Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-lnqnp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T15:20:25.060Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

SWIDDEN AGRICULTURE IN THE TIERRA FRÍA? EVIDENCE FROM SEDIMENTARY RECORDS IN TLAXCALA

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 October 2011

Aleksander Borejsza ,
Charles D. Frederick  and
Richard G. Lesure
Aleksander Borejsza*
Affiliation:
Aleksander Borejsza, Coordinación de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades, Universidad Autónoma de San Luis Potosí, Av. Industrias 101A, Fracc. Talleres, San Luis Potosí, C. P. 78494, Mexico
Charles D. Frederick
Affiliation:
Charles D. Frederick, Department of Geography and the Environment, University of Texas, Austin, TX 78712–1098, USA
Richard G. Lesure
Affiliation:
Richard G. Lesure, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095–1533, USA
*
E-mail correspondence to: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Swidden agriculture in Mesoamerica is commonly associated with the hot and humid lowlands and with small isolated communities. Charcoal-rich sediments discovered in Tlaxcala, however, suggest that it was practiced in the cold highlands in the Formative and Classic periods. The headwaters of the Xilomantla drainage incised a nine-meter deep channel shortly before 200 b.c., in response to increased runoff from slopes degraded by agriculture. It was filled back within a few hundred years with sands and muds containing recurrent laminae of charred plant matter that reflect the annual burning of secondary scrub in fallowed fields. A gully in the La Ladera drainage received high inputs of charcoal from the surroundings of a nearby settlement between ca. a.d. 400 and 900. The farming practices inferred from these deposits have no exact ethnographic analog. They inflicted lasting environmental damage, but were upheld for several centuries despite changes in settlement patterns.

Type
Research Article
Information
Ancient Mesoamerica , Volume 22 , Issue 1 , Spring 2011 , pp. 91 - 106
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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

Abascal Macías, Rafael 1980 Riego y control de agua en los cultivos prehispánicos de Tlaxcala. Revista Mexicana de Estudios Antropológicos 26:115–167.Google Scholar
Abascal Macías, Rafael, and Cook, Ángel García 1975 Sistemas de cultivo, riego y control de agua en el área de Tlaxcala. In Balance y perspectiva de la antropología de Mesoamérica y del norte de México: Arqueología I, pp. 199–212. Sociedad Mexicana de Antropología, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Benz, Bruce F. 1999 On the Origin, Evolution, and Dispersal of Maize. In Pacific Latin America in Prehistory, edited by Blake, Michael, pp. 25–38. Washington State University, Pullman.Google Scholar
Bogaard, Amy 2002 Questioning the Relevance of Shifting Cultivation to Neolithic Farming in the Loess Belt of Europe. Vegetation History and Archaeobotany 11:155–168.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Borejsza, Aleksander 2006 Agricultural Slope Management and Soil Erosion in Tlaxcala, Mexico. Ph.D. dissertation, Archaeology Program, University of California, Los Angeles.Google Scholar
Borejsza, Aleksander, López, Isabel Rodríguez, Frederick, Charles D., and Bateman, Mark D. 2008 Agricultural Slope Management and Soil Erosion at La Laguna, Tlaxcala, Mexico. Journal of Archaeological Science 35:1854–1866.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boserup, Ester 1965 The Conditions of Agricultural Growth. Aldine Publishing, Chicago.Google Scholar
Caballero, Margarita, Lozano, Socorro, Ortega, Beatriz, Urrutia, Jaime, and Macías, José Luis 1999 Environmental Characteristics of Lake Tecocomulco, Northern Basin of Mexico, for the Last 50,000 Years. Journal of Paleolimnology 22:399–411.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
