Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2plfb Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-28T15:22:23.003Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

COMPLEXITY, INTERACTION, AND EPISTEMOLOGY: MIXTECS, ZAPOTECS, AND OLMECS IN EARLY FORMATIVE MESOAMERICA

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 September 2010

Jeffrey P. Blomster
Jeffrey P. Blomster*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, George Washington University, 2110 G. St., NW, Washington, DC 20052
*
E-mail correspondence to: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Interaction between the Gulf Coast Olmecs and various regions of Early Formative Mesoamerica remains debated and poorly understood. In Oaxaca, models have been dominated by neoevolutionary epistemology; interaction between the Valley of Oaxaca and San Lorenzo has been characterized by emulation or peer polity models. Data from the Valley of Oaxaca, the Nochixtlán Valley, and the Gulf Coast demonstrate that San Lorenzo was at a different level of sociopolitical complexity than its contemporaries. Previous comparisons between Olmec-style pottery in the Gulf Coast and Valley of Oaxaca are found to be problematic, and have led to the impression that Oaxaca villagers produced more of this pottery than did the Olmecs. Neutron activation analysis demonstrates the Gulf Coast Olmecs exported ceramics to Mixtecs and Zapotecs in Oaxaca, while receiving few if any pots in return, suggesting that new models and theoretical perspectives must be applied to understanding the relationships between Oaxacan chiefdoms and the nascent Olmec state at San Lorenzo. An agency perspective explores what Mixtec, Zapotec, and Olmec groups may have taken from these interactions and relationships and acknowledges both local and Gulf Coast understandings of “Olmec.” Such relationships may be characterized more by acquisition between regions, with San Lorenzo as a superordinate center.

Type
Special Section: Rethinking the Olmecs and Early Formative Mesoamerica
Information
Ancient Mesoamerica , Volume 21 , Issue 1 , Spring 2010 , pp. 135 - 149
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Agrinier, Pierre 1989 Mirador-Plumajillo, Chiapas, y sus relaciones con cuatro sitios del horizonte olmeca en Veracruz, Chiapas y la costa de Guatemala. Arqueología 2:19–36.Google Scholar
Algaze, Guillermo 1993 The Uruk World System: The Dynamics of Early Mesopotamian Civilization. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago.Google Scholar
Binford, Lewis R. 1962 Archaeology as Anthropology. American Antiquity 28:217–225.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blomster, Jeffrey P. 1998a At the Bean Hill in the Land of the Mixtec: Early Formative Social Complexity and Interregional Interaction at Etlatongo, Oaxaca, Mexico. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, Yale University, New Haven.Google Scholar
Blomster, Jeffrey P. 1998b Context, Cult, and Early Formative Public Ritual in the Mixteca Alta: Analysis of a Hollow Baby Figurine from Etlatongo, Oaxaca. Ancient Mesoamerica 9:309–326.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blomster, Jeffrey P. 2002 What and Where is Olmec Style? Regional Perspectives on Hollow Figurines in Early Formative Mesoamerica. Ancient Mesoamerica 13:171–195.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blomster, Jeffrey P. 2004 Etlatongo: Social Complexity, Interaction, and Village Life in the Mixteca Alta of Oaxaca, Mexico. Wadsworth, Belmont, CA.Google Scholar
Blomster, Jeffrey P. 2009 Materializing the Olmec Style in the Nochixtlán Valley, Oaxaca. Paper presented at Dumbarton Oaks Rountable, “The San Lorenzo Olmec and their Neighbors: Material Manifestations.” Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Blomster, Jeffrey P., and Cheetham, David 2008 Six Degrees of Olmec: Comparisons of Interaction with Olman in Oaxaca and Soconusco. Paper presented at the 73rd Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology, Vancouver.Google Scholar
Blomster, Jeffrey P., Neff, Hector, and Glascock, Michael D. 2005 Olmec Pottery Production and Export in Ancient Mexico Determined through Elemental Analysis. Science 307:1068–1072.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bourdieu, Pierre 1977 Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge University Press, New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burger, Richard L. 1992 Chavín and the Origins of Andean Civilization. Thames and Hudson, New York.Google Scholar
