few centuries of the fifth millennia B.C. Shulaveri-Shomu sites, ranging in extent from ca. 0.5 ha to 4.5 ha, contain a distinctive material culture assemblage with handmade pottery, clay figurines, and circular mud-brick and pise superimposed domestic structures with relatively thick cultural deposits. For example, at Khramis Didi Gora, 10 building levels were uncovered in a ca. 6-m cultural deposit. To my knowledge, the Shulaveri-Shomu complex has not yet been documented outside Transcaucasia, and it seems to represent a local phenomenon, centered in eastern Georgia and western Azerbaijan.

Subsequently during the fifth millennium B.C., there seems to have developed a series of regional cultures distributed across Transcaucasia but particularly welldocumented in the south in Nakhicevan (e.g., Kyul' Tepe I) and in eastern Azerbaijan (e.g., Chalagan Depe, Alikemek Tepesi) along small rivers flowing down from the Little Caucasus ranges toward the Araxes or Kura rivers. It is during this period that one finds the first unequivocal evidence for relations to the greater Mesopotamian world and possibly for contacts across the Caucasus to the north. Isolated but unmistakably Halafian sherds have been found, first at Kyul' Tepe I in Nakhicevan (see Munchaev 1975:97, Fig. 8; Abibullaev 1982); at a site currently being excavated in the Agdam region of eastern Azerbaijan-Leila-depe, the principal investigator, 1. Narimanov (1985), has identified Late Ubaid-related materials similar to those uncovered

124 PHILIP L. KOHL

by the Soviet mission to northern Iraq at Yarim Tepe III. Another late fifth to early fourth millennia B.C site in southeastern Azerbaijan, Alikemek Tepesi, contains painted pottery analogous to wares known from Iranian Azerbaijan, as well as a very impressive assemblage of bone tools; most interestingly, hundreds of horse scapulae from two, presumably domesticated species were found in one tool-production zone (Munchaev 1982:135). The horses apparently were introduced into the area frorrl the Ukraine or south Russian steppes where they were indigenous and have been documented in earlier archaeological contexts (Anthony 1986; Telegin 1986). Large canine tooth pendants, similar to those known from the northern Caucasus, and numerous flat shell beads, apparently produced at the site, also were found at Alikemek Tepesi.

These localized Late Aeneolithic cultures are followed by the appearance of what is known in the Soviet literature (e.g., Kushnareva and Chubinishvili 1970) as the Kura-Araxes or, in the Western literature after Burney (Burney and Lang 1971), the Transcaucasian, culture. The density of settlement is impressive; literally, hundreds of Kura-Araxes sites have been discovered throughout all areas of Transcaucasia (except westernmost Georgia); Daghestan and the Chechen-Ingush autonomous republics of the northeastern Caucasus, eastern Anatolia, and northwestern Iran at least as far south as Godin Tepe near Kermanshah (for the most complete-though still partial-listing of Kura-Araxes sites and a detailed discussion of Kura-Araxes ceramics and chronological subdivisions, see Sagona 1984). The later phenomenon known as the Khirbet-Kerak culture or ware of Syria and Palestine extends the distribution of Kura-Araxes-related materials far to the southwest and has led to speculations associating the widespread distribution of Kura-Araxes remains with the early diffusion of Rurrian-speaking peoples across roughly the same area. Connections, in other words, extend far to the south of Transcaucasia, and, given the demonstrated presence of actual Kura-Araxes settlements in eastern Anatolia and western Iran, may suggest the actual movement of peoples north to south probably at the end of the fourth or the beginning of the third millennia B.C During the Early Bronze period of Transcaucasia, nothing really suggests the movement of materials or peoples in the opposite direction.

Regional variations in Kura-Araxes culture exist both within Transcaucasia and the northeastern Caucasus and the materials may be subdivided into three or four chronological phases stretching over a broad period, ca. 3600+ B.C to ca. 2300 B.C (as determined from a few corrected radiocarbon dates and the interpolation of KuraAraxes materials between earlier and later relatively well-dated archaeological horizons). Nevertheless, the uniformity of material remains, including diagnostic and easily recognized black- and brown-burnished ceramics, highly distinctive portable and stationary ceramic hearths or supports (podstavki) for objects over the hearth, metal tools, standardized architectural features, and the like, is still striking and difficult to interpret or type in cultural evolutionary terms.

What is lacking relative to other roughly contemporaneous complex archaeological phenomena, such as the riverine civilizations of Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Indus valley or the proto-urban cultures of the Iranian plateau and Central Asia, is clear evidence for a hierarchy of settlements, including cities, and documentation for a stratified or sharply ranked social order. During the Kura-Araxes period, there were indisputable developments in the material forces of production, such as the construction of agricultural terraces (up to 25 m long and 10 m wide at Amiranis-gora, for


example), earthen dams for containing water (e.g., at Mokhrablur), and fortification walls (e.g., at Shengavit and Early Bronze Metsamor), as well as the local production and utilization of arsenic-bronze agricultural tools and weapons. The evidence for settlement hierarchy, however, is either ambiguous (e.g., at Metsamor and Samshivilde) or unimpressive (sites, like Arich, ranging up to ca. 10 ha in size), and one cannot refer to Early Bronze Kura-Araxes cities nor to the monumental construction of public buildings. Similarly, mortuary data and roughly standardized village domestic architecture, as, for example, best revealed at Kvatskhelebi in Shida Kartli (Dzhavakhishvili and Glonti 1962) where at least 17 houses were completely excavated in a ca. 70-cm thick Kura-Araxes cultural deposit, suggest relatively little social differentiation. It is also noteworthy that, unlike the earlier Aeneolithic sites of Kvemo Kartli, most Kura-Araxes settlements in Georgia are quite thin, with cultural deposits rarely exceeding one to two meters. In the Ararat valley of southern Armenia and Nakhicevan, the situation is different with some Kura-Araxes sites, such as Dzhraovit, stratified to a depth of more than 10 m. Unfortunately, the lowest strata at these sites cannot be satisfactorily plumbed because of the high water level.

The question of continuity of Kura-Araxes remains with the earlier Aeneolithic materials is not clear and debated among Soviet archaeologists themselves. The weight of the evidence seems to favor a break in the record-that is, an absence of continuity-for many, though not all, areas, and most investigators see the KuraAraxes culture as originally developing during its earliest phase in Shida and Kvemo Kartli (Le., central and southeastern Georgia). More interesting from a perspective of interregional interaction is the fact that while one today can speak of Halaf and Ubaid materials in Transcaucasia, one cannot point to anything-save, possibly, a few broadly shared technologies-that bespeaks a connection between the earliest KuraAraxes remains and those of the Uruk period in Mesopotamia. This is in marked contrast to the presence of Uruk-related materials from the neighboring region of eastern Turkey, as reported from Arslan-tepe, or, even more, unequivocally Uruk sites, if not colonies, along the upper Euphrates at Habuba Kabira and Jebel Aruda. Although not yet demonstrable, it is tempting to associate or detect some causal relationship in the coalescence of the Kura-Araxes culture, which soon unites in some fashion nearly all of Transcaucasia and Daghestan to the north, with the Uruk presence immediately to the south. In what ways might the former phenomenon have been a response to the latter? How one could demonstrate such a connection archaeologically, however, is not clear, since, besides the chronological correspondence, the evidence in favor of such a causal relationship is essentially negative.

Sometime during the second half of the third millennium B.C., there is a dramatic change in settlement data, suggesting the abandonment of most sites. The archaeological record for the Late Early Bronze and Middle Bronze periods is known primarily, though not exclUSively, from mortuary data, particularly from the excavation of large, richly adorned kurgans. Reasons for the shift in the location and nature of sites is not completely clear. Explanations range from environmental changes, including misuse and overexploitation of cultivated areas, to developments of new economic subsistence practices, such as possibly a growing reliance on sheep I goat pastoralism and, correspondingly, a further development of true pastoral nomadism with annual movement to seasonal pastures and exploitation of resources available in different altitudinal zones. Whatever the reasons, the change in material evidence is pronounced and seems to have occurred rapidly throughout the entire Caucasus area.

126 PHILIP L. KOHL

Materials found in burials record the increased importance and utilization of metal weapons and equipment, including some now made of tin-bronzes, as well as new means of transportation. Specifically, two- and four-wheeled wagons, pulled by either bulls or horses, have been uncovered in these kurgans along with evidence (bits, cheekpieces, etc.) suggesting increasing mastery of horses and mounted horsemanship. Jewelry and the use of precious stones and metals, as later are well known from the Middle Bronze Trialeti kurgans, also show a sharp qualitative increasing during the period immediately subsequent to the final phase of the Kura-Araxes culture.

Georgian archaeologists now refer to two periods, documented principally from kurgans, between the end of the Kura-Araxes culture and the Middle Bronze Trialeti and related Karmir-Berd, Sevano-Uzerlik, and Kyzylvan cultures (as defined by Kushnareva 1983, 1985) of the first half of the s~cond millennium B.C: (1) the Martkopi phase (ca. 2500-2200 B.C or earlier ?; see Kavtaradze 1983: 105-107); and (2) the Alazano-Bedeni phase (last centuries of the third millennium B.C; for a popular summary, see Pitskhelaouri 1984: 40-44). The former phase is documented by the excavation of tumuli some 20 to 25 km northeast of Tbilisi. One Martkopi kurgan, 12 m high with a diameter of more than 100 m, consisted of a double wooden burial chamber with a flagstone floor, on top of which were placed first a stone, then an earthen fill. Black-burnished ceramics, polished to an almost metallic lustre, clearly continued and developed the Kura-Araxes ceramic tradition, but gold and silver objects and jewelry made from carnelian, agate, cowries, and pearls also were found together with metal weapons much more advanced that those of Kura-Araxes times. In the subsequent Alazano-Bedeni phase, documented in Kakhetia, Kvemo-Kartli, and near Trialeti on the Bedeni plateau, tin-bronzes first appear together with evidence for two- and four-wheeled wagons in large kurgans often containing several burials, sometimes placed around the walls of the wooden beam and stone-lined burial chamber, surrounding a central cremated burial. The working of precious metals is even more advanced, as shown by the discovery of gold spiral-headed pins and gold animal figures, such as the famous lion from a kurgan near Tsnori in the Alazan valley (Dedabrishvili 1979), and clearly foreshadows that long known from the Trialeti kurgans. Georgian archaeolOgists, in fact, now date the earliest Trialeti tumuli to this phase. One habitation site, Berekeldeebi in Shida Kartli, currently being excavated, contains Bedeni-phase levels stratified above those of the Kura-Araxes Early Bronze period. This site, however, remains unique, a fact underscoring the dramatic shift in settlement distribution associated with the appearance of these richly decorated burial mounds.

Judging by differences in the grave assemblages and distinctions between secondary and principal burials, it is clear that the societies constructing these kurgans were not undifferentiated but ranked, if not stratified, into well-defined social hierarchies. To some extent, this evidence can now be better related to data coming from kurgans in the northern Caucasus, and it is likely that there were movements of peoples and probably diffusions of technologies across the Great Caucasus, possibly in a dominantly north-to-south direction. As argued above, the sudden occurrence of rich kurgans in the northern Caucasus (at Maikop, Novosvobodnaya, etc.), which contain distinctive, but related, precious materials and metal weapons and which exhibit similar, though not identical, construction techniques, must chronologically overlap with their appearance in Transcaucasia. The newly defined Novotitorov-


skaya cultural phase of the late third millennium B.C. (Trifonov 1983; also see Gei 1986) has been documented as part of the salvage excavations of thousands of burial mounds in the northern Caucasus, particularly along the Kuban river. Not only does this phase contain new materials, such as a distinctive ceramic corpus, and novel burial rites, but it also witnesses the widespread utilization of four-wheeled wagons with fixed axles and standardized tripartite wheels (70 em in diameter). Although careful comparison still needs to be undertaken, it is tempting preliminarily to equate this phase with that of the Alazano-Bedeni phase in Georgia and the preceding northern Caucasian horizons with the Martkopi phase, as well, possibly, as the terminal Kura-Araxes period. That is, it is logical to expect that changes in important, possibly politically crucial technologies, such as metal-working and means of transportation, diffused rapidly; their spread would not have been impeded by the eminently traversable Great Caucasus range.

Chronological difficulties still beset a definitive interpretation of the rich materials found in the kurgans at Trialeti that Kuftin (1941) originally dated to the Middle Bronze period or roughly the first half and particularly the middle of the second millennium B.C. Parallels to materials from Mesopotamia, northwestern Iran, Anatolia, and the Aegean world can be cited that favor an earlier or later date, the former extending back into the final centuries of the third millennium B.C. (for a discussion in English favoring a lower date and a division of the Trialeti materials into three basic subphases, see Rubinson 1977; for a generally higher chronology with four subdivisions [termed Early Bronze IlIA and IIIB, Middle Bronze I and II] that is based, as much as possible, on corrected available radiocarbon dates, see Kavtaradze 1983: 116-129). Interestingly, parallels in jewelry types and jewelry working tend to support the higher chronology, whereas resemblances in weaponry favor the lower. The latter should be more reliable as chronolOgical indicators since critically important technologies would be expected to diffuse rapidly and be less subject to changes in fashion. However, the problem of heirlooms applies to both categories, and the real unresolvable difficulty relates to the fact that the materials being compared come principally, if not exclusively, from graves.

Unfortunately, this unresolved difficulty is important. If the chronology could be determined absolutely, the archaeological materials could be related and interpreted in light of historical developments known to have affected interregional interactions; namely, the Kultepe/Kanesh trade in silver, textiles, and tin between Anatolia and Assur undoubtedly influenced Transcaucasia in important, though still imperfectly discernible ways (for a brief, theoretically informed description of this trade network, see Gledhill and Larsen 1982). Following Rubinson's interpretation (1977:243-246), the Trialeti materials show correspondences with Anatolia primarily during her Middle Bronze II period which she views as contemporaneous with the Kultepe trade (first centuries of the second millennium B.C.). Subsequently, parallels to later Trialeti materials are either with Iran or the Aegean world, possibly suggesting a shift in this long-distance trade network. Tin-bronzes gradually replace the earlier arsenicbronzes, a development that is essentially complete by the end of the Middle Bronze period. The quantity of metal artifacts dating from the Late Bronze through Early Iron periods in the Caucasus is simply staggering (e.g., a collection of the famous "Koban culture" bronzes in the Moscow State Historical Museum from northern Ossetia that were excavated mainly in pre-Revolutionary times contains roughly 40,000 objects; considerably more, related metal artifacts have been unearthed in recent years on

128 PHILIP L. KOHL

both sides of the Great Caucasus range, particularly in western Georgia and southern Ossetia). Those large quantities must imply regular access to a source of tin, though it is still debated whether such a source was indigenous and depleted in antiquity or necessarily foreign (Abesadze, personal communication). It also should be noted that comparisons of late Middle and Late Bronze Georgian materials, such as bronze anklets and copper cauldrons (Rubinson 1977: 246-247), with the Aegean world, including the Shaft Graves at Mycenae, are sometimes quite precise and may point to a still undocumented mid-second millennium B.C trade route across the Black Sea to western Georgia or the classical land of CoIchis.

Burial data, subdivided into chronological phases primarily in terms of accompanying ceramics and metal weapon types, continue to be the major source of archaeological information until roughly the middle of the second millennium B.C Similarities in materials, including ceramics, metal decorative elements on wagons, weapons, and horse equipment, as well as features of burial rites and kurgan construction, often are striking and suggest that at least central Transcaucasia along the middle course of the Kura river was controlled by a single or closely related groups. Thus, materials from the rich kurgan 4 in the Berekeldeebi field of kurgans are identical to materials from two kurgans at Enikend in the Shamkhor region of western Azerbaijan. In both cases, two human skeletons were buried beneath large mounds built of cobblestones together with their carts and horses (as well as bulls, sheep, and the head of a small deer at Berekeldeebi) and nearly identical white-inlaid black ceramics and metals.

During the Late Bronze period, however, settlements, often fortified with massive stone walls and located in easily defensible spots, such as on the top of steep hills or on buttes surrounded on two or three sides by deep ravines, reappear in great numbers. Kurgans containing rich burials continue to have been constructed during the Late Bronze period, as, for example, at Borsunlu east of Kirovabad along the right bank of the Kura, but now archaeologists also find large cemetery fields, often in association with settlements, such as at Treligorebi near the western outskirts of Tbilisi or at Shamiram and Metsamor in Armenia. Caches of literally thousands of metal weapons and ornaments have been discovered at sites, such as Mele Gele I and II and Melaani in Kakhetia (Pitskhelauri 1979), in what clearly must be interpreted as ritual contexts. The settlement, together with the cemetery, data at sites, such as Metsamor on the Ararat plain west of Yerevan, leave no doubt that there existed a Late Bronze/Early Iron state formation in Transcaucasia preceding that of the later Urartians. Thus, for example, the massive fortification wall surrounding the citadel at Metsamor, in terms of its size and construction technique, foreshadows those of the Urartian kingdom. The site, which is said to extend for almost 100 ha (Khanzadjan 1985:32), was a large center for metallurgical production and had a centralized" cult" area abutting one side of the fortification wall. One large burial from the center yielded a stone weight in the shape of a frog with a cuneiform inscription attributable to the late sixteenth-century Kassite ruler, "I shekel-Ulam Burariash, son of Burna Burariash." This interment is said to have contained two principal burials, surrounded by 50 accompanying human burials, mainly women (i.e., evidence for human sacrifice), and 19 horses, bulls, sheep, and dogs (Khanzadjan et al. 1983). Another grave, yielding a large carnelian seal with an Egyptian hieroglyphic inscription referring to Kurigalzu I (a contemporary of Amenhotep III, second half of the fifteenth century B.C) the "head of the great country Sangar" (e.g., Babylonia), contained numerous disturbed human skeletons and the


remains of 8 horses, 4 bulls, goats, rams, pigs, and dogs, as well as many objects made of tin (Khanzadjan and Piotrovskii 1984). Such a Late Bronze/Early Iron state-and, to a lesser degree, possibly others in different regions of Transcaucasia-may be viewed as a secondary formation in response to growing Near Eastern influence, if not attempted expansion, from the south. However, at least as reconstructed archaeologically, what formed were indigenously created and independent political entities. That is, as with the later historically documented kingdom of Urartu, the regal titles and certain features of state ideology may ultimately have been derived or borrowed form the higher civilizations to the south, including the Hittite empire of central Anatolia, but autonomous states emerged that adapted their methods of rule and construction of fortified centers to local ecological and cultural conditions (for the later Urartu, see Zimansky 1985).

By the second half of the second millennium B.C. a pattern of settlement had been established that would continue to characterize the region not only throughout antiquity, but also (if one discounts for the purpose of argument certain changes in the material record associated with the advent of Christianity) for the historic period until the advent of modem times. Hilltop fortress sites, for example, which first appear in large numbers during the Late Bronze period, continue to have been constructed through Medieval times (as determined primarily on the basis of surface remains from such sites; Biagov, personal communication). Transcaucasia always attracted pastoral nomadic groups coming from the north or east or imperial states expanding from their bases in Iran, Asia Minor, or Mesopotamia to the south. Consequently, indigenous peoples sought refuge in the Caucasus (and, over time, ethnic diversity undoubtedly increased continuously); they lived in areas and built settlements that could be easily defended. Martial skills were honored, and people pursued mixed subsistence strategies that were already in place by the late prehistoric period.

COMPARISON WITH CENTRAL ASIA (WESTERN TURKESTAN)

It is instructive to compare briefly the sequence from Transcaucasia with that established also primarily by Soviet archaeologists for another peripheral or frontier area bordering the greater Near East: Central Asia (western Turkestan, see Figure 2; for a more detailed consideration of the Central Asian materials in English, see Kohl 1984, 1985). The Caspian Sea functioned as an effective barrier separating developments in Transcaucasia from those in Central Asia. An initial striking and superficially correct impression of the material culture remains from the two areas is that they are highly distinctive with few obvious parallels. The connections between the areas must have been either very indirect through the more sparsely inhabited steppes and desertic regions north of the Caspian or, of course more certainly, across northern Iran, particularly Gilan and Mazanderan provinces. Unfortunately, the archaeological record from the latter area is-to put it mildly-incompletely known and largely documented by illicit, nonscientific excavations. For obvious reasons, it is not likely to be better documented in the immediate future. Thus, for all practical purposes, it is at the moment impossible to establish direct connections between Transcaucasia and Central Asia and, correspondingly, justified to compared these records sepa-

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rately-though this procedure, in fact, represents only a necessary adjustment to an incomplete data base.

Western Turkestan can be defined simply as the vast area of interior drainage formed by the steams draining the Kopet Dagh and northern Hindu Kush mountains and by the Atrek, Tedjen, Murghab, Amu Darya, Zeravshan, and Syr Darya rivers and their tributaries. The area today is divided among three nation-states: Iran, Afghanistan, and the republics of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tadjikistan, and part of Kirghizia in the Soviet Union. The land itself contains largely uninhabited deserts (the Kara Kum and Kyzyl Kum, in particular), rugged mountain ranges, lowland alluvial plains, watered piedmont zones, and intermontane valleys. The archaeological record, however, is best established for specific piedmont areas, particularly the northern foothills of the Kopet Dagh which merge quickly into the southern Kara Kum, and now also for the lowland plains of Margiana or the deltaic fan once watered by the lower course of the Murghab and what classically was known as Bactria or today's southern Uzbekistan and northwestern Afghanistan. Southern Central Asia is a landlocked basin with a sharply continental climate and is very arid, particularly throughout these low-lying plains that were densely occupied during the Bronze Age. Thus, the development of a form of irrigation agriculture, typically along the terminal ends of water courses disappearing into the Central Asian sands, with their settlements clustered together in separate oases, like grapes bunched together at the end of grapevines, was an essential requirement for inhabiting these zones.

Although not as strikingly as Transcaucasia, the northern boundary of this vast area is reasonably well-defined by the Kara and Kyzyl Kum deserts and ultimately the steppes of Kazakhstan, while its southern border is much less clear as the region imperceptibly merges with the Iranian plateau and other landlocked riverine systems, such as the Hilmand of Afghan and Iranian Seistan. General similarities in environments and the corresponding cultural adaptations to them have occasioned the use of the later cultural! geographical term Turan to encompass the Bronze Age societies that developed throughout an even broader area stretching from Baluchistan in the south to the Kyzyl Kum in the north. Whatever its shortcomings conceptually, reference to a prehistOriC Turan does underscore the interregional connections stretching north to south from Central Asia throughout the Indo-Iranian borderlands to the Indus valley itself and also reflects the later seasonal movements of peoples from Baluchistan up to Khorassan or, alternatively as known historically, of peoples moving south from Central Asia toward the subcontinent. In other words, in terms of its cultural ecology, western Turkestan's interregional connections are not so much with the Mesopotamian world as with eastern Iran, the Indo-Iranian borderlands, and South Asia-a fact also reflected in the material culture record.

Soviet archaeologists have established a continuous evolutionary sequence for southern Turkmenistan in particular which stretches from the so-called Djeitun Neolithic period through the Iron Age into historic times. The sequence begins, in other words, almost at the same time as the first well-established horizon, the ShulaveriShomu cultural complex, appears in Transcaucasia. One cannot draw connections between these areas given the absence of information from northern Iran, but it seems to me that it is not unlikely that we are dealing with a related phenomenon of secondary centers of domestication responding to the diffusion of food production technologies that developed earlier to the south in the Zagros and Syro-Palestinian areas. The Central Asian sequence, the chronological phases of which after the Djeitun

132 PHILIP L. KOHL

period are named after the type site of Namazga-depe (NMG I-VI), can be distinguished from the Transcaucasian sequence principally in the respect that some sites, like Namazga-depe and Altyn-depe, are continuously occupied from at least the fifth through most of the third millennium B.C and that there is an earlier obvious and continuing settlement hierarchy with cities up to 50 ha in extent appearing perhaps as early as the beginnings of the third millennium or during the Early Bronze (NMG IV) period. We also know today that by the fourth millennium B.C agricultural settlements, clearly related to those of southern Turkmenistan, with an advanced copper metallurgical technology, stretched farther to the east at least to the upper Zeravshan valley east of Samarkand, and are now documented at the site of Sarazm in Tadjikistan.

What is intriguing, however, and important for comparison with Transcaucasia, is that the long-lived settlements in southern Turkmenistan seem to have been largely abandoned by the closing centuries of the third millennium B.C or roughly during the same period when the Kura-Araxes settlements were abandoned and the Transcaucasian archaeolOgical record shifts to materials coming almost exclusively from kurgans. In Central Asia, a different pattern develops. New alluvial plains watered by larger rivers, such as the Murghab, which were previously seemingly exploited almost exclusively by non-food-producing peoples, are suddenly settled on a massive scale. Permanently occupied settlements, often apparently planned and fortified, that show a clear settlement hierarchy of urban and nonurban sites, appear in clusters or oases of settlements at the terminal ends of these rivers. Shallow, easily uncovered cemeteries accompanied these settlements, and those in northwestern Afghanistan are the source of the so-called Bactrian bronzes that have flooded the art market in recent years. Reconstruction is difficult, given the lack of provenience and associations and most of these materials, but comparison and contrast with the Transcaucasian materials is instructive. Although the objects found in the two areas are clearly culturally distinctive, the qualitative advances in metallurgical technology appear to have occurred at roughly the same time. A similar emphasis on advances in weaponry is apparent, though again the types found are distinctive. The use of specific jewelry techniques and of precious metals, such as silver and gold, for vessels is documented in both areas for sites-cemeteries accompanying settlements in Central Asia and kurgans either isolated or in fields of burials without accompanying settlements in Transcaucasia-dating to the end of the third and beginning of the second millennia B.C. The Transcaucasian materials more unambiguously document social differentiation and also to a considerably greater degree emphasize horsemanship and the use of drawn wheeled vehicles.

Parallels for the Bactria-Margiana phenomenon beginning at the end of the third and into the first half of the second millennium B.C are not to the Mesopotamian world, but to the south and southeast, to prehistOric "Turan" and to the borders of the Indus valley, particularly now to the important series of sites-Mehrgarh, Sibri, and Nowsharo-excavated on the Kachi plain by J.-F. Jarrige. Contra Jarrige's current interpretation (1986:119-122), I still feel these parallels, which document a profound shift in cultural orientation throughout eastern Iran and the Indo-Iranian borderlands, are best viewed as witnessing a movement of people as well as materials, undoubtedly more gradual than sudden and planned, north to south. This movement permanently affected the cultural geography of the region and set the stage for important developments during the Iron Age and later historic periods.

TRANSCAUCASIAN npERIPHERY" IN THE BRONZE AGE 133

One final comparison with Transcaucasia must be drawn, this time following the interpretation of Jarrige and his co-workers; namely, at the early second millennium site of Pirak Oarrige and Santoni 1979), there is both unequivocal evidence for mounted horsemanship and a shift in the agricultural economy with the introduction of new cultigens, such as sorghum and millets, probably coming from Africa via the Arabian peninsula, and rice. The evidence is viewed as supporting use of the monsoonal rains and double cropping-summer as well as winter grains being harvested. Thus, by the early second millennium B.C., an economic pattern was established which defined in many important respects village India until the arrival of the British and the advent of the modem era. Settlement patterns, subsistence practices, and economic/technological features of material culture differ from Central Asia to Transcaucasia, but for both regions new features seem to have been established during the early second millennium B.C. that became firmly entrenched by the middle of the millennium or roughly during the so-called Dark Ages of Mesopotamia or period of Kassite rule.

CONCLUSION

Where does this review of the Transcaucasian prehistoriC sequence and its comparison with Central Asia leave us in terms of conceptualizing broad, interregional patterns of interaction? Is it helpful to conjure up a world-systems model and see Transcaucasia as either a "peripheral" or "semiperipheral" adjunct to a Mesopotamian "core"? Many problems beset the use of such terminology not least of which is the basic difficulty of defining archaeologically one's relevant units of analysis. A Mesopotamian "core" must be subdivided into its substantially different constituent parts: Sumer, BabylOnia, western Syria, northern Mesopotamia, particularly the Khabur drainage, and so forth (Weiss 1986). It is just as misleading to refer to Transcaucasia as some real cultural or political entity. Possibly, there may have been some form of unity during part of the Early Bronze or Kura-Araxes period, but, if this were the case, such an entity clearly extended beyond the area currently defined by the borders separating the Soviet Union from Turkey and Iran. During earlier periods, and for the rest of the Bronze Age, Transcaucasia was divided on the basis of its material culture remains into distinct regions; most notably for most periods, three primary regions or centers of cultural development can be distinguished: western Georgia, the Ararat valley (southern Armenia and Nakhicevan), and the middle course of the Kura and its catchment area (Shida Kartli, Kvemo Kartli, Kakhetia, and western Azerbaijan).

Each of these regions cannot be considered in isolation from one another nor from the Mesopotamian and Iranian civilized worlds to the south nor the south Russian/European "barbarian" world to the north. Influences, sometimes involving the actual movements of goods and peoples, were felt from all directions. But such "influences" -the word itself being perhaps even vaguer than the archaeologically preferred, though often imprecise, term interaction-do not constitute evidence for a world system. For the latter to apply in any Wallersteinian sense of the concept, linkages between regions must be shown in which real bonds of economic and/or political dependency have been established. With the possible exception of relating the advent of tin-bronzes and weaponry best known from Asia Minor with the Old

134 PHILIP L. KOHL

Assyrian trade, such linkages have not even been suggested by our review of the Transcaucasian prehistoric sequence. Part of the problem certainly relates to the archaeological record: incompleteness, chronological difficulties, and the like. Perhaps some day it will be possible to detect a fundamental shift in a "world economy," structured largely around a trade in metals, from an Old Assyrian/ Anatolian focus to one incorporating Iran to the east and the Aegean world via the Black Sea to the west. If tin was not obtained locally, the very profusion of tin-bronzes in Transcaucasia from Late Bronze times onward suggests an interregional linkage with real economic dependencies (or, better, interdependencies).

E. N. Chernykh's concept (in press) of archaeologically attested "metallurgical provinces" may ultimately prove helpful in sketching such interdependencies. These provinces, which are referred to as the largest historical production systems operating in antiquity, cover broad regions of Eurasia from Cha1colithic through Iron Age times and are defined by their shared utilization of typologically similar metal ornaments, tools, and weapons; by a common technology of metallurgical production; and by the availability of or access to the same metallurgical sources. His own analysis of metal from the Caucasus, however, suggests that the area was surprisingly isolated from the northern steppe populations during the Late Bronze and Early Iron periods when its production of metals, particularly tin-bronzes (e.g., as manifest in the Koban and Co1chidean cultures), reached a peak. Earlier, when its own production of metals was less significant and not so dependent on the availability of tin, the area seems to have shared its metals and sources more broadly with cultures to the north, forming part of what Chernykh defines as the "Circumpontic Metallurgical Province." Perhaps further work will reveal a shift in international exchange and a redirection of Caucasian metals and source materials to the south during the second half of the second millennium B.C. when Caucasian metallurgy" takes-off," truly becoming one of the richest areas of metallurgical production in the Old World. POSSibly, such a redirection of influences and, presumably, political and economic contacts may be associated with the emergence of states in Transcaucasia and the appearance of more complex kingdoms farther south (first the Middle, then New Assyrian Empires and Urartu). More work needs to be done for documenting contacts to the south in northern clOd western Iran as well. Unfortunately, the details of such a picture cannot yet be drawn. Paradoxically, the rich Late Bronze and Early Iron cultures of Transcaucasia today appear to us as somewhat withdrawn or turned in upon themselves (culturally involuted), not active participants in a larger world system.

Regardless, Transcaucasia was in neither the late second millennium B.C. nor earlier a simple provincial backwater or dependent periphery to more developed "core" areas to the south. At certain times, Transcaucasia functioned as a conduit for important advances in transportation technology, particularly those associated with the use of wheeled vehicles and the domestication of the horse and subsequent development of horsemanship; at other times, it was a rich innovative source for the large-scale production of metal tools and weapons. Transcaucasia never appears to have been an exploited cheap supplier of raw materials to resource-deficient, expansionary states to the south, though it undoubtedly traded in metals, jewelry, and other semiprecious materials with such states. The richly accoutered kurgans, which dominate the archaeological record from the second half of the third through the middle of the second millennium B.C., suggest societies permanently cleft between rulers and ruled. The goods accompanying the principal burial(s) in the larger kurgans are not qualitatively inferior to those found in "royal" tombs to the south. By the


Late Bronze/Early Iron Age the evidence supports the formation of state(s) in southern Transcaucasia and, minimally, the possibility for the considerable stockpiling of wealth-in the form of massive caches of bronze weapons-elsewhere throughout the area. Finally, when true history dawns at the end of the second and beginning of the first millennia B.C., the Urartian state that emerges is one of the most powerful kingdoms in West Asia, a worthy rival of mighty Assyria to the south. The process is not one of a periphery transforming itself into a core because of shifts in the world economy. Rather, an independent kingdom has emerged which clearly developed from its Late Bronze predecessors in the area but which also assumed certain trappings, above all literacy, characteristic of "civilized" societies further south.

Such a conclusion does not mean that Transcaucasia should be viewed simply as an area of either independent or secondary state formation. Comparison of its prehistoric record with that of Central Asia suggests that both of these "peripheral" or, to avoid confusion, "marginal" areas in the ancient Near East shared certain broad patterns of development from the introduction of food production and settled life through a fundamental shift in settlement patterns toward the end of the third millennium B.C. to the establishment of characteristic ways of life or cultural adaptations by the middle of the second millennium B.C. Some time ago R. H. Dyson, Jr. (1973) noted the lack of continuity of settlements across the Iranian plateau during the second millennium, and numerous scholars (e.g., Dales 1977) have tried to explain the decline of proto-urban sites throughout the Indo-Iranian borderlands, Afghanistan, and eastern Iran that seems to have occurred again toward the end of the third and beginning of the second millennium B.C. Whatever the reasons favored, similar patterns can be traced that minimally imply participation in shared, fundamentally significant historical processes. The main current of world cultural evolutionary or universal historical development flowed far beyond the confines of the Mesopotamian plain, inundating areas that included both Transcaucasia and Central Asia.

A second plant and animal "revolution" had been completed by the middle centuries of the second millennium B.C. which provided new means of transportation, new sources of energy for draft purposes, and new sources of food. Effects of this second revolution reverberated throughout the ancient Near East, including both its central and eastern northern frontiers. Different patterns of settlement and subsistence practices were established in Transcaucasia and in Central Asia, but in both areas they proved remarkably durable. Neither Transcaucasia nor Central Asia were dependent politically upon the higher literate civilizations flourishing farther to the south until the Iron Age and the advent ultimately of the Achaemenids. During the Bronze Age, dependencies and sources of technolOgical innovations-as they can be referred to at all-moved in the opposite direction: north to south. The barbarian "peripheries" or northern frontiers of Transcaucasia and Central Asia, like their Aegean counterpart far to the west, did not palely reflect the light of civilization emanating from the ancient Near East; rather, they stimulated the latter" civilized" areas and profoundly affected their courses of development.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I visited Transcaucasia while I was on sabbatical from Wellesley College; the exchange visit itself was supported by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences Senior Scholar Exchange Program with the Soviet Academy of Sciences. Countless Soviet

136 PHILIP L. KOHL

scholars helped me in countless ways. Here I cannot list them all, but will simply mention a few that particularly facilitated my work in specific cities: Dr. R. M. Munchaev (Moscow); Dr. K. N. Kushnareva (Leningrad); Dr. I. Narimanov (Baku); Dr. T. Kigoradze (Tbilisi); and Dr. R. S. Badaljan (Yerevan). I have benefitted greatly from conversations with Dr. Karen S. Rubinson, particularly on problems relating to the dating of Middle Bronze materials and their relations beyond Transcaucasia to Iran, Anatolia, and the Aegean world. Parallels between Late Bronze anklets found in western Georgia with Mycenaean examples from the Troad were pointed out to me in a letter by Hanne Lassen of the Carsten Niebuhr Institute for Ancient Near Eastern Studies in Copenhagen. Lacey Chylack drew Figure 1, and Diane Menyuk drew Figure 2.

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Abibullaev, 0., 1982, Eneolit i Bronza na Territorii Nakhichevanskoi ASSR. Elm, Baku. Andreeva, M., 1977, K Voprosu 0 Yuzhnykh Svyazakh Maikopskoi Kul'turi. Sovetskaya Arkeo

logiya 1:39-56. Anthony, D., 1986, The 'Kurgan Culture': A Reconsideration. Current Anthropology 27:291-313. Burney, c., and D. Lang, 1971, The Peoples of the Hills: Ancient Ararat and Caucasus. Weidenfeld

and Nicolson, London. Chernykh, E., in press. Ancient Metallurgy in the USSR. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Dales, G., 1977, Shifting Trade Patterns between the Iranian Plateau and the Indus Valley in the

Third Millennium B.C. In Le Plateau Iranien et I'Asie Centrale des Origines d la Conquete Islamique (ed. J. Deshayes). CNRS, Paris, pp. 67-78.

Dedabrishvili, 5., 1979, Kurgani Alazanskoi Doliny. Metsniereba, Tbilisi. Dyson, R., Jr., 1973, The Archaeological Evidence of the Second Millennium B.c. on the Persian

Plateau. In Cambridge Ancient History II: Part 1. The Middle East and the Aegean Region ca. 1800-1380 B.c. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 687-715.

Dzhavakhishvili, A., and L. Glonti, 1962, Urbnisi I: Arkheologicheskie Raskopki Provedennye v 1954-1961 gg. na Selishche Kvatskhelebi (Tylenia Kokhi). Tbilisi.

Gei, A., 1986, Pogrebenie Liteishchika Novotitorovskoi Kul'turi iz Nizhnego Prikuban'ya. Arkheologicheskie Otkrytiya na Novostroikakh: Drevnosti Severnogo Kavkaza, Vol. I. Nauka, Moscow, pp. 13-32.

Gevorkjan. A., 1980, Iz Istorii Drevneishei Metallurgii Armyanskogo Nagor'ya. Annenian Academy of Sciences, Yerevan.

Gledhill, J., and M. Larsen, 1982, The Polanyi Paradigm and a Dynamic Analysis of Archaic States. In Theory and Explanation in Archaeology (ed. C. Renfrew, M. J. Rowlands, and B. A. Segraves). Academic Press, New York, pp. 197-229.