CLICOM 2006 Climatología computarizada. Servicio Meteorológico Nacional and Comisión Nacional del Agua, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Córdova, Carlos E. 1991 Geomorfología y evolución del uso del suelo en el medio semiárido de la cuenca media del Río Balsas, Guerrero. Unpublished Master's thesis, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Córdova, Carlos E. 1997 Landscape Transformation in Aztec and Spanish Colonial Texcoco, Mexico. Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Geography, University of Texas, Austin.Google Scholar
Córdova, Carlos E., and Parsons, Jeffrey R. 1997 Geoarchaeology of an Aztec Dispersed Village on the Texcoco Piedmont of Central Mexico. Geoarchaeology 12:177–210.3.0.CO;2-#>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Darby, Stephen E., and Simon, Andrew (editors) 1999 Incised River Channels: Processes, Forms, Engineering and Management. Wiley, Chichester, UK.Google Scholar
Denevan, William M. 1992 Stone vs. Metal Axes: The Ambiguity of Shifting Cultivation in Prehistoric Amazonia. Journal of the Steward Anthropological Society 20:153–165.Google Scholar
Doolittle, William E. 1990 Canal Irrigation in Prehistoric Mexico. University of Texas Press, Austin.Google Scholar
Doolittle, William E. 2000 Cultivated Landscapes of Native North America. Oxford University Press, Oxford.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Doolittle, William E. 2004 Permanent vs. Shifting Cultivation in the Eastern Woodlands of North America Prior to European Contact. Agriculture and Human Values 2:77–85.Google Scholar
Doolittle, William E. 2006 An Epilogue and Bibliographic Supplement to “Canal Irrigation in Prehistoric Mexico: The Sequence of Technological Change”. Mono y Conejo 4:3–15.Google Scholar
Edwards, Kevin J. 1993 Models of Mid-Holocene Forest Farming for North-West Europe. In Climate Change and Human Impact on the Landscape, edited by Chambers, F. M., pp. 133–45. Chapman and Hall, London.Google Scholar
Ern, Hartmut 1972 Estudio de la vegetación en la parte oriental de México central, en especial de los bosques de las montañas en el área del Proyecto Puebla-Tlaxcala. Comunicaciones 6:1–6.Google Scholar
Etchevers, Jorge D., Hidalgo, Claudia, Prat, Christian, and Quantin, Paul 2003 Tepetates of Mexico. In Encyclopedia of Soil Science, edited by Lal, Rattan, pp. 1745–1748. Marcel Dekker, New York.Google Scholar
Flannery, Kent V. 1983 Precolumbian Farming in the Valleys of Oaxaca, Nochixtlan, Tehuacan, and Cuicatlan: A Comparative Study. In The Cloud People: Divergent Evolution of the Zapotec and Mixtec Civilizations, edited by Flannery, Kent V. and Marcus, Joyce, pp. 323–338. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Flannery, Kent V. (editor) 1982 Maya Subsistence. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Fowler, Melvin L. 1987 Early Water Management at Amalucan, State of Puebla, Mexico. National Geographic Research 3:52–68.Google Scholar
Frederick, Charles D. 1995 Fluvial Response to Late Quaternary Climate Change and Land Use in Central Mexico. Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Geography, University of Texas, Austin.Google Scholar
Frederick, Charles D. 1996 Landscape Change and Human Settlement in the Southeastern Basin of Mexico. Report submitted to Mary Hodge and the University of Houston, Clear Lake.Google Scholar
García Cook, Ángel 1972 Investigaciones arqueológicas en el estado de Tlaxcala. Comunicaciones 6:21–26.Google Scholar
García Cook, Ángel 1981 The Historical Importance of Tlaxcala in the Cultural Development of the Central Highlands. In Archaeology, edited by Sabloff, Jeremy A., pp. 244–276. Supplement to the Handbook of Middle American Indians, Vol. 1, Victoria R. Bricker, general editor, University of Texas Press, Austin.Google Scholar