Cahn, Robert, and Winter, Marcus 1993 The San José Mogote Danzante. Indiana 13:39–64.Google Scholar
Cheetham, David 2006 The Americas' First Colony? A Possible Olmec Outpost in Southern Mexico. Archaeology 56:42–46.Google Scholar
Cheetham, David 2010 Cultural Imperatives in Clay: Early Olmec Carved Pottery. Ancient Mesoamerica 21:165–186.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cheetham, David, Gonzáles, Susana E., Behl, Richard J., Coe, Michael D., Diehl, Richard A., and Neff, Hector 2009 Petrographic Analyses of Early Formative Olmec Carved Pottery. Mexicon 31:69–72.Google Scholar
Clark, John E. 2007 Mesoamerica's First State. In The Political Economy of Ancient Mesoamerica: Transformations during the Formative and Classic Periods, edited by Scarborough, Vernon L. and Clark, John E., pp. 11–46. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Clark, John E., and Pye, Mary E. 2000 The Pacific Coast and the Olmec Question. In Olmec Art and Archaeology in Mesoamerica, edited by Clark, John E. and Pye, Mary E., pp. 217–251. Studies in the History of Art, Vol. 58. National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Coe, Michael D. 1965 The Olmec Style and its Distribution. In Handbook of Middle American Indians, Vol. 3: Archaeology of Southern Mesoamerica, part 2, edited by Wauchope, Robert and Willey, Gordon R., pp. 739–775. University of Texas Press, Austin.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coe, Michael D., and Diehl, Richard A. 1980 In the Land of the Olmec, Vol. 1: The Archaeology of San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán. University of Texas Press, Austin.Google Scholar
Comaroff, Jean, and Comaroff, John L. 1991 Of Revelation and Revolution: Christianity, Colonialism, and Consciousness in South Africa. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cyphers, Ann 1997 Olmec Architecture at San Lorenzo. In Olmec to Aztec: Settlement Patterns in the Ancient Gulf Lowlands, edited by Stark, Barbara L. and Arnold, Phillip J. III, pp. 96–114. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.Google Scholar
Cyphers, Ann 2004 Escultura olmeca de San Lorenzo Tenochititlán. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Cyphers, Ann and Di Castro, Anna 2009 Early Olmec Architecture and Imagery. In The Art of Urbanism: How Mesoamerican Kingdoms Represented Themselves in Architecture and Imagery, edited by Fash, William L. and Luján, Leonardo López, pp. 21–52. Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
de la Fuente, Beatriz 1992 Order and Nature in Olmec Art. In The Ancient Americas: Art from Sacred Landscapes, edited by Townsend, Richard F., pp. 120–133. The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago.Google Scholar
Di Castro, Anna, and Cyphers, Ann 2006 Iconografía de la cerámica de San Lorenzo. Anales del Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas 89:29–58.Google Scholar
Dietler, Michael 1998 Consumption, Agency, and Cultural Entanglement: Theoretical Implications of a Mediterranean Colonial Encounter. In Studies in Cultural Contact Interaction, Culture Change and Archaeology, edited by Cusick, James G., pp. 288–315. Center for Archaeological Investigations, Occasional Paper No. 25. Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale.Google Scholar
Dobres, Marcia-Anne, and Robb, John E. 2000 Agency in Archaeology: Paradigm or Platitude? In Agency in Archaeology, edited by Dobres, Marcia-Anne and Robb, John E., pp. 3–17. Routledge, New York.Google Scholar
Flannery, Kent V. 1968 The Olmec and the Valley of Oaxaca: A Model for Inter-regional Interaction in Formative Times. In Dumbarton Oaks Conference on the Olmec, edited by Benson, Elizabeth P., pp. 79–117. Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Flannery, Kent V. 1972 [1968] Culture History v. Cultural Process: A Debate in American Archaeology. In Contemporary Archaeology: A Guide to Theory and Contributions, edited by Leone, Mark P., pp. 102–107. Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale.Google Scholar