Glumac, P., and D. Anthony, n.d., Culture and Environment in the Prehistoric Caucasus: The Neolithic through the Early Bronze Age. In Chronologies in Old World Archaeology (3rd ed.) (ed. R. Ehrich). University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

Jarrige, J., 1986, Excavations at Mehragarh-Nowsharo. Pakistan Archaeology, Vols. 18-22 (1974-1986):63-131.

Jarrige, J., and M. Santoni, 1979, Fouilles de Pirak, Vols. I and II. Diffusion de Bocard, Paris. Kavtaradze, G., 1983, K Khronologii Epokhi Eneolita i Bronzy Gruzii. Metsniereba, Tbilisi. Khanzadjan, E., 1985, Araratskaya Dolina v Kontse IV - Nachale I tis. do N. E. Doctoral dissertation

abstract, Yerevan. Khanzadjan, E., and B. Piotrovskii, 1984, Tsilindricheskaya Pechat' c Drevneegipetskoi

leroglificheskoi Nadpis'yu iz Metsamorskogo Mogil'nika. Istoriko-Filologicheskii Zhurnal 4:59-65.


Khanzadjan, E., G. Sarkisjan, and I. Diakonoff, 1983, Vavilonskaya Girya XVI v. do N. E. c Klinopisnoi Nadpis'yu iz Metsamora. Drevnii Vostok 4:113-122.

Kohl, P., 1984, L'Asie Centrale: des Origines Ii l'Age du Fer. Synthese 14, Editions Recherche sur les Civilisations, Paris, AD.P.F.

Kohl, P., 1985, Recent Research in Central Asia. American Antiquity 50:789-795. Kohl, P., 1987, The Use and Abuse of World System Theory: The Case of the "Pristine" West

Asian State. In Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory, Vol. 11 (ed. M. Schiffer). Academic Press, New York, pp. 1-35.

Korobkova, G., 1987, Khozyaistvennie Komp/eksi Rannikh Zemledel'cheskoskotovodcheskikh Obshchestv Yuga SSSR. Nauka, Leningrad.

Kuftin, B., 1941, Arkheologicheskie Raskopki v Trialet. Georgian Academy of Sciences, Tbilisi. Kushnareva, K, 1983, K Probleme Vydeleniya Arkheologicheskikh Kul'tur Perioda Srednei

Bronzy na Yuzhnom Kavkaze. Kratkie Soobshcheniya Instituta Arkheologii 176:9-15. Kushnareva, K, 1985, Sevano-Uzerlikskaya Kul'tura Perioda Srednei Bronzy na Territorii Yuzh

nogo Kavkaza. In Kul'turnoe Nasledie Vostoka. Nauka, Leningrad. Kushnareva, K, 1986, Yuzhnii Kavkaz v. VI-II tis. do N. E. (Etapi Kul'turnogo i Sotsial'no-Ekonom

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Pitskhelaouri, K, 1984, Bronze Moyen: Richesses des Tumulus. Historie et Archeologie 88:38-45. Pitskhelauri, K, 1979, Vostochnaya Gruziya v Kontse Bronzovogo Veka. Metsniereba, Tbilisi. Plashchev, A., and V. Chekmarev, 1978, Gidrografiya SSSR. Gidrometeoizdat, Leningrad. Rubinson, K, 1977, The Chronology of the Middle Bronze Kurgans at Trialeti. In Mountains and

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Weiss, H., 1986, The Origins of Tell Leilan and the Conquest of Space in Third Millennium Mesopotamia. In The Origins of Cities in Dry Farming Syria and Mesopotamia in the Third Millennium B.c. (ed. H. Weiss). Four Quarters, Guilford, pp. 71-108.

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Chapter 6

Interaction and Isolation The Empty Spaces in Panregional Political and Economic Systems

STEADMAN UPHAM

INTRODUCTION

Since the 1960s, it has become axiomatic in American archaeology to argue that culture change is predicated on the existence of variability in cultural and behavioral strategies. The debate over whether to emphasize norms or variation in archaeological interpretation, in fact, has become passe. At the same time, site-specific studies have been argued to be less relevant. Regional and panregional approaches that emphasize the systemic development of cultural systems and interaction are now viewed as a synthetic alternative to narrower culture historical studies of single sites. The changing spatial perspectives of archaeologists (from sites to regions and panregions) and the acknowledged importance of cultural and behavioral variation in change studies is the self-evident result of disciplinary housekeeping that has taken place during the last two decades. What is not self-evident despite such housekeeping, however, is how the axes of cultural and behavioral variation are acted upon by the selective pressures that mold cultural systems. In this chapter, I explore the issues of variation and change in a limited way by focusing on the spatial characteristics of panregional systems. As the title of this chapter suggests, I am interested in the" empty" spaces in such systems, the areas most often neglected by the spatial analytic techniques that emphasize nodal analyses, connectivity measures and ideas of centrality. Yet the purpose of this chapter is to show how these "empty" spaces create an important dynamic in regional and panregional systems, and are essential in the development, maintenance, and decline of large-scale interactive networks.

STEADMAN UPHAM • The Graduate School, University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon 97403-1219.


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CONSIDERING THE REGIONAL AND PANREGIONAL SYSTEM

STEADMAN UPHAM

Many models of large-scale political and economic systems, and especially those derived from economic geography, are based on conceptions of regional interaction that describe connections between population centers. The identification of population centers (nodes) that were participating in particular regional interactive networks, and the nature of the connections between them, are often used as proxy measures for describing the interactive patterns across entire regions or panregions. I employed just such an approach in my study of the fourteenth-century Western Pueblo (Upham 1982). In that work, I used a variety of different measures derived from graph theory to characterize interactive ties between sites and to describe the distribution of population centers in the Colorado Plateaus region of Arizona and New Mexico. Measures of centrality and accessibility were viewed in the classic sense of central place theory, as ways to assess the level of systemic connectivity and integration. Moreover, I also used rank-size analysis, another measure designed to assess the degree of integration in a settlement system.

Those analyses proved quite useful and revealed spatial and organizational patterns previously unrecognized among prehistoric and protohistoric Pueblo groups. Even then, however, I was troubled by neglect of populations residing outside of major centers and by the way the analyses focused on small systemic nodes, ignoring large geographic portions of the system. My discussions of the Querechos, who are non pueblo-dwelling Pueblo, in that study and of other groups of huntergatherers in the northern Southwest in my more recent work (see Upham 1984, 1988; Reed and Upham 1987), reflect my continuing concern about the nodal approach in regional analysis.

Although the nodal approach is useful for describing the relationship of population centers to each other, formal analyses of hinterland areas and rural regions lacking large population centers are poorly represented in archaeological literature dealing with the evolution of regional systems. Such areas are presumed "vacant" and" empty" in the locational approach, and are of secondary interest to the formation and operation of the core interactive network that is conceived to be localized in the concept of central places. One result of this approach has been the creation of a prehistory that is overwhelmingly biased in favor of large sites, more obtrusive archaeological remains, and "dominant" patterns. Several archaeologists have pointed out how such biases influence our perceptions of prehistory, leaving large segments of past rural populations as an underclass without history (Adams 1980; Freidel 1983; Upham 1984, 1986; Wolf, 1982).

Nevertheless, an emphasis on regional systems, and even larger scales of interaction and connectivity advocated by some economic geographers, has been salutary for the discipline and has led to a rewriting of prehistory in many New World regions. By increasing the scale of analysis, however, this emphasis has also raised a number of questions pertaining to the more peripheral areas of regional and panregional systems. Many regional analyses have focused on rural hinterlands (e.g., Blanton 1976; Blanton et al. 1984; Logan and Sanders 1976; Parsons 1976; Smith 1976); few have dealt with the problem of open or peripheral areas that are devoid of large settlements. Such neglect is a particularly vexing problem in some New World areas, like

PANREGIONAL POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC SYSTEMS 141

the Greater Southwest, where vast expanses of territory separate primary population centers. Such areas cannot be considered formal rural hinterlands, since they are often not directly linked to proximate population centers. Moreover, dichotomous urban phenomena are lacking in the region. Yet regional analyses have clearly demonstrated formal connectivity between the large towns within and between these regions, linkages that often span hundreds of square kilometers of seemingly" empty" space.

The problem of empty spaces became particularly apparent to me several years ago when I began working in the southeastern portion of the American Southwest. The area, referred to as the Jornada or Jornada Mogollon region, extends on a northsouth axis from Carrizozo, New Mexico to the Big Bend region of Texas and on an east-west axis from the margins of the Llano Estacado to the Mimbres Bolson of southwestern New Mexico. In this peripheral area, large villages are rare; by far the most common type of site is the ubiquitous artifact scatter. Nonlocal trade goods are likewise rare and are comprised primarily of shell from the Gulf of Mexico and the Gulf of California and a few black-on-white, redware, and polychrome ceramics from surrounding regions. The Jornada region has figured little in general interpretations of southwestern prehistory. Cordell, for example, in Prehistory of the Southwest (1984) devotes only one formal paragraph to the Jornada in 400-plus pages of discourse (I should point out that Cordell's treatment of the Jornada approximately doubles that of McGregor's 1974). Yet the Jornada region covers more than 100,000 km2. More importantly, however, it is bordered by three of the most important areas of cultural development in all of the Southwest: the Mimbres, the Eastern Pueblo, and Casas Grandes.

A PANREGIONAL MEANING OF EMPTY

Empty spaces in regional and panregional systems are those areas between major population centers: areas without obtrusive or distinctive evidence of occupation. Such spaces can exist adjacent to major zones of habitation as hinterlands, or can be seen more profoundly as large zones of dispersed occupation that cover entire regions and are peripheral to primary population centers. In the American Southwest, both kinds of empty spaces occur. The Chacoan regional system of northwestern New Mexico that flourished between AD.900-1200, for example, contains large expanses of hinterland territory. Chacoan "outlier" communities are found throughout the San Juan Basin in this hinterland, with expanses of territory separating outliers from each other and from the more central canyon sites. In many cases the empty spaces in the Chacoan system are traversed by roads that link population centers. All recent interpretations of the Chacoan system have included these hinterland areas as essential components of the system, empty spaces in the technical sense, primarily because of the formal road network that links these communities.

It is now clear that these empty spaces exerted profound influences on the development of social, political, and economic organization in the Chacoan regional system. Construction of the Chacoan road network, a feat requiring the mobilization of sizeable labor pools, has been directly tied to resource extraction activities necessary for construction and development of the canyon core (Betancourt et al. 1986). One such activity was the long-distance transportation of construction timbers, involving

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the movement of at least 200,000 logs more than 75 km. This kind of resource extraction posed a major logistical obstacle to the Chacoan Anasazi. Such an obstacle looms especially large in the organizational development of the system when it is considered that the average log measured 22 cm in diameter, 5 m in length, and weighted 275 kg (Betancourt et al. 1986:370). Additional logistical activities associated with logging also necessitated the organization of substantial labor pools. Dean and Warren (1983:220-230), for example, detail how task groups "felled, trimmed, debarked, sorted into size classes, and cut to predetermined beam lengths" the hundreds of thousands of timbers required for construction.

When one begins to attach people to this enterprise, the meaning of "empty spaces" suddenly assumes greater importance. Although the exact number of people required to complete this undertaking remains unclear, it is certain that the number was in the hundreds, if not thousands. These individuals would have had to have been provisioned during their trips to procure timbers and such systematic labor would have had to have been supervised, even if only at a rudimentary level. Similarly, it is unclear if major logging expeditions nearer to the timber sources actually supplied the requisite labor. In some respects, the form of logistical organization is irrelevant since both logistical strategies suggest very centralized control over the organization and management of labor. The latter strategy, however, suggests a higher degree of systemic integration. What is clear from the recent work of the Chacoan researchers is that the 402.3 km of major and secondary Chacoan roads that have been identified, and especially the 9-m wide Great North Road, West Road, and Southeast Road, were built to surmount the obstacles posed by "empty spaces" in the regional system. Such a conclusion is bolstered by recent documentation of an elaborate system of signaling stations that linked Chacoan outliers together and to the major population centers in the canyon core (see Cordell 1984:256). In the case of the Chacoan regional system, the meaning of empty is directly tied to the nature of the links (roads and signaling stations) that integrated populations who occupied the San Jan Basin during the eleventh through the thirteenth centuries.

In the southern Southwest, in contrast, entire regions measuring tens of thousands of square kilometers exist without significant evidence of permanent population centers. The Jornada area, described previously, presents a case in point. But in the case of the Jornada, the region has been ignored in many discussions of regional and panregional cultural development because there is a different perception about the meaning of "empty," despite the fact that the Jornada region separates the Mimbres from Casas Grandes culture areas and begins at the southern margin of the Puebloan zone of occupation. The significance of this interpretive difference has a variety of implications for analyses of interaction at the regional and panregional level.

Empty Spaces in Panregional Analyses

The analysis of regional and panregional interaction in archaeology received a significant boost during the 1970s with the publication of Wallerstein's important analysis of the modern world system (1974, 1979). Although some of his conclusions have been challenged (e.g., Mayhew 1983), the structure Wallerstein proposed has lent itself to the analysis of many large-scale systems. For example, a number of archaeologists have postulated the existence of a Mesoamerican World System that


emerged during the early centuries A.D., had its organizational core in central Mexico, and, although transformed, persisted to the eve of European contact (Blanton and Feinman 1984; Di Peso 1980; Pailes and Reff 1980; Pailes and Whitecotton 1979; Plog et al. 1982; Upham 1982, 1986; Whitecotton and Pailes 1979; Weigand 1982). This world system exercised varying degrees of control over specific regions but encompassed vast areas and incorporated many groups with diverse social, political, and economic organizations. It has also been suggested that the Greater Southwest was part of the Mesoamerican World System. Because Wallerstein's formulation includes a number of different structural parts (core, semiperiphery, periphery, external area), debate has risen over the functional significance of southwestern areas in the Mesoamerican World System. Pailes, Whitecotton, Plog, Weigand, Di Peso, and I have all offered slightly different reconstructions and have placed different emphases on interaction, exchange, social stratification, political development, and other variables. What unites all of our past approaches, however, is a common concern with major political centers, with the primary zones of occupation where population and labor were sufficient for exploiting a variety of strategic resources. None of us has explored the implications of vast "empty" areas within, the confines of the Mesoamerican World System. In the following sections of this chapter, I consider such areas in terms of (1) population and labor, (2) barriers to travel and trade, and (3) "economic layering," a feature of the panregional economic system that linked groups at widely varying levels of complexity over a vast area.

Population and Labor

Two of the most important distinctions Wallerstein makes in his analysis of the emerging capitalist world system involve the categorization of commodities and the link between commodity class, labor, and world-system structure. High-ranking and low-ranking goods as well as preciosities are defined in relation to labor costs. Of particular note with respect to the Greater Southwest and to the "empty" areas of world systems is the notion that the Greater Southwest constituted a periphery in the Mesoamerican World System. Whitecotton and Pailes reflect the general consensus among southwesternists when they write, "from our perspective, the Southwest would represent a peripheral area in a Mesoamerican world economy" (1986:193). Yet Wallerstein writes,

The periphery of a world economy is that geographical sector of it wherein production is primarily of lower ranking goods (that is, goods whose labor is less well rewarded) but which is an integral part of the overall system of the division of labor, because the commodities involved are essential for daily use. (1974:301)

Few archaeologists or historians would argue that commodities produced in the Greater Southwest were essential for daily use in the Mesoamerican core. This situation holds especially true if those commodities from the periphery were foodstuffs, something Wallerstein seems intent on for peripheral areas (particularly if his discussions of Portuguese expansion to Madeira and the Azores and the development of agriculture on those islands are intended to be taken as more general statements [1974:24-38]). Even though Wallerstein's concepts of core, periphery, semiperiphery, and external area are not spatial constructs, the idea of empty spaces is relevant to considering how a periphery might be articulated with core and semiperiphery. As

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in the case of the Chacoan road and signaling systems, information, people, and material must be able to traverse the vast unoccupied expanses. It is the case, however, that the Greater Southwest could not constitute a periphery in the sense that Wallerstein intends because of the vast "empty" spaces between it and the central Mexican core during the entire prehistoric period. In this case, much of the Greater Southwest, what the Spanish later identified as portions of the Gran Chichimeca, was devoid of large population centers and features like roads and signaling systems that link such centers together. In the Jornada region, for example, total population was low relative to other areas during most of the late prehistoric periods (ca. AD.l-14S0), as groups lived as hunter-gatherers ranging over wide areas. Consequently, population density was also extremely low. In other words, exploitable labor markets in the Greater Southwest that did exist in various areas were isolated by "empty" spaces. The effect of such isolation, however, was not to exclude the Greater Southwest from the world system, but to change the structure of interaction and increase the value of the few commodities flowing to the core by increasing the labor costs associated with procurement and production. This process can be seen in the extraction of Southwestern turquoise and its exchange to Mesoamerica, for example, an activity that apparently took place in the Jornada area at the Oro Grande turquoise source as well as at other localities in the Southwest (Weigand et al. 1977).

Travel and Trade

Travel across vast, sparsely populated areas would seem to present substantial impediments to the transmission of commodities, people, and information. Yet archaeological data indicate connectivity between regions and relatively formal links both to and across areas like the Jornada. The narrative accounts of Spanish explorers who entered the Southwest during the first century of colonial occupation are instructive here. It is true that sizeable areas explored by the Spanish lacked permanently settled populations. But rarely did the Spanish travel any distance without making contact with aboriginal groups. These aboriginal groups knew about their neighbors and provided detailed information to the Spanish; in some cases, they knew about groups found at considerable distances. Alarcon's narrative recounting exploration of the lower Colorado River region is relevant: Yuman groups provided Alarcon with abundant information about the province of Cibola located several hundred kilometers to the east (Bolton 1949). In the Greater Southwest, neighboring groups often spoke mutually intelligible dialects, and there appears to have been a kind of universal sign language in use (see Hammond and Rey 1966). Moreover, in much of the Rio Grande corridor, Keres was used as a lingua franca among native groups (Spicer 1962). In the case of the southeastern periphery of the American Southwest, these groups were described primarily as hunter-gatherers (Sumas, Mansos, Janos, Jocomes, and so forth). It is these hunter-gatherers who must have been instrumental in facilitating travel and trade between more densely populated centers.

We know that only a few commodities like turquoise, shell, copper bells, and parrots crossed the Mesoamerican-Southwestern boundary (McGuire 1980; Upham 1986). Absolute quantities of these commodities were small relative to the total population of either or both culture areas. Because of this fact, some archaeologists have suggested that Mesoamerican-Southwestern links were primarily structured around the transmission of information. Given the intricate interactive structure and the


extensive alliances described by Riley (1982) for sixteenth-century groups in the Greater Southwest, and especially the southern periphery, such information flow would be a natural consequence of intergroup relations. Thus, the empty spaces between major population centers could be bridged, not by actions emanating directly from the centers, but by hunter-gatherers and other" rural" folk occupying the sparsely inhabited zones between widely scattered central places.

Economic Layering

It is clear that the large-scale systems of prehistory, like the Mesoamerican World System, linked groups with different social and political organizations at markedly different levels of complexity. The economies of those groups also varied and must have included market systems of the cities and towns, subsistence economies of the rural areas, and foraging and hunting strategies of what I term here the empty spaces. This economic layering imposes a dynamic on the larger system that resulted in a fabric of alliances and oppositions facilitating and impeding interaction and information flow at different times. The empty spaces in this context are thus at least as important as population centers and hinterland areas, since the system is not fully articulated without them. At the same time, the absence of significant labor pools in these empty spaces and their physical separation in space influence the economic structure of the larger system by increasing the procurement and transportation costs of commodities. Consequently, the growth and development of large-scale interactive systems is determined to a very real extent by the distribution of such empty spaces, and by the way they are articulated by more encompassing political and economic institutions. In the following section of this chapter, I examine one region, the Jornada, in greater detail to show how archaeological interpretation of a broader regional system can be facilitated by consideration of sparsely inhabited "empty" areas.

THE JORNADA IN PANREGIONAL PERSPECTIVE

The Jornada Mogollon were first systematically described by Donald Lehmer (1948), although the research of other archaeologists like the Cosgroves and H. P. Mera contributed important information about the Jornada region more than a decade earlier. Lehmer was a student of Emil Haury, and following Haury's lead, Lehmer sought to broaden and extend the concept of Mogollon culture. To accomplish this task, he excavated, tested, or visited a few sites in south-central New Mexico, near the modern towns of Las Cruces and Alamogordo. At one of those sites, Los Tules, he conducted extensive excavations, and on the basis of that work he defined Los Tules as the type site for the Jomada Mogollon.

Data from Los Tules also provided the basis for construction of a phase sequence for the large geographic region described earlier. That sequence contained four named phases (Hueco, Mesilla, Dona Ana, and EI Paso), and deScriptions of cultural developments in the region during a l,450-year period. In broad outline, Lehmer's Hueco phase (A.D. 1 to 900) represented the transition from Archaic hunting and gathering to incipient agriculture. The beginnings of settled village life were to be found during the Mesilla phase (A.D.900-1100), which Lehmer argued was manifest

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in the development of the first pithouse villages in the region. The ensuing Dona Ana phase (AD. 1100-1200) represents the pan-Southwestern pithouse-to-pueblo architectural transition and, according to Lehmer, continued the trends of increasing agricultural reliance and sedentism begun during the Mesilla phase. The EI Paso phase (A.D. 1200-1450), the final phase in Lehmer's sequence prior to the postulated widespread regional Southwestern abandonments, saw the culmination of processes begun some 300 to 500 years before: the construction of large adobe pueblos, more intensive floodplain agriculture, and inter- and intraregional trade in ceramics and other commodities.

The outline Lehmer constructed for the Jornada Mogollon in southern New Mexico parallels development sequences in other Mogollon regions, and especially those that Haury defined in the central Arizona mountains. More recent archaeological work, however, has cast doubt on Lehmer's original phase sequence and the developments it describes; Lehmer's sequence was based on data from only a few sites. Today, thousands of sites have been recorded and hundreds have been tested or excavated because of cultural resource management work in the area. Consequently, the Jornada region has become much better known. These new data substantially change our understanding of Jornada cultural development, and that new understanding incorporates three important changes in thinking about settlement patterns, subsistence, and material culture.

Settlement Patterns

Perhaps the single most important change in thinking about Jornada adaptation has been liked to the recognition that there are very few permanent habitation sites in the entire region. In fact, calculations based on survey data show that only about 5% of all sites in the Jornada region can be so classified (Upham 1984). The most common site type is the nonarchitectural artifact scatter, a class of site that suggests high levels of residential mobility throughout most of the prehistoric period. Two exceptions to this pattern exist, one between AD. 1100 and 1150, and one between AD.

1250 and 1300. During these short-lived developments, there was an increase in the number of permanent habitation sites (primarily pueblos) that were constructed in better-watered areas of the Jornada region, and a concomitant decrease in residential mobility. A variety of explanations for these changes in settlement strategies have been offered (e.g., Carmichael 1985; Hard 1984; Mauldin 1986), but most researchers seem to agree that a demographic change and an increased reliance on agriculture is involved.

Subsistence

In Lehmer's.original phase sequence, the appearance of cultigens and developing reliance on agriculture occurred early in the Christian era, during the mid- to late Hueco phase (ca. A.D. 500). In the following Mesilla phase, pithouse village agriculturists were argued to be present on the landscape. New research on this question, however, has again substantially changed the perception of Jornada adaptation ijohnson and Upham 1988; Upham et al. 1987). Excavations in dry rockshelters of the southern Organ Mountains, Dona Ana County, New Mexico have provided direct


least 1,000 years earlier than Lehmer suspected. Direct radiocarbon dating of eightrowed corn (proto-Maiz de Ocho and Maiz de Ocho) and obsidian hydration dating of associated lithic artifacts firmly establish the presence of Maiz de Ocho in the Jornada region at 1225 B.C. (Upham et al. 1987). This date is significant because strata underlying those yielding early eight-rowed corn contain remains of Chapalote maize, the earliest variety of maize found in the Southwest (see Simmons 1986). Consequently, a date of 2000 B.C., or even earlier, is not unrealistic for the beginnings of corn agriculture among the Jornada.

Material Culture

Assemblages of material culture from Jornada sites are remarkable for their localistic character. Although intrusive ceramics and marine shell are found in assemblages from larger sites (including larger artifact scatters, rockshelters, pithouse, and pueblo sites), the overwhelming majority of artifacts are made of local materials. The technological characteristics (including paste, temper, and vessel form) of the local brownware pottery, for example, are remarkably consistent from the pottery's first appearance at ca. A.D. 400 to the close of the prehistoric period. Surface treatment of the vessels, especially painted designs, change through time, but the technological characteristics of the basic brownware pot remained largely unaltered. The extent of local exchange of these locally made commodities has yet to be defined, but judging by the quantity of intrusive materials at Jornada sites it appears that commerce among Jornada groups, at least in nonlocal goods, was infrequent and conducted at low levels.

Two important exceptions to this pattern exist: one beginning about A.D. 900 and lasting to A.D. 1050 or 1100, and one following A.D. 1300. The first is related to an increase in the frequency of Mimbres Black-on-white pottery in Jornada assemblages. This pottery exhibits paste and temper characteristics suggesting manufacture in the Mimbres Valley some 100 km to the east. The second exception is tied to the introduction of two distinct pottery traditions to the Jornada area, one from the Pueblo area 200 km to the north (probably the Salinas Pueblos), and the other from the Casas Grandes region 200 km to the south. Each such change represents a major panregional social, political, and economic reorientation, and in the following section, I discuss these changes in light of the revised thinking on the Jornada.

Rethinking Jomada Developments

Acquisition of more extensive and detailed data from the Jornada region has dramatically altered the way archaeologists now view the Jornada sequence. In hindsight, it is clear that the portrait of this group painted by Lehmer was based on only a small segment of the entire archaeological record. That segment is important, but cannot be taken as representative of the more general adaptive pattern found across the region. Today we view the data that Lehmer argued were characteristic of the entire region to be characteristic of major adaptive shifts, punctuations in an otherwise enduring pattern of hunting and gathering. We now view characteristic archaeological data to be found in the ubiquitous artifact scatters and nondescript localistic artifact assemblages.

Given this adaptive backdrop, a number of developments in the Jornada region

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appear anomalous. For example, the appearance of cultigens (especially maize) and the beginnings of com agriculture during the Late Archaic period is a development that seems to be out of step with continued evidence of high levels of residential mobility and the persistence of hunting and gathering. Because Chapalote maize has been dated to much earlier periods in central Mexico (Mangelsdorf et al. 1967), the transmission of maize to the Jornada region indicates panregional connectivity with a much larger system. Based on these data, it is possible to conclude not only that the Jornada was connected to the larger system, but also that the region served as one of the principal corridors through which maize (and possibly other goods and information) was transmitted from Mesoamerica to the Puebloan zone of occupation. This conclusion is not surprising given the presence of the Rio Grande and the natural avenue for travel it provides. Yet some archaeologists, perhaps influenced by the perception of "empty" I described earlier, have argued quite forcefully that the primary corridor to the Pueblo region was to the west, along the Sierra Madre Occidental into the boot heel of New Mexico, and from there into the Mogollon Mountains to Cibola (see Riley 1980, 1987).

The two major changes in settlement strategies noted earlier in this chapter (increased numbers of permanent habitations occurring at A.D. 1100-1150 and A.D.12S0-1300) are apparently correlated with demographic change and with an increased reliance on agriculture. Although the details of these two important settlement shifts remain unclear, it does appear that the construction of permanent habitation sites is correlated with an increase in total regional population. The basis for such an inference is tied to the fact that the number of artifact scatters, the primary evidence for high residential mobility during earlier periods, does not decrease substantially during these times. Moreover, data from dry rockshelter sites (Johnson and Upham 1988) and open sites (Carmichael 1985) indicate that at least some portion of the total population continued to hunt and gather and to rely on a strategy of residential mobility. Another more archaeologically visible portion apparently settled down and began to invest more energy in the cultivation of crops.

It is ironic that these two settlement shifts would be seen by Lehmer and an earlier generation of archaeologists as characteristic of "phases" and more general (if not typical) patterns of adaptation. I believe one reason for such a perception is tied to the notion of "empty" developed earlier in this chapter and to the fact that cultural sequences that were different from core area or heartland groups could not be accommodated by existing taxonomic frameworks. To this end, more recent treatments of unobtrusive, atypical, or asynchronous cultural sequences have sought recourse to concepts borrowed from theoretical ecology and evolutionary biology to deal with what have been termed resilient or efficient adaptations (see Adams 1980; Stuart and Gauthier 1982; Upham 1984). Such adaptations often persisted for extremely long periods of time (e.g., Thomas 1972) and produced low visibility and archaeologically unobtrusive remains that are often most common in what are best described as "empty" regions.

The changes noted earlier in Jornada artifact assemblages appear to be tied to the demographic and settlement pattern shifts described above. The introduction of different pottery types during these two distinct periods also seems to be related to panregional reorganization and to the differential incorporation of the Jornada into the larger panregional system. Based on a preliminary analysis of pottery from several rockshelters in the southern Organ Mountains (Howell 1986; Johnson and


Upham 1988), a few statements can be made regarding the nature of the panregional system and its impact on Jornada development.

Mimbres Black-on-white pottery (Boldface and Classic) found on Jornada sites dating between AD. 900-1100 primarily exhibits a nonlocal paste and appears to be an import (Sudar-Laumbach 1982). The appearance of this pottery in Jornada assemblages thus seems to signal the establishment of social ties with groups occupying the Mimbres Valley to the west. Following AD. 1100, however, Mimbres Black-on-, white design styles begin to appear on pottery made with the local Jornada brownware paste. The apparent local manufacture of Mimbres pottery in the Jornada area following AD. 1100 may represent either an immigration of Mimbrenos to the area (thereby accounting for a portion of the demographic increase noted by other archaeologists), or may simply be the transplantation of a pottery-making tradition and its adoption by Jornada potters. In either case, the local manufacture of this pottery may explain why Mimbres types persist in the Jornada region into the thirteenth century, well after the generalized" abandonment" of the Mimbres Valley. The first settlement shift noted above (ca. A.D. 1100-1150) seems to occur when occupation ofthe Mimbres Valley is coming to an end, at a time when Mimbres Black-on-white was increasingly being manufactured using local Jornada clay. Consequently, the intensification of agricultural activities and the increase in the number of permanent habitation sites in the Jornada noted by Carmichael (1985) and others during this time would appear to follow collapse of the Mimbres Valley system. Thus, a cultural" shock wave" across the Jornada empty space generated by the Mimbres collapse may explain the earliest Jornada settlement shift to areas more conducive to the practice of agriculture.

The second major change in Jornada pottery assemblages involves the introduction of pottery from the Pueblo region to the north and the Casas Grandes region to the south. In both cases, the pottery is demonstrably of nonlocal origin and its appearance again signals a change in social, political, and economic systems outside of the Jornada area. The Puebloan pottery, Chupadero Black-on-white, is a product of the Chupadera Mesa region and the adjacent Salinas Pueblos (Wiseman 1986); the Casas Grandes pottery (many different types) originated in the Casas Grandes region (Di Peso 1974). By AD. 1250 to 1300, the pottery from both of these regions is common in Jornada assemblages, although it generally occurs in low frequencies. At about that same time, a few large adobe pueblos began to be constructed in the Rio Grande Valley near EI Paso and on alluvial fans on the western side of the San Andres Mountains. As during the previous settlement shift, a portion of the local Jornada population continued to hunt and gather using logistical strategies of high mobility. The AD. 1250 settlement shift thus seems to coincide with the expansion of the Salinas Pueblos and peak development of the Casas Grandes system. In this case, the Jornada region formed an important link between these latter two areas and, as an interstitial empty space, may have been drawn into this larger interaction network.

CONCLUSION

In this chapter, I have sought to call attention to what I have termed" empty" spaces in panregional political and economic systems. Such spaces, although devoid of large population centers, often pose significant logistical obstacles to travel, trade, and communication. In the past, regional approaches and conceptions of panregional

150 STEADMAN UPHAM

political and economic systems derived from economic geography have neglected analyses of these empty regions. The absence of obtrusive archaeological remains in these areas has created the impression that empty spaces in panregional systems were unimportant. I have attempted to show for the Southwest, however, that empty spaces considered either as hinterlands or as zones of dispersed occupation peripheral to primary population centers are essential for explaining certain logistical strategies and local sequences of cultural development.

It is the case that modeling the systemic role of empty spaces cannot proceed in lockstep with regional analyses based on the nodal approach. Empty spaces are simply not amenable to that kind of quantitative analysis (point pattern analyses, Thiessen polygons, graph theory, and so forth). Instead, empty spaces must be analyzed in terms of other spatial and organizational relationships. I have identified three axes of variation that are relevant to such analyses: population and labor, travel and trade, and economic layering. In the case of the Chacoan regional system, variables of population and labor are keys to understanding how various logistical strategies were used to surmount the empty spaces in the Chacoan "hinterland." In the case of the Jornada, the vast size of the region, the general paucity of permanent settlements, as well as the low regional population density would seem to have created real obstacles to travel and trade. Yet the Rio Grande Valley was a natural corridor, and the presence of maize late in the second millennium B.c.suggests that populations in the surrounding regions did not view conditions in the Jornada as impediments.

The most complex issue related to empty spaces in panregional systems is economic layering, or the linkage of groups whose economic, social, and political organizations were markedly different. It is clear that cultural developments in empty spaces like the Jornada are subject to external forces. The appearance of nonlocal commodities and their incorporation into local material assemblages is probably only the most visible (and maybe least important!) aspect of this process. Recognizing that nearly all prehistoric cultural systems were articulated with larger panregional networks that encompassed great distances and diverse cultures may help to explain anomalous, asynchronous, or atypical developments at the local level. In the case of the Jornada, looking past the immediate region to surrounding areas has shed considerable light on Jornada settlement history and subsistence, as well as changes in material culture. Moving to the next logical step, that of explaining the way panregional systems are economically and politically articulated, should now be a priority in Southwestern archaeology.

REFERENCES

Adams, R., 1980, Strategies of Maximization, Stability, and Resilience in Mesopotamian Society, Settlement, and Agriculture. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 122:329-335.

Betancourt, J., J. Dean, and H. Hull, 1986, Prehistoric Long-Distance Transport of Construction Beams, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. American Antiquity 51:370-375.

Blanton, R., 1976, The Role of Symbiosis in Adaptation and Sociocultural Change in the Valley of Mexico. In The Valley of Mexico (ed. E. Wolf). University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, pp. 181-202.



Blanton, R, S. Kowlewski, G. Feinman, and J. Appel, 1984, Ancient Mesoamerica. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Bolton, H., 1949, Coronado: Knight of Pueblos and Plains. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.

Carmichael, D., 1985, The Pithouse of Pueblo Transition in the ]ornada Mogollon: A Reappraisal. Paper presented at the Jornada Mogollon Conference, Tularosa, New Mexico.

Cordell, L., 1984, Prehistory of the Southwest. Academic Press, Orlando. Dean, J., and R Warren, 1983, Dendrochronology. In The Architecture and Dendrochronology of

Chetro Ketl, Chaco Canyon, New Mexico (ed. S. Lekson). Reports of the Chaco Center, No.6. Division of Cultural Research, National Park Service, Albuquerque, pp. 105-240.

Di Peso, c., 1974, Casas Grandes: A Fallen Trading Center of the Gran Chichimeca. Amerind Foundation Series, No.9. Dragoon.

Freidel, D., 1983, Political Systems in Lowland Yucatan: Dynamics and Structure in Maya Settlement. In Prehistoric Settlement Patterns: Essays in Honor of Gordon R. Willey (ed. E. Vogt and R Leventhal). University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, pp. 375-386.

Hammond, G., and A. Rey, 1966, The Rediscovery of New Mexico 1500-1594. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.

Hard, R, 1984, Settlement and Subsistence in the Chihuahuan Desert. Proceedings of the American Society jor Conservation Archaeology 2:234-25l.

Howell, T., 1986, Ceramic Chronology Construction for the Zuni Region: Implications for Demographic Processes and Sociopolitical Organization. Unpublished master's thesis, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces.

Johnson, M., and S. Upham, 1988, Approaches to Adaptive Diversity: A Preliminary Report on Archaeological Investigations in the Organ Mountains, Southern New Mexico. In Proceedings of the Fourth ]ornada Mogollon Conference (ed. K. Laumbach and P. Eidenbach). Human Systems, Tularosa, pp. 65-9l.

Lehmer, D., 1948, The ]ornada Branch of the Mogollon. University of Arizona Social Science Bulletin 17, Tucson.

Logan, M., and W. Sanders, 1976, The Model. In The Valley of Mexico (ed. E. Wolf). University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, pp. 31-58.

Mangelsdorf, P., R MacNeish, and W. Galinat, 1967, Prehistoric Maize, Teosinte, and Tropsicum from Tamaulipas, Mexico. Botanical Museum Leaflets, Harvard University 22:33-63.

Mauldin, R, 1986, Settlement and Subsistence Patterns during the Pueblo Period on Ft. Bliss, Texas: A Model. In Mogollon Variability (ed. C. Benson and S. Upham). University Museum Occasional Papers 15, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, pp. 255-270.

Mayhew, A., 1983, Wallerstein's World System: An Institutionalist Perspective. Paper presented at the 25th Annual Meeting of the Western Social Science Association.

McGregor, J., 1974, Southwestern Archaeology. University of Illinois Press, Urbana. McGuire, R, 1980, The Mesoamerican Connection in the Southwest. The Kiva 46:3-38. Pailes, R, and D. Reff, 1980, Colonial Exchange Systems and the Decline of Paquime. Paper presented

at the 45th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Philadelphia. Pailes, R, and J. Whitecotton, 1979, The Greater Southwest and the Mesoamerican "World"

System: An Exploratory Model of Frontier Relationships. In The Frontier: Comparative Studies (ed. W. Savage and S. Thompson). UniverSity of Oklahoma Press, Norman, pp. 105-12l.

Parsons, J., 1976, Settlement and Population History of the Basin of Mexico. In The Valley of Mexico (ed. E. Wolf). University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, pp. 69-100.

