Long Term Social Stability in the Tres-Zapotes Region

在国家科学基金会的支持下，克里斯托弗·A·普尔博士和迈克尔·L·洛夫林博士将领导一项地区性考古调查，以调查墨西哥韦拉克鲁斯南部以特雷斯·萨波特斯为首的政体具有非凡韧性的原因。从阿拉伯之春到海地地震，再到全球气候变化，当代事件突出表明，政治需要适应其环境中的社会和自然动乱。考古学有一种独特的能力，可以为人类社会的长期复原力提供一个比较的视角。尽管许多学术和大众的注意力都集中在崩溃现象上，但理解为什么某些政治和制度比其他政治和制度更具弹性，与理解什么崩溃以及为什么崩溃一样重要。特雷斯·扎波特斯是公元前1000年至公元300年间奥尔梅克人和表奥梅克人文化的地区政治中心。当其他奥尔梅克中心在公元前400年左右崩溃时，特雷斯·扎波特斯又成长并繁荣了700年，直到遭受了长期的衰落。在此期间，不断演变的特雷斯·扎波特斯政体经历了周期性的火山喷发、不断变化的环境条件和竞争日益激烈的政治格局的挑战。普尔博士之前由NSF资助的调查表明，特雷斯·扎波特政体之所以具有韧性，一个关键因素是它从君主制统治转变为由首都多个相互竞争的派系共享治理的体制。目前的项目重点是Tres Zapotes如何在其领土内实施治理，以及如何创建和维护该领土。这种理解需要关于人口分布、民间仪式建筑计划、手工艺品生产组织和环境开发的区域规模数据。目前的项目将传统的考古调查和地面收集方法与激光雷达和多光谱卫星图像的先进遥感技术相结合，以调查特雷斯·扎波特人和腹地人口随时间的关系。此外，该项目还寻找可以追溯到古代时期(公元前8000-2000年)的早期职业的证据。为了更好地了解人类如何适应潮湿的热带环境，最终形成了特雷斯·扎波特斯政体。该项目的学术价值在于它融合了政治-经济和景观视角来评估政治复原力模型-这是一个具有相当大的人类学和实践重要性的问题。该研究的更广泛影响包括对墨西哥和美国学生进行实地和分析技术培训，解释遥感数据，以及通过必要的扩展到特雷斯·扎波特斯博物馆的项目实验室来加强当地的研究基础设施。该项目将通过(1)为博物馆陈列提供材料，(2)让博物馆参观者观察实验室活动，以及(3)为该地区的学校和民间组织举办公开讲座，从而促进公众教育。该项目的信息将通过专业出版物、毕业论文和论文以及项目网页广泛传播。

With National Science Foundation support, Dr. Christopher A. Pool and Dr. Michael L. Loughlin will direct a regional archeological survey to investigate causes for the remarkable resilience of the polity headed by Tres Zapotes in southern Veracruz, Mexico. From the Arab Spring, to the Haitian earthquake, to global climate change, contemporary events underscore the need for polities to adjust to social and natural disturbances in their environments. Archaeology has a unique ability to provide a comparative perspective on the resilience of human societies in the long term. While much scholarly and popular attention has been focused on the phenomenon of collapse, understanding why some polities and institutions are more resilient than others is as important as as understanding what collapses and why. Tres Zapotes was the capital of regional polity of the Olmec and epi-Olmec cultures between 1000 B.C. and A.D. 300. While other Olmec centers were collapsing around 400 B.C., Tres Zapotes grew and flourished for another 700 years before it suffered a protracted decline. During that time, the evolving Tres Zapotes polity experienced challenges from periodic volcanic eruptions, changing environmental conditions, and an increasingly competitive political landscape. Previous NSF-funded investigations by Dr. Pool suggest that a key factor in the resilience of the Tres Zapotes polity was its shift from monarchical rule to a system in which governance was shared among multiple competing factions in the capital. The current project focuses on how Tres Zapotes implemented governance within its territory and how that territory was created and maintained. Such understanding requires regional-scale data on the distribution of population, the plans of civic-ceremonial architecture, the organization of craft production, and the exploitation of the environment.The current project combines traditional archaeological survey and surface collection methods with the advanced remote sensing technologies of LiDAR and multispectral satellite imagery to investigate the relationship between Tres Zapotes and hinterland populations over time. In addition the project seeks evidence of earlier occupations stretching back into the Archaic period (8000-2000 B.C.) to better understand how humans adapted to the humid tropical environment that eventually gave rise to the Tres Zapotes polity. The intellectual merit of the project lies in its melding of political-economic and landscape perspectives to evaluate models of political resilience - a matter of considerable anthropological and practical importance.The broader impacts of the study include the training of Mexican and U.S. students in field and analytical techniques, interpretation of remote sensing data, and enhancement of the local research infrastructure through needed expansion to the project laboratory on the grounds of the Tres Zapotes Museum. The project will contribute to public education by (1) providing materials for museum displays (2) allowing museum visitors to observe laboratory activities, and (3) giving public talks to schools and civic organizations in the region. Information from the project will be widely disseminated through professional publications, graduate dissertations and theses, and a project web page.