Flannery, Kent V., and Marcus, Joyce 1994 Early Formative Pottery of the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico. Memoirs of the Museum of Anthropology, University of Michigan, No. 27. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Flannery, Kent V., and Marcus, Joyce 2000 Formative Mexican Chiefdoms and the Myth of the “Mother Culture.” Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 19:1–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Giddens, Anthony 1984 The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory of Structuration. University of California Press, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Grove, David C. 1996 Archaeological Contexts of Olmec Art Outside of the Gulf Coast. In Olmec Art of Ancient Mexico, edited by Benson, Elizabeth P. and de la Fuente, Beatriz, pp. 105–117. National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Grove, David C. 2007 Stirrup-spout Bottles and Carved Stone Monuments: The Many Faces of Interregional Interactions in Formative Period Morelos. In Archaeology, Art, and Ethnogenesis in Mesoamerican Prehistory: Papers in Honor of Gareth W. Lowe, edited by Lowe, Lynneth S. and Pye, Mary E., pp. 209–227. Papers of the New World Archaeological Foundation, No. 68. Brigham Young University, Provo,.Google Scholar
Guevara, María Eugenia 2004 La cerámica de San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán, Veracruz: Origen y naturaleza. Unpublished Master's thesis, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Helms, Mary W. 1993 Craft and the Kingly Ideal: Art, Trade, and Power. University of Texas Press, Austin.Google Scholar
Lesure, Richard G. 2000 Animal Imagery, Cultural Unities, and Ideologies of Inequality in Early Formative Mesoamerica. In Olmec Art and Archaeology in Mesoamerica, edited by Clark, John E. and Pye, Mary E., pp. 193–215. National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Marcus, Joyce 1989 Zapotec Chiefdoms and the Nature of Formative Religions. In Regional Perspectives on the Olmec, edited by Sharer, Robert J. and Grove, David C., pp. 148–197. Cambridge University Press, New York,.Google Scholar
Marcus, Joyce 1998 Women's Ritual in Formative Oaxaca: Figurine-making, Divination, Death and the Ancestors. Memoirs of the University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology, No. 33. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marcus, Joyce, and Flannery, Kent V. 1996 Zapotec Civilization: How Urban Society Evolved in Mexico's Oaxaca Valley. Thames & Hudson, New York.Google Scholar
Miller, James G. 1978 Living Systems. McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York.Google Scholar
Neff, Hector, Blomster, Jeffrey P., Glascock, Michael D., Bishop, Ronald L., Blackman, M. James, Coe, Michael D., Cowgill, George L., Cyphers, Ann, Diehl, Richard A., Houston, Stephen, Joyce, Arthur A., Lipo, Carl P., and Winter, Marcus 2006 Smokescreens in the Provenance Investigation of Early Formative Mesoamerican Ceramics. Latin American Antiquity 17:104–118.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Niederberger, Christine 1976 Zohapilco: Cinco milenios de ocupación humana en un sitio lacustre de la Cuenca de México. Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Niederberger, Christine 1987 Paléopaysages et archéologie pre-urbaine du Bassin de Mexico. Etudes Mesoamericaines, No. 11. 2 vols. Centre d'études Mexicaines et Centraméricaines, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Ortner, Sherry B. 1984 Theory in Anthropology since the Sixties. Comparative Studies in Society and History 26:126–166.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pires-Ferreira, Jane Wheeler 1975 Formative Mesoamerican Exchange Networks with Special Reference to the Valley of Oaxaca. Memoirs of the Museum of Anthropology, No. 7. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Polyani, Karl 1957 The Economy as Instituted Process. In Trade and Market in the Early Empires, edited by Polyani, Karl, Arensberg, Conrad M., and Pearson, Harry W., pp. 243–269. The Free Press, New York.Google Scholar
Pool, Christopher 2010 The Early Horizon at Tres Zapotes: Implications for Olmec Interaction. Ancient Mesoamerica 21: 95–106.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pyne, Nanette 1976 The Fire-serpent and Were-jaguar in Formative Oaxaca: A Contingency Table Analysis. In The Early Mesoamerican Village, edited by Kent V. Flannery, pp. 272–280. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Renfrew, Colin 1982 Polity and Power: Interaction, Intensification, and Exploitation. In An Island Polity: The Archaeology of Exploitation in Melos, edited by Renfrew, Colin and Wagstaff, Malcolm, pp. 264–290. Cambridge University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Renfrew, Colin 1986 Introduction: Peer Polity Interaction and Socio-political Change. In Peer Polity Interaction and Socio-political Change, edited by Renfrew, Colin and Cherry, John, pp. 1–18. Cambridge University Press, New York.Google Scholar
Rice, Prudence M. 1987 Pottery Analysis: A Sourcebook. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.Google Scholar
Ringle, William M., Negrón, Tomás Gallareta, and Bey, George J. III 1998 The Return of Quetzalcoatl: Evidence for the Spread of a World Religion during the Epiclassic Period. Ancient Mesoamerica 9:193–232.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Spaulding, Albert C. 1953 Statistical Techniques for the Discovery of Artifact Types. American Antiquity 18:305–313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stark, Barbara L. 2000 Framing the Gulf Olmecs. In Olmec Art and Archaeology in Mesoamerica, edited by Clark, John E. and Pye, Mary E., pp. 31–53. Studies in the History of Art, Vol. 58. National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Stark, Barbara L. 2007 Out of Olmec. In The Political Economy of Ancient Mesoamerica: Transformations during the Formative and Classic Periods, edited by Scarborough, Vernon L. and Clark, John E., pp. 47–63. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Stein, Gil J. 1998 World Systems Theory and Alternative Modes of Interaction in the Archaeology of Culture Contact. In Studies in Culture Contact: Interaction, Culture Change, and Archaeology, edited by Cusick, James G., pp. 220–255. Center for Archaeological Investigations, Occasional Paper No. 25. Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale.Google Scholar
Stoltman, James B, Marcus, Joyce, Flannery, Kent V., Burton, James H., and Moyle, Robert G. 2005 Petrographic Evidence Shows that Pottery Exchange between the Olmec and their Neighbors was Two-way. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 102:11213–11218.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Symonds, Stacey C. 2000 The Ancient Landscape at San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán, Veracruz, Mexico: Settlement and Nature. In Olmec Art and Archaeology in Mesoamerica, edited by Clark, John E. and Pye, Mary E., pp. 55–73. National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Symonds, Stacey C., Cyphers, Ann, and Lunagómez, Roberto 2002 Asentamiento prehispánico en San Lorenzo Tenochtitlán. Serie San Lorenzo, Vol. 2. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Taube, Karl A. 2004 Olmec Art at Dumbarton Oaks. Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Urcid, Javier 1992 Zapotec Hieroglyphic Writing. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, Yale University, New Haven.Google Scholar
Werbner, Richard P. 1977 Introduction. In Regional Cults, edited by Werbner, Richard P., pp. ix–xxxvii. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Whalen, Michael E. 1981 Excavations at Santo Domingo Tomaltepec: Evolution of a Formative Community in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico. Memoirs of the University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology, No. 12. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Winter, Marcus 1984 Exchange in Formative Highland Oaxaca. In Trade and Exchange in Early Mesoamerica, edited by Hirth, Kenneth G., pp. 179–214. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Winter, Marcus 1994 Los altos de Oaxaca y los olmecas. In Los olmecas en Mesoamérica, edited by Clark, John E., pp. 129–141. El Equilibrista, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Yoffee, Norman 2005 Myths of the Archaic State: Evolution of the Earliest Cities, States, and Civilizations. Cambridge University Press, New York.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zárate Morán, Roberto 1987 Excavaciones de un sitio preclásico en San Mateo Etlatongo, Nochixtlán, Oaxaca, México. British Archaeological Reports International Series, No. 322, Oxford.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zeitlin, Judith F., and Zeitlin, Robert N. 1993 Pacific Coastal Laguna Zope. Ancient Mesoamerica 4:85–101.CrossRefGoogle Scholar