Plog, F., S. Upham, and P. Weigand, 1982, A Perspective on Mogollon-Mesoamerican Interaction. In Mogollon Archaeology (ed. P. Beckett). Acoma Books, Ramona, pp. 227-238.

Reed, P., and S. Upham, 1987, Limited Activity Sites and Low Visibility Remains. Paper presented at the 52nd Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Toronto.

Riley, c., 1980, Mesoamerica and the Hohokam: A View form the 16th Century. In Current Issues

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in Hohokam Prehistory (ed. D. Doyel and F. Plog). Anthropological Research Papers 23, Arizona State University, Tempe, pp. 41-48.

Riley, c., 1987, The Frontier People. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque. Simmons, A., 1986, New Evidence for the Early Use of Cultigens in the American Southwest.

American Antiquity 51:73-88. Smith, c., 1976, Regional Analysis in Archaeology, Vols. 1 and 2. Academic Press, New York. Spicer, E., 1962, Cycles of Conquest: The Impact of Spain, Mexico, and the United States on the Indians

of the Southwest. University of Arizona Press, Tucson. Stuart, D., and R Gauthier, 1982, Prehistoric New Mexico. Historic Preservation Bureau, Santa Fe. Sudar-Laumbach, T., 1982, Analysis and Commentary on a Ceramic Sample from the Bruton

Bead Site. In The Arma Project: 407 Miles of Archaeological Transect Sampling in the Basins of Southern New Mexico (ed. J. Hilley). Volume 2, Appendix A and B. Cultural Resources Management Division Report 475. New Mexico State University, Las Cruces.

Thomas, D., 1972, Western Shoshone Ecology: Settlement Patterns and Beyond. In Great Basin Cultural Ecology: A Symposium (ed. D. Fowler). Desert Research Institute Publications in the Social Sciences 8, Reno, pp. 135-153.

Upham, S., 1982, Polities and Power: An Economic and Political History of the Western Pueblo. Academic Press, New York.

Upham, S., 1984, Adaptive Diversity and Southwestern Abandonment. Journal of Anthropological Research 40:235-256.

Upham, S., 1986, Imperialists, Isolationists, World Systems, and Political Realities: Perspectives on Mesoamerican-Southwestern Interaction. In Ripples in the Chichimec Sea (ed. F. Mathien and R McGuire). Southern lllinois University Press, Carbondale, pp. 205-219.

Upham, S., 1988, Archaeological Visibility and the Underc1ass of Southwestern Prehistory. American Antiquity 53:245-261.

Upham, S., R. MacNeish, W. Galinat, and C. Stevenson, 1987, Evidence Concerning the Origin of Maiz de Ocho. American Anthropologist 89:410-419.

Wallerstein, I., 1974, The Modern World-System: Vol. 1. Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World Economy in the Sixteenth Century. Academic Press, New York.

Wallerstein, I., 1979, The Capitalist World Economy. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Weigand, P., 1982, Mining and the Mineral Trade in Prehistoric Zacatecas. In Mining and Mining

Techniques in Ancient Mesoamerica. (ed. P. Weigand and C. Gwynne). Anthropology 6:87-134. Weigand, P., G. Harbottle, and E. Sayre, 1977, Turquoise Sources and Source Analysis: Meso

america and the Southwestern U.S.A. In Exchange Systems in Prehistory (ed. T. Earle and J. Ericson). Academic Press, New York, pp. 15-34.

Whitecotton, J., and R Pailes, 1979, Mesoamerica as an Historical Unit: A World System Model. Paper presented at the 40th International Congress of Americanists, Vancouver.

Whitecotton, J., and Pailes, 1986, New World Precolumbian World Systems. In Ripples in the Chichimec Sea (ed. F. Mathien and R McGuire). Southern lllinois University Press, Carbondale, pp. 183-204.

Wiseman, R, 1986, An Initial Study of the Origins of Chupadero Black-on-White. Technical Note 2. Albuquerque Archaeological Society, Albuquerque.

Wolf, E., 1982, Europe and the People Without History. University of California Press, Berkeley.

Part III

The Political Value of Imports

The world-systems perspective discussed earlier focuses on inequalities among regions as a dynamic factor driving sociopolitical change. Interregional economic exploitation is a primary causal variable within this framework. The chapters that follow represent a developing perspective that complements world-systems views. Variably called "wealth finance" (e.g., Brumfiel and Earle 1987), "prestige good" (e.g., Friedman and Rowlands 1978:224-232), and "prestige good ranking" (Shennan 1982) theory, we have grouped these schemes into a single framework and used Helms's apt term (Chapter 7, this volume), "political ideology," to refer to them. The focus here is on how elite participation in interregional exchange networks translates into regional power. How do the local scions involved in these transactions use the exotics they acquire to establish and maintain positions of power and prestige within their particular societies?

The basic premises of this approach may be summarized as follows. In order to establish sociopolitical preeminence, developing elites must find ways to extract surpluses and services from their followers while maintaining the simulacrum of reciprocal relations among different social levels (Ekholm 1978:128-130; Renfrew 1982:269,286,289). Followers must also be made dependent on their leaders to ensure compliance with elite requests. The solution is for notables to monopolize locally rare prestige items which are passed down the hierarchy in "exchange" for generally available subsistence goods and services. These social valuables figure prominently in processes of social reproduction as essential payments in life crisis rites (e.g., bridewealth) and! or as status markers whose display legitimizes the rights of lesser elites to receive support from their clients (Ekholm 1978; D' Altroy and Earle 1985:203; Strathern 1971:196,225). These social goods maintain their value and are monopolizable because they are: locally rare, acquired through interelite exchanges require considerable skilled labor to manufacture; and! or are protected by sumptuary laws (Brumfiel 1987:114; Friedman 1982:183-184). The first two criteria are frequently invoked in the identification of prehistoric prestige items. The regular removal of social valuables from circulation through burial with their owners also serves to maintain their scarcity and value (e.g., Dupre and Rey 1973:149-150). The social segment which monopolizes the acquisition and! or manufacture of these socially critical resources also monopolizes political power. The rest of the population is dependent on it for those goods which define and create social status.

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Prestige good systems emphasize vertical ties of dependence. Recipients of elite largesse have a vested interest in preserving the status quo and compete with each other for favors from the paramount. Horizontal ties conducive to revolt and usurpation are discouraged (BrumfieI1987:114; D' Altroy and Earle 1985:196). The stability of these systems is debated (Friedman 1982; Gilman 1987). Their continued functioning, however, depends on the ability of local scions to effectively monopolize prestige good production, distribution, and acquisition (Brumfiel and Earle 1987; Friedman and Rowlands 1978:224-232). Given the political power inherent in social valuables, obtaining them outside established hierarchical channels opens the way for increased competitions for power and political fragmentation (Ekholm 1978:131; Friedman 1982; Kipp and Schortman 1989; Strathern 1971:227).

Prestige good systems are also dynamic. Aspiring leaders initially compete among themselves for control over social valuables with which to "capture" adherents. The more successful notables exploit their supporters for exchangeable surpluses which can be used to obtain larger quantities of exotics and so snare additional clients. The more prestige goods these scions control, the more dependents they can attract, and so the cycle continues until some limit, such as the ability of supporters to continue generating surpluses, is reached (Kristiansen 1979; Schortman and Urban 1987). Polities expand in this manner incorporating their less successful neighbors (e.g., Ekholm 1972, 1978).

Political ideology draws considerable inspiration from ethnographic studies of "Big Man" societies (e.g., Keesing 1983; Strathern 1971). Its theoretical roots, like those of world-systems theory, lie in Marxist thought, especially French Marxism (e.g., Meillasoux 1960; Dupre and Rey 1973). Marxist influences are especially evident in the (1) emphasis on the exploitive nature of intrasocietal relations; (2) the concern for social reproduction despite inequities in power and wealth; and (3) the tendency to attribute causal primacy to the sociopolitical organization of production. Political ideology translates the concepts of exploitation and competition so obvious on an interregional scale in world-systems theory to the regional level.

The symbolic character of inter- and intraregional exchanges is a crucial interest within political ideology. Imports are only significant if they are perceived as precious by those who will receive them. Understanding the roles of exotics in systems of nonverbal communication that convey information about power are central to formulations in this framework (e.g., Hodder 1982). The reconstruction of ancient value and symbolic structures is, therefore, essential to carrying out research in political ideology. This distinguishes the present framework somewhat from world-systems theory where there is a tendency to stress the economic significance of interregional exchanges at the expense of their symbolic meaning (e.g., Wallerstein 1974:20-21, 41-42). Those efforts noted earlier to incorporate preciosity transactions into the world-systems scheme mark a convergence with the tenets of political ideology (e.g., Blanton and Feinman 1984; Ekholm and Friedman 1979; Schneider 1977, see also Feinman and Nicholas, Chapter 4, and Whitecotton, Chapter 3, this volume).

An important assumption of this framework, distinguishing it from cultural ecology, is the political importance attributed to the acquisition, production, and distribution of "luxury" goods. Traditionally, cultural ecologists have stressed that elite power rests on control over local basic resources, such as land and water (e.g., Webster 1990). Those espousing political ideology do not deny the importance of this relationship for the development and maintenance of sociopolitical hierarchies. Rath-

POLITICAL VALUE OF IMPORTS 155

er, they see this control as directly proportional to an individual's ability to display and disperse prestige items. Access to and control over local resources is mediated through the manipulation of "luxuries."

Major questions which researchers are addressing within political ideology include: What factors underlie the political significance attributed to imports? Under what conditions to exotics assume political importance, and when are they primarily of economic concern? These queries are addressed in Chapter 7 by Helms and in Chapter 8 by Wells. The former takes a broad, comparative perspective in order to establish the relationship between extraregional contacts and local political power. Helms helped pioneer this approach (e.g., 1979, 1988). Her examination of ethnographic and ethnohistoric cases from around the world to determine patterns of interregional contact has done much to enhance our understanding of the political significance non-Western peoples attribute to such ties. Wells, in turn, provides a more detailed consideration of the interaction conditions which affect the political value of imports. This marks a continuation of his earlier work in Bronze and Iron Age Europe (e.g., Wells 1980, 1984, 1988). Throughout these investigations, he has consistently drawn attention to the SOciopolitical consequences for northern and central European societies of contacts with polities within the Mediterranean Basin. He has particularly emphasized the manner in which European chieftains used control over Mediterranean luxuries to centralize and expand their power. Both authors have been concerned with the crucial relations among value, political hierarchy, exploitation, and interregional interaction which are hallmarks of the political ideological approach. Their research here reflects and amplifies those concerns.

REFERENCES

Blanton, R, and G. Feinman, 1984, The Mesoamerican World System. American Anthropologist 86:673-682.

Brumfiel, E., 1987, Elite and Utilitarian Crafts in the Aztec State. In Specialization, Exchange, and Complex Societies (ed. E. Brumfiel and T. Earle). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 102-118.

Brumfiel, E., and T. Earle, 1987, Specialization, Exchange, and Complex Societies. In Specialization, Exchange, and Complex Societies (ed. E. Brumfiel and T. Earle). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 1-9.

D' Altroy, T., and T. Earle, 1985, Staple Finance, Wealth Finance, and Staple Storage in the Inka Political Economy. Current Anthropology 26:187-206.

Dupre, G., and P. Rey, 1973, Reflections on the Pertinence of a Theory of the History of Exchange. Economy and Society 2:131-163.

Ekholm, K, 1972, Power and Prestige: The Rise and Fall of the Kongo Kingdom. SKRIV Service AB, Uppsala.

Ekholm, K, 1978, External Change and the Transformation of Central African Social Systems. In The Evolution of Social Systems (ed. J. Friedman and M. Rowlands). University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, pp. 115-136.

Ekholm, K, and J. Friedman, 1979, "Capital" Imperialism and Exploitation in Ancient World Systems. In Power and Propaganda: A Symposium on Ancient Empires (ed. M. Larsen). Akademisk Forlag, Copenhagen, pp. 41-58.

Friedman, J., 1982, Catastrophe and Continuity in Social Evolution. In Theory and Explanation in Archaeology: The Southampton Conference (ed. C. Renfrew, M. Rowlands, and B. Segraves). Academic Press, New York, pp. 175-196.

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Friedman, J., and M. Rowlands, 1978, Notes Towards an Epigenetic Model of the Evolution of Civilization. In The Evolution of Social Systems (ed. J. Friedman and M. Rowlands). University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, pp. 201-276.

Gilman, A., 1987, Unequal Development in Copper Age Iberia. In Specialization, Exchange, and Complex Societies (ed. E. Brumfiel and T. Earle). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 22-29.

Helms, M., 1979, Ancient Panama. University of Texas Press, Austin. Helms, M., 1988, Ulysses' Sail: An Ethnographic Odyssey of Power, Knowledge, and Geographical

Distance. Princeton University Press, Princeton. Hodder, I. (ed.), 1982, Symbolic and Structural Archaeology. Cambridge University Press, Cam

bridge. Keesing, R., 1983, Elota's Story: The Life and Times of a Solomon Islands Big Man. Holt, Rinehart &

Winston, New York. Kipp, R., and E. Schortman, 1989, The Political Impact of Trade on Chiefdoms. American

Anthropologist 91:370-385. Kristiansen, K, 1979, The Consumption of Wealth in Bronze Age Denmark. A Study in the

Dynamics of Economic Processes in Tribal Societies. In New Directions in Scandinavian Archaeology (ed. K. Kristiansen and C. Paluden-Muller). National Museum of Denmark, Copenhagen, pp. 158-190.

Meillasoux, c., 1960, Essai d'Interpretation des Phenomenes Economiques dans les Societes Traditionelles d' Autosubsistence. Cahiers d'Etudes Africaines 4.

Renfrew, c., 1982, Polity and Power: Interaction, Intensification, and Exploitation. In An Island Polity: The Archaeology of Exploitation in Melos (ed. C. Renfrew and M. Wagstaff). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 264-290.

Schneider, J., 1977, Was There a Pre-capitalist World System? Peasant Studies 6:20-29. Schortman, E., and P. Urban, 1987, Modeling Interregional Interaction in Prehistory. In Advances

in Archaeological Method and Theory. Vol. 11 (ed. M. Schiffer). Academic Press, Orlando, pp. 37-95.

Shennan, S., 1982, Exchange and Ranking: The Role of Amber in the Early Bronze Age of Europe. In Ranking, Resource, and Exchange (ed. C. Renfrew and S. Shennan). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 33-45.

Strathern, A., 1971, The Rope of Moka. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Wallerstein, I., 1974, The Modern World-System, Vol. 1. Academic Press, New York. Webster, G., 1990, Labor Control and Emergent Stratification in Prehistoric Europe. Current

Anthropology 31:337-366. Wells, P., 1980, Culture Contact and Culture Change: Early Iron Age Central Europe and the Medi

terranean World. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Wells, P., 1984, Farms, Villages, and Cities: Commerce and Urban Origins in Late Prehistoric Europe.

Cornell University Press, Ithaca. Wells, P., 1988, Industry and Society in Late Prehistoric Europe. In Tribe and Polity in Late

Prehistoric Europe (ed. O. Gibson and M. Geselowitz). Plenum Press, New York, pp. 207-218.

Chapter 7

Long-Distance Contacts, Elite Aspirations, and

the Age of Discovery in Cosmological Context

MARY W. HELMS

INTRODUCTION

It is readily apparent that in traditional societies interregional interactions are complex activities that can be undertaken for many reasons by various types of actors and may occur in a variety of formats or structural relationships, ranging from mutual give-and-take to distinctly one-sided associations. The investigation of these phenomena can also proceed along diverse lines. A number of scholars have placed interregional interactions within frameworks of political economy, considering the exchange or acquisition of valuable material resources as an important motive for interregional or long-distance contacts and assessing the usefulness of such acquisitions in the political careers of local and regional elites. I have no quarrel with this perspective, but I believe we can add another major dimension to our understanding of the nature and significance of long-distance or interregional contacts by considering these interactions within a framework of political ideology. In this chapter I wish to broaden emphasis beyond resource acquisition per se to consider both the "mean-

MARY W. HELMS • Department of Anthropology, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, North Carolina 27412.


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158 MARY W. HELMS

ing" of the distant domains from which such goods are obtained and the" meaning" of the activities involved in contacting such domains.

Since the focus of this volume is on the relationships among resource control, power, and intersocietal contacts in situations of cultural change and adaptation, I shall also consider the significance of distant contacts for political elites or "men of influence" in traditional societies. After suggesting some ground rules for understanding the position of traditional elites in long-distance or interregional activities, I shall attempt to illustrate these points by applying them to the most extensive case of long-distance contact on record, that between Europeans and native peoples worldwide. In so doing, it will also be necessary to briefly review medieval and renaissance European attitudes toward geographical distance and the things and beings found there. In general, I shall suggest that we may usefully approach the study of interregional interaction or long-distance contacts as conjunctions between cosmographical systems in which attitudes about the structure and functioning of the cosmos or universe have a significant effect on the nature and meaning of such interactions.

TRADITIONAL CONCEPTS OF GEOGRAPHICAL DISTANCE

To begin, I believe we should become more cognizant of the qualities attributed to geographical distance by members of traditional societies. As Durkheim (1915) pointed out long ago, for human beings dimensions of geographical space and distance are not neutral categories, but are charged with symbolic connotations:

Space is not the vague and undetermined medium which Kant imagined; if purely and absolutely homogeneous, it would be of no use, and could not be grasped by the mind. Spatial representation consists essentially in a primary co-ordination of the data of sensuous experience: But this co-ordination would be impossible if the parts of space were qualitatively equivalent and if they were really interchangeable. To dispose things spatially there must be a possibility of placing them differently, of putting some at the right, others at the left, these above, those below, at the north of or at the south of, east or west, etc., etc., just as to dispose of states of consciousness temporally there must be a possibility of localizing them at determined dates. This is to say that space could not be what it is if it were not, like time, divided and differentiated ... all these distinctions evidently come from the fact that different sympathetic values have been attributed to various regions. (Durkheim 1915:11; emphasis added)

Not only is space divided and differentiated according to "different sympathetic values," but the particular nature or content of these values may be quite variable, depending on cultural context. In general, however, in traditional societies, space is rarely considered to be as "vast," as infinite, or as seemingly neutral as we may believe our concepts of the cosmos to be. Space as an aspect of traditional worlds instead is finite in extent, and is cosmologically defined or charged with diverse powers and values that accord mundane familiarity to some locales and foreign exoticism to others. In such settings, the differential significance attributed to various places also give definite meaning to actions, peoples, and things associated with these places. Thus, considering the" meaning" of geographical distance, we find that ethnographic and ethnohistoric data from all types of cultures clearly indicate that geo-

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graphical distance carries cosmological connotations that correlate geographical distance with supernatural distance.

More specifically, the farther one moves away from the center of settled life, from the known, safe, socially ordered, civilized heartland, the more one encounters territories and peoples that are defined as markedly contrastive in qualities and/ or behaviors with the heartland and its inhabitants. The contrast can emphasize characteristics that are regarded as more inhuman or nonhuman; that is, distant peoples may be more" savage" or less intelligent or less culturally evolved. Alternatively, the contrast can emphasize qualities of the superhuman, whereby foreigners are granted greater intelligence and wisdom or stronger shamanistic powers. The contrast also frequently carries a temporal dimension, such that distant lands may be associated with ancestral or cosmic origins, or with still "uncivilized" or unsettled or "uncultured" forms of existence where the blessings of ancestors or culture heroes have not yet been felt.

In all cases, distant geographical or "horizontal" domains are likely to be regarded as closer to, or more influenced by, or more imbued with extraordinary or supernatural powers or mystiques in a manner closely paralleling the attribution of exceptional powers to those distant domains located on "vertical" axes that identify levels of underworlds below or of heavens above the earth's surface. Indeed, in many traditional cosmologies, the vertical axis of intangible spiritual realms joins or at least touches the horizontal axis of geographically distant realms at the horizon, where ancestral spirits or ghosts of the dead or of legendary rulers are believed to affect contact between the horizontal and vertical spheres. In other words, geographically distant lands may be perceived as part of the extraordinary, supernaturally powerful "other" realm that surrounds the social or political heartland in all directions vertically and horizontally (by way of example, see Hugh-Jones 1979:267-271; Middleton 1960:236-237).

It follows logically from this line of argument that contacts with geographically distant regions should be regarded as ideologically exceptional activities, and those who can conduct such contacts should be regarded as exceptional persons by virtue of these endeavors. Indeed, I would argue that, anthropologically speaking, we should consider long-distance travelers or contact agents as political-religious specialists, and include them in the company of shamans, priests, and priestly chiefs and kings as political-ideological experts or "heroes" who contact cosmically distant realms and obtain politically and ideologically useful materials therefrom. The ethnographic record seems to support this view, for not infrequently long-distance travelers are also shamans (Hamer 1973:119-121; Taussig 1980b:235-240), or prestigeful initiated men (McCarthy 1939:83,409; Morphy 1978:209), or chiefs or chiefly heirs (de Laguna 1972:356-357, 465-466; Scholes and Roys 1968:4; Southall 1953:194), or kings or future kings (Adamu 1978:69-70), or their sons or brothers (Roys 1972:51, 59,116; Wilks 1966:326-327), or agents substituting for such elites.

To be sure, there are significant differences in experiences with horizontal (geographical) and vertical axes of "distance" (see Helms n.d.). Perhaps the most obvious is the likelihood that, in contrast to contacts with more intangible spiritual realms and the disembodied beings associated there, contacts with geographically distant realms can more readily be given overt and tangible expression or "proof" in the form of exotic, power-filled material goods acquired from far away or in elaborate hospitality accorded foreigners who derive from far away, or in learned conversations held

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(often in ostentatious secrecy) between local lords and visiting diplomats or other influential "learned strangers."

Yet there are also significant similarities between vertically and horizontally distant realms, for experiences with either domain can imbue influential persons with esoteric knowledge of the nature of the cosmos and thereby accord them greater personal aura, or distinction, or even sanctity. Which is to say, prestige can be obtained either by communing with ancestral spirits or powerful deities in the privacy of the temple enclosure or by communing with recently arrived diplomats from a distant polity in the privacy of the chiefly house; by ritually traveling to distant levels of the heavens by trance, or by traveling, also with ritual precautions (Hill 1948; Van Gennep 1960:28-38), to distant lands toward the horizon by foot or horse or sailing vessel. Such prestige can be acquired either by diligent study of traditional lore, ceremonies, myths, and rituals of one's own society or by diligently seeking knowledge of the lore and ritual of foreign societies by a period of residence with foreign tribes or by study of the written wisdom of foreign traditions (Adamu 1978:69; de Laguna 1972; Goody 1968; Southall 1979:217-219). All these activities are of essentially the same order and can be used directly to increase political power and influence within the home society and to legitimize positions of political~ideological power and authority.

In addition, the experience of travel to geographically distant places and the full significance of the adventures and knowledge acquired thereby, or full appreciation of association with visiting foreigners, like personal contact with intangible supernatural powers, simply cannot be fully and adequately conveyed to ordinary persons who stay at home. The sense of esotericism associated with such travel and such contacts is measurably enhanced by this difficulty of communication (d. Burridge 1969:158). Incompleteness of communication, in tum, serves to still further enhance social-political-ideological" distance" between those cogniscent of foreign affairs and those who are not so informed.

MEN OF INFLUENCE AND GEOGRAPHICAL DISTANCE

The need to stand above or apart from the general populace, either on special occasions or in a permanent capacity, is part and parcel of the meaning of political influence and leadership, as is the need to associate oneself with supernatural powers and" distances." Hence, men of influence and political elites are particularly likely to be involved with geographically distant domains, long-distance travel, and foreigners, just as they are particularly likely to be involved in dealings with less tangible supernatural realms and beings.

This involvement may be effected by either direct or indirect association or interaction. One commonly encountered tactic is for politically influential persons, or persons hopeful of becoming politically influential, to attempt to bolster their intrasocietal influence by external contacts with outsiders believed to be mystically or magically powerful, even dangerous (Woodburn 1979:244-266). Alternatively, persons of foreign origins, deriving from outside their current place of residence, may be thought to have special powers by virtue of their identification with dangerous, powerful distant places and, as a consequence, be accorded important politicalreligious offices (Thornton 1980:27,74,210,215). Similarly, persons who seek foreign


experience in their areas of mystical expertise, as many shamans and diviners do, may be believed to acquire greater powers and abilities than those who do not (EvansPritchard 1956:99-104; Lienhardt 1961:163-165).

The belief that superior magical or mystical power or sanctioning can be derived from lands and peoples outside the home society can also be used to legitimize the origins of ruling houses. Myths, traditions, and, in some cases, historical realities may associate ruling chiefs and chiefly lines with the arrival of foreigners who became lineage founders or were recognized as knowledgeable and skilled culture heroes who introduced new and useful skills and then married local princesses to found ruling lines (Lewis 1966:36; Wilson 1958:21-22, 34). In a comparable manner, noble descent groups claiming nonlocal origin may assert seniority or greater sanctity over local descent groups, and rulership by a member of an outside group may be sought because of the greater efficacy associated with foreign ritual knowledge (Kottak 1980:64-65; Southall 1953:13,94-95, 147, 218-219).

Alternatively, local rulers may employ as learned advisers and diviners "wise strangers" from afar (frequently scholar-traders) whose wisdom reflects the greater authority and prestige associated with distance and foreign learning. When such foreign advisers represent a more powerful, more complex, or more prestigeful political or ideological realm, local rulers may seek legitimation of their position through rites of investiture and adoption of personal and ceremonial regalia derived from the distant center; they may even accept foreign ideologies and models of government and make pilgrimages to the distant center itself (Adamu 1978:60-61, 75; Hunwick 1966:307; Stancliffe 1983; Trimingham 1959:85, 87, 139, 144; Wheatley 1975:238-240,242). Such activities again cannot help but further emphasize separation and contrast between ruling elites and commoners and emphasize the association of elites with powers and places above and beyond the here and now.

Even when political leadership is firmly rooted in native origins and legitimized by traditional ideology, political-religious specialists may seek association with geographically foreign phenomena to augment their status and express qualities of leadership. Evidence of the capacity to cope ably with foreigners and their powers can be a measure of the power and capability of a leader and may be actively sought as a vehicle to evidence such abilities. Both actual travel to foreign places and the ability to organize successful caravans may become important indicators of chiefship (Alpers 1969:406-411). Political leaders may compete energetically in such activities, not only for the material goods that may be acquired but also for the opportunities to actively evidence leadership abilities, provide tangible proof of foreign contacts, and expand the spatial extent of one's name and personal fame, thereby enhancing personal prestige and authority at home (Brunton 1975:549,553-555; Scoditti 1983:272). Even rulers who prefer to stay at home can achieve these goals through lavish generosity and hospitality to those who visit their capitals (Chaffetz 1981:158; Wilks 1966:326-327).

Generally speaking, in traditional societies, political-religious specialists are acquainted with power and with distance, geographically as well as supernaturally defined. Their intellectual and experiential horizons extend beyond those of ordinary folk. They may travel farther, perhaps with greater safety. Their fame and reputations are more widely flung. Their knowledge of the customs, languages, and religions of outsiders is more complete. Their chiefly compounds and royal courts receive both strangers and official visitors whose news and stories contribute to the repertoire of

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knowledge of afar, even as their gifts and tribute add to the wealth of foreign goods on hand. Their messengers and agents may venture into distant lands while learned priestly scholars and travelers with foreign skills, and therefore greater wisdom, offer them advice and revelatory insights into cosmic mysteries. For such men of influence, the ultimate goal of these outside contacts and associations is greater understanding ot and greater power and greater control over, the fateful mysteries of the universe. Such understanding, power, and control will support, legitimize, and enhance special statuses at home by attesting to the greater wisdom, sanctity, and esoteric knowledge that attends those who become familiar with the unfamiliar.

In traditional cosmologies and political ideolOgies, the powers of the universe are expressed in many dimensions and forms, and can be approached through many dimensions and forms. The ethnographic evidence relating rulership to geographically foreign phenomena attests to the symbolic significance that such phenomena hold for political-religious speCialists as much as to the secular or material significance that may accrue. The virtue attached to geographical foreignness from the point of view of political-religious specialists is predicted on the fact that foreignness or distance is by no means a neutral concept but correlates strongly with expressions of universal sacrality and energy, knowledge of which can be a valued part of the total package of knowledge that political-religious specialists seek to acquire. Long-distance contacts or interregional interactions, therefore, might be understood as Simultaneously occurring independent efforts by elites of various polities to actively explore the geographically distant frontiers of their respective cosmographies in activities oriented not only toward mutual material exchange but also toward the inclusion of the supernatural powers of those frontiers into their respective sacred heartlands (d. Sahlins 1981:38).

It is important to remember, however, that knowledge of geographically distant peoples and places is only one of a number of possible sources of exceptional political-ideological power and esoteric knowledge. (It is noteworthy, too, that in light of the various "dangers" associated with geographical distance and with foreigners, some political-religious leaders chose not to be geographical long-distance experts; e.g. Ford 1972:44; Rigby 1966:280-281). In addition, the means and extent to which even this particular "fund of power" will be tapped by political-religious specialists may be expected to vary considerably cross-culturally. Even among elites of a given society, interest in what lies beyond the geographical horizon may be expected to differ individually, even as shamanic expertise is known to vary greatly according to personality, individual skills, and other attributes. Individuals may show a considerable range of skills or of interest in dealing with foreigners, in adaptability to dangerous travel, or to living conditions in a distant place, in ability to learn foreign languages, or even just in general curiosity.

Similarly, it is difficult to know whether long-distance associations increase proportionately according to increases in cultural complexity, for example, whether the organizationally more complex society entrusts a relatively greater proportion of its centralized political-religious legitimacy to visible long-distance contacts than does the organizationally simpler society, or whether, in fact, the reverse might be true. It is particularly difficult to compare scope and scale or relative impact of distant associations cross-culturally, given the effects of European and other industrial societies on simpler forms of traditional society, for long-distance contacts and activities may well have been among the earliest casualties of the European expansion in many


tribal areas of the world, and, therefore, have gone unrecorded in the general ethnographic literature. On the other hand, European contacts may also provide excellent data on native concepts regarding distant peoples and places, whereas consideration of European views of geographically distant lands and peoples can further illuminate some of the problems we encounter in our concern with the perennial question of the most far-reaching case of long-distance contact on record, that between traditional peoples and Europeans.

NATIVE VIEWS OF EUROPEANS

Briefly stated, when members of traditional societies first encountered Europeans, they accorded them the only designations that could be applied to heretofore unknown strangers from far away: they had to be ogres or demons or spirits or ancestors because such were the types of animate beings "inhabiting" distant space. In most cases, it was not long before the (in)humanness of the newcomers asserted itself, all too often in most disturbing and disastrous ways. But descriptions of initial nativeEuropean contacts not only provide excellent ethnographic data relevant to traditional perceptions of people and things from afar, but also show how those perceptions of people and things from afar were applied to Europeans.

In assessing the general interpretations most frequently imparted to Europeans by native hosts on their first acquaintance, we find that Europeans almost invariably appeared as manifestations of some aspect of the unregulated "power outside" suddenly and often inexplicably made manifest and become intrusive into regulated society. Thus, Europeans were sometimes interpreted as spirits or ghosts of the dead who were returning in reincarnated form (e.g., Evans and Walker 1977:39-42; Heizer 1947) or as returned chiefly ancestors from lands of the dead behind the horizon (e.g., Williamson 1933:90-91). Sometimes they were associated with godship or cultureheroes or at least attributed great honor as exceptional beings by virtue of association with sacred realms or the prognostication of traditional myth-histories (e.g., association of Spaniards with the return of Quetza1coatl in Mesoamerica or of Viracocha in the Andes; of Captain Cook with the Hawaiian god, Lono; see Gillespie 1989:226-230). Sometimes Europeans were associated with temporally (mythically) ancient beings and socially (and territorially) distant nonhumans in less complimentary fashion, as creatures from distant uncivilized realms (which were representative of early stages of human evolution) who were as yet devoid of decent social constraints, were strange in appearance, and savage in behavior (e.g., Gossen 1974:18-30, 233, 236; Middleton 1960:234-235).

Alternatively, as exceptional, even superhuman beings from places of power, Europeans could be viewed as latter-day culture heroes, accorded heroic and magical qualities of courage, wisdom, wealth, and knowledge, and, as powerful "wise strangers," approached for new material benefits and advice (e.g., Lawrence 1964:64-68; Middleton 1960:235). As Monica Wilson phrased it,

[Traditional wise strangers] brought fire to people who ate their food raw; iron to those who used wooden hoes; cattle to cultivators; the institution of chieftainship to those who lived unorganized, in scattered villages. . .. The whites brought cloth, literacy, medicines, the gospel. (1977:178, 167)

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Sometimes, in their capacity as "wise strangers," Europeans themselves became local chiefs in much the same manner described by traditional accounts of a foreign hunter or curer marrying the daughter of a local chief and founding a dynasty, or as a result of association with local chiefs in the capacity of powerful and knowledgeable men from afar:

Sometimes they were credited with supernatural power, particularly control over rain. Often, they formed an alliance with an existing chief, giving aid in war, acting as an advisor, providing "medicines," and cementing the friendship by marrying a daughter of the chief. (Wilson 1958:59; see also Wilson 1979:53, 57-58).

It is by now a truism that, in the mix of reactions to the coming of the Europeans, among the attractions of these newcomers were their exceptional technical skills and the products produced thereby. The material benefits of contact can hardly be denied, but to be properly appreciated, it is useful to bear in mind that in traditional societies, exceptional crafting skills and certain types of material goods, particularly unusual or foreign ones, were believed to reflect exceptional personal powers, powers that could only be derived from a special relationship with the spiritual world; powers that attested to unusual personal aura or mana. This same capacity for exceptional skill, revealing the same abundance of exceptional power, underlay talents not only in material craftsmanship but also in the less tangible fields of music, curing, literacy, and divination. In this sense, not only the superior weapons of the Europeans and their access to seemingly unlimited trade goods but also their teaching of the arts, their medical skills, their instruction in the literacy needed to read the Bible, and so forth, attested to the same superabundance of powers and related intellect with which Europeans were believed endowed. Exceptional skills and derivation from distant places combined in many cases to identify Europeans as power-filled beings with control over life, death, and the riches of the earth. Lienhardt expressed the matter succinctly:

Juok is usually said to be the supreme being of the Shilluk, to be spirit. . .. What the Shilluk cannot otherwise account for, they account for by this concept. So, for example, the creation of the world and of life is the work of juok and he may also be an explanation of sickness and death. The presence and pawers of the foreigners are explained with reference to juok, for those who are specially gifted are supposed to be so by virtue or the stronger flow, in them, of the being which created and animates the universe. (1954:156, emphasis added)

Similarly, in Southall's words:

Though the Europeans were usually at first so few in numbers, their miraculous firearms, their lavish personal supply of clothes, their elaborate domestic equipment even under camping conditions, the technical wonder and variety of even their trivial trade goods, and the unlimited wealth suggested by their supplies of cotton cloth, all gave the quality of a unique marvel to their first appearance among any African people. To the latter the newcomers appeared to have a complete mastery over the material world, and a degree of control over life and death through their medicines and their firearms, which was genuinely terrifying. Even after the first shock had worn off, the indelible impression of a master of fantastic forces of unknown extent remained. This induced many African peoples to submit to the establishment of European administration with little opposition. (1953:230)


Since it is the rightful duty of political-religious specialists in traditional societies to comprehend and then to come to terms with or "control" the powers of the universe as they are variously expressed, so it is reasonable to find native elites interested in trying not only to understand the nature of Europeans' power but also to utilize such powers both in fulfillment of their expected duties and as a source of supernatural support for their statuses and offices. Generally speaking, traditional political specialists were interested in how Europeans derived their power over people and their power over things (d. Reay 1967:203). It is easy to lose sight of this point in the emphasis accorded by native elites, European travelers and colonists, and current anthropological and historical scholarship to the native desire for European material goods, but it is important to recognize that traditional elites had an equally pressing desire for access to European esoteric knowledge. It was an equally compelling interest in turning this new knowledge to useful political-religious gain that prompted elites in particular to associate with white foreigners and to try to masterand openly express--this new association in order to add a new power source to their political-religious basis of operation.

Thus we find equal emphasis by native elites in mastering both the use of guns and the esoteric knowledge contained in the Bible and made manifest in the strange art of writing. We find native leaders eagerly adopting European names, costumes, cooking techniques, table furnishings and table manners, housestyles, musical skills, dances, and titles of rank. We find native lords seeking confirmation of governing titles by European installation rites, and seeking association with foreign, European power by offering hospitality (at least initially) to these wise strangers and by travelling themselves (or sending agents) to the distant sources of Europeans' power (e.g., Olien 1983:203). In this context, first-hand experience with European countries and especially with European heads of state or their representatives can be seen as directly comparable to a first-hand visit with a higher level axis mundi. Which is to say, native chiefs' trips to Washington or to England or to other European centers can be considered comparable to trips taken by Islamized West African chiefs to Mecca, by Christianized North European early medieval kings to Rome, or by the rulers (or their envoys) of frontier Asiatic tribes to the Imperial Court of traditional China.

It is likely, too, that a similar quest for esoteric knowledge provided at least one motive for the not infrequent requests (or at least agreements) by native elites to have their children educated by Europeans (e.g., Ruby and Brown 1975:170; Southall 1979:214-217,223); a practice which again has parallels in precontact traditions regarding the value and practical necessity of foreign education and foreign contacts.

It is impossible to really know what thoughts passed through the minds of native princes visiting the court of Charles I or seeing the sights (and meeting high officials) in Washington, D.C., or voluntarily or involuntarily, accompanying explorers and missionaries back to Europe as curiosities themselves. In some senses, the experience must have been unique, and yet must have been placed within already existing contexts of geography and cosmography. Similarly, those who made such trips (and survived them; d. Foreman 1943) must have become "exceptional" individuals, for better or for worse, in their home societies, and, indeed, we know that such often was the case. It is not accidental that the initial instigators ("prophets") of various cargo cult movements in Melanesia and Polynesia often were individuals with wider travel experience and knowledge of the white man's world, some of whom even traveled

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in European ships to distant European settlements (e.g., to Sydney, Australia, sometimes associated with Heaven; d. Burridge 1969:22, 50, 52, 72, 156-157; Lawrence 1964:77).

