The Prehistory of Chiapas, Mexico

墨西哥恰帕斯州的史前史

• 批准号: 1115361
• 负责人: Hector Neff
• 金额: $ 27.66万
• 依托单位: California State University-Long Beach Foundation
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2011-07-01 至 2015-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1115361&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Prehistory; Chiapas; Mexico

The tropical coasts of Mesoamerica are lined with mangrove forests and estuaries that, while rich in many food resources, are of little use for agricultural production. As a result, once Mesoamerican people (forerunners of the Aztec, Maya, and other Native American groups of Mexico and Central America) became fully committed to agricultural subsistence, probably during the Middle Formative period (~800 - 400 BC), human habitation shifted away from the coasts. The coastal margins continued to be utilized for hunting, fishing, and shellfish collecting, but increasingly over time as well for industrial production. Salt extraction is one well-documented activity, and recent research has indicated that large-scale ceramic production was another such activity. To date, there have been very few systematic investigations of these coastal Mesoamerican industrial sites. There is some urgency to initiate such studies because sea-level rise and environmental degradation threaten to submerge or destroy coastal sites over the coming few decades.The National Science Foundation has provided funds to support a three-year effort to document archaeological remains on one section of the Mesoamerican coast, the far-southern Pacific coast of Chiapas, Mexico, a region known as Soconusco. One fundamental issue that this NSF project will address is whether the boom and bust cycles posited for Soconusco are real or whether they may be artifacts of the coarseness of the existing chronological framework. By investing heavily in chronometric analysis (radiocarbon and luminescence dating) this project will dramatically improve chronological resolution. If demographic change still appears to be abrupt and cyclical once a better chronological framework is available, then it becomes sensible to begin evaluating possible causes of collapses, population explosions, and prolonged abandonments. Unlike the cases discussed by Jared Diamond in Collapse, all of the instances of 'collapse' and recovery listed above took place in a single region, so geography is held constant, and other possible causes of demographic change, such as climatic downturns or amelioration, population movements, local political events, and organizational or technological innovation, can be examined without the confounding effect of geographic variability. Not only did prehistoric Soconusco people use the mangrove zone for industrial activities, leaving an abundance of archaeological remains, the zone itself acts as a catch basin for plant parts and charcoal brought down rivers and streams or blown in from the coastal plain. This means that changes in vegetation cover in the coastal-plain agricultural zone are recorded in sediments of the mangrove zone. Thus, while mangrove-zone archaeological remains document industrial activities that people engaged in away from their inland agricultural villages, the sedimentary record documents upstream land clearance, which correlates with population levels on the coastal plain. The archaeological and geo-archaeological research recently funded by NSF will sample and analyze these complementary historical records. According to current archaeological understanding, the records targeted for investigation on this project were shaped by momentous changes that swept across Soconusco at various times during prehistory and history: - The region was a center of pre-Maya sculptural art, but the sculptors abruptly closed up shop around 2000 years ago, and much of the coastal plain seems to have been abandoned. - Emissaries or militarists from the highland Mexican empire of Teotihuacan arrived around AD 400, apparently initiating a period of sustained population growth that lasted at least through Terminal Classic period (~AD 1000). - During the Terminal Classic, potters of the estuary zone produced Plumbate, the most technologically sophisticated and widely traded pottery every made in Mesoamerica. - Population appears to have collapsed again around AD 1100.- Late Prehistoric population resurgence began around AD 1250. - At the time of the Spanish conquest (AD 1521), Soconusco was the most distant province of the Aztec empire and paid tribute to the rulers of Tenochtitlan (Mexico City).- Population again plummeted soon after the conquest, as introduced European diseases decimated the population, a collapse from which it did not recover until the early 20th century. The project will provide research opportunities for MA students at several California State Universities in the Los Angeles area and for Ph.D. students at Washington State University, SUNY-Albany, and UCLA.

中美洲的热带海岸两旁是红树林和河口，虽然有丰富的食物资源，但对农业生产几乎没有什么用处。因此，一旦中美洲人(阿兹特克人、玛雅人以及墨西哥和中美洲的其他美洲原住民的前身)开始完全致力于农业生存，可能在形成中期(公元前800-400年)，人类的居住就从海岸转移了。沿海边缘继续被用于狩猎、捕鱼和采集贝类，但随着时间的推移，也越来越多地用于工业生产。盐提炼是一项有充分记录的活动，最近的研究表明，大规模的陶瓷生产是另一项此类活动。到目前为止，对这些中美洲沿海工业遗址的系统调查很少。由于海平面上升和环境退化有可能在未来几十年淹没或摧毁沿海遗址，因此启动此类研究具有一定的紧迫性。美国国家科学基金会提供资金，支持一项为期三年的努力，记录中美洲海岸的一段考古遗迹，这段海岸是墨西哥恰帕斯最南端的太平洋海岸，被称为Soconusco地区。这个NSF项目将解决的一个根本问题是，对Soconusco设定的繁荣和萧条周期是真实的，还是可能是现有时间框架粗略的产物。通过在计时分析(放射性碳测年和发光测年)方面的大量投资，该项目将极大地提高时间分辨率。如果一旦有了更好的年表框架，人口变化看起来仍然是突然的和周期性的，那么开始评估可能导致崩溃、人口爆炸和长期被遗弃的原因就变得明智了。与贾里德·戴蒙德在《崩溃》一书中所讨论的情况不同，上面列出的所有情况都发生在一个地区，因此地理位置保持不变，可以研究其他可能的人口变化原因，如气候下降或改善、人口流动、当地政治事件以及组织或技术创新，而不会受到地理变化的混杂影响。史前的索科努斯科人不仅将红树林带用于工业活动，留下了大量的考古遗迹，而且红树林带本身就是一个收集植物部位和木炭的水池，这些木炭要么顺流而下，要么从沿海平原吹来。这意味着沿海平原农业区的植被覆盖变化被记录在红树林带的沉积物中。因此，虽然红树林地带的考古遗迹记录了人们在远离内陆农业村庄的地方从事的工业活动，但沉积记录记录了上游的土地清理，这与沿海平原的人口水平相关。最近由美国国家科学基金会资助的考古和地理考古研究将对这些互补的历史记录进行采样和分析。根据目前的考古学理解，这一项目的调查记录是由史前和历史上不同时期席卷索科努斯科的重大变化形成的：-该地区是玛雅之前雕塑艺术的中心，但雕塑家在大约2000年前突然关闭了店铺，沿海平原的大部分似乎已经被遗弃。-来自墨西哥高地特奥蒂瓦坎帝国的使者或军事家在公元400年左右到达，显然开启了至少持续到晚期经典时期(公元1000年)的持续人口增长时期。-在终端经典时期，河口地区的陶工生产铅酸盐，这是技术最复杂、交易最广泛的陶器，每一件都是在中美洲制造的。-人口似乎在公元1100年左右再次崩溃。-史前晚期人口的复兴始于公元1250年左右。-西班牙征服时(公元1521年)，索科努斯科是阿兹特克帝国最遥远的省份，向特诺切蒂特兰(墨西哥城)的尺子进贡。-征服后不久，人口再次急剧下降，因为传入的欧洲疾病导致人口大量死亡，直到20世纪初才恢复过来。该项目将为洛杉矶地区几所加州州立大学的硕士学生以及华盛顿州立大学、纽约州立大学奥尔巴尼分校和加州大学洛杉矶分校的博士生提供研究机会。