Archaeological studies of culture contact often presuppose culture change. Contact that did not result in culture change is difficult to identify archaeologically, but it merits our attention for understanding how and why change failed to materialize in the wake of cultural encounter. In this paper, I examine the occurrence of contact without change on the frontier of the south-central Andean Tiwanaku state (AD 400–1100). Tiwanaku settlers who colonized the uninhabited middle Moquegua valley in the seventh century AD shared a mortuary landscape with coastal sojourners at the site of Omo M10, even though their interactions were otherwise limited. Complex regional histories and divergent economic interests explain why contact between highland and coastal groups was confined to mortuary rituals during the initial stage of contact, following a Tiwanaku pattern in Moquegua of ritualizing culture contact. Later generations of Tiwanaku colonists may have reinitiated contact with coastal communities for access to marine resources, and accepting foreigners into their community. This case study presents a framework for identifying culture contact without culture change. It demonstrates the utility of regional histories and careful contextual analysis for hypothesizing the nature and consequences of cultural encounters that did not follow expected trajectories of change.

Isotopic investigations of human burials from excavations of the Autonomous University of Campeche (CIHS) at the prehispanic Maya capital of Calakmul in southeastern Mexico, near the border with Guatemala, include determination of radiocarbon dates; carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios in collagen; and strontium, carbon, and oxygen isotope ratios in tooth enamel. A total of 22 human and 5 faunal samples analyzed for strontium isotopes reveal a narrow range of variation in values, pointing to the likely local origin of over two-thirds of the central population of Calakmul, including two of its rulers. Carbon and nitrogen data confirm a typical Classic Maya diet at the site and identify a diet high in meat consumption for one dynastic individual. Interpreted jointly, the isotopic information offers new perspectives on the provenience and lifestyles of the residents of Calakmul, including a potential place of origin for the royal occupant of chamber tomb Burial VII-1.

Reconstructing access patterns, in particular processional and liturgical movement in ceremonial architecture, can illuminate social processes within expansive states. Extensive excavations from 2010–2012 in the uniquely preserved Tiwanaku temple at the Omo M10 site in Moquegua, Peru (ca. AD 500–1100), shed new light on connectedness and access patterns of the temple. Extensive areal excavations confirm past interpretations of a central axial series of doorways and staircases presided over by stelae and U-shaped, altar-like structures leading from public plazas to the sunken court and a central shrine. However, new findings revealed separate lateral pathways through the structure, which suggest liturgical processions to walled patio groups that were isolated from the central axis. We posit that these small patios and their roofed chambers may have functioned as chapels for distinct groups or pluralistic cultic activities that were separate from those of the central axis. Implications for Tiwanaku social structure are studied in light of other examples of triple entryways in Tiwanaku monumental architecture, and Kolata's suggestion of “Taypi” as a structural amalgam of a center and complementary halves, with implications of mediation and bilateral complementarity between ethnicities, genders, moieties, or other pluralistic entities within Tiwanaku state and society.

We use ceramic and obsidian data from the ancient Maya port site of Vista Alegre to discuss long-distance exchange during the Terminal Classic (c. AD 850–1100) period. This is a time often associated with increased international trade relations and the growth of Chichen Itza as a dominant regional power in the northern Maya lowlands. Critical to the increased volume of international trade were the merchants who transported goods along the coast of Yucatan in large trading canoes. By combining a macroscopic assessment of the ceramics with visual, XRF, and INAA analyses of the obsidian artifacts, we gain insight into the various socioeconomic forces at work moving goods around the Peninsula. Given the paucity of Terminal Classic settlement in the interior Yalahau region, Vista Alegre appears to be an isolated site during this period, approximately 40 km from the nearest coastal neighbor. This allows us to focus on coastal exchange as the sole means by which goods arrived at the site. Our preliminary data contribute to the growing literature on the role market economies played in the Maya area, and the increased opportunities this afforded coastal peoples as circum-peninsular trade became more common through time.

The archaeological record in the Negro River in central Uruguay Republic is remarkable for its richness, including the presence of a significant number of Paleoindian fishtail points. As part of ongoing research on the earliest human occupations in this region, luminescence dating is applied to develop a terminal Pleistocene-Holocene regional chronology. Eight ages were derived from six samples taken from sedimentary fluvial deposits from two sites near the city of Paso de los Toros. The resulting dates span 11.8 and 1.04 ka corresponding to the Late Pleistocene and the whole Holocene. Because the chronology of the sedimentary sequences spanning these ages is poorly known, the presented results become a significant contribution to the construction of a chronostratigraphy sequence in the area. The results also show how single-grain dating can distinguish different components of mixed assemblages.

Recently, an exceptional find was made by the Nakum Archaeological Project in an offering deposited deep within the architectural core of the Precolumbian Maya site of Nakum located in northeastern Guatemala. The form of the object and comparisons made to ethnographic analogs indicate that it is a clay beehive, most probably one of the oldest in the Maya area and in the whole of Mesoamerica. Whether the object was used for its intended function or is an emulation, or skeuomorph, of perishable counterparts, remains unknown. The importance of this find lies in the fact that beekeeping is an activity that is traced with difficulty in archaeology. The present paper discusses the discovery of this artifact at Nakum, which dates to the end of the Preclassic period (ca. 100 BC–AD 250/300), in a wider temporal and spatial context and provides new data on Precolumbian beekeeping. We use a broad comparative vantage, drawing on archaeological, epigraphic, and ethnohistorical sources to discuss Mesoamerican beekeeping and its role in both the daily and the ritual lives of the Maya.

