Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Household Intensification and Agrarian States: Excavation of a House and Terraced Field in a Mixtec Cacicazgo

在国家科学基金会的支持下，Veronica Perez Rodriguez女士将在墨西哥瓦哈卡州的Mixteca Alta地区进行考古和民族历史研究。Mixteca Alta是墨西哥南部的一个山区，以其晚理解的仙人掌或王国而闻名。这个项目将研究后古典混合体社会(公元800-1521年)的经济、社会分层和农业集约化。古代的Mixtec人通过修建梯田和以许多世纪可持续的方式加强农业生产来适应他们的山区环境；历史记载表明，普通人在这些梯田上工作，但对他们的生活或在集约化农业生产中的作用知之甚少。学者们通常将农业集约化解释为对人口增长的回应，或精英和国家的需求。佩雷斯·罗德里格斯女士的研究采取了“自下而上”的视角，考察了生产粮食的普通家庭及其在集约农业生产系统中的作用。Mixtec王朝历史包含了对政治兴衰的描述。但真正长期支持Mixtec社会的是普通家庭稳定的农业生产。几个世纪以来，Mixtec农业生产是如何组织和维持的？生产粮食的平民户对集约农业生产体系有何贡献？对于当今的人口增长和环境退化问题，我们有哪些经验教训？本研究将探讨这样一个命题，即生产粮食的普通家庭可能已经自我引导了集约农业生产的Mixtec系统。Perez Rodriguez女士将绘制、测量和挖掘后经典Mixtec遗址-Nicayuhu-这是一个人口稠密的山顶梯田遗址，周围仍然矗立着深水区农业梯田。测绘和测量数据将用于确定普通住宅职业和其他挖掘区域。对住宅和农业梯田的挖掘将提供有关梯田建设的信息，并将确定普通人是否居住在这些梯田上或拥有这些梯田的用益物权。在挖掘的居民区继续占领将支持这样的假设，即普通家庭可能创造了自我导向的集约农业生产。与家庭劳动力逐渐增加相一致的农业梯田建设(即家庭通过占用和使用农业梯田和相关居民区获得保有权)将提供进一步的支持。Perez Rodriguez女士将研究墨西哥城国家档案馆和国家档案馆的殖民文件，以得出一个理解农业生产、土地使用和土地保有权的民族历史模型，用于解释挖掘结果。这项研究很重要，因为它将提供关于国家在创造和实施集约农业生产中所扮演的角色的数据。它将探讨可持续集约农业系统可能起源于家庭一级的倡议和决策，而这些倡议和决策只能来自对当地环境的非常深入的了解。这项研究将是瓦哈卡州对后古典平民家庭和附近农业梯田的首次系统挖掘。结果将为衡量梯田的可持续性和侵蚀控制提供一个时间深度的视角；并将产生关于农业集约化的社会组织和粮食生产阶层的数据。

With National Science Foundation support Ms. Veronica Perez Rodriguez will conduct archaeological and ethnohistorical research in the Mixteca Alta region, Oaxaca, Mexico. The Mixteca Alta is a mountainous region in southern Mexico, known for its late prehispanic cacicazgos or kingdoms. This project will study economy, social stratification, and agricultural intensification in Postclassic Mixtec society (AD 800-1521). The ancient Mixtec adapted to their mountainous environment by building terraces and intensifying agricultural production in ways that were sustainable over many centuries; historical accounts suggest that the commoners worked these terraces, but little else is known about their lives or roles in intensive agricultural production. Scholars usually explain agricultural intensification as a response to population growth, or the demands of elites and the state. Ms. Perez Rodriguez's study takes a "bottom up" perspective by looking at the food-producing commoner households and their role in the system of intensive agricultural production. Mixtec dynastic history contains accounts of political rises and falls. But what actually supported Mixtec society over the long term was the stable agricultural production of commoner households. How was Mixtec agricultural production organized and sustained over centuries? How did food-producing commoner households contribute to the system of intensive agricultural production? What lessons are there for today's issues of population growth and environmental degradation? This study will investigate the proposition that food-producing commoner households could have self-directed the Mixtec system of intensive agricultural production. Ms. Perez Rodriguez will map, survey, and excavate a Postclassic Mixtec site-Nicayuhu-a densely populated hilltop terraced site surrounded by still-standing prehispanic agricultural terraces. Mapping and survey data will be used to identify commoner residential occupations and other areas for excavation. Excavations in residential and agricultural terraces will provide information on terrace construction and will determine whether commoners lived on or had usufruct rights over these terraces. Continuity of occupation in the excavated residential area would support the hypothesis that commoner households could have created and self-directed intensive agricultural production. Agricultural terrace construction that was consistent with gradual accretion by household labor (i.e., households secured their tenure rights through occupation and use of agricultural terraces and associated residential areas) would lend further support. Ms. Perez Rodriguez will study Colonial documents at State and National archives in Mexico City to derive an ethnohistorical model of prehispanic agricultural production, land use, and land tenure that will be used to interpret the excavation results.This research is important because it will provide data on the role of the state in the creation and implementation of intensive agricultural production. It will explore the possibility that sustainable intensive agricultural systems may have originated from household-level initiatives and decision-making that can only come from very intimate knowledge of the local environment. This study would be the first systematic excavation of Postclassic commoner households and nearby agricultural terraces in the state of Oaxaca. The results will provide a time-depth perspective to measure terracing sustainability and erosion control; and will generate data on the social organization of agricultural intensification and the food-producing class.