In brief, the interest shown by native political-religious specialists in identifying with the powers of white foreigners was very similar to the interest shown by such specialists in associating with esoteric representatives of traditional foreign political and ideological worlds. Particularly in the early days of European contact, when the colonizer first appeared as a stranger, as a guest, and not yet an enemy (d. Mannoni 1964:86), the esoteric knowledge, learned skills and crafts, and ideological efficacy offered or at least represented by explorers, missionaries, and colonial administrators opened another realm of outside forces to local power seekers; a realm that sometimes offered new examples of exceptional power (guns, literacy for societies where writing was unknown, blacksmithing for people where forged tools were new, etc.) but which was readily accommodated, at least in theory, within the cosmological framework that associated things and events of the geographically (and supernaturally) distant world with exceptional powers of the universe. The advent of Europeans wa.s often a shock and tremendous surprise, but, at least initially, the newcomers were placed rather easily within existing cosmological frameworks with interpretations that attest to native understandings of the nature of things from afar.

Ultimately, the fundamental difficulty underlying European-native relationships was simply that most Europeans were unaware of the roles they played and the places they were assigned in native cosmologies and cosmographies. "They were not to know that their position of dominance was due to the fact that in the network of dependencies they occupied roughly the same position as the dead ancestors" (Mannoni 1964:87). Consequently, Europeans generally failed to act in ways that extraordinary beings with an abundance of universal mana should behave. They could not be "controlled" by the usual means by shamans, priests, and chiefs; they did not recognize the mutuality of expectations between themselves, as representatives of the forces of the cosmos, and local leaders and authorities as knowledgeable and prestigeful representatives of already" cultured" and" civilized" societies. They appeared more as destructive tyrants than as reciprocators. The disenchantment and frustrations that inevitably erupted in native societies did not so much reflect the dislike of native peoples for foreign men of power, but their confusion and resentment that these men of power did not behave appropriately. Exceptional power they could understand; misuse of such power, especially on such a scale, was a new and cosmologically upsetting phenomenon.

EUROPEAN VIEWS OF DISTANCE

Why did Europeans misuse and abuse their seemingly extraordinary powers and influence so drastically and become destructive tyrants rather than reciprocators? To some extent, of course, the answer lies in the simple truth that, as the mountain people in Kipling's insightful story of "The Man Who Would Be King" eventually discovered, Europeans were, in fact, "neither gods nor devils, but only men," and men anywhere are fallible. The answer also lies in the cultural milieu of these fallible Europeans, because traditional European cosmological concepts of the nature and significance of geographical distance influenced European interpretations and reac-


tions to the peripheries of their own oikoumene no less than traditional native cosmological concepts influenced native reactions to Europeans.

The medieval cosmography influencing Europeans of the Age of Discovery generally did not people the cosmographical frontiers with feared or revered ancestral spirits, but with strange and fantastic legendary creatures whose points of contrast with "normal" society ultimately lay more in the realm of the physically and! or morally deformed than in the realm of the deified. But, then again, not always so. Depending on the direction and the era, the cosmological periphery could lead to paradise as well as to wilderness, could exemplify great good as well as evidence great evil. Which is to say, considered overall, the symbolic significance of geographic distance for traditional Europe had much in common with that of the non-Western traditional world.

Briefly, the heartland of both the classical world (the Greek oikoumene or Roman habitation) and the European medieval world centered on the Mediterranean area. Bordering this heartland and its immediate hinterland (e.g., Roman Europe) were geographical zones considered far too hot or too cold for normal habitation. Encircling oceans, running north-south and east-west, bounded the heartland and limited the outside periphery. In medieval cosmography as portrayed, for example, on mappaemundi ("maps of the world"), Jerusalem stands as the central axis mundi and two rivers, the Don and the Nile, mark a north-south division, while the Mediterranean runs east-west.

The east, which stands at the top of these maps and is demarcated by the head of Christ and! or depictions of earthly paradise, is of primary symbolic importance. The east was long associated with fantastic wealth, natural wonders, and magic, and expressed conditions of symbolic extremes that contrasted with the controlled and civilized Christian heartland as the "abnormal" contrasts with the "normal." Thus, Asia, on the one hand, was believed inhabited by an assortment of inverted animals, monsters, and other anomalous beings (pygmies, giants, men with feet turned backward, etc.), and on the other, was the site of the terrestrial garden paradise, a place of human "origins" no longer available to mortals and located "beyond all known land" at the edge of the ocean where distant space correlated with distant (past) time. The east could also represent future time, for medieval tradition located Gog and Magog, the savage tribes whose apocalyptic emergence at the Last Day would bring world destruction, in Asia. To some medieval writers the east was a land abounding in gold and magical gems, to others it was a place of poisonous animals, pollution, and death. Sometimes these images of the powers of the distant east were combined, as when paradise is depicted as surrounded by a savage, trackless waste, infected with wild beasts and serpents (e.g., Kimble 1938:24-25, 3D, 184-187; Manuel and Manuel 1971; Penrose 1952:10-11; Phillips 1988).

Until the discovery of the New World, the west received less attention as a distant place of extraordinary powers, perhaps because its land areas were concealed in what was essentially still the realm of encircling and limiting ocean and were known to be islands. Nonetheless, western islands contained their share of medieval cosmographical wonders, although the miraculous, strange, and curious wonders of the west were envisioned in far gentler terms than those of the east. In contrast to the harsh, forbidding, and unobtainable though gem-filled magic of the Orient, the western islands were generally envisioned as blessed, paradisiacal natural settings for peaceful health and happiness that might be sought and possibly obtained in a future

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of perfected utopian existence. To both classical Greeks and medieval writers the western ocean contained the Fortunate Isles (Isles of the Blessed), a land without care where night was unknown, filled with abundant food available without labor, and eased by a temperate and pleasant climate, a land identified by some as the setting for the Elysian Fields, the death-free retreat for immortal heroes (e.g., Ramsay 1972:77-81, 90; Penrose 1952:14).

In medieval cosmography, the east was definitely more fixed, stabilized, and definitive as a symbolically charged direction and locale, whereas the west was more elusive, literally veiled in mists. The east, though equally invisible over the horizon, was a more substantial power-filled place, firmly linked by land to Europe. The west was a symbolically significant direction that immediately left the orientation and stability of terra firma and led eventually to peripheral island end points which, however, were themselves basically elusive and had yielded little tangible evidence of their reality. The west does not become a definitive place until it was realized in the early years of the Age of Discovery that oceanic travel in a western direction did not lead directly to the east but to a new definite and distinct place; that is, until the New World was discovered and recognized as such.

By this discovery and recognition, European cosmography also faced the necessity of symbolically absorbing and defining these new places of the west, a task which, in effect, required not only the recognition but the creation or invention of a new geographically distant supernatural domain on the geographical-cosmological periphery of the European world (d. O'Gorman 1961; Quinn 1976).

Not surprisingly, viewed overall, the initial attempts to fashion and design this new supernatural realm assumed the character of a work of intellectual bricolage, as an assortment of classical, Biblical, and medieval concepts derived from the original concepts of the western isles and the supernaturally well-established Orient were fitted roughly together to form a structure of sorts. Ultimately, as cosmological construction continued, the prevailing view, though still greatly mixed and varied, seems to have hoped to combine the more beneficial aspects of both the medieval east and west. The New World, in European eyes, was soon expected to offer a combination of tangible riches and utopian existence (variously defined and not excluding any destruction of perceived evils necessary for its achievement) that, in a sense, united the wealth and wonder of medieval India with the alleged beneficent ease of the Fortunate Isles.

Fundamental were concepts of paradise and wilderness, both of which depicted strong contrasts to settled medieval Christian (European) life, both of which were identified with the geographically distant and supernaturally potent east and with a temporally earlier Mediterranean and Biblical heritage, and both of which, though they seem at first to be antithetical, are replete with the symbolism of supernatural power in its purest or most refined forms (the blessed and the cursed, the divinely good or divinely evil, the haunt of God or the haunt of the Devil, the place of beasts and the place for saints; d. Williams 1962). As we have seen, paradise already held western connotations prior to the discoveries, but the attribution of wilderness and its qualities to the west was new and clearly part of the effort to create and identify a new cosmological locale. Similarly, the creatures who inhabited the wilderness in traditional belief and experience provided prototypes for identification of New World indigenes. Indeed, from the perspective of the fate of natives, the wilderness perspec-


tive is the most important, although the paradisiacal view of the New World strongly influenced the ideology of European colonization.

As is well known, Mediterranean and European cosmology traditionally defined the territory beyond the oikoumene in the manner of zones inhabited by beings evidencing varying degrees of physical and behavioral contrast (inversion) with settled and civilized life. To Greek and Roman writers of Classical antiquity as well as to compilers of medieval encyclopedias and chronicles, the most distant and remote frontiers (generally inland and interior) that lay beyond the oikoumene and its most immediate hinterland were places of fable and the habitat of beings that were definitely "nonnormal/' being either physically or morally deformed (lotus-eaters and cannibals, cyclops, and dwarfs) and of creatures that were definitely "nonnatural" (ants alleged to be bigger than foxes, griffins cf. Casson 1974; Friedman 1981; Wright 1925:37-38, 257, 329). Closer to the heartland or its territorial outskirts were "barbarians/' recognized as human, but considered "below normal" in the sense of lacking the moral and organizational attributes of settled and civilized (lawfully ordered) society. Instead barbarians were deemed to be warlike and predatory, ferocious and treacherous, unpredictable and cruel, the incarnation of perfidy and savagery, and indicative of the worst in human life. The most familiar barbarians of medieval Europe were the Tartars of the east who were awesomely ferocious and pagan and posed a cosmological and physical threat to civilized Europe likened to that of Gog and Magog and, thus, of the Devil himself, who, though vanquished and disarmed in the Christian heartland was believed to have retired "into the most remote parts" of the world wherein he still ruled (see Acosta 1588 in Taussig 1980a:169; cf. W. Jones 1971:399-400; Pagden 1982:24).

Fabled deformed creatures of the very distant lands, being so far away and beyond expectations of direct contact, served mainly as markers for" other worlds" that had little direct bearing on the known world of Christian-European human beings and human life. They posed no direct threat and were of no direct importance other than identifying, by symbolic inversion (deformity and exaggeration), the "extreme" conditions and absence of "control" that correlated with far distance. In contrast, in the experience of classical and medieval Europe, conditions and contrasts posed by barbarians definitely were more of a direct problem or carried a more immediately significant message since barbarians, unlike deformed monsters or supercreatures, were closer geographically and were in direct interaction with established society.

Particularly in the earlier medieval centuries, barbarians were direct threats (morally and physically) to established life and, therefore, required active attention. Barbarians could be vehicles for demonstrating the benefits and moral salvation of civilized life if they could be remade ("saved") to be trustworthy, peaceful, and believers in the true faith. Which is to say, barbarians could provide material for testing the rightness and righteousness of ordered Christian life. But if these attempts failed, then barbarians could be legitimately regarded as permanently retarded infants incapable of improvement or as sources of invincible diabolical evil, and in either case placed permanently beyond the cultural pale, either to be pitied and tended in a resigned manner or to be marked for permanent enmity and, if possible, destruction (cf. W. Jones 1971:397-399; Pagden 1982:15-21).

Barbarians as fields for testing the validity of moral, ordered society also con-

170 MARY W. HELMS

trasted with the traditional wildmen of medieval European myth, literature, and credulous peasant belief, because wildmen, though also outside the civilized life, simply provided a contrast with its virtues and expectations. Wildmen were portrayed as content with their own habitats in the remote and uninhabited areas of forested mountain or desert wilderness, yet they and their wilderness were viewed intellectually as falling within the orbit (or interstices) of settled life, and, in this sense, were part of the overall established order. Wildmen themselves, though believed to live in a primordial and unsocial manner, without the benefit of hearth, home, or kinsmen, did not directly threaten social order. They were not as actively warlike and destructively intrusive as barbarians. Nothing needed to be done about them, although those who, in myth or legend, ventured into their domains could rightly expect unpleasantness or, alternatively, find oracular and magical insights if the wild and raving men of the wilderness were also regarded as prophets (d. Bernheimer 1952:13; White 1972:21).

If (1) fabled unnatural creatures, (2) barbarians hovering somewhere between potential good and probable evil, and (3) wildmen defined ambiguously as neither cultured men nor natural animal but partially both (natural man or cultural beast) inhabited the (1) far distant realms, (2) frontier regions and (3) desolate wildernesses, respectively, of the classical and medieval cosmographical world, then such are the likely interpretations to be accorded inhabitants of the new western realm, particularly in the first century or so of its cosmological "creation."

In the initial days of discovery and exploration, as the ferocious lushness and climatic violence of the equatorial New World, or the cold "white terror" of the north, or the incredible and miraculous powers reportedly contained in the natural products of America aroused the wonder and amazement of the newcomers, its strange natives and curious animals were interpreted as fabulous (sometimes devilish) or supernatural denizens of myths and legends (Amazons, giants who ate dragons, ageless benefactors of fountains of youth, etc.; d. Hand 1976:47, 52; H. Jones 1964:55-57, 61-70; Quinn 1976:641; White 1972:125).

When interpretations turned to points of behavioral contrast between somewhat human natives and Europeans, the relative acceptance that had existed between European wildmen as anomalous denizens of the natural wilderness and settled villagers and townsmen as purveyors of civilized social life was extended, sometimes even with an element of admiration, to the New World to define relationships between native and European (e.g., early English views of North American Indians as backward but receptive to peaceful contact and exchange).

When interpretation turned to points of moral testing, natives who failed to attain European standards of righteous and ordered Christian living were regarded as beastlike or barbaric" children" incapable of learning. In more extreme cases, when moral excesses (idolatry, cannibalism, sexual promiscuity) were observed or when native reactions became more sanguinary, New World inhabitants were feared as powerful agents of the Christian devil toward whom extermination or at least persistent combating of diabolical evil for the sake of Christian good was approved behavior (d. Taussig 1980a:169-170).

As many writers have observed, the diverse images of New World Indians made it difficult for European observers and scholars to form some kind of synthesis of the nature of the inhabitants of the New World. Virtually the only point of commonality lay in the position of New World Indians as anomalous and ambiguous beings; as


men, but men "without God, without law, without breeches" (Bucher 1981:144), which is also to say, men with either no god or with the devil, with either social chaos or natural order, and with a simple life without need for the artifice of clothing. Such a state could only be achieved outside the Christian oikoumene on cosmological frontiers geographically/temporally distant from the heartland.

Traditional Christian cosmography also stopped short of Black Africa, with the important exception of Ethiopia (one of the possible locations for the Garden of Eden), which was often associated with Asia during the medieval centuries (when Ethiopia and India were often confused), and whose inhabitants were generally admired as part of the marvels associated with distant magical locales. The rest of sub-Saharan Africa, basically unknown, never received such plaudits. On the contrary, according to Herodotus and other writers, here lived strange monstrous beings: cave-dwelling troglodytes who ate reptiles; others who were ostrich-eaters or locust-fanciers; people with no heads or with feet like thongs; in other words, the usual fantastic inhabitants to be expected in one of the most remote corners of the world lying well beyond any civilized intercourse and proximate especially to the inhospitable torrid zone. To be sure, Black Africans lived in Europe in both Classical and Medieval centuries as slaves or human curiosities, but their country and its indigenous inhabitants were unknown and remained part of the wilderness outside Christendom; a strange place regarded as fearfully mystical, without Christian norms or society, and irrevocably uncultured and uncultivated (Phillips 1988, Chapter 8).

When Europeans finally began more sustained contact with the coasts of the Dark Continent, they found little to ameliorate their preconceived picture: hellish heat, monstrous and incredible animals, and natives living in a seemingly godless state (Marshall and Williams 1982:34); which is to say, they "found" a land that seemed to exemplify, on the one hand, the spiritual epitome of the Old Testament wilderness as a place totally devoid of God's grace and blessing and, on the other, a fabled land of deformed and exaggerated nonhuman marvels of the sort reserved for the lands beyond the ends of the known earth. Small wonder the primary interest of Europeans in Africa for so long was as a source of "unhuman" labor (d. Oakes 1944).

In the native view of the initial stages of the ultimate clash of cultures, Europeans materialized from intangible cosmographical and cosmological distance, from across the sea or out of the sky, supernaturally powerful, knowledgeable, and surrounded by the material riches that evidenced their magical superiority. Arriving in this manner, they personified the divinity or spiritual aspect of human experience-the ancestors or spirits of the dead or wise strangers who brought elements of the power of geographical distance to the native heartland. In the European perspective of the same experience, Europeans traveled from their own heartland to extraordinary cosmographical frontiers beyond the boundary of sacred Christendom, and indigenous peoples were encountered in situ as the denizens of supernaturally charged realms. As such, natives generally came to personify neither ancestral spirits nor knowledgeable supermen with beneficial skills and wisdom (the Garden of Eden never materialized, though prospects for utopian paradise lingered) but the intangible and tangible qualities of the monsters, wildmen, and barbarians of the uncultured, uncivilized, and devil-ridden medieval frontier wilderness. Therefore, they were considered closer (or identical) to demonic and animalistic anomalies of European cosmology than to its more beneficent spiritual beings.

172 MARY W. HELMS

In the initial stages of the conjunction of European and native societies, then, natives enhanced the humanity of the newcomers with supernatural attributes that they both revered and feared, whereas Europeans usually degraded the humanity of their hosts with supernatural attributes that they both despised and feared. The moment marked a major event, a literally cosmological event, for both groups, for both to some extent recognized the extraordinary power inherent in the other. This meeting of personages from cosmographical frontiers with such diametrically opposed interpretations also defined and helped to justify the future and the impact of center-periphery relations for both natives and Europeans, and created a new, interdependent world for both based on the harshly hierarchical relationships that might be expected to obtain between peoples who, though quickly and mutually disillusioned about each other, still expressed these basic cosmographic definitions and oppositions in their relationships.

NOTE

Additional ethnographic examples of phenomena mentioned in this chapter can be found in Mary Helms, 1988, Ulysses' Sail: An Ethnographic Odyssey of Power, Knowledge, and Geographical Distance, Princeton University Press.

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Chapter 8

Tradition, Identity, and Change beyond the Roman Frontier

PETER S. WELLS

INTRODUCTION

The subject of this chapter is the use of objects transmitted through intercultural interaction. The cases examined involve a long-lived, relatively stable frontier between distinct cultural groups. Similar instances can be identified in many examples through time and space. The chapter treats human beings as self-conscious, decisionmaking entities, able to make informed choices about their courses of action.

The cases examined below involve the passing of goods between societies. "Trade" is often defined as the peaceful transmission of goods, but such a definition only obscures complex realities. Any interaction resulting in the movement of goods between societies involves complex economic, social, and political processes and raises numerous questions. The aim of this chapter is limited: the focus is not on establishing the nature of trade goods, mechanisms of trade, or routes over which trade moved, but rather on the meaning of the trade goods for the recipients on one side of the interactions.

In studying the objects transmitted from one region to another, I employ Mary Douglas's concept of "goods" (Douglas and Isherwood 1979). Objects used by human beings have "meanings" more complex than their apparent "functions." For example, a sword is not just a weapon; in late prehistoric and medieval Europe it was also a

PETER S. WELLS • Center for Ancient Studies, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455.


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176 PETER S. WELLS

symbol of adult male status and often a sign of a specific high rank. in a complex hierarchy. Even apparently mundane, everyday objects can have powerful social and ideological meanings (Csikszentmihalyi and Rochberg-Halton 1981).

My approach is related to Douglas's, in that I am concerned with the social and political aspects of goods transmitted through interaction. Douglas shows that goods mediate relations between individuals and groups; they make visible statements about the ways that societies are organized and the ways in which individuals and groups interrelate. They help to define relationships, and at the same time symbolize those relationships.

Thus, goods play an active, not just a passive, role in defining relationships and in conveying social meanings. At the same time, they symbolize those relationships that they define. In studying prehistoric societies, the archaeologist dealing with goods is not examining the" debris" or the" material residue" of culture, but instead a very real part of culture-the visible part (Douglas and Isherwood 1979:66). Thus, through study of the goods involved, we can investigate both the material manifestation of the interaction and an essential component of that interaction.

THE ROMAN FRONTIER IN EUROPE

In the middle of the final century before Christ, Roman armies under the command of Julius Caesar conquered the peoples of Gaul (modern France, Belgium, and parts of Germany, the Netherlands, and Switzerland), establishing the Rhine River as the eastern frontier against peoples Caesar called "Germans." At the end of the final century B.C., Roman armies conquered southern Germany as far north as the Danube, the rest of Switzerland, and other lands to the east. Except for the subsequent addition of the triangular region of what is now Baden-Wiirttemberg between the upper Rhint' and the upper Danube (the agri decumates), by the time of Christ the Romans had completed the conquest of the maximum amount of land that would be brought into the Empire in western and central Europe.

One result of these conquests was the establishment of a frontier along the Rhine and the Danube Rivers that would last for about 400 years (King 1990). (From the mid-third century AD. on, groups east and north of this frontier carried out raids and invasions across the frontier, but the boundary remained an important political demarkation.) The lands west and south of that frontier were administered by Rome; those east and north remained occupied by groups that were never conquered by the Romans. The lands east of the Rhine frontier are generally referred to as "Free Germany" and the groups inhabiting those regions as "Germans" (Todd 1975), though their ethnic or national character is not at all clear (Hachmann et al. 1962). In the newly conquered lands, the Romans introduced Mediterranean-style cities with large-scale architecture in stone, rural landscapes organized around the Roman villa system of farming and estate management, a network of paved roads for moving troops and goods, the Latin language, writing, a unified monetary system, and many other aspects of Mediterranean life that contrasted with that of the indigenous Iron Age people (Drinkwater 1987; King 1990).

The societies east and north of the frontier maintained their native ("Iron Age") character throughout the Imperial period (Todd 1975; Kriiger 1988:321-543). They

TRADITION, IDENTI1Y, AND CHANGE 177

were comprised of communities with small-scale economic and political systems. Excavation shows that the settlements were small: farmsteads, hamlets, and very small villages, with no evidence of development of major centers of population or commercial activity such as had existed in southern parts of temperate Europe during the Late Iron Age. Manufacturing was also considerably less developed in these "Germanic" lands than in the "Celtic" regions of Iron Age Europe. Wheel-made pottery was not produced on any significant scale, nor was glass jewelry manufactured. Indigenous coinage did not come into use, in contrast to regions to the south where a local coinage economy had developed by the end of the second century B.c.The archaeological evidence suggests that communities were largely autonomous politically; there is no evidence for larger-scale political organizations that unified regions.

Considerable interaction took place between the Roman world and the small communities of unconquered Europe, and this interaction was important for all parties involved.

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

Our knowledge about the Roman-dominated part of Europe derives from extensive surviving historical records and from rich archaeological material. Our understanding of the societies that inhabited the lands beyond the Roman frontier depends, on the other hand, upon a few ancient writers, such as Tacitus, who described the peoples outside of the empire, and upon results of extensive archaeological research carried out over the past century and a half.

Tacitus's accounts of life in "Free Germany" describe social and economic conditions around A.D. 100, at the height of Roman economic development in the provinces north of the Alps (Tacitus 1948). Although his statements cannot be relied upon in the same way that a modern ethnographic account can, largely because the nature of his sources is not always clear, his treatment provides useful insight concerning peoples beyond the Roman frontier. Much of his account is supported by archaeological evidence.

Since the development of archaeology as a systematic discipline in Europe, archaeologists have been interested in the thousands of Roman imports found in graves and on settlements, not only near the Imperial boundaries but also at distant locations to the north and east (Hansen 1987; Hedeager 1979). They include fine pottery, vessels of bronze, glass, and silver, jewelry, coins, and bronze figurines. Wine was imported from the Roman world into Germany, but the scale of the wine trade is unclear. Such exotic foodstuffs as spices and Mediterranean fruits are also likely imported items.

In 1951, Hans Jiirgen Eggers published a major synthesis of available data on Roman imports in Europe beyond the Imperial boundaries. His study has been updated to incorporate finds made during the past four decades (Hansen 1987; Kunow 1983). These monographs provide an excellent data base for study of the trade between the Romans and natives across the frontier. Through stylistic analyses, Classical archaeologists are able to date the Roman imports with precision; thus, the chronological outlines of the exchange systems are well established. Among the

178 PETER S. WELLS

mechanisms through which the imports arrived were probably gift-giving (for the establishment of congenial relations to foster trade or political alliance), plunder from raids, protection payments (to keep marauding groups from raiding across the frontier), and "real trade" -peaceful exchange of goods (Barrett et al. 1989).

Gift-giving is recorded in the historical sources. Tacitus tells of the giving of Roman silver vessels to Germanic chiefs (Germania 5). In some richly outfitted graves dating to the period when Tacitus was writing, Roman silver vessels occur along with such other imports as Roman jewelry (Eggers 1950). Silver vessels of Roman origin have been recovered in a number of "treasure hoards," where entire sets of banqueting vessels occur together, including platters, dishes, jugs, and cups (Strong 1966). Tacitus's description of silver vessels as "political gifts" serves as a reasonable general model for the interpretation of these kinds of finds. The specific purpose of any individual gift may have included the establishment of friendly trade relations and the sealing of peace treaties.

At different times during the Roman period, groups from the unconquered lands attacked Roman communities to seize booty. After the middle of the third century A.D., raids across the frontier became a regular problem for the Roman administration. For roughly 200 years, until the departure of the Romans from Europe north of the Alps, the persistent plundering by Germanic groups of the Roman territories constituted an important mechanism for the circulation of Roman goods-particularly such valuable objects as metal vessels and jewelry-into the unconquered lands across the frontier.

The establishment of friendly relations with groups inhabiting the lands beyond the frontiers was important to Roman administrators. The materially rich communities of the Roman Rhineland constituted easy potential targets for fast-moving bands of raiders from across the river, and the maintenance of good relations was important as a means of keeping such marauders at bay. One of the reasons for the giving of gifts to potentates in the unconquered territories was to buy peace or to pay for protection (Braund 1989). This mechanism probably accounts for some of the Roman objects in native contexts.

Many young men from the "Germanic" territories served in the Roman army. Besides exposing them to the Roman world and its culture, this service also provided them with the opportunity to acquire Roman goods, which they probably brought back home with them when they returned to their native communities. Some of the Roman objects can be explained through this mechanism.

Several passages in Tacitus indicate the practice of barter-the peaceful exchange of goodS-involving everyday items. In the unconquered lands adjacent to the Imperial boundaries, great quantities of everyday Roman goods, such as pottery, jewelry, bronze ornaments, glassware, and coins, have been recovered on settlement sites and, to a lesser extent, in graves (Davies 1983). A market trade based on Roman coinage and values seems to have developed in many of the frontier lands.

By the early part of the first century A.D., the Romans had ceased to threaten peoples living east of the Rhine and north of the Danube. Following Julius Caesar's sorties across the Rhine, and subsequent Roman marches through the lowland landscapes east of that river, the defeat of Varus's army at the hands of Herrmann (Arminius) and his Germanic followers in the Teutoburg Forest in A.D. 9, along with other related events, effectively ended Roman designs on the forested lands of Free Germany. Throughout the first and second centuries A.D., while the Roman economy

TRADITION, IDENTITY, AND CHANGE 179

flourished in the provinces-particularly in the Rhineland and the adjacent regions in Gaul-the peoples beyond the frontier had little fear of Roman military force and CQuid regard their urbanized neighbors as ready sources for a variety of attractive goods (Barrett et al. 1989).

When societies of greater social and economic complexity conquer smaller-scale societies, elite groups in the native societies typically try to adopt aspects of the manners of the conquerors (Kossack 1974). They frequently alter their language, their ritual behaviors, and their material culture in order to adapt to the culture of the new overlords. In parts of temperate Europe that the Romans conquered, there is textual and archaeological evidence to show that local elites eagerly tried to become "Romanized" (Crumley 1987; Drinkwater 1983; Wightman 1985).

For the lands beyond the Roman frontier, the situation was more complex. Indigenous peoples there had a wider range of choices in their responses to Rome than did conquered groups.

Most Roman trade goods were everyday items in the Roman world: pottery of various kinds, especially terra sigillata, glassware, bronze jewelry and fastenings of different sorts, and coins. Basalt grindstones from quarries near Mayen on the middle Rhine were traded extensively to regions lacking such raw material. All these items were produced in large quantities within the Roman provinces, and they were commodities-that is, mass goods with little or no quality differentiation among them. The distribution of these products is concentrated near the frontier (Eggers 1951). Tacitus's references to trade in the borderlands, the nature of the objects recovered archaeologically, and their generalized distribution all make a peaceful mechanism of exchange likely for the transmission of these goods.

Roman-made bronze vessels are numerous in the lands beyond the frontier, particularly, as Hedeager (1987) has shown, beyond a roughly 200-km-wide zone along the border. Eggers (1951) and Kunow (1983) indicate that the bronzes were made in series, probably mainly expressly for export. Few of the bronze vessels are unique specimens.

The great numbers of bronze containers, and smaller numbers of glass vessels, of Roman manufacture that have been found in Germany, Denmark, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Sweden, and Norway (Kunow 1983:113, lists 1,607 imported Roman bronze and glass vessels of known provenance) can be attributed principally to the fascination that Mediterranean rituals of wine-drinking and banqueting, and the material paraphernalia that went with them, held for northern Europeans. Practically all of the bronze and glass vessels imported were of types used for serving and drinking beverages.

The Roman world sought raw materials from the lands beyond its frontiers. Among the goods traded from northern Europe to the Roman provinces for which we have evidence are cattle, salted meat, leather, iron, wool, amber, and slaves (Hansen 1987, 1988). Other natural products, such as honey, wax, resin, and pitch, may have played a part as well.

As Barrett and Fitzpatrick (1989) note, most studies of Roman-native interactions in Europe have been conducted with the assumption that the Roman Empire was the dominant power in the relations. Peoples east of the Rhine frontier have been viewed largely in terms of their reactions to Roman culture rather than as active cultural entities in their own rights. Recent research on the native side of the interactions is suggesting that this prevailing perspective is in need of revision.

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ROMAN GOODS IN NATIVE CONTEXTS: FOUR EXAMPLES

We can gain a different view of the situation if we focus on the archaeological evidence from native communities in its own terms, rather than examining it in comparison to the Roman world. Four examples, that follow will serve as illustrations (Figure 1).

N ear the Frontier: Westick

Along the Rhine frontier of the Roman Empire, sizable quantities of Roman imports have been found in both settlement and cemetery contexts. For the most part,

Figure 1. Map of north-central Europe showing places mentioned in the text. ... = principal sites discussed; • = Li.ibsow-group graves (one grave in Norway is beyond the area shown); • = Roman centers near the Imperial frontier (from west to east, Nijmegen, Trier, Cologne, Mainz, Regensburg). The shaded area in the western and southern portions of the map are lands that were incorporated into the Roman Empire.

TRADITION, IDENTITY, AND CHANGE 181

the Roman goods in contexts near the frontier are everyday items, not special luxury objects such as are found further east (Hedeager 1979, 1987, 1988). Schoppa (1970) notes that all known settlements of the Roman period in Westphalia, including the landscapes east of the middle and lower Rhine, have Roman imports on them. These include a variety of types of Roman pottery, fragmentary bronze vessels, pins, coins, and some glass vessels.

At the settlement of Westick, situated about 65 km east of the Rhine frontier, fully one-third of all objects recovered were of Roman origin (Schoppa 1970). They included several different types of pottery, fragments of such bronze objects as belt hooks and pins, and 78 coins.

The finds correspond to the situation as portrayed by Tacitus. He noted that Germanic groups near the frontier had learned Roman ways of trade and had engaged in commerce with Roman coins. The archaeological finds show frontier communities fully adopting available material culture from the Roman world and integrating it into their own systems. The pottery, fragmentary bronze ornaments, and coins occur as part of the general settlement debris at these sites, together with the indigenous materials, and not in any apparent way separated by virtue of their Roman origin. As Dyson (1988) has argued, by this time Roman factories were able to flood trade systems with mass-produced articles that came into high demand among many peoples who were inhabiting lands beyond the frontiers. The results of this demand, and of the indigenous peoples' ability to furnish trade goods, are apparent in the Roman materials at such settlements.

The evidence from Westick does not suggest any special distinctions in the use of the imports, but a general utilization of Roman goods in place of native ones in a location where the Roman wares were readily available and could replace indigenous forms.

On the North Sea Coast: Feddersen Wierde

Feddersen Wierde is situated north of the city of Bremerhaven in northwest Germany in a sandy marsh close to the North Sea. Over many field seasons (1955-1963), Werner Haarnagel (1975, 1979) and his colleagues excavated the entire settlement and produced rich data on the economy of this community beyond the Imperial frontier. The site was occupied continuously from about 100 B.C. to A.D. 400.

Buildings at Feddersen Wierde were made of timber and brushwork, and the lower portions of many survived in the waterlogged conditions of the site. Haarnagel was able to identify six principal phases over the 500-year occupation. Through the first five, the community grew steadily in size. In the first phase, the settlement consisted of five buildings. In the fifth phase, 26 buildings stood on the site. The structures at Feddersen Wierde were long and rectangular in form, with domestic space at one end and stalls for livestock at the other. In its development over time, the community at Feddersen Wierde increased its livestock-holding capacity from 98 to 443 stalls.

Roman imports are well represented at the settlement. The most common categories are terra sigillata pottery, glass beads, glass vessels, coins, and basalt grindstones shaped as hand-mills of a type used by Roman soldiers (Haarnagel 1979). These categories are typical for Roman imports found on settlement sites along the North Sea coasts beyond the frontier (Eggers 1951:see Maps 4 and 5). Another wellstudied settlement, at Wijster in the Netherlands, yielded Roman imports very similar

182 PETER S. WELLS

in character to those at Feddersen Wierde (Van Es 1965; see general discussion in Bloemers 1983:191). Bronze vessels, which occur frequently further away from the frontier (see below), are rare at these North Sea coastal settlements (Kunow 1983).

Haarnagel interprets the growth in Roman imports at Feddersen Wierde and other settlements of the region at the time of the commercial fluorescence of Rome in the second century A.D. in terms of changes in the social and economic structures of the community that are apparent in the archaeological record. He notes that the greatest trade activity took place at the same time as the development of a building in the settlement that he interprets as a headman's or chieftain's house (1979:311) and concludes that the high-status individual who lived in that structure played an active role in fostering the trade. The general increase in quantities of terra sigillata pottery and basalt grindstones from Mayen on the middle Rhine at settlements along the North Sea littoral during this period can thus be viewed in terms of the emergence of a group of individuals who were specializing in this Roman trade (1979:312).

The raising of cattle was important to the community at Feddersen Wierde (Haarnagel 1979:249-260), and live cattle and leather goods were probably the major trade items (Bloemers 1983:181-182). The Roman armies were in great need of meat, and leather was required for many kinds of equipment, such as belts, straps, and tents. At Tolsum, in West Friesland, a tablet was found bearing an inscription that records the sale of cattle to Roman buyers at about this time (Boeles 1951:129-130; see also Plate 16; Whittaker 1989:67).

The rapid growth in cattle-stalling capacity at Feddersen Wierde suggests that the occupants intensified the production of the goods sought by the Roman merchants: cattle and hides. The residents did not change their economy altogether. The archaeological evidence indicates that the rest of their economic system, including agriculture and craft activities, was maintained with little change (Haarnagel 1979). The essential traditions of the community and, apparently, the cultural identity of its members, were not substantially altered as a result of the interaction.

In the Unconquered Heartland: Liibsow Graves

A very different response to the availability of new goods from the Roman world is reflected in the group of richly outfitted graves in northeastern central Europe known as the Uibsow graves, named after the German designation of the type-site east of the mouth of the Oder River on the Baltic Sea coast in modern Poland (Eggers 1950). About 25 graves of this group are known, and they occur in Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, and Norway (see Figure 1). They date to the first and second centuries A.D. and share strikingly similar features of burial structure and grave goods, despite their distribution over a wide area and through landscapes characterized by distinctive local material cultures. Writing in 1950, Eggers suggested that these extraordinary graves were the burials of members of a "common Germanic nobility" of the period, unified in its authority and status.

Among the features shared by these 25 graves are exotic Roman imports, including bronze and silver vessels, often in complete sets, and Roman jewelry of precious metals and bronze. Grave 1 from the type-site of Liibsow, which was excavated in 1908, exemplifies the group. The burial was covered by a cairn of stones, and it contained goods of both Roman and local manufacture. Of Roman origin were two silver beakers, a bronze bucket with attachments in the form of women's heads,

TRADITION, IDENTI1Y, AND CHANGE 183

a bronze basin, a bronze jug, a large bronze pan with swan-head handle, a small bronze pan, two blue glass bowls, a silver-plated bronze mirror, and a gold fibula. Of local "Germanic" origin were three silver fibulae, two silver pins, a silver belt hook, two silver mounts for drinking horns, a pair of bronze shears, and a ceramic vessel. Even though not all of the Liibsow graves are as rich as this one, they share these common features of Roman metal vessels and jewelry together with exceptional ornaments of local manufacture (Gebiihr 1974; Oldenstein 1975).

In the Liibsow graves, we see the employment of foreign objects imbued with special social and perhaps ideological and political meanings to construct and maintain special identities both within local communities and between regions. These identities were tied to material symbols that were manipulated by the Roman elite, and, by means of them, Germanic individuals who were far removed geographically from the Imperial frontier attempted to assert their affiliation with the admired culture which was maintained by the elite of the Empire. The Roman presence north of the Alps from around the time of Christ was a powerful cultural factor for all of Europe, induding peoples far from the border. This complex and large-scale, stateorganized society set the standard for status display throughout much of Europe. The elite of the Germanic groups in this part of the continent adopted the signs of high status that the Roman world had to offer.

The two categories of objects that characterize the imports in the Liibsow graves-the metal vessels used for serving and drinking beverages and the precious metal jewelry-were both important in the representation of status in prehistoric and early historic Europe as well. Wealthy graves marked by special beverage containers characterize the Bell Beaker phenomenon around 2000 s.c.(Harrison 1980), the warriors' graves of the Late Bronze Age (Miiller-Karpe 1955), and the lavish burials of both the Early (Wells 1980) and Late Iron Age (Werner 1978). The evidence suggests that access to special beverages was a prerogative of high status in European tradition, and the containers-often elaborately decorated-in which they were served and consumed were symbols of that position.

