Dissertation Research: The Development of Social Complexity at El Dornajo: Conditions of Change in Southwestern Ecuador

在Robert Drennan博士的指导下，Sarah Taylor女士将为她的博士论文收集数据。她将在厄瓜多尔南部扎鲁米拉河上的El Dornajo遗址进行考古发掘。El Dornajo很可能在公元前500年到公元1200年之间成为一个政治中心，并提供了一个洞察安第斯地区政治复杂性出现的背景。这一过程导致了新大陆一些最复杂的史前社会，如印加人。埃尔多纳霍位于厄瓜多尔南部热带森林和秘鲁沿海沙漠之间的环境过渡地区。它在文化上也是安第斯山脉北部复杂的酋长领地和安第斯山脉中部广阔的国家之间的过渡。传统上，该区域一直被视为区域间互动在社会变革中发挥重要作用的区域。与邻近的、更复杂的发达政治的互动，以及它们之间在贸易路线上的地位，可能让一个精英管理集团通过控制产品的流动而出现。然而，对南美洲西海岸有重大影响的厄尔尼诺事件可能也发挥了重要作用。该区域的史前人口将在很大程度上依赖海洋和红树林资源，虽然厄尔尼诺事件将给许多人口造成生存压力，但它们也为在通常干旱的地区开展农业提供了可能性。随着降雨量恢复到正常的低水平，农民可能已经开发了其他技术，如灌溉，这让他们走上了走向社会复杂性的道路。为了研究这些替代方案，泰勒女士将在该遗址进行考古研究。这将包括分阶段的地面测量计划、随机抽样以恢复人工制品和生态制品组合，以及挖掘最大的土丘以评估其建设顺序并确定发生这种情况的速度和时间。最后，将进行小型水平挖掘，以寻找家庭间的差异。该项目还将促进一位有前途的年轻科学家的培训和职业生涯。它将包括来自美国和厄瓜多尔的学生，从而加强这两个国家之间的考古联系。

Under the direction of Dr. Robert Drennan, Ms. Sarah Taylor will collect data for her doctoral dissertation. She will conduct archaeological excavation at the site of El Dornajo located on the Zarumilla River in southern Ecuador. El Dornajo very likely emerged as a political center between 500 BC and 1200 AD and provides a context within which to gain insight into the emergence of political complexity in the Andean region. This process led to some of the most complex prehistoric societies in the New World such as the Inka. El Dornajo is located in an environmentally transitional region between the tropical forests of southern Ecuador and the deserts of coastal Peru. It is also culturally transitional between the complex chiefdoms of the northern Andes and the expansive states of the central Andes. Traditionally the region has been seen as one in which inter-regional interaction played a strong role in social change. Interaction with adjacent more complexly developed polities and a position on a trade route between them may have allowed an elite governing group to emerge through control over the movement of products. However El Nino events which have a major impact on the western coast of South America may also have played a significant role. The prehistoric populations of the region would have been largely reliant on marine and mangrove resources and while El Nino events would have created conditions of subsistence stress for much of the population they would also have opened the possibility of agriculture in a normally arid area. As rainfall returned to normal low levels, farmers may have developed other techniques such as irrigation which set them on the path to social complexity. To examine these alternatives Ms Taylor will conduct archaeological research at the site. This will include a staged program of surface survey, random sampling to recover artifact and ecofact assemblages, and excavation of the largest mound to assess the sequence of its construction and determination of the pace and timing with which this occurred. Finally small horizontal excavations will be conducted to look for inter-household variation.This project will also further the training and career of a promising young scientist. It will include students from both the US and Ecuador and thus strengthen archaeological ties between these two countries.