Excavations at the small-scale domestic settlement of Gramalote between 2010 and 2014 allowed the exploration of the social dynamics and economic interactions in the second millennium BC on the Peruvian North Coast. Detailed excavations and materials recovered during the intervention contribute a unique opportunity to explore domestic aspects of early settlements in the Andes. This study presents new data on the public sectors of Gramalote's settlement, house-to-house differences, and evidence that the extended family was a unit of economic productivity and collective action. This analysis assesses the degree of overlap, and lack thereof, in the economic activities of each house during the Initial Period (1500–1200 cal BC). A new model for social and economic interactions is proposed, with the aim of exploring alternative models from the bottom-up perspective for the emergence and consolidation of social complexity in the Central Andean Region.

Con el propósito de conocer la variabilidad en la producción de alfarería en el centro-este de Argentina, se estudiaron conjuntos procedentes de 14 sitios arqueológicos ubicados temporalmente en el Holoceno tardío (ca. 3000–250 años aP). Se registraron prácticas de elaboración compartidas a escala macrorregional, relacionadas con la preparación de las pastas cerámicas (agregado de tiesto molido) y la decoración (aplicación de variantes del inciso para plasmar elementos de diseño similares). El tiesto molido no siempre es observable a simple vista en las vasijas, por lo que su contexto de transmisión entre comunidades involucraría la presencia de los ceramistas durante el proceso de manufactura. Por su parte, las representaciones decorativas poseen gran visibilidad y pueden ser copiadas o tomadas prestadas entre comunidades en situaciones de contacto más superficiales y ocasionales, sin que esto implique necesariamente el movimiento de alfareros. En el marco de amplias redes de interacción social circularon modos de decorar, ceramistas con sus modos de preparar las pastas y, excepcionalmente, vasijas. En este escenario, ciertos elementos de diseño reconocidos en la alfarería de la macrorregión abordada habrían funcionado como diacríticos de interacción social, es decir, como un medio para reforzar relaciones de intercambio entre diferentes grupos.

En este trabajo exponemos y discutimos los resultados obtenidos a partir de estudios realizados a puntas de proyectil lanceoladas recuperadas en sectores acotados de las sierras y llanuras pampeanas de Argentina. El análisis se basó en puntos morfométricos adicionando, además, variables como largo, ancho, espesor y materia prima de los especímenes. La morfometría geométrica fue la principal herramienta utilizada, complementada por estudios tipológicos clásicos y estadística multivariada. Los instrumentos líticos examinados, pertenecientes a sistemas de armas utilizados por cazadores-recolectores, son comúnmente identificados como puntas Ayampitín. Estos constituyen un elemento diagnóstico sobre la tecnología existente en el centro de Argentina durante el Holoceno temprano-medio. Los resultados permitieron discutir que a la variabilidad propia del conjunto se adiciona una variabilidad interna en los tipos morfológicos básicos (pedunculadas y apedunculadas). Además, la selección de rocas para la talla estuvo fuertemente ligada a las aptitudes físicas de aquellas, existiendo, asimismo, una correlación entre algunas materias primas y las formas de los ejemplares. Finalmente, los diseños básicos fueron utilizados en un sistema de propulsor. La discusión permitió plantear nuevas líneas de evidencia a desarrollar para aportar al conocimiento de las etapas iniciales del poblamiento sudamericano.

We take an archaeodemographic approach and provide new insights into the population and demographic shifts of the prehispanic site of Xcambo, Yucatan, Mexico. Located in the coastal marshlands, Xcambo functioned as a salt production locale, administration center, and port during the Early Classic (AD 250–550) and Late Classic (AD 550–750) periods. Sierra-Sosa extensively excavated the settlement, and more than 600 skeletons, representative of all age groups, were recovered. We apply growth simulation models that combine archaeo- and paleodemographic approaches. Our simulation specifically takes into account Wood's (1998) theorem. Results show that Xcambo grew slowly during the Early Classic, with estimated figures ranging from about 860 individuals at the onset of the period to some 1,073 at the end. During the Late Classic, populations ranged from about 1,103 to 1,728 people at its peak occupation (AD 625). Eventually population drastically declined due to out-migration. During this last stage, the settlement had to face the consequences of political and economic shifts in the area. Considered jointly, both approaches provide a new research venue, because their application documents the population profiles and growth of a typical Maya coastal site over its 500 years of occupation.

Surface clearing of small Ballcourt 2 at Nixtun-Ch'ich’, constructed atop a Middle Preclassic platform, revealed that the court was built and used in the Late and Terminal Classic periods and into the Postclassic, before and after apparent termination. Recovered artifacts suggest feasting and gambling.

This report discusses miniature anthropomorphic figures found in ritualized contexts across the Lowland Maya region, dating to AD 15–800. Crafted with minimal detail to indicate humanlike features, anthropomorphic miniatures have been found in offerings placed alongside the dead, within temples and ballcourts, and beneath stone monuments. Their form, often with arms over the chest, is similar to bundled bodies and may reference those that reside in other worlds. This paper considers, through their form, archaeological contexts, and ethnographic comparisons, these anthropomorphic miniatures as active agents in their roles as ritual helpers, small companions, and materialized ancestors.