The Roman bronze, glass, and silver vessels in the Liibsow-type graves were probably not acquired through mercantile exchange. If they had been, we would expect other, less elaborate Roman goods to occur in the same contexts or in the same vicinities. Neither is it likely that plunder by Germanic raiders in Roman territories can account for the majority of these imports. Despite the thousands of bronze, silver, and glass vessels, only a relatively few types make up the great majority of all of the objects. If plunder were an important mechanism of transmission, we would expect a wider range of forms in the graves.

These imports in the Liibsow burials are very different in character from the everyday Roman objects that occur at the native settlements near the frontier, such as Westick and Feddersen Wierde. The circulation mechanisms that transmitted them to Germany, Denmark, and further east and north must have resulted from careful planning and organization (Hedeager 1988). They served as important and, apparently widely accepted, signs of status in the Germanic world.

Jewelry is also a significant category of object for the communication of information about status (Bogatyrev 1971) and is part of a long tradition in wealthy burials in Europe (e.g., Werner 1980). In the Liibsow graves, silver and gold pins distinguish the identities of these elite individuals from others. Such items of personal adornment are worn in places on the body where they can be easily seen, and they are devices

184 PETER S. WELLS

for communicating information about the status and position of the wearer. Thus, gold and silver jewelry of Roman origin probably played a role similar to that of the vessels in expressing the status of the wearer to all who could see the person.

A New Commercial Center to the North: Gudme

The final example concerns the emergence of a center of wealth and high social status, indicated archaeologically by an unusual concentration of Roman imports in contexts with other signs of elite rank. This concentration occurs at and around Gudme on the island of Fyn in Denmark, and the development began in the late pre-Roman Iron Age and intensified during the Roman period. In the cemetery of M0llegardsmarken, of the over 2,000 graves, 83 contained Roman imports, among them a total of 133 objects, not induding coins or glass beads. Although some of these import-containing graves are exceptionally wealthy, similar in character to Liibsow graves, many are more modest and suggest a distribution of the imported objects among a broader range of the social hierarchy than elsewhere (Thrane 1988). The region is also distinguished by exceptional concentrations of both gold and silver Roman coins (Fonnesbech-Sandberg 1989).

Since Fyn is an island, the Roman objects had to arrive by sea. Thus, Hansen argues (1988) that this locale was a major landing place for ships bearing cargos of Roman goods that were coming from ports at the mouth of the Rhine. The emergence on the Danish islands during the Roman period of coastal commercial centers of long-distance importance is supported by the recent discovery of the site of Lundeborg, just 5 km east of Gudme on the St0rebelt coast, where abundant evidence has emerged for a port engaged in intensive trade (Thomsen 1987).

To account for the spectacular development of the Gudme region in wealth and in concentration of Roman imports from the late pre-Roman Iron Age through the fourth century A.D., Thrane (1988) notes evidence for sacred sites at the location and suggestive evidence for the emergence of a local kingship there (Hauck 1987). Even though the Liibsow graves usually were isolated from any apparent larger political pattern of elite grouping, here on Fyn the Roman imports seem to have been directly connected with the process of the emergence of local kings. If this model is supported by further work, we might interpret the richest of the import-bearing graves with imports to be those of supporters and retainers present in any royal system.

The result on Fyn then, in contrast to that of the more general group of Liibsow graves over a wide expanse of northern Europe, may have been the formation of a center of political and economic activity, in the process of which the Roman luxury imports were employed both to bolster the growing status of the rising kings and, at the same time, to redistribute them to supportive followers in the hierarchy. Ongoing research should yield results against which this suggestion can be tested, in particular concerning the nature of the relation between the imported objects and the social and political changes.

DISCUSSION

These four cases divide into two groups. At Westick and Feddersen Wierde, both near or with easy access to the Roman frontier, Roman imports played no significant role

TRADITION, IDENTIIT, AND CHANGE 185

in status display. The imports were, for the most part, everyday goods, and they were integrated into the material culture of the communities that used them. In the Liibsow graves and at Gudme, on the other hand-at locations further removed from the frontier-Roman imports were mostly luxury objects and were not integrated into the material culture of the communities. Instead, they were used as signs of status and of connection with the Roman world.

From these examples we might propose a general model. Easy access to goods from another culture-in this case access along the frontier-results in their integration into the local everyday milieu and mitigates against their use as objects signifying special status. When imports are not easily accessible, as in the hinterlands far removed from the frontier, then such objects can be adopted by elites for purposes of status display. The archaeological evidence from the four cases suggests this pattern (Hedeager 1979, 1987), and statements by Tacitus can be interpreted to support it.

Along with different attitudes taken toward the imports at different removes from the frontier, it is probable that different mechanisms of transmission account for the goods in the frontier zone and in the hinterlands. The evidence of Roman coin finds and masses of everyday goods in the frontier lands suggests that market trade operated along the border of the Empire. Cattle and cattle products, along with other commodities, were important in this frontier trade. Such mechanisms probably did not operate in the transmission of luxury imports to elite consumers in the northern and northeastern parts of Europe. Gift exchange may have played a part, though some form of organized trade would seem necessary to account for the very large numbers of Roman objects in those regions. The long-distance trade may have been organized and administered by elite individuals and groups in the Germanic lands and may have involved cattle, leather, horses, slaves, amber, and grain (Hansen 1987:234). Although the evidence of archaeology and texts provides information about some of the goods involved, it is not possible at the present state of research to say which were more important or which were primary at any specific place or time. The persons represented in the Liibsow graves may have administered such trade, and the concentration of Roman imports at Gudme makes direct involvement of persons there likely.

In the marketlike conditions that pertained in the frontier zones, systems of value which were based on the Roman economy developed. Tacitus notes that the peoples along the border learned to use Roman coins. But away from the frontier area, a different system of value prevailed. As Hedeager (1988) argues, the Roman imports in the Liibsow graves had no standard value. There is no indication that they played any role in local commerce. They were not handed down through inheritance, but were buried with the individual who acquired them (at least, so we assume). They appear to have been closely tied to the individual who received them, and their significance remained connected to that person after death. This fact underscores their role in the assertion of identities, as well as their high status value, since they could not be passed on but had to be acquired anew by each generation.

The role of these objects in communication was critical. Given the evidence of the objects in the graves, we need to visualize their use in display activities during the lives of their owners-perhaps at community feasts and festivals, when display of status was important socially and politically. The imports played a role in display to two different audiences. To the communities to which the owners belonged, the Roman luxury imports expressed status, wealth, and affiliation with the great power

186 PETER S. WELLS

to the west. They provided a visible link between these local elites and the Roman Empire. At the same time, the objects linked together elite groups in many different regions of the Germanic lands, as Eggers (1950) noted. The Liibsow graves demonstrate these widespread connections.

As to the question of the status and identity of the individuals buried in the Liibsow graves, we can say only that they were probably local chiefs or princes, depending upon what model of the social structure we apply. There is no evidence to suggest that they achieved their status through trade relations with the Roman world, but rather every reason to believe that they enhanced an existing status through the Roman connection. For Gudme, on the other hand, the imports may demonstrate a more dynamic situation. The evidence there suggests that the Roman goods were arriving at Gudme at the time that a political center of regional importance was emerging, and the Roman goods may have been utilized to play an active role in that development. The distribution of the imports in modest graves as well as in rich ones at Gudme suggests that the objects were used as a visible form of royal largesse, dispensed by rising potentates to their supporters. The imports were both part of the power, and signs of it.

CONCLUSION

As Schortman (1989) has shown, distribution among dispersed local elites of specific kinds of status imports is a phenomenon widespread in human culture. Like the proliferation of exceptionally richly outfitted graves in general, this patterned use of foreign status signs is probably a feature specific to contexts in which cultures are undergoing rapid and disorienting change. The imported objects are used to make visible statements about statuses and identities where those statuses and identities might otherwise be challenged. Certainly in the case of the Liibsow graves and those at Gudme, such change in response to effects of the Roman presence across the frontier is clear in the archaeological record.

The patterned display of imported status goods represents a special case of the more general manipulation of status objects. As communities throughout northcentral Europe were experiencing substantial stress as a result of military events and economic developments along the frontier, local elites strove to assert their authority both to contain change and to maintain their positions. The Roman origin of the status objects that were used served to emphasize that those individuals had personal links with the Roman Empire and perhaps were thus in a favorable position to contend with and benefit from the changes.

Yet all of this display took place in a traditional context. The burial practices at the Liibsow graves and at Gudme were indigenous to the local societies; they were not borrowed from the empire. Both the grave structures and the other goods that accompanied the Roman imports belonged to the regional traditions. The elite persons who were utilizing the Roman imports to assert status and to express new identities connected with Rome were not trying to become Romans, but rather to use their constructed Roman connection to advantage in their own communities.

TRADmON, lDENTIIY, AND CHANGE 187

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Haamagel, W., 1979, Die Grabung Feddersen Wierde. Steiner, Wiesbaden. Hachmann, R, G. Kossack, and H. Kiihn, 1962, VOlker zwischen Germanen und Kelten. Wachholtz,

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Part IV

Warfare

The sociopolitical effects of warfare have not generally been considered in worldsystems or political ideology theories of interregional interaction (cf. Hedeager 1987:133, 138-139; Wells 1984:178). This stands in marked contrast to the attention intersocietal conflict has received in recent (Carneiro 1970, 1978; Webb 1975; Webster 1975) and well as past (Spencer 1896) considerations of state development (see Haas 1982 and Service 1985:23-25, 28-32 for reviews). Contemporary investigations in this vein are largely concerned with how elites take advantage of armed conflicts to solidify their control over wealth, land, and power at home. In general, population pressure within socially and! or physically circumscribed, highly productive environments generates pressures for conquest to secure additional resources essential for survival. Concurrently, retreat from these threats is not a viable alternative to fighting or submitting to the domination of the victor. Persistent threats of conflict, therefore, select for the development of centralized rule an effective means of organizing for offense or defense. Conquest, in its turn, yields booty which war leaders can manipulate to attract bodies of armed clients whose loyalty is less to the society at large than to their benefactor. These bands become the basis of permanent military structures as useful in terrorizing dissidents within a polity as in threatening enemies outside it. The net result is the concentration of unprecedented wealth and power in the hands of a single individual. Warfare in these models is a mechanism for the consolidation of elite control over local resources, especially arable land and people. System-serving (Flannery 1972) functions, such as leadership in conflict, certainly act as a basis for hierarchy building. Ultimately, however, it is the self-serving efforts of war leaders to use conflict, along with the spoils and military institutions which develop from it, to enhance their power which underlies the appearance of sociopolitical hierarchies.

Warfare is certainly the most dramatic form of intersocietal competition. It is, nonetheless, a complex process whose results are not easily predicted. This point is forcibly underlined by Athens in Chapter 9 and by Weigand in Chapter 10. Both authors stress the importance of intersocietal conflicts in determining developments among the Late Period Cara of Highland Ecuador and the Teuchitlan polities of western Mexico, respectively. The analysis of open conflict provided by Athens and Weigand diverges somewhat from the traditional warfare perspective outlined above. SpeCifically, they deal with the infrequently addressed question of how cul-

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190 PARTW

tural symbols can be used strategically by small polities to resist incorporation by their larger neighbors. The sociopolitical effects of these ideological shifts on the combatants are also considered. Both the Late Period Cara and Teuchitlan cases represent complexly organized polities occupying sociopolitical entities (the Inka and Teotihuacan, respectively). The results of this conflict did not, however, select for increasing complexity as suggested by current models. The chapter by Athens in particular indicates that intensive conflict over basic resources, especially arable land, can result in other effective solutions to the problem of organizing for defense. The major task of defining the conditions which favor one sociopolitical response to warfare over another still remains before us.

Both chapters share the central assumption of warfare theory that control over basic resources is the foundation of sociopolitical hierarchies. Contention for land, population, and other essential commodities motivates intersocietal competition which itself has significant sociopolitical consequences. Warfare theories share this assumption with many world-systems formulations (see Santley and Alexander, Chapter 2, this volume).

The warfare papers included here also stress the importance of hostile contact processes which involve the transfer of very little cultural information. These situations are frequently ignored in interaction studies. The contributions of Athens and of Weigand serve as counterpoints to the old diffusion assumption that intersocietal contacts generate acculturation. Weigand in particular points out that intense interaction, especially if it threatens the autonomy of one of the contact partners, may lead to affirmations of cultural distinctiveness. Divergence, rather than convergence, of salient material forms is the result. Once more, we are confronted with the need to identify the conditions under which different reactions to conflict are likely to occur.

Athens and Weigand both have long-term research interests in the areas they discuss here. The investigations by these authors of intersocietal contacts and their sociopolitical consequences within these regions constitute in particular significant contributions to the literature. Their research findings that follow represent important continuations of these concerns.

REFERENCES

Carneiro, R, 1970, Theory of the Origin of the State. Science 169:733-738. Carneiro, R, 1978, Political Expansion as an Expression of the Principle of Competitive Exclu

sion. In Origins of the State: The Anthropology of Political Evolution (ed. R R. Cohen and E. Service). Institute for the Study of Human Issues, Philadelphia, pp. 205-224.

Flannery, K, 1972, The Cultural Evolution of Civilizations. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 3:399-426.

Haas, J., 1982, The Evolution of the Prehistoric State. Columbia University Press, New York. Hedeager, L., 1987, Empire, Frontier, and the Barbarian Hinterland: Rome and Northern Europe

from A.D. 1-400. In Centre and Periphery in the Ancient World (ed. M. Rowlands, M. Larsen, and K Kristiansen). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 125-140.

Service, E., 1987, A Century of Controversy. Academic Press, New York. Spencer, H., 1896, Principles of Sociology. Appleton, New York.

WARFARE 191

Webb, M., 1975, The Flag Follows Trade: An Essay on the Necessary Interaction of Military and Commercial Factors in State Formation. In Ancient Civilization and Trade (ed. J. Sabloff and C. Lamberg-Karlovsky). University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque, pp. 155-209.

Webster, D., 1975, Warfare and the Evolution of the State: A Reconsideration. American Antiquity 40:464-470.

Wells, P., 1984, Farms, Villages, and Cities: Commerce and Urban Origins in Late Prehistoric Europe. Cornell University Press, Ithaca.

Chapter 9

Ethnicity and Adaptation The Late Period-Cara Occupation in

Northern Highland Ecuador

J. STEPHEN ATHENS

INTRODUCTION

The primary concern of this chapter will be to suggest the importance of ethnicity as an adaptive strategy for the Late Period-Cara culture of northern highland Ecuador. This prehistoric culture represents the final period before Inca and Spanish conquests. There seems to have been little in the way of cultural diffusion or borrowing from either neighboring or more distant contemporaneous or antecedent cultures to account for the origin of the particular array of cultural elements that define this society. Furthermore, the boundaries of this culture are generally quite abrupt and do not appear to "blend" into neighboring culture areas. This is all the more surprising in that the Late Period-Cara culture appears to be a case of autochthonous development in which it might be assumed that there would have been time for the gradual intermingling of cultural elements from neighboring societies or ethnic groups, especially along the peripheral zones of occupation.

Rather than simply assuming that the distinctiveness of the Late Period-Cara culture is the natural result of human inventiveness when left in isolation, this chapter will attempt to show that there is a rational reason behind it. What is here called distinctiveness is, in fact, the manifestation of ethnicity. That the Late Period-Cara culture may be considered an ethnic group appears justified in light of the four

J. STEPHEN ATHENS • International Archaeological Research Institute, Inc., 949 McCully Street, Suite 5, Honolulu, Hawaii 96826.


193

194 J. STEPHEN ATHENS

criteria Barth (1969:10-11) cites as the generally regarded characteristics of ethnic groups:

(1) [the ethnic group) is largely biologically self-perpetuating, (2) [it) shares fundamental cultural values, realized in overt unity of cultural forms, (3) [it) makes up a field of communication and interaction, [and) (4) [it) has a membership which identifies itself, and is identified by others, as constituting a category distinguishable from other categories of the same order.

Although Barth (1969:10) is critical of such a characterization for a variety of analytical reasons (e.g., it assumes that boundary maintenance is "unproblematical and follows from isolation" (Barth 1969:11), it serves as a first step in highlighting what is meant by ethnicity in this chapter and, as shall become clear in the following discussion, in justifying the term's attribution to the Late Period-Cara culture.

Interregional interaction, the focus of this volume, is usually perceived as a process that binds different social groups together, and this is done most commonly through such mechanisms as trade and exchange. Another type of interregional interaction-perhaps even more important and widespread as a social processconcerns the separation of closely juxtaposed social groups. That is, why do we observe over and over again in the ethnographic and archaeological literature, differing social groups living side by side with each other and in obvious contact, but which do not blend, amalgamate, or become absorbed, one by the other, through time? Surely there are very strong interactive processes at work to maintain the separation. As Barth (1969) sought to demonstrate, ethnicity is a powerful ingredient in the separation of social groups.

Ethnicity, of course, is a property that categorizes in some degree most sedentary agricultural societies the world over. In Ecuador, prehistoric ethnicity appears to be a particularly notable characteristic of the prehistoric past because of the small size of the country and the fact that each geographical region has its own distinctive archaeological sequence (d. Meggers 1966; Porras 1987; Porras and Piana 1975). In the Ecuadorian highlands, in fact, prehistOriC ethnic diversity is even more dramatic than in the geographically more expansive coastal regions. Here a number of prehistoric cultures coexisted, their differences amplified by the narrow intermontane corridor into which they were squeezed, making the cultural boundaries all the more apparent. Thus, while this chapter addresses only the Late Period-Cara occupation, the arguments concerning ethnicity should be applicable to a wide variety of cases in the region as well as other tropical areas.

The investigations of Hodder (1979) are particularly relevant to this study. As he notes, "ethnicity ... is ... the mechanism by which interest groups use culture to symbolize their within-group organization in opposition to and in competition with other interest groups" (Hodder 1979:452). Thus, "material culture differences between tribes can only be understood if material culture is seen as a language, expressing within-group cohesion in competition over scarce resources" (Hodder 1979:447). Hodder's ethnographic work demonstrates that as stress increases because of competition for scarce resources, it becomes increasingly advantageous for societies to define cultural boundaries and establish exclUSionary mechanisms. When there is stress resulting in increased interaction, neighboring cultural groups do not" share" their cultures as a diffusion or normative model of cultural development implies.

ETHNICITY AND ADAPTATION 195

Rather, competing groups use material items to clearly communicate within-group identity, which gives rise to sharp social boundaries.

Taking the ideas of Hodder as a point of departure, it will be argued that ethnicity is an adaptive strategy. It is an energetically efficient means to achieve territorial security within an intensely competitive regional social environment. Such a theoretical perspective not only explains the origin and function of ethnicity, but also certain other aspects of prehistoric cultural development in northern highland Ecuador.

The organization of this chapter will be first to briefly review the physical environment of the study area. Historical data concerning the nature of Cara society will then be presented. This will be followed by discussions of archaeological data and evidence for interregional trade and exchange. Finally, arguments will be presented concerning the adaptive significance of ethnicity and the application of the model to the Late Period-Cara occupation. The detailed presentation of data that follows is intended to provide enough information to substantiate the case and provide a basis for future discussion and research. While the data are not ideal or definitive in any absolute sense to be sure, they provide a more than ample starting point for discussion.

ENVIRONMENT

The present study focuses on the highland basins and neighboring lowlands comprising Imbabura and northern Pichincha Provinces between the Guayllabamba and Mira-Chota Rivers (Figures 1 and 2). The north-south distance of this region is roughly 75 km and the east-west distance is 65 km (approximately 5,000 km2). Sources on geography and environment include Acosta-Solis (1968), Basile (1974), Ferdon (1950), Sampedro (1975-1976), Teran (1972), Troll (1968), and Wernstedt (1961). Recent studies by PRONAREG-ORSTOM (1978, 1979a, 1979b) also provide a wealth of information.

The region is perhaps best described as a mosaic of closely juxtaposed microenvironments (Figure 1). This environmental mosaic is largely the result of the effects of variable altitude and rainfall in the region. The north and south geographical boundaries are both defined by relatively low elevation (1,800 to 2,000 m), hot, and dry river valleys-the Chota in the north and the Guayllabamba in the south. Both valley systems cut through the western cordillera. The fertile and generally well-watered intermontane basins in between are defined by north-south trending eastern and western mountain ranges. Large haciendas control much of the intermontane flatlands, while Indian farmers densely occupy the valley slopes up to about 3,300 m. Surrounding mountain peaks reach well over 4,000 m. Cold and humid paramo grasslands are found in areas above approximately 3,400 m. This zone is separated from the highest agricultural fields by a narrow belt of relict Andean forest in many areas. On their outer flanks to the west and east, the mountain ranges descend into humid tropical montana and rainforest zones.

The town of Otavalo, centrally situated in the intermontane basin of Imbabura Province just 25 km north of the equator, has a mean annual temperature of 13.9°C

196

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and receives an average of 950 mm of rainfall each year. The summer months (June, July, August, and September) tend to be dry, although they are not completely lacking in rainfall.

HISTORICAL DOCUMENTATION

There is relatively little information about aboriginal society in northern Ecuador for the years immediately following the Spanish conquest in 1534 (Murra 1946). Population loss and policies of the Spanish colonial administration severely altered the social landscape right from the beginning of European contact. To this must be added the

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disruptions caused by the Inca conquest a few decades earlier. Although recent ethnohistoric studies (Caillavet 1981, 1983, 1985; Espinosa Soriano 1988; Salomon 1986; Salomon and Grosboll1986) have expanded on information provided in such standard references as Cieza de Leon, the Relaciones Geognificas, Belalcazar, and Cabello Valboa, and a few others, aboriginal life before Spanish and Incaic contact remains a very hazy subject in historical references.

The cultural group inhabiting the study area of northern Pichincha Province and Imbabura Province at the time of the Inca and Spanish conquests has come to be known as the Cara.1 As Jijon y Caamano (1951:73-75) carefully documented, the Chota Valley forms a distinct linguistic boundary between the Cara and the neighboring Pasto culture to the north (in Carchi Province). Caillavet (1983:6) adds that,

the linguistic frontier with the Pastos is delimited with absolute clarity: further to the north of the Chota River, only toponyms of the Pastos, further to the south, only toponyms of the Otavalos (Cara; author's translation).

Caillavet (1983:6), however, also observes that Pasto toponyms are as common within the Chota Valley as Cara toponyms, and, furthermore, that the presence of Pastos in areas west of the Cara zone is documented in archival sources.2 From these data, she infers that territories of the two ethnic groups overlapped, a conclusion which presently available archaeological data fails to support (see below).

The southern boundary of the Cara, according to Jijon y Caamano (1951:75), extended from the valleys east of Quito (Quinche, Pifo, Yaruquf, Tumbaco, and part of the Chillo Valley) to Pomasquf just north of Quito. This boundary, which does not appear to be as neatly delimited by a major geographical feature as was the case for

lThe term Cam is apparently a product of historical studies that has come into common usage. According to Caillavet (1983:4), it was "created" by Padre Juan de Velasco, who published in the late eighteenth century a history of a supposed pre-Inca empire centered on Quito. This history was largely based on legendary and oral historical accounts (see Salomon 1986:12). The actual ethnic name, if there was one, for the late prehistoriC people inhabiting northern Pichincha Province and Imbabura Province is not known. The earliest documentary sources refer only to various named chiefdom polities (e.g., the Caranqui, Otavalo, Cayambe, Cochasqui, etc.) and do not specify a regional ethnic entity. Cara is used in the present study in reference to information derived from historical sources. Archaeological information for the late prehistoric culture of this area-certainly the remains of the historically described Cara-falls under the designation "Late Period" (Athens 1978a, 1980).

2The presence of Pastos in the Chota Valley is documented by Borja (1897[1582]:134), who indicates that they had become like native residents in the course of their work on the coca farms. He writes that,

There are always at any given time in this town of Pimampiro and in the said valley of Coangue [Chota] more than three hundred outsider Indians from Otavalo and Carangue and from Latacunga and Sichos and from other lands very distant from this one, that come for the purpose of coca to deal with these [Indians]. Also there are here more than two hundred Pastas Indians, who come for the same trade. There are eighty Pastas Indians, who are like natives; these are camayos, that is to say, that they are like stewards of the owners of the coca clearings, and they are staying with these natives, because they give them land in which to plant; and in this manner they are now like the natives. (author's translation)


the northern boundary, was arrived at through Jij6n y Caamano's study of toponyms and his archaeological investigations.

Recent anthroponym data of Salomon and Grosboll (1986:396) confirm that the northern area of the valleys east of Quito had a "northern" or Imbabura linguistic affiliation. They believe that this linguistic affiliation probably reflects a social boundary, dividing the northern mound-building peoples (Le., Cara) from the southern nonmound-building peoples (the latter are referred to as either Panzaleo or Quitu [Jij6n y Caamano 1951:77-79; Perez 1960]).3

The eastern boundary of the Cara culture is generally taken to be the Rio Pisque and the eastern cordillera. The western boundary is unclear Gij6n y Caamano 1951:74-75), though it may have extended into the western montana region. Paz Ponce de Le6n (1897 [1582]:105, 107) mentions Intag, located on the humid western slopes of the western cordillera, as one of the four pueblos of the province of Otavalo and part of an encomienda in his corregimiento. Thus, there is a good possibility that the historically documented Cara occupation extended at least this far to the west (this is confirmed archaeologically-see below).

Linguistic research places the Cara language in the Barbacoan group of Chibchan (Greenberg 1987; Mason 1950:184; Loukotka 1968:250), a classification which aligns it with the still extant Cayapa and Colorado cultural groups and languages of the western montana and lowland regions of central Ecuador (but see Bernardez 1979). There is a belief by many Ecuadorian scholars of a direct relationship between these ethnographically documented groups and the Cara culture from which they were supposedly derived (e.g., Jij6n Caamano 1951:93-94; Larrea 1972:110-111; Perez 1960:139).

As the linguist Stark (1983:798-799) explains, originally a Barbacoa language extended from north of the Rio Guaytara in Columbia to the western part of Tungurahua Province in central Ecuador, spilling over the western slopes from Quito to the south. From glottochronological calculations, Stark (1983:798) estimates that by about the first century A.D. the language was divided into a Cayapa-Colorado branch and a Coaiquer branch. The latter occupied the area from the Chota Valley to the north, while the former occupied the area from Ibarra to the south. The Cayapa-Colorado branch then divided itself at about A.D. 1000 when another unnamed cultural group occupied the Guayllabamba Valley, creating a wedge between the north and south highland speakers and eventually leading to the language separation (Cayapa in the

3Jij6n y Caamano (1951:79) writes the following with respect to the southem distribution of earthen mounds and Cara toponyms:

... there are no "tolas" [earthen mounds] from Pomasqui to the south, and in the Chillos Valley the last is near Sangolqui; these [earthen mounds], common in Quinche, are very rare in Tumbaco and Cumbaya; the surnames and geographic names of the Caranqui type are mixed with those of the Panzaleo type, diminishing in the same proportion as the "tolas." Everything indicates a recent advance by the Caranquis [Cara], coming close to Quito, but not reaching it (author's translation).

As far as this author is aware, the mounds to which Jij6n y Caamano refers, located east of Quito, were never described. However, if they are similar to those described by Uhle (1926) for the Cumbaya area, they may not, in fact, be related to a Cara occupation.


north and Colorado in the south).4 With expulsion of the Cayapa from the area around Ibarra (Barrett 1925:31) and later displacement by non-Indian settlers in the highlands (Stark 1983:799), the Cayapa and Colorado became entirely residents of the tropical montana and lowland forests of western Ecuador.

To summarize the historic and linguistic data presented so far, it is clear that what we may refer to as a single ethnic unit-the Cara-was distributed within a fairly well-defined geographical area in northern Ecuador. An abrupt boundary was located at the Chota River valley in the north, and another somewhat less precisely defined boundary was located to the south somewhere along the Guayllabamba drainage basin. The heights of the eastern cordillera also served as a boundary, though to the west the Cara range evidently extended into the tropical montana. However, it was only on the northern and southern boundaries that the Cara geographical range directly abutted territories of other known ethnic groups-the Pastos in the north and the Panzaleos or Quitus in the south. To the east and west specific boundaries with lowland or montana ethnic groups have not been identified.

With respect to social organization, Paz Ponce de Le6n (1897[1582]:111) relates that:

The communities [pueblos] of all of this corregimiento anciently had in each community or population division [parcialidad] their chief that governed them by tyranny, because the one that was more able and valiant, this one they had for [their] ruler and him they obeyed and respected and paid tribute; and the Indians did not have anything more than what the chief allowed them to have; such that he was ruler of everything that the Indians possessed and of their women and sons and daughters and he helped himself to all of them as if they were his slaves, except the merchant Indians, that did not serve their chief as did the rest, they only paid tribute of gold and cloth and beads of white and red bone. [author's translation]

Paz Ponce de Le6n (1897[1582]:116) describes houses as

some round huts covered with straw; all of them are small and the walls of them are of thick sticks woven together and covered with mud inside and out. The houses of the chiefs and lesser lords are of the same manner, except that they are larger and have a large beam in the center in order to support the house. [author's translation]

Paz Ponce de Le6n ([1582]1897:111) also indicates that anciently the Indians of his corregimiento,

brought war upon one another about the land they possessed, and the one that was most able displaced the other of all he possessed; and these controversies the Indians have always had with their neighbors, of a manner that all was disorder. [author's translation]

4According to Jij6n y Caamano (1951:93), during an unspecified earlier period the Panzaleos expanded into northern Ecuador, occupying a much larger area than that described for this cultural group during the sixteenth century. At the time of the Inca conquest, the Cayapa were still in the process of reconquest of their native north Ecuadorian highland valleys, bringing with them the knowledge of mound construction they had learned during their exodus to the lowland coastal areas (Jij6n y Caamano 1951:94).

ETIlNICITY AND ADAPTATION 201

Borja (1897[1582]:132-133) also provides a very similar statement with respect to the Pimampiro area above the Chota Valley.

At least four social classes are indicated by the above accounts. These include a paramount chief class (cacique), a principal or intermediate chief class ("lesser lords" of parcialidades; d. Netherly 1984:231), a commoner class, and a class of mercaderes or trader Indians (the latter class, however, could be more of an occupational specialization rather than a social class). It is also clear that a number of independent chiefdoms were present in the Cara area, and that warfare and feuding were common between neighboring chiefdoms.

Mechanisms for the formation of temporary alliances between chiefdoms are suggested by the protracted nature of the Inca conquest. Cieza de Leon (1959[1553]:48), for example, indicates

Those of Otavalo, Cayambe, Cochasqul, Pifo, and other peoples north of Quito had made an alliance among themselves not to allow themselves to be dominated by the Inca.

Cabello Valboa (1951[1586]:369) indicates much the same. However, the incessant warfare between neighboring chiefdoms, as mentioned by Paz Ponce de Leon and Borja, suggests that such alliances must have been very fragile.

With respect to subsistence, Paz Ponce de Leon (1897[1582]:114) states,

Now I have said that in this land the native Indians of it rely and have relied for their sustenance upon maize and beans and lupine beans [Lupinus mutabi/isl and potatoes and sweet potatoes, that are batatas [Spanish potato, Convolvulus batatas l, and some small plants that they call guaca-mullos, and at the present they rely upon and sustain themselves with all of these and with wheat and barley and lettuces and cabbages and other greens that have been brought from Spain. [author's translation 1

Caillavet (1983:13-19) discusses archival information relating to agriculture, providing evidence for the extensive use of raised fields for the cultivation of potatoes, com, vegetables, and probably totora (a marsh reed used for weaving mats). She also notes the importance of irrigation canals as indicated by early Colonial documents.

With respect to the use of raised fields, it is of interest that Paz Ponce de Leon (1897[1582]:108-109) mentions widespread evidence for previously worked agriculturalland. He attributes this to the existence of a very large indigenous population prior to the Inca conquest.

Although the above account suggests a sizeable population, specific data for the Cara region and individual chiefdom polities are very difficult to ascertain from historic sources. Experimental agricultural data obtained by Knapp (1984:302-306) indicate that densities of 750 people/km2 would be expected with raised field agriculture. Furthermore, such an intensive cropping system would have been attractive to farmers once valley slope densities reached 125 people/km2 in the maize elevations, and 70 people/km2 in the higher potato elevations. ConSidering population size estimates based on historical sources as reported by this author (Athens 1978a, 1980) and Larrain Barros (1980), as well as his own experimental findings, Knapp (1984:399) suggests that there were approximately 155,000 people within the region during late prehistoric times. Assuming 18 (Athens 1978a:139, 148-149) or 21 (Knapp 1984:316-318, 336-337) chiefdom polities (as indicated by ramp mound


sites) with approximately equivalent populations, Knapp's estimate works out to either 8,611 or 7,381 people per chiefdom. Such figures, while quite speculative, are not at all out of line with what might be expected for chiefdom populations (cf. Drennan 1987).5

The only indication of regional economic specialization in the Cara zone concerns the production of cotton and coca in the Chota and Guayllabamba river valleys (Aguilar 1897[1582]:125; Borja 1897[1541]:133, 134; Paz Ponce de Leon 1897[1582]: 116-117) and salt at Las Salinas (Paz Ponce de Leon 1897[1582]:116) just south of the Chota Valley. However, the extent to which such activities of the early Colonial period also characterized the Cara region prior to Spanish and Inca conquest is open to question. In any case, in so far as agriculture is concerned, it is clear that the environmental mosaic of the region would necessitate a certain amount of variability in cultivars and production strategies. There is no information, however, that would suggest any kind of social and economic organization resembling the vertical archipelago model proposed by Murra (1972) for Peru (Athens 1978a:119-120; Salomon 1986:9-10). In this respect, it is important to note that the physical environment of the Ecuadorian Andes, and particularly northern Ecuador, is fundamentally different from that of Peru (see especially Salomon 1986:22-28) in that among other things, the climate of Peru is much less equable and the different ecological zones are separated by much greater distances.

The above should not be interpreted to mean that there were no mechanisms for bringing to the Cara chiefdoms exotic goods from distant areas, such as coca, salt, cotton, medicinal plants, marine shell, and so forth. Mercaderes, or traders, may have facilitated regional exchange of goods, assuming some continuity in cultural practices between the prehistoric (pre-Inca) and early historic periods. Furthermore Salomon (1986:114) has documented interregional trade initiated by nonspecialist Andean farmers in the Quito area. Cara farmers may have done likewise, though there is no specific information to that effect.

Although historical accounts of the Cara are immensely valuable, they are silent on many details of interest to the social scientist. Also, there is the question of the historical reliability of the accounts for the pre-Inca period: they were all written long after two major social upheavals. Both of these problems can be circumvented in some measure with archaeological investigations, the currently available data of which will now be presented.

ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH-THE LATE PERIOD

The archaeological manifestations of the Cara culture are collectively designated as belonging to the Late Period (Athens 1978a, 1980). Based on a series of radiocarbon

5Bela1ccizar, writing in 1549 but probably referring to the year of his conquest in 1534, reported that the cacique (paramount chief) of Otavalo had 1,500 to 2,000 Indians (1936[1549] :356). If these are considered to be only the tributary Indians, and a population adjustment factor of 4.7 is applied (both points are suggested by Larrain Barros 1980:122 in a detailed study of the data), then the population range for the Otavalo chiefdom falls between 7,050 and 9,400 people. Although perhaps fortuitous, it is interesting that this estimate so precisely coincides with the estimate derived from individual chiefdoms based on Knapp's overall figure of 155,000 people


dates reported by this author (Athens 1978a, 1980), Oberem (1969, 1970), and Meyers (1975) from four sites, the Late Period is chronologically defined as lasting from about A.D. 1250 to 1525.6 The principal diagnostics of the Late Period are large quadrilateral earth mounds with ramps and a type of large jar with red line painting on buff (Figure 3; see Athens 1978a, 1980 for discussion of diagnostics).

Primarily through the use of aerial photographs, a total of 18 definite ramp mound sites are known (there are additionally three sites with possible ramp mounds), and 14 other mound sites without ramps have been recorded? A map showing the distribution of these sites, most of which have been checked by ground survey and mapped by the author, is presented in Figure 2. As may be seen, ramp mound sites are found throughout the region. They occur in a variety of environmental zones, including the temperate intermontane basins up to 3,000 m, the hot, dry Chota Valley, and the humid montana forest area of the west (i.e., the Intag region; see also Lippi [1986, 1987] for another recently discovered ramp mound site in this area and other details concerning the region's prehistory). The distribution of ramp mound sites conforms quite closely with historical data on the boundaries of the Cara region.8 Such sites are not known from the coastal lowland areas occupied by the ethnographic Cayapa (see Tolstoy 1987).

for the region. However, use of Belalcazar's population figure assumes that there was little or no change in population as a result of the Inca conquest.

EYrhe end date of 1525 is an estimate based on historic documents. Inca administrative construction in the Cara region was very minimal, being limited to Caranqui (Athens 1978a:217) and Quinche (Jijon y Caamafio 1914:71-81). This suggests a very brief presence. Hyams and Ordish (1963:119) believe that it was probably in 1513 that the Inca began their final effort to incorporate northern Ecuador. Assuming a protracted conflict-evidenced by the construction of numerous hill-top pucaras or military forts in the Cara region (Athens 1978a:111; Plaza Schuller 1976, 1977)-a terminal date of 1525 for the pre-Incaic Cara occupation does not appear unreasonable.

7Gondard and Lopez (1983) have recently completed an intensive study of aerial photographs, locating all visible archaeological features in northern Ecuador. Unfortunately, they made very little effort to field check their aerial photograph site locations, a factor which likely has resulted in some misidentifications and perhaps an overstatement of actual site numbers. Nevertheless, their work, which includes an excellent discussion of the archaeology of northern Ecuador, is extremely valuable for its systematic approach and well-drawn maps, providing an excellent basis for future studies.

8Regarding the southern extent of mounds (not necessarily only those pertaining to the Late Period), Jijon y Caamafio (1914:300) writes,

To the south it can be affinned that tolas [earthen mounds I do not exist on the south bank of the Guayllabamba. They do not exist either in the valleys of Pomasqui, Quito and Chillo, and we understand that they are not very common in that of Tumbaco (1), in whose western part we believe they are absolutely lacking; we have been assured that they exist in Niebli, Nono, and other towns located south of the Guayllabamba canyon, but on the slopes of mountains, toward the coast. ...

