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Chronology, Subsistence, and the Earliest Formative of Central Tlaxcala, Mexico

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Richard G. Lesure ,
Aleksander Borejsza ,
Jennifer Carballo ,
Charles Frederick ,
Virginia Popper  and
Thomas A. Wake
Richard G. Lesure
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of California, Los Angeles, 341 Haines Hall, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1553
Aleksander Borejsza
Affiliation:
Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1510
Jennifer Carballo
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Michigan, Museum of Anthropology, 1109 Geddes, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1079
Charles Frederick
Affiliation:
Department of Geography, University of Texas, Austin, Austin, TX 78712-1098
Virginia Popper
Affiliation:
Paleoethnobotany Laboratory, Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1510
Thomas A. Wake
Affiliation:
Zooarchaeology Laboratory, Cotsen Institute of Archaeology, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1510
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Abstract

We propose that pottery-using villages did not appear in the upland Apizaco region of central Tlaxcala, Mexico, until after 1000 B.C., centuries after such developments in choice locations for maize agriculture. We excavated at two of the earliest known Formative sites in the region. That work revealed abundant intact refuse deposits, allowing us to evaluate an existing ceramic chronology with new radiocarbon dates as well as characterize Formative subsistence. Our results support a more general model of emerging sedentism in central Mexico involving population dispersions from prime agricultural areas to zones of higher elevation. The earliest pottery-using agriculturalists in Apizaco were probably migrants from adjacent regions.

Proponemos que las aldeas con cerámica no aparecen en el área alta de Apizaco, en el centro de Tlaxcala, México, hasta después de 1000 a.C., unos siglos más tarde que en los lugares elegidos para el cultivo del maíz. Los dos sitios excavados se encuentran entre los más tempranos del Formativo de la región. Sus abundantes e íntegros depósitos de desechos domésticos permiten reconstruir las actividades de subsistencia y evaluar la cronología cerámica propuesta anteriormente para la región, en base a nuevos fechados radiocarbónicos. Nuestros resultados apoyarían un modelo en el que el modo de vida sedentario se propaga desde las regiones más favorables para la agricultura hacia las zonas altas del centro de México, involucrando la dispersión de poblaciones. En el área de Apizaco, los primeros agricultores con cerámica fueron probablemente migrantes de regiones adyacentes.

Type
Articles
Information
Latin American Antiquity , Volume 17 , Issue 4 , December 2006 , pp. 474 - 492
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 2006

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