García Cook, Ángel, and Carrión, Beatriz Leonor Merino 1988 Notas sobre la cerámica prehispánica en Tlaxcala. In Ensayos sobre alfarería prehispánica e histórica, edited by Puche, Mari Carmen Serra and Cáceres, Carlos Navarette, pp. 275–342. Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico City.Google Scholar
García Cook, Ángel, and Trejo, Elia del Carmen 1977 Lo teotihuacano en Tlaxcala. Comunicaciones 14:57–70.Google Scholar
Guzmán, Louis E. 1962 Las terrazas de los antiguos mayas montañeses, Chiapas, México. Revista Interamericana de Ciencias Sociales 1:398–406.Google Scholar
Habana de los Santos, Misael 2005 Corresponsables, narcos, en incendios forestales en Guerrero: Semarnat. La Jornada. 8 May.Google Scholar
Halstead, Paul 1987 Traditional and Ancient Rural Economy in Mediterranean Europe: Plus ça Change? Journal of Hellenic Studies 107:77–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harrison, Peter D., and Turner, Billy L. II 1978 Pre-Hispanic Maya Agriculture. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar
Heine, Klaus 1976 Schneegrenzdepressionen, Klimaentwicklung, Bodenerosion und Mensch im zentralmexikanischen Hochland im jüngeren Pleistozän und Holozän. Zeitschrift für Geomorphologie Supplementband 24:160–176.Google Scholar
Heine, Klaus 1978 Mensch und geomorphodynamische Prozesse in Raum und Zeit im randtropischen Hochbecken von Puebla/Tlaxcala, Mexiko. Verhandlungen des Deutchen Geographentages 41:390–406.Google Scholar
Heine, Klaus 2003 Paleopedological Evidence of Human-Induced Environmental Change in the Puebla-Tlaxcala Area (Mexico) during the Last 3,500 Years. Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Geológicas 20:235–244.Google Scholar
Johnston, Kevin J. 2003 The Intensification of Pre-Industrial Cereal Agriculture in the Tropics: Boserup, Cultivation Lengthening, and the Classic Maya. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 22:126–161.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Knighton, David 1998 Fluvial Forms and Processes: A New Perspective. Arnold, London.Google Scholar
Lehmann, Johannes, Kern, Dirse C., Glaser, Bruno, and Woods, William I. (editors) 2003 Amazonian Dark Earths: Origin, Properties, Management. Kluwer, Dordrecht.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lesure, Richard G. 2002 Segundo informe técnico parcial del proyecto “Investigaciones del Formativo y Precerámico en Apizaco, Tlaxcala”. Report submitted to the Consejo de Arqueología, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Lesure, Richard G. 2004 Tercer informe técnico parcial del proyecto “Investigaciones del Formativo y Precerámico en Apizaco, Tlaxcala”. Report submitted to the Consejo de Arqueología, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Lesure, Richard G., Borejsza, Aleksander, Carballo, Jennifer, Frederick, Charles, Popper, Virginia, and Wake, Thomas A. 2006 Chronology, Subsistence, and the Earliest Formative of Central Tlaxcala, Mexico. Latin American Antiquity 17:474–492.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, Oscar 1951 Life in a Mexican Village: Tepoztlan Restudied. University of Illinois Press, Urbana.Google Scholar
Lewis, Oscar 1960 Tepoztlan. Holt, Rinehart & Winston, New York.Google Scholar
Lowe, John J., and Walker, Michael C. 1997 Reconstructing Quaternary Environments. 2nd ed. Longman, Harlow.Google Scholar
Lozano García, María del Socorro, and Guerrero, Beatriz Ortega 1994 Palynological and Magnetic Susceptibility Records of Lake Chalco, Central Mexico. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 109:177–191.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lozano García, Socorro, Nájera, Susana Sosa, Sugiura, Yoko, and Caballero, Margarita 2005 23,000 yr of Vegetation History of the Upper Lerma, a Tropical High-Altitude Basin in Central Mexico. Quaternary Research 64:70–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lozano García, Socorro, and Selem, Lorenzo Vázquez 2005 A High-Elevation Holocene Pollen Record from Iztaccihuatl Volcano, Central Mexico. The Holocene 15:329–338.