(1) The boundary of tolas in Tumbaco Valley is very difficult to determine; they are numerous in Quinche, they exist in Pifo, and we have not seen them either in Tumbaco or Cumbaya; maybe the boundary, for this area, is the deep bed of the Chiche River (author's translation).

(continued)


10 - -- - -centimeters

Figure 3. Partially restored large jar from Socapamba mound 15. Painting is a dark rust color on buff. The wide vertical lines and rim have a rose-colored slip with polish. Vessel orifice is 24 cm in diameter, and height of restored section is 56 cm.

ETHNICIIT AND ADAPTATION 205

Many of the ramp mound sites are quite large. The site at the Hacienda Zuleta (1m 13), for example, has 148 recorded mounds, of which 13 have ramps (Figure 4). The base of the largest mound measures 84 m square and it has a height of 8 m. The ramp is 159 m long. As discussed by Athens and Osborn (1974), the construction of such mounds represents a tremendous labor effort that would be most likely associated with a chiefdom level of social organization.9

Excavations at Socapamba (Im-10), a site having 60 mo~nds including two with ramps, demonstrate that some mound sites have a time depth much greater than just the Late period. Here mounds were being built by at least AD. 500 to 700, and some archaeological deposits are from an even earlier time period (Athens 1978a:126-137). The occupation of Cochasqul (Pi-4), a site with 45 mounds of which nine have ramps, dates from approximately AD. 950 (Oberem 1975:79, 1981). It appears probable that the number of mounds at a site is at least partially an indication of the length of occupation. Mound sites do not appear to have been nucleated settlements or towns, but rather loci of settlement for high-ranking individuals and perhaps their retainers.

Occupation at all of the ramp mound sites seems to have been contemporaneous during the Late Period. This is suggested not only by the presence of diagnostic Late Period pottery at all sites for which information is available (15 sites), but also by the relatively regular spacing of such sites throughout the region. Nearest neighbor analysis indicates a strong tendency for maximal spacing for the 12 ramp mound sites in the OtavaIo and Ibarra basin (Athens 1978a) where major geographic irregularities are minimized. This kind of patterning would not be expected if these sites had been occupied at different time periods, in which case there would be a more random spacing pattern. An implication of this finding is that territorial boundaries between the ramp mound chiefdoms probably remained relatively stable throughout the Late Period. The regular spacing pattern is also a strong indication of competition between the chiefdoms (see Athens 1978a and 1980, 1988 for a discussion of these points).

The function of ramp moun,ds frequently has been viewed as ceremonial or religious in nature (Gondard and Lopez 1983:267; Jijon y Caamafto 1914:295-298; Oberem 1982:342, 1975:75, 1969:322; Uhle 1939:12). However, based on excavations at a number of mounds at the Socapamba site (Im-10), the Pinsaqul site (Im-2), and the Otavalo site (1m-I), this author (Athens 1978a:172) has suggested that a domestic or habitation function is more probable. Presumably the ramp mounds served as house foundations for high-ranking chiefs. This view receives support from the ethnohis-

Gondard and L6pez (1983:98-103) provide a detailed discussion of the distribution of earth mounds for all but the southern boundary. However, like Jij6n y Caamano, they are unable to give any indication of the temporal placement of most of their sites. Their distributional findings are very similar to those of Athens (1978a, 1980).

9The labor effort that might have been required for mound construction was calculated for Paila-tola of the Im-4 site (Athens and Osborn 1974:10-11). The site is located within and around the town of Atuntaqui. Paila-tola, a quadrilateral structure, measures 80 m at the base, 50 m at the top, 22 m high, and has a ramp 120 m long and 25 m wide at the base Gij6n y Caamano 1914:294). There is a depression 40 m in diameter on top. According to Athens and Osborn, "One hundred men each carrying 3.17 cubic meters from a distance of 50 meters would require 330.6 man-days to build the mound" (1974:10). There is reason to believe that this may be a conservative estimate.

206

HACIENDA ZULETA

EARTHEN MOUNDS - Im-13

o 400 L-..-o...-J

Meters

]. STEPHEN ATHENS

Figure 4. Plan view map of large mound site at the Hacienda Zuleta (Im-13).

toric studies of Salomon (1986:126), who was unable to find any reference to the existence of special ceremonial buildings or architecture in the Quito region. As he notes, "the chief's household itself is likely to have been the main place of ceremonial action" (Salomon 1986:126), which was likely as true for the Cara region as for the Quito area. The other mounds-usually of a hemispherical shape-were used either for habitation or burial purposes, and sometimes for both. Their sizes are quite variable, ranging from less than S m in diameter and 1 m in height to over 40 m in diameter and heights of 8 to 10 m.

No one mound site appears to dominate in the region in terms of size or structural elaboration. This might have been expected if control over important resources, trading routes, or prime agricultural land had been factors in social or political development. However, despite the differential distribution of resources and productive potential because of the region's heterogeneous environment, there is no indication that these were of any consequence in terms of site growth or sociopolitical complexity. The Chota Valley mound sites (Im-12, 1m-IS), for example, were in prime locations for the production of coca and cotton; however, there is nothing about these


sites to suggest that they were any more or less important than sites in the temperate basins.

There is relatively little archaeological information concerning agricultural practices during the Late Period. Mano and metate grinding stones are common at mound sites, and carbonized com is frequently found in excavations.

Regarding field systems, three small areas of raised fields have been noted. These are in the vicinity of the Paquiestancia site (Pi-2), the Cayambe site (Pi-3), and the San Rafael site (Im-14; Athens 1978a:120-121). The former two agricultural sites cover an area of approximately 5 km2, while the latter consists of approximately 2 km2• These fields, found in low-lying and often water-logged areas, may have been much more extensive before the advent of mechanized agriculture (up to as much as 59 km2 according to Knapp and Denevan 1985:202).10 Their association with ramp mound sites suggests a Late Period origin, and Knapp and Denevan (1985:189) report a single radiocarbon date of A.D. 1450 ± 100 from the San Rafael site (see also Molestina Zaldumbide 1985).

Knapp (1984, 1988), in a detailed study of raised-field agriculture, shows that it was a highly labor intensive double cropping system on reclaimed wetlands. He suggests that raised fields formerly were quite extensive in the valley flats and that their high productivity was a major economic factor in the development of the Late Period-Cara chiefdoms (Knapp 1984:306-307, 331, 352). In arguing against this conclusion, however, it may be noted that a significant number of ramp mound sites are not located on the valley flats where access to raised-field agriculture would have been possible (e.g., Im-6, Im-lO, Im-12, 1m-IS, Im-19, Pi-4, and probably others).

Small areas of possible agricultural terraces have been observed in the vicinity of the raised fields, though Knapp (1984:236-246; 1988:123-129) suggests that these are most likely defensive structures unrelated to agricultureY Jij6n y Caamafio (1920:113) also cites evidence for ancient canals in the Cara region, believing that II the cultivation of a great part of Caranqui [Cara] territory is scarcely possible without it. II 12 This would certainly be true for the dry Chota and Guayllabamba Valleys and neighboring areas. However, most modem indigenous agriculture in the temperate valleys relies on rainfall, which suggests that prehistoric use of irrigation in these areas may have

100yhe measurements of Gondard and Lopez (1983:145-165) vary considerably from those of Athens. For the Paquiestancia and Cayambe sites (their site numbers (P-088, P-095, P-106, P-108), they list a total area of 12.71 krn2. For the San Rafael site (their site number 1-097), they list a total area of 4.75 krn2. Most oftheir other sites are much smaller (see also Knapp 1984:250). Batchelor (1980) provides further information from a field study of the Cayambe site.

11 Additional information on terrace sites is provided in Gondard and Lopez (1983:135-144). For Imbabura Province and northern Pichincha Province they list a total of 28 sites having an area of 17.38 krn2. Nearly half of the total area in terraces is from a series of sites located 17 krn west of Otavalo on the western slopes of the cordillera.

12Jijon y Caamafio (1920:113) writes that

In Urcuqui there is a canal of great antiquity. The town of Quinche possesses one, constructed, it seems, by the Incas, and [the town) of Pimampiro [has) three, that originate in the canyon near Chapi, which takes its water from the Chota [River) (Borja 1897:130) and another that was

(continued)


been unnecessary. As Knapp notes, "There is remarkably little evidence of pre-Incaic canal irrigation in the Equatorial Andes" (1984:233). A recent study (Knapp 1987) provides additional field data and archival information concerning irrigation in the region. Finally, the presence of ancient ditched fields on sloping land has been documented by Knapp and Preston (1987) for the northern highlands.

Animal husbandry during the Late Period included llamas, guinea pigs, and dogs, all of which were commonly found in the Socapamba archaeological deposits (Athens 1978a:280-281). Bones of wild game, such as deer, tapir, and agouti, were not found at this site, suggesting that these animals were either not exploited or that they were perhaps unavailable in the Socapamba area. Rabbit bones, however, were relatively common in the Socapamba midden.

Other than the agricultural features, only a single Late Period nonmound site has been identified. This site (Im-21) was probably the locus of a small farmstead. Many other such sites undoubtedly exist, but they would be difficult to find without intensive ground survey.

At this time, the archaeological data do not permit a quantitative estimate of population size for the Late Period. There are indications, however, that regional population size must have been quite high. The experimental findings of Knapp's investigations of raised-field agricultural systems already have been noted (the labor effort required for this type of production system does not make economic sense until population densities reach 7S0/km2). With the presumed conversion oflarge tracts of previously unused wetlands to this highly intensive form of cultivation during the Late Period, population levels had to have been quite high. Also, given the fact that ramp mound sites have a mean nearest neighbor distance in the Otavalo-Ibarra basin of only 6.56 km, the availability of unused arable land was probably minimal during the Late Period. Thus, agricultural intensification was apparently the only alternative for sustaining a large and presumably growing population. Finally, the tremendous labor effort required for construction of the many very large quadrilateral earthen mounds during the Late Period is in itself suggestive of relatively high population levels.

REGIONAL TRADE AND EXCHANGE

The importance of regional trade and exchange during the Late Period can be judged to some extent in terms of the quantity of exotic materials identified in Late Period archaeological contexts. In this regard, it may be noted that small quantities of Tuza pottery and Cosanga-Pillaro "thin-ware" pottery (also called Panzaleo pottery) have been identified. The former is from the Pasto region to the north (see Francisco 1969), while the Cosanga variant of the latter probably derives form the eastern lowlands

in ruins and was restored by Grateful Cleric (Ord6f1es de Cevallos 1614:225) (author's translation).

There is also reference to a "large ancient canal" originating from springs at Carangue that was made at a Cabildo meeting in Ibarra in 1607 (Garces G. 1937:59-61).


near the headwaters of the Napo River and the Pillaro variant is from the highland area northeast of Ambato in central Ecuador (see Porras 1975 and 1987:204-212, 240-245). Both variants, though sharing many aspects of vessel shape and style, are highly distinctive, and there can be little doubt of their origin outside the Cara region. Only the Pillar variant is relevant to the present discussion as the Cosanga variant appears to date prior to the time of mound construction.13

What is of interest about the exotic pottery is that so little of it was actually present at sites that have been investigated in some detail (1m-I, Im-2, Im-6, Im-l0, Im-12, 1m-IS, Im-19, Pi-4). For example, in a controlled systematic surface collection at the Socapamba site (lm-l0), 7,689 sherds were recovered (2.59 sherds per m 2). Of this total, there were just 14 Pillaro sherds (11 plain and 3 painted) and 9 Tuza sherds (Athens 1978a:173-184). Excavations at the Socapamba site also produced similarly small numbers of Pillaro and Tuza sherds. At the Cochasqul mound site (Pi-4), which is located at the opposite extremity of Cara territory, Meyers (1975:106-108) reports very small quantities of these sherds. Meyers also observes that Pillaro and Tuza

13Pillaro and Cosanga pottery are strikingly similar in terms of vessel shape and their very thin-walled construction. However, based on this author's experience with Cosanga and Pillaro pottery in the northern and central highlands, the two types can be readily distinguished: Pillaro pottery, referred to in earlier studies by the name of Panzaleo (Jij6n y Caamano 1951:209-211), has a predominately orange exterior paste, while that of Cosanga is creamcolored. The latter also has a coarse volcanic sand temper, while the former has a fine micaceous temper. A stratigraphic record of imported Cosanga pottery is present at the La Chimba site, located at 3,180 m near the Cordillera Oriental at the eastern boundary of the Cara region (identified as Pi-1 in Figure 2). Radiocarbon dating of the deposits indicates that Cosanga pottery began to appear about 700 B.C. and lasted until about AD. 300 (dates based on 10 unpublished and 1 published radiocarbon dates-see Athens 1990; more dates are expected for a refined chronology). Prior to about 100 B.C. its frequency was relatively low, whereupon it climbs steeply, only to fall sharply after about AD. 100 (see density graph, Athens 1990:67). These dates compare to dates of 420 B.C. and 600 B.c.assigned by Porras (1975:151 and 1987:240, respectively) for the beginning of the Cosanga Phase, and AD. 600 or 700 for the termination of the lowland phase and beginning of the "intense migration" into the highlands (Porras 1975:151 and Porras and Piana 1975:241, respectively). Porras and Piana (1975:242) note that almost 80% of the Pillaro pottery in Ecuadorian museums and collections comes from the Pillaro area northeast of Ambato, the vicinity of which this author believes may be the origin for this pottery. Porras (1975, unnumbered map between pages 152 and 153; 1987:204), on the other hand, believes that the Cosanga migrants established their highland settlements over a very broad area from as far south as Riobamba to the Carchi area of northern Ecuador.

Excavations and radiocarbon dates from the Socapamba site in the Cara region indicate that Pillaro-type pottery is present in this area of the highlands by about AD. 700 to 800, and continues to be present through the Late Period (Athens 1978a, 1980). During the Late Period there is positive painting on vessel exteriors.

It is perhaps unnecessary to point out that detailed and well-documented field studies in both the Cosanga and Pillaro areas would be most helpful in determining the nature and relationship of these two pottery variants, as well as their geographical and cultural contexts.

210 J. STEPHEN ATIlENS

pottery, while very limited in quantity, are widely distributed in the Cara region.14 Regarding other possibly imported materials not known to occur naturally in the

Cara area, there is only the sparsest indication for the prehistoric presence of marine shell, jade, and metals. This limited evidence derives almost entirely from the investigations of Jijon y Caamafio (1914, 1920). Where provenience is given, most of the artifact materials are from shaft burials, which almost certainly predate the Late Period. Investigations by the author at Socapamba and other mound sites produced only a single nonceramic exotic artifact, and this was a copper ornament from an early (A.D. 700-800) context (Athens 1978a:128-129). No exotic artifacts (other than the previously discussed pottery) are reported from the Cochasqui site (Oberem 1969, 1975, 1981, 1982).

That there may have been more interregional trade or exchange during the earlier prehistoric periods is suggested by evidence from the La Chimba site (Pi-I; Athens and Osborn 1974; Athens 1978a, 1990). Up to 3 m of stratified refuse deposits have been documented at this site, which is located close to the upper limits of agriculture at the eastern extremity of the study region. La Chimba has a welldefined ceramic sequence, and recent excavations resulted in the recovery of a large number of artifacts, animal bones, and botanical samples (Athens 1990). The initial date of the La Chimba occupation is about 700 B.C. while the latest date is approximately A.D. 300. (Athens 1990 and unpublished radiocarbon dating records).

Among the exotic artifacts from La Chimba are a number of fragments and several artifacts of marine shell (one of the latter being a relief carving of a fish), a ceramic grater with imbedded stones (possibly for processing manioc), a small but consistent presence of Cosanga pottery from the eastern lowlands (previously discussed), a coca-chewing ceramic figurine fragment (suggesting use of coca), and remains of gold working. When this evidence is considered with the metal artifact from Socapamba and Jijon y Caamano's data from shaft burials, long-distance trade or exchange, although probably always conducted on a small scale, was apparently more important during the earlier periods in the Cara region.

A project has just been initiated by the author to chemically source the obsidian flake debris that is commonly found in archaeological deposits of the Cara region (the analysis was performed by Christopher Stevenson using X-ray fluorescence). Although only 22 samples from 4 sites have been analyzed thus far, none of the samples can be matched with other samples or quarry locations from outside the region (see Asaro et ai. 1981a, 1981b). However, the recent investigations at La Chimba have shown that another type of obsidian, Mullumica, was being imported from a source about 30 km east of Quito during at least the earlier periods (thus far Mullumica obsidian, which is very distinctive-see Salazar 1985-has not been observed at mound sites). In addition to La Chimba, this same Mullumica obsidian has also been found in small quantities at the Tababuela site in the Chota Valley (near the confluence with the Rio Ambi-see Berenguer and Echeverria 1988), which dates to the La Chimba middle ceramic period (Athens 1990). This indicates that it was fairly

14Meyers (1975:107) also reports the presence of Inca-style pottery at Cochasqui in the upper archaeological deposits. He is uncertain whether this pottery is imported or if it is a local imitation. The exact quantity is not mentioned.


widely distributed during the earlier occupations in the region. Thus, preliminary indications are that some of the obsidian of the Cara region was derived from sources outside the area during the earlier periods, but that possibly none of it came from outside sources during the later periods.

Regarding distributional patterns of the chemically sourced obsidian (non-Mullumica obsidian) within the region, it is apparent that at least one of the three types was widely circulated. Once additional samples can be obtained for analysis, it should be possible to document more accurately distributional patterns.

THE ADAPTIVE SIGNIFICANCE OF ETHNICITY

As should be clear from the preceding discussion, the Late Period-Cara culture represents a well-defined and highly recognizable social entity in the northern highlands of Ecuador. Its boundaries with other social groups to the north and south are generally quite distinctive and abrupt. This is clearly suggested by historical accounts and has been confirmed archaeologically. Within the Cara region, there is what can be called a "unity of cultural forms," particularly as can be seen from the presence of ramp mounds and large jars with rust slip and red line decoration. These regionally unique cultural forms suggest that the Late Period-Cara culture can be considered an ethnic group. The Late Period-Cara people evidently had a shared cultural identity and they seem to have markedly differentiated themselves from social groups outside the region. External contact was apparently limited, and the few exotic artifacts present in the area-namely, small quantities of Pillaro and Tuza pottery-suggest minimal trade or exchange. It therefore appears that the Late Period-Cara culture was a relatively closed society, responding little if at all to outside stimuli for its development or functioning despite the close geographic proximity of other social groups.

The question that must now be posed is how to understand the development of such regional ethnicity. For example, why is there a unity of cultural forms at all? This is an especially intriguing question when we consider the amount of feuding and warfare between neighboring Cara groups indicated by historical accounts. Why did not all of these mini-societies, or chiefdoms, just go their own way, developing a dozen or more "mini-cultures" throughout the Cara region? If we reject the theoretically inadequate notions of diffusion and cultural borrowing to explain the rise and development of a distinctive Cara society, what can be offered in their place?

It is proposed here that ethnicity is an adaptation to a regionally competitive environment (see Athens 1988 for a discussion of the causes of competition). Selective pressures operate to maintain a region-wide cultural system even though there is no formalized systemic organization unifying its different sociopolitical elements (Le., individual chiefdoms) within the region. An essential assumption of this argument is that single chiefdoms within the Cara region would not have been viable social systems in that they would not have had the capability for ensuring long-term security and survival of their members. This is because competition from neighboring ethnic groups for limited arable land in the narrow Andean valleys constantly exerts pressure for territorial expansion. Individual chiefdoms, especially in border areas, would be easy victims to this expansionist tendency. However, ethnic membership enables single chiefdoms to resist territorial incursions or absorption by virtue of the ascriptive and exclusionary principles inherent in ethnicity (see Barth 1969:10-16).


What this means is that any territorial incursions against one group within a region would automatically be a concern to all the other groups precisely because the exclusionary principle is being challenged. Shared cultural values-the essence of ethnicity-can facilitate the formation of expedient alliances among otherwise independent groups for the purpose of undertaking effective resistance against outsiders.

The selective advantage of ethnicity over other forms of supralocal organization, such as a single region-wide polity, is that it is an energetically very efficient method for providing security to its members. It is always there, yet the need for energy and information exchange between the various sub groupings (i.e., chiefdoms) can be minimal. Thus, there is no need for a hierarchy of administrators with its attendant costs. Furthermore, any external threat can be met with precisely the correct offsetting force whether it be a single chiefly polity, several neighboring polities, or a region-wide coalition of polities. This kind of expedient organizational response through temporary alliances can be achieved for just the period of time such action is needed; when an immediate external threat is lacking, there is no energy investment needed for the maintenance of a supralocal organization. Clearly, an ethnically organized population in northern highland Ecuador could pose a formidable challenge to outside threats to any part of that ethnic unit's territorial integrity.

The best example of how regional ethnicity functions as an adaptive response and its effectiveness for maintaining the security of local populations is, of course, the Inca conquest of the Cara. In this case, an extremely large conquest state-the Incanearly met its match with the small and loosely organized Cara polities. Although the Incas eventually prevailed, the military hostilities were quite protracted. According to Murra (1946:808), they may have lasted as long as 17 years. The reason for this was that the small Cara polities were able to flexibly coalesce and disunite in direct proportion to the strength of the opposition. Cieza de Le6n's 1959[1553]:48) reference to the alliances formed among the different Cara groups will be recalled (see quote above). Although the Inca eventually prevailed because of their vastly superior resources, the effectiveness of the Cara resistance is nevertheless remarkable. Lesser challengers than the Inca would never have had a chance.

Several hypotheses can be deduced from the above theoretical model about the adaptive significance of ethnicity. One of these is that given the effectiveness of ethnicity for ensuring the security of human populations pertaining to a particular ethnic group, territorial boundaries should show a great deal of stability through time. The second hypothesis is that ethnicity as manifested by overt cultural forms, such as a distinctive cultural tradition, should become increasingly well-defined as competition between human populations increases. A third hypothesis is that cultural development through time will tend to be insular in character: contacts with other ethnic groups shoulu h'lve little or no influence on the cultural content of the ethnic group in question.

The data relevant to hypothesis 1 come from the northern boundary of the Cara region, located in the Chota River valley. That this has been a very stable cultural boundary through time is suggested by the absence of the Capuli-PiartalTuza style sequence of Carchi Province south of the Chota River valley, as well as by the absence of the large circular earthen embankments (bohios) associated with the Piartal and Tuza periods (see Francisco 1969 for a description of this se-

ETHNICI1Y AND ADAPTATION 213

quence).15 Likewise, the archaeological sequence of the Cara region appears to be absent from the area north of the Chota River valley (Carchi Province), including the pottery styles recovered from the earliest shaft-and-chamber tombs (Athens and Osborn 1974; Meyers et al. 1975), the La Chimba ceramic sequence (Athens 1978b, 1990), or the earthen mounds and pottery styles of the later periods (Athens 1978a, 1980). As the Cara region archaeological sequence covers a period of over 2,500 years, the Chota River valley clearly has been a very stable cultural boundary.

Regarding hypothesis 2, there are measurement difficulties in determining whether overt cultural forms become better defined as competition increases. One index of competition is regional population size (see Athens 1978a, 1988 for warranting arguments). Although archaeological data are far too limited to provide any kind of reliable estimate, previous discussions concerning population size, as will be recalled, strongly pointed to very high population levels during the Late Period. All arable land was evidently completely occupied by Cara farmers. In addition, the reclamation of wetlands for highly labor-intensive agricultural use was initiated. Thus, if regional population size may be taken as an index of competitive pressures, it would appear that competition must have been very intense within Cara territory during the Late Period. With respect to external competition from neighboring ethnic groups to the north and south, data that might relate to population size are virtually absent. However, it can be surmised that population levels in these areas were sufficiently high as to make Cara expansion impractical in the face of these ethnically organized populations.

The question of analyzing overt cultural forms is also problematical because of the subjective nature of how these are determined. In a general sense, however, it does appear that pottery styles become increasingly identifiable through time, which suggests that there was a conscious effort to increasingly affirm and define ethnicity. This is particularly true when the very simple early shaft-and-chamber pottery is compared with the pottery of later periods (d. Athens and Osborn 1974; Meyers et al. 1975). However, the La Chimba sequence indicates that readily identifiable styles nevertheless were present at an early date.

Mound building may also be viewed as an overt cultural form for marking ethnicity (see Weigand, Chapter 10, this volume). In this respect, Renfrew's (1976) investigations of European mounds are relevant. As summarized by Hodder (1979:45), Renfrew suggests that,

large burial mounds and monuments may be used to symbolize local competing groups and lineages. Such mounds may become more important as group awareness in reference to other groups increases in stressful situations.

15Gondard and L6pez (1983:79) have located what they believe are possible bomo sites in Imbabura province as a result of their aerial photograph studies. They describe these sites as generally being dispersed with only a single bomo at each site. This is in contrast to sites found in Carcm Province where numerous bomos are frequently clustered together. They also note that the identification of these sites in Imbabura Province was difficult due to the very slight differences in contrast between the putative archaeological structures and surrounding terrain on the aerial photographs. As they note, a field check of these sites in Imbabura is needed for verification.


Taking Renfrew's idea one step further, it may be argued that the act of mound building may be as important as the structure itself for ethnic identification. Mound construction is often a participatory activity, and this would signal and reaffirm an individual's or group's membership and identity in a particular ethnic unit, as well as lineage affiliation or chiefly allegiance. In this sense, the frequently heard anthropological notion of large-scale prehistoric construction projects as an indicator of the exercise of coercive chiefly authority is probably quite erroneous in many instances (cf. Athens 1988).

The situation appears to be very similar in the Cara region, where mound building begins relatively early with simple hemispherical forms and progresses to the more elaborate ramp and quadrilateral forms by the Late Period. Construction of at least some mounds also appears to have been organized through the participation of different work groups, each of which may have been responsible for filling individual "cells" within the mound (see Athens and Osborn 1974). But it must be emphasized that use of mound data as a measure of ethnicity, like the pottery data, is very subjective.

Hypothesis 3 concerns the increasingly insular or closed character of cultural development through time as ethnicity increases. The data for this hypothesis have already been noted in the section treating regional trade and exchange. As noted, there was apparently little interregional trade or exchange during the Late Period (only small amounts of Pillaro and Tuza pottery). As earlier periods had slightly more articles of trade or exchange, this hypothesis appears to be substantiated.

CONCLUSION

This chapter has presented an examination of the Late Period-Cara society in northern highland Ecuador. Relevant historical accounts were discussed, and the available archaeological data were summarized. A theoretical model was then advanced to account for the development of ethnicity and the apparently autochthonous development of prehistoric Cara society. This model suggests that ethnicity is an adaptation providing security to member units in a regionally competitive social environment. It enables small and relatively independent segments of a regional ethnic entity to meet and overcome external challenges to its territorial integrity with minimal energetic costs. A regional hierarchical social organization is thereby obviated by this less costly social device. The extremely protracted nature of the Incaic conquest of the Cara demonstrates the effectiveness of this form of social organization for maintaining security and territorial integrity. Three hypotheses were deduced form the theoretical model. Although data needed to confirm these hypotheses were very uneven in quality and quantity, supporting evidence was available for each, and disconfirming evidence was lacking.

It must be noted that the ethnicity model presented here is primarily applicable to sedentary agricultural societies in tropical settings with equable environments. The selective condition presented by seasonal or periodic environments appears to be quite different, and ethnicity may arise and function somewhat differently in such settings (see Athens 1978a, 1980, 1988 for a discussion of these points in relation to the development of social complexity).


ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

An earlier version of this material was presented in a symposium, Current Issues in the Archaeology of the Northern Andes, at the 52nd annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, in Toronto in 1987. I am most grateful to the organizers, Patricia J. Netherly and Karen E. Stothert, for the invitation to participate, thereby providing the impetus for the preparation of this chapter. Fieldwork in Ecuador, conducted between 1972 and 1976, and again in 1989, was sponsored by the Instituto Otavaleno de Antropologia. Funding was provided through grants from the University of New Mexico (1972), Sigma Xi (1976), Wenner-Gren (1976), International Archaeological Research Institute, Inc. (1989), a fellowship from the Organization of American States (1974), and the Fulbright Commission (1989). The manuscript was considerably improved as a result of comments provided by Rosalind Hunter-Anderson. I am extremely grateful for the support and assistance of these individuals and institutions.

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Acosta-Solis, M., 1968, Divisiones Fitogeogrtificas y Formaciones Geobottinicas del Ecuador. Casa de la Cultura Ecuatoriana, Quito.

Aguilar, F. de, 1897, Relacion fecha por mi, Fray Geronimo de Aguilar, de la Orden de Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes, redenti6n de cautivos, de la dotrina y pueblo de Caguasquf y Qui1ca, que dotrino y tengo a mi cargo, en cumplimiento de 10 que por S. M. se me manda y en su nomre el my illustre senor licenciado Francisco de Auncibay, Oidor en La Real Audiencia de Quito [1582]. In Relaciones Geogrtificas de Indias (tomo III) (ed. Jimenez de la Espada). Tipograffa de los Hijos de M. C. Hernandez, Madrid, pp. 124-127.

Asaro, F., H. Michel, and R. Burger, 1981a, Chemical Source Groups in Ecuadorian Obsidian. Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory Preprint No. LBL-13247. Technical Information Department, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley.

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Athens, J., 1978a, Evolutionary Process in Complex Societies and the Late Period-Cara Occupation of Northern Highland Ecuador. Doctoral dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico. University Microfilms, Ann Arbor.

Athens, J., 1978b, Formative Period Occupations in the Highlands of Ecuador: A Comment on Myers. American Antiquity 43:493-496.

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Berenguer, R J., and J. Echeverria A., 1988, ,Ocupaciones del Periodo Formativo en la Sierra Norte del Ecuador?: Un Comentario a Myers y Athens. Sarance 12:65-108. Revista del Instituto Otavalefto de Antropologia, Otavalo.

Bernardez, E., 1979, Linguistica de Esmeraldas: Relaciones Sincr6nicas y Diacr6nicas. Actes du XLIII Congres International des Americanistes, Paris, 1976, Vol. 9A:343-350.

Borja, P., 1897, Relaci6n en Suma de la Doctrina e Beneficio de Pimampiro y de las Cosas Notables que en ella Hay, de la cual es Beneficiado el P. Antonio Borja [1582]. In Relaciones Geograficas de Indias (tomo III) (ed. Jimenez de la Espada). Tipografia de los Hijos de M. C. Hernandez, Madrid, pp. 128-136.

Cabello Valboa, M., 1951, Miscelanea Antartica: Una Historia del Peru Antiguo [1586]. Intituto de Ethnologia, Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, Lima.

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Caillavet, c., 1983, Toponimia Hist6rica, Arqueologia y Formas Prehispanicas de Agricultura en la Regi6n de OtaValO, Ecuador. Bulletin de l'Institut Franr;ais d'Etudes Andines 12:1-21.

Caillavet, c., 1985, La Adaptaci6n de la Dominaci6n Incaica a las Sociedades Autoctonas de la Frontera Septentrional del Imperio: (Territorio Otavalo-Ecuador). Revista Andina 3:403-423.

Cieza de Le6n, P. de, 1959, The Incas of Pedro de Cieza de Le6n [1553]. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman.

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Espinosa Soriano, W., 1988, Los Cayambes y Carangues: Siglos XV-XVI: El Testimonio de la Ethnohistoria (3 Vols.). Colecci6n Curinan. Instituto Otavalefto de Antropologia, Otavalo.

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Gondard, P., and F. L6pez, 1983, Inventario Arqueol6gico Preliminar de los Andes Septentrionales del Ecuador. Ministerio de Agricultura y Ganaderia, Programa Nacional de Regionalizaci6n Agraria, and Office de la Recherche Scientifique et Technique Outre-Mer. Banco Central, Quito.

Greenberg, J., 1987, Language in the Americas. Stanford University Press, Stanford. Hodder, I., 1979, Economic and Social Stress and Material Culture Patterning. American Antiquity

44:446-454. Hyams, E., and G. Ordish, 1963, The Last of the Incas. Longmans, London.


Jij6n y Caamafto, J., 1914, Contribucion al Conocimiento de los Aborigenes de la Provincia de Imbabura. Blass y Cia, Madrid.

Jij6n y Caamano, J., 1920, Nueva Contribucion al Conocimiento de los Aborigenes de la Provincia de Imbabura de la Republica del Ecuador. Boletin de la Sociedad Ecuatoriana de Estudios Historicos Americanos, Vol. IV, Nos. 10-11, Quito.

Jij6n y Caamano, J., 1951, Antropologia Prehisptinica del Ecuador. La Prensa Cat6lica, Quito. Knapp, G., 1984, Soil, Slope and Water in the Equatorial Andes: A Study of Prehistoric Agricultural

Adaptation. Doctoral dissertation, Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin, Madison. University Microfilms, Ann Arbor.

Knapp, G., 1987, Riego Precolonial en la Sierra Norte. Ecuador Debate 14:17-45. Quito. Knapp, G., 1988, Ecologia Cultural Prehisptinica del Ecuador. Biblioteca de Geografia Ecuatoriana 3.

Banco Central del Ecuador. Knapp, G., and W. Denevan, 1985, The Use of Wetlands in the Prehistoric Economy of the

Northern Ecuadorian Highlands. In Prehistoric Intensive Agriculture in the Tropics (ed. I. Farrington). BAR International Series 232, Oxford, pp. 185-207.

Knapp, G., and D. Preston, 1987, Evidence of Prehistoric Ditched Fields on Sloping Land in Northern Highland Ecuador. In Pre-Hispanic Agricultural Fields in the Andean Region (ed. W. Denevan, K. Mathewson, and G. Knapp). BAR International Series 359(i), Oxford, pp. 403-423.

Larrain Barros, H., 1980, Demografia y Asentamientos Indigenas en la Sierra Norte del Ecuador en el Siglo XVI (2 Vols.). Instituto Otavaleno de Antropologia, Otavalo.

Larrea, c., 1972, Prehistoria de la Region Andina del Ecuador. Corporaci6n de Estudios y Publicaciones, Quito.

Lippi, R., 1986, La Arqueologia de los Yumbos: Resultados de Prospecciones en el Pichincha Occidental. Misceldnea Antropologica Ecuatoriana 6:189-207. Boletin de los Museos del Banco Central del Ecuador.

Lippi, R., 1987, The Western Pichincha Project: Survey and Excavations in Ecuador's Western Montana. Paper presented at the 52nd Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Toronto.

Loukotka, c., 1968, Classification of South American Indian Languages. University of California at Los Angeles. Latin American Center, Los Angeles.

Mason, J., 1950, The Languages of South American Indians. In Handbook of South American Indians, Vol. 6 (ed. J. Steward). Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 143, United States Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., pp. 157-318.

Meggers, B., 1966, Ecuador. Frederick A. Praeger, New York. Meyers, A., 1975, La Cenimica de Cochasqui. In Estudios sobre la Arqueologia del Ecuador (ed. U.

Oberem). BAS 3, Estudios Americanistas de Bonn, Seminar fUr Volkerkunde der Universitat Bonn, Bonn, pp. 82-113.

Meyers, A., U. Oberem, J. Wentscher, and W. Wurster, 1975, Dos Pozos Funerarios con Camara Lateral en Malchingui (Provincia de Pichincha). In Estudios sobre la Arqueologia del Ecuador (ed. U. Oberem). BAS 3, Estudios Americanistas de Bonn, Seminar fUr Volkerkunde der Universitat Bonn, Bonn, pp. 114-129.

Molestina Zaldumbide, M., 1985, Investigaciones Arqueo16gicas en la Zona Negativo del Carchi o Caputi. Cu/tura 7:31-82. Revista del Banco Central del Ecuador.

Murra, J., 1946, The Historic Tribes of Ecuador. In Handbook of South American Indians (ed. J. Steward). Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 143, United States Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., pp. 785-821.

Murra, J., 1972, EI'Control Vertical' de un Maximo de pisos Ecol6gicos en la Economia de las Sociedades Andinas. In Vista de la Provincia de Leon de Hudnuco en 1562, Vol. 2 (ed. J. Murra). Universidad Nacional Hermilio Valdizan, Huanuco, pp. 429-476.

Netherly, P., 1984, The Management of Late Andean Irrigation Systems on the North Coast of Peru. American Antiquity 49:227-254.


Oberem, U., 1969, Informe Provisional sobre Algunas Caracteristicas Arquitect6nicas de las Piramides de Cochasqui, Ecuador. Verhandlungen des 38th Internationalen Amerikongresses, Band 1:317-322.

Oberem, U., 1970, Monticulos Funerarios con Pozo en Cochasqui. Boletin de la Academia Nacional de Historia 53:243-249.

Oberem, U., 1975, Informe de Trabajo sobre las Excavaciones de 1964/1965 en Cochasqui, Ecuador. In Estudios sobre la Arqueologfa del Ecuador (ed. U. Oberem). BAS 3, Estudios Americanistas de Bonn, Seminar fiir Volkerkunde der Universitat Bonn, Bonn, pp. 70-79.

Oberem, U. (compiler), 1981, Cochasqu{: Estudios Arqueol6gicos (3 Vols.). Colecci6n Pendeneros. Instituto Otavalefto de Antropologia, Otavalo.

Oberem, U., 1982, Algunos Hallazgos Arqueol6gicos de la Sierra Ecuatoriana, Indicios de Posibles Relaciones con Mesoamerica. In Primer Simposio de Correlaciones Antropol6gicas AndinoMesoamericano (ed. J. Marcos and P. Norton). Escuela Superior Politecnica del Litoral (ESPOL), Guayaquil, pp. 341-345.

Ord6ftez de Cevallos, P., 1614, Historia y Viaje del Mundo. Madrid. Paz Ponce de Le6n, S. de, 1897, Relaci6n y Descripci6n de los Pueblos del Partido de Otavalo

[1582]. In Relaciones Geograficas de Indias (tomo III) (ed. Jimenez de la Espada). Tipografiia de los Hijos de M. C. Hernandez, Madrid, pp. 105-120.

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l6gicos de la Convulsiva Situaci6n de Contacto Cultural. Instituto Otavalefto de Antropologia, Otavalo.

