The Reconstitution of Early Complex Society in Pacific Guatemala

在国家科学基金会的支持下，迈克尔·洛夫博士将分析位于危地马拉太平洋海岸附近的乌朱克斯特考古遗址出土的材料。目前得到国家科学基金会支持的调查表明，乌尤克斯特大约在公元前600年开始是一个规划的城市，并发展到相当大的比例。调查显示，在其鼎盛时期，它覆盖了超过4平方公里，并占据了一些二级中心，其中包含其仪式建筑的较小副本。通过他的工作，乐福博士希望了解该遗址的历史，以及它的社会、经济和政治组织是如何随着时间的推移而发展和变化的。乌尤克斯特出产了大量的文化材料--陶瓷、石器和动物遗骸。通过对这些人工制品的分析，将有可能重建社会概况，确定经济分化的程度，并确定是否存在等级组织形式。早期复杂的社会现在被认为是脆弱的，并受到融合和解体循环的影响。洛夫博士将在一个拥有目前已知的中美洲最早的复杂社会遗迹的地区研究一个这样的周期。这些社会的演变对于理解中美洲文化史具有基本的重要性，并可以阐明复杂社会发展的机制。在中世纪前古典主义时期，大约从公元前900-600年，该地区第一个以La Blanca遗址为中心的大型地区政体建立并崩溃。在那次坍塌之后不久，附近的乌朱克特遗址首先得到了发展。乐福博士的研究考察了从La Blanca政体到Ujuxte主导政体的过渡。它将从社会组织、经济结构和权力的思想基础方面对这两个实体进行比较。这项研究试图了解乌尤库特政体的结构在多大程度上重现了La Blanca的政体结构。在结构截然不同的程度上，研究人员将询问是什么条件使Ujuxte能够在La Blanca没有的地方生存和生长。

With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Michael Love will analyze materials excavated at the archaeological site of Ujuxte, located near the Pacific coast of Guatemala. Currently supported NSF investigations indicate that Ujuxte began as a plannedcity at approximately 600 BC and grew to reach considerable proportions. Survey has shown that at its peak, it covered over 4 sq kilometers and dominated a number of secondary centers which contained smaller copies of its ceremonial architecture. Through his work, Dr. Love wishes to understand the history of the site and how its social, economic and political organization developed and changed over time. Ujuxte has yielded large amounts of cultural materials - ceramics, lithics and animal remains. Through the analysis of these artifacts it will be possible to reconstruct a social profile, determine the extent of economic differentiation and determine if a hierarchical form of organization existed. Early complex societies are now recognized as fragile and subject to cycles of integration and decomposition. Dr. Love will investigate one such cycle in a region which has remains of the earliest complex societies presently known for Mesoamerica. The evolution of those societies has basic importance for the understanding of Mesoamerican culture history and can shed light on the mechanisms responsible for the development of complex society. During the Middle Preclassic period, from ca. 900-600 BC, the region's first large regional polity, centered on the site of La Blanca, was constituted and collapsed. Soon after that collapse the nearby site of Ujuxte first developed. Dr. Love's research examines the transition from the La Blanca polity to that dominated by Ujuxte. It will compare the two entities in terms of social organization, economic structures and ideological basis of power. The research seeks to understand the extent to which the structures of the Ujxute polity recreated those of La Blanca. To the extent that the structures are distinct, the research will then ask what conditions enabled Ujuxte to endure and grow where La Blanca did not.