Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: Communal Feasting and the Social Order at Late Classic El Coyote, Northwestern Honduras

在本·纳尔逊博士的指导下，克里斯蒂安·威尔斯先生将为他的博士论文收集数据。他将继续在位于洪都拉斯西北部卡库拉帕山谷的前西班牙遗址El Coyote进行考古研究。本研究将探讨在公元7世纪和10世纪之间形成和崩溃的政体的社会宴会和政治组织之间的关系。考古学家希望了解古代社会中个体的整合和分化过程，其更大的目标是重建过去的政府体系及其对社会增长和变化的影响。韦尔斯先生之前在该遗址的主要公民仪式广场的挖掘，揭示了大量大规模食物生产和消费的证据，表明公共宴会是El Coyote统治时期的核心实践。这些活动将成为政治整合的机制，以及公开展示外来物品以提高当地领导人的社会声望和政治权威的背景。在国家科学基金会的支持下，威尔斯先生的博士论文研究将研究广场上的宴会组织，包括使用了什么物质文化，与划定广场的寺庙有关的食物消费发生在哪里，以及哪些社会阶层参与其中。他的研究将包括对广场和邻近建筑的考古挖掘，以及广场边缘堆积的垃圾堆。此外，他将对广场的土壤样本进行化学表征，研究磷和重金属的分布，这将表明活动区的位置。他的研究还将检查从垃圾区域遗留下来的陶瓷容器的组成，以阐明参与广场导向活动的不同社会群体。考古学家对宴会的习俗和宴会中再现的社会关系很感兴趣。对El Coyote的物质文化和土壤化学的研究是研究这一现象的直接方法，并将提供有关古代复杂社会中宴会组织的新信息，以及这种做法在El Coyote的政治和经济管理中所涉及的程度。此外，这项研究将提高我们对考古记录中宴会物质特征的认识，并将有助于培养一名有前途的年轻科学家。

Under the direction of Dr. Ben Nelson, Mr. Christian Wells will collect data for his doctoral dissertation. He will continue ongoing archaeological research at the prehispanic site of El Coyote, located in the Cacaulapa Valley of northwestern Honduras. This research will investigate the relationship between community feasting and the political organization of the polity that formed and collapsed between the seventh and tenth centuries AD. Archaeologists wish to understand the processes that integrate and differentiate individuals in ancient communities, with the greater goal of reconstructing past systems of government and their effects on the growth and change of societies. Mr. Wells' previous excavations in the main civic-ceremonial plaza at the site have revealed abundant evidence for food production and consumption on a large scale, suggesting that communal feasts were a central practice in the rulership of El Coyote. Such events would have served as a mechanism for polity integration, as well as a context in which exotic items were publicly displayed to enhance the social prestige and political authority of local leaders. With NSF support, Mr. Wells' doctoral dissertation research will examine the organization of feasting in the plaza, including what material culture was employed, where food consumption took place in relation to the temples that delimit the plaza, and which social segments of the polity participated. His research will incorporate archaeological excavation of the plaza and adjacent buildings, as well as trash middens that accumulated on the margins of the plaza. In addition, he will chemically characterize soil samples from the plaza to study the distribution of phosphorous and heavy metals, which will indicate the locations of activity areas. His research will also examine the composition of ceramic vessel remains from the trash areas in order to illuminate the different social groups that participated in plaza-oriented activities. Archaeologists are interested in the practice of feasting and the social relations that are reproduced during feasts. The examination of material culture and soil chemistry at El Coyote is a direct method for the study of this phenomenon, and will yield new information on the organization of feasting in ancient complex societies and the degree to which this practice was involved in the political and economic administration of El Coyote. In addition, the research will enhance our knowledge of the material signatures of feasting in the archaeological record and will assist in training a promising young scientist.