Plaza Schuller, F., 1977, El Complejo de Fortalezas de Pambamarca: Contribuci6n al Estudio de la Arquitectura Militar Prehisplinica en la Sierra Norte del Ecuador. Instituto Otavalefto de Antropologia, Otavalo.

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Porras, G., P. I., and 1. Piana Bruno, 1975, Ecuador Prehist6rico. Imprenta y Ediciones Lexigrama, Quito.

PRONAREG-ORSTOM (Programa Nacional de Regionalizaci6n Agraria-Office de la Recherche Scientifique et Technique Outre-Mer), 1978, Ecuador: Mapa Ecol6gico. Map (1:1,000,000). Quito.

PRONAREG-ORSTOM (Programa Nacional de Regionalizaci6n Agraria-Office de la Recherche Scientifique et Technique Outre-Mer), 1979a, Mapas de Sue/os por Regionalizaci6n. Centre des Antilles-Bureau des Sols, Martinique and Quito.

PRONAREG-ORSTOM (Programa Nacional de Regionalizaci6n Agraria-Office de la Recherche Scientifique et Technique Outre-Mer), 1979b, Isoyetas Medias Anuales e Histogramas Mensuales: Peri6do 1964-1973. Map (1:1,000,000). Quito.

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Actuales. America Indfgena 43:797-821.


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Ecuador. Paper presented at the 52nd Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Toronto.

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ers, Ann Arbor.

Chapter 10

Central Mexico's Influences in Jalisco and Nayarit during the Classic Period

PHIL c. WEIGAND

The highland lake districts of Jalisco and Nayarit were focal points for complex social developments during the Classic period, developments firmly rooted in long sequences of exotic Formative cultures (Galvan 1976, 1984; Kelly 1980; Mountjoy 1972; Oliveros 1974; Scott 1985; Weigand 1977, 1985a). The purpose of this chapter is to outline the apparent degree of relationships between these Classic period societies and the Central Mexican polity called Teotihuacan.

The area under consideration is one of natural wealth in strategic resources. Fertile lake basins-fertile in soils, aquatic foods, water, and demographic potential-abut high mountains and deep canyons. The area is characterized by tightly packed, highly variegated ecological zones. Abundant in addition are rare resources: copper, silver, gold, malachite, azurite, chrysacola, pyrite, hematite, opal, optical quality quartz, and high-quality obsidians (Weigand 1985a; Weigand and Spence 1982). The Formative cultures of this region showed early and intensive interest in many of these rare resources. In the lake basins due west of Guadalajara are sideby-side sites and site areas that show Capacha (cf. Kelly 1980) and EI Openo (cf. Oliveros 1974) cultural characteristics. Since it is thought that these Early Formative

PHIL C. WEIGAND • Department of Anthropology, Museum of Northern Arizona, Route 4, Box 720, Flagstaff, Arizona 86001.


221

222 PHIL C. WEIGAND

complexes are coeval, it is interesting to note that their diagnostic characteristics are not found in the same sites. They are all located on the terraces of lakes in close proximity to excellent obsidian outcrops.

Social differentiation became far more notable during the Middle Formative or San Felipe phase, culminating in a distinct architectural style during the Late Formative or El Arenal phase (ca. 300 B.C. to AD. 200). This architectural style will be discussed in some detail because of its consolidation during the Classic period (the Ahualulco phase, ca. AD. 200 to 400, and the Teuchithin I phase, ca. AD. 400-700) and its uniqueness in Mesoamerica, which gives it a "signature" character that also marks clear geographical boundaries (Figure 1). Hundreds of sites, often differentially de-

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INFLUENCES IN JAUSCO AND NAYARIT 223

veloped from one another, illustrate these diagnostic architectural characteristics. The differences between the architecture of the Late Formative and the Classic periods are in monumentality, expressed as a shift from investment in shaft-tombs to large surface structures, plus an implosion of population. This implosion concentrated people into six major habitation zones, one of which, the Teuchitlan-EI Refugio zone, covers 32,000 ha of precincts, residential compounds, terrace systems, check dams, and chinampas. The nucleus of this habitation zone is ca. 3,000 ha into which almost all of the high architectural activity is concentrated. The other habitation zones are considerably smaller, at 3,000 to 5,000 ha each, with cores of 300 to 500 ha. Population estimates, based upon an assumption of 60% coevality in residential compounds, are 40,000 to 60,000 individuals, about half of whom were concentrated within the nucleus of the Teuchitlan-EI Refugio zone. Within that zone, four tiers of precinct architecture have been defined, though all share the five diagnostic features (see Figures 2 and 3), and a high degree of symmetry and proportionality in pian.

The five diagnostic features are: (1) a circular pyramid, terraced and flat-topped, with an occasional semi-subterranean room on the top, which is surrounded by (2) a circular, elevated patio, which is made from clean, tamped earth; which, in tum, is surrounded by (3) a circular platform/banquette, completing an arrangement of three concentric circles, or a family of three circles with a radical center, which display patterned proportionality. And atop this final circular feature are between (4) 8 to 16 rectangular, terraced pyramids/platforms with stairways into the patio, underneath which are (5) reenterable family crypts with modest shafts and at least one side

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chamber for the actual burials and offerings. 1 For a more detailed and contextual discussion, see Weigand (1985a) and also Figure 4.

It must be stressed that the concentric circles are organized as families of circles laid out from radical centers. There were strict, formal rules governing proportionalities between the radii of the components (elements I, 2, and 3),2 plus stricter rules concerning the symmetrical placement of the platforms / pyramids (element 4) on top of the circular platform/banquette (element 3). The end effect is one of grace and elegance, a "classical" attainment in architecture not duplicated anywhere else in Mesoamerica nor in the world. The closest complex formats elsewhere in the world appear to be the circular city plans of several Near Eastern sites, such as Baghdad, Gur, and Darabjerd; see the plans in Johnston (1983:16-18), and the two famed 1765 Patte plans for the French royal palaces in Tzonis and Lefaivre (1987:270-271). Classical architects, such as Alberti (1986) and Palladio (1965; Ackerman 1984), illustrate some circular buildings in plan and profile, but only lightly discuss the generative grammars (a fa Chippindale 1986; Stiny 1976; Barnatt and Moir 1984) that led to their formulations. The discussions of polar grid systems by Serlio in 1537 and the generative potentials in Cesariano's 1521 models (cited in Tzonis and Lefaivre 1987, Chapter 1) seem to be the most clearly reasoned conceptual discussions of the underlying principles of architectural circularity during the Renaissance. Remarkable buildings from Classical antiquity, such as the Pantheon in Rome (d. MacDonald 1976), and Renaissance Italy, such as Brunelleschi's Church of San Maria Degli Angeli in Florence (1434-1436) (d. Clark and Pause 1985), however, only resemble the circular buildings of the Teuchitlan Tradition in a most superficial fashion. In reality,

IThe relationships between the shaft-tombs and the Late Formative (El Arenal) and Early Classic (Ahualu1co) phases circular architecture has been demonstrated with three sets of information: (1) the work of Corona Nunez (1955) plus that of Long (1966) identified two monumental shaft-tombs directly under side-by-side platforms of the major architectural circle at El Arenal (see Figure 4). (2) Our own survey has produced dozens of more examples of exactly this same association at dozens of more sites. (3) The looters themselves state that these platforms are the first places that they excavate, because decades of experience has taught them about the association. It is important to note, though, that this association is not one-hundred-percent. The shaft-tombs of earlier phases have different patterns of architectural association. The San Felipe (Middle Formative) shaft-tombs are most frequently found beneath circular platforms that apparently are free-standing (Weigand 1989) and not organized as elements within families of circles. The still earlier El Openo (Early Formative) phase tombs appear to be associated with no architecture whatsoever. Even in the El Arenal phase, some of the monumental shaft-tombs are located in the patios, or under platforms away from the circles, though it is very important to note that they are still associated with the architecture of the period. Therefore, we must specify the time period involved when discussing the type of surface architecture associated with the shaft-tombs. In general, however, the greatest and most monumental tombs are found as elements within the architectural circles.

2In reference to the three concentric elements, aside from the symmetry in the placement of the platforms above the banquette, one should note the proportionality of the diameters of banquette to patio to pyramid (see Figure 2). In a reading across the diameter of the entire building, the banquette is one measure (no matter what that measure may be), the patio is one measure, the pyramid is 2.5 measures, the patio is another measure, and the banquette is another measure. In other words, the formula 1:1:2.5:1:1 was followed rather closely, and, as a formula, apparently used in the formal planning and design of the circles.

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INFLUENCES IN JALISCO AND NAYARIT 227

there exist no comparable structures for any time period anywhere else in the world, including the rest of Mesoamerica. These formal buildings are completely and truly unique in the Mesoamerican (and world) architectural repertoire. This architectural tradition was so unmistakably different and exotic from its neighbors, near and far, as to offer highly visible boundaries for its distribution, and, in effect, an experimental and innovative style of unusual beauty, and certainly a "signature" style for a wellorganized society.

I have discussed this architectural pattern here in some detail because of its significant difference in morphology from anything even remotely associated with the architecture of the Teotihuacan style (Millon 1973; Sanders et al. 1979). Since architecture is such a fundamental and basic social investment in resources and just as importantly in ideology, this dramatically different worldview, embodied architecturally, appears to portray a considerable detachment from that of Teotihuacan. Although round structures are found occasionally in the Teotihuacan repertoire, their rarity underscores their lack of centrality in formal design and precinct planning. Architectural morphology is reflected in spatial design systems as an entire class. The reliance of the Teuchitlan tradition on concentric circular architectural morphology is at the opposite extreme of Teotihuacan's rectangular/square building-plus-grid geometry. There is more to this observation than simply the question of prehistOriC design; there is the entire question of the ideological underpinnings for formal design. Both the Teotihuacan and Teuchitlan styles appear to have had formal rather than vernacular design, since both embody a working from abstract architectural conceptions and the creation of specified designs tightly replicated by others (ut in pluribus), whereas vernacular architectural design is the process of design inseparable from construction (Deetz 1977; Downing 1969; Gauthier-Larouche 1974; Mercer 1975; Moholy-Nagy 1957; Rudofsky 1964; Wells 1987). Vernacular architectural design displays more variability, and, while it can be very conservative, the governing rules most often are implicit. Both Teotihuacan and Teuchitlan are highly regular in symmetries, proportionalities, and geometries. But, as already implied, here the similarities between Teotihuacan and Teuchitlan end.

Circularity and rectangularity as governing geometries in architecture imply far more than just different preferences. In a mechanical sense, rectangularity means a grid system, which can be extended characteristically by agglutination. Circular systems, when organized into families of circles from a radical center, change dramatically in character with addition, because the circumference becomes greater. Also, these systems do not fit together using the "packing" principles that govern rectangles and squares. They do fit together using a "gear" principle, but the economics of space organization are very different. Overall, when the power and formality of social investment required by architecture and community settlement pattern design are considered, the architectural and morphological differences suggest strong divergences in worldview and social order.

All of what has been said above, however, is only part of the picture when conSidering Teotihuacan's relations, or lack thereof, with the highland lake districts of Jalisco and Nayarit. Although I believe that architectural morphologies are more basic in understanding the social order than many other artifact types, nonetheless the other types must be consid~red as well. At the level of fine art, Teotihuacan's influences into our zone of interest are remarkably few and scattered. Just as the western Mesoamerican Formative was quite free of Olmec artistic influences, the

228 PHIL C. WEIGAND

Classic periods of much of the same area show remarkably few Central Mexican influences. The question of pseudo-cloisonne ceramics are a case in point (Holien 1977). Even though they superficially resemble the al fresco wares of Central Mexico, their technology and stylistic sense are very different. The roots of this style seem firmly based in the polychrome ceramics of the Late Formative, and these have clear associations with the circles. Other ceramic objects that might be of the Central Mexican style include the rectangular boxes. Frequently found with late shaft-tombs (Long 1966), yet made with local clays and decorated in local styles, nonetheless their inspiration perhaps does come from the outside. Certain imports into the Teuchitlan area are very rare: no jade has ever been found; figurine styles are certainly local; but Thin Orange does appear in small quantities at the large sites of the Classic period. Pedro Armillas identified the three Thin Orange sherds from Ahualulco as "Teotihuacan III." These sherds were found in the body of the central or circular pyramid of the "A" court, and appeared on the floors that divided the Ahualulco phase (A.D.200-400) from the Teuchitlan I phase (A.D. 400-700). Elsewhere in our study zone, another dozen Thin Orange sherds have been found. Thus, since a fine-arts connection surely existed, it is not all that impressive in terms of quantity, though, of course, its value must have been very high. Even with high value, however, Teotihuacan fine arts do not appear to have had pace-setting consequences.

I have mentioned the territorial extent of the signature, circular architecture. The boundaries of this architecture are rather easily determined: either it exists or it does not. There are no intermediate or transitional forms possible, though, of course, there are derivations in the Teuchitlan II phase (AD.700-900/1000), when the symmetrical design begins to break up. One such boundary of the Classic period deserves special note in relation to Teotihuacan: that between the Atemajac Valley, where Guadalajara is situated, and the Tala-Ahualulco-Teuchitlan basin to the west. It is important to note that there are no natural barriers between these two valley systems. The rolling ridges, once heavily forested in pine, could impede no movement. However, the differences in Classic period architectural morphology between these two valleys are extremely pronounced. The Atemajac Valley has several large sites with monumental architecture which show undoubted Teotihuacan characteristics (Galvan 1976, 1984). The morphology is rectangular / square, and the architectural are includes the taludtablero building exteriors. The talud-tablero pyramid at Ixtepete is not well understood, because it is largely buried beneath a huge Postclassic platform. The pyramids at EI Grillo can be appreciated not only for their talud-tablero exteriors, but also for their square plaza layout. Other well-organized sites in the Atemajac Valley, such as Las Paredes (Weigand 1986) and the fortified 55-ha citadel at Coyutla (Weigand 1987), have attested rectangular architectural features and probably date, at least in part, to the Classic period. Coyutla is an amplified Ixtepete: three great 50- x 60- x 4-m platforms that flank spacious rectangular plazas, bordering plazuelas with other buildings, including a cruciform pyramid. Talud-tablero architectural art was exposed by looters on a 40- x 40- x 12-m pyramid, and the general sherd cover also fits the Galvan ceramic sequence for the Classic period in the Atemajac Valley. Coyutla is by far the most extensive and monumental site of the Atemajac region. As mentioned, its location is fortified by a combination of cliffs and terraces. The site guards an easy access from the rolling hills of Los Altos de Jalsico and the Lerma Valley on a natural gateway (d. Hirth 1978) between the Lerma and the highland lake zones of Jalisco. Only one site in the Atemajac Valley has the five-element architectural style:

INFLUENCES IN lALISCO AND NAYARIT 229

Bugambilias, which is located at the far western edge of the valley, on an easy access to the obsidian-rich Las Flores/La Primavera deposits. Bugambilias's relationship with the other Atemajac sites cannot yet be stated, though the ongoing analysis of the salvage archaeology undertaken there by Galvan will undoubtedly be enlightening. Such a sharp boundary between two such different architectural traditions (less than 10 km apart at the closest points) strongly suggests a political and social frontier of pronounced dimensions. It is perhaps one of the best examples of such a frontier that we have for the Classic period in all of Mesoamerica.

If we dismiss the Teuchitlan Tradition from Mesoamerican civilization, as has already been suggested, then we are copping out of explaining why we have such diversity within a civilization, and why we have such sharp boundaries / frontiers within the overall entity. All other civilizations in the world had multiple roots, some expressions of which were as exotic as that of Teuchitlan. So, ignoring the sterile argument of whether or not Teuchitlan was Mesoamerican, let us examine one final point, which may indeed suggest a strong structural relationship between Teuchitlan and Teotihuacan. As mentioned, Teuchitlan's signature architectural morphology has Formative roots in the area. But the trend toward pronounced site hierarchies and monumentality, in building and settlement size alike, seems to trail the developments in Central Mexico by at least a century, and perhaps a bit more, though the Teuchitlan Tradition's chronology is not well understood (Weigand 1985a). Thus, there exists this very real possibility: in scenario, Teotihuacan's expansive presence, as the major metropolitan component of an evolving world economy and trade structure (a la Braudel 1972, 1982), placed pressure upon the less complex societies of Western Mesoamerica. That pressure, whether direct or indirect, whether political or economic (or both), cannot be assessed yet, but most assuredly came by way of Ixtepete, EI Grillo, and Coyutla.

However, the lake district societies just the west were too viable and far too self-reliant in resources simply to acculturate. The viability was represented by a dynamic and forceful style in both architecture and art. The self-reliance in resources included everything from agricultural lands to obsidian to gems, plus the fact that Central Mexico apparently had little that attracted regional attention, resource-wise or artistically. At the 1987 meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Sanders counter-postulated that the reason for the isolation of the Teuchitlan Tradition from Teotihuacan's system was that the latter needed nothing from the lake districts, and hence effected no penetration of them. But that argument can be turned around just as easily: self-sufficient systems under pressure from the outside can intensify their social and political structures in order to retain that economic independence. The intensification, patterned along exotic cultural lines, can further differentiate and distance the two systems in confrontation or contact (see Athens, Chapter 9, this volume).

Continuing the scenario: Teotihuacan's pressure was real, though we cannot know if it was economic, cultural, or political, or in combination. The sociocultural vibrancy of the Teuchitlan Tradition, plus its resource self-sufficiency, allowed it to respond by intensification of its exotic Formative heritage. The result was a distinctive architectural morphology expressing a totally different, and apparently innovative, worldview from that of Teotihuacan, as reflected in formal design. If it was formed in response, however, there is a strong structural relationship between the two areas of the kind which is not normally evaluated in the archaeological literature.

230 PHIL C. WEIGAND

Intensification through response meant that in order to stay different from Teotihuacan, the Teuchitlan Tradition had to change radically. This apparent paradox, however, had its own logic. In Western Mesoamerica, there are several examples of societies that intensified their cultural traditions through response to radically changed political, economic, and social circumstances in order to maintain independence. The Nayarita (a term which includes Tecuales, Cora, Huichol, and Tepecano; Weigand 1985b) survived the first wave of Spanish conquest of the early sixteenth century, and through raiding, open warfare, rustling, and acceptance of refugees, stayed independent until the early eighteenth century. They formed an internal frontier region with parallels to those discussed by Lattimore (1951) for Inner Asia. Their refigured political structures were molded through response and compositiveness. These examples can be repeated for other areas in the New World (e.g., Di Peso 1985). The situation of response through intensification seems to be a perdurable frontier theme.3

Whether or not the scenario outlined above is correct, the Teuchitlan Tradition was culturally outside the Teotihuacan network, though it must have formed part of the Mesoamerican trade structure. Teuchitlan's region experienced civilization, with craft specialization, urbanization processes, social and settlement hierarchies, and so forth. Although Teotihuacan, for whatever reasons, could not incorporate it in its cultural sphere, the Central Mexican societies of the Early Postclassic period did. The tenth century A.D. was a period of profound change, wherein the nature of civilization in Western Mesoamerica was revolutionized. Habitation zones were dispersed; the circular architectural tradition was abandoned; ceramic types changed; and so forth. This process of deep sociocultural change in the west apparently parallels somewhat the transformation sweeping over the general Mayan world at about the same time. In the west, the dramatic changes are reflected in the collapse of the AtemajacTeuchitlan frontier and the end of the Teuchitlan Tradition.4

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The field work was accomplished under permits from the Instituto Nacional de Antropologia y Historia (I.N.A.H.). I am grateful to Otto Schondube and Javier Galvan of the Centro Regional de Occidente for their aid. Galvan was most unselfish in sharing his data and ideas. I also wish to thank Francisco Ron Siordia, Celia Garcia de Weigand, Michael Spence, James Schoenwetter, Robert Shadow, Joseph Mountjoy, Dolores Soto de Arechavaleta, Michael Cinquino, Emil Veakis, Robert Koll, Luis Figueroa, and Pedro Figueroa for their invaluable aid during the course of the field work. The intellectual debt that lowe Christopher Chippindale cannot be expressed

3This argument is complicated by the recent discovery of fairly small, five-element circles in Guanajuato (Sanchez and Marmolejo 1990). At least four of the five-element circles have been located in this area to date, so their distribution at present appears to be sporadic. In addition, these structures are associated with larger, rectangular compounds. Their functions as correlaries to these rectangular buildings, and, indeed, their exact chronological placement are yet to be determined.

4The collapse of the Teuchitlan Tradition is explored in more detail in Weigand (1990).

INFLUENCES IN ]ALISCO AND NAYARIT 231

in words. A version of this chapter was first given to the symposium on The Foreign Relationships of Teotihuaetin, which was organized by Michael Spence, at the meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Toronto, 1987.

REFERENCES

Ackerman, J., 1984, Palladia. Pelican Books, New York. Alberti, 1., 1986, The Ten Books of Architecture. Dover Publications, New York. Barnatt, J., and G. Moir, 1984, Stone Circles and Megalithic Mathematics. Proceedings of the

Prehistoric Society 50:197-216. Braudel, F., 1972, The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age of Philip II. Harper &

Row, New York. Braudel, F., 1982, The Wheels of Commerce. Harper & Row, New York. Chippindale, c., 1986, Archaeology, Design Theory, and the Reconstruction of Prehistoric De-

sign Systems. In Environment and Planning B: Planning and Design. pp. 445-485. Clark, R., and M. Pause, 1985, Precedents in Architecture. Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York. Corona Nunez, J., 1955, Tumba de El Arena/, Etzatlan, jalisco. Informes No.3, I.N.A.H., Mexico. Deetz, J., 1977, In Small Things Forgotten: The Archaeology of Early American Life. Anchor Books,

New York. Di Peso, c., 1985, Displaced Native Americans of the Gran Chichimeca. In The Archaeology of West

and Northwest Mesoamerica (ed. M. Foster and P. Weigand). Westview/Praeger, New York, pp. 431-437.

Downing, A., 1969, The Architecture of Country Houses. Dover Publications, New York. Galvan, J., 1976, Rescate Arqueol6gico en el Fraccionamiento Tabachines, Zapopan, jalisco. Cuadernos

de los Centros No. 28, I.N.A.H., Mexico. Galvan, J., 1984, Las Tumbas de Tiro del Valle de Atemajac, jalisco, 2 Vols. unpublished manuscript. Gauthier-Larouche, G., 1974, Evolution de la Maison Rurale Traditonelle Dans la Region du Quebec.

Presses de l'Universite Laval, Quebec. Hirth, K., 1978, Inter-regional Trade and the Formation of Prehistoric Gateway Communities.

American Antiquity 43:35-45. Holien, T., 1977, Mesoamerican Pseudo-Cloisonne and Other Decorative Investments. Doctoral dis

sertation, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale. Johnston, N., 1983, Cities in the Round. University of Washington Press, Seattle. Kelly, I., 1980, Ceramic Sequence in Colima: Capacha, an Early Phase. Anthropological Papers of the

University of Arizona Press, No. 37, Tempe. Lattimore, 0., 1951, Inner Asian Frontiers of China (2nd ed.). American Geographical Society, New

York. Long, S., 1966, Archaeology of the Municipio of Etzatltin, jalisco. Doctoral dissertation, University of

California at Los Angeles. MacDonald, W., 1976, The Pantheon. Harvard University Press, Cambridge. Mercer, E., 1975, English Vernacular Houses. Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London. Millon, R., 1973, Urbanization at Teotihuacan, Mexico: Vol. 1. The Teotihuacan Map. University of

Texas Press, Austin. Moholy-Nagy, S., 1957, Native Genius in Anonymous Architecture. Horizon Press, Fremont. Mountjoy, J., 1972, Matanchen Complex. Science 175:1252-1243. Oliveros, A., 1974, Nuevas Exploraciones El Openo, Michoacan. In The Archaeology of West Mexico

(ed. B. Bell). West Mexican Society for Advanced Studies, Ajijic, pp. 182-201. Palladio, A., 1965, The Four Books of Architecture. Dover Publications, New York. Rudofsky, B., 1964, Architecture without Architects. Exhibit at the Museum of Modem Art, New

York. Sanchez, S., and E. G. Marmolejo M., 1990, Algunas Apreciaciones Sobre el Clasico en el Bajio

232 PHIL C. WEIGAND

Central, Guanajuato. In La Epoca Clasica: Nuevas Hallazgoz, Nuevas Ideas (ed. Amalia Cardos de Mendez). MNA/I.N.A.H., Mexico, pp. 267-278.

Sanders, W., J. Parsons, and R. Santley, 1979, The Basin of Mexico. Academic Press, New York. Scott, S., 1985, Core versus Marginal Mesoamerica: A Coastal West Mexican Perspective. In The

Archaeology of West and Northwest Mesoamerica (ed. M. Foster and P. Weigand). Westview/Praeger, New York, pp. 181-19l.

Stiny, G., 1976, Two Exercises in Formal Composition. Environment and Planning B, Vol. 3, pp. 187-210.

Tzonis, A., and L. Lefaivre, 1987, Classical Architecture. The Poetics of Order. MIT Press, Cambridge.

Vitruvius, 1914, The Ten Books on Architecture. Harvard University Press, Cambridge. Weigand, P., 1977, The Formative-Classic and Classic-Postclassic Transitions in the Etzatlan

Teuchitlan Zone of Jalisco. Los Procesos de Cambio. XV Mesa Redonda, Vol. 1. Sociedad Mexicana de Antropologia, pp. 413-423.

Weigand, P., 1985a, Evidence for Complex Societies during the Western Mesoamerican Classic Period. In The Archaeology of West and Northwest Mesoamerica (ed. M. Foster and P. Weigand). Westview /Praeger, New York, pp. 47-9l.

Weigand, P., 1985b, Considerations about the Archaeology and Ethnohistory of the Mexicaneros, Tequales, Coras, Huicholes, Tepecanos, and Caxcanes of Nayarit, Jalisco, and Zacatecas. Contributions to the Archaeology and Ethnohistory of Greater Mesoamerica: Essays in Honor of Carroll Laverne Riley (ed. W. Folan). Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, pp. 126-187.

Weigand, P., 1986, Las Paredes. Report to the Centro Regional de Occidente, I.N.A.H., Mexico. Weigand, P., 1987, Coyutla. Report to the Central Regional de Occidente, I.N.A.H., Mexico. Weigand, P., 1989, Architecture and Settlement Patterns within the Western Mesoamerican

Formative Tradition. In El Precltisico 0 Formativo: Avances y Perspectivas (ed. M. Carmona Macias). MNA/I.N.A.H., Mexico, pp. 39-64.

Weigand, P., 1990, Discontinuity: The Collapse of the Teuchitlan Tradition and the Early Postclassic Cultures of Western Mesoamerica. In Mesoamerica y Norte de Mexico, Siglo IX-XII/, Torno 1 (ed. F. Sodi M.). MNA/I.N.A.H., Mexico, pp. 215-222.

Weigand, P., and M. Spence, 1982, The Obsidian Mining Complex at La Joya, Jalisco. In Mining and Mining Techniques in Ancient Mesoamerica (ed. P. Weigand and G. Gwynne). Special Issue, Anthropology, Vol. VI, pp. 175-188.

Wells, C. (ed.), 1987, Perspectives in Vernacular Architecture. University of Missouri Press, Columbia.

Part V

Conclusion

Chapter 11

Current Trends in Interaction Research

EDWARD M. SCHORTMAN AND PATRICIA A. URBAN

INTRODUCTION

This chapter seeks to identify major components of a developing interaction paradigm. As mentioned in the introductory chapter, such intellectual frameworks consist of the analytical units, assumptions, and unsolved questions which direct systematic research into any topic (Kuhn 1970). The particular paradigm we are attempting to elucidate focuses on predictable relations among extrasocietal contacts and sociopolitical changes. The views advanced here are those of the authors alone. Although considerably inspired by the chapters in this volume, and the "schools of thought" they represent, there is no reason to assume that the contributors concur with the ideas we express. Our objective, in fact, is not just to exercise an editor's prerogative to have the last word. Rather, we are writing this essay as a contribution to the formulation of an interaction paradigm and not under any delusion that our statements are definitive. If the chapter encourages constructive debate on the systemic relations between sociopolitical change and intersocietal contacts, then it will have been successful.

UNITS OF ANALYSIS

It almost goes without saying that the basic unit of analysis in interaction studies is a network of societies that maintain some degree of contact. This stands in contrast

EDWARD M. SCHORTMAN and PATRICIA A. URBAN. Department of Anthropology and Sociology, Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio 43022.

Resources, Power, and Interregional InteraCtion, edited by Edward M. Schortman and Patricia A. Urban. Plenum Press, New York, 1992.

235


to the cultural ecological emphasis on territorially bound ecosystems, including a particular society and the relevant environment to which it adapts (e.g., Steward 1972 [1955]). Having identified the unit of study in the interaction paradigm, we immediately confront a perennial archaeological problem, the drawing of boundaries. This is, of course, a difficulty on all analytical scales, including delimiting sites and particular societies. The reconstruction of ancient intercommunication networks depends on our ability to identify the material correlates of contact.

The most common approach borrows, often implicitly, from earlier research on prehistoric trade and equates intersocietal contact with the distribution of exchanged items (e.g., Bishop 1980; Brothwell and Higgs, 1963; Hammond 1972; Hammond et al. 1977; Webb 1974; Weigand et al. 1977; see Schortman and Urban 1987:49-55 for a review). Interregional communication among several societies, therefore, is established when source analyses or stylistic studies indicate that goods passed between them. Frequently, it is assumed that the intensity of past contacts, assessed by some measure of trade good quantities, is equivalent to their sociopolitical importance. There are many problems with simply reconstructing the volume of ancient exchanges including: establishing the contemporaneity of the deposits used to study the network (e.g., Adams 1975:457-458); sampling sufficiently large and representative portions of the settlements involved (e.g., Lamberg-Karlovsky 1975:348; Pires-Ferreira 1976:300-305; Renfrew 1969:157; H. Wright 1972:99-100); and accounting for the presence and Significance of perishable items within the network (e.g., Heider 1971; Sabloff and Freidel 1975). What we would like to dwell on here is the central assumption that the sociopolitical significance of past contacts is measurable by the amounts of preserved exotics found in excavated and surface collections.

Certainly, it is possible to imagine interaction systems in which goods were exchanged in relatively small numbers and yet played important roles in defining regional and interregional sociopolitical hierarchies (see the prestige goods literature cited earlier and the discussion of exchange intensities below). Examples include the enduring exchange networks which linked social leaders in the Middle Preclassic Highlands and Lowlands of Mesoamerica (e.g., Flannery 1968a; Sharer and Grove, 1989), Middle Woodlands of eastern North America (e.g., Braun 1986; Brose and Greber 1979; Caldwell 1964), and Bronze Age western and central Europe (e.g., Shennan 1982, 1986). In these, as well as in other cases, intersocietal ties helped promote and enhance the power of certain social factions while the amounts of goods changing hands were few and largely limited to "luxuries" (Brose and Greber 1979; Flannery 1968; Shennan 1982). It has also been pointed out elsewhere (e.g., Renfrew 1982; Renfrew and Cherry 1986; Lamberg-Karlovsky 1989:262-263; Upham 1982) that the most important" good" moving among interaction partners may be information and not something tangible. Much current work within the peer polity formulation is, in fact, concerned with the sociopolitical significance of the material similarities found among neighboring societies. These similarities are accounted for by processes of information transfer which encourage stylistic emulation (e.g., Renfrew 1982; Renfrew and Cherry 1986).

The intersocietal movement of commodities remains important in recognizing the presence of ancient interaction systems. Nevertheless, the assumption that exchange volumes are equivalent to the sociopolitical significance of interregional contacts seems unwarranted. Similarly, important links among societies may involve

CURRENT TRENDS IN INTERACTION RESEARCH 237

significant transfer of information but little, if any, movement of items. None of these observations makes the study of interaction systems any easier.

The reconstruction of our unit of study must depend, therefore, partly on our ability to identify the goods which passed among a number of different societies and the sources of these commodities. It must also involve an examination of stylistic choices within a wide array of different data categories. Here we are concerned with choices relatively unencumbered by technological and environmental constraints and free to reflect selections made by individuals in response to extrasocietal contacts (e.g., Frankenstein and Rowlands 1978:97-98; Sackett 1982). It is, of course, hard to quantify the exchange of ideas and use them as interaction indicators. This does not detract from their potential importance as archaeological signatures of past contacts nor from their developmental significance within ancient populations.

A further complication to be considered in defining interaction networks is that the goods and ideas moving among societies had variable significance within the groups to which they were introduced. Items which functioned as symbols of leadership would have had very different sociopolitical significance from those which served in religious rituals or met basic economic needs. Needless to say, considerable overlap in the behavioral significance of transferred objects and ideas is possible (e.g., Knapp 1986). It is also likely that the meaning of at least some styles and commodities varied among interaction partners; what may have been a utilitarian item near its source could serve as a badge of office within a more distant locale (Knapp 1990). These variations may affect the speed with which items/ideas move through an interaction system as well as their sociopolitical effects (see Wells, Chapter 8, this volume; also R. Wright 1989). In reconstructing interregional networks, we must be able to place the objects and styles which define them within their original behavioral contexts. Treating them as the undifferentiated products of monolithic, homogenous cultures will only obscure the sociopolitical significance of ancient transactions (e.g., Ball 1983; Caldwell 1964; Hodder 1978, 1979; Pires-Ferreira 1976; Schortman 1989; Shennan 1978). Determining the behavioral significance of objects and styles invariable depends on careful analyses of their contexts of recovery (Ball 1983; Binford 1962; Hodder 1986).

The discussion so far has assumed that societies are the interaction agents. This is, of course, not the case. People, not societies, interact, exchange goods, adopt or reject ideas. Whereas we may recognize interaction networks as linking territorial groups (societies), we must be aware that only segments of these populations were actually in contact with each other (e.g., Barnes 1986; Davis 1983; Sabloff 1986; Schortman 1989; see Schortman and Urban 1987:63-68 for a more detailed review of this issue). The social faction most likely to have been involved in these transactions is the local elite and their agents (e.g., Barnes 1986; Cherry and Renfrew 1986; Helms 1979, Chapter 7, this volume; Renfrew 1986). The behavioral implications of this phenomenon will be dealt with in succeeding sections. The importance of simply recognizing such divisions within interaction systems is itself crucial. Because societies are not homogenous, not all of their members will have equal access to external contacts. Consequently, we cannot presume that all stylistic choices made within them will reflect significant interregional interaction or that the goods resulting from these contacts will be widely distributed. Rather, we must look to elite material patterns for evidence of intersocietal relations. It should be made clear, however, that the socio-


political effects of intersocietal ties are not limited solely to the uppermost social stratum. Rather, the impacts of interregional contacts are mediated through local scions whose reactions to external inputs have wide-ranging effects on their respective societies (e.g., Barnes 1986; Renfrew 1986). The point we wish to emphasize is that interaction networks are complex phenomena whose reconstruction requires an awareness of what passes among societies and who is involved in these transfer. Such considerations determine what we will look for in defining our unit of study and how we will interpret our finds.

It is also clear that interaction intensities are not uniform throughout the entirety of a network at anyone point in time. The nature of a society's involvement within an interaction system is likely to vary as are the effects of these contacts. In addition, there is no need to assume that the significance of interactions is simply correlated with the distances separating polities. The impact of hegemonic empires, such as the Aztec, on the societies they dealt with (see Santley and Alexander, Chapter 2, this volume), could not be accurately predicted by simple distance-decay formulas (e.g., Hodder 1978). The form and significance of interregional linkages are almost certain to change with time as well. This is especially the case where initial voluntary contacts are transformed into tribute-paying relations as certain polities expand at the expense of their former partners. There are many examples of this phenomenon, ranging from the well-documented case of Roman conquests from the Republic through the Empire (e.g., Dyson 1985; Haselgrove 1987; Hedeager 1987; Glodariu 1976; Luttwack 1976) to purely prehistoriC cases from the Old (e.g., Kohl 1978; Hall 1985) and New Worlds (e.g., Blanton and Feinman 1984; Spencer 1982; see also Whitecotton, Chapter 3, Feinman and Nicholas, Chapter 4, and Wells, Chapter 8, this volume).

Rephrasing the initial statement, the basic unit of analysis is a dynamic network of interactors whose transactions link their respective polities and affect sociopolitical developments within these units. The import of this definition for the conduct of research is significant. Survey data alone, for one thing, will probably be insufficient for defining interaction networks. Extensive excavations within a large number of polities presumed to have been in contact will be necessary to unearth sufficient information on goods exchange, stylistic details, and their behavioral significance. Such work will also be needed to identify the social segments involved in the reconstructed transactions and the effects of their dealings on the rest of society. Unfortunately, we will not be able to specify a priori a particular type of site as more important for study than any other. Attention will certainly have to be directed to the investigation of monumental centers, the residences of the primary elite interactors. Here we can expect to find the greatest wealth of information on the nature, intensity, and diversity of ties maintained by an ancient polity. In order to comprehend the effects of these linkages, however, we must also have a good understanding of developments within the hinterland and the correlation, if any, of rural settlement and material shifts with changes in elite interactions (e.g., Costin and Earle 1989; Hastorf 1990).

The sorts of research we are discussing are well beyond the capacities of anyone investigator. Instead, they will require coordinated studies by different individuals in neighboring regions recording and reporting their results in a comparable, mutually intelligible manner. This work must involve studies of both centers of ancient sociopolitical complexity as well as their "peripheries." Cultural cores are traditional foci of archaeological scrutiny while their peripheries are commonly ignored. This divi-


sion of research interests makes sense within a cultural-ecological framework in which causal relations operate on a local scale. Such a distinction is inimicable to interaction studies as it reduces our ability to reconstruct the dynamics of entire interaction networks (see below). The very nature of the interaction paradigm also calls into question the view that core developments can somehow be divorced from events within peripheries and vice versa.

Beginning with simply defining analytical units, we can already appreciate the complex array of problems facing interaction researchers: How are ancient contacts to be recognized? Who is actually involved in extrasocietal transactions? What are the nature and intensity of the ties binding any society to the network? Having laid out some of the issues pertinent to this portion of the paradigm, we now move on to a consideration of an even vaster field, the assumptions guiding research. In order to give our discussion some focus, we will deal with one salient question within this domain: Under what conditions do intersocietal contacts assume significance in processes of sociopolitical change? This certainly does not even come close to exhausting all interesting queries in interaction research but provides a good starting point in searching for regularities in interregional processes.