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacDonald, Glen M., Larsen, Christopher P.S., Szeicz, Julian M., and Moser, Katrina A. 1991 The Reconstruction of Boreal Forest Fire History from Lake Sediments: A Comparison of Charcoal, Pollen, Sedimentological, and Geochemical Indices. Quaternary Science Reviews 10:53–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McClung de Tapia, Emily, Rubio, Irma Domínguez, Castro, Jorge Gama, Solleiro, Elizabeth, and Sedov, Sergey 2005 Radiocarbon Dates from Soil Profiles in the Teotihuacan Valley, Mexico: Indicators of Geomorphological Processes. Radiocarbon 47:159–175.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Merino Carrión, Leonor Beatriz 1989 La Cultura Tlaxco. Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Metcalfe, Sarah E., O'Hara, Sarah L., Caballero, Margarita, and Davies, Sarah J. 2000 Records of Late Pleistocene-Holocene Climatic Change in Mexico: A Review. Quaternary Science Reviews 19:699–721.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neff, Hector, Pearsall, Deborah M., Jones, John G., Arroyo, Bárbara, Collins, Shawn K., and Freidel, Dorothy E. 2006 Early Maya Adaptive Patterns: Mid-Late Holocene Paleoenvironmental Evidence from Pacific Guatemala. Latin American Antiquity 17:287–315.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nichols, Deborah L. 1982 A Middle Formative Irrigation System near Santa Clara Coatitlan in the Basin of Mexico. American Antiquity 47:133–144.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nichols, Deborah L. 1987 Risk and Agricultural Intensification during the Formative Period in the Northern Basin of Mexico. American Anthropologist 89:596–616.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ohngemach, Dieter, and Straka, Herbert 1983 Beiträge zur Vegetations- und Klimageschichte im Gebiet von Puebla-Tlaxcala: Pollenanalysen im Mexiko-Projekt. Franz Steiner, Wiesbaden.Google Scholar
Palerm, Ángel 1952 La civilización urbana. Historia mexicana 2:184–209.Google Scholar
Palerm, Ángel 1955 The Agricultural Basis of Urban Civilization in Mesoamerica. In Irrigation Civilizations, a Comparative Study, edited by Steward, Julian H., pp. 28–42. Pan-American Union, Washington.Google Scholar
Parsons, Jeffrey R., Brumfiel, Elizabeth, Parsons, Mary H., and Wilson, David J.. 1982 Prehispanic Settlement Patterns in the Southern Valley of Mexico: The Chalco-Xochimilco Region. Memoirs of the Museum of Anthropology No. 14, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Piperno, Dolores R., Moreno, J. Enrique, Iriarte, José, Holst, Irene, Lachniet, Matthew, Jones, John G., Ranere, Anthony J., and Castanzo, Ronald 2007 Late Pleistocene and Holocene Environmental History of the Iguala Valley, Central Balsas Watershed of Mexico. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104:11874–11881.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Piperno, Dolores R., and Pearsall, Deborah M. 1998 Origins of Agriculture in the Lowland Neotropics. Academic Press, San Diego.Google Scholar
Plunket, Patricia, and Uruñuela, Garbriela 1998 Preclassic Household Patterns Preserved Under Volcanic Ash at Tetimpa, Puebla. Latin American Antiquity 9:287–309.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Plunket, Patricia, and Uruñuela, Garbriela 2005 Recent Research in Puebla Prehistory. Journal of Archaeological Research 13:89–127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Price, Barbara J. 1971 Prehispanic Irrigation Agriculture in Nuclear America. Latin American Research Review 6:3–58.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reina, Rubén E. 1967 Milpas and Milperos: Implications for Prehistoric Times. American Anthropologist 69:1–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rice, Don S. 1999 Agricultura, alimentación y población en Petén. In Historia general de Guatemala, Vol. 1, edited by Muñoz, Jorge Luján, pp. 445–458. Asociación de Amigos del País and Fundación para la Cultura y el Desarrollo, Guatemala.Google Scholar