CONDITIONS OF INTERACTION

A number of different scholars have observed that complex sociopolitical systems require large amounts of externally derived goods and information in order to function (e.g., Blanton and Feinman 1984; Gall and Saxe 1977; Kohl 1978:471; Paynter 1981:127-130; Spencer 1982:42-47, 53-58, 205; Webb 1974:374-375; H. Wright 1972:104). There are several reasons for this situation. As noted in the earlier discussion of political ideology, the sociopolitical preeminence of local luminaries frequently depends on their monopoly of imports used as badges of office symbolizing rights to tribute and loyalty from supporters (e.g., D' Altroy and Earle 1985:203; Earle 1987:69; Myers 1985:200). Similarly, these exotics often serve as "gifts" with which to attract and hold clients (see references in the essay introducing the political ideology section). As Helms points out in this collection (also 1979, 1988), the exotics themselves are often charged with a supernatural aura associated with the distant realms from which they drive. Those controlling the acquisition and distribution of such sacred items come to partake of this same power. The more complex the sociopolitical hierarchy within anyone society, the more imports are needed to support and extend elite rule (cf. Schortman and Urban 1987).

Regional scions also require external alliances to facilitate this movement of politically potent resources and rationalize their authority. A paramount's legitimacy is frequently supported by the leader's association with other rulers who participate in the same elite interaction network manipulating a common set of symbols which helps to set rulers apart from those they rule and lend credibility to the former in the eyes of the latter (e.g., Freidel 1979; Hall 1985:5-6, 45-46; McGovern 1985:283; Renfrew 1982, 1986; Snodgrass 1986:49; G. Wright 1969:83; Zaccagnini 1987). The spread of similar material forms, goods as well as styles, functioning in a number of different behavioral realms among elite interactors may reflect acculturation of participants to just such a common spatially extensive social identity (e.g., Schortman 1989; Schort-


man and Urban 1987:63-68). Sharing an identity, founded on commonly held assumptions, values, and beliefs, creates personalistic ties which encourage trust and communication among people who would otherwise be isolated by the absence of such bonds (e.g., Barnes 1986; Freidel 1979, 1986; Hall 1985:36-38; Kohl 1978:468, 486; 1979:77; Lamberg-Karlovsky 1989:261-262; Liverani 1987; Marfoe 1987:32-33; Shennan 1982:158, 160; 1986:143; Upham 1982:6; Vogel 1990:110, 131). Examples of this phenomenon are commonly attested from different areas and time periods. They include the spread of Hinduism among the rulers of Southeast Asian trading states in the fifth to the fifteenth centuries A.D. (Hall 1985; Tibbetts 1957; Van Leur 1955; Wheatley 1964:41-42, 52-56; Wolters 1967:221, 246-247); cultural diasporas which controlled trade in precolonial (Curtin 1975) and colonial (Cohen 1969) west Africa as well as other parts of the world (Curtin 1984); and, in prehistoric contexts, such spatially extensive networks as the Hopewell (e.g., Braun 1986; Caldwell 1964), Chavin (e.g., Patterson 1971), Olmec (e.g., Flannery 1968a; Sharer and Grove 1989), and Maya (e.g., Freidel 1979, 1986). These interregional identity systems are sufficiently common to suppose they are a regular adaptation to problems of promoting predictable intersocietal interactions in the absence of other institutions which ensure security among strangers (nonkin). The maintenance of these elite networks makes possible, but also requires, continuous contact and the display and movement of membership symbols among participants. Consequently, complex societies rely on externally derived inputs of goods and ideas to maintain and support the growth of their sociopolitical systems. Elites, and the polities they represent, are thereby enmeshed in hypercoherent networks of interdependence which we have termed elsewhere "coevolutionary" (Schortman and Urban 1987; cf. Flannery 1972).

Egalitarian societies have a less predictable need for exotics. This does not mean that extrasocietal contacts are invariably unimportant to their processes of change. The movement of domesticates among groups had a major impact on cultural shifts in the early stages of food production (e.g., Flannery 1968b; MacNeish et al. 1975). Still, in situations where the resources of primary concern to a population are locally available, there is little need to establish enduring ties with other territorially based units. Changes in patterns of power and resource control in this situation are likely to result primarily from the operation of local factors.

Once a ranked or stratified polity appears within an area, however, the formation of coevolutionary relations becomes inevitable. At this point, intersocietal contacts assume crucial roles in prompting and guiding processes of sociopolitical change. The goods, ideas, and alliances they provide are important in forming and maintaining new patterns of centralized control over labor and surplus production.

We have therefore hypothesized that the development of sociopolitical complexity, and the transfer of goods and ideas among elites which it requires, is one important condition which must be met before intersocietal interaction can play a predictable, important role in sociopolitical change. The transfer of large quantities of goods and ideas does not necessarily correlate, however, with shifts toward increasing complexity. In fact, the transfer of objects at high volumes through a network may work against an important component of such complexity, the centralization of power. It has been observed, for example, that the considerable numbers of items which passed through Melanesian exchange networks in relatively recent times did not promote the development of sociopolitical complexity among the societies involved (e.g., Brunton 1975; Knapp 1990:170). In at least some cases, the large influx


of goods following European intervention in the area contributed to political decentralization (Strathern 1971:227-229). A similar sequence is recorded following the flooding of west-central African markets with Portuguese trade items in the seventeenth century. The result was the breakdown of the sizeable Kongo kingdom into a series of competing territorial factions (Ekholm 1972:102-103, 113, 138; 1978:131). Whitecotton (Chapter 3), along with Feinman and Nicholas (Chapter 4), in this volume, has also observed the relationship between political fragmentation and the introduction of high-volume market trade in late prehistoric highland Oaxaca. This correlation may result from the same processes alluded to above. The introduction of large quantities of imports into societies where political control is based, at least in part, on elite monopolies over exotics serves to undercut elite power (e.g., Kipp and Schortman 1989). Lower level notables can now successfully compete for symbols of power and the goods with which to attract clients by acquiring these items from sources other than the paramount. Centralized control evaporates or is frustrated and dispersal of supporters, and so power, is the norm (Frankenstein and Rowlands, 1978:79; Friedman 1982:184, 190-191; Hall 1985:258; Haselgrove 1982:81). High volumes of exchange and/ or intense interregional contact, rather than promoting political centralization, can select for the opposite development. Exchange intensity may be a significant interaction condition but it is a complex one.

This leads us to a third point. We assume, along with others (e.g., Paynter and Cole 1980:94, 94; Terray 1974:325-331; G. Webster 1990) that control over labor and its fruits is central to the development of sociopolitical hierarchies. Particularly important is finding a means to bind clients to elite patrons and provide incentives for the former to produce surpluses put at the disposal of the latter (Renfrew 1982:265, 269-270). However, we diverge from cultural ecological (e.g., G. Webster 1990) formulations of this relationship in several ways. First, labor control is not limited to hierarchial societies but is found among many egalitarian systems as well (we are indebted to R. Kipp 1990, for bringing this point to our attention). The "Lineage Mode of Production," for example, specifically deals with the means by which lineage elders manipulate the distribution of imports to direct the labor of their juniors (Dupre and Rey 1973; Ekholm 1972:109-111,116; Terray 1984; Vogel 1990). It is not simply control over labor that is at issue but the centralization of that control whereby a few gain enduring claims on the work of many (e.g., Paynter 1981:119-120; Terray 1974:331). Second, we disagree that power over labor is exclusively based on control over productive land. The important point is the ability of some social segment to monopolize a resource on which all members of a group depend. The right to deny access to such a "good" gives those who control it a basis for widespread influence. This resource may certainly be land and its products. It could just as easily be items whose significance derives less from their roles in production than in social reproduction: the aforementioned symbols of office and political currency (e.g., Brunton 1975:544-545; Brumfiel and Earle 1978b; Earle and D' Altroy 1989:201-204; Frankenstein and Rowlands 1978:76; Friedman and Rowlands 1978:224-232; Haselgrove 1982:81,83-85; Hedeager 1979:222; Renfrew 1974:69; Spencer 1982:43-44; Strathern 1971; Wells 1980:97-103; 1984:113).

Political centralization, therefore, occurs where such monopolies can be established. It is only in this case that one faction can effectively put the rest of a society into a dependency relationship. Supporters would then have to "exchange" labor for access to crucial goods under elite control. The more effective the monopoly, the more


total the dependence, the more absolute the power of the monopolists. Such control allows a few privileged individuals to organize a society's productive activities for their own benefits (e.g., Ekholm 1978:119-120; Frankenstein and Rowlands 1978:78; Friedman and Rowlands 1978; Haselgrove 1982:81; 1987:107; Marfoe 1987:32; McGuire 1987:132-133; Strathern 1971:206-207; Wells 1984:97-99, 113-114). Under these circumstances, we see the centralization of power as well as changes in the organization of entire polities at levels of production come to be controlled from above (e.g., Renfrew 1982; Wells 1984:204-205).

There is no one set of conditions which meets these requirements. "Trade scarcity" may be a circumstance which selects for such developments. The location of the Trobriand Islands on the margins of the extensive kula network, where social valuables were rare and difficult to acquire, facilitated centralized control over exchanged commodities. The monopoly of exotics that this scarcity made possible contributed to the appearance of powerful chiefs in the Trobriands. Societies more centrally located within the network, where access to exchanged goods by all society members was much easier, never witnessed the development of ranked societies (Brunton 1975; cf. Friedman 1982:183-184; Knapp 1990:161). Wells's contribution to the volume details a similar case. At Late Iron Age Feddersen Wierde and Westick, trade was carried out in high volumes directly with Roman entrepreneurs. Although commercially significant, the goods changing hands did not assume important political values. The Lubsow graves and site of Gudme, on the other hand, apparently represent the remains of societies remote from imperial contact. The flow of Roman goods was more restricted, and social leaders were able to effectively monopolize these less intense but politically more significant ties.

Control over localized sources of raw materials convertible to valued exports can give their" owners" privileged access to larger quantities of critical imports than can be captured by their regional competitors. Elite ownership of copper deposits on Bronze Age Cyprus seems to have played a large role in underwriting the increasing power of this class from 1700-1400 B.C. (Knapp 1986:141, 151; 1990). In lieu of control over raw materials, elite supervision of social valuable production may playa crucial role in sociopolitical change. This is especially true where such manufacture requires the use of imported raw materials and/ or considerable skill to successfully complete (e.g., McGuire 1987:131; Tosi 1984:24, 42, 49). Production expertise, in short, may be a monopolizable resource (e.g., Brumfiel and Earle 1987a:3, 5; Frankenstein and Rowlands 1978:77-78). The centralized control fifteenth century Kongo kings exercised over iron tool production contributed significantly to their preeminence (Ekholm 1972, 1978) just as imperial supervision of prestige good workshops in the Aztec (BrumfieI1987) and Inka Empires (Costin and Earle 1989:691-692; Earle 1987; Earle and D' Altroy 1989; D' Altroy and Earle 1985) enhanced the power of the emperors.

Strategic location within an interaction network can, itself, be an important resource. Societies, or segments of them, which occupy positions, such as mountain passes or river crossings, which permit their members to control the movement of valued goods can tum this situation to their advantages (e.g., Dyson 1985:137; Ekholm 1972:133-136; Hall 1985:35, 41). Less well-situated polities will have to depend on their strategically positioned neighbors for politically critical resources. This may be one factor behind the observed sociopolitical complexity and interregional prominence of so-called gateway communities (cf. Hirth 1978). Frequent shifts in the regional preeminence of late prehistoric centers in southern Zambezia seem to be


correlated with changes in the location of the exchange network thus affecting the fortunes of groups at different points on that network (Vogel 1990). The rise and fall of major states within Southeast Asia from the fifth to the fifteenth centuries can also partially be accounted for by their positions within changing exchange systems linking India and China (Hall 1985; Van Leur 1955; Wolters 1967).

Competition among would-be monopolists may result in arming clients. These military retinues can then be employed externally to supplement trading with raiding while, within a polity, they can tyrannize competitors and enforce tribute payments (e.g., Brumfiel and Earle 1987a:8; Haselgrove 1987:106-107, 114-115; Kipp and Schortman 1989). Such armed followings may be used to control the actions of potential competitors and systematically impoverish elite and commoners alike by enforcing the payment of ever larger tribute amounts (Kipp and Schortman 1989). This strategy seems to be a common response in cases where small polities come into contact with expansive states whose professional traders and market economies introduce large quantities of valuables which undermine chiefly prerogatives based on the control of these goods (Kipp and Schortman 1989). The reaction of "Free German" social leaders to the pressures and opportunities offered by contact with Rome seems to follow this method (e.g., Haselgrove 1987; Hedeager 1987). Militarism may have been part of north European elite strategies to monopolize trade with Greek colonies along the western Mediterranean earlier in the Iron Age as well (e.g., Wells 1980, 1984).

Finally, as noted above, the very existence of intersocietal elite identities, identified by their distinctive symbols, may facilitate centralized control over exchanged goods (e.g., Curtin 1984:49-50; Demarest 1988:370; Schortman 1989; Wheatley 1975:238-239, 242). This is especially the case where the interregional transfer of social valuables is restricted to those displaying symbols of identity membership. A number of different ethnohistorically known cases, often grouped under the heading of cultural or trading "diasporas" (e.g., Curtin 1984), exhibit this pattern.

There are, therefore, a number of different factors which can contribute alone or in combination to the monopolization of exotic valuables and, by extension, to centralized control over labor. Some of these relate to conditions within the physical environment while others are less tangible, dependent on the development of political and economic strategies to promote internal dependence. We are not proposing that the specified relations are inevitable. The conjunction of these different conditions does not require the development of sociopolitical complexity. Rather, the specified circumstances provide opportunities for political centralization if certain social segments become aware and take advantage of them.

There are several additional points we would like to consider in relation to resource control. First, there is general agreement that sociopolitical hierarchies based on elite monopolies over social valuables are inherently unstable (e.g., Friedman and Rowlands 1978; Gilman 1987). Lesser notables retain a fair amount of local autonomy (e.g., Hall 1985:257-258). This instability follows, in part, from difficulties paramounts face in maintaining effective monopolies against competition from lesser elites. In addition, rulers in anyone society do not control the flow of essential commodities and so are prey to fluctuations in their availability (e.g., Friedman 1982; Friedman and Rowlands 1978:228; Kohl 1979:80; Kristiansen 1987:47; McGuire 1987:131; Santley and Alexander, Chapter 2, this volume). There are several ways this instability might be countered. A polity can expand at the expense of its exchange


partners thereby converting voluntary transfers into tribute exactions (Santley and Alexander, Chapter 2, this volume; d. Hall 1985:228-229, 231). Monte Alban's military conquest of the neighboring Cuicatlan de Canada region in Monte Alban II times is one example of this phenomenon (Spencer 1982). The contemporary incorporation of the Ejutla valley into the Monte Alban polity, as described here by Feinman and Nicholas, may have followed a similar militaristic effort.

Another response would be to convert control over valuables into privileged access to such basic resources as arable land. In fact, any strategies which broaden the range of important resources a ruling group controls will enhance the dependence of supporters on elites and so increase the power of the latter. Examples include the conversion of monopolies over imports among Late Iron Age paramounts north of the Roman limes into centralized control of their clients' land and herds (Haselgrove 1987:138-139).

Second, the discussion so far has focused on the effects of interregional interaction on local relations among power, resource control, and command of labor. The concept of resource monopolization also has implications for understanding broader scale patterns of sociopolitical development. It has been observed many times that the appearance of a ranked or stratified polity within an interaction network tends to be followed by shifts toward increased complexity among its contact partners (e.g., Renfrew and Cherry 1986; see Schortman and Urban 1987 for a review). In part this follows from the demands the complex polity puts on its neighbors to organize for the production and/ or transport of needed social valuables (e.g., Flannery 1972:411-412, 423; Johnson 1978, 1983; Knapp 1986:140; 1990:162; Kohl 1978:472; Renfrew 1972:28; Schortman and Urban 1987:72; H. Wright 1972:104). Sociopolitical hierarchies also develop as "peripheral" scions take advantage of opportunities to acquire and monopolize new sources of wealth provided by their complex partners (e.g., Renfrew 1974). The interaction system that develops tends to include societies, however, with different growth potentials (e.g., Renfrew 1982:276). Those with access to large tracts of productive land capable of supporting sizable populations with intensive cultivation develop the most populous and complex sociopolitical systems. The labor controlled by elite patrons in these areas can be turned to producing abundant surpluses useful in exchange for additional valuables as well as capturing and supporting even more clients. A positive feedback relation comes to exist between elite wealth, labor supplies, and surplus production. Zones less blessed with arable lands support fewer producers and yield relatively meager surpluses. Elites here are at a disadvantage in competitions for interregional sociopolitical preeminence based, ultimately, on control over labor, surpluses, and the valuables to secure them both.

The result is the development of core-periphery systems in which less productive peripheries are exploited by more powerful, productive, and populous cores. As pointed out by several authors in this volume (Feinman and Nicholas, Kohl, Santley and Alexander, and Wells), however, core-periphery relations in noncapitalist situations are fragile and lack the marked developed/underdeveloped distinctions characteristic of the modern world system (e.g., Kohl 1987a; 1987b:21; 1989). The fragility of these ancient systems is due in large part to the inability of core elites to monopolize either essential resources or technologies and so to create perdurable patterns of interregional dependence (e.g., Frankenstein and Rowlands 1978:79-80; Kohl 1987a, 1987b, 1989; R. Wright 1989:277). The appearance of sociopolitical complexity within peripheries, especially those with high production potentials, also often leads to the


shift from dependency to development elites (Paynter 1981:125-127). Initially, newly emergent rulers may rely on contacts with core paramounts to establish their power (dependency elites). This is frequently accomplished through conforming to highprestige core ideologies which legitimize new power relations and give scions an "edge" in local competitions for power and privileged access to elite interaction networks (e.g., Hall 1985). Dependency elites, consequently, channel local surpluses to core rulers who thereby come to control labor on an interregional scale (Hall 1985). In return, they receive the paraphernalia of, and sacred association with, the foreign ideology which establishes their local legitimacy (e.g., Rowlands 1987). As peripheral elites solidify power at home, they come to preside over their own set of clientproducers, their own source of power (development elites). Under conditions where cores do not monopolize essential resources and primitive transportation systems make the levying of sanctions difficult, there is the persistent danger that peripheral scions will secure enough supporters and secede from the network seeking a better "balance of trade." If such a rebellion is successful, a previously marginal zone may become the core of a new system eclipsing the old central polity. Alternatively, if the core has sufficient demographic and organizational advantages over its peripheries, it may use military force to return recalcitrant partners to the fold, now as tribute payers (Santley and Alexander's hegemonic empire). Wars waged by Mesopotamian city-states against their former interaction partners in the 3rd millennium B.C. Iranian Highlands (Kohl 1978:472-473; 1979), Monte Alban against its immediate neighbors (Spencer 1982; Feinman and Nicholas, Chapter 4, this volume), and Rome against central and west European polities (Dyson 1985; Glodariu 1976; Luttwack 1976) may all exemplify this latter response.

Prehistoric interregional core-periphery systems are as unstable and volatile as the polities which comprise them. Competition over politically critical resources is the engine which drives these interactions and produces their political effects. Apparently, it is only when conquest and tribute replace contact and voluntary exchanges that the interregional sociopolitical system stabilizes to the benefit of populous cores. Both within and among polities, the fragility of dominance relations is traceable to the difficulty social factions confront in trying to absolutely control the loyalty and labor of clients. The development of effective military organizations appears as one way of compensating for this inability both among and within polities.

We are still a long way from being able to specify all of the conditions under which intersocietal contact has sociopolitical significance. As a starting point, we hypothesize that important variables include: the complexity of the contact partners; the volume of exchanged goods; and the ability of a social segment and/ or entire society to monopolize the acquisition, production, and/ or distribution of crucial resources flowing through the network. We have also suggested, along with others, that one of the central variables in determining the sociopolitical import of interregional ties is the ability of rulers to use their extrasocietal contacts to gain privileged access to the loyalty and labor of their adherents. The effectiveness of this control is always greater the wider the array of critical resources a social faction can monopolize. Consequently, the stability of regional and interregional dominance hierarchies depends on how successful a paramount and his faction are at translating initial control of exotica into monopolies over other resources including land, military force, and, eventually, the very means of production itself (see Santley and Alexander, Chapter 2, this volume).


QUESTIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH

During the course of this chapter, we have pointed out several open-ended questions currently being pursued within interaction studies. All of the statements made above could, in fact, be rephrased as queries around which additional work might productively focus. We will conclude this volume with a brief overview of some of the more salient problems whose consideration should carry interaction research well into the future. Unresolved questions are important parts of any paradigm (Kuhn 1970). They suggest the vitality of a field and its potential contributions.

One of the most persistent debates in the interaction domain concerns the significance of elite control over basic (subsistence) as opposed to luxury (sociopolitical) resources as foundations for controlling labor (d. Wallerstein 1974, 1980). Santley and Alexander in this collection clearly see the former as the more stable foundation for sociopolitical hierarchies (see also Gilman 1987 and G. Webster 1990 for recent published support of such a materialist view). On the opposite side, Whitecotton follows the lead of some world systems (e.g., Blanton and Feinman 1984; Schneider 1977) and prestige good theorists in attributing causal weight in sociopolitical change processes to elite monopolies over imported exotics. We do not see these positions as mutually exclusive. There is more than one way for elites to " skin" (or, at least, exploit) their clients. Further research into this topic will undoubtedly yield more profound insights into the nature and relative successes of different elite dominance strategies. We must be careful, however, not to treat control over basic or social resources as the sole, universal path to the formation of sociopolitical hierarchies. Rather, as we tried to indicate earlier, attention should focus on regularities in the interrelations among these variables, as seen in different cases, under specifiable circumstances.

A second major question relates to whether" adaptation" is a significant concept in understanding the sociopolitical impact of interregional linkages. Santley and Alexander suggest that peripheries develop, at least in part, to serve core economic and demographic needs, as adaptations to changes at the center. Other studies envision the genesis of interaction networks from the need to exchange subsistence resources within environments where food production is unpredictable from year to year (e.g., Pires-Ferreira 1975:6; Vogel 1990; see also Price 1977:213). On the contrary, most interaction studies derive from Marxist approaches which see interregional contacts as parts of elite strategies to promote their own, not the entire society's, well-being (Dupre and Rey 1973; Meillassoux 1960; Schneider 1977; d. the " political approach" of Brumfiel and Earle 1987a:3). If there are any adaptive effects of the arrangements constructed by these scheming elites, they are secondary, unintended, and certainly not causal. This difference of opinion is epistemological and not amenable to empirical evaluation. In fact, the distinction is probably overdrawn. Political leaders are not usually altruistic social engineers but neither can they get away without performing some services for their polities (e.g., Tainter 1988). Whether sociopolitical hierarchies and the interregional networks that maintain them arose to meet adaptive or individual needs may, ultimately, never be knowable in any particular case. To our minds, the principal danger here would come from any effort to see intersocietal ties as mere extensions of local adaptive processes. This presents a too one-sided view of a complex phenomenon and precludes consideration of individual goals and strategies in change processes. Research conducted from both


premises, therefore, is needed to elucidate the self-serving strategies of factions as well as the system-serving effects of intersocietal contacts (Flannery 1972).

A major question on the interregional scale concerns how labor is distributed among cores and peripheries and to what extent peripheries are underdeveloped in relation to cores. Feinman and Nicholas in their contribution note that certain productive activities were relegated to the peripheral Ejutla valley by the powerful Monte Alban state during Monte Alban III times. Interestingly, these included workshops for such plausible prestige goods as shell and textiles. The observed distribution of production activities does not conform to traditional expectations of peripheries as producers of low-value goods or raw materials for shipment to cores (Wallerstein 1974,1980). Wells also describes peripheries of the Roman Empire which do not meet modem expectations of underdevelopment. He is at pains to point out that Feddersen Wierde, in particular, did not develop the dependent relations with Rome that characterize Third World ties with modem capitalist cores. Feinman and Nicholas, Kohl, and Upham independently note the peripheries may act as important conduits for transfers of technological information and goods exchange on which cores themselves depend for survival. Peripheries, in short, are not necessarily passive recipients of core innovations but can be active participants in interregional processes of sociopolitical and economic change. This distinction between modem and ancient interaction systems probably relates to the aforementioned inability of prehistoric cores to monopolize essential resources, including technologies and capital. Whitecotton's case study of Late Postclassic Highland Oaxaca does, however, more closely approximate patterns of peripheral underdevelopment. In this situation, military coercion apparently helped enforce central Mexican dominance, imposing unfavorable exchange relations on peripheral Oaxaca. It may well be that economic underdevelopment is associated with hegemonic and, more certainly, territorial empires where cores control their peripheries by military force (Santley and Alexander, Chapter 2, this volume). This ability to develop patterns of peripheral underdevelopment also depends, in large part, on the effectiveness of the transportation system (Chapter 2, this volume).

Upham's essay takes us further into this question through his consideration of " empty spaces" within interregional networks. His specification of the effects of these sparsely settled zones on the values of exchanged commodities and the organization of interaction systems sensitizes us to contact processes we have successfully ignored up to now.

This variation in prehistOriC relations of development and underdevelopment raises the issue articulated most clearly by Kohl and by Santley and Alexander of the applicability of Wallerstein's world-systems theory to prehistOriC cases. Many of this theory's expectations are based on the capitalist system in which cores can effectively monopolize essential resources and so force peripheries into dependent statuses. The problems experienced with transferring world-systems theory to the study of more remote time periods may follow from basic differences between modem and ancient interaction processes.

Whitecotton raises the important issue of " cultural hierarchialization" in the Late Postclassic Mesoamerican world system. We have already noted that interaction systems frequently function through the personalistic ties maintained by elites. As Whitecotton notes, however, there is a tendency for emergent leaders to acculturate to the material and cultural forms of established paramounts, at least initially (see the


discussion of dependency elites, above). Consequently, the social diacritics which define paramount identities tend to conform to patterns previously developed by one of the interactors, usually the rulers of the polity with the longest history of sociopolitical complexity (e.g., Cherry 1986:31-32, 38, 40; Frankenstein and Rowlands 1978:83; Wells 1980). In this way, Southeast Asian scions adopted Hindu cultural forms (Hall 1985; Wolters 1967:221, 246-247) while "Free German" chiefs north of the limes mimicked Roman imperial practices (Dyson 1985; Wells 1984, also Chapter 8, this volume). It may be in this sense that we can actually perceive some dependence of peripheries on cores. Peripheral leaders, at least initially, rely on ties with established polities for symbols of membership within important exchange systems and for ideologies which legitimize new power relations based on these contacts at home (e.g., Flannery 1968a; Hall 1985:53-54; Renfrew 1982; Rowlands 1987; Wells 1980:96-97). An ideological reliance may be a weak basis for long-term domination but it is nonetheless significant during the first contact stages. The recognition of ideological hierarchialization archaeologically is crucial to testing this notion and its implications for understanding ancient core-periphery relations.

The significance of warfare in interaction processes also needs further consideration. As noted in several volume contributions (Feinman and Nicholas, Santley and Alexander, see above) the use of military force can be of crucial importance in stabilizing interregional exchange relations to the benefit of cores. In this volume, Athens (Chapter 9) and Weigand (Chapter 10) address the often ignored issue, however, of the effects of these hostilities on societies facing core expansion. Questions here include: What conditions favor successful resistance to incorporation within expanding empires? What is the sociopolitical significance of persistent conflict on the combatants in general? The nature of the transport system as well as a society's distance from a bellicose core certainly help to determine the effectiveness of local resistance efforts. Weigand also points out that this success may be positively correlated with a polity's ability to control a wide array of resources necessary for survival. Athens, in tum, provides a model for resistance in which widely shared ethnic ties function to maintain an energetically efficient, situationally activated alliance system in the face of persistent military threats. An important point in all these cases is the strategic use of highly visible material forms to stress unity versus powerful aggressors. The communicative character of material culture is an all-too-often ignored aspect of intersocietal conflicts (e.g., Hodder 1986; Rapoport 1982). Clearly, warfare is a complex process. Much more work is needed to specify the conditions under which armed conflict, or at least its persistent threat, has an impact on local processes of sociopolitical change.

CONCLUSIONS

The ultimate goal of interaction research is to write "total histories" (Kohl 1987a:29) of ancient societies, histories which place local developments within the rich network of connections anyone society maintained. In order to meet this objective, we need to construct a paradigm which, among other steps, identifies analytical units and the conditions under which intersocietal contacts are likely to have particular sociopolitical effects. The perceptive reader, or even the one who is half asleep by now, will know from the evidence of this volume that such a paradigm is still being con-


structed. The present lack of unanimity is not grounds for despair, however. As we have striven to indicate in this chapter, there is a developing consensus on the basic elements of an interaction paradigm and a wide array of questions currently guiding innovative and productive investigations. Interaction studies are increasingly distinguishing themselves from other archaeological approaches to the past with their own contributions to make. We are, as noted in the introductory chapter, picking up where diffusion research left off in the 1950s, improving our understanding of the systemic effects of intersocietal contacts. There is no reason, in the course of this revival, to resuscitate old debates concerning the causal primacy of internal or external causes of sociopolitical change. Rather, we can view interaction, cultural ecology, and other intellectual frameworks for what they are: avenues to deciphering the past with each providing its own insights on sociopolitical change. At some future point individual paradigms will be evaluated by the quality of the research they spawn, the understandings to which they give rise. Based on the chapters in this volume, and the overall course of interaction studies, there is every reason to believe that interaction research will be judged positively.

REFERENCES

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Index

Adaptation, 246-247 resilient, 148

Aeneolithic, 121, 123, 124-125 Aztec, 22-23, 28--29, 36, 38, 62-64, 66, 67, 242

Barter, 178 Booty,178 Bronze Age, 118, 122, 124, 133, 134, 236, 242 Bulk goods, 20, 22, 47, 52, 179

Cara culture, 193, 198-202 Chacoan system, 141-142, 150 City-states, 56 Classic period Mesoamerica, 58, 101-106,

221,222 Cochasqui,205,210 Cociyo Hueza, 57-58, 64 Coevolution, 240 Contexts of recovery, 237 Core, 9, 18, 21, 24, 34, 37, 45-46, 66, 76, 78,

118,133,238-239,245,246,247 Core-periphery

hierarchy, 66 system, 18, 25, 26, 34, 37, 38, 40, 47, 244

Craft specialization, 23, 36, 78, 85, 110, 113 Cuicatlan, 59, 99, 244 Cuilapan, 58, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 75 Cultural ecology, 2, 9-10,236 Culture, 53, 57, 67

Diasporas cultural, 240, 243

Diffusion, 5-7, 8, 9, 10, 117 Disenfranchisement, 27, 29, 32, 34, 40

Economic layering, 145, 150 Ecuador, 193

Egalitarian societies, 240 8-Deer "Tiger Claw," 59-60, 61, 66 Ejutla, 47, 76, 244, 247

settlement pattern, 80 Empire, hegemonic, 18,21-23, 26, 34-35, 37,

40,238,245 territorial, 18, 23-25, 26, 29, 30, 35, 37, 40

England, preindustrial, 25, 32, 39, 40 Ethnicity, 193, 211-212, 214, 248

defined, 194 Etla, 57, 58 Evolution, cultural, 52, 117 Evolutionary paradigm, 5-6, 8, 9 Exchange, 18,24,68,153-155,236. See also

Trade Aztec, 23, 63 in Ecuador, 210 in Oaxaca, 60-61, 66, 75-76, 99 by sea, 38-39 Transcaucasia-Iran, 123

Exotics. See Preciosities External arena, 45-46, 47, 53

Feddersen Wierde, 181-182,242,247 Formative. See also Preclassic

Early, 91, 93, 221-222, 225 Middle, 222 Late, 222, 223, 225

Frontier, 76 Roman, 176

Gaul,176 Geographical distance, 158 Gift-giving, 29, 178, 185, 239 Goods

defined, 175-176 Gudme, 184, 242

257

258

Hinterlands, 140, 141,238 Historical causality, 4, 5

Identity formation, 68, 175, 179, 183, 185-186, 229-230,236,239-240,243,247-248. See also Ethnicity

Imbabura Province, 195, 198 Inca, 198, 200, 214, 242 Information transfer, 236-237, 247 Interaction sphere, 8 Interaction studies, 3, 4, 235 Interregional interaction, 3, 118, 133, 139,

153-155, 157, 175, 194 intensity of, 236

Jalisco, 221 Jornada, 141, 142, 144, 145

Kinnan Basin, 21, 27-28, 35 Kongo, 241, 242 Kura-Araxes culture, 122, 124-125 Kurgans, 122, 126, 127, 134

Labor control, 241-246 distribution, 247 organization, 19, 31, 32

La Chimba, 210, 213 Late Period (Ecuador), 202-203 Late Period-Cara culture, 193 Lubsow graves, 182-185, 242 Luxury goods. See Preciosities

Macuilxochitl, 57, 65 genealogy of, 57, 58

Maikop culture, 122 Meggers, Betty, 8-9 Mesoamerica, 52, 236, 247 Mesopotamia, 36-37, 38, 47, 123, 125, 133,

245 Metallurgical province, 134 Metallurgy, 121, 126, 127, 128, 132, 134 Mexica. See Aztec Miahuatlan, 62, 75-76, 86

valley, 79, 86, 94, 99, 107 Mimbres, 147, 149 Minisystem, 45 Mixtec, 54, 68 Mixteca Alta, 59, 60 Mixteca-Puebla

culture, 64, 65-66 style, 56

Mode of production capitalist, 31, 32, 35, 40 lineage, 241 tributary, 31, 32, 33, 34, 53

Mogollon. See Jornada Monopoly, 241-242, 244 Monte Alban, 47, 56, 58-59, 87, 88

1,61,94,97 II, 61, 87, 97, 99 III, 61, 82, 85, 87, 101-102, 105-106 IV, 57, 59, 61, 106-107 V, 57, 61-62, 82, 85, 107, 110-111

Moteuczoma, 64

Nayarit, 221 Neolithic, 121, 123, 131 Nesting, 47 Networks, 75, 235-238, 240, 246

Oaxaca, 47, 51, 75, 247

Paradigm, 3, 235 Peer polities, 236

INDEX

Periphery, 18, 21, 23, 24, 34, 35, 45-46, 47, 76, 112,118,133,140,143,244-245,246,247

technological superiority of, 118, 134 Pochteca, 22, 67 Pichincha Province, 195, 198 Political economy, 19, 40

Aztec, 23 broad-spectrum, 32, 46 dendritic, 18, 20-21, 25, 26, 28, 34, 37, 40 narrow-spectrum, 32, 34

Political ideology, 153-155, 157,239 Political fragmentation, 106, 110, 112-113,

241 Population estimates, 78-79

Cara region, 201-202 Jalisco and Nayarit, 223 Oaxaca, 80, 82, 93, 94, 97, 99, 101, 106

Postclassic (Mesoamerica), 54, 75 Precapitalist, 67 Preciosities, 19, 20, 22, 24, 25, 28, 29, 31, 32,

35, 38, 46, 53, 85, 126, 143, 154, 177, 179, 182-183,202,210,239,242,246

Prec1assic (Mesoamerica), 236. See also For-mative

Prestige good, 153, 236, 247. See also Preciosities

ranking, 153, 154 Primate center, 20, 26, 27, 29 Principalities, 56-57 Pueblo, 140, 149

INDEX

Querecheros, 140

Raised fields, 201, 207 Ramp mounds, 203, 205, 207, 211 Roman Empire, 30-31, 36, 39, 176, 238, 247 Rome, 30, 36 Rosario Phase, 93, 94

San Jose Mogote, 87, 94 San Jose Phase, 91, 94 Santa Cruz Ixtepec-Cuilapan. See Cuilapan Semiperiphery, 45-46, 65, 66, 119, 133 Settlement

hierarchy, 124-125 patterns, 78, 80, 146 systems, "empty" spaces in, 139, 247

Socapamba, 205, 206, 208, 209, 210 Social system, 45, 52, 53, 67 Sociopolitical change, 3, 235, 240 Southwest, U.s., 47, 139 Spain, Colonial period, 24-25, 33, 36, 38, 39 Status display, 183-186 Steward, Julian, 9-10 Surplus, economic, 153

Tacitus, 177, 178, 181, 185 Tarascans,67 Tenochtitlan, 22, 23, 28, 36, 38, 39, 68 Teuchitl<ln tradition, 223 Tehuantepec, 60, 61, 62, 64, 66, 75 Teotihuacan, 58-59, 67, 221, 227, 228, 229 Tierras Largas Phase, 91 Tlacolula, 58, 80, 107 Trade, 25, 78, 144-145, 153-155, 175, 178, 236.

See also Exchange Aztec, 22-23 meaning of, 175 on the Roman frontier, 176 scarcity, 242

Trade, ecumene, 53. See also World economy

Transcaucasia, 47, 117 defined, 118-119

259

Transcaucasian culture. See Kura-Araxes culture

Transport mode, 19,37 Travel

and empty spaces, 144-145 meaning of, 158

Trialeti culture, 126, 127 Tribute, 21, 22, 23, 26, 31, 39, 238, 243, 244 Tula, 54, 66 Turan culture, 131, 132 Tututepec, 59-60, 61, 63, 66, 67, 75-76 Turkestan, Western, 118-119, 129

defined, 129-131

Ubaid, 123, 125 Underdevelopment, 46, 47, 247 Urartians, 128, 134, 135 Uruk,125

Wallerstein, Immanuel, 17, 18, 45, 51, 118, 142,247

Warfare, 56, 63, 76, 99, 102, 110, 128, 129, 176, 189-190, 198, 200, 214, 243, 244, 245,

Wealth finance, 153 Westwick, 180-181, 242 White, Leslie, 8-9 World economy, 45, 53, 62, 66, 67,133-134,

143,229 World empire, 45, 53, 67 World system, 45, 66, 67, 145

Mesoamerica as, 17 model, 41, 118, 133 precapitalist, 18 theory, 17-18,45,52, 118,247

Zaachila, 56, 59, 61, 62, 63, 64 Zapotec, 54, 68

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