Rojas Rabiela, Teresa 1988 Las siembras de ayer. Secretaría de Educación Pública, Mexico City.Google Scholar
Rowley-Conwy, Peter 1981 Slash and Burn in the Temperate European Neolithic. In Farming Practice in the British Neolithic, edited by Mercer, R., pp. 85–96. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh.Google Scholar
Rzedowski, Jerzy 2001 Principales comunidades vegetales. In Flora fanerogámica del Valle de México, edited by Rzedowski, Graciela Calderón de and Rzedowski, Jerzy, pp. 32–38. Instituto de Ecología and Conabio, Patzcuaro.Google Scholar
Sanders, William T. 1965 The Cultural Ecology of the Teotihuacan Valley. Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Pennsylvania State University, University Park.Google Scholar
Sanders, William T. 1971 Settlement Patterns in Central Mexico. In Archaeology of Northern Mesoamerica, Pt. 1, edited by Ekholm, Gordon F. and Bernal, Ignacio, pp. 3–44. Handbook of Middle American Indians, Vol. 10, Robert Wauchope, general editor, University of Texas Press, Austin.Google Scholar
Sanders, William T., Parsons, Jeffrey R., and Santley, Robert S. 1979 The Basin of Mexico: Ecological Processes in the Evolution of a Civilization. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Sanders, William T., and Price, Barbara J. 1968 Mesoamerica: The Evolution of a Civilization. Random House, New York.Google Scholar
Sanders, William T., and Santley, Robert S. 1977 A Prehispanic Irrigation System near Santa Clara Xalostoc in the Basin of Mexico. American Antiquity 42:582–588.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seele, Enno 1973 Restos de milpas y poblaciones prehispánicas cerca de San Buenaventura Nealtican, Puebla. Comunicaciones 7:77–86.Google Scholar
Snow, Dean R. 1966 A Seriation of Archaeological Collections from the Río Zahuapan Drainage, Tlaxcala, Mexico. Ph.D. dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of Oregon, Eugene.Google Scholar
Stadelman, Raymond 1940 Maize Cultivation in Northwestern Guatemala. Contributions to American Anthropology and History No. 33. Carnegie Institution of Washington, Washington, DC.Google Scholar
Turner, Billy L. II, and Sanders, William T. 1992 Summary and Critique. In Gardens of Prehistory, edited by Killion, Thomas W., pp. 263–284. University of Alabama Press, Tuscaloosa.Google Scholar
Waters, Michael R., and Haynes, C. Vance 2001 Late Quaternary Arroyo Formation and Climate Change in the American Southwest. Geology 29:399–402.2.0.CO;2>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Werner, Gerd 1986 Landschaftsumgestaltung als Folge von Besiedlung, Vegetationsänderung und Landnutzung durch die altindianische Bevölkerung im Staat Tlaxcala, Mexico. Erdkunde 40:262–270.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Werner, Gerd 1988 Die Böden des Staates Tlaxcala im zentralen Hochland von Mexiko: Untersuchungen über ihre Entwicklung, Verbreitung, Erosion und Nutzung unter dem Einfluß 3000–jährigen Ackerbaus. Franz Steiner, Wiesbaden.Google Scholar
Whitlock, Cathy, and Millspaugh, Sarah H. 1996 Testing the Assumptions of Fire-History Studies: An Examination of Modern Charcoal Accumulation in Yellowstone National Park, USA. The Holocene 6:7–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Whitmore, Thomas M., and Turner, Billy L. II 2001 Cultivated Landscapes of Middle America on the Eve of Conquest. Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Wilken, Gene C. 1987 Good Farmers: Traditional Agriculture and Resource Management in Mexico and Central America. University of California Press, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Wolf, Eric R. (editor) 1976 The Valley of Mexico: Studies in Pre-Hispanic Ecology and Society